Death and all her Friends

It's been a weird couple of weeks.

On the 6^th of June, my grandma, who had taken unwell a couple of days before, passed away peacefully at the grand old age of 96. My dad and uncle were both with her at the end, so it's as nice a way to go as you could hope for really. It still hasn't fully sunk in yet even a fortnight later, and I somehow don't think it'll hit me for a good long while, as everything happened so quickly I haven't really had time to process it all.

About to blow out the candles on her 90th birthday cake

 

I couldn't focus on anything the rest of the day after I found out, but needed to do *something* so I broke out the polymer clay and spent the afternoon making some miniature succulents and a pizza for my dolls.

A post shared by Christine Sutcliffe (@lynkhart) on Jun 7, 2017 at 12:16pm PDT

Some miniature noms! . #sixthscale #playscale #barbie #dollcrafts #dollfood #dollshouseminiatures #polymerclaypizza #polymerclay #polymerclayfood #lastalliancestudios

A post shared by Christine Sutcliffe (@lynkhart) on Jun 9, 2017 at 11:51am PDT

I’ll post how I made the *polymer clay free* fried chicken pieces at a later date as they’re super easy to make!

Anyway, the funeral was arranged and we all travelled down south to Manchester the following weekend. As this month (yesterday actually!) marked the 20th anniversary of the first Harry Potter book, I brought some choice reading material for both the journey down and back up again…

It's hardly the Hogwarts Express but it'll do I suppose. . #harrypotter #harrypotterbook #virgintrains

A post shared by Christine Sutcliffe (@lynkhart) on Jun 18, 2017 at 5:33am PDT

Northward bound! . #readingonthetrain #virgintrains #headinghome

A post shared by Christine Sutcliffe (@lynkhart) on Jun 20, 2017 at 5:15am PDT

The funeral was just as she would have liked it, very respectful and led by people who knew her well, sharing stories of her long and fruitful life. She'd have found the first hymn at the crematorium just as hilarious as we did – ‘The Lord is my Shepherd’ sung to what sounded like multiple tunes from different people, with the minister in a totally different rhythm to everyone else! I just hope our shaking shoulders were seen as an outpouring of grief instead of the barely concealed giggles they actually were! I also barely stifled a chuckle at the incredibly condescending expression on the portrait of Jesus above the door as we left. XD

It still doesn’t feel like she’s gone and I keep thinking that at some point she’s going to phone up to ask how we’re doing but then I suppose that’s just how these things go – all my other grandparents had long and drawn out illnesses prior to death so for her to go so suddenly and in no pain is a blessing in a way, albeit a terribly sad one. ☹ I got a little teary at one particular piece of music, and I’m obviously upset that she’s gone, but I just don’t really feel anything about it right now which is really weird. I thought the funeral would be a bit of an emotional release but it wasn’t. ☹

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Aside from the obvious, the timing of the funeral was rather unfortunate, as it clashed with the visit of my friends Tomás and Rory, who had arranged months previously to come up and stay with me for a week and go to the Royal Highland Show together. Their transport northwards was already booked so they’d be up in Glasgow regardless of whether I was or not, and had to book into a hostel for the couple of days I'd be away. It was so weird to think of them navigating the city without me, and especially whilst I was melting in the unseasonably hot and muggy weather that was affecting England that week.

As I lay in the hotel bed with two desk fans literally inches from my face in an attempt to cool myself down, I recommended places to visit - The Botanic Gardens (which recently celebrated its 200th anniversary) and the Hunterian Museum, both of which seemed to go down very well indeed. I was just gutted that I couldn't be there to share it with them. My cousins managed to cheer me up a bit though with a ridiculously entertaining app game (I can't remember the name of it, but you hold your phone to your forehead and it gives a film/song/animal the other players have to act out for them to guess) which I will definitely be recommending to everyone for parties! (quote of the night: 'It's not a beaver, it's a bed-bug!' Shoutout to Kathryn's impression of a tick and a bull too - the former consisting of her grabbing her sister's leg and looking creepy and the latter was basically a gorilla! XD)

Though I got home on Tuesday, I still had to unpack and things so it wasn't until the next day that I was able to go into town and meet my friends. As Tomás had been staying in the UK for several months on an equine internship, he had an absolutely massive case with him, which seemed determined to break at every opportunity. While we planned on me taking them round my favourite museum of all, Kelvingrove (not that I'm biased or anything XD) and then going out for a drink somewhere, there was just no way that they'd both have managed with all their luggage, so we headed home to dump everything at the hotel, (failing to understand how the lights worked, lmao) then go back into town which was a bit of a faff but infinitely preferable to dragging that case around! My dad very generously dropped us off right outside the museum and the next few hours passed like a blur, eventually having to be told to leave by the tanoy as the building was closing for the night!

We got a good look at the important parts, though missed out on a LOT as we would just end up standing by a case and talking for fifteen minutes. (extra incentive to come back! :P)

This guy seemed to stare into your very soul...

As KG closed at five, it was just a little bit soon for a drink, so we ended up just chilling out in George Square for a few hours, chatting away and getting the unexpected treat of some police horses meandering past on their patrol and stopping for photos from tourists.

At one point we went to McDonald's for some food, and as I polished off the last of Rory's chips, I made some comment about how I was 'recycling' them, only somehow my brain got scrambled inbetween thinking of words and saying them, so what I actually said was 'I'm volcano'

I don't even know. 😆

 The original plan was to visit a particular gay bar we'd picked out as it sounded pretty friendly, but as usual I ended up scuppering those plans by not having any ID and being (rather apologetically I might add!) asked to leave by the barman. In fairness, I don't drink, don't drive/have a driving licence and I've never had a passport, so I've really had no real need for any form of ID prior to now!

We finally found somewhere else, Katie's Bar, which was very nice, though we somehow managed to go on kareoke night, which resulted in some rather hilarious serenading from the other side of the room!

I was going to take a selfie there of us all but forgot, and instead marked my first visit to a gay bar with this picture of a column. Well done me.

While I don't drink, myself, I couldn't deny that the cocktails looked pretty damn fancy...

also, lol, here's the first of the embarrassing photos :P

Most of the following day was spent in front of my TV; Rory and I waxing lyrical about the original PS1 Spyro trilogy, then giving them both a go of any game I had which contained horses. XD
We also came to the conclusion, after seeing some in the background of Assassin's Creed: Syndicate, that most classical baroque paintings consist of half naked people falling off furniture. (which is actually frighteningly accurate once you start looking)

I'm not entirely sure what happened here, lmao

The rest of the time mostly consisted of Tomás trying to steal playing with  my models and/or art dolls...

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I'm not sure Harper has recovered yet tbh...



Jazz didn't seem to mind too much though...

Not quite Spyro, but Toothless is close enough I suppose XD

We finished off with a long and at times, fraught, co-op game of Portal 2 which was bloody hilarious and showed just how decidedly unlogical my mind is at times. XD

The next day, Friday, was the day of the show, (which I'll go into in much further detail in my next few posts as usual) and our last day together as they had an obscenely early coach to catch the following morning and I wouldn't see them off as they were staying at a hotel down the road.

That evening was so bittersweet, we played games, ate pizza and talked and talked and talked.

Rory managed to catch the elusive Unicorn in Red Dead Redemption's Undead Nightmare DLC...

...handed the controls to Tomas and literally five minutes later he'd managed to accidentally ride it off a cliff to its doom, the body randomly ragdolling away into the air like a rocket seconds later which had us in stitches. I'm not sure what kind of hamfisted metaphor that was for arguably the gayest horse in the game but never mind. XD

 They stayed far longer than we'd planned, and there were many cuddles...




...and a handful of selfies...

...and then they were leaving, and while I made light of it all, joking with them to 'get out of my house', inside I just wanted to lock the door and not let them leave!

I've never been very good at showing affection, and while I do love hugs and things I'm not very good at initiating anything, but gahhh, after I closed that door I just needed one. :(

We worked out on the bus back from the show that Tomas and I had been friends for 8 or 9 years now, first talking on Flickr, then on forums and finally to Whatsapp, where we chat almost daily. He's honestly my closest friend and prior to this show we'd only met once before for a couple of days in London. I'd never met Rory before this week, but I felt like I'd known him forever, and seriously, if anyone ever gives you grief for having online friends that 'aren't as important as real ones' then tell them where to stick it, because they know nothing.

Distance can fuck off, but thank the gods for the internet.  <3 p=""><3 br="">💓

<3 p=""><3 br=""> Anyway, ponies of all descriptions will be coming soon so watch this space!