Hi everyone
Just wanted to let you know what happened to me earlier today.
It's a usual Tuesday morning, my wife and son leave for work about 8.15am, and just me and the dog left. It was a horrible morning, wind howling and rain falling incessantly. No point getting up and freezing with no heating on, I'll be going to the MacMillan exercise class about 12. I'll stay in bed.
About 11.00am the doorbell rang and I made my way slowly up the hall turned left and there's a Yodel van and the driver standing with a large box. Now I'm wearing pyjamas and a pair of socks. So I open the inside door into the porch, squeeze my way into the porch, keeping the dog in the hall and closed the door behind me, opened the front door and signed the delivery guy's pad, thanked him, closed the front door and turned around to open the inside door.
It's locked! It's locked! Am I sure? Tried it again and yes, it's definitely locked! OMG. Ok, what now? I have no keys hidden anywhere. Right! Think, think! My wife and son both work in Comber, about 8 miles away. My mother in law lives over the hill from me about ½ mile away, and my brother in law, Peter also over the hill, just, but Peter, he's at work in Belfast. I need to ring my wife to get her to come home and let me in which is why I'm going to my mother in law's, aged 95, to use her phone.
Well, it's still raining and quite breezy and I have no choice but to try to make it to her house, in my pyjamas and socks. Remember, I'm a wheelchair user, however I can walk a little but then the pain, in shovelfuls, kicks in. I had to rest against trees, hang on to gates and branches. Not one car passed me, although I'm not sure a driver would have stopped for a rain soaked, bent over man, his face contorted with pain. I wouldn't. All the time I was thinking, "neutropenic, neutrophils, neutropenia, death of cold, death FROM cold". I was freezing and starting to get a little numb.
I had just gone over the crest of the hill and my brother in law came round the side of his house to the roadside. I shouted "Peter, Peter" and he stopped in his tracks, turned around and a look of disbelief came over his face. He told me later that when he saw me walking towards him, water dripping off my face, wearing just pyjamas and socks which were dripping wet, well, you can guess the rest. In hope he asked "Locked out?" and I could only nod!
He brought me into the house, gave me clean dry socks and drove me to Comber, picked up my son's keys and drove me home. I even had time to go to the leisure centre, I missed the exercise class but I was just in time for the Christmas dinner, yay! I tell you what, I had the most interesting topic to talk about.
Hope you enjoyed that
Tvman
Hi Jane and all
I have taken on board the idea of a key safe in-between the two front doors, I was thinking about that on my way over the hill but that doesn't take into account should I get locked out of the front door and I don't like to put a key safe outside the front door, we're quite remote and if we're not in, that's a security risk.
We were broken into once before and I was at home! I had finished work and got home about 10am, breakfast then into bed. Some time later the front door was rapped and I thought it was the postman and I didn't answer, then a large bang as some low life burst in through the patio doors, that got me up to see what the noise was, I came out of the bedroom in time to see some 17 yr old in the hall, he saw me and scarpered. Too fast for me unfortunately.
I'm going to hide a key to the back door somewhere in the garden, somewhere very safe because even if the key is in the back door in the utility room side, the key will still open the door from the outside.
I thought of many things on my journey over the hill, one of which was that I've been told to keep warm and dry! So far I've had no ill effects, I'm a hardy critter but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone else 
Tvman xx
