A Curious State of Affairs …

  Sadly Grandad died on 10th December 2008 aged 100 years and 4 months old. I will miss him greatly.

RIP Grandad – I will remember you, miss you and love you forever.

“To live in the hearts of those you love is not to die”

“There is no old age. There is, as there always was, just you” – Carol Matthau

If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you’ll know I sometimes write about my dear old Grandad, who was 100 years old in August 2008. He’s a wonderful old man (now a great, great, grandfather to my own beautiful little grandchildren – whom he adores) and although he is getting a little forgetful now, get him talking about his war stories, when he met the HRH The Queen Mother, HRH Queen Elizabeth 2nd, and Winston Churchill – and there’s no stopping him!

He now resides in a nursing home and my husband and I are the only ones he has left to look out for him on a week by week basis, as everyone else lives too far away, or has lost touch with him. He has outlived all his sisters and his brother, and all of his friends.

On my blog I’ve charted the traumas we’ve had trying to get him appropriate nursing care in the UK. It hasn’t been easy – there is so much red tape. But he is now in a wonderful home that caters for his needs and he seems as happy as he can be, given that day by day his body deteriorates; which is only to be expected at his great age.

Below: My grandad with me, at his 99th birthday picnic (opening his presents)! It was such a lovely, happy day.

Below: Grandad (when he was 98 years old) with his two adored great, great grandchildren (my grandchildren) – he loves them to visit as often as they can. My little grandson (nearly 5) writes him a letter every few weeks to tell him what he’s been up to at school. I read the letters to Grandad as his eye sight is beginning to fail a little now – he has cataracts (but the doctors tell me he is too old for them to be removed now).

Catch up posts on Grandad’s story of trying to get care in the UK & other things (the latest posts are last in the list):

• Failures in the system
• Not fit for a dung beetle
• No room at the Inn, or anywhere else come to that!
• Lavender, a perennial
• Blair, a pensioner who will be able to splash the cash
• Catch 22 – and no light at the end of the tunnel
• Catch 22… But a glimmer of hope
• Old age isn’t so bad when you consider the alternative….
• Dying, the lost art…
• Not quite Sir Winston Churchill’s last words, but almost
• Almost his 100th year
• The Birthday bash!
• Que Sera, Sera
• Old age isn’t for sissies
• Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything …
• Living for Today
• Love and Loss
• Some things were built to last!
• A Christmas wish or maybe several …
• The Blessing
• Update on my Grandad
• The road less travelled …
• The inevitable journey … one step at a time
• The Seven Ages of Man
• Somewhere, towards the end
• Grandad’s Big Adventure
• The dark night approaches …
• A letter from the HRH the Queen
• My lovely Grandad is 100 years old today!
• Part Two: Grandad’s 100th Birthday Bash!
• Update on my Grandad
• Protected Post: Sad News (announcement of Grandad’s death)

Below: In Memorium

• Video Tributes of Grandad
• Some ramblings about Grandad
• What Grandad would want…
• Hands that toiled for over 100 years …
• The Festive Season
• Memories
• A Life well lived …
• Photos of my beloved Grandad
• A photo memory
• Remembering Grandad – Easter 2009
• The Circle of Life
• Remembering Grandad on what would have been his birthday

~