Cheese and ham croissant, hot honey halloumi batons, Caesar chopped salad

Today mum decided she wanted blackberries. So, as is only natural, I ended up covered in scratches and berry juice picking them for her: one of the benefits of reduced sensation is that brambles don’t hurt as much. One of the downsides is that I don’t notice until some time later that I have dramatic scratches all down my arm.

I brought the berries inside, sorted and washed them, and sat over a hot stove cooking them with a bit of honey, to have over ice cream. Fast forward to this evening, after dinner, and mum doesn’t want them.

I despair sometimes, I really do.

A few days ago I ordered myself a new sunflower lanyard, as my old one has long since disappeared. I was delighted to find one which includes the inclusive Pride flag, and comes in a pack with a matching wristband and a plain sunflower pin-badge. Excellent value for £6, plus postage!

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This afternoon mum has been noticeably more dementia-y than normal. I asked her to get me a knife to prise open a stuck freezer drawer, but she couldn’t remember what a ‘knife’ was. She is anxious about church tomorrow, and keeps asking if we will sleep tonight.

I helped her sort out her clothes for tomorrow, and recommended that she wear a bra under the t-shirt as it’s a bit sheer. Her older old bras are, thanks to her current obsession with sweet things, now too small for her, so I got out the new ones I ordered for her online.

I should point out here that we went through the M&S website together, picking out the exact style and colour mum wanted. So of course mum took one look at them and said “no, definitely not, I would never wear anything like that”.

Frustratingly, we are now outside the returns window, so a local charity shop or care home is going to get a nice donation. Mum picked up on my exasperation and has been repeatedly patting me on the arm and apologising.

I hate seeing her so distressed, but I also hate spending so much of my time doing things for mum only for her to turn around and refuse my efforts.

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To prevent further refusals, I abandoned my planned dinner and instead simply did some croissants with ham and cheese. I also did some hot honey halloumi batons from Tesco’s summer range (very nice, although I think the honey could do with being considerably hotter), and a chopped Caesar salad, also from Tesco.

It was delicious, and would be better only if it was followed by home-grown, home-cooked blackberries. Oh well, never mind. It’s not like my resulting scratches actually hurt – it’s merely cosmetic damage. As they say on the antiques shows I like so much.