Counterfeit currency and blunders

 

This morning I drove the short distance to the field and having fed and watered the animals I then went on to the Post Office in the next village to send a large envelope to England.

I didn’t recognise the youngish woman behind the counter and asked if she was new since the summer. She replied that she had changed from glasses to contact lenses and had cut her hair and changed the style, so that explained that – I wasn’t losing the plot completely then.  Carolyn, for that was her name, reminded me of the conversation which we had in the summer when I said that after my gastric bypass people who knew me didn’t recognise me after losing half my weight.

I handed over the envelope and she weighed it. I also asked for four stamps for letters to England and handed her a ten euro note. She passed it under a security light and it failed the test. Having filled in a set of forms to pass the dodgy note to the right department she handed me my copy and I handed over a twenty euro note. This too failed the test. We looked at each other, both surprised. Then the penny dropped.  

On 3 January I had a morning of blunders – I should have stayed in bed that day.

First, while feeding the rabbits I fell in their grassy area because of all the mud. I stripped off, dressed again and put all my dirty clothes into the washing machine on the way to the car to go shopping. After about two minutes of driving I thought I had left my mobile in the pocket of my fleece I came back to the house and quickly stopped the machine but the pockets were empty thank goodness.

Next I drove to SuperU and when I got out of the Land Rover I realised I didn’t have my wallet with me.  Luckily, a search of the vehicle yielded €40 so I was still able to do some shopping. 

When I returned to the car park with my shopping trolley I found I didn’t have my keys.  I hadn’t locked the vehicle fortunately, and there were another set of keys hidden in it.  I went back into the shop and reported the loss of my keys giving them my ‘phone number in case they were found.

I drove home and having unloaded the car I went into the utility area to empty the washing machine.  I took the clothes out and as usual swept my hand around the interior for the sock that usually sticks to the drum and found my wallet.  I had been carrying it with the laundry  earlier and must have just put everything into the machine.

I dried out the paper money and the wallet over the woodburner and the only things to have suffered terminal damage were some non-laminated membership cards and my new 2014 Mutuelle health card. 

About half an hour, SuperU called me to say my keys had been handed in to the Information Desk.  So all was well that ended well – but all this happened before 10.45am – I was frightened to do anything else during the rest of the day just in case!

As soon as I told Carolyn the story she destroyed the forms she'd completed and handed me back the twenty euro note, using the ten euro for payment.  She was sure that the washing the notes had produced this false result.  One of my friends on Facebook suggested I had been money laundering - lol.

While she was doing all this a man entered the Post Office. I knew him but couldn’t remember his name – he told me it was Gilda. Ah – the plumber who did the work on my house renovation back in 2006.  He looked at me and gasped, astonished at the difference in my appearance for he hadn’t seen me since before my gastric bypass. It was extraordinary that we had just been talking about this before Gilda came in. He talked to Carolyn for a few minutes but kept looking back at me and shaking his head in disbelief. It’s lovely when you know you’ve changed so much for the better that you are unrecognisable.

Here’s yesterday's beautiful loaf, home made soups - mushroom and ratatouille - which I've been enjoying this week.  I love comforting soup with crusty bread or hot-buttered toast when the weather's bad.

 

 

 

Three things I like:

 

1.   My grandson, asking to talk to me on the 'phone when I'm chatting with his Mum.

2.   Skyping with friends holidaying in Tobago even though I have to look at the sunshine and the blue, blue sea from their balcony.

3.   Working my way through the freezer and coming up with new recipe ideas.