Yes Mandi has gone to be with her husband. She will be okay - well she has panic and anxiety attacks but Dogan her husband has a magical way of making her calm and relaxed. I drove her up to Exeter last night for her to get a train to Gatwick. You know the train fare was only £41.50 [about 62.50 dollars] which was certainly much cheaper than petrol, also the times were absolutely perfect. Her flight was leaving at 10.20am and she had to be there for 3 hours before take-off and the train got in at 6.10am - how good was that? Everything went swimmingly - we left home around 11.15pm last night got to Exeter for 12.45, train was leaving at 01.05, it was on time. I drove home [couldn't get the damn radio to work so drove in silence!!] Arrived home at 02.15am which was really good time and then.......................... couldn't find the keys to the house. As I'd put it in the console well under the hand brake, I assumed that Mandi had accidentally taken them. Checked all over the car and had to phone my neighbour [!!!!!!] to ask for my spare key. They were very good about it and immediately came round with the spare key. I let myself in, feeling awful for having woken them up at such an hour. Anyway this morning when I woke up and looked outside I saw my keys on the driveway!!!!!! They must have slipped out when I took some things out of the car on my return. So I had to phone my neighbour and not only thank her for bringing the key around, apologised profusely for disturbing them and then had to own up to having dropped them on the driveway - she was fine about it, but I felt such a fool.

She's now arrived in Turkey and is being hugged to death by Dogan who has been missing her terribly. He's got a month off work so they'll have quality time together. Hopefully she'll be in a better place in her mind when she comes back.

So my home is empty - well apart from the cats and the fish, but their conversations are very limited. Today and tomorrow is going to be a relaxing day so I'll be fit for writing etc after that. The last couple of weeks have been crazy with shopping, Christmas, meeting people etc so I'm ready for a rest. I do understand the 'empty nest syndrome' - I'd been very used to living alone until Mandi came and moved in about 6 months ago. I did wonder if we could manage to survive being around each other daily - but it's been absolutely wonderful. We do have a lovely sort of routine which suits us perfectly. Even she has said that she'll miss it, even though she's dying to be with Dogan, she'll miss not being here. So I'm off to go and cook myself some supper and then I'm going to shut the computer off and have an early night - well after I've spoken to Mickey that is. LOL

I'll catch up with you all soon.