the gifted penguin blog

Tonight myself, my other half and the teen set off for something to eat at Frankie & Benny’s at Teesside Park. It was packed out with diners but they had a table available & our order was taken and we sat waiting for our food to arrive. To be honest it was quite a long wait and we were becoming quite restless and very hungry! Suddenly the fire alarm started to ring and along with everyone else we started to look around to see what the problem was. A member of staff opened a door and what looked like smoke poured out of the room but it transpired quite quickly it was steam. The dishwasher had flooded the room and staem had set of the alarm and no one knew how to disconnect it.

At this point our food arrived and whilst I was desperate to leave the teen was desperate to eat & so we sat and ate with the fire alarm screaming around us! Diners who hadn’t received their food at that point left very quickly & only our table and a couple of others remained. I have to offer up praise to the staff who kept us informed throughout and were extremely apologetic.

The outcome: No such thing as a free meal?  Well we were given our meal completely free and also given a voucher for another free meal for the three of us to use. Excellent customer service and a meal we won’t forget in a hurry!

I have for the past few weeks sat at my computer thinking I really should update my blog and hunted around in the darkest dustiest corners of my brain for inspiration. What shall I write about, the Royal Wedding maybe?, the latest arrivals at the gifted penguin?, thoughts on the economic impact for small retailers over the past year? These are a few of the ideas I toyed with but none seemed the right thing. Advise from fellow bloggers and social media sights included just be your self, share who you are, talk about the things that interest you. I could tell you I am married with 5 children (3 from my first marriage & two step children), I love modern art, lattes, reading…..actually this is sounding a little too much like a personal ad! So I have run into a brickwall but have decided to just sit with my brickwall for a while and will either smash it down with a superb posting later or I could gradually dismantle my wall brick by brick over the coming days with snippets of thoughts and ideas. Anyway let me leave you for now with a few images.

Sunday 3rd April is when we as a nation say ‘thanks Mum’ and many a mum will receive burnt toast & cold cups of tea in bed. As a mum of adult children I miss those Mother Day treats in bed but do love the type of gifts I receive now. To be honest my favourite gift is either a book or a bunch of daffodils. In my opinion nothing says Mother’s Day more than a bunch of daffodils. I also, like many people, find Mother’s Day quite a sad day as my mother died quite young when I was in my early twenties and the day brings sadness as I reflect on all the time I never got to spend with her as an adult woman. I was just coming into adulthood when she died and our relationship was changing at this time and being a young mother at that time seemed to compound the grief as I looked at my children and realised not only would they never have her as a grandma who they could remember but also they too would one day be facing life without me. I don’t want to be maudling in this post but I just want to say don’t forget the daffodils or whatever it is that makes your mum smile but most of all don’t forget to give her a hug and tell her you love her. However complex our relationships are with our mother one day we will all miss them.