Took Bella for a nice walk first thing and it was lovely and Sunny with perfect blue sky. I can already tell that Spring is fully here and my bulbs are coming up in the front garden. That reminds me I have a lot of jobs to do around the garden before summer comes. I need to paint all my planters white to brighten them up, dig out them huge bloody plants taking over the garden and re-line my window troughs and buy more compost and bulbs etc so I have colour in them all year round.
After our walk, I sorted out a spare key for Jay so he could let Bella out for me while he was in the back at his and then headed over to Worsley for outdoor Axe throwing. I had arranged for our Danni to do it with me as she said she fancied it. Jenna also wanted to do it but I hadn't heard form her so guessed she had either gone off the idea of forgot lol.
The event was through my Buckt subscription and it said it was a place called Adventure Now, but when I got to where the satnav took me I couldn't see any signs and was in the middle of a housing estate. I stopped and asked a lady who said there was a farm further up the lane that did paintballing so that could be the place? I started to drive further up and then saw the paintball sign so continued up for quite a while until I eventually saw a yellow Adventure now sign. It wasn't very well sign posted at all but eventually found it and directed our Danni to where it was as she wasn't far behind me.
It turned out to be a really good morning and both of us picked it up quite well by the end of it. I saw Bailey and Tash (guessing short for Natasha) who I had seen at the archery event I went to with Andy. I am guessing I will start to bump into a few regulars over time and it might be a good way to meet new people. I asked Bailey if she was going to the Brazillian dance/martial arts class and she was. I hadn't booked that as it felt like something I would feel silly doing, but now I wish I had. I also mentioned I couldn't get a date for the cocktail masterclass and she said it had filled up quickly but to contact Buckt and let them know, which I am going to do.
Managed to get a couple of short videos of us in action, thankfully on both tries we hit the target lol.
After the session we both went in our separate cars as I was going to meet the girls (Alexa and Fi) for Sunday lunch. Lex was mid-jetwashing the back when I arrived and Fi had a bit of study catch-up to do so she set me up on the PS4 for a week play until they were both ready. I gave them both their belated birthday gifts and before I knew it we were on our way. It was a pub down the road called the woodside and was very busy but we managed to get a table in the lounge area part of the pub. The only difference was you had to order at the bar, which was no big hardship.
The food was a bit pricey at £21.95 for a Sunday lunch it's an expensive day out if there is a family of 4 of you. Lucikly Fi had a voucher for £45 that she had gotten for her birthday that she put towards our bill, so it brought the price down considerably bless her. It was very nice though and the meat was lovely and veg cooked perfectly. My roast potatoes would have been better though ;-) They felt a bit cooked then fried rather than "ruffled garlic and thyme roasted" as listed. We also managed to sneak in a trio of desserts between us (I forgot to take a pic) as we all just tucked in.
I had a really good chat with Alexa, who is always very insightful. I was talking about how I want to be the best version of myself and improve things I am not good at etc. She pointed out some things I could do differently when having conversations with people to improve the interaction. I have to admit general chit-chat is something I am not very good at. I always find it stressful to think of things to say. Alexa is a bit like my sister Kirsty in that they will talk to anyone. You could take either of them to Tesco and within minutes they will end up chatting with a complete stranger and know their life story. It's something I am never comfortable doing and really takes me out of my comfort zone, but I want to be good at it. She did give a top tip though which is that one of the key things is to ask lots of questions as people usually like to talk about themselves and it then takes the pressure off you having to fill the gaps. When someone asks me a question I usually ramble on for ages trying to fill the silence and then completely forget to ask them something lol. I am probably guilty in conversations of not actually listening/hearing what the other person is saying and instead I am just formulating what I am going to say and waiting to speak. Fi said she has a bank of questions that she uses when meeting new people at meetings etc, I need one for sure.
There is a big difference between listening to someone and hearing what they say, I defo need to work on the latter. To someone who doesn't know me (or even those that do) I could come across as quite selfish in a conversation as I talk a lot about myself and what I'm doing, and have done but they don't always show the same interest in what the other person has been up to and ask them questions. It's definitely a skill I want to master.
Comments