If you absolutely *have* to scatter the ashes of the person you loved beyond all reason for forty years, then there are worse places to do it, I reckon 🤍
Honoured to be appointed to this role
@NHS_Education
, and very much looking forward to working alongside
@DavidGarbutt1
@CEONHS_NES
& the whole team to support this amazing organisation
Congratulations to Annie Gunner Logan, new Vice Chair at NES from 1 Sept. Annie brings great insight and experience, from her existing role as a NES Board member, and her previous roles. Find out more
@DavidGarbutt1
@CEONHS_NES
I lost the Absolute Love Of My Life this week, last year. Feels like 100 years. Feels like 5 minutes. Feels like I need to do some *serious* sighing. So I've come here
#PonteDeiSospiri
🤍
I'm delighted that so many of you lovely tweeps enjoyed the photos of my tulips. Like, *really* delighted. If you've got a minute, and you're interested, I'll tell you why... 🧵👇
Sunday morning memories of a life shared, and a love lost. If you're not careful, this stuff can mire you in misery and poison your future. But the wiser course, I find, is to delight in it, and let it sustain you 🤍
After the Absolute Love Of My Life died, I resolved to get a band together for a tribute gig in honour of his *astonishing* wonderfulness. It's taken a year, but I've done it. It happened, with all our best people, & we kicked some *serious* ass✨️💥🎤
#TheLateGreatJohnnyAce
🤍
Well now. It's been 18 months since The Absolute Love Of My Life left the planet. For a while there, I thought I might have lost my mojo for good, but I'm delighted to report that I've located it, and I'm in hot pursuit. Aided, as ever, by some *seriously* lovely people 🤍✨️🙏
Longest night, shortest day. Won't be long before it's the other way around again. Live your life, people. Don't hang about. Time is short, the world is wide, & there's a lotta crap out there. What do you need, to get you through? Love. Love is all you need. Happy Christmas 🎄🤍
So. It turns out that if you spend your life radiating warmth & positivity & friendship & love & hospitality & good humour & good times, then when you're gone, the people you leave behind find themselves suffused with all that, & set about looking after each other. How wonderful
Good morning lovely
@ccpscotland
people! The rose you sent me when John died is blooming! It's arrestingly gorgeous, & the scent makes me swoon at 20 paces. A bit like the man himself, as it happens. Thank you
@CPprogramme
@workforceCCPS
@HSEU1
& everyone else 🌹 🙏 💕
Starting the new year with thoughtful words from the amazing Nick Cave, who knows whereof he speaks (and then some). Thank you, Nick. Here's to growing open and expansive in 2023 ❤️
Not for the first time, I'm drawn to Nick Cave, and I find my own experience reflected almost perfectly. People, kindness, love. That's what'll save you. That's what'll save us all, I reckon 🩶
Our team said goodbye to more than one "valued colleague" during the pandemic, including one who died of cancer. We did so respectfully & affectionately, without drinking until 4am, vomiting, doing karaoke or fighting. We did it online, like everyone else. Almost
#NotMovingOn
I could post pics & tweets from that
@petshopboys
gig all night long, but I won't. Except this one: here is my new best friend Neil, whose husband couldn't make it, which meant I could buy his front row seat on resale, and lemme tell you, Neil is a bear who knows how to PARTY 🥳
A coupla weeks ago, I received the most extraordinary, poetic, handwritten (in French) letter of condolence that instantly brought me to tears. This one, I have to say, runs it a close second
Well now. It's been 18 months since The Absolute Love Of My Life left the planet. For a while there, I thought I might have lost my mojo for good, but I'm delighted to report that I've located it, and I'm in hot pursuit. Aided, as ever, by some *seriously* lovely people 🤍✨️🙏
How marvellous, when you book a table for one, & they show you to the best spot in the house. Happens surprisingly frequently. Restaurateurs of the world, I salute you 🦐 🫡
Well yes, actually, I do think a person deserves one of these, if that person managed to swim 70 lengths of the pool in 45 minutes despite not having been in it since last August 🧜♀️
...and *that's* why I'm so pleased you like them. Because I *will* have a life, and I'm determined to live it as the same woman he loved, and not by some tragic, diminished shadow of her. Not saying it's easy, but I think I can do it...
🎶 I don't want a lot for Christmas
There's just one thing on my brain
I don't care about that sloth-thing
Humpin' on that candy cane
I just want to smile & grin
Knowing that the fish will win
Make my dream come truuuuue..
All I want for Christmas...
CALL IT, MARTIN CREWE 🎶
Despite some tactical voting, there's still guacamole on the ski slope as Sloth moves into the final by mashing Avocado 65 votes to 47.
So now the Grand Final - will it be
#PilchardPower
or
#TeamSloth
?
Last chance for Votes etc by 6.00pm tomorrow.
#XMasBaubleChallenge2023
Out of the blue... a fellow traveller of the good times was thoughtful enough to send me this. And yes, the sunlight *is* starting to leak through the leaves. Thank you 🙏🤍
...still without Mr L, of course. But with many, many wise & wonderful people who've made this year of sadness so much less strange & scary than it might otherwise have been. Thank you. And Happy New Year ✨️💕
Sadly my personal photographer is no longer able to record these moments for posterity, so you'll just have to take my word for it that I galloped down this dune, grinning, with my arms outstretched, as I have always done 🤍
Solo Christmas update. I am a *total* fraud, solo-wise. Lovely pre-prandial prosecco with the MOST fabulous woman, dressed as an elf, to boot. And then further fizz with wonderful neighbours, who rang my bell 🔔... as it were. And now... 🎄💕✨️🍾
Solo Christmas update. I am in a v v v posh Edinburgh restaurant. The guy on the next table has his iPhone out & is actually *filming himself* eating his starter while his partner necks her oysters. She hasn't taken her eyes off him for a second
#TheLivesOfOthers
If you come across a sheep lying on its back with its legs up, it is 'cast'. Please be so kind as to tip/roll it back over; if left like this they can die as they cannot get up. Please be kind enough to share.
....and so can you, if & when when your time comes. Just remember: nobody else can make this better. The only thing that can, is the memory of the person you loved, and who loved you, so very, very much...
I thought l would live & die without ever seeing the aurora borealis. But I've just sat on a garden chair outside my kitchen door for an hour, watching it do its thing, right overhead. I may never recover
#aurora
Beautiful moments. Don't let them pass you by. Remember all the beautiful moments you've had, and the beautiful people you shared them with. They happened: they will *always* have happened. Not everything is lost 🤍
It is a very rare thing, to be sitting outside in Edinburgh at this hour without a cardie - without socks, forsooth- taking in the birdsong, and the blue sky
#ScottishSummerSensation
Days drenched in the hot sun of the Occitane countryside, serenaded by cicadas & dipping occasionally into a blue, blue pool? Invaluable. Days when you can get up, put on a tee shirt, amble down the road & paddle in the north sea? Priceless ☀️
PSA, à propos of that excruciating Daily Mail headline. It *is* possible for a man not to "live in the shadow" of his successful wife and kill her, but to delight in her achievements, and love her. Take it from me ❤️
I'm taking myself out to dinner in our fine capital city centre before a concert, and I swear to god, one waiter called me "Darling" from the get-go (as in, "Darling, are you ready to order?") and another has now called me "Miss" (as in, "how is your starter, Miss?")
#SixtyRocks
The first alfresco kir of the 2024 season, dedicated to the memory of my *absolute* favourite fellow pleasure-seeker, in whose honour I continue this fine tradition 🤍🍷☀️
Time & tide wait for no man, right? Right. So that's a whole calendar year gone by, now, without the Divine Mr L by my side. Last time that happened, it was 1982. Wowser. And I'm thinking... 🧵
Audrey. What a life, what a life force, what a woman. So generous with her time & her wisdom & her comfort, even when dealing with her own pain. Such a special person. Love & strength to Chris & all the family 💕
@cdbirt
here. It’s with great sadness that I announce the death of our brilliant Mum, Wife, Grannie and friend Audrey Birt
She died peacefully surrounded by family after the swift worsening of her cancer
We’re all so sad but take comfort in her love, kindness and passion xxx
Aberdeenshire council has apologised after parents were offered a choice of class photos with or without children with complex needs in them.
Natalie Pinnell's daughter, who has additional support needs, told the BBC about what happened at Aboyne Primary
Remembering I wasn't allowed to go & see my lovely mum in her care home for more than a year, and even then, not without testing, masking, wearing apron & gloves and only minimal physical contact, while these people were living it up like this. Vote wisely, vote early 💪💥 🗳
@ThirdSectorLab
Also, I would say, don't assume that people who work for good causes & believe in social justice will necessarily be nice people/good employers
To all the unbelievers out there: you *can* drink decent champagne, outside, in Perth, without a jacket, at 10.30pm, still in the light, having just been moved to tears by an international superstar, live on stage. Come all ye 🏴
@rufuswainwright
I'm not surprised by this at all: the last two years have shown that the decision to live in a care home involves handing over any & all decisions about who you see, who comes to see you, where you go, and with whom, to the management. Why would you?
Four months from today, I'll be 62 years old. And for the first time ever, today, I have succeeded in packing a capsule wardrobe in a budget airline cabin bag, *well* under the weight limit & with room to spare
#Winning
#OlderButWiser
✈️ ☀️
Back from the rehearsal studio. If anyone has *ever* found a better way of processing grief & celebrating life than playing loud, funked-up rock & roll with a tight band of seasoned pros, I *really* wanna hear about it
#HappeningSoon
🕶🎤🤘🤍
Trying to find the apt word for the facial expression that (some) people pull when you tell them you're spending Christmas by yourself. It's not quite pity, it's not quite horror, it's not quite alarm. It might... it just might... be envy 🤭🎄
Apocalyptic scenes in central Edinburgh tonight, as all the tourists & hens & stags who dressed for the midday sunshine feel the unimaginable shock of the North Sea haar 🧊
When I was doing political cabaret back in the day, John said he was disappointed that I never chose him as a target. "You need to mess up a bit more, John" said I, "then I can have a proper pop"
(Truth be told, I didn't quite say "mess" 😁)
After almost 16 years as a Minister, I have today written to the First Minister to say that when her successor is appointed I will leave Government. Serving Scotland has been the privilege of my life. Thank you. 👇
On this day in 1985, the lovely cardiac team at
@GSTTnhs
fixed my hole-in-the-heart. Which has to mean that it's this fella's 38th birthday 🎂 🥳 ❤️
@LibertyLondon
#Ted
Will ya just LOOK at this beauty 👇! Ovation Custom Legend, bought for me by the one & only love of my life, played to bits (literally) over decades & now gloriously restored by
@jimmyegypt
with the kind services of
@v1cr
. Just LOOK at it 😍😍😍