The winter of my discontent.

Intermittent telephone and internet problems which Bob, the Bell repairman, has tried to fix a few times now. He's back again today. He's like an old friend.

How does he remain cheerful in the face of a biting blizzard of ice pellets hitting his face. Outside, wearing mitts as he splices narrow gauge wires and bits of plastic as I hobble around indoors, still in pyjamas and robe.

I feel proud I managed to offload and then reload the dishwasher. Everything is a remarkable effort in the jabs of pain crawling up and down my spine. Stoic I am not. My pain threshold is very low. I learned that in childbirth.

I do a tally in my fingers. My BFF dying so horribly, leaving me bottled up with grief and heartbreak.

My chimney fire, still unresolved, still waiting for parts for the chimney and for the weather to stabilize to let the repair guys on the roof.

Even though I don't heat most of my rooms, my electricity bills are high enough to leave me a little breathless each time they pop into my email for normally the wood stove heats the house.

I try and balance all this off with the positives, a series of workshops I'll be conducting on memoir writing with a publish at the end of it, my new musical drama back on track (we think – casting out here on the Edge is always a challenge) and private software training sessions. And knitting. And reading. And writing.

And somehow, it's not enough.

You can call me a whinebag.

I won't mind.

In fact, you can join me.

Perennially cheerful doesn't cut it today.