In the UK, it is mother's day today. But because of the pandemic, mother's day is going to consist of online communication, with many people unable to see their mother and grandmothers. So, without being able to see my mom this year, I thought might now the perfect time to repost my mother's day post from three years back.

Mother's Day 2018: A Distant past where people met, socialised and ate together

My mom has lived in Birmingham all her life and hardly visited another city, so on this mother's day I invited her up to my university city, Derby. You can't find any two cities that are more different. Derby is small with a shopping centre as the main attraction, but even then, you can move around without bumping into someone. Birmingham and the shopping centre there, the Bullring, can be hard to get around, particularly if there is an event or its a special day, if you don't like crowds it can be hard to breath as you make your way through the city.

So taking this into consideration, I was glad I invited mom to Derby.

We went to cafés, the arcade and did a bit of window shopping together. I introduced mom to her first mocktail, and she enjoyed it. We also learned never to eat at the fast food chain, Five Guys.

Food and Drink

Five Guys is a fast food place like KFC, McDonalds and Burger King, they style their restaurants to imitate America and make "Little" versions of the burger.

Their vegetarian burger was not a burger. it was a salad on a seeded bun. I'm sorry, but to me, it is only a burger if there is a patty in the middle. Surely it can't be that hard to use a bean patty or something else - like the other fast food restaurants do.

I personally didn't like my bacon and cheeseburger either. The patty was a thin slice as if trying to cut the patties into as small as possible. I did order the "Little" versions of the burger but I thought that was the bun would be smaller. To me, it seems Five Guys really worry about their patties existing. The bacon tasted awful too.

We had eaten at another place earlier in the day, a pub. They took an hour to serve us but the fish fingers, chips and peas were nice. So thankfully we were full enough to forgo the burgers. Five Guys also refunded us when we complained.

Mother's Day Fun in Derby

The Arcade we went to distributes tickets. You know, like you see in american tv. Little tiny things that are sealed together. You collect so many and then you get a prize. Those kind of tickets. It's the first one I've seen in the UK that does that and I think it's pretty cool.

Instead of putting pennies in the penny drop you play games for tickets and get the prize that you want. It was great fun and there was a little cafe joining to it - we should have gone there for dinner. Still, we knew for next time.

It was a nice day, but by the end we had been walking for a long time; my weaker leg had had enough and my special aid sock had pinched my skin. But every second of the day was worth it.

Soaking Feet

Mom told me to soak them in a bowl. I don't know why this never occurred to me before because I know that a bath helps me with the aches and pains I wake up with. She also said to add some shower cream to the bowl to make the muscles relax more. I did and after about 30-45 minutes it had made a massive difference.

All you need is a bowl of hot water with something that creates a bit of bubble.

My legs still felt it yesterday but it was worth it. I'm going to put that on my PIP diary as I am now being forced by the government to apply for it.

Back to 2021

It feels so long since we've been able to socialise with people. Last year, 24th March, the UK hit lockdown. That was mother's day here too. Thankfully, that year, I decided to celebrate mother's day early and we went out to see the film Onward, which had just been released in the cinema.

This year, I couldn't plan anything, but I'll chat to her on the phone. I made her a gift this year; a collage of my niece and nephew. Hopefully, next year we will see some normality. To everyone celebrating mother's day today, enjoy!