Wright On! Shelley Wright takes a wry look at life

IT'S been a funny old week, as they say, and although I've not been tempted to laugh out loud myself, I'm sure my friends have had a good giggle at my expense.

Now, maybe in time I will too, but at the moment I'm fed up with a capital F and looking around I'm not the only one - even top rocker Rod Stewart's been nicknamed Victor Meldrew for his moaning.

God knows what that makes me!

I don't know what's up but I'm thoroughly cheesed off with life, I mean, what is there to look forward to in January? More snow? Great.

I remember when I used to love snow. That feeling of excitement when you woke up to find everything under a blanket of white and the absolute thrill of making the first footprints down the path. It was the only time we ever listened to Radio Lancashire in our house and then only until the newsreader announced our school was closed. We barely caught the last words of the report as we cheered with delight.

My brother and I loved it because we had the best sledge in the street and it was our big chance to show it off. No-one else's could touch it for pure speed because my dad had cannily knocked it together from two central heating pipes and a piece of hardboard when we asked him to buy one.

Quite frankly, the Frank Williams Renault team couldn't beat the Wright Formula One sled on a good day.

We had it for years - it was practically indestructible. It even survived a particularly hairy ride down Bluebell Avenue when, as an inexperienced sledger, I hurled myself from the top of the hill like a member of the British bobsleigh team. The only thing was I completely panicked when I couldn't stop towards the bottom and threw myself overboard - almost severing a main artery in my wrist and sending the super sledge flying perilously close to the main road.

But these days all snow means to me is an extra 10 minutes every morning and night clearing the car and an equally hairy ride to work over Grane Road - which would probably be quicker on a sledge because at least then I could cut across the fields and avoid the stream of manic drivers also battling their way through the snow.

How some of them, especially those ploughing along in lorries, got to where they were going in one piece when the snow hit earlier this week is anyone's guess - as they diced with death for the sake of an extra five minutes. It's mad.

And things only got worse when I arrived at work to find the car park packed with ice and snow. As I pulled into a space I skidded and crashed straight into the wall.

All this on top of a major romantic bust-up and the fact my dad took a turn for the worst and landed in hospital and you could say it's not been the best start to the New Year.

He's feeling a lot better now though after my mum and I have spent most nights by his bedside nursing him back to health.

The fact you can have your tea there and he's got his own TV has had nothing to do with it, although I must say they do a fantastic spinach and mushroom lasagne.

I don't think the nurse could believe her eyes when she came in to check his vital signs on Saturday night to find my mum and me had kicked our shoes off and were sat glued to the Brookside omnibus scoffing scampi and chips.

Never mind how my dad's doing - have you seen what's happening on the Close?

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.