As anyone who has been within earshot of me for the past few weeks knows, my big plan is to move to the beautiful island of Madeira with my husband Dave later this year. You'll be hearing plenty more on that as time goes on. In addition, I hope to spend time indulging in my many passions.
One of my biggest passions is sewing, and sewing lingerie in particular, and my lovely colleagues have given me a course in Bespoke Bra Making as my leaving present so I am totally in my element.
They also gave me a wonderfully mad leaving card:
Now I can't promise that I will dye my hair pink and jump from a plane, but I won't rule them out either (although the pink hair may be a step too far for me). I can't thank my friends and colleagues at EY enough for making me feel so special and giving me such a great send off.
A few people asked what I was going to do on my first day of retirement and I had no idea. Now that it is over I can tell you what I did instead. No Bucks Fizz in bed I'm afraid. First I went to buy the weekly supermarket shop (I really know how to live) and then Dave and I went out for a ride on our BMW motorbike. We need to get in lots of riding practice as we will be taking it down through Spain and Portugal and ferrying it to Madeira later in the year, and it's a long time since we have done such a long bike journey. We stopped at the bike dealer for me to try on a new crash helmet, which will now be fitted with the ultimate communications system, and then went to a lovely country pub for lunch. Now that bit is more what I expected retirement to feel like.
I have to say I have been on an emotional roller coaster this week, with my emotions going from apprehension to elation via just about everything else in between as I start to appreciate the magnitude of this next step of my life. I have said goodbye to the environment, routine and people that have been such a major part of my life for so many years. But I am now coming down to land (albeit not in a parachute) and getting excited about what comes next.
Let the adventures begin.......!
