Naturally, however, there was a drawback to this fine plan; I realised that I hadn't recorded all the exciting things that have happened to me this past week for posterity, for the grandchildren that I would surely have had if only I'd had children, for the legions of readers, if only there weren't more of them when I didn't blog than when I did ... anyway, this week:
First the 100 mph winds off The Needles. Pah! That didn't stop me hanging out a load of washing. But since there is nothing between our house and The Needles except one forlorn coastguard house and miles of flat countryside, if anyone finds my stripey tea-towels, I'd appreciate their return. And, not content with my tea-towels, the wind tried to snatch the garden benches. One, a Victorian-style metal thing that is heavier than me was flung 2 metres down the hill. Thank God, I held on firmly to the washing line, is what I say.
Naturally, this was the week that we chose to have a chimney lining installed. The Chimney Man was coolness personified - he was perfectly willing to climb up a ladder IF the wind dropped below 60 mph. Alas, his wife and I were in perfect agreement - go up that ladder and you die, we chorused, like a Greek tragedy. So, no fire until the weekend, though he came back yesterday and finished the job when the wind was a mere 46 mph.
But as the wind was thwarted of attempts to fling him from his ladder, it evidently decided to shove me down the stairs; which is bad timing, because I'd finished my indoor jobs of curtain-making and lunch for 12 people planning, and need to get out there and plant an orchard. The orchard I've always dreamed of having, though I hadn't imagined it being located on a windy hill.
But thanks to a swollen ankle and the neighbour who has just told me that adders live on the hill and used to enter the back room of the house when the last but one owners lived here, I don't want to go outdoors ever again.
So it looks like I'll just be left with blogging. Except I've just signed up for an art course. And I start theatre duty next week. And ... and ... and ...
]]>I found myself wondering, on the dog walk this morning, why rain isn't purple or grey or black, given the colour of rain clouds. But I didn't have to ponder for very long why the puddles were golden - the cattle were watching out for the approach of the tractor, loaded with a giant hay bale. They started mooing loudly, Dog panicked and tried to bolt, dragging me through the puddles in the tracks left by the tractor, then compounded her crime by lunging at a black lab, knocking me into the fence.
"Are you all right?" asked its owner, belatedly, as I picked bracken out of my hair and surveyed the golden toffee splodges that had been my feet a few minutes previously.
I said I'd get back to her.
]]>When she caught her first one, we didn't have the heart to take it from her because it seemed such a miracle. A year ago, she had a stroke, then four months ago she was diagnosed with a ruptured ligament in her knee and partial blindness and deafness. So when she stumbled over the rabbit crouching in a furrow beside a field of emerging barley, we could only watch in amazement as she set off in hot pursuit.
The rabbit tried to double back when it reached the middle of the field, so Dog managed to grab it. But the rabbit set off again, with Dog still in pursuit. This went on for a couple of minutes, with both of them getting slower and slower as though their clockwork mechanisms were winding down. When Dog caught it, she stood there so shattered we thought we'd have to carry her home. But when we approached her (or her rabbit) she rallied and set off home ahead of us at a determined trot. By the time we got home, she had half eaten it.
But that wasn't enough. She then managed to catch a second one. And ate that too. Then lay comatose, happily burping (and worse) for 24 nearly hours, because her belly was so full. Yet, she still wanted to have her dog biscuit dinner and our left-overs, so clearly a full stomach isn't a message to dogs to stop eating.
So now we have a dilemma. Do we let her wander off and hunt and eat to her heart's content? On the one hand, this would help keep the rabbit population down. On the other hand, our central heating bill would go up as we would be forced to live with the doors and windows permanently open. Or do we confine her to barracks and live out the rest of her life on a dreary, but unsmelly, diet of dog biscuits, whilst the bunnies continue to play havoc with the garden.
Oh, decisions, decisions
]]>One downstairs, working with his laptop; the other upstairs, playing on her computer.
Both disturbed by the radio being suddenly switched on and loud news flooding the house;
Both slammed doors to respective rooms with irritated sighs and mutterings about their spouse's deafness;
Both lose it and rush out of room, colliding on stairs, to accuse the other of being 'bleeding deaf';
Both deny listening to the radio;
Both peer cautiously into bedroom and behold radio alarm belting out the news!
And the weird thing is ... it is set to operate as an alarm only, not a radio.
Gulp ... not The Creatures Who Live In The Loft up to new tricks?
]]>"Hurry up and eat your dinner" meant "Time you cleared off to bed"
Which meant stretching out time to infinite proportions. Bet none of you could have beaten me in the challenge to delay dinner by dissecting peas with Heart Consultant precision, so that they could be eaten an eighth at a time.
Anyway, this morning I had to resort to such time-stretching tactics again. Despite entreaties to 'hurry or you'll be late' I manage to delay coming downstairs until my tea was just the right temperature and the OH had finished his toast and was thus free to make mine.
Because this morning was check-up day and I was full of worry about flossed teeth and what to wear for a physio appointment.
First the dentist, where despite my worries and memories of the volume of sweets I had eaten recently, the magic words 'no problems and see you in six months' saw me in and out of the door in ten minutes flat.
Then the physio to find out what the problem is with my left knee and the right-hand side of my back - and instead of being told it was age and I couldn't expect much else, I heard the magic words "we can repair you" and "my, aren't you flexible".
And so I'm home, celebrating with a Chelsea Bun and coffee, and the only worry I now still have is whether I was wearing the right sort of pants.
]]>Anyway, just the thing to get me in the mood to make a draught excluder for the back door, I thought, flushed with the success of a hop pillow that may or may not do its job.
But I want a dog, not a snake. And I can't find a pattern. So I've drawn one. And it looks like a rabbit's head stuck on a snake's body with a shark's fin on its back. And it's cross-eyed.
I keep telling myself to get a life - it doesn't matter what it looks like as long as it excludes the draught.
But it does .... so there goes my afternoon.
]]>Is it me/my computer?
Or have they been given a terminal squirt of virtual fly spray?
]]>We often saw these binoculars because they also had a bowl of sweets for the children who held them in such low esteem, and we were quick to think of ingenious ways to knock on the door in the hope of getting a sweet.
Now I realise that I am A Nosy Neighbour myself.
For I have a pair of binoculars by my desk. And I whip them out at the slightest movement, despite the lack of neighbours in my line of vision. And thus I have been rewarded today by a gang of partridges scuttling across the field; and a brown blob on a telephone wire that miraculously turned into a buzzard doing a clever trapeze act in the gale.
But should anyone think of lobbing a ball into the garden and knocking on the door - don't bother. I've eaten the last Fizzy Fish.
]]>So being unable to resist being a copycat, I did the same. Mainly because I just loved the garlands or bines. But I couldn't leave them festooned across the potting bench forever, so I got my sewing box out. Here it is, ready for bed.
I'll let you know how ...... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
]]>It's been two months of dizzying excitement; intense emotional highs when the course of love ran smooth and we envisaged a life of luxury together on the proceeds of his world-famous works of art. Of course there were occasional lows - how could there not be when you are skulking around in the dark - when we've argued and I threw things at him, only to miss and hit someone else. And uncomfortable moments when my father disapproved and said so plainly. And the even more nerve-wracking occasion when my husband was observing us.
Now it's all over. I've put my wedding ring back on and am trying to re-adjust to my old life.
But I long for the next time; the adrenaline rush is completely addictive.
]]>Mice, I thought, that first night. We'd found an empty mousetrap up there when we moved in.
Fat mice, I thought, the second night. Heavy-footed, cobbled shoed, strutting mice.
Eh? What the hell?, I thought, the third night. Because whatever was up there kept dropping something that sounded like a coin on the floorboards....
and the loft is empty of personal effects.
So what is it? Mice with piggy banks, rats with (can't bear to think of that), squirrels with nuts?
I'm too scared to open the hatch and stick my head in to look.
]]>But it made me think about songs that are so intertwined with a moment in my past that I am instantly transported back to another time and place. Like hearing Denis by Blondie, when I was a lonely au pair in France and totally gratified that I could understand the verse that was in French; my first night in a uni hall of residence, lying in bed and hearing 'Lovely Day' by Bill Withers drifting across the night; Jamming with Bob Marley and the Wailers at the Crystal Palace Bowl in 1980, the air heavy a thick cloud of smoke from pot; Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd, when I met the love of my life, and later, Wise Men by James Blunt, blasting out in cafes when I spent hours researching family history in London. And many more.
On my Nano, but clearer still in my head and heart.
]]>"Do you think these shoes go better with that dress ... or those ... or those?"
"No, that's no good for an engagement ring. It needs to be plastic - let's try 'New Look'/M&S/Next/H&M ..."
"I can't decide whether to have Clotted Cream Rice Pudding or Raspberry Royale - what do you think?
"Oh dear, I've eaten the last Haribo Mini Jelly Baby. They don't last long, do they?"
"Watch out, there's a car coming/Slow Down, there's a bend/It's a 30 mph zone here, you know?/You're in the wrong lane, aren't you?..."
"What times does Strictly start?"
My husband. My hero. His Saturday - hijacked by me.
]]>And this morning my computer goat has been well and truly gotten by one of those flashing ads that appear on my email homepage. The ones that, if you are not careful, can spring up on your screen and refuse to disappear. Like the one this morning, when I clicked on the close button, only to get this message.
Are you sure you want to navigate away from this page?
Skeptical about earning a living from home?
Just wait a second and check out what we have to share...
Simply click 'CANCEL' and enter your information to receive a FREE make money from home guide!
Just click 'CANCEL' to get your EXCLUSIVE copy of the Online Success Guide.
Press OK to continue, or Cancel to stay on the current page.
So it's win, win, win for them whatever button I click. But I won't. I've minimised it until I can't see it without my spex. And I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that it clears off when I turn the computer off.
Cos they are right about one thing. I am 'skeptical'.
]]>So Little Missy Busy thought she'd paint over the bits of wall that Big Mr Lazy had missed behind the washing machine and on the wall where a magnetic letter tray had been fixed. And deeper joy! She found a clean stick to stir the paint, and a clean paintbrush which, remarkably, still had flexible bristles despite the evidence of a full brush-load of paint.
And lo! The walls were painted and any signs of laziness during previous painting sessions were erased. Success!!!
But ... Little Miss Busy couldn't leave it there, could she? Oh no.
She spotted a black mark. So, with half a can of paint crying out to be used up she dabbed the black mark until it disappeared. Then she spotted a hole that had been filled with filler. And dabbed it. Then she spotted some bits at the foot of the lounge wall that had either been missed or were just dirty. So she zoomed up and down with her paint brush and covered it. And all was well.
Until the sun came out. And suddenly, what looked like a nice bit of fixing-up blended paintwork stood out in relief, even when dry. So she carried on. Stopped. Sighed. Carried on. Stopped. Cursed. Cursed a bit more. And more.
Some hours later, she surveyed her handiwork. Little Miss Busy should have felt a sense of pride. Instead, she ruefully surveyed her paint-covered hands, her paint-covered T-shirt and jeans (both 'best', not decorator's rejects because she had only intended to dab) and last, but not least, the nice ring of paint on the carpet left by the paint can.
Little Miss Busy ate two Mars Bars, took two neurofen and went to die lie down in a dark room and decided she would never, ever leave it ever again.
He was standing by the path clutching his trousers and when he looked up at me, with tears in his big, blue eyes, I feared the worst and tried to remember where the loo was located. But it wasn't that at all.
"Will you push me on the swing like them?" he said, in a pathetic voice.
And I so wanted too. Except the garage was about to close so I said 'Sorry ...." and hurried on.
And it was only later, when I recalled this and it reminded me of all those times in childhood when you stood on the sidelines watching in envy and feeling left out, that a dreadful thought struck me. I must have been mad to even think about doing something like that, I told myself. What if his parents had accused me of being a child molester or something?
And that is a thought that makes me truly sad about today's society.
]]>What? Assault tender lugholes with Lady Gaga or - well, somebody I've never heard of?
But I don't really remember my parents teaching me nursery rhymes - except, perhaps, Baa Baa Black Sheep (because we had a lamb called Baa Baa). Yet I do know several, which probably means that I learned them at primary school. Along with country dancing, which we girls loved (the boys were highly embarrassed and preferred to throw themselves on a pitchfork rather than hold our hands).
Anyway, here's my favourite rhyme from childhood:
Oh where, oh where has my little dog gone?
Oh where, oh where can he be?
With his ears cut short and his tail cut long,
Oh where, oh where is he?
I remember it clearly from my childhood, along with London Bridge is Falling Down, Hey Diddle Diddle, Hickory Dickory Dock and Goosey, Goosey gander, whither shall I wonder.
Probably lots of others too. I need to go and seek them out instead of humming Amy Winehouse songs.
]]>When my mum and dad visited, my mum went wandering off around the garden and came back with two buckets of bottles. (No - she hadn't found our recycling box!) They came from a bank behind the house that appears to have been used as a rubbish tip in pre-refuse collection times. Today, I finally got around to washing them.
They nearly all had their contents or a company name embossed in the glass. I laughed gleefully when I found such treasures as green, blue and indigo glass bottles intriguing marked 'Not to be taken', bottles marked with - probably - long gone company names (like Timothy White) and sauce bottles, fish paste jars and chicory essence.
Then felt very sad when I realised that the largest quantity of bottles were embossed with 'Lung tonic' or 'Embrocation for whooping cough'.
But the most intriguing was a small bottle marked "Eiffel Tower Lemonade' - made by a company in Kent. I googled it on the off-chance. Turns out it was a bottle of crystals that you mixed with water to make a refreshing drink. No idea when it was in circulation - that's my next challenge!
]]>Except today's visit coincided with the arrival of the catch. Which seemed to mostly consist of large Ventnor crabs.
Live crabs. In big trugs. Live crabs trying to do a runner. But caught in the act and put back in their trug with a bit of sacking over them to confuse them.
I could have been mistaken, but I thought they looked a bit ill-tempered about the whole business.
So I bought fish instead.
]]>Can this possibly be true? I've always thought it was to catch you out if you told them fibs. Or simply one more delaying tactic to (a) run up your phone bill or (b) a means of putting off the moment when they have to actually deal with your query.
But now I'm intrigued as to whether some poor git has to actually replay these tapes, analyse the standard of service provided, give feedback to the employee answering the call, then draw up an exquisitely fine-tuned training programme that will ensure future customers are driven insane before they actually dial the number.
If this is the case, then I will console myself with the reflection that the person responsible for listening to such calls in BT will have burning ears now, given my four attempts yesterday to get my name removed from mailshots to my former address.
]]>to sit at a computer, using lots of electricity and generating lots of hot air in exasperation about the increasing amount of advertising in the featured blogs and home page and the decreasing amount of posts by 'ordinary' bloggers BUT reading lots of good thoughts (by people other than me) on climate change?
or
to hop into a car (NOT a BMW and never will be), drive 12 miles, have lunch with a mate (generating lots of gossipy hot air) BUT buying a dozen fruit trees en route and shopping for vegetables and meat at the farm shop just down the road?
Tough choice, I know. But I'm a woman, I'm used to multi-tasking. See you later.
- the smoothness of glossy brown chestnuts contrasting with their spiky lime-green case;
- the crunch of acorns and the crackle of dried leaves underfoot;
- cosy evenings cuddled up on the sofa in front of a log fire;
- comfort food - casseroles, baked potatoes, bread and butter pudding;
- the start of a new academic year - evening classes, new jotters and pens, another cupboardful of craft materials/equipment;
- the smell of bonfires and the musty dampness of woodland;
- Harvest festivals and mounds of golden pumpkins;
- the start of another Strictly Come Dancing series - and moans from the OH;
- the start of the football season - and moans from me;
- spiders' webs and butterflies and migrating arrow-formation birds;
- Halloween and Bonfire Night and sparklers;
and - less welcome -
the first cold of the winter season.
]]>So it was with much interest that I read a story about a theory that spiders are scared of conkers.
Well, the man at the Natural History Museum reckons it's a bonkers idea. But I'm keen to test this theory. Problem is, I don't know where any conkers are to be found. But I did find some sweet chestnuts that had fallen on the road this morning. So I'm assuming they are the same thing, with the same (possible) effect on spiders.
Now, how do I hang them? I'm thinking an Australian-style bush hat hung with chestnuts instead of corks. At least that would make the man from the Natural History Museum feel he had a valid point if he is ever proven wrong about the spiders' phobia for conkers.
]]>Yes, I am succumbing to a twitching craze. This weekend's tally includes a buzzard, a kestrel, an owl (dunno what sort), a robin, a pheasant, two wrens, a goldfinch (I think) blue tits, great tits, sparrows and four of these characters ...
They made their way into the garden and I have no idea what they are. If anyone knows, let me know.
Inspired by all this bird activity, I have been making bird lardy cake; a lovingly concocted melange of chopped nuts, fresh seeds and cereal and best Co-op lard.
And you know what? The fussy gits prefer the Lidl 'six for a quid' ones.
I feel just like my mother must have felt when I spurned her home-made sponge in favour of a Mr. Kipling's.
]]>I can't even remember what I was doing on Friday. But yesterday, I did my cat impression and snoozed in the sun. And I did some gardening. And today I've done some cooking and been to rehearsals to perfect my 'frightful gel' alter-ego. Then more cooking.
It's a far cry from the dizzy, exciting days of blogging 'till you drop'. Then again, there used to be a lot more posts to read to occupy your time.
And now I've depressed myself by reading a few posts that all refer to Sunday roasts. And suddenly my cooking experiment of red peppers stuffed with bulghur wheat and other bits floating around in the fridge/cupboard sounds decidedly second-best.
And we have run out of wine.
Oh, roll on Monday, Monday.
]]>So last night was a heaven-sent opportunity. Except, like an idiot I sent the OH to stumble around the house to look for a torch. Then I had a light-bulb moment, when I remembered my mobile. So I casually strolled forth to find the torch, whilst he floundered around, cursing. All of which provided us with enough light to get safely to bed, but still left my power-cut acting skills dangerously similar to those required by an extra in a film about zombies.
But there is light at the end of the tunnel. I might win an award for the scene in which my character becomes overcome with rage. That is, if I can reproduce my reaction when the power was restored at 2am this morning and the lights flashed on, the alarm clock emitted a howling sound and the broadband hub started screeching.
I'm off to watch Masterchef now to see if anyone's nerves are so bad they will serve up a reduction of finger. But really, I could do with going to bed. I just can't cope with less than 8 hours sleep and I have a blinding headache. (Though that might be more to do with reading OK! magazine at the hairdressers). Zzzzzzzzzzz ...
]]>And if you were too, then I apologise. Because it was entirely my fault you had such a rain-sodden day. You see, I booked a hair appointment for yesterday afternoon. And we all know what that means, don't we? Oh yes. I pay the hairdresser 80 quid so I can return home from the salon looking like I've been swimming.
But - lean closer, because I need to whisper this - I fooled the weather! Under cover of drumming rain and howling wind, I rearranged my hair appointment for today and it is sunny!
For now.
Cue Hurricane Henrietta Hair-raiser.
]]>Not if you have been chopping chillies, anyway.
Lunch will be late - I can't stop crying.
(Though that might be more to do with Hotel Chocolat lying about my 'special' status - refused my personal chocolate-fest password, they did!)
]]>They have created my own personal web address so that I can order a stonkingly large box of their chocolates. How thoughtful - it makes me feel so special.
Not only has it been at least three weeks since I had any chocolate (I'll just gloss over the pile of fudge, cakes and ice cream I've had in lieu ...) but I'm in need of a bit of cheer-up.
Just nearly knocked myself out on a low-flying branch. I'm seeing stars ... stars that seem to be populated by choc bars.
Going in now ...
]]>And the caller rang off after about four rings - despite me nearly breaking the 100m world record as well as my neck - before I got there.
Why don't people allow longer for you to answer the phone these days? Is this some by-product of the mobile phone era where people assume a phone is surgically attached to your hand? The same thing happens when the OH rings my mobile - doesn't he realise yet that it is usually lost in the bottom of my handbag amid sweet wrappers, scrunchies, paracetamol and coins and it takes at least ten rings before I can find it?
Give telephone rings a chance - that's all I'm saying!
]]>