Tuesday, 11 October 2011

York


What a weekend a group of us had to celebrate the ruby weddings of M&T,J&E who have had 40 years of married bliss....



On the train we were like a group of kids with our bottles of wine and great hilarity!



The Cedar Court looked good but was not so out of the ordinary as it should have been; but it was central for the station and the old town.



I love York!



Ambling down the Shambles; there was a large Food fayre on; Alan Bennett's show on at the theatre; and a service at the Minster (on the Saturday the ringers had a full peal going.) We took a Hop on/Hop off bus which was handy. The river boat ride was interesting and good value too.



The Minster is always beautiful especially the rose window; I would love to have seen John Sentamu, the archbishop- a man I have a lot of time for- would take a religion forward with joy not back preVatican II like the Catholic bishops. Fish on Fridays and twiddling round with liturgical language?? - Come off your pedestals and catch up to 2011 !

Wednesday, 5 October 2011

Shower!


Time goes on and the shower is still leaking- only 4 months now at least. H1 is useless at DIY and is not interested in the house so how do I get a shower base sorted out? Every plumber I have contacted says 'Yes! I can put that right but No! I won't put in the shower base you want and have trawled round for months choosing - I have an account at the Plumb Centre so choose out of their catalogue'. Said catalogue contains tiny pictures in which I can not see what they have to offer.



Some weeks ago we three decided to visit somewhere out of the rain- the Bowes Museum with the mechanical silver swan.....



We never got there! We stopped off in Staindrop for grub - purely in the interests again, of supporting rural economy- duty calls!



The church was holding a flower festival and we got waylaid. The community were originally holding the festival to buy a toilet for the congregation; however thieves had stripped lead off the church roof- and churches can only insure for up to £5,000 so forget the loo- they need to find another £15K to put the roofing in proper order again. How sad is that?

Saturday, 1 October 2011

Like the dawning of the morning.....

and so it is..... my plan...... isolation till.... given time to calm the situation ... then I go back and ask if we can talk over a cup of coffee/tea.



Outside we sit, survey, contemplate. H1 says
"I've had an idea. It doesn't seem fair to slump the heap against a fence so why not........"



Bingo! We work out where to try & I persuade him it is not important if we make a mistake (already I am thinking will our hedgehog find the new location of the heap before hibernation- there is snow forecast for October- IT IS OCTOBER TODAY!)



Meabwhile the silence of the patient wait affords me time to read my book from cover to cover. The Faithless Wife is set in Menorca and I recognised most of the places mentioned.I had not realised there was such Menorquan resistance to the Franco Fascist takeover.



It is a beautiful island set like a jewel in the Mediterranean; white houses grouped round pretty calas; turquoise sea wrapped round headlands;it was very hot when we were there. Our hosts walk daily among wild tortoises of every size in the land near their home. I tried to scale them so you could appreciate the sizes and colours of their shells.



My neighbour says I am a girl on a mission today- but weddings (first time and 40 years of rubies) and holidays leave no time for housework so I have blitzed- and now I am going to stuff a marrow!



I shall return to insert photographs.




The moral? Plant the seed and wait to see what grows......

Rubbish

Orange light peeking over the horizon. Black rooftops. Pink streaks silhouette a line of ridge-tile pigeons watching the sun come up with me. Gentle grey dusts across the everchanging celestial vista. The sky glows highlighting a vapour trail. A flight of birds move high above my heaven. The day begins with the soft coo of a ring collar dove.

I am awake. I hate arguments. I just leave them... walk away from the protagonist.... cut them out in order to get away from them- like dead wood. It is what I do- step away and isolate myself. I do not want to face them. I do not know how to handle them so I leave them. It looks cold but it is not- it is the reverse- they can leave me in a limbo of confusion. How do I face the meeting up?- usually pink with embarrassment- so at the rendezvous I always seem to do/say the wrong thing. People make up things to cover their backs when they recount to other people what has happened and I can not believe they have told fibs. Why bother? Is it SO important? I can't be bothered with working it out so I walk away. Ah! There is the sun staring at me now.

H1 and I have had a row! He has to win at everything.... and he has taken over my last refuge- my garden. He doesn't understand that gardens are a journey of discovery; you get it wrong- plants in the wrong place, soil, aspect; always changing and never the same. So I want the compost heap location changed! Big deal? Honest! How come a scientist shows an inability to cope with change? Surely their world of theory , hypothesis, experiment, research is everchanging? He does everything to the least possible...Does that go with the gender? If I was an employer I think I'd employ mainly women- they are particular..... So..... I have asked him not to put compost directly against the fence but to put a piece of ply between the grass cuttings and neighbours' (or our own) fences so they do not decompose with the warming heap(the fences not the neighbours!). This has proved a major source of inconvenience/irritation to H1 who (upon my request) did it eventually and once but asap has abandoned the idea and moved along the fence to dump again on unguarded perimeters. Such a big deal?! Can you believe it?