Tuesday 29 December 2009

Irish Christmas


Tried to upload a video on last post but couldn't do it. Need to learn how to upload to Picassa web albums when I get a mo.
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Saturday 19 December 2009

Aberfeldy




We are back from our Scottish Experience, a pleasant rest except for the travelling which went as well as these things can but seemed to be exhausting nevertheless. We had some slow miles going following a wide load, and met snow on the way back. We shared the driving which worked out well. Our friend I.M. is rebuilding a ruined house and HoF would have loved to help but couldn't because of his poorly heel. For those of you who have read The Sugar Book, we met the famous Dr Yellowlees too, a fit nonogenarian. Our travels are as nothing compared to our niece and husband who are doing the Great Trek South and are currently in Morocco.
Miss P is now up with us for the Christmas holidays. Before I can relax though I have a potentially Scary Event tomorrow. I am singing in a choir at a fund-raising concert in the village. That part's OK but I have also been inveigled into doing a one verse duet which has high notes that are giving me grief. I may have to mime, which I am told is a common occurrence in theatres, where an off-stage singer will put in the high notes for the on-stage star from a booth behind the scenery.
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Saturday 12 December 2009

Hollows Farm


Winter has arrived, the temperatures have dropped and there is fog in the mornings. But before the turn in the weather I went for a walk by myself, which I like best because you see and hear more. HoF, not being able to accompany me just yet, dropped me off some miles from home and I walked back. Through fields and woods and past this farmhouse, a very pleasant outing.
Tomorrow we are off to Scotland to visit friends in Aberfeldy for a few days.
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Saturday 5 December 2009

Last times


Miss P cutting the grass for probably the last time this year. We rather envied the handkerchief -sized patch. We serendipitously arrived at our old church when they were having a Thanksgiving lunch for fourteen years of its existence. So we were able to join in and enjoy seeing photos of those years.

The white flowered prunus in the back garden at Kate's Cottage. Hmm, well it said white flowered on the label.

Last chance to see HoF on the scooter. It has gone back to its owner now. Returned too are the perching stool, shower stool and grabber. We went swimming twice in one week, more times than we usually go in a year. (Sort of thing HoFs do when its free). He can now ride his bike and did so down to the butcher's this morning to fetch bacon for breakfast. The walking however is still very painful, which is where the swimming helps, or rather the supported walking in the water.
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Friday 27 November 2009

Return to Kate's Cottage

We are in Reading. Miss P's washing machine broke, her housemate is away, we've finished the publication of the newsletter, so it seemed appropriate to come, armed with tools. HoF grovelled underneath while I held the machine up, and he fixed the pump which had been infiltrated by a piece of bamboo from the laundry basket. So that job is done and now he is revelling in the chance to watch 'rubbish' on the TV. Well, probably. I am catching up on emails and the reserach I'm doing for an elderly friend which has included finding a long lost cousin on GR for her, and for someone in Australia who has a village-born Jones in his tree who could be one of ours. Life gets very involved with all this IT we have nowadays.
Tomorrow there will be all the other mending jobs to tackle, broken stair rail, frosted-up freezer, broken DVD player. What it is to have a handyman in the family.
Oh, and although his foot is very painful to walk on, the last infection has cleared, and a bit of DIY seems to have helped.

Monday 23 November 2009

Saga Weekend


How about this for a clever, accidental photo. We had our now annual oldies gathering a 'Saga Weekend' , so called by the next generation down. We had a good time of fun and reminiscing and updates on children, grandchildren etc. Thence deteriorating into the three P's of pensions, pills and politics. It was reasonable weather back then and five of us had a good walk up and down the hills around while HoF went to the Remembrance Day service to support the new rector. We had our two minute silence leaning on a gate looking over towards my ancestral home in the woods.
Now we are very busy, which means spending long hours on computers. Firstly there's the next village newsletter to get out and HoF is still researching formats whilst I try and slim down the articles and write an editorial and send all of for proof-reading. Then there's booking a Christmas trip to H and family. Next is checking the Excel lists of presents to buy and cards to send and subsequent online research. After that there is transcribing local parish registers, and finally there is making the most of my subscription to explore the 1911 census. Just as well perhaps that it's pouring with rain so there is no need to feel guilty about the garden, and too gloomy to notice the dust piling up. I have even been neglecting the making of menus, so that tells you something.
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Thursday 12 November 2009

Happy Birthday to me

For my birthday treat we went out to lunch today at a special place, here. Its an experience not just a meal. You pay for three courses, but in between these you are served mini courses with food that looks like an artwork. One tiny course, served in a dainty cup, had three layers including squid, prunes and cauliflower cheese. Sounds awful? It was delicious. I hadn't realised till I read this site, that it is linked with L'Ortolan where I never did go, in Reading. The cost of the wine was rather a shock, though. Guess we're not quite knowledgeable enough to appreciate that, but my wine certainly tasted delicious.
Yesterday we discovered another perk for the senior citizen. Free swimming! Good therapy for The Foot. If you click on the photo, you'll see there's a special chair to lower the disabled into the water, but HoF was too chicken to use that and managed on his crutches.
For the family history buffs, I now have a subscription to the 1911 census for six months so let me know if you want anything looking up.

Steeple Houses

Some of you may remember the phrase 'steeple houses'. Well here we are again. Are we going backwards or forwards? When does a building matter and when doesn't it? Yes, I know the church is not the building, but the disassociation is a lot harder when the beautiful building in question sits in the middle of your village. Yes, the church is the people. So what does that make the building? A meeting place, a historic artefact, a museum?
These are questions that may mean more to us in the year ahead.
Friday 6th November saw the outward culmination of our prayers. Our new rector, for whom we had prayed since January, was installed. (Yes, I know the term sounds more as if it's to do with central heating, but that's what they say) We look forward in hope to New Things. Above all, that Jesus would be glorified.

The key of the church door, presented to the rector. The original was lost and a replacement made by taking off the lock to make a model for the locksmith who treated it as a labour of love.


Meanwhile I am transcribing the register for the first decade of the eighteenth century. I wonder what church meant to the folk back then.......
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Wednesday 4 November 2009

Gadgets

The Head of Finance has two new gadgets. For his birthday he bought himself an assortment of camera paraphernalia so we went to a beautiful local garden armed with a camera each, and got in free with a special offer. To get around he used the other gadget, a mobility scooter which we've hired for a month. Although he can hobble about now on his crutches, they are no use for distance, so this is ideal. We compared photos and mine were best because he was too busy experimenting!




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Friday 30 October 2009

Happy Birthday 2

Four of our oldest, most long standing friends came to celebrate. Once upon a time we were young people together. Once upon a time we took regular holidays together as families. Now it's been several years since we were all together. So the Big Birthday seemed a good time to have a reunion. We played games, shared meals, talked a lot and laughed too. The nice thing about such old friends is that you can just pick up where you left off.

Some of you may understand what's going on in the photo below. The men are trying to reproduce a black and white 'snap' (if you remember that word it dates you) that used to sit on our piano, of several, was it four or five we argued, young men looking wise and inscrutable. These were three of the original group. HoF is carefully balanced on one-and-a-bit legs as he has been told he can bear 25kg.

On Monday we accompanied N to a boat builder's yard. He has a scheme to have a barge made so that when he retires they can
go and live on the canals. He's looking for someone who can build it to the plan he's drawn. Is it a pipe dream? We'll see. And if it comes off, we're promised a trip.
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Thursday 29 October 2009

Happy Birthday

It was HoF's birthday last Saturday. A Big One. But there was a problem. Because his usual birthday treat is a stroller ticket to the Bridgnorth Jazz Festival which involves strolling from venue to venue, ie pub to pub, to listen to the various musicians. Tricky when you are on crutches. Some people suggested a supermarket trolley would come in handy! After deliberation and studying the programme, we decided that we would have lunch in the pub where his favourite musician was playing, and that I would stroll to see mine.
Here is his pin-up. Not the blonde singer, by the way, but the curly haired pianist.

Bridgnorth is a beautiful town, and the place where I went to school. In some ways I appreciate it more now without the Terror of the Teachers, although it has lost something with becoming a tourist destination.
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Monday 19 October 2009

Girls


Girls just love playing hairdressing games. This willing victim is going to get lots of practise.
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The Downs

Well, one is that we have had a fretful time with The Foot. There seems to be an infection which we were warned was a Very Bad Thing, but there seems no way to get any very sound advice on what to do. We've got the antibiotics, but should it still hurt this much, how do we know when it's quite cleared up, should the leg be up all the time, when should we make a fuss? The NHS was great for the in-hospital treatment, but after that, from the carer's perspective, it's like arriving home with a miserable new baby who is never comfortable for long. There were no instructions with the package.
Also of concern but not without hope, is that a dear friend here has been diagnosed with lymphoma and we feel, that like Dorcas, we need her with us. Folks have dropped in to pray with us twice a day during the week which has blessed us and we hope will bless her. As I've researched on the internet, it is rather scary to discover that we are all producing cancer cells all the time, and it is down to our immune systems how well we can fight back. I think I see a spiritual parallel here. Do you?

Snakes and ladders

Life has its ups and downs, rather like snakes and ladders. One of the ups was a day with nearly all the family, a rare treat now that we are globally scattered. I had two good kitchen helpers for the dinner: one to make crumble and acrve the joint, one to make roast spuds that matched up to Delia's.

The grandsons found uses for Pop's crutches which he doesn't use much himself, since they give him shoulder pain. He moves around on all fours which can be an unexpected surprise for some visitors looking for a face at the usual height.

Sharing crosswords.

Enjoying a chat.

The downs.
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Wednesday 30 September 2009

Malvern Show


On Sunday I was treated to a day off. A friend came to 'babysit' the invalid and I drove his wife to the Malvern Autumn Show where we had been again treated to free tickets. The vegetable display above is amazing; the exhibitor grows and displays all his own vegetables at shows across the country. The show itself was slightly disappointing. The craft and plants were excellent but other stalls were selling what I think is described as kitsch. Maybe just as well as it enabled us to be selective with what we looked at, and happily, we liked looking at the same things. Including this garden for the disabled design below.

We are going back to the hospital tomorrow to see the surgeon in outpatients. We hope we will get a clearer picture of 'what next' in the way of physios and timescales for weight-bearing. Meanwhile we are praying daily for a dear friend, pivotal in the scene here, who has received a serious diagnosis.
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Monday 21 September 2009

Operation done

Operation took place this morning. With eight screws! Thank you to all who prayed and thought of him. He's not too happy a bunny at present, so please continue.

Tuesday 15 September 2009

Hemmed in


HoF is in the wars - bigtime. On Friday he fell from a ladder and broke his heel. He spent all weekend in hospital, which it has to be said, he quite enjoyed, apart from the suspense of not knowing when or if he would have an operation. While he was there a blue tit flew in through my bedroom window. If you can spot him, there he is looking at me from the bookcase. He might have thought I was cruel shutting the door to keep him in, and then shutting the curtains when he went to the window sill. He just could not work out how he'd got into such a mess. But hemming him in worked and he found the open window again.

In the event, HoF was released from hospital on Monday on condition that he was extremely sensible and kept his foot above his waist all week. On Sunday he goes back again to have a long operation for the surgeon to try and make sense of the jigsaw in his heel. Here he is in the base set up in the study where he can receive visitors.
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Friday 4 September 2009

Beer Festival


You can't say nothing happens in the county.
This was the fourth annual Sun Beer Festival, a piece of village tomfoolery creating a new custom. It may well have been the last as you can see here. It began at the cemetery with flowers being placed on the grave of the late Flossie Lane, last publican of this parlour pub. Then a procession led by Scottish pipers (' whose grave is that?' the Highland lassie whispered in my ear)

Then the Mayor, elected annually by regulars, opened the event.

We put in an appearance (spot us if you can) and might have stayed longer but for the rain. Rumour has it that the Sun is almost in safe hands. We hope the new owner manages to maintain the atmosphere of the old building whilst conforming to Elf and Safety, more tomfoolery.

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Wednesday 2 September 2009

Visitors


It's not that easy to get me on a bike but when some enthusiasts come to visit and you want to show them the beautiful countryside, what can one say? I just have to get off and walk the slightest slope; there seem to be some muscles missing. Perhaps it was merciful that soon after the second photo my bike got a puncture!

We had other visitors for the Bank Holiday weekend and this is one of them being amused by the first ever phone box cosy in the world, or so they say, a feature of an exhibition by another local village.
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