Seven facts ........

Thank you Pondside.......

here goes ....

1 I loathe and detest Parmesan Cheese one whiff of the stuff and I am nauseous. Add the odd tomato and I'm off..........yuk!

2 I learned to ride when I was 28 because I wanted to get over a fear of horses. Now I can ride but am STILL scared of horses!

3 I love Ireland with a passion, it started with Edna O'Brien, then a mad, bad, red haired Irishman then took me by the hand to show me his 'home', since when I have been back...and back ...and back....totally addicted.

4 Have always suffered from travel sickness due to an ear imbalance thingy wotsit ...but it doesn't affect me on trains ....came to love train travel as a young child, still do ...now if I could just be sure i could get round the world by train .......

5 As a wayward teenager joined the local St John Ambulance Brigade and had the job of patching up MR Suzuki himself after a nasty spill at an international moto cross event. Also met Sandy Lyle and Tony Jacklin whilst dressed in my grey uniform.

6 I have three big strapping sons who I am proud to say I can also count as three of my bestest friends...although they can drive me to drink and prescribed drugs on ocassions...bless!

7. I can literally whimper over beautiful china.....you should have heard me in the Moorcroft factory shop in Stoke on Trent....I suppose it is a throw-back to when my Grandfather was a policeman in Coalport.....I think he was paid in china! Nothing like a nice bit of Aynsley to get me going ...........

So there you go ..seven random facts...if you havent done this by now ...off you go...

The above picture is a gorgeous tile from the Un Peu Lefoque collection, I love it to bits. So why has one tile caused so much upheaval, consternation, long discussions, soul searching silences and now ...stalemate?

We have been in this house 11 years on the 12th April...it was our second choice. We still look longingly at first choice but it was not meant to be. Second choice needed a lot of work and as I read the trials and tribulations of those undergoing building or renovation projects I sigh with relief to think we are through that bit ..got the tee shirt... seen the film. Yes... I came home to a kitchen that was renamed 'Beruit on a bad night', we still remember the winter nights with no heating when we all sat under one duvet ...five of us....and watched TV on a portable crackly thing, after washing up in the bath.....NEVER, NEVER AGAIN! There are still things to do ...a fireplace in the lounge to offset the log burner, the bedroom floors, a set of fitted cupboards..but we have come a long way in 10 years.

Anyway ...both bathrooms need decorating desperately. The downstairs one is more clinical than most hospital sluice rooms being simply basic white ...nice but cold...nice but clinical...I always expect to find a box of those vile rubber gloves that gynaecologists favour on the windowsill...the previous occupants wallpapered with masses of orange and yellow flowers to relieve it ...but they have gone thanks to middle son who is a whizz at wallpaper stripping. So what would brighten my sluice room I thought? ..Aha..a band of beach huts.....and after discussing mundane things like cost with UPL, miraculously and via North Wales a beach hut appeared! Wonderful! Sorted!

Until he stuck his oar in! He uttered one word.....'bookshelves'! I stood open mouthed.....'Remember what happened with the bookshelves and how distraught you were?'

Oh yes, I remember it well........

We lived in a lovely brand new house for 10 years before we arrived here....it was nice but we were a room short ...a decent dining room...and it eventually irritated me enough to want to move. A lovely man, a wonderful craftsman at his best, had worked out how we could incorporate bookshelves into the lounge, we always have so many books and never enough space for them. When it came to selling the house I wanted to take the bookshelves down and have them re-erected here.....but the buyers loved them as well and begged me to leave them in situ...so sadly I did. Three days later I had to go back for something and was horrified to see the whole wall of shelves had gone .....completely! I stood there open mouthed ...'errr I thought you wanted the shelves?' I croaked in horror...'We sold them!' she said proudly. I could have knocked her flat!

So...will I want to move once all the work has finished? mmmmmm might do. Will I be putting a band of beach huts into the bathroom only for some moron to demolish as soon as my back is turned? A moron who doesnt recognise the work of a craftsman when it jumps up and pokes them in the eye? Have I got the ten year itch to move? He wants to move nearer to the Welsh coast ..well he is Welsh. I'm not sure about that, a market town like Bishops Castle beckons....or a cottage with an orchard and ten acres....so when anybody asks ...'Why have you got a tile of a beach hut in the middle of the china on the dresser?' The answer comes back in stereo...'Don't ask!' The bathroom is stripped of its orange daisies, the ceiling is painted, the paintwork and tiles are scrubbed.....and its now stalemate!

That was the week that was

Is it just me or has this last week whizzed past much faster than normal? One minute I was sitting here last Sunday and now I'm back and my goodness the middle bit passed in a veritable blur!

On a foray into Welshpool yesterday I thought I really do need a new pair of work shoes.....should be a two minute task ...how difficult could it be to find a pair of plain black court shoes with a heel.....VERY difficult as it happens! The comments ranged from....'sorry not in your size' to ' we are waiting for our new stock to come in but there wont be any court shoes' I muttered and mumbled, forced my feet into shoes that made me feel like I had been impaled on a railing or visibly stunted.....helpful husband pointed out a pair of lace up boots....I gave him one of those 'looks' usually given to errant children which roughly translated means ...'just you wait 'til I get you home 'cause you are for IT...... BIGSTYLE!

Saturday evening found a friend and I happily ensconsed in Marton Village Hall watching Atonement by courtesy of 'Flicks in the Sticks'. The 'usherette' wandered about selling popcorn. crisps and drinks from her proper usherette's tray which we thought was wonderful. Cups of tea at half time and a natter with Mountainear in what was a very full hall. I loved the film all over again and drooled over that green dress all over again as well.

Now cast your minds back to the summer months when we had daily doses of Mme Grognonne from UPL.....remember the political upheavals and the gentleman who featured with the name of Fartoocozy? Well on Friday night as I sat helping to mark sheets at a heat of the Village Hall we were just having a go at answering the questions....to the question 'Who was elected president of France in August 2007?' One guess who scribbled 'Fartoocozy' and sat there all righteous......thank you UPL! Your ears were burning when I realised I had just made a total plonker of myself!

Thursday was a lovely day spent with Moutainear walking the hills, pottery shards and old bottles under tree roots tempted us ...was this the cottage rubbish heap...a large piece of eathenware stein surfaced. We wondered what had been stored in it. We found the twisty privvy, sadly a tree has fallen across it damaging the wall.........the natural elements are running in front of us ...ashes to ashes, dust to dust...taking these little settlements back to the grassy mounds from whence they came. A skylark sang ...its years since I heard one so clearly.

Tuesday was a complete get together of our local history/writing group with some celebration....of the alcoholic sort...have we ever been apart? Well yes we have ...but all back together now for some new and really exciting projects. The last one nearly turned us into an unruly bunch of alcoholics ...surprising how much wine we needed to imbibe to get the written word out ....I suppose it helped our confidence? Ha Ha! Hic!

Monday was Parish Council ....rumblings of discontent, did you know the fine for disturbing a bat roost has gone up drastically? Our recyling skip for plastic has never appeared ...its got lost...Oh yeah! Three very different wards all competing for funding for projects, noting planning applications and begging for drains to be cleaned, roads to be repaired and church yard gates to be paid for...a melting pot of rural issues.

So that was the week that was.....Wednesday I think I had an early night .....recovering from the night before.....

Sunday afternoons I wander round the pool while himself plays fishing ...I have tried and tried to get a picture of the barn owl that flits above the rough grass ......this is the best I have got so far ...the white blob is him sitting on the branch ......and then he flew off ...a pice of paper turning in the wind....

Spring................

Sunday was another beautiful day....a proper spring day. The washing dried outside.....doesnt it smell wonderful for having been dried outside?

The afternoon found us doing 'housekeeping' chores around the woods. The shooting season is over, the feed bins are filled with everything that is left for all the pheasants and other birds that now live in peace. The pegs are all removed from the fields and stored away until next October. The pheasants must have their own calendar somewhere .....they peeped at us from under the trees and made no move to leave.

I had the camera with me because every time I have been to the woods recently an enormous barn owl has drifted to and fro over the rough land by the pool like a sheet of newspaper caught on the breeze. Needless to say ...because I had the camera he was heard but not seen! Instead I found a lovely selection of snowdrops, primroses and hellebores shelterd below the garden walls.......

The swans appear to have ditched last year's family at last ....there was one cygnet that seemed determined not to leave home but eventually he must have got the hint......

As the sun set over the lake the air chilled quite noticably but it was a beautiful scene

Page 123

Bodran has plonked this task on me.......
find page 123 of the nearest book
find the 5th sentence
then copy out the next five.........

yorksire accent required for this one please......

"I didn't enjoy my time with Auntie Bee and Uncle Herbert - he was grumpy, and she was impatient. Its funny; in later life she was one of the sweetest natured gentlest women I have ever met, (and Uncle Herbert was still grumpy)
Their sons, David and Arnold were slightly older than Kath and me, and kept on a fairly tight rein (though they did have baked beans with their tea, which mum thought very slack). Its a wonder she let me stay there.
Eventually I was allowed back home - the first few days at Ash Grove, staying with Grandma Hardisty, where my first sight of breasts as my mother fed my sister gave rise to the question,'Is that what them things are for?'

Alan Titchmarsh...'Nobbut a lad'

a lovely gentle read, a 1950's childhood ....so many similarities......Fablon on the pantry shelves, tinned fruit, The Archers, one week holidays by the sea and of course a garden.........

Out of hibernation......

Now what was it that woke me? The rusty smoker's cough of the resident cock pheasant? The duck banging the cat flap for his breakfast? I peeped over the duvet to guage the weather...Oh my goodness...blue sky...wisps of high white cloud....its here.....Spring! Within seconds I am out of bed and hanging out of the open window seeing my glorious surroundings bathed in warm sunlight. Since November I have lived in a dingy, dull world. I have left my hillside each morning as a grey dawn pokes a weak finger through the heavy mist, by the time I hit the suburbs of the town the sun may have risen ...more often it has been hidden by cloud. I spend my day in the windowless world of a Courtroom and then its back home in the dark. So between November and February I rarely see my home in daylight other than weekends and they are so frenetic I don't have time to look around me. So this morning there I was hanging out of the window gulping the clean fresh air, feeling the warmth of the sun and really enjoying the view over to the Long Mountain. A blue mist still clung to the valley below me following the line of the river, an aeroplane left a vapour trail as it headed south...and I realised what it was that had woken me .....'MuuuuuuuuuuuuuM can you come and fold these shirts for me please and do you know where my blue tie is and I'm going at half past eight!'

The instantly recognisable squawk of a middle son....in a panic...overslept and on his way to Edinburgh for the weekend with friends to meet friends and attend at some time during the proceedings a christening.

He duly departed having purloined my overnight bag seeing as how the zip broke on his trying to get too much in .....I did query how long he was going for ....eyes rolled heavenwards ...'Mother' when any of my three sons says 'Moth-er' like that I know I am probably being a pain so I just smile sweetly like a batty old lady and toddle off.......

I had a lovely time shopping in the farm shops and the market this morning and returned heavily laden with veg, meat, dog bones, a bottle of cold pressed, extra virgin rapeseed oil, a large tin of white paint and a copy of Captain Correlli's Mandolin....surprising what turns up at these farm shops isn't it?

Feeling sorry for middle son's dejected labrador, (she sulks when he goes away for more than a day...she just knows!) I thought I would get rid of my hibernated pink eyed look and take her for an invigorating walk in the gorgeous sunshine . She was very excited. She has the character of her owner ....larger than life, boisterous, happy, exuberant and can she run...........! Off we went ...no problem she has been trained well and is a pleasure to walk on a lead along the lanes.

We stopped to admire the view over the field gates......(Mountainear ...I know you are over there basking in the sunshine somewhere)..... I could see the windmill in the valley and hear the faint hum of the traffic way below me. We left the main road to return along a stony track and I let Skye off the lead, she was backwards and forwards along the edge of the wood sniffing and snorting like a black pig. I called her back to me as she made to chase something in the undergrowth....and remembered .......arrggggghhhhhh!

When she was a puppy J taught her tricks and we warned him that some may return to metaphorically bite him on the bum but he persisited. Skye is now a hefty, full grown, five year old, well trained, black lab ...that does tricks ...when you least expect them. One such trick she was taught as a puppy was to run full tilt at J and leap and he would catch her mid air and swing her round...like you would a toddler. We did warn him against this on numerous ocassions but at 17 he took a lot of no notice. She has embarrased him with this when he has least expected it and have we laughed. Cries of 'Told you so' echo in his ears!

So there I am and no sooner than I have called 'Skye' I see her hurtling towards me and I know she is going to leap and I have not got a single hope of catching her... the big thug of a dog....she hits me full in the chest and we end up full length in the muddy grass at the side of the track. Laughing hysterically and being licked enthusiastically we disentangle limbs and I struggle up wards... swearing ...just a little!

I arrive home looking as though I have been mud wrestling instead of dog walking ....but who cares... the sun is still shining although the warmth has now gone but its spring and I'm out from hibernation!

I just dont belieeeeeeeeeeve it!

Where is he? That Victor Meldrew bloke? I have heard his signature line so many times over the last few days its almost an anthem here in grey and windy Shropshire.
I'm still dancing about on the dining table ...good job its a decent size seeing as how many decided to join me ...even Wipso with her crutches ...bless.
It appears Central Government had to inform the Council that what they were attempting to do was in fact illegal. How embarassing is that? It appears a similar situation was also happening down in Herefordshire and they have been told to draw their horns in as well. What utter plonkers...heads are being kept well down now ...waiting for some battered ones to come out on plates I expect. No doubt there will be a scapegoat or two...but personally having seen some of the anger, anguish and heartache that was caused to the villagers concerned a couple of County Councillors tied to the Lord Hill monument in front of the Shirehall and horsewhipped wouldn't go amiss!
The trouble is that this Council has been murmuring 'Unitary authority' for some considerable time now...get rid of the District Councils altogether save loadsa money and just govern from the top ....then after getting dozens of staff from the District Council's working out their redundancy figures with glee...'Oh but we will need some sort of little committees in the middle of the County Council and the Parish Councils ...just to ...sort of....talk about stuff. After this little escapade I would not be alone in wondering why not just pare down the County Council and leave the District Councils alone ...at least they are there on the ground ...they know their area , the people ....surely the old saying ...'if it aint broken why mend it' should apply. But as for the clowns in that great grey and glass place ...well..... as good old Victor Meldrew said ...' I just do not beleeeeeve it!'
Its OK Cait ...we won the fight on the village loo...but sadly lost on the nearby adult education centre, the last TSB bank went last year but hanging on to the library for grim death. The swimming pool was filled in a couple of years ago and somebody has built a house on the tennis courts...............next?

Oh yes I know...the Lottery ...now lets REALLY JUMP UP and DOWN! The local village hall applied for a lottery grant to refurbish the old part of the hall that is in such poor condition it is dragging the rest down. The hall is well used by the local Brass Band, Tai Chai, dog training, the nursery group, whist drives, parties etc. The windows are hanging on by a thread, water pours through the roof and dont sit in the draught it will cut your legs off. Guess what the reply was ....it had to be demonstrated that the facility was going to be of use to ethnic minority groups, those with learning difficulties and the disabled.....oh well ... so we cant have any money then? Just push the new bucket over to catch some of the drips......