The Shepherdess has wilted!

'Shattered' is probably the understatement of the year!

After five months of being at home... going back to work was a bit of a surprise! I can't even say it was a nice one either. They are still bickering and sulking about something that happened six months ago...I remember it well!

I just felt like shouting 'Get over it..life is too short to let things wrankle....' There is an empty room where K used to be, he died unexpectedly in May. I went in and took a picture off the wall that I had drawn for him as a joke....no one would remember the joke now so I have reclaimed the picture before someone bins it.

There are changes afoot, moves and new jobs to do, reports to compile and calls to make, new people to get used to before I have had chance to miss those that have gone.

Today I felt like a hamster ...running on a wheel and getting nowhere!

But never mind....I met four purple people yesterday...that was hilarious!

We have got the street party tomorrow and I have got to make meringues and a huge beef stew! There will be the usual mayhem and madness..we actually have a professional performer living along our track and he does fire eating in the entertainment slot...set fire to the hedge last time!

We will be sitting round the bonfire if the rain keeps off ....mountainear look out for the fireworks...I think we have got two!

Youngest son...the grub that was..has asked if the girlfriend can come......and stay!!! Her mum has been on the phone tonight to check it all out.....hell... that means I have got to stay 'responsible'...'well that will be a first!' says walking friend peeping in again to read!

Chimneys!

I always loved the art lessons at school, my mother was very artistic and had taught me to draw and paint even before I had made my way into the reception class. At secondary school I followed the art classes through to examination stage under the 'care' of a wild red headed woman whose voice could have stripped paint off a door five miles away. She did not suffer fools gladly and would reduce the less artistically able in the class to gibbering wrecks. Her classes were very small! We did cross swords on more than one occassion because she did not like the way that I had been taught by my mother and thought I should express myself in a freer way. Well my way just suited me fine and although for the sake of harmony I tried what she extolled ..it simply wasn't me! I can remember a picture to this day when she stood over me shrieking, 'No No No...put the paint THAT WAY!' It was all blue, french windows opening on to a patio, with flowers...and everything was blue...just different blues and different textures. I've still got it somewhere. it formed part of my portfolio for final examinations. I walked away from shrieking red head wih a top grade and no doubt she patted herself on the back.

It was a complete shock to the system when I arrived at college the following September almost nervously reporting for the A level art class thinking what sort of arty farty loony am I going to get this time and perhaps I should do extra maths, and finding a sweet old lady! Mrs Jones was about as different to whirling dervish as you can imagine. She had white hair with a blue rinse, she wore a navy blue nylon smock and her pockets were always full of pencils. She spoke quietly and always had a shy smile readily available as she gently pointed something out. Mrs Jones never raised her voice in the two years I spent with her and yet the students hung on her every word. Lunchtimes would find Mrs Jones eating her sandwiches in amongst a group of hairy kaftan attired second year students poring over the Art history books and dicussing the merits of Degas or Monet as if they were well aquainted mates.

Mrs Jones was near to retiring age and I think I may have been in one of her last groups and sadly I don't think she had a long retirement. It was looking for trees for Bodran that reminded me of her first lesson that September many years ago. A gentle lady in a blue smock stood in front of us and taught us to simply learn to 'look' and once you know how to 'look' the rest will follow. We were sent out empty handed, no pencils, no paper ...just look! Firstly we were told to look upwards...forget eye level...ignore windows and doors..and people... come back in a week and talk about the chimneys, the roof lights, the attics, tiles and chimney pots.

Chimneys.....I was hooked. The following week Mrs Jones gave out wonderful new sketchpads pencils, charcoal, biros whatever medium you chose and simply said, 'Now I would like to see what you have seen on those roof tops..come back next week and show me.'

Should you ever find yourself in Shrewsbury at a loose end then find the miserable grey building that houses the market that has more attempts at reviving itself than Gary Glitter. If you wander up onto the balcony to look down on the stalls of vegetables, eggs and flowers then find the cafe because out of that huge window you have a panoramic view of old Shrewsbury. The chimneys with so many different pots, dormer windows, quirky roof lines, bits added and bits missing, there are more varieties of tiles than you can shake a stick at. We spent hours in that cafe sketching away surrounded by cold cups of congealed coffee and we learned to look.

In Aberystwyth on Sunday I noticed a roof ....its well over thirty years since Mrs Jones' art classes but I still have to look at the chimneys...and now Bodran has got me looking at trees to find those that dance ...so here are some chimneys for me and a tree for her... and thanks to Mrs Jones.

A day at the seaside

It may have been something to do with the fact that I had taken to whirling my cast iron frying pan around my head looking for a suitable skull to rest it sharply against....or the fact that I was not answering questions..more like snarling a growl....because even when I look back at last week it really was a bit 'uphill' as things go...anyway a day at the sea was suggested. Now that in itself does not have me leaping around full of expectation because I know who has got to do the organising of picnic, car boot, animal tending when we are away, contact normal Sunday lunchers and tell them my Little Chef is closed and suggest youngest brings a mate to keep him occupied...but we set off bright and early in the rain full of the possibilities of a day in the rain in Aberystwyth..and this was supposed to make me less stressed?

It rained all the way to The Red Kite cafe where we had breakfast, swapped drivers and the 'who'll be first to see the sea' competition started. Now I know that on a really fine day just after the Red Kite and before you drop down into the next village you CAN see the sea but did not think for one minute that it was one of those days...but it was! Unbelievable! There we were in rain and mist looking at the most beautiful horizon of tropical blue sea and sky... I almost forgot to scream, 'I can see the sea!' (This poor lad that youngest has towed along..he must have thought he was out with the 'Barking' family!)

It was not a mirage and within twenty minutes we were throwing sticks into the sea for mad labrador who had never seen the sea before and thought it was good sport. BUT where was everybody else? Was there a hidden oil slick? Had we had the four minute warning? There were flags flying announcing 'Seaside Award 2007' but there was nobody else there to read them! We had the whole of the south beach to ourselves! The boys decided to wander off into the town no doubt to ogle the local talent as is the desire of two sixteen year olds and we walked the whole

length of Aberystwyth seafront from harbour to Constitution Hill in beautiful sunshine with jumpers tied round middles. There were more people on the North beach but not as many as one would expect for a sunny June Sunday which I thought was a bit odd but never mind.

By 2pm we were on the road to one of my favourite seaside towns Aberaeron.... where we parked our caravan for many years on a hilltop overlooking the sea and had massive rows about putting the awning up...until one windy August the awning ripped off and blew away..and that marked the end of our caravan holidays ....There are more pastel painted houses now ..there are whole terraces looking like bags of sugared almonds with their windows fringed with gaudy geraniums the size of cabbages. The boats tinkled in the harbour in the afternoon breeze and an old man sat in the shade in his braces with his corgi at his feet watching the world go by.

We had our very new National Trust folder with us and rustled through the handbook to find a local gem ...Llanerchaeron..(this is where the computer literate put in a 'linky' thing but I can't so very sorry) a gentleman's estate left to the NT in 1989. A house designed by John Nash, a working organic farm, a walled garden to die for and a wander through woods full of mature trees and round a lake where swallows skimmed the surface. There was a ladies' boudoir in pale green silks..it was circular... as if in a turret...strange because there were no turrets on the outside...the bedroom doors were convex...so when inside the room ..it was circular...very weird ... but very beautiful. The staircase yelled John Nash as did the glass atrium above the landing, apparently all the curves and circular tweaks are his trademark. The kitchens and scullery were open and full of interesting quirks. There was also a collection on display belonging to a Miss Pamela Ward..a lady much travelled and of independant means..who had bequeathed her collection of over 5000 items to the NT for safe keeping.

The walled gardens took my breath away and I only hope the pictures will do them justice. They are beautiful and amazing. The perfume of roses and herbs on a warm and humid Sunday in June behind the old brick walls was heady, the greenhouses were open and a vine marched through a broken window as if on a mission to escape. I could have spent a week in that garden and not seen the same thing twice.

We could hear farm noises from over the walls and eventually made our way out to find pigs and calves in old walled yards..stables now empty and huge cobbled courtyards waiting for hooves to clip clop across them.

Well they had to show us the door...it was well past closing time when we were prised away...funnily enough no-one was in any hurry to leave...not even the staff who carried on serving teas and vegetables as though it was mid day not nearly 6pm!

We meandered back to Aberaeron for a picnic on the harbour wall, a wander along the river to watch the trout while the boys went off talent spotting. Hymn music and welsh singing came from an open cottage door and I was back in the world of Dylan Thomas and Under Milkwood and Mrs Ogmore Jones.

We lazed over ice cold shandy in the still warm sun with our backs to the harbour wall as little boys worked out crab fishing strategies...and then we trekked home. As we climbed back towards the Red Kite Cafe we could see the windmills starkly white against a navy blue and purple sky .....and the rain started.

and for the two final cats....

The two 'babies' of the feline family are 'charley stripes' as above and 'Black Betty' as per the song of which I only know a couple of lines and no idea who sang it! Wheras Stripey will pose for the camera ...the hell bat will not. Both are related to Crocket and Scruffy cat having the same mothers but with 12 months and heaven only knows how many litters in between that we never knew about. Just why people will not have female cats speyed is beyond me. The mothers of these kittens started producing kittens before they were twelve months old and are now probably dead...

We started rescuing cats after the only cat I ever 'paid ' for had to be given up to a rescue society for its own good. Mitsibushy was a blue persian kitten I purchased from a breeder...only to find it was unwell....it had the greenapple quickstep...the two bob bits....you know what I mean....continually! I spent a fortune at the vets and eventually Mitzi had to go to Liverpool to the Vet University to be diagnosed. All her digestive tract had been rendered sterile by too many antibiotics as a small kitten......Great! So the special diet that was going to cost about £10 per week for her and her alone would be Ok if there were not other cats in the household...but there were! After much soul searching I figured we had done the best for Mitzi that we could by finding out what her problems actually were...the bill had now hit well into three figures! So it was with a heavy heart I contacted the Persian Cat rescue people who at once found Mitzi a home where she would be cherished and fed her special food and where she would be an 'only' cat.

In return I agreed to give a 'rescued' cat a home......we are up to seven now! They are a family in their own right and we watch their antics, their moods, their squabbles with pleasure. they are safe here well away from the road, with woods and fields to play and hunt in as they wish. They are all fed and watered daily...can come in and out as they wish...jabbed annually for cat lergys and have 'visitors' removed very quickly. I think I have done my bit in return for Mitzi now and there will be no more additions to the feline family! She says! What 'he' says may differ in the face of nice lady from Cat Protection....

..of medicinal things

A while ago I blogged about the book we compiled from taped memories of the elderly of the parish...in there were some pretty gruesome remedies for minor afflictions..some of which you may have seen me taunting En Peu with in the commenty bit for her gardener Loic..(my hero)

Just thought I would share a few and wondered if you had any more...

...'Children were given a weekly dose of Epsom Salts, Castor Oil or brimstone and treacle. Home made remedies included gorse blossom tea, yarrow tea and a mixture of butter, sugar and vinegar for sore throats, feverfew for headaches, greater celandine sap for curing warts...or a local person would be asked to 'charm' them away. Bathing with salt and water would prevent blood poisoning..and often did! Boils were treated with plasters of carbolic soap and brown sugar. An alternative was to fill a bottle with boiling water, pour this out and apply the steam filled bottle immediately with the rim over the boil. Very painful but very effective.' EG

..'If we had a bad throat mother used to get a piece of fat bacon, put it on a piece of paper and that's what we had around our neck. For coughs you took black treacle and bacon liquor. if you had a bad chest you would rub it well with goose fat. Mum always used to put a shallot in the oven, get that warmed up and put it in the ear for earache' PC

..'.I proabably had goose oil rubbed on my chest, we saved it in a jar, then of course you'd take the rest out when you was ploughing and put it on the wheel of the plough, you always greased things in them days. You had no oil. You'd pull the wheel off the cart, grease it with goose grease and put the wheel back on'. JP

.....'For a sore throat..a sweaty unwashed sock could be tied around the neck....and a remedy for goitre, a common ailment in mineral mining areas, was to put a live mole in a stocking and tie it around the affected neck..By the time the mole had died..the goitre would have gone!'

...'For warts ..a black snail was to be rubbed on the warts and then impaled on a blackthorn. As the snail dies and decomposes the warts disappear...if it proves difficult to find a balck snail an alternative was to cut an apple in half...eat one half, the other half to be rubbed on the warts and buried'

...'My granny had eighteen children but she buried two within a fortnight of each other with measles. Granny was expecting Uncle Harry at the time and her sister came from Manchester to look after her, bringing her little girl with her who had measles. These two little ones, one was two years old and one was three, died within a fortnight. The children dwindled down to ten, but she had one or two still born as well. I think originally she had twenty one! SH

Can I hear anybody muffling a scream yet?


Has anyone got any more gruesome medicinal cures? Before we all get burnt at the stake that is!

Monday 18 June 2007

This date appeared on dentist appointment card and physio appointment card...thing is..the dentist is in Ludlow right at the bottom of Shropshire and 30 miles from home and the physio is in Oswestry right at the top of Shropshire and another 30 miles from home! Good job I am driving again! Anyway have been to Ludlow and dentist and came away with nothing to be done...well there is a bridge awaiting me at some time but I just feel that I am being fiddled with enough at the mo and it can wait a while.

What a miserable day..its like November here with clinging grey mist lying low on all the hills and drizzle. I was looking forward to the drive to Ludlow ...it really is pretty with the Longmynd hills really 'in your face' as you leave Lydham and head for Craven Arms. But the Longmynd was not even visible this morning and all the cars had headlights on. And this is June? Anyway forget the weather and come on in to my sunny room....the coffee is on and I've bought a big bag of cherry scones from Price's the bakers in Ludlow and they're still warm. The picture is The Devils Chair on the Stiperstones from the road by Hope school. Yes...go on ...you can stick your feet under you on the old settee..we all do...

Where was I ...Oh yes Ludlow....I worked in there for five years as Court Manager...a small Court and where they always put newly promoted mangers to 'cut their teeth' so to speak. Middle son was very new and went to nursery there for four years...he gets totally mortified when I remind him of the ballet classes he went to while in Ludlow. Well.... he had very bad ear infections as a baby and they seemed to knock his balance and speech about...nursery lady suggested ballet classes might help his balance and off he went twice a week...the only boy with about thirty little girls! He loved every minute of it! Never told his mates at home though and that sort of news never travelled....unless mother was feeling particularly evil...tee hee! Yes.. it did wonders for his balance... if not his street cred!

It was a really friendly place to work and even now some 15 years later I can still walk down the street and find a face I recognise and we have a natter....not like Oswestry where I spent 10 years and never knew a soul! I went to find Broadhurst's the material shop in the hope of some pinking shears and...its shut..and gone...Oh dear! Just where is one going to buy deck chair canvas from now I wonder ?...it was a weird shop but lovely. The journey back from Ludlow was just as miserable in the rain but I noted a few changes...what is that big place behind the Clive Arms at Onibury? Looks like an organic food centre of some sort...will have to come back soon and have a sprot round. Craven Arms doesn't change much ..still reminds me of a one horse western town with the last chance saloon on the one side and the undertaker on the other...mind you I do have a tale about that last chance saloon....or The Craven Arms Hotel! I was actually barred from there...maybe still am ....never been back since that night!

We had gone on a works outing from the hospital where Husband (Mark 1) was a staff nurse, to see Del Shannon of all people. A supper was included in the ticket price and I think the coach was full so that meant there must have been over 50 of us. The evening did not start well...the supporting act was a comedian who was dire! Someone threw a tomato and sure enough another one or fifteen followed. The management pleaded for order and the Craven Arms locals blamed the incomers...us! On came the main man but if he was Del Shannon then I was the milkman! This was an old man with long white hair, a voice that sounded like a creaking gate, and either drugged or drunk! Ever heard 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight' sung in an old peoples home? I think the consensus of opinion was that the whole thing was a 'rip off' and the shouting started, fights started...Craven Arms is famous for fighting just in case you didn't know. Saturday nights used to be the best when the Clun lads came down for their weekly scrap! Chairs started flying and I went to the loo...as you do...only to be met by a fierce looking girl with drawn on eye brows in black...who, as quick as a flash belted me in the face. Charming! Not one to 'turn the other cheek' and forgive and forget...I belted her straight back..and wow did we scrap..I cringe at the memory! Eventually we were all forcibly removed to our awaiting pumpkin and white horses just as the police arrived. The manager escorted by the men in blue got on the coach and shouted 'YOUR'E ALL BARRED ...INDEFINITELY'....as if any one of us would ever come back! I wonder where everybody on that coach is now and if they tell the same tale? Many of them went on to rather illustrious careers in the Health Service and I see their names now in very important high places and wonder if they still giggle at the night they got barred from The Craven Arms Hotel? Guess who strolled into Ludlow Court one fine afternoon a few years later...I recognised the eyebrows! She said looking very closely at me...'Don't I know you from somewhere?' ....'Who? Me?.....Surely not!' I said whilst thinking..I've still got the scar on my nose you cow!

On we go down the A49 and turn left for Bishops Castle and Mid Wales...the PYO fruit farm where I used to stop with son on the way home on a summer evening to pick strawberries for tea, where I first bought asparagus from and where the gooseberries are as big as golf balls...I was going to stop today for some strawberries but rain has stopped play. What a crying shame after all that lovely weather in April that in rains like this now in the PYO season. Over to Lydham through the fields of the Walcot and Plowden estates and to the Harvest Whole Foods farm shop where you can find just about every herb or spice known to man and a few more besides. I could just stand in that shop and breathe in all those spicey, herby aromas all day but don't think they will appreciate it so I settle for some dried apricots, coconut, almonds, ginger and oats and I'm on my way down the home staight.

Should really be making jam for the Bog Visitor Centre..have found the message....'Yer shelf's empty!' on the phone.. but not enough time really before I am on the road again.. so I'm here instead ..entertaining...more coffee? There's some scones left in the bag...


This is the 'street' where we live...what does yours look like?

Remember those shy sheep we purchased on a day from hell last Saturday? I have seen them...lurking under the dead tree in the dip...where's the camera......got it with me for a change!

Got them......now how close can I get? Wow this is good...they are watching the dog, not me........Kim... stay right there....

Right purplecooers a lesson in farm livestock coming up.....these are Torddu (Badger Faced Welsh Mountain) sheep .....with Dartmoor lambs ...one of which does not appear to have been wormed yet! The black stripe must run from nose all the way underneath right to the tip of the tail. They were at one stage on the Rare Breed list but I don't think they are now. The sister breed is Torwen. We have six pure bred lambs on order to join these girls in August and eventually a pure bred gentleman will pay a visit .....you know the rest.....




Bodran...are you there? You have got me hooked on lookng at trees now! At mid day yesterday two strange looking women were stomping up the A488 in Hope valley to take pictures of trees no less! I was the one in the pink jumper and that was my little walking friend with me.....you know her...that one that comes in to read the blogs but is too frit of her computer to join in! Yes Caroline I know
you are reading this .... And Mountainear ...you will no doubt recognise this....what does it look like from your side?



Since I have been at this skool for wayward women and disfunctional dogs I have learnt a whole bagful of things about my computer I would not have done....but please do not ask me to do an avatar ever again.....phew that was a swine! Met loads of interesting people that do loads of interesting things, fallen in love with a one legged gardener with shellshock...bless him, got recipes and gardening tips...Countrymousie my sick arum lily looks well now in the rockery...and Sally Chateau...that lemon pud is a firm family favourite.....AND I am now learning what I can do with last year's birthday pressie from my lot....I think they had despaired....from one who was camera mad before digital...I virtually came to a standstill! Not now though....I am off and camera comes too.....all the time...just in case a spot a tree with features.....or something....