tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2805820187914226382024-03-19T01:48:44.198-07:00The Weaver of GrassWelcome to life in the Yorkshire Dales.The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.comBlogger4685125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-79804976934453917232024-03-16T03:14:00.000-07:002024-03-16T03:14:59.167-07:00Sunday morning early (ish)<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I switched on during my first tour of the bungalow to look at my e mails. I had some lovely photographs of their new house from friends who have moved from Devon countryside into Sussex and I was so pleased to see that they are surrounded by trees and open countryside. How good that they are still in such a lovely area.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">After twenty odd years of living in quite a lonely spot I had to move when the Farmer died. And being alone meant living near to other people. My back garden looks over the fields and I can't see another building - just one very large ash tree which the rooks who flew over the farm each morning have chosen for their late afternoon roost before flying over one more field, then the farm and then finally to the very large rookery which I suppose one can say they call 'home'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I am on the road into the estate and luckily the 'plot' opposite my bungalow is at present 'wild land'. I expect it will be built on eventually but at present it has a silver birch and a row of hazel 'trees' along the back edge and a few ash saplings here and there (cut back every year to head height) and plenty of 'hillocks' covered in grass. Here and there are clumps of daffodils just coming into bloom.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Now that I can no longer go out, this bit of 'open country' presided over by a little red mail box on a black stalk, is a great asset. Doesn't make up for the swallows who nest every year in the barns around the farm or the house martins who nest under the eaves of the house or the little owl who is diurnal and usually watched us from the same gate post on our morning walk, or the one song thrush who at this time of the year sang my favourite song.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I have spoken before about the neighbourhood cats and how they stalk among the hillocks on the waste ground - on the look-out for mice, voles - who knows what lives on the plot. Don't know whether they ever catch anything but they do a lot of sitting very still in one spot and then doing a 'balletic' pounce.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">But - surprise surprise - what did I see this morning at around 6am? The sky was blue (a rarity at the moment), the air was still, the sun was up and as I drew back the sitting room curtains guess what I saw???</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Hovering over the grassy hillocks opposite was a BARN OWL! And as I watched he pounced and came up with a tiny rodent in his beak and then he was away swooping behind the bungalows on the other side of the road. Was he the barn owl who used to check the paddock hedge late each evening (we could watch him from our kitchen window)? Maybe not - it is seven years since I left. But he has certainly started my Saturday morning off on the right foot.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Oh and just as an afterthought = yesterday, March 15th= was the 72nd anniversary of my first marriage and the beginning of 39 very happy years with Malcolm. And Malcolm would have been 100 in late April this year.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Nothing is forever - make the most of every day. </span><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com31tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-48677320013367945722024-03-14T03:33:00.000-07:002024-03-14T05:20:46.377-07:00Spring sweet spring.......<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">......is the year's pleasant thing - well it goes something like that anyway.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Well friends, however you look at it, next Wednesday is the Vernal Equinox, the day when the day and night are both approximately the same length. Of course this will be all 'mucked up' shortly when we get British Summer Time and have to get used to getting up in the semi dark again for a week or two.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">You, like me, may well still be wearing two sweaters, your room thermostat like mine, may well be set at 21 and the radiator may be hot so that you can keep putting your cold hands on it (pause in writing while I do just that).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">The North Yorkshire Community Policeman is still warning us about where there is floodwater and reminding those who drive not to risk driving through it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">We are supposed to be top in the Species Chain but really I do sometimes question it. We need the calendar on the wall to tell us it is Spring. And unless there is a sudden dramatic change our behaviour will not change on the first (or second) day of Spring. We will still be well-wrapped up in our winter jackets.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Gardeners may be out there 'topping' the grass on their lawns with a first gentle mow but they may well be nipping out between showers (and leaving ruts in the grass with their mower wheels).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">But my flowers in the garden know Spring is coming - primroses, tete a tetes, hellebores, mauve striped crocus, dark purple crocus and a very pretty pink flower which creeps about my garden as it will every year popping up in different places - all going ahead as per usual.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And Mrs Blackbird is sitting - us girls aren't daft you know - a snug nest in mid hedge is probably the warmest place to be in this wind (from the East and blowing across a North Sea before it reaches here).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">The sky is full of heavy black clouds, the East wind is cutting cross the top of all the flowers, the sun is unlikely to show its face today around here and everyone passing has the hood up on their anorak and every dog passing is still wearing its fashionable winter coat.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And I am signing off and going to make a cup of hot chocolate to drink with my kit kat. So I'll sign off with what I usually say at this time of year (especially for you Tom)</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">"Loveliest of trees the cherry now </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> is hung with bloom along the bough.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> and all along the woodland ride</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> is wearing white for Eastertide"</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> A E Housman</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> 'A Shropshire Lad'. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">****</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">My son bought me the collected poems of Roger McGough for Mothering Sunday. Sifting through it after writing this I came across a poem called 'Trees cannot name the seasons'. He says it so much better than my post above does. Google it - it is beautiful. Enjoy.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span> <br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com23tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-33937941821496000012024-03-11T04:57:00.000-07:002024-03-11T04:57:05.667-07:00Mountains out of molehills grow!!<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">Yes I am afraid that tends to be the side effect of time on one's hands. Here is the tale - laughable in the end and ridiculous.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Yesterday, Sunday, Mothering Sunday, a day when my usual Sunday visitors were otherwise engaged, dawned cold,dull and promising to never get 'properly' light. My carer came and went, hot choc poured and two biscuits, false flames on my electric fire for comfort, table lamps on to make it look a bit warmer, central heating up a notch, I settled down with the Sunday papers ( three quarters of which always get put in recycling unread!)</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">My son was due to come round to move my Sim card into my new phone and to sit and chat for a while. We had a lovely chat. Changing the Sim failed - we need some sort of adaptor which he duly ordered and is coming today (good old Amazon Prime) - yes I know some of you will disapprove of using Amazon but believe me - when you are slowly dying off, are immobile more or less, never feeling quite 100% - it is wonderful to need/want something, press a button and know that that something will arrive within 24 hours.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">All was lovely and peaceful - we had a lovely morning. It was as I closed the door after his departure that I noticed it. Slap bang outside my front door, on the edge of the lawn, there was a large dog 'turd'!!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I can't bend down to remove it. It had to stay until either another visitor arrived or my evening carer came.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">How had it got there? </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Had a stray dog wandered up my lawn? I never see a dog wandering unattended. Most of the dogs I see are expensive pedigree dogs (almost a compulsory attachment on my estate) so I doubt it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Had one of the dog walkers taken umbrage at the way I sit up straight in my chair when a dog walks past, so that I can see it properly. Ageing eyesight means I get a clearer view. And I take such pleasure in seeing the dog, guessing its breed (not always easy as there is such variation). Did the walker perhaps mistakenly think I was making sure any pooh on my patch was picked up and bagged? Had he thought ' I'll show the nosey old baggage that it is nothing to do with her'?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And so dear reader I spent most of the afternoon (between TV Crufts) pondering and making the whole episode into a mountain of anxiety. Was he going to keep doing it? How did he get up to my front door unseen?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">By the time J, my evening carer, came I had got quite 'hot under the collar' about the whole episode. How long would the aggravation go on for? How could I let he or she know that I meant them no harm but just loved looking at their dogs?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">J looked at the offending turd in the gathering dusk and came up with the comment, "That's not a dog turd - its more like cat pooh!"</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Had one of W's Bengal cats been around? W is often my evening carer and they often follow her here - she only lives about six doors away. On well that's a relief then - just a one off - can stop worrying.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">As J went after helping me into my dressing gown she was armed with a pooh bag to pick up the offending object on her way out. I was much relieved and reassured that it was not after all the start of a 'hate campaign' against a nosy old bag who should find something better to do than be sitting there on permanent 'pooh watch'. As I sat back in my chair much happier the sitting room door opened and J held up the offending 'turd'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">It was a brown curly leaf.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com43tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-40770980104235187002024-03-06T02:50:00.000-08:002024-03-06T02:57:26.336-08:00Human Nature<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Strange thing Human Nature. As my father used to say 'Everyone's funny except me and thee and thee's a bit peculiar'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Yes - in the main we have all got two arms, two legs, a head and a body and all the dangly bits that Nature added to make certain we don't die out as a species. But there the similarity ends.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Reading The Times this morning over my "after breakfast" coffee just endorsed this view. Do you remember the (very good) 1995 TV adaptation of "Pride and Prejudice"? If you watched it and you are a woman then I hardly think you need reminding of the moment when Mr Darcy walked out of the lake towards Elizabeth with his very wet fancy shirt sticking to his body. (Pause here while I compose myself - I might be 91 but some things keep going to the bitter end).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">But what endorses my view on Human Nature is that at a Sale in London this week that same shirt (dry and just an ordinary rather fancy shirt but without Colin Firth inside it)was bought by somebody (wait for it) for £25,000!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">If you had £25,000 going spare what would you do with it? Invest it? Buy Premim Bonds? Give it to a needy friend? Give it to your child towards a deposit on his/her first home? Buy a new car?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I could go on with that list for ever couldn't I? Money buys THINGS. Money doesn't stop wars. Money doesn't stop young people dying. Money doesn't stop Homelessness or people starving all over the world. There is truth in the statement that 'the rich get rich and the poor get poorer'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And would you believe that just because Victoria Beckham had to use 'Cool Crutches' when she went to the Paris Fashion show, same black 'Cool Crutches' searches rose by 350 % and sales increased by 70%.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Try explaining that to a starving Palestinian, or a homeless young man sleeping under a leaking shelter on a pouring wet night, or a man or woman from Afghanistan who has struggled across half the world and is crossing the Channel as I write this, in a boat not much more seaworthy than a child's plastic paddling pool.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Human Nature has a lot to answer for.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span> <br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com35tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-80524479286301477812024-03-01T05:54:00.000-08:002024-03-01T05:54:17.582-08:00Love<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">I apologise for the absence, not in any way anything to do with my illness but simply to do with not having time. I cannot begin to tell you how busy I have been this week - some days having as many as seven or eight visitors; it would be so good to ration them but, sadly, life doesn't work like that.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Far back in the "innocent "days of my childhood and teenage years, as a country child in a county which might be the second largest (Lincolnshire) in the country but probably because of its isolation and its large amount of land reclaimed from the sea, was - in pre-War days - I guess rather lagging behind in its efforts to 'keep up' with the then 'modern' thinking, Leap Year to us just coming into the idea of "boys" as something interesting rather than something to avoid was important.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">(I meant this post to be put on on the 29th February but I am a day late and apologise.) I think we rather thought that a woman could actually 'propose marriage' to a man rather than the other way round on this one day every four years.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Was this common to the whole country in those far off days or was it just in our "backward" neck of the woods? (And please don't tell me we weren't backward in coming forward. Our total lack of sophistication when compared with teenagers in large towns and cities was no mean thing.)</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I was lucky (well I consider I was) in that I married a well-travelled, sophisticated man ten years older than me. He pulled me up by my shoelaces so to speak. He taught me that Romance, Love, call it what you will, is something quite different from the images we were brought up with. One should not get carried away by a bunch of red roses on St Valentine's Day, by a mental image of happy ever after once the knot is tied. As I said in my "poem" of a few weeks ago in this blog - small everyday things add up to more than any "gaudy bunch of red roses".</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Which brings me to today's title and to Matthew Parris's Notebook in this week's Times. One paragraph "Poetry in Motion" in which he talks about 'love hearts and schmaltzy verses" being alright in their place but forget St Valentine, forget that extra Leap Year Day. What really matters is a much more sensible way to see "Love" as expressed in the ordinary, everyday things. As he says - "fixing a leaky cistern in the toilet" or "emptying the dishwasher" or in my poem bringing me the first golden marsh marigold from the beck, or a beautiful partridge feather picked up in the field.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">LOVE is such a funny word isn't it? We use the word so often: "I love to see the rooks flying over a backdrop of a pink dawn"; "I love my dog so much - I can't imagine life without him by my side", " I do love Seville Orange Marmalade on Sourdough Toast with my morning coffee".</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">The word has become too commonplace. 'Living together' I understand has now become more popular than 'Getting married.' 'Easier' say the cynics - no great torment of divorce if it doesn't work out. Very true and perhaps the way forward. In my day many, many couples stayed together not because they still loved one another but because a woman leaving her husband and taking their children with her was just not possible in those days before child benefits and suchlike.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">The young seem to view life, having children, finding a partner, everything to do with the progress through life, in a totally different way from how it was viewed when I was young. I am not for one moment suggesting this is a retrograde step. Far from it. I think the young in this respect have a far more realistic view of life than we did (if we thought about it long term at all - I am not sure we did). I am reminded of the last verse of Robert Herrick's 'Gather ye Rosebuds' which is advice to a young lady:</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So be not coy, but use your time</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And while ye may, go marry.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">For having once but lost your prime</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Ye may for ever tarry!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">May we never return to that kind of thinking. Womens' Lib may still have some way to go but don't let's go backwards.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">St Valentine's Day, Leap year, may now be viewed almost with amusement. But 'real' love is more about cooking the dinner if you are first in, sticking the washer on when you see a pile of school football gear piled on the kitchen floor by an open washing machine door, putting the bins out. Oh and the odd bunch of flowers/box of chocs/surprise meal of your partner's favourite food never comes amiss. Let's keep things in proportion.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-42200755041632387302024-02-26T04:59:00.000-08:002024-02-26T05:02:53.832-08:00Today's the day<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">At least it is for those two tete-a-tete daffodils who, at the first hint of a sun-ray reaching them, decided to open their petals to greet it. Sadly, by the time they really managed it the sun had gone behind a cloud as it crossed over on its way out to sea(I hope), The weather man says there will be the 'odd bright spell' this afternoon so perhaps they won't live to regret it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I am still quite well and enjoying a somewhat limited life - but as that situation has approached stealthily rather than happen overnight I have gradually adapted to it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">An hour's chat morning and evening as my Carers scurry around doing their allotted chores - lots of laughs and a good start and end to the day. (7am morning shift and 6pm evening). I am still able to put myself to bed thank goodness and need only to remove my dressing gown and slippers.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">The middle of the day passes quickly - various friends pop in (yesterday T and S came for the usual Sunday chat with tea and kit kats and as they went D and J, my gardeners and friends, arrived with a very large bunch of roses. Red ones, yellow ones and apricot ones. This morning they have all opened out and the apricot ones in particular are an absolutely luscious colour.)</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Already this morning soon after J, my morning carer, had gone, friend and carer K arrived on her way back from Tesco with some bananas to top up my fruit bowl. She arrived in windy weather, cold with bright sunshine, and stayed a quarter of an hour for a quick chat before going home to put her frozen stuff in the freezer before it began to defrost. Now it is cloudy and light rain is falling.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">When I read Rachel and Derek I feel I shouldn't complain about a little rain shower - really poor old East Anglia has suffered greatly throughout February (and I rather think most of the winter) with awful rain. I suppose it is the price they pay for sticking out into the North Sea and catching the worst of the cruel East Wind. I don't know about them but I always feel rather smug up here in the North of the country when the weather map shows horrible weather in the South and sunshine up here (a somewhat rare occurrence though).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Nothing much to tell you today. Last evening, after two lovely visits from friends, I was very tired indeed. I made myself a milky drink and dozed until time for Channel 4's 'Great Pottery Throwdown' - last night was a real cliff-hanger with tears never far away from the contestants left in the competition (and I suspect many of the viewers too).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Today is quiet so far. Mondays usually are these days but thinking back to my young days when Dad lit the copper before going off to work and Mum slaved away in the wash-house washing heavy twill sheets (no non-iron fabrics in those days) and lugging them in the clothes basket down to the line across the lawn to peg them out after first putting them through the big old mangle with wooden rollers (keeping a close eye on the weather) - Lincolnshire, the second largest county in England, carries on North from East Anglia and is not noted for blissful weather on Mondays - in those far off days the obligatory 'wash day'.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-73889037624368622302024-02-24T04:18:00.000-08:002024-02-24T04:22:39.736-08:00B.B.B.*<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">It is a glorious "Spring" February day here - bit chilly with it (sharp frost this morning) but a beautiful, unblemished blue sky. All the birds in the area are singing their beaks off and every single flower out in my garden is singing.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I couldn't resist a walk round the garden so I put on a topcoat and walked out onto the patio (in my slippers!). All the golden crocus were out - and the snowdrops, the winter primroses in all their bright finery and two tete-a-tete daffodil buds, sitting next to one another, are having a discussion about whether to open or not.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">One clump of very large purple crocus had been decimated by the frost. Three of the flowers were laid flat on the soil, cut down by it. They were close to the edge and I could reach them - each had a long white 'stalk'- almost inviting me to pick them. My farmer loved purple crocus so I brought them in and put them in a specimen vase by his photograph in the sitting room and lo and behold within five minutes the flowers had opened wide - their bushy stamens are thick with golden pollen and they look superb. I don't expect they will last long. That is three that my solitary bumble bee will miss if he calls again today.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">On a wider front I am reading again -dibbing into here and there - a book my son bought me years ago - 'BETTER THAN FICTION ' edited by Don George. It is 32 true travel tales from great fiction writers (Isabel Allende, Joyce Carol Oates, Jan Morris and many more). Over breakfast this morning I read 'A visit to San Quentin' by Joyce Carol Oates. Not jolly reading by any means but her standard of writing was so brilliant that I was there with her. If you like travel writing give it a whirl - I'm sure you'll enjoy it. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">As I look out of the window nothing much is moving. A couple of hedge sparrows are hopping along the top of the wall and - as usual - Mr Blackbird is showing off in the hawthorn. Incidentally I asked about Hazel catkins and Derek kindly let me know that on the Reserve they are full out. If you are reading this Derek, the sun is really bright on the hazels I can see from my sitting room window and here too the catkins are waving in the breeze.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Yes - Spring is winning the battle. Enjoy your day.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">*In case you are wondering B.B.B. in the title stands for "Big, Bright and Blowsy" - a good description of my three purple crocus.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com25tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-69384386801595301972024-02-23T05:52:00.000-08:002024-02-23T05:52:00.999-08:00Transitoriness<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Chatting with Derek on e mail this morning about sleeping - how long we sleep Thinking about things after reading his e mail, I got into another 'stream of consciousness'(see yesterday's blog about such things) which has gone on all morning more or less.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I did the Mind Games, read my e mails, cursorily read bits of the Times which were not depressing, but all the time I was thinking on and off about the transitory nature of life. .</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Last night I watched 'Dynasties' on BBC 2. It was about Macaque monkeys and their way of life. About who was the boss of the troop (always a male of course but then they are bigger and stronger and that is what matters in the animal world). About how you really had to fight to be the boss and when you got there it was a constant strain to keep there. You needed eyes not only in the back of your head but on each side too. And when a male who was bigger/stronger/more wily picked the right moment it was very easy to be toppled off your perch.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Then this morning I read how the writer moved to the country almost 'on the spur of the moment' during Covid (time to really 'think about things' for so many who were isolated) and I thought of Robert Frosts's 'The Road not Taken' (yes I have a 'Butterfly Mind') - how when we come to a metaphorical fork in the road we have to decide which fork to take - often having to make a quick decision rather than pondering on it for days. And how such decisions can in an instant alter the whole course of our lives.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And as Priscilla and I did our 'fineweather' circuit of my garden in chilly sunshine I stood and watched my first bumble bee of this year as he investigated every flower then moved on. Hopefully he would find pollen, enough work to keep him going to get back 'home' before he ran out of steam - otherwise at this time of the year it would mean the end for him.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And I thought about what a short time we are here in the giant scheme of things. How the tiniest of decisions - pondered on for days or made in an instant - moves us on to the next stage in our lives.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Here we all differ don't we. Some of us think hard at a fork - shall I do this or shall I do that? Others go headlong into a new adventure - go to the Antarctic, climb Everest, go to Glasto, move house, decide to marry (or these days 'shack up with), change careers, row the Atlantic. the list of possibilities is endless and often we make the wrong choice. But it all builds up to a life lived.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">We are transitory beings - flitting from flower to flower, deciding where to settle and I suppose hoping for the best of outcomes. And then one day we are gone. And in a couple of generations we are forgotten - that is unless we have written a book or won Wimbledon, or fashioned a beautiful garden or a fine building, or 'ruled' a country or some such.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Or to quote Macbeth we are mostly poor players who strut and fret their hour upon the stage and then are heard no more'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I suppose the moral of all this rambling is - don't look back and regret - move on and enjoy every minute.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span> <br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-40353422298390329252024-02-22T02:27:00.000-08:002024-02-22T02:32:44.448-08:00Stream of consciousness<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">Good morning on a dull, wet and typical February day - and commiserations to anyone down the Eastern side of the country as we are under dull, dour February skies. But Spring is beginning to shout out all over knowing it will win in the end, so let's square our shoulders and get on with the day. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">When the 'solitudes' begin to close in - as they inevitably do when one is on 'end of life' care - suddenly memory becomes incredibly important. I usually wake around 5am - as I go to bed around 9pm (apart from the odd evening when there is something tempting on television) and I rather look forward to that hour when I can lie warm and relaxed and let my mind wander wherever it chooses to go.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">This morning I woke up playing music. For almost twenty years my first husband,Malcolm, and I played with a group of musicians regularly each week and managed to get quite a lot of pieces up to performance standard. We also played with another husband a wife friends and really enjoyed just playing rather than 'working' to improve our performance. And this morning I woke to Bach's Brandenburg 4 playing in my head. And I thought of F and K - we loved having a go at this in the privacy of their music room where nobody was listening or criticising. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Now long retired and in their eighties F, who was a highly intelligent man in a top job in a hospital - a rambler, a musician, a committed Christian, friend and helper to many - a really lovely man, has dementia and can no longer remember the music he used to play - or the friends he used to play with.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And I thought of our playing, of our walks together in the Clee Hills of Shropshire, and on the Long Mynd and of visits to Scotland to stay in a cottage in Kincraig and our wanders in the surrounding countryside (nothing too strenuous).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">All these ordinary, everyday things which we did - and took forgranted in a way. Now I can no longer walk unaided I can do them in my memory as I lay snug and warm in the early morning (and I never make mistakes when I am reliving them - no wrong notes, no groaning when I lag behind on a too long walk, no stumbling on stony ground.) How kind our selective memory is at this time of life.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">F can do none of this and I grieve for him and his solitude - so different from mine. And for K who looks after him with a mixture of love (they have been married a very long time) and sadness. As she says in her letter 'he can no longer remember the Brandenburg 4'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Tomorrow I shall have my float down memory lane - a personal journey, many of those with me are no longer around. Those who are will have a totally different memory of the same events. The memory is so selective (and sometimes so inaccurate). But my ' stream of consciousness' spurs me on to get up when the clock shows 6 and then I can potter around with my wheeled trolley getting my breakfast and my morning cuppa.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Have a good day - oh and if you live in the UK and have to go out - take your brolly.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com26tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-8822083150565363102024-02-19T03:47:00.000-08:002024-02-19T03:59:28.363-08:00Perky today!<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Feeling my old self today - long may the feeling last.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I am in no doubt that my garden keeps me cheerful. I suppose non-gardeners might not feel the same, but having been a gardener since I was a child I just can't imagine life without growing plants just outside my window.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">A friend called on Friday to show me some of her exquisite handwork - neat and precise (two strengths I never really achieved with my handwork apart from beading, a craft I enjoyed until trying to get the beading needle and thread through the tiny hole in the bead (having already spent a long time actually threading the needle) became impossible)). If you are reading this G then I hope you realise just how much I admire your craft work. And in case you think you are too precise you then let yourself go entirely with your highly colourful, hand-dyed material using wax-resist so that the colour and pattern burst out and dazzle. I do wish you had a blog so that we could all enjoy that colour.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">As one's end of life becomes visible even if on a fairly distant horizon (and yes I do realise I might fall on the garage floor on my way to the freezer at lunch time today) it concentrates the mind beautifully. So many things one worried about suddenly become unimportant and tiny things which were hidden in secret corners of one's mind pop out and loom large.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Marvel at the way the blackbirds suddenly seem to know St Valentine has woken up their 'flirting songs'. As I write this a male blackbird is singing his beak off in the hawthorn in next door's garden. I have no idea whether Mrs B is impressed because I am sure she has heard it all before. But I do know that come hell or highwater it won't be long before the pair of them will be wearing themselves out flying back and forth to my hedge with beakfuls of twiggy bits - I just hope they build far enough down in the hedge so that they are safe from bigger beaks.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">It's hot choc time (11.30) and an added Kit Kat but before I go I wonder if anyone out there can help me. Some time ago I read a verse on line somewhere which I thought was very beautiful. Now that it so appropriate for me I would like to find it again - but it seems to have disappeared. I write it here. Does anyone know where it comes from please?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">At this time I would ask three things</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">as the Solitudes round me close.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Spare me the sensitive nerve that sings,</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">the storm cock*</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">and the rose.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">*the storm cock is the Mistle Thrush</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Enjoy your day if it is warm (16 degreesC) and very sunny - unseasonable but welcome. As the doom-mongers will say - it won't last!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">PS. If you have access to The Times do please read Melissa Harrison's Nature Notes on Page 23. The uncompromising first sentence "Badger droppings are fascinating" might be a bit off-putting but the paragraph is well-worth the read.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span> <br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com38tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-41998378678222765222024-02-09T06:07:00.000-08:002024-02-09T06:07:49.688-08:00Typical!<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">Yes typical indeed. Just when we begin to marvel at the absolutely glorious sunrises (they were exquisite last week - especially when flocks of rooks chose to fly right across the deepest red part), just when folk began to say,"at last the dawn is coming that bit earlier and did you notice it was still light at half past five last night?" February chooses to remind us that Winter is not yet past. It obeys the Weather Forecasters on the TV - they said the snow would begin here in the foothills of the Pennines at around 8am yesterday - they were two minutes out. 8.02am light snow began to fall. By tea time the darkness had set in and it was turning to sleet. But February had the last laugh - the temperature went down a tad (minus 0.5 degrees C according to my carer's phone), what had been sleet turned to 1p sized snow flakes and when I went to bed there was about four or five inches of the stuff (sorry in an emergency metrics go out of the window quicker than a gnat's fart as a dear member of staff in my teaching days used to say - a male member I hasten to add as it is certainly not ladylike language).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">My milkman delivers my Friday milk at 5am. He walks across my front lawn and I haven't the heart to tell him to use the drive at that time in the morning. When I unlocked the front door and looked out at about a quarter to seven his footprints were melting nicely. And now - at 1.48pm according to this dear laptop - the cars have swished the slush off the road and into the gutters and there is green grass where his feet trod.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Apparently there were photographs abounding on Facebook of abandoned cars littered across the roads through Wensleydale (we are a mile or so outside the National Park and just in the 'foothills' of the Pennines so not so bad here).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Neither of my morning carers for today could get here on time. W had to go right into the Pennines for an hour before 7am (and managed it as much of the worst of it had melted overnight) and J couldn't get the car out of the garage.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So a rather different (and rather nice ) morning. I always get my own breakfast (porridge this morning - Flahavan's Organic Jumbo Oats) with the obligatory prunes, banana, grapes and orange juice. Two cups of tea. Times spot on cue at 8am, Mind Games until 9.30 and then half an hour of TV News on 231. A message from both carers. W to say she would call in on passing = she lives nearby = to bring in the milk and see if I was OK (I was) and one from J to say she would be round shortly. So here I am - showered, dressed, sprayed with Elizabeth Arden Toilet Water, de-whiskered (a secret from the Boudoir - everything might slow down when one is on 'End of Life Care' but whiskers just have not got the message yet).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">My Son is bringing my Grandson, over from Shanghai, later - that means a nice chat and I am so looking forward to it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Hope you are all coping with the weather here in the UK - it is set to get better over the next few days.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com39tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-21913216412251709552024-02-08T01:51:00.000-08:002024-02-08T01:51:24.420-08:00Busy<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">'Busy'. A pretty meaningless word I think. It means something different to each one of us. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">There was a time - in what seems to be the far distant past - when I was busy. Our bedsit (wash basin, kitchen cabinet, table with two dining chairs, two single beds, small wardrobe and small settee) - our very happy home for five years of our married life-and a full time office job kept me really busy and fully occupied - Saturday morning was bedsit cleaning morning. Then it was off on the tandem if the weather was fine.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">The arrival of a baby and when he was fourteen days old moving into our cottage in the Lincolnshire countryside - baby, new home, front and back gardens to work on from scratch (it was the old school which we had had converted so the surroundings were what had been playgrounds). I used to think I had never before known the real meaning of busy.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Teaching in a large comprehensive - first as Head of a unit for ESL, then as a Head of a large department and finally as Senior Mistress -made me interpret the word again.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Now - 91 - on end of life care - cancer known to be at least in colon, liver, lungs and now bones - it has a different meaning altogether. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">One tiny quarter of a hour activity means busy. The rest of the time I sit in my comfy chair (on a cushion aimed at avoiding sores on my bottom from sitting too long), do the mind games, make a pot of coffee, open the curtains all round the bungalow, sit down again, read the Times, get up from my chair, put my dinner in the micro wave, sit and eat it. Gosh I have been busy all morning.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Monday my Grand daughter, her husband and my two Great Grandchildren (7 and 2) called in on their way back home to Glasgow. They stayed for a couple of hours. It was so lovely to see them all. Gosh - what a busy time I had - chatting, laughing with them, generally catching up.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Tuesday my friend E came for sherry. Carer J provided us with a lovely scone each - and E poured the Croft Original - nice large ones! What did I do? Well I put the daffodils E brought me in a pretty jug, put it on my trolley along with the sherries, the scones I had buttered and two paper napkins and pushed it through to my chair. Two and a half hours of chat, laughter and reminiscence followed - lovely busy morning. Friend W called after lunch for an hour and then nearer tea time friend S called with the cash she had got for me. I slept well after such a busy day.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Yesterday? My cleaner D, who comes once a month to clean through the whole bungalow, came. Simultaneously my Doctor came for our half an hour monthly chat. What a brilliant Palliative Care programme we have. District Nurse, Palliative Care Nurses and the Doctor call each month to check on me. Doctor T told me that the whole team then meet once a month for the afternoon during which they discuss each 'end of life care' patient under their care idividually. Carer W came to help me get ready for bed (and brought me a bag of oranges picked the previous day from the orange tree in their garden in Spain!!) - I ate one as soon as she left. Watched a programme on Chimpanzees and how the 'top' male has to constantly plot and fight (and get 'allies' on his side by grooming them), drank my Ispaghula Husk drink and went to bed musing on them being one of our closest relatives and thinking we haven't evolved all that much. Phew - what a busy day - slept like a log (apart from numerous 'toilet' calls best glossed over). Phew and double phew - what a busy day.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Today? Nothing planned. Light covering of snow - that fine stuff you can hardly see falling but which covers all surfaces like a coat of paint. Off now to make a cup of hot chocolate, get a two-finger kit-kat (or maybe a couple of chocolate digestives (decisions, decisions), sit down and do the mind games. Am exhausted at the thought of it all - but at least the house is all clean and shiny and smells of polish.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Looking forward to seeing my Grandson - all the way from Shanghai (must remember to greet him with Ni Hao - the only Chinese word I know).</span> <br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com44tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-90832280795344275662024-02-04T08:33:00.000-08:002024-02-04T08:33:44.028-08:00Hello again<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">Hi everyone! Still alive and kicking - more lively some days than others. Sunday is a good day for me in that I have my dear friends S and T each week for a couple of hours. Today, as often, I have several jobs lined up for T - a letter to post in the box opposite (I can no longer go that far) and a message for the milkman in the morning in our secret place. He comes at 5am so there is no catching him unless I happen to be having a sleepless night. At present I am sleeping like a baby so no making cups of tea at dead of night.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Friend E is coming for sherry in the morning at 10.30 so I look forward to that - we always find plenty to chat about (as ladies who sherry always do).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">S and T went a while ago but I dropped off to sleep - perhaps as well as I intend to stay up until ten tonight to watch Simon Reeve's "Wilderness". It is a wonderful hour if you like travel programmes. The first episode was in the Second largest rainforest in the world (the first being the Amazon) in The Congo. Last week he was in the wilds of Patagonia with the Pumas who were magnificent animals - not by any means tame but certainly not afraid of humans.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Speaking of animals - in case you don't live in the UK you may not have heard of our escaped monkey! He escaped from his 'home' in a wildlife park somewhere in Scotland - somewhere near Kingussie I think - and has been 'on the run' for about a week - spotted now and again in various villages around the area. He became adept at dismantling bird feeders to get at the peanuts and villagers were I believe asked to take them in. But most of all I love the way he was finally caught: LURED BY A YORKSHIRE PUDDING put out for the birds.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">In these days when all the news is so dreadful - both at home and abroad - wars, stabbings, attacks with a corrosive substance, terrible, terrible days, isn't it good to have just a little bit of light relief?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">How are your gardens doing, those of you who live in the Northern Hemisphere. (Pam feel free to tell us of your Australian garden. We are within spitting distance of Spring now so it will give us something to look forward to). I have golden crocus, a few purple ones (they never seem to do as well as the 'ordinary' golden ones), snowdrops, Helleborus Niger - four plants all in full flower with snow white flowers and a host of different coloured Winter primroses - red, orange, yellow, cream and purple. The one or two really sunny days have brought them out. Today is dull, windy and chilly with that thin, drizzly rain than soon gets you wet through.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I am just going round drawing blinds and curtains and washing up ready for my carer coming at 6pm to help me get ready for bed. I have one night each week when a carer doesn't come but I think shortly I shall have to have her as it is becoming harder by the day. Last Friday I accidentally pressed my lifeline button while getting ready for bed. My answer button machine is in the sitting room so I didn't hear her asking if I was alright. Alarm bells must have started ringing as she telephoned me on my mobile (I always sleep with it on my bedside table) to make sure. Lifeline is a really excellent service. Do any of you have it?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Hopefully back tomorrow. See you then.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com40tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-81168271337283638672024-02-03T08:08:00.000-08:002024-02-03T08:08:29.730-08:00A Short Post.<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">John (Going Gently) has given me a 'kick up the knickers' to say I have to keep going. Thank you John. I absolutely must not give up. One of my daily drugs became unavailable, another was tried and was not helping at all - at last an alternative seems as though it might be going to 'work' (only started on it yesterday) so hopefully I will be back. In the meantime just a short quote from today's Times which will make us all - whoever's side we are on (I am on neither or both whichever way you choose to look at it - believing I know nothing about the real situation so I am better not taking sides):</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">It is 55 years ago today when - in 1969- Yasser Arafat was appointed chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation. What more can anyone say? But we should all be aware of the fact and ponder on it.<br /></span></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span> <br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com35tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-63082124296161862592024-01-29T03:55:00.000-08:002024-01-29T04:02:32.285-08:00Janus<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">Yes he has a lot to answer for this year hasn't he? Two-faced as he is he has sent storms, floods, a volcanic eruption in Iceland; then he has taunted us this week with the warmest day ever recorded:19.6C in a most beautiful little village in Wester Ross in Scotland (hotter than Rome or Cote d'Azur!). As the two-faced one disappears for another year he has one last taunt - for us here in the Yorkshire Dales - a dark, dismal, pouring-wet day. It is 11.20am here - I have completed The Times Mind Games (well, the ones I do every weekday), read my e mails and answered the one or two that needed an answer, cleared out my Spam and Trash files and I am sitting at my Laptop and he is still beating on my window. Yesterday for the first time in weeks my patio was completely dry.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">My garden is steep and is landscaped with a couple of retaining walls to hold back the rockery. Where the bottom wall meets the patio there is a row of small drain holes all the way along to allow the water to drain out - and drain out it does. Until yesterday. Suddenly all the surplus water had drained away. Back to January 'normal' now as Janus empties gallons of the stuff out of great black storm clouds. I, like most people in this country at least, will be glad to wave goodbye to Janus - the two faced one - the day after tomorrow. And then folk will speculate on what February will bring (I don't think he is named after a god). One thing is certain - the old adage 'January brings the snow, makes our feet and fingers glow' does hold any longer does it?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I don't want to go on about 'the good old days' but I do know that when I was a child the sledge was always at the front of the shed, given a cursory wash and brush up and ready to go. I would hazard a guess that there are very few sheds on this estate that even hold a sledge.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So, brace yourselves for February in the sure and certain knowledge that anything might happen where the weather is concerned - hottest/coldest recorded day - one year during the six years I have lived here - we had snow and it lasted a fortnight on the ground; another year we had absolutely no rain at all in what used to be called 'February fill-dyke' in Lincolnshire when I was a child.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I wonder what would happen if we did away with months and consigned their names to the history books; decided to just have one big year with no such things as seasons (they no long hold good do they?). That would mean we are on day 29 this year.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">By my calculations (maths of any kind not my strong point) that would make the new tax year begin on day 97 and my 92nd birthday (if I am still here) will be on Day 305. Fancy the idea?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Just a thought but I bet it would smarten up our arithmetic by the end of the year.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Have a good day/<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com31tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-8179519765618423212024-01-25T03:11:00.000-08:002024-01-25T03:11:08.348-08:00Nature or Nurture<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">The eternal argument which is never settled. I remember discussing it during Teacher Training over fifty years ago. My son and I fell into discussion about it only last evening.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">My son reminds me so much of my first husband - my son's father. With both parents practising musicians it was inevitable that he would grow up playing an instrument and I suspect he didn't so much choose the Double Bass as drop into a gap in the school orchestra (he went to a Cathedral School near to where we lived) and have a wonderfully sympathetic and inspiring teacher who everyone called 'Uncle Bertie'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I was always a reader/writer and have a love of literature - especially poetry and books about Natural History. My son writes very well and writing now that he has retired has taken over every spare moment when he is not being a Carer for his wife. I have to say his poetry and his writing in general has long surpassed mine - his use of language is now often 'out of my league'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">But my goodness me his character, his decisiveness, his 'no nonsense' approach to life, his enthusiasm for filling his life with things to do (ham radio, astronomy, keeping in touch with old friends) is his father through and through.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Me? I have my mother's insistence in almost excessive tidiness. When my main morning carer, J, who is the same, goes I get the first exercise of the day as I walk round checking that everything is in its place. I can't relax even if a cushion on the settee is out of alignment!!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">But from my father I have a love of the countryside, of nature in general and a love of poetry. And from them both I get a complete and utter love of the hare. My dad loved the hare for its fearlessness, its speed and its sheer beauty. I hardly dare tell you that my mother loved it for an entirely different reason! Jugged hare was her very favourite meal. She loved preparing it, she loved cooking it slowly in the fire oven (coming home from school I could smell it cooking as I turned down the drive at the side of the house. ) I hated it and always had something like a jacket potato instead. My parents would savour it and tell me that it was healthy to eat food which came from the open countryside. Much better than what my mother scathingly called 'shop bought'.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I love the hare still - I have books on the hare, a bronze hare cleaning its paws sits on my hearth, another smaller one leaps across the top of my bookshelves. They remind me of my childhood in the open fenland countryside of Lincolnshire where hares were plentiful. Years ago I wrote a poem on the hare - I leave you with it:</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">The Hare.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Dew flirt, <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Mysterious, wild thing of the ploughed earth-</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">birthing in the furrow and</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">living for the free, open ground.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Tales of mystery and magic surround you.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">How little we really know you - the wild one.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">'Familiar' of the goddess Freya as the black cat</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">to the witch.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">You stand tall, tipped ears erect,</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> meet my eye with your fearless gaze.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Then you are gone, leaping and flying</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">through the air in one gigantic burst of speed.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Sleep with your eyes open if you will.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Dance to the rhythms of time</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">as you have always done.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Shun taming.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Stay free. But</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">give me that occasional glance</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">to gladden my heart. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com50tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-2662275852967746562024-01-17T04:08:00.000-08:002024-01-17T04:08:48.798-08:00O Fickle sun - and other complaints.<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">It snowed - rather half-heartedly- here on and off all day. Miserable little-flake stuff. Then about 3pm it stopped and a ball of pale yellow appeared surrounded and slighty shaded by snow or snow clouds.. After this brief glance by golly it snowed - enormous great 'I really mean it' stuff. After about ten minutes it gave up just as it was getting dark. My evening carer chose to leave her husband's BMW on my drive (her car was at the garage) which then meant an urgent text this morning to my morning carer not to swing round my hedge into my drive otherwise she would cause a crash and last evening's carer would be up the creek without a paddle as they say.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Main roads clear, side roads skating rinks. Sun up bright and early, clear deep blue sky, brilliant sunshine, even colder tonight forecast.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So to today's thoughts. Do you have a list of Pet hates (not talking animals here necessarily - using 'pet' as an adjective)?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">As I have got to 'elderly' with little to do except wander about the house with my walker, watch the passers by, chat on the phone, greet callers and eat the lovely lunches J my main carer provides for me (Scotch Egg with jacket potato and salad today), I find that pet hates tend to fester and become more uppermost in my mind than they merit. So in an effort to rid my mind of the festering heap here are a few:</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Dog walkers who allow their dogs to poo on the piece of land opposite and because it is just a 'spare bit of land' don't clean it up if nobody is looking. I tend to sit up straight if I see it might be going to occur and regulars seem to look at me before turning and getting a poo bag out. Sometimes I am tempted to knock on the window but I fear getting a reputation of an -'old fussy hag' or worse.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Litter louts. I am lucky to live in an area where it doesn't happen much except on nights like Bonfire Night, Boxing Night, New Year's Eve, when cans, the odd bottle (a broken on on the bottom of my drive last New Year) and worst of all left over take-aways (will not mention s***) which my carer hates and I suspect on the odd occasion it appears is the result of youth/too much alcohol. But alleyways in our little town are apparently reservoirs of cans, bottles, even the odd old mattress. We have a jolly good collection service for domestic rubbish. Would a few yards further to a litter bin/ the tip/ be too much to ask?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And last, but by no means least and apologies for mentioning it (ladies of a nervous disposition look away now) men who feel the need to sit with their legs wide apart. I watch 'Mastermind' - love it - it always reminds me of just how little general knowledge I have. Some of the male contestants adopt this pose (a la Boris) and I find it objectionable. If their trousers are too tight and that is the only way they find comfortable to sit then buy bigger trousers. As a child/young woman my mother would correct me if I sat in what she called 'an unladylike manner' and that was in the days when girls/ladies never wore trousers. I hope these men are just adopting what is their normal way of sitting rather than making a statement, but wouldn't it be good if they realised that there are more 'gentlemanly' positions to adopt?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">There has been a pause while B, my District Nurse attempted - and eventually succeeded - to draw blood from the back of my hand.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Off to microwave my jacket spud now (not as tasty as doing it in the oven but too late now). Enjoy the sun - and I promise you it is creeping up a tiny bit every day - Spring is on its way.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com45tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-46826065345495772262024-01-16T07:52:00.000-08:002024-01-16T07:52:39.068-08:00Dulce Domum.<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">These days my brain does not seem to be fuctioning enough to read anything of any depth. I read The Times, do the Mind Games, put on a post when I can think of something to post about and then if I don't watch out subside into a semi-stupor in this weather. Today, determined not to do that, I c arefully ordered my Red File (if you haven't got one (or a yellow envelope which pre dates red files) it is probably because you are not yet on the endangered list (makes me sound like a rare mountain lion or something doesn't it). It is to be displayed in a prominent place in the hallway (on Welsh Dresser in my case) the DNR form (do not resuscitate) clearly showing for any visiting Ambulance man to snatch up in passing.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">However, fighting fit today - just lacking the will to do anything other than sprawl - I picked up one of my 'go to' books when my brain is in neutral. Kenneth Graham's 'Wind in the Willows' (with Ernest Shepard's illustrations) and turned to read one of my favourite chapters: Dulce Domum. Perfect for today. (Now really raining)</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">After a jolly day out together in mid winter Mole and Ratty have said goodbye to Otter and are off home to the fireside. They pass through a village as darkness falls and look in the windows where families are sitting round their log fires - Dads are knocking their pipes out on logs, children are playing games, the family is sitting round a table having tea, a cat is being stroked.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">They carry on, out in the countryside again and suddenly Mole catches a faint whiff of his old home and despite his happy new life with Ratty, Badger, Toad et al, he is desperately homesick. He tries and tries to not weep but can't help it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">To cut a long chapter short Ratty insists on taking him there. They go in, Mole dusts the furniture while Ratty lights a log fire. Before they can eat the meagre store cupboard food the field mice arrive carol singing, are invited in and because this is 1908 in "Willows Land" all the shops are still open a mouse is despatched by Ratty (with money and don't spoil it by asking where he keeps it) for all kinds of goodies. They eat a hearty meal, the mice depart and Ratty and Mole hop into the two bunks, pull up the blankets and are asleep.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">For a while I bask in the delightful scene that has been painted. Then I think of Gaza and the children and the image disappears. And to add insult to injury it has begun to snow again bigger, faster and heavier flakes.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com30tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-52359682252127418962024-01-15T02:50:00.000-08:002024-01-15T02:54:20.591-08:00Cold??<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I have just read Red's post. Where he lives he has stepped out to take sunny photographs in a temperature of minus 42C. If I could remember a) where my camera is and b)how to transfer camera to blog and if I could stop the pins and needles in my hands then I could step out and take sunny photographs here too in a temperature of plus 3C - when my carer came in at 7am this morning it was - to quote her bl***y cold.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">But I shall look on the bright side because - let's face it- a cold day with a beautiful apricot dawn (how fantastic the rooks looked as they chose the strip of deep apricot to fly over on their way to feeding grounds) and a temperature of plus 3C is far better than our usual cold, damp, foggy morning when the sun chooses to stay in bed all day.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">What can I see as I sit here multi-layered (even in an 'old lady' shawl) next to a radiator at 10.18am? Well there are primroses out - pale yellow ones and a couple of red ones. I think I can see a clump of snowdrops right at the top of the garden but that might be wishful thinking. But my Viburnum is covered in pink blossom and I have plenty of Helleborus Niger (Christmas Rose) in bloom. And plenty of Spring bulbs are oh well on the way with inch long green shoots poking through. Oh and a blackbird is singing atop the hawthorn tree next door and 'my' resident wren is quietly working its way along the dry stone wall at the top.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">What people miss when they are not interested in Nature. Sometimes my son and I have competition to see who can get the most answers correct on 'University Challenge'. He always wins. I think my usual average is about five - the odd poetry, the odd music, the odd geography in the old sense(ie when I was at school Geography meant Atlas)but mostly birds, wild flowers. Usually the University Students are pathetic - rarely able to name a blackbird or a starling. (I suspect, like the young people I see from my window they are too busy scrolling rather than strolling). I expect they would say the same about me not being able to answer anything on Quantum Physics (what is it?)</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Which brings me to a puzzle. For weeks there has been a bird hanging around looking rather sorry for himself. He is Jackdaw size, he walks rather than hops, he traverses my lawn poking his beak into the grass and getting grubs. Jackdaws are black. He is part black and part dark brown. No specific parts - just here and there. He stretches his wings a lot as he stands there and at first I though perhaps he had injured a wing and couldn't fly. Then he suddenly flew off (rather awkwardly) and the next time I saw him he was in the hawthorne tree next door. When he is on my front lawn folk often stand and look at him - presumably trying to identify him. We do very occasionally get a blackbird with a white wing feather (haven't seen him lately). Are some birds perhaps of questionable sex like we humans? Often the mostly drab females of birds have indiscriminate feathers (eg Mrs Blackbird who is more or less brown).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Almost 11am now so off to make a hot choc and get a two-finger kit kat from the tin as I pass it (as I am on my 'last legs' might even get 2 - after all that is only an ordinary kit kat size isn't it.)</span> <br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com44tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-46453209289613310762024-01-10T08:11:00.000-08:002024-01-10T08:11:52.745-08:00Big fleas etc<p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Oh dear - Covid seems to be back with a vengeance round here at present. But somehow, after lockdowns everyone seems to take it less seriously. A close relative of mine who has very many health issues has to keep clear of Covid as it is likely to prove very serious should she catch it. Both she and her husband wear a mask if they go out. These days folk look askance at masks in this country but I have been to several far east countries where certainly in large cities and crowded places in general most folk wear masks. But on the whole I would guess that most folk just carry on and many who do get Covid do shake it off in a few days.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I read in the Times today how studies in Brazil seem to suggest that Vegetarians and Vegans come off better where Covid is concerned. Will this prompt thousands to become Vegetarian?Vegan? </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">But it did make me think about how we look at diseases. When I was born in 1932 Pneumonia was a real killer, especially of babies and young children. I was the youngest of 5 children and out of us 5 two - Irene and Colin - died of pneumonia in infancy. We other three all had it but survived. We were born well apart (my sister was 22 years older than me).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">When I was growing up in a small Lincolnshire village the scourge was TB. Most families in our small village lost at least one member to TB and everyone was scared of getting it. My mother fed me up - had there been the variety of foods there are today I would probably have had a weight problem but being Second World War time and there being no way to get about except by bus or bike (and the latter was cheaper once the bike was bought ) plenty of leg-power was needed to get from A to B . That - and walking everywhere kept us all pretty fit. Or so we thought. But still the TB deaths carried on. Or did until I think (this is only a guess, so please feel free to correct me) antibiotics arrived on the scene.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">When I had my medical examination before going into teaching the doctor asked me when I had TB. I said I had never had it but he said X Ray showed up plenty of 'TB Scars'. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I do remember the advent of M and B tablets in 1938 (rather unimaginatively called after the producers May and Baker) and of course they were closely followed by Penicillin which I rather think was used to good effect during World War 2 to treat Winston Churchill's pneumonia.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Now antibiotics are bandied about like Smarties and many folk are saturated I understand. Folk seem to ring Medical Centres and ask if they can have an antibiotic as they have a throat infection and can't get an appointment to see their doctor for another three weeks.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And so back to Covid. Will the small study in Brazil mean a giant rush to Vegetarian? I doubt it.We have learned to take it in our stride - until the next nasty microbe makes an appearance. Until a 21st century version of Spanish flu wipes out more people than died in whichever war precedes it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Not a pleasant prospect from where I sit at my computer. I try to watch the News as rarely as possible but sometimes I feel compelled to switch it on. Some days it is as though Ukraine and Gaza and the dreadful killing and maiming, the hatred and the barbarianism don't exist any more. Either they come last as an add-on or they are not mentioned. Like Covid, like pneumonia, like TB - out of sight out of mind.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Everyone just keeps ploughing on. Is there an alternative? Can't think of one. </span> <br /></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com57tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-37555277440916250422024-01-05T06:56:00.000-08:002024-01-05T06:56:25.694-08:00Reveal all....<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">After yesterday's revelations about your horror of beasties in various form - from eight legs to no legs at all, from shiny to furry, from teeny to pretty big. My goodness me, I wonder if it did any of us any good 'telling'. I know what it did for me. It made me glad I lived in the UK where things to scare us are, on the whole, small and fairly harmless even those with the ability to invade our houses(thinking here of cockroaches).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">In the UK we always say that what happens in the US is always bigger. It certainly applies to your revealing of what you are scared of - snakes not the little UK adder but enormous and poisonous ones! And compare being scared of a mouse to coming face to face with a bear!!!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So I thought today - while we are revealing 'all' - let's all have another big reveal.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">What are your weaknesses? What can you just not resist? I will start the ball rolling by revealing mine (and no Tom if you are reading this - you do not feature as one):</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">1.Chocolate. Especially - Kit-Kats (last night's carer told me you can get bags of mini kit kats. I dare not indulge - I know I would eat a whole bag full. ) Buying two finger ones hasn't helped because I usually have two so I might just as well buy 'proper' ones in the first place.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">2. Clothes. Leather jackets come high on the list but now I no longer go out they are a bit pointless so I shall stick to the one I have, look at it longingly and wear it on the odd occasion I venture forth.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Sweaters are a close second. There was a time in the Autumn when my carer J, who is 'in charge' of my wardrobe, threated me with a fate worse than death if I bought another sweater (she washes, irons and returns my sweaters to the wardrobe). Then she bought me for my birthday TWO sweaters - just because she saw them and knew I would like them. Fitting them on to the wardrobe rail is an art form.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">3. Books. My philosophy is read a review in the week-end papers - if the book sounds interesting - click on Amazon Prime and it pops through the letter box the next day.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">4. Plants. Claire Austin's Handbook of Perennials 2023 (it sits by the computer as I write this) pops through the letter box and immediately I just have to have Geranium 'Patricia Josephine' whose Great Grandmother was selected from Claire's Mum's garden 'years ago'. Well for many years I lived within spitting distance of Albrighton so that is a good enough excuse isnt it?<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">All four survive on the one word TEMPTATION. how far back into antiquity does the word go I wonder?Why am I so weak=willed? Why don't I convince myself that if I had put all the money I have spent on plants over the last sixty years into a bank then I could probably have a week-end retreat in the Cotswolds? (add that spent on leather jackets, sweaters etc.etc. and it could be "For Cotswolds read the Riviera,)</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So come on all of you. Reveal your weaknesses. There is a school of thought that suggests that writing these things down is the first step to recovery. After all it is a new year and that is the time for resolutions.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com48tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-58394686820985187312024-01-04T05:42:00.000-08:002024-01-04T05:42:53.452-08:00From ghoulies and beasties<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">and things that go bump in the night.....</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Deborah Ross in Times 2 this morning speaks of avoiding the kitchen all one day because she saw a spider nestling in the recessed handle of her cupboard door. Said spider turned out to be a tomato 'haulm' (well from a distance, without one's specs, I suppose there is a similarity) Set me thinking about things that scare.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">STOP PRESS INTERRUPTION A flock of long-tailed tits has just systematically worked through my garden before swooping over the hedge to do the same next door - and a weak sun helped their search!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Is it just women? Are men scared of silly things? I am not speaking here of things which are worth being scared about. e.g. I have a dry-stone wall at the top of my garden. Occasionally a heifer pops its head over just to have a mosey. If instead a cheetah got up on its hind legs to have a look round I would be locked in and dialling 999 before you could turn round.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So - trying hard not to be sexist = I am sure some men dislike such things= I would guess that there are more women who are well ,if not scared certainly not happy to be in the vicinity of spiders, mice, creepy crawlies in general. So come on - lay your cards on the table. Let's have a straw poll on what if anything you just can't bear to be in the same room with (one of my dearest friends has more than a 'thing' about wasps (he will be reading this so yes, P, you know who you are.))</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Me?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Well I do remember in some foreign clime I found a praying mantis clinging to a fence. The farmer was already on the coach so I knocked on the coach window and pointed it out to him. He indicated that I should bring it on the coach so that he could have a closer look. I didn't, arguing that I didn't know how to pick it up (legs, wings or whatever were all in funny places) but in fact nothing on this earth could have persuaded me to pick it up.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Spiders? alright using the card and glass method of removal but definitley not alright if I have to raise my legs off the ground because I am causing a road hazard to its progress across the room.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Mice? Can cope if dead in mouse trap - otherwise forget it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Moths? Genuine fear!!!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Butterflies? Love them.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Rats? Never come face to face with a wild one - but no thanks. Years ago a male friend had a quite pretty white, brown and black patch pet rat. It slept in his knife drawer on a yellow duster. He was unmarried. Need I say more? I am sure you get the gist.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Hedgehogs? Adore them.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So come on. Reveal all. Psychologists say it is better to talk about these things so treat your personal revelations as the first step on the road to recovery.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com56tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-50842228492513810672024-01-02T04:47:00.000-08:002024-01-02T04:47:07.371-08:00Award from Laughing Horse.<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">Thank you so much those of you who recommended me for the Award - I am very touched that you think me worthy of it. Sadly my computer skills do not spread far enough for me to be able to transfer it to my page. I don't think anyone can do it for me but please be assured that although the Laughing Horse is not smiling/laughing at you all as your read my next post (coming shortly I promise) he is there is spirit. A Happy New Year to you all from a very wet, miserable day in Wensleydale.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com34tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-70401214001885783772023-12-28T07:30:00.000-08:002023-12-28T07:30:58.186-08:00Townie or Country Bumpkin.<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">Polly Vernon writes today in Times 2 about growing up in an "idyllic fishing town on the River Exe" - a quiet, unspoilt town where everybody knew everybody. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Sounds wonderful doesn't it? Except that she loathed it and couldn't wait to get herself off to the life of London.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">I grew up in a Lincolnshire village of about two hundred souls on the banks of the slowly moving River Witham - a quiet, unspoilt village where everybody knew everybody. I found it quite exciting to leave when I married and move a mere three and a half miles away to the life of the cathedral city of Lincoln.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">There any similarities between the two of us ends. I loved my country life. I knew every house in the village and, because I pushed my only doll in her pram (I call my doll 'her' but don't think there were any 'identifying features') every evening in Summer to meet my Dad and brother, I passed a good few of the houses and according to my family I could "talk the hind leg off a donkey" so talk to everyone I did, and cadged a few goodies on the way. It was very much a Methodist village so most folk went to chapel on a Sunday and from the age of 10 I played the organ for services. In other words - not much went on that muggins here didn't know about.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">From there to Lincoln was a small move - I had gone to the Girls' High School in Lincoln and one set of Grandparents lived there.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Then another very countryside move - only about 25 cottages in my next Lincolnshire village and me with a small baby. (and a Yorkshire terrier - and a husband of course). Everybody knew everybody but too small a village for all that much gossip.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">After that Lichfield - another cathedral city but much smaller - and here's a major difference - by then it was college as a mature student and then teaching. When you work you have little or no time for gossip about the neighbours and their doings.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Wolverhampton followed for 17 years of working in a large Comprehensive School. I knew my immediate neighbours but no-one else in our little road. Friends were fellow musicians and free time spent walking in nearby Shropshire Hills.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">And so - since 1987 - here in the Yorkshire Dales - first in a small village (joined local societies, was president of local W I, went to various craft clubs), then after the death of my first husband to a fairly isolated farm (Friday Auction Mart plus the weekly edition of the Darlington and Stockton Times kept everyone up to date on gossip/news)with the farmer.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Now into the nearby little Dales town and housebound. Here the best of both worlds - little town, in the country (my garden backs on to wide open fields, walk over three of them and I would be back at the farm I lived on for 23 years - same rooks or their offspring fly over at daybreak every day.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Big town/city/London? No thanks. A few Wolverhampton years (well 'few' of my 91) was good in that Opera/Ballet/Plays/Exhibitions on my doorstep (15 miles to Birmingham) were available as were music groups galore.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Now, cosy and snug in my bungalow, I know many of the folk on my estate, How? Get a dog. Tess, my dearly loved Border Terrier and I walked the paths on the estate twice a day when I first moved here 6 years ago. Every dog lover loves to chat 'dogs' and dogs, on the whole, once the original 'bottom sniff' is done with, are happy to communicate with one another too.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">From my window I see trees, gardens, birds, folk going past (many of whom give me a wave if they see me) - all keep me amused. Gossip, 'social claustrophobia', (everyone knows everyone else's business) as Polly Vernon says in her article? Oh yes. It exists in this little town for sure - as it does everywhere now with facebook I suspect. How do I get it? My carers are local. They keep me up to date!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Are you a bumpkin? Are you a townie? If so why? Do tell.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com55tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280582018791422638.post-76307037817021875792023-12-27T08:21:00.000-08:002023-12-27T08:21:57.784-08:00Yorkshire Pudding.<p> <span style="font-size: x-large;">Mention of Yorkshire Pudding on my yesterday's post brought forth one or two interesting comments. I wasn't born in Yorkshire but over The Humber Bridge in Lincolnshire (no bridge in my youth it was ferry from Barton on Humber to Hull). But it got me thinking about that good old favourite. I wonder how many 'tricks of the trade' our American bloggers know. I thought I would pass on a few tips. Maybe some of you can add to the pool because I have a feeling that a few tips might give some of you a few ideas. I do hope some of you don't think I am trying to teach my Grandmother to suck eggs.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">So here goes with a few tips gleaned from my dear old Mum in the nineteen years I spent at home eating good wholesome food at her table - and for at least the first ten of those years cooked in a good old fashioned cast iron fire oven. ( Rice pud - just rice, sugar, milk and a grating of nutmeg- popped in the oven at bedtime as the fire was burning down and being let die out- was sublime for lunch the next day)</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">1. YPs were traditionally made in a large roasting tin, not in little individual 'pattie'tins.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">2. The mixture was made early - before chapel - on Sunday morning and left to stand. On the return home, the roast joint ticking over nicely after its short, sharp searing earlier in the morning, the fire would be stoked up high and when the oven was really hot (no thermometer on these old ovens - just open the door and stick a knowing hand in between shelves) the mixture, after a quick stir, would be poured into a large roasting tin with a sizzling layer of beef dripping spurting up to catch your hand with a short sharp shock and left until it was crisp on the outside and hilly in the middle. Traditionally the joint would be placed on a slatted shelf so that the juices could then drop on to the pudding beneath but I never remember those days. But if the cook wanted her pudding to come out looking like the Mountains of Mourne the oven had to be HOT. (individual puds were never made in those days).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">3. Good gravy essential.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">4. What to do with left over mixture - or if you chose to make a new mixture - add sugar and sliced or cubed fruit - cubed or sliced cooking apple or - my favourite chunks of new rhubarb - and cooked in a hot oven. Then serve cut in pieces and dotted with blobs of good old fashioned farm butter and a sprinkling more sugar. Divine.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Off to toast a muffin.<br /></span></p>The Weaver of Grasshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13947971556343746883noreply@blogger.com40