Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

The ballet Giselle, was mighty fine as we no doubt expected and as always the WILLIES provided terrific value for money. 

Now for those that perhaps don't know, the Wilis are ghosts of the dead. Spurned women from doomed love affairs who inhabit the forests of Bavaria looking for men to exact their revenge on. 

The Corps de ballet at the Royal Opera House give the Wilis a precision and the visual delight of one of the ever changing clouds of Starlings once so common in the British countryside. They literally move as one, and their veiled entrance at the beginning of act two is a theatrical delight second to non.

Anyhow enough about willies !

We stayed the night in a very comfortable hotel in Bloomsbury, where I slept all night uninterrupted by bulldog feet, terrier scratching and the Prof's early morning iPad glare. There is noting quite like a long sleep in a comfy bed. 

I dreamt I was buying hats with Sandra Bullock 

Freud sort that one out, if you please.

Anyhow , as usual I am digressing.

I share with you now the fact that my hair is thinning. 

I only noticed it the other day when I took off my beanie after 24 hours solid wear. 

I've always had thick brown hair now although still here and others may have noticed anything drastic, I have noticed it has changed perceptively 

Now it's flecked with grey and feels like the mane hair of a pony

I look like my dad.

He didn't go bald, just a bit thin and it came as a bit of a shock to realise that my usually unruly mop is turning Gently South like the rest of me.

The Prof is practically bald and wears a jaunty hat to complete is usually natty ensemble. 

I may have to stick to my beanie to keep the wolf from the door.

I'm typing this on the train home. The Prof is on the next table across, his work spread out , his laptop busy. Opposite is an Asian couple. She has just caught me looking at her husband and has given me a hard stare.

I wasn't ogling him.

I was looking at his thick black hair........

......with envy.

Lovely Wilis

I didn't sleep that well last night.
With the Prof away Winnie decided that she would leave her normal sleeping position ( poured into an Edwardian arm chair in the living room) to join me in bed.
Now, I should have known better, but once you've given a row of implausibly floppy teats a cursory and rather sleepy rub, a bulldog like Winnie will tap you constantly with a paw the size of a dinner plate until you continue.
Perhaps she knew the Prof was away. Perhaps she was just in a needy mood,, all I know is that the paw tapping only stopped after I had covered her with the bedspread and slipped a hand under her head.

I'll leave you with the arrival of the Willis from Giselle 
We shall be watching this very scene later on at Covent Garden.
I'd better scrub up well

Go On ....Hit me!

Meeting The Prof tomorrow in London
So tonight I went over the cottage sitting care plans with Cameron the teenage boffin.
I told him to help himself to anything he wanted
Gave him instructions for the wireless, tv remotes and satellite tv
And have left him some cash, beer, a massive pizza and Crisps
Now you are all going to post horror stories about leaving a teen in charge at home
Aren't you?

Miss Hauxwell

Hannah Hauxwell died a day or so ago
She was 91
When I was twelve I remember seeing one of those grainy Northern documentaries so prevalent on Yorkshire tv in the seventies which chronicled her life on an upland High Pennine farm over a bleak North Riding winter.
I remember almost falling in love with her there and then.
She was in her mid forties  and lived a life of true poverty with only her animals for company .The only water she had was from a Dale's stream, the only light from kerosene lamps and candles and when the snow was waist deep her only true warmth came from cuddling her cow in a room off her kitchen but it was her gentle sing song attitude to life and her inquisitive friendly nature that made her into an instant and rather surprising star.
" In Summer I live , In winter I exist " she said with a gentle smile and the general public fell in love with her as she struggled to survive in her fathers raincoat and oversize Wellington boots!
She was the most unlikely of celebrities.
Hannah lived all her life in that small part of County Durham and thousands of people sent her letters and money to support her frugal life after they saw the documentary......books of her life became bestsellers all over the world and four tv documentaries,( one which followed her on a surprise trip to Europe) were viewed by millions.
Hannah Hauxwell  wasn't a complainer . She got on with things and she liked people
And we loved her for it.

A Knife In The Catflap

Blogland seems to be all a bit tits up at the moment.
Tom Stephenson seems to have shot his last bolt. Ursula  is still monopolising my comment section to " debate" slights and injustices . Chloe is lurking like a bad smell around an old toilet and I'm rather nonplussed by it all.
I have been thinking about this so much so, that I think my blog entry of this morning is the most banal in Going Gently's history, a product of the sniping and upset me thinks
Thank goodness Rachel is back! Her little bit of normality - life of an  East Country artist ( and what she's having for tea) gives the community some much needed balance
I enjoy debate and banter as much as the next old queen.
I adore wisecracks ( Wanda you are the Maggie Smith of the one liner)
But I want to stress that my blog is not a forum for personal slights.

Ok ....end of lecture.

It's freezing and hailing this afternoon and I'm making bubble & Squeak .
The postman has just knocked on the lane window to pop with mail
" you have a knife stuck in your catflap!" He noticed
" I'm locking Albert in the cottage!" I told him
He went off without further clarification

Too many dirty paw prints to cope with! 

Like A Duck On A Pond

I think I understand how modern parents feel sometimes.
Its a balls in the air kind of phenomenon where on the surface the duck looks serene and in control and under the surface the webbed feet are going like the clappers.
The Prof has his own balls-in-the-air and so has no idea of the joys of animal parenthood and so the organisational nightmare of sorting a few days away is somewhat lost on him.
The Welsh Terriers have to be booked and taken into kennels (with all shots up to date) Winnie has to taken to my friend Greta's ( bulldogs being Diva dogs don't cope well with kennel incarceration) and George being the old boy has to be taken to my sister for some pampering.
Gifts have to be sorted for the dog sitters and for Animal-helper Pat who has to be asked to come to kindly feed Albert. And some grovelling is the order of the day for one of the neighbours to look after The Bachelors for the duration.
Only after this is done can The Prof and I can go off and over the Welsh Border.
At Christmas I treated The Prof to tickets to see Giselle at The Royal Opera House.and its almost time  for us to go
It's only an overnight jaunt to London but its a night to be suited and booted and child free !
So I am so happy at finding a responsible house sitter for the night in the shape of Cameron the teenage boffin.
Cameron is now eighteen going on 40. I have instructed him to eat and drink what he likes and at his insistence he is calling down to go over instructions for his stay.

gulp!

What's The Bleeding Time?

In my 35 year nursing career I must have worked with hundreds of doctors .
The majority have been a joy to work with, but some, like anyone else you have to rub along with in the workplace have been absolute shockers.
When I was a student nurse I withnessed a renowned neurosurgeon have a temper tantrum in theatre. He screamed into the face of a scrub nurse and actually threw a tray of surgical instruments onto the floor, behaviour that was not challenged at the time due to the pure shock and passive acceptance by the staff.
I would like to think that such godlike diva behaviour by such autocrats is a thing of the past, nurses generally are more assertive where medical bullying is concerned.

Yesterday I gave a villager some advice about how to get the best out of their family doctor, who they thought had rudely dismissed a problem they felt they had.
My advice ? Remember your doctor is not god. Write your questions and statements down- it makes it easier to get your points over. Take in a friend or relative with you to act as your advocate or
Speak to a practice nurse.

Years ago I was acting as a chaperone to a consultant psychiatrist who was physically examining a middle aged female patient who had a "full figure" .
The doctor was showing off to me, his audience and took it on himself to point out various physical signs of long term alcohol abuse on the patient's body.
I felt uncomfortable on behalf of the patient as the references seemed inappropriate bordering on cruel but the woman looked nonplussed by the examination and even winked at me when the consultant pointed out a " scar" on the woman's abdomen exclaiming " what a neat looking appendix scar that is!"  
Moments later , the patient leaned over and whispered to me with a grin " it's a line left by my tights!" 

A Roaring Log Fire

Thanks to Athene and Rachel

Handy Hints work !
A winter's night...blowing and cold
And a lovely warm cottage with a clean window

handy Hints

Have you a handy hint to share? I promised one commentator ,last week, that I may call for suggestions...I suspect my readers may surprise us all with a few.
I love handy hints, the real ones and  the false " funny " ones.
They all intrigue me and entertain me.
Today I followed the hint at hoovering the living room carpet with the upholstery attachment rather than with the regular brush roller attachment
And bingo ! 

Five minutes hoovering of a clean carpet!

Half a ton of shit !
Ok not entertaining but very effective!
So what are your handy hints?
They can be as practical as you like....or , like those in Viz, as wonderfully surreal! It's up to you

YOUNG mothers: Calm hysterically crying children in the supermarket by firmly slapping their legs and then tugging them along by the wrist.

PHILANDERERS: Avoid the embarrassment of shouting out the wrong name in bed by having flings only with girls who have the same name as your wife.

FOOTBALLERS: Remember there is plenty of time to get drunk after your playing career has ended.

HORSE whisperers: Speak louder. The animals will hear you more clearly, thus speeding up training times.

FEMALE shop assistants: When a garage mechanic comes to your till, add on a selection of random items they didn't know they needed and charge them s50 labour costs for the transaction.

SINGLE MEN: Fool folk into thinking you've got a girlfriend by standing outside Topshop with loads of bags

Happy Days

Snowdrops in the Churchyard this morning 

Apologies for the thumb

I nearly got my head kicked in this morning.
Not something you expect in a lane above the village at 10.30 on a Sunday morning.
Mary and I had stopped to say hello to Mrs Trellis and her greyhound Blue when a large black car, tinted windows and a throaty exhaust roared past us without slowing down.
The dogs jumped as we did, so I gave one of those very British open palmed shoulder shrugs and the car reached the top of the hill in front of us, in order to say " thanks for slowing down"
The car stopped for a long moment
And as Mrs Trellis gulped a large gorilla-sized man got out to stare at us.
" what are you effing looking at? " the gorilla bellowed furiously
" You didn't slow down and your exhaust scared the dogs!" I countered not unreasonably
" You were in the middle of the fucking road!" the man shouted waving his arms
There was no point arguing as patiently were couldn't have been in the middle of the lane as he had passed us easily.
Mrs Trellis' bobble hat twitched nervously
There was a stand off silence for a few moments as the aggrieved gorilla thought about what to do, and eventually he got into his car to drive off, only then did I conceded to myself that we were lucky. Luckily a silly stare could have landed me into hospital.
When I was on ITU I remember having a conversation with a police officer who told me that cocaine use was rife in North Wales. Cocaine, methamphetamine, amphetamine and steroids all stimulate the user into violent rages and aggression and they are drugs of choice by more people that I could shake a stick at. " Normal people like yourself have no idea just how common drug taking is " I remember the policeman saying " would you think of cocaine at breakfast time with your sugar puffs? They would " He added cheerfully
We have a brave new world.
I'm not saying that the gorilla in the lane had taken drugs...perhaps he had...whose to know.....more likely he was just an angry person upset that a middle aged dog walker had looked at him "in the wrong sort of way" a look which he had caught in his rear view mirror .

The Post

Worthy but not riveting
Interesting but not compelling
Hanks was good, Streep was better
I wouldn't watch it again

1989

Yesterday I took in a print of Broadstairs to be reframed for the Prof's office.
Tucked away behind the print was a large photograph taken in the late 1980s
It was a photograph of a groom and his best man each with each other's hats on.
Laurel and Hardy comes to mind.
I am Stan Laurel.
It was the only fun thing in that wedding as I recall.
The photo holds a great deal of memories for me. Many good -a few bittersweet
Bittersweet, as the photographer who snapped it ( who was also a close friend) was killed in a plane crash only a few months later!
And slightly bittersweet that my friend, the groom more or less lost touch with me over the years as some friendships envairably do
I sent him a copy of the above photo yesterday on Facebook and he replied to my message with a " bloody hell look at us !" Kind of way. The photo I am sure was bittersweet for him as well ,as his marriage failed not long after as  we all knew it would.

All The Way Through

This is one of the most moving things I have seen recently

Please watch till the end to view the two soloists reaction 

High Colour

I'm a terrible blusher.
Always have been.
It's a curse which has followed me through all of my 55 years on this planet .
I either look embarrassed , pissed or hypertensive at the best of times given my ruddy complexion ( when I was a baby I looked like a fat tomato!!)
And unfortunately with my years advancing the sometimes crippling affection of " the blush from nowhere!" remains with me.

I tell you this secret because I blushed terribly at the land agents' office this morning. I have driven the twenty miles to a little market town up in the hills to drop off the field paperwork and tenancy  agreements as well as the rent payment and couldn't quite locate my wallet from my manbag!
The camp-as-Christmas clerk had already wrong footed me by complementing the bag only a minute or so before , so it was with much embarrassment that I had to empty most of the bag's flotsam in front of him in order to reach the rent cheque.
An almost empty bottle of aftershave, blackcurrant fisherman friends cough sweets, empty envelopes a note book with " weight watcher's recipes" written on the front and George's antibiotics were all hoisted out and as the clerk wryly commented that the bag indeed was " a regular tardis!" 
I blushed like a teenager after he had said it
Like I told you....it's a curse

Blushing often comes in waves , it's almost as though one " attack" sets another off. Only a half hour before the bagblush I had seriously coloured up at the vets when George (who had not been to the vets since he was a puppy) opened his bowels in a fit of nerves in the middle of the waiting room floor.
It was only made worse by William who being half blind stepped in the shitty puddle before I could stop him.

I was still glowing a bit as I took a picture in to be framed at a local art shop.
" is it too warm for you in here?" The shop owner asked politely
" No I'm fine' I said " I've got a cold"

Hey ho

Rock 'n Roll

Rush hour Wrexham

In February I've been asked to take part in a weekend course for Samaritans
It means a multiple workshops and an overnight hotel stay,
One of these events took part in the picturesque city of Bath so I got quite excited at the prospect of a pub trip, a brief bit of local colour and maybe a nice meal out!
Suffice to say my weekend is in Wrexham ( Google Wrexham and you may get a feel for my disappointment )
I also had a message from a fellow Sam called Graham ( not his real name) who is a retired pensioner ...who is going on the same course and who wanted a lift
Hes a lovely person who added as a postscript " I'll bring my ukulele " 
Rock n fucking Roll! 

Lewd Behaviour

Much has been made of the dreadful conduct of the rich and famous at that charity night at The Dorchester last night.
The sight of a men only night out where 300 men slavered over a bevvy of mini skirted hostesses ( who happened to agree to go to the night in question with matching skirts and knickers) makes me feel rather sick but I think it is important to have some balance here so I wanted to tell you of the time in 1999 when I went to a nightclub in Sheffield with a friend.
In a function room of the club there was a "female only" charity night taking place.
Male "exotic" dancers were on show, the ladies had a  basket meal, much too much to drink, a comedian and a raffle and
their behaviour would have made Caligula blush believe me!
My friend and I were molested, groped and goosed several times by some of these women as they staggered back from the loo ( and we were in a corridor at the time on the way to another bar!)
A barman had his shirt removed ( well ripped off!)
and I am sure an "oral act" was actually performed on one of the dancers in full view of the wife of the head of the council!
lets get a bit of balance here
bad behaviour is bad behaviour ! whatever sex you are
plain and simple.........lets not make it into a man hating moment please!

I can Sure Move For A Fat Lad

George ambling

Like I said yesterday, George was attacked by a staffie.
He wasn't injured, but the reason for this was luck more by good judgement.
We were lucky.
I had taken the dogs to the Dyserth Walkway which is a country walk on the former track of a hillside railway line. The walkway is popular with walkers, bikers and dog owners and can be rather busy so the independent Welsh Terriers and George are always placed on a lead.
Winnie, who is too friendly (and too big to attack) ambles along behind at her own pace.
It was dusk and as we returned to the car park, I let off George to sniff at the grass verge whilst I placed the other dogs in the car and had just closed the car door on them when I heard a man's harsh shout of "Come here!"
George was perhaps thirty feet away happily sniffing at a clump of grass and perhaps a hundred yards beyond him, down the walkway came the staffie at full pelt.
It meant business.
Everything happened very fast, as behind the staffie two scruffy young men and a teenage girl came running and I jumped up like Fatima Whitbread, running from the opposite direction. The Staffie pounced on George a couple of seconds before I got there and the two had already started to fight.
I kicked the Staffie as hard as I could and surprisingly my aim was dead right and the dog bounced off snarling and as I picked George up it spun back to have another go.
I stamped on it again.

Like I said we were lucky.
Lucky that the staffie was a young and underweight specimen,
Lucky that I can move with the speed of a jungle cat when I need to,
Lucky that my boot connected
and lucky that one of the scruffy owners grabbed him and carried him away after the fact
If all of the dogs had been there Blind William or the slight Mary may have been attacked on their leads.
I found it strange that neither man complained that I had kicked their dog and even though the girl mumbled a "sorry mate" I let rip with a mouthful of expletives  a docker would be proud of.
I was still swearing as the group shambled away onto the main road.
"You Were lucky" I bellowed like Sylvester Stallone playing Rocky Balboa "If the bulldog was out she would have fucking killed it!"
Charming!

George Attacked

I've just been messaging my sister ( who is a dog owner and lover) about George being attacked by a staffie earlier today! Now don't worry he's fine ( thanks to my hard brown shoes which kicked the shit out of the attacking dog let loose by three trailer trash characters.)
But it was a rather upsetting experience
I'll tell you the story tomorrow , suffice to say as a treat I bought the old guy half a cooked chicken from Sainsbury's for his tea
I hate, HATE, HATE bad dog owners!

Three Billboards ( Spoilers)

I first became a fan of Frances McDormand after I saw her play wily old police officer Marge Gundersun in the Cohen Brothers' black comedy Fargo back in the mid nineties. In that movie and in most thereafter she has dominated the screen with a quiet authority so it won't surprise anyone that  she brings that raw acting power to her performance of a grieving mother in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri. 
She is simply wonderful.
Like Fargo, Billboards is a dark and at times violent black comedy that walks the fine line from potentially being rather a bleak movie to being a surprising uplifting and hopeful one. I say surprising  because it is essentially the study how the rape and murder of a teenage girl affects a small family and most importantly her feisty battling mother who cannot cope with the fact that her daughter's killers have escaped detection by the local small town police department.
McDormand plays Mildred, the boiler suited, bandana wearing mother who takes it on herself to rent three local billboards in order to highlight what she thinks is the lack of action of the local Sheriff Willoughby (Woody Harrelson). 
This drastic action has a knock on effect within the Small Town of Ebbing, as with tensions running high because of the open secret that the much loved Willoughby is in fact dying, Mildred has to fight the unstable and stupid deputy Dixon ( the excellent Sam Rockwell) an un supportive ex husband and the sympathetic yet powerless Willoughby in her crusade to find the truth.

The film plays fast and loose with reality at times, in a very similar way that old fashioned Westerns do to modern eyes and I think this is a conscious decision by Brit director/ writer Martin McDonough  who obviously has something to say about blue collar America where institutionalised racism, homophobia and small thinking can often rule the day.
Wisely McDonough chooses the main thrust of the story to be that of grief and redemption rather than focus on a social commentary and this is where McDormand comes into her own .
Reminding me of that wartime poster of the all-American factory worker , she takes on all comers with a potty mouth and the fierceness of a cornered lioness . Rarely smiling but possessing a wry humour McDormand's character wavers between being sympathetic one minute and truly monstrous the next and it is this ambiguity that makes the film so interesting.
9/10

Writing A Film Review

The Prof is in Ireland today
I went to the cinema to see Three Billboards Outside Ebbing , Missouri as a treat
It was a cracking movie
I'll post the review tomorrow as I'm having a little difficulty dealing with my new laptop
However I shall leave you with a photo of me and my co-pilot reviewing my review with the computer on my knee..
She likes to see what I see