Thursday

I've worked 5 twelve and a half hour day shifts in the last 7 days
And I'm tired tonight.

I've had to sweep the flue of the wood burner as it was smoking when I lit the fire
The cottage is still full of smoke and I'm cold

I only had a four day old homemade shepherd's pie left in the fridge that and a murky pork chop
I ate the pie cold with tomato sauce still in my uniform
Winnie ate the chop
( whole)

Dotty is now licking my bare feet with a fat tongue
It's Bliss....

The cottage looks like the wreck of the Hesperus

I can't think of a blog to write today
Bed soon me thinks

I'm tired and rather angry

Three Words

I'm not after any " you're lovely" comments tonight
I just wanted to share something special that happened today.
I've been working with a very gentle soul.
A patient my own age.
We spent time going over medications. We talked about anxiety
I told her a story about a dim nurse and she laughed
And when I turned to go
She looked me squarely in the face
And quietly said
" Thank you ..John" 
I understood and my eyes watered
And I nodded gently.

Y Shed

 I met my elder sister yesterday for coffee at Y shed which is Welsh for .......... The Shed . A converted  ( go figure!) Railway shed on the walkway I walk the dogs.
My sister wanted to check I was alright since my decree nisi which she had presumed was my decree absolute.
No, I had to tell her, I am still legally married!
She chewed her lips in worry....
My elder sister is fiercely matriarchal...and would put  Mildred Pierce to shame in a head to head.

Y Shed welcomes dog walkers, and Dotty and Mary were impressively well behaved as we drank our coffee.

I got my hair cut at my local barber who unfortunately was suffering from sickness and diarrhoea ( what a lottery!!!!)
Then I went to a furniture centre who sells big store seconds and bought a lovely "new"  arm chair!

In the afternoon , my neighbour Trevor asked me to shake his fruit trees with a rake....in order to collect the apples.

I've done it every year since 2007

Put put put

Pup pup pup pup......pup pup pup pup!
So go the faraway sounds of shotguns.
Sounds that echo against the village valley walls
And bounce around the Church, now silent without its vicar.
It's a common background to most Sundays here.
Clay pigeons
A weekend playtime for " country folk "

Dorothy and I are sat in the graveyard.
Well I am sat
She is crouching
And we both are waiting for the
Pupupupups to stop.

She is watching me carefully and because I seem confident
She is becoming braver at the sound of gun fire
Albert joins us and butts his head against hers
It's the first official greeting I have seen between the two
His natural confidence boosting her fearfulness in spades
And in typical bulldog style she sniffs at his bottom with some gusto

I notice that the colours of the graveyard trees are beginning to warm.
And I photograph the most colourful of them as the faraway shotguns continue to blast away

Dorothy and I do another circuit around the church with Albert following us at an angle
He is obviously pretending that it was the way he originally intended to go.

Cats have a strange pride about them

Doctor Doctor

The Walking Dead has a new character
Dante....the doctor

Come to mama!!!!!!
Day off tomorrow
Coffee with elder sis, lunch with friends,
Choir too
Divorce paperwork ...buying a new armchair
Anal glands on Mary to squeeze
It's all go !

Thank You

There are ponies again on my lower field. They are clearing the nettles so that my spring allotments can be marked out in March.
" Bosoms" will return then like a ghost
The dogs love sniffing the ponies noses as they snort gently under the five bar gate

When I was at work someone has kindly cut down my overgrown hedges
I know not who!
I have no one to thank or to pay.....I will stop gentleman Farmer Ralph to see if he knows
Thank you whoever!
That's village life for you.
Trelawnyd is bracing itself for winter activities too
The " race night" in November is sold out ( well done Well Street Bridget !) and Heulwen from choir  and despot jason ( who is surpringly 50 very soon) wants a pub night out as soon as the cottage officially mine
" You are not to buy a drink " Heulwen instructed " Not one!" 
I agreed reluctantly ! ( secretly pleased)
Mr J left me some homemade jam today...in a bag on the garden wall
It was in response to the fact I'd loaned him my blood pressure machine for the summer
His tablets must have kicked in

Enjoy the music
It features in one pivotal scene in my imaginary movie

Its the finale xx

Kissed Softly By Buster Keaton

Dorothy 

Although not quite housetrained as yet,
Dorothy has brought a certain exuberance back into the cottage atmosphere.
When I pick the dogs up from Trendy Carol's space age square conservatory after a long day, it is now Dotty that gallops forward like a miniature sumo wrestler on amphetamines in order to greet me first.
Her whole tail wagging body shrieks of excitement and joy, but only her expression, which is often fixed in a kind of worried hopefulness, belies her real mood.
Like most bulldogs, she has more than a passing resemblance to the silent film star Buster Keaton.

Buster

This morning at 7 am she very slowly pushed her Buster face into mine.
We were lip to lip for a while before she effectively cut off my air supply and that signalled the time to get up for a morning walk.
I got up dutifully........as I said she is not yet fully housetrained as yet, so my one other lie in moment went for a burton and minutes later she was leading our way down the Dyserth walkway, followed closely by a quieter and more grown up Mary.
And as always ,Winifred gently brought up the rear. Her old head swinging from Side to side as she silently greeted passing walkers
She looked like Queen Sālote Of Tonga at the coronation

Winnie

Muffin before dawn

Another pre dawn post
This time in Llandudno just before work

Things are always better after a sausage and egg Mcmuffin and a strong coffee

Two Words

It's a good hour before dawn and I'm sipping strong sweet coffee at the kitchen table
It's a work day.
..and I've just re read some emails from yesterday...
The day out with my sister overshadowed real life...it was fun....
One email was from my solicitor who informed me that my decree nisi had been legally pronounced on the 3rd of October
The cottage was quiet save for bulldog snoring from bedroom and sofa
And in the quiet ,
You realise that there is nothing more lonely than an early morning before light

I've just had a good long cry. 

Amélie & Fucking Cat City

One of my all time favourite movies is Amélie 
I adore it.
It's my go to movie, when I need a sob and a smile.

Today my sister Janet and I went to Liverpool to see the new musical version of the Jean Pierre Juneau classic and surprisingly it was almost as charming and sweet as I remember the film was.
With all of Amélie's Montmartre friends on stage at any one time, the extraordinary talented cast play a selection of instruments to accompany the songs which more or less exactly follows the film's plot to the letter, and I must admit Audrey Brisson gave the Queen Audrey Tautou a run for her money in the title role.
The famous kissing scene where Amélie finally meets the geeky Nino ( Chris Jared) had the whole theatre audience holding its breath and was just as tear jerking as it was on film.
I cried buckets.
It was quite quirky, innovative and charming
It was also quite lovely

Audrey Brisson & Chris Jared

The original kiss

Twins in the theatre

Afterwards we did some shopping at John Lewis ( new cutlery for me) then went to the Cat Cafe for tea! Now the cat cafe is not quite my cup of tea, but It WAS an experience to be sure.
Set on three floors on Bold Street it is a cafe that is the home to 17 pedigree free roaming  cats.
A minute after a rather impressive caramel cake and flat white arrived, so did the cats, arseholes winking in my face nicely as they climbed quite merrily over every surface in search of a lick of cream

Everywhere I looked there was a fucking cat! 

I know ...duh.......

The cat cafe !

I'm lucky to have sisters I enjoy the company of !!

Downton & Roses

Finally Barrow Snogs the royal Butler

 Downtown Abbey has perhaps thirty characters of any note. Add to the mix four Royals, two far distant family members and a gaggle of half a dozen Royal aides and flunkies and you have forty people to juggle on screen.
A near impossible job to be done in just two tight hours I would have thought.....and my thoughts proved to be right as the story galloped away with itself as the likes of Mr Bates, Mrs Crawley, Mrs Hughes and Lord and Lady Grantham just stand around in the background and mutter a few hastily edited lines on screen.
Anna ( Joanne Froggatt) Branson ( Allen Leech) and Lady Violet ( A frail looking Maggie Smith still providing the best one liners) fare better with more screen time but it does feel all a bit of a rush as the movie throws a Royal Visit, pregnancy, an inheritance question, an assassination attempt! and  an Ealing Comedy-esque understairs mutiny into the mix before hinting at a gay romance for Thomas Barrow ( Robert James-Collier) after he gets caught in a Gay Nightclub in York ( more than I ever did when I lived there!)
As a piece of cinema , it's all a bit of a mess.....but having said this, the whole production is so infused with good humour and affection for its characters, I finally found myself enjoying it, especially the bits where Anna leads the Downton mutiny against the Royal servants and Smith's bravura handing-over-the-reins to the sullen Lady Mary in what turned out to be a rather moving finale as the whole upstairs cast waltz colourfully past the camera.

I got home later afternoon to a package delivered much earlier
Whoever sent me a lovely bunch of yellow roses

Thank you
Xx

Mouldy Old Pongos!!

I need to drum up some interest in the concert our choir is supporting on the 2nd Of November.
The Rivers are described as a Groove Driven contemporary Acapella choir of some note and they will be performing a one off concert at our village hall in Trelawnyd on the 2nd !
They will be supported ( briefly) by our Gwaenysgor Community Choir who can be described as an eclectic group of mouldy old pongos ! 
Tickets can be bought on the door  or at the following link
click here for link to buy tickets

We look forward in seeing you there

Henry

Unlike most Gay men
I've never really fancied young twinks
But Henry from The Great British Bake Off
Was an absolute sweetie!
I thought he is adorable
And sadly Voted off today...I shall miss him dreadfully

" Daddy ......my Daddy"

" Have you got kids?" my colleague asked .
We were talking about my divorce and subsequent  return to work
"No I had a husband" I said thinking she had originally misheard me
" I know , you said , I just wondered if you had children?" She replied
A silly presumption on my part, I realised all too late
" You look the type to have children " she added.

" What type is that?" I asked her curiously
" Jolly and warm " came the reply
In my book jolly and warm are euphemisms for large 
But I took it as a complement

Working in a hospice invariably leads one to think about family.
Family dynamics, family love, family ties.
But Family woes, family spats and family problems lie just under the surface
As we all know, death brings out the best and the worst in people

I bought a pumpkin today.
It's a tradition I've always done living here in Wales.
I remember one year when the Randa girls came around after school  to disembowel one ready for carving
It was such a joyous event , full of squeals and acting and false vomits over the drainage board.
And as they chatted, and included me in their day dreams and silly talk, I found myself fantasising about how cool it would have been to be a father

I talked to two grown up daughters at work the other day
Daughters who felt useless and helpless at their father's bedside
" You're here !" I told them....." You're here........that's all that matters!"
I think they understood

20 Years

Tv series I have followed

1960s- 1970s
Land Of The Giants
Thunderbirds
Peyton  Place
Coronation Street
Farmhouse kitchen
Space 1999
Survivors
The Tomorrow People
Starsky And Hutch
Charlie's Angels
Banana Splits


1980s-1990s
Tenko
Ally Mc Beal
Sex and the City
Tales of the city
Victoria Wood as seen on Tv
Paint Along With Nancy
Prime Suspect
It's a knockout
ER
Hill Street Blues
Call my Bluff
The last Train


2000-2019

Man In Orange Shirt
The Walking Dead
Miranda
Taskmaster
The Great British Bake Off
Hinterland ( Welsh cop show)

Sunday

I've got today off.
It's a drab, grey kind of Sunday and I'm cooking a Sunday lunch for a couple of village friends.
Roast chicken, roast potatoes, leeks, carrots, homemade stuffing and onion gravy.
It's nice to be preparing a proper meal again and the dogs have caught up with my activity and are all a bit excited by it
I bought cheap white cheerful chrysanthemums and dotted glass jugs of them around the cottage

I've lit the log burner too and aim to watch some long overdue unseen films throughout the afternoon.

I bought a new limited edition print the other day
A bright colourful Welsh woman by Ruth Jên
All is fine

Friends

My very own Bel Ami 

I've caught up with several friends by phone and FaceTime the last couple of days
And I've felt the benefit of that contact
I've felt the benefit of warmth , and affection and of good humour
I've felt the benefit of a waspish comment and a joke over a Welsh Love Spoon
I've felt loved and I've felt supported
And I am lucky to have them, standing in the wings of my life
They are Just like Thelma Ritter in All about Eve

One Crazy Bitch

It's official
I AM A SLUT 

Now  I am referring to the archaic meaning of the word which, as memory serves, defines slut as being an unkempt slovenly woman and not a tart whose knees are behind her ears!

I've had a lie in!
Ok I got up at 7am and walked the dogs, but shortly after we all crept back into bed for a smelly  PJ lie in!
A lie in! I have not had a proper , teenage , fuck-the -word lie in till 11 am since Noah was a boy!
I got up at 11am and made eggs on toast
Then WENT BACK TO BED AGAIN!!!!
I'm one crazy bitch !!

The dogs don't know quite what to make of this behaviour and are watching me carefully through narrowed eyes.....
I have one more hour to go before I go in to work for a half day late shift!
And so I'm going to drink a bucket of coffee in bed and watch YouTube videos of Chris Pratt with his top off!

Guilt pleasures anyone?

French Soup

 It was the best French onion soup I have ever tasted. I told the waitress so at the Mostyn Gallery Cafe and she told the chef who looked a bit tearful and very pleased with himself when he poked his head around the kitchen door
I had bought birthday presents for a friend and a great niece  and a return gift for John ( the snogee from Sitges) and some Halloween horror shit for my nephew Leo and so I spent a merry hour or so eating soup and writing envelopes and cards
The waitress brought me over a free flat white , I think for being so nice to the chef
And I photographed the soup stains on my front ....just because I could

 When I got home I took Dorothy on her first walk around the village which was a task and a half.
Everything frightens her still, especially loud noises and traffic , and so we invested over half an hour  sat on the village green with her face hidden  under my armpit .
By the end of that time she was able to look out at the farm tractors without shaking....after this we walked around the Chapel on London Road which has just been sold. I hope that it's converted into a family home and not left derelict. We only have one working chapel left now....and that's located next door to Jason the affable despot..

Tonight a friend and I went to see a so-so production of The Strange case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
In Chester...we had a better time in the Storyhouse bar than we did in the theatre....
That's how it goes sometimes!

Judy

A lot has been made of the biopic Judy .
Renèe Zellweger's powerhouse performance
The long suspected child abuse by the studio boss Louis B Mayer
The tragically hopefully story of a performer bred solely to perform
I get all that.....
....the finished film is a polished version of a sad story, and a story we all think we know and understand ...
But one lovely scene lingers long in my mind and it is a tribute to Garland's array of gay fans , whose lives were essentially illegal in the late1960s, the time when the movie was set

Finding herself alone one night after her sell out performance at The Talk Of The Town , a lonely  Judy asks two middle aged gay fans out to dinner. Unable to find somewhere to eat the trio end up at the men's flat and after a rather sweet and enjoyable evening Judy sings a melancholy version of her signature song Get Happy, accompanying a tearful fan  ( Andy Nyman) on the piano .
It's a beautiful and telling scene in a rather interesting but ultimately unsatisfying  movie
But it wasn't THAT sad.....