That means changing my phone providers, sorting a better deal with broadband and getting rid of my landline. I’ve streamlined some accounts and cancelled unwanted frivolous items such as Disney + ( which was a total indulgence as it kept me up to date with the Walking Dead)
With interest rates going up yet again it seemed like a prudent thing to do today.
I had a row with a Nazi Cyclist today too who rang his bell so insistently on the Dyserth Walkway for me and another woman and a dog to get out of his way that we barely had time to gather our thoughts. Dorothy got flummoxed and walked directly in front of him which caused more shouting on his part and he was most upset when I reminded him it was a walkway and not an official cycle track
This afternoon, I loaded Bluebell up with cold drinks, flower show programmes and a watering can full of water and set off to publicise the Show.
It was hot but with the windows open, bearable. and only a few seconds drive East of Trelawnyd I stopped at Marion to take my first programme to Irene Murray.
Now Irene is a force to be reckoned with. With the late Sylvia and Gladys Jones , she was the third matriarch that co ran the original show, and did so with a keen eye and no messing,and I wanted her to know that the show was returning soon and she was tickled pink and rather moved that it was.
I left her to drive to our neighbouring village of Trelogan to catch up with Graham, my first potential vegetable entrant. He’s a delightfully friendly chap who sings in the village choir but he is also a magnificent grower of vegetables which I was privileged to see in his crammed polytunnel this afternoon.
Getting his veg into any show is a real boon for any Flower and Produce Show and I was excited to have him aboard, especially as his carrot tops were in a word, MAGNIFICENT !!!
Onwards and upwards!
Next stop was Terry, my old Quiche nemesis from my early days in the village.
We had gone head to head in the baking classes for years with the plaudits swinging both ways each time entered.
With some old testosterone reignited he’s agreed to enter the Quiche, Boiled Fruitcake and Scone classes in a misjudged attempt to topple me
We both couldn’t help grinning at each other
“old Times “ he said with a chirp.
My next stop was the beautifully rustic Still House , just off Well Street and I was glad that Ma Manley was at home, for I wanted to encourage her into our arts classes as she will be running the new arts and crafts club in the autumn , a club I’ve already asked to join .
Ma Manley is a lovely woman with a long flowing white hair and a style that shrieks local hero/ Whiskey Galore/ Earth Mother
I hope I’ve won her over.
Tomorrow I have more characters to catch up with, so I just had time to water the new planters at the Church gate, the ones donated to the TCA by Jackson’s, before getting home for tea,
It’s been a good day
A photo of some of the original Flower Show Committee
The Trelawnyd Flower Show is reborn on August 5th.
And the schedules are out.
I’ve got much to do today.
Jackson’s Nurseries ( which lies a stone’s throw from the village) donated several planters to the TCA and I’ve picked three up this morning and have placed two either side of the Church gate and put the last one by the noticeboard.
I will personally deliver flower show schedules to the old flower show committee and to people who have already requested them.
I love the fact that inside the programme the TCA has honoured Auntie Glad
I wanted to write this yesterday but the post deserved time, emotion and thought and effort
To me it’s an important post for an important day
all I can tell you is that I have been captivated by Venice from the get-go, captivated , entranced, impressed from the first time I saw it properly the moment we approached it from the North East causeway but I truly fell in love with the city when we had a break inside the subtle Guggenheim museum and walked on an almost deserted museum terrace which over looked the Grand Canal at midday.
From the calm, beauty of the deserted museum on Sunday morning , we left the mutedly lit Pollock’s and Picasso’s for the bright, blue beauty of a thoroughfare packed with boats and people and movement.
And It was joyous
My friend Colin giggled as I waved without any embarrassment to anyone in the boats on the canal who would wave back, and I guessed understood just why I did it.
And wave they did, almost as if they could feel my excitement and pleasure of that one moment pure moment .
A big black guy , showing off to his girlfriend in a motorboat, a group of schoolgirls on a vaparetto and a family of women in hijabs in a water taxi they all waved to me as I waved to them from one of the most impressive and beautiful museums in the world, on a sunny hot day , when the water looked duck egg blue and Sun shone so happily .
It was a glorious wonderful moment that I will never forget
As you all can probably tell, I have totally fallen for Italy
Just as Tom Stephenson probably did over a busty Sophia Loren when he was a teenager.
Always late to the party, this quick jaunt has seriously healed a little hole in my psychi, one I never knew was still there and even after a few days I feel lighter and brighter and eager to move on to Barcelona next month and Rome in the autumn.
A four star hotel, lovely service,plush surroundings, cracking food and long easy conversations over sunny views all help to lift the spirits.
Last night we had to laugh, as a young couple who had sat silently next to me on the plane in to Venice despite my welcome saw me sat in our favourite cafe/bar.
Both smiled broadly and waved just as I had waved so energetically at the passengers in the water taxies and Vaparettos on the Grand Canal from the veranda of the Guggenheim .
I’ve not been away with my friend Colin before and so needed to suss out his way of holidaying.
It will surprise no one to learn that I’m a wash face and go person
Colin is a gently gently face the day person, so I get up wash my face and take a short early walk.
He’s great company when he surfaces, yesterday we spent four and a half hours in a delightful cafe wedged by a canal, drinking Apirol Spritz and talking and watching the world amble buy
Venice is truly magical.
I’m quite captivated by it.
Blending in with the tourist places, the cafes and the church’s, almost faceless, ancient building brood and blend just as they did in the scenes of Don’t Look Now and the canal water glows a blue of the sky and looks clean and smells fresh.
I will come again ,I am sure.
I’m presently eating breakfast on the hotel terrace
It’s still early
I’m the only Brit in the restaurant, as far as I can tell the others, with an exception of a chic Greek family and one German lady are all Americans who banter between tables like old jolly friends.
In my experience, they have little knowledge of the difference between an Englishman and being from the UK, so I’ve told everyone who asked that I’m Welsh.
Without realising, I even sound more Welsh as I told them
The iPad is now protecting me from further questions.
I need to be a little still in the early mornings
We are off to the Guggenheim a little later this morning
The weather is the same her as it is in the Uk
All of the Italians I have met, have been charming and friendly, quite unlike what I was told to expect.
Not a mistake , one photo of us in the mirror of a vapretto
It’s been a lovely day.
In the end we missed the Murano trip so leapt on the first vaparetto and braved the sights in Venice’s centre.
It was glorious but quite hot and yes I did wear my hat.
We arrived back in out quiet North West corner of Venice at 4pm and spent 4.5 hours in the same cafe, eating wafer thin pizza, drinking spritzers, talking and people watching
Never not a man of habit , I’m sitting with my coffee at a table.
The hotel Papadopolis overlooks the small pretty gardens with the same name and I feel rather cosmopolitan as I seem to be surrounded by guests from all nations
It’s a glorious day, I have my hat ready and I think we are off to Murano
The Trelawnyd Community Association Memorial Hall sub committee ( you try saying that after a large gin) is an eclectic group of village folk, intent on keeping our hall open and functioning in this expensive , post covid, financially compromised world
In addition to the 2 usual Caucasian retired men ( every committee has them and they no doubt bring with them vital experience and know how) we have 2 bright working mums, an lady entrepreneur with a Joan Rivers sense of humour. A gentle hearted farmer, the glamorous velvet voiced Linda and her flared pants , and me and Bunty supporting and being the village gay population.
I know it sound like a film cast but it kinda works. The main group is an eclectic mix too, a cheerful Welsh Mom, an ex police inspector with a shrewd eye, an all rounder book illustrator, I could go on.
Last night we sorted out another list of ideas to raise funds for the hall , old Men’s Yoga, a casino night, film nights, bingo, more table top sales, a fashion show, a bespoke choir concert, badminton, history lectures and a grand Christmas food festival !!! And a even a 🌈 pride night out next year ( Bunty asked me if I was out at work for that one)
Today I’m getting ready for my few days in Venice starting tomorrow
A couple of years ago, I had a few dates with a guy which sort of petered out.
We were not suited, and had no chemistry , but he was a nice guy and I’m sure that the feelings were mutual, so I was surprised that he messaged me asking to go out for coffee.
It’s transpires he has oesophageal cancer, a best friend in need of hospice care and a mum in a nursing home.
Add to this the Herculean task of advocating himself in a post covid oncology fuck up nhs and no one at home to help and it’s easy to see how difficult things are for him.
I sat and listened
That’s all I could do.
After he had left, I sat at the beach cafe, we had met in, and watched the sea.
I felt odd.
And thankful .
It’s never failed to surprise me, just how people cope with adversity.
Most, in my experience do so blindly
It’s a case of one short step in front of another.
Israel isn’t well known for gay romantic comedies, so the Israeli/ American film Sublet is a rarity indeed.
It’s an interesting spring/autumn sort of story about middle aged American writer Michael ( John Benjamin Hickey) and his relationship with twenty something film student Tomer ( Niv Nissim) as the two sublet an apartment in Tel Aviv, with the obvious class of cultures, experiences and philosophies.
Insightful, complicated and with the usual yin/yang between youth and older age, it’s a moving and rather charming film
The rain from last night has made everything seem more humid and certainly cooler. For some reason Roger had wandered around the cottage and had collected 5 shoes overnight which he placed carefully into his crate.
I’m making turkey meatballs, half I will have with mango salad tonight and the other half in a passata sauce with a bit of spaghetti for lunch tomorrow.
The field grass is tinged with yellow and the roses in the front garden are fully in bloom.
Around six we had the threat of a storm but nothing moved past the rumble of thunder until almost seven when it rained without lightening.
The thunder grumbled on until almost 8pm
I’m watching Barry Manilow at the BBC
I’m doing another overtime shift tomorrow afternoon.
All monies are going to my counselling fund.
I’d like to think that blogger is frequented by older internet users.
People that have learned to play nice for the most part.
As we all know that’s not always the case.
Earlier someone complained there were too many videos posted on Going Gently …fair point , but felt the need to add a petulant and negative so I didn’t watch any
Most bloggers I have physically met have proved to be delightful characters. Indeed only a couple of weeks ago, I met up with Libby and had a lovely time, over a gin and tonic, mutually shared information from the written word expanded into the verbal where it becomes real and tactile.
I’ve had friendships with bloggers which have proved disappointing and I’m now a firm believer that much of this kind of phenomenon is an example of Over familiarity breeds contempt .
Blog friends often turn up daily, feel that they know you and in extreme cases feel that they can say anything to you that in real life they would never say to the face of an enemy let alone a friend.
A little while ago a commentator informed me that I disgusted them. Then they used personal insults to support a view they neither had personal experience of or practical facts about.
It’s a common phenomenon seen with online interactions , akin to road rage.
Another blog followeronce referred to me in a comment with such venom and rudeness that I was shocked to my core. At 60 I think I’ve had a good 55 years experience of making friends and during that time had never been spoken to in such a way.
I cut all contact there and then.
I would not let my best friends talk to me like that, let alone someone who had never met me
Without the nuances, parameters and reality of physically meeting up, proper friendships on line I feel are rare.
Which is sad, as is the bile which is unleashed from faceless and angry people
It has amused me that this iconic scene has been hijacked by hundreds of women and gay men and been reenacted all over the world.
All great fun
I’m hydrating at home today. It’s hot here and we’ve not seen rain in weeks.
The lawn is started to yellow in the sun and I got dehydrated yesterday which allowed my bladder to play up.
An extra antibiotic and fluids by the bucketload have almost sorted me out, but I’ve had to cancel lunch with my friend Colin in Chester this afternoon which is a bummer.
We are off to Venice in just under a week.
The neighbour popped in to give me some of her sweet peas which I’ve put in my fox vase
Dogs know where they are if things are kept simple.
I thought about Fatty this morning.
Fatty was the hero in one of my Grandmother’s stories and the only story which featured her as a very young woman. At 16 she worked in a warehouse in Liverpool which stored animal feed and somehow had become isolated on one of the upper floors when there was a blackout.
My grandmother loved this story as it had every element of suspense .
A young girl trapped in a dark factory,
Rats running along the floor over her feet and an open winch door five stories above the street only inches away.
But my grandmother added her usual comic flourish and that was her manager Fatty who came to her rescue after being called time and time again and who kept replying by shouting “ I’m coming ! fatty’s coming! “
As a child I would be crying with laughter when Fatty came to her rescue
It was a good story, and one always well told and I was glad I remembered it this morning.
Sometimes , all it takes is a short phrase or a few words to wizz you back to a moment when you were important in a stranger’s life.
Moments like these can be rare.
But they flash forward into consciousness like miniature shoals of fish do when they swim past you in the sea.
I was drinking coffee in The Flat White Cafe with a friend the other day when a family of a dad and two older kids walked in to find seats. The dad had a kind face and he looked at me and immediately smiled
“ Hello Big Guy” he said warmly and suddenly his hands were on my shoulders patting me like a long lost relative
“Big guy “told me the lost context and I suddenly knew who he was.
He was the husband of a patient I nursed four years ago and “ Big Guy “ was how they always referred to me when we met over drugs, and district nurse visits and talks about symptoms and needs and worries.
We chatted briefly.
Polite hellos and updates on the kids and him followed and minutes later they were sat at their own table ordering cakes and tea whilst I ate mine.
And twenty or so minutes later my friend and I stood to go
As we did , I waved a slightly awkward goodbye to the man and his family , all of whom waved back
The husband nodded his head and mouthed a silent “Thank you” as I turned to leave
