Spring, a fight at the vets and scrooge

The snowdrops that I dug up from the old Meliden cottage have started to bloom, and the mild weather has brought forth all the bulbs I planted in the autumn, miles too early.

George was taken down to the beach today with the others and amid gales he held his end up very well, and walked on the lead from Central to Barkby beaches! after that I took Meg,Maddie and Finlay to the vets for their jabs and they all sat like little angels in the old fashioned waiting room, which was full ! Opposite sat two labradors with a smelly old Welsh farmer type, and a poodlecross with his owners. Next to me was a bloke with a cat on his knee in a carrier. As this bloke got up, the labradors got too close to the mongrel and one huge holy fight started! At one point the old boy fell onto the seats behind him, as the poodleowners (shouting as loudly as the dog was barking) dragged him out with a nasty bleeding bite on his face! My three sat there open mouthed and quiet (Maddie was hiding under my seat) and I was proud as punch they behaved! The vetinary nurses fell in love with Finlay as he accepted all his jabs and a particulary nasty kennel cough innoculation with great humour!

Sometimes I think we were spoilt in experiencing excellent theatre in Sheffield, and I am so looking forward in seeing Fiddler on the Roof at the Crucible on Friday. Tonights version of Scrooge in Llandudno's Venue Cymru, was truely awful. Moody was ok, (even though he forgot many of his lines), and was impressive at 82 ! but the rest of the production, cast, sets, costumes and adaptation was on a level with an adequate school play! We walked out!

Now I feel better!

nuff said.................

Stormy weather

I am tired of the weather! it has been raining off and on for weeks now and the back yard, paths and garden are totally sodden, dirty and slick. Four dogs and a senile cat who spends the day in and out and out and in, means that the kitchen feels clammy for much of the time, and ( with the risk of sounding like a loon) I have already cleaned the kitchen floor five times today!
I want us to experience crisp dry frosty days with weak sunshine as we are supposed to be experiencing this time of year, and I want to get stuck in with the field, which resembles the quagmire out of All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) !

Worked last night and had an hours sleep this morning before toileting duties. Now I cannot complain as I chose to have a new puppy, but it does feel like hard work after 60 minutes sleep.! The beach walk woke me a little and got thinking of a polish doctor who has just left ITU to go back home. A warm, gentle and ever so self depreciating woman in her early thirties, this doctor had taken the chance to move her young family over to Wales to start a new life. She seemed to struggle with the UK culture and language, but coped , with humour and dignaty. Universally the nursing staff ( historically very tough cookies to win over) liked working with her, and we all were shocked to find out that she is suffereing from terminal cancer, which was diagnosed quite suddenly after a short period of back pain. It is strange , but working amid sudden death and disability, as we do on intensive care, the nursing staff are well used to seeing lives that have been torn apart; yet, the speed of her diagnosis and subsequent departure has created a huge wave of shock and despondency amongst us all which is dreadfull. I was reminded of another close collegue of mine from Sheffield who had been diagnosed with cancer in very similar circumstances. Her funeral was perhaps the saddest I have ever experienced, as it was devoid of any humour or irony. I know this seems like a stupid thing to say, but I always feel that funerals should be bitter sweet, with loss mixed with normal, happier memories. I always remember the rather dry clergyman stating that my collegue had a full and happy life and qualified this by stating she had always enjoyed "Time Team" on tv. ! I almost cried at the emptiness of his remark.!

Message to self.................get more sleep

Guilt

Been naughty tonight ( Sunday Night Monday Morning) it is 1.29 am and I have been watching celebrity big brother. I have found some of it fascinating ( well like perhaps you would find a train wreck fascinating), and some of it rather sad. Jade's mum,( thick as mince but ready to fight her corner) was crying in the diary room, and asked for her "medication" to be sent in! humm worrying! I think she is another example of a sadsack being manipulated by the producers to provide the Romans with a Christian!
Anyhow was watching an advert and it featured a teenage girl who is angry that her family is eating her healthy "Kworn", warning her brother off she hisses
"Touch my food...feel my fork!"
well it made me smile......

Pottering and Miss Potter

A showery day, and gloomy to say the least. But have managed to prune and rid the front garden of dead wood and leaves. Next week is going to be a busy one as I am working nights on Monday, bee club on Tuesday, Theatre on Wednesday, out with Jonney Highfield on Friday which will be fun and Nu's hen night (gulp) on Saturday! with working nights on Sunday , I am going to knackered!

Listening to one of Chris' Christmas Cds today. A 1930 review type collection thing, and not very interesting in itself, but two songs did catch my attention. "Get Happy" from the film Summer Stock , sung by Judy Garland, and The Way You Look Tonight sung by Fred Astaire in Swing Time. The Garland song just bursts with energy, it is quite joyful! and lifts the spirits quite easily. The way you look tonight was featured in many films, obviously My Best Friend's Wedding!, but interestingly in Hannah And Her Sisters, Peter's Friends and the final episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine!! Astaire cannot sing, but his suave art deco tones seem just right for the song!

Miss Potter (2006) is quite a sweet little film, that never quite convinces in its portrayal of Beatrix Potter. Now I love Renée Zellweger , and was looking forward in how she captures the reality or indeed the guessed reality that was Miss Potter, but I found the characterisation a bit thin!...charming yes, but ever so slightly thin. I guess the information about the personality of Beatrix Potter is, in itself, scanty. From what I have read about her she is described simply as jolly and good fun, but I suspect little of the "real" woman is realy known. Perhaps this is why Zellweger is reduced to pulling her cute pudgy face into a pout and crinkling her eyes a lot. Having said that I enjoyed the film greatly. Ewan McGregor (not an actor I like) is incredibly moving as Norman Warne, her publisher and suitor, and Emily Watson, as Norman's wisecracking spinster sister is always worth the price of admission. An enjoyable evening.

Oh no.............its apocalp..to !

I should have taken a warning from the publicity blurb for Apocalypto (2006) ! It is advertised as Mel Gibson's Apocalypto rather than just "Apocalpto", as if the film itself needed Gibson to help sell it to the general public, which of course it does. The story of how the baddie Mayans (ugly brutes !) take poor simple forest Indian villagers ( Environmental heros) prisoner to satisfy their angry gods is a thinly veiled political allegory about civilisations, (especially the USA), in decline. It is also quite simply a chase movie in the Les Misérables tradition, and a violent and often disturbing one at that. Gibson directs the action sequences deftly, but we have seen all this before in so many ways!- At one point the council estate looking hero Jaguar Paw (Rudy Youngblood), gallops through the jungle pursued ad nauseum by the Mayan psychopaths, I found myself wishing for him to end it all by jumping over the obligatory waterfall. I almost laughed when he did just that! Many of the other action set pieces are quite breathtaking and the cinematography is stunning ! but everyone looks pierced to death and all a bit dirty for my liking.

The Last of the Mohicans did it all so much better.

The Flower show committee and music to have at my funeral

Well I am officially a member of the Trelawnyd flower show committee! ( according to Hazel at work!), and I am totally overwhelmed with the responsibility! even though the letter with "it in writing" hasn't plopped through the letter box as yet! I do suspect they need a robust pair of hands to set up the Hall rather than a new perspective on decision making! but I am looking forward to our first meeting, when I meet the other "chosen few"!

Think we are off to see Miss Potter (2006) at the weekend, looking forward to that as I do like Renée Zellweger and her spot on/Meryl Streep-esque English accent. Another favourite actress of mine Emily Watson appears in the film too, so I am hoping for an entertaining evening!

ps. George had his first proper wee in the garden.......! al hum dilly la!

Postscript, I know I am risking sounding like a Luddite, but I must comment on how pleased I am with my cheapo Technika MP3 player, which I bought from Tesco for some ridiculous sum (not even a tenner). Filled to the brim of film soundtracks and particular fav ballads (Moon river being one), I am forced into thinking about making a list! This list is the music I would have at my funeral!

As the coffin is being wheeled in (Julia Fordham.....Happy Ever After OR The theme from The Archers)...I want wry smiles at the very beginning! Then interspersed during the service I would like "Moon River" (I would like Chris sobbing loudly at this stage as it is "our song" !, then "Thank You" by Dido ( did I hear a strangled cry from friends in the congregation?. This would be followed up by "The Morning After" from The Poseidon Adventure, and finally as the crowds are staggering towards the exits, I would finish them off with the end credits from the film Out of Africa, by John Barry.

who says I'm gay!

A good British Comedy film

Shaun of the Dead (2004) caught me by surprise last night,as it is a truly funny modern British comedy! The tag line of the movie states it is A Romantic Comedy. With Zombies. and that just about sums it up. Simon Pegg, (who also co-wrote it) is wonderful as the hapless Shaun, an electrical store supervisor, with a loser best friend, dissatisfied girlfriend and hated step father, who rises to the challenge of a zombie takeover of London and becomes an anti-hero. Pegg is a talented comedian and surprisingly he brought some pathos to a comedy/slasher film, which is no mean feat.

Caught up with lots of jobs today in between toilet training. Bought a hoe (with Christmas vouchers from Chris' dad), planted the old Christmas tree in the garden and shot through to Llandudno to swap some theatre tickets for Ron Moody in A Christmas Carol at Venue Cymru, so I can go to Nu's Hen night! The new re vamped theatre complex looks great, and certainly better than the hospital day ward that it resembled last year.

Not my best photo (tired fat bastard photo in fact) to be honest I have got a stinking cold.....mind you I am going to get this blown up and put on the fridge.....message to self......don't miss weight watchers this week.....and any week for that matter.