Yawn

Stanley and Duncan started cock- a-doodle soddin doos at 5 am and continued off and on until dawn at 8am. I like the crowing as it sounds rather muffled and gentle by the double glazing! Just a bit worried about Carol, Viv and Mike down the lane and John and Mandy next door! Getting the neighbours on side is an important part of the field enterprise. Off with eggs this morning to appease a sleepless night, as part of a major PR offensive.
Seeing Nige in Manchester later
PS. Just got back from one particular neighbour who is NOT happy! despite eggs and a friendly approach.............let's wait and see......

Cock tales- Duncan and Stanley

Well the menagerie grows! Very Welsh nurse Ceri rang today and said her hubby would drop me off a cockerel this afternoon! They live right out in the sticks so I was very grateful for their kindness as I would never have found their cottage way in the back and beyond.
I felt rather rural myself when he brought two large 8 week cocks! to choose from, as he wasn't sure how to hold them or which feathers to cut to ground them! ( I love showing off)The big red cock seems to be a tough "teen" and rather feisty! and it took a bit of wrestling and a few nasty pecks before I got him subdued. The other chap is a smaller Light Sussex with rather bandy legs and a diffident manner, so as they are brothers and supposedly friendly towards each other I agreed to take them both!
The tougher handsome cock I have called Duncan! ( after Chris' Uncle) and the weedy white cock will be called Stanley (He looks like a Stan!)
The hens lined up with interest when the "men" arrived, and one of the black hookers looked rather surprised (to say the least) when Duncan promptly shagged her!
Stanley just buffed up his feathers and staggered around the coop hysterically in an effort to show off, as the girls looked on with mild interest!

Anyhow, things seemed to have settled down somewhat after a few minutes, and I hope that the neighbours will be happy at the crowing! which is loud but I think very comforting.


In March I am planning ducklings AND hen chicks.
Me thinks that Duncan is going to be a bit of a stud!
Duncan Browning will be pleased!!!!

Pass the tissues

Night shifts should have one rule of participation! and that is never watch a sad film after only two hours sleep. Fatigue, leaves the body and soul slightly wrung out, and an emotional romp of say Pet Rescue proportions or heaven forbid an unscheduled viewing of Little Women (1994) or Shadowlands (1993) can leave a person prostrate!

Finding Neverland (2004) is the kind of film that can fell the most cynical of movie goer at ten yards. It has all the ingredients; small grief ridden children, a willowy tragic heroine, sad incidental music and clever inspired and manipulative direction. Ok, the story of J.M Barrie's inspiration for Peter Pan is supposed to be based on a true story (yeah right!), but who indeed cares that reality is way out of the window in this film as the performances from dying Edwardian mom Kate Winslet and her brittle grieving son ( an outstanding Freddie Highmore), are stunning.

A weepy 8/10

2008 plans

Working tonight (we are quiet on ITU so what's the guess I will be farmed out to another ward), but have got loads done this morning and afternoon.
Bartering and little swaps of eggs and veg have been so useful to me over the past year! I have gotten quite good at it. Today the lady at the veg shop came up trumps and I collected a ton of slightly over ripe tomatoes and lettuce for the girls (a few stories about the chickens coupled with a few eggs have worked wonders with her) People love feeling that they contribute to the well being of a few animals in some small way, and getting people on board has been rather fun.
2008 plans have bee on my mind today!
I have the promise of a cockerel from one of the very Welsh country nurses I work with, so next year I do hope to rear a few of my own hybrids as well as a whole flock of ducklings. The runner ducks will be the cash crop of the year whereas new layers will take over from the likes of Robina, who have stopped laying.The whole of the field has now been effectively cropped close by the poultry, leaving me a blank canvass on which the new vegetable patches will be laid this spring.
I think I shall write to the owners of the orchard which is located behind our cottage yet again and see if they would consider a rental? The ducks would benefit form a move beneath the apple trees and would clear the overgrown untidy look of the place. (I could preserve apples and pears without feeling I am scrumping all the time).
The picture is of suddenly friendly new hen Beatrice, who has taken over from Mildred Pierce in the matey stakes.

Meg's New mate

This is my 582 nd post!!! and I thought I would keep up with tradition and drop a brief line about everyday cottage life. Janet and Ned came round last night for dinner, and it was nice to feel that we had some Christmacy night with my family before the fairy lights have been taken down.

Meg decided she was Janet;s bessie mate all evening, which made Janet rather smug.

I am Legend

Richard Matheson's 1954 novel I Am Legend is an excellent portrayal of a lone man in a plague ridden Los Angeles and his decent into a sort of isolation madness amid a horde of mutant vampires. The 1970 film version starring a robust Charlton Heston changed the vampires to a more palatable Zombie threat, but did, I remember, explore the psychological effects being the "only man on earth" would have on an individual, if the unthinkable ever happened.

I enjoyed the first half of Francis Lawrence's 2007 remake, as hero Will Smith actually makes you believe that insanity is only a hairs breath away. I have always found Smith an incredibly charismatic and personable actor, and he gives his role of Robert Neville a depth which enhances an above average action movie to something quite moving at times. The audience actually believes he loves and needs his only companion (a beautiful Alsatian dog), and there was one or two sniffs of emotion from the stalls when Neville speaks line after line of the Shrek movie screenplay perfectly in time with a playing dvd, thus reinforcing his despair

What let's the film down, is that it drops the psychological torment that is key to the narrative after an hour and concentrates all attention on the vampire threat with some very variable computer-generated imagery (CGI). The mutants, I am afraid, just do not look real and it is this fakery that reduces the dramatic punch the film has in its action scenes.
Having said that, several of the action sequences are pretty exciting!, the recreation of a dead New York complete with deer grazing on 42nd Street is wonderfully evocative and set pieces such as a flash back to the destruction of the Brooklyn Bridge are truly spectacular.
But the film is carried by Will Smith and it is his performance which saves it. I would have loved to see more of his decent into his own inner hell, but I guess the average American audience wants to see more mutants than be challenged with the psychology of loneliness.

A good 8/10

Simple ideas

As with most good products, it is often the simplest of ideas that work the best. I have always had a problem with getting the high and low tides all mixed up before dog walking, and trying to exercise 4 dogs on a small strip of grass if the waves are crashing over the sea wall is a right bind.
Now I have a tidal "clock" up in the kitchen, walking could not be made simpler! set for 13 hours I now know exactly when to go; not rocket science but an effective idea nevertheless.
hummm, must be easily pleased

They don't like it up 'em!

I have always enjoyed the film Zulu (1964) . A military precursor to the disaster films of the 1970s, this boy's own adventure has the usual mixed bag of characters (quiet, thoughtful hero, snobby toff, thief-with-a-heart and a score of hymn singing Welshmen) and pits them against 4000 angry Zulus in 1879 South Africa. Who will survive? and how?....., it is an age old story, which works wonderfully under director Cy Endfield's deft hand.

Watching my Christmas remastered edition of the film has been greatly satisfying! as some of the set pieces have now worked themselves into movie history. Who can forget the Welsh soldiers (led by actor Ivor Emmanuel (pic) in their scarlet tunics belting out "Men of Harlech" in reply to the Zulu war chants; Nigel Green's underplayed and lugubrious Colour Sergeant and of course John Barry;s thundering musical score. (Perhaps his best African score - ok I also love his music to Born Free and Out of Africa). the film is the stuff of movie legend.

Zulu still keeps you interested after three hours of stiff upper lip and has been ideal for a rainy Friday afternoon.

I also have the box set of Hitchcock films to watch at some stage (Xmas Pressie from Sorrel)......excellent!

Found a couple of huge dead rats in their runs behind the compost heaps this morning, which is satisfying! I have cleaned out the coops and moved the whole electric perimeter fencing to allow the birds new grazing.The weather has been mild but it feels more wintery today than of late. Chris has spent the day reading and watching some sort of Disney film about female figure skaters!