Mind Games

I spent most of my shift in a side room last night comforting a distressed patient. To pass the time (in those long periods when he seemed still and comfortable) I contented myself with recalling my top ten screen nuns! Yes I know it sounds a little bizarre, but it did help me pass the time a little quicker on a very long 12 hour shift.

The previous short ten blogs, indicate the level of my thinking between 4 and 6 am!!!


Today I have found with some horror that the buffs have lice!!! Just what I didn't need after a knackering shift. I have spent most of the day scrubbing out hen houses, powdering the buff's bums with insecticide and inoculating as many hens as I could with panomec....oh the shame I feel like a parent with a kid with their first batch of nits!!!

No 1 Nun: Sister Luke

I first saw The Nun's Story when I was around ten, and even then I knew I was watching something rather special. The story of the trials and tribulations of Sister Luke (the amazing Audrey Hepburn), was filmed in an almost documentary style by Fred Zinnemann, and some beautifully crafted scenes of the austere convent life were sandwiched between some shockingly effective dramatic pieces ( the attack on sister Luke by an violent psychiatric patient being a standout)

2. Sister Clodagh

Not my favourite Nun, but almost...........Deborah Kerr, shaky of faith and full of pride and memories she is the flawed and beautiful heroine of Black Narcissus.

She always looked good in a white habit!

3. Sister Ulrica

It is a strange fact but an elderly starchy dutch nun, with big feet, became a household name in the 1980s POW series Tenko. Played by Patricia Lawrence, Sister Ulrica was separated from her convent and teamed up with the motley group of British prisoners, acting as their conscience and counsellor.......she gave up her habit in series three and was forced to wear an old night dress by the filthy Japs......hey ho

4: Sister Mary Clarence

Do Nuns actually wear this sort of box-on-head habit?.Anyhow I absolutely love Sister Act. A ropey choir that needs plucky maverick "nun" Goldberg to kick some ass is this camp classic of the early 1990s. Great to see the musical stage version opens in the West End in a month or so.........

5: Sister Philippa

Black Narcissus again, and the somber,wise and ever so melancholy performance by Flora Robson as Sister Philippa is one of the most memorable things in this Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger classic. She is the gardening loving oldest nun of the small 5 strong group of missionaries battling faith,natives, and the strange atmosphere of the Himalayas.
Robson's quiet sadness, I always think is incredibly moving

6. Sister Angela

I have always loved Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957) A Sexy, decent and blue collar Marine Robert Mitchum is shipwrecked with an Irish Nun on a pacific island overrun by the Japanese during World War 2............will they survive? and not a stain on her white habit too!!!!

7. Sister Euphemia of the Five Wounds

Sister Euphemia of the Five Wounds (Eric Idle ) has one of the best lines as an unlikely comedy nun in Nuns on the Run.......when introducing himself to the mother superior ( he is a petty criminal hiding in a convent as a nun like you do!), he utters the unforgettable line

"My name is Sister Euphemia of the Five Wounds ........five wounds for short!!!"