Hetro night

Sometimes I do enjoy a typical "heterosexual" night!
In Sheffield I used to have a weekly meet up with my married friends Mike or Jonney H and we used to do the straight guy thing of talking absolute bollocks over a pint of beer! With mike I could do the science fiction Star Trek/ Voyager emotional romp , where John H was a typical All About Eve debate or list "all the films you have ever loved".etc etc.....
Tonight I met up with Geoff (above), the affable Scouser, so we had rubbishy conversations about life,Liverpool and the merits of terrier dogs!.....
sometimes you just need a crappy, frivolous conversation..............

Bunny

Its been raining all day, but I braved the elements and have strimmed most of the field and allotment so the place looks neat and tidy.

I snapped the below photo of Bunny during a brief lull in the downpours. She needed to stretch out her deformed hip and leg.

Welsh Roots

Rowena Price, one of the older residents of the Village confirmed yesterday that we are in fact related albeit by marriage! Now, I knew that my Great Grandmother Mary Jones was the only true Welsh member of our family. (She infact hailed from Twysog, which was a huge farm on the outskirts of Denbigh.) whereas my other Great grandparents hailed from Liverpool,Bristol,Ireland and Scotland!
Rowena was married to Tom Price who was a distant relation of Mary's, and reading her hand penned version of "our" family tree, that she forwarded on to me, brought back all of those stories that my Grandmother used to tell us as children.
Mary Jones married my Great Grandfather,James Fry in the late 1890s and they Lived in the city of Liverpool (which was then called the capital of Wales)
They had five children, Hughie,Alf,Lizzy, Louie and my grandfather Jim and all the family lived in close proximity to one another around the area of Everton which is just North of the City centre and overlooks the famous Liverpool docks. My Grandfather married my grandmother (above), who was also called Mary in 1924 and they had my mother Joan in 1925. The entire family remained in Liverpool until the war, and I was interested to see that Rowena's sketched family tree documented the most famous of our family stories, namely the family disaster of the May blitz of 1941. I always remember my Grandmother recalling the time she was running through the streets with my mother (who was around 16) and my Uncle Jim who was perhaps 12. The sirens had already sounded and the bombers where overhead as they debated where to run to. The options open to them, was a reinforced room in the local school or the family shelter located at my Great Grandparents (Jim and Mary's) home, both of them within running distance, and as the bombs started to fall, my Grandmother had a premonition to run to the school.
The family shelter took a direct hit soon afterwards.My great Grandfather was killed instantly and Mary, with Lizzy and Louie were buried along with many others . Fortunately they survived but over 1450 people were killed in one of the worst raids of the war
My Grandmother, Mother and Uncle had already survived a previous bombing raid, when an unexploded parachute "torpedo" (middle photo) actually crashed through the next door house and lodged under their kitchen floor while the three of them were hiding under an upturned settee in the living room!. So the May blitz, was the last straw for them, and it provided the springboard for my Grandparents to move to the safety of Wales. The village where my family first settled was in fact Gwaenysgor, which is located just a mile away from where I am sat now!
It's a small, small world, isn't it?

Today Chicken course tomorrow a Poultry degree!

Well, I have returned home after the first session of my 4 week "Chickens for beginners" course, flushed with success! Out of the ten people that said they were participating , seven turned up tonight, and two more will hopefully attending from next week after their holidays.
Three course members already have hens , but wanted to improve their knowledge base, whilst the others had very basic poultry experience and needed teaching "from scratch" as it were and all seem a very jolly bunch indeed!
The two hours shot by, and I really enjoyed the evening.
I am already planning my next course! and am thinking of how I can advertise it to a wider population!!!

Let down

You tend to get used to some aspects of human misery when you are a nurse. It is not the nicest part of the job, nor is it one that you should ever get blasé about, but when you consistently have to deal with families in crisis you kind of develop a nose for the unbalanced and stressed.

Today was a case in point. I went into work at 4pm, (I was on the unenviable 4pm to 8pm shift) and as I walked into the hospital (looking like Rebecca of Sunnybrook farm-complete with trug of vegetables and 2 dozen eggs for sale. I saw a middle aged woman smoking a cigarette. She looked rather down at heel. Hair a mess, clothes crumpled , forefinger stained with nicotine. She stank of stale beer and was sporting the start of a black eye, and I couldn't help thinking that there was something incredibly forlorn and sad about her resignation and isolation.
She must have touched a nerve with me, for as I passed, I stopped and asked if she was ok.
The woman smiled, but it was a long sad smile and she shook her head
"Just kids........ ", she said "they always let you down, no matter what you do and say for them......don't they?"
I nodded and eventually walked on, there was little I could say or do.....but the image of this disappointed lonely woman has remained with me all evening.

I know what it is like to be disappointed by a parent....sometimes that is just the way of the world, but being let down by your children seems to have a cold hardness about it....., and that in itself must be a very bitter pill to swallow, especially when you think your child has failed in life because of something you did or didn't do.

Message to self.....thank god we have animals...I couldn't quite cope with the awesome responsibility of children!!!

The Vicarage Gardens Prestatyn Flower Show 2009

A brief video from today's show, you can just make out Chris and William standing to attantion at the endof the clip.

Nephew Chris with partner Rebecca and their "prize" Broad bean

First place for my mega courgette ! (I said it was a marrow)

Susan

Hens are like people....., some get sick, no matter what you do for them! Susan is still looking rather poorly, even though she rallied after her serious bout of sickness when we were away in San Fransisco earlier in the year.
I have done everything I can think of to pull her through this time. Antibiotic in her water, lice and parasite treatments, wormer and vitamins! The pasta has helped too, as does the occasional egg, but still she looks anaemic, lethargic and weak.
This morning I have syringed her a good dose of olive oil and sugared water, and she has eaten some white bread and a tiny bit of wheat, but she remains very thin and sick.
There is a general rule of thumb that all sick birds are removed from the flock, so she is at present sitting in a cat carrier overlooking the field.
I know I shouldn't have favourites, but her gentle personality and valliant battle with ill health, over the last few months has endeared her to me somewhat