Preventing the Great Escape

Yesterday when I was out, apparently the female turkeys slipped through the badger hole in the fence and went walk about far up the lane. Gentleman farmer Ralph and bird hating neighbour Mandy managed a Sterling job in rounding them up and without my knowledge returned the escapees to the field.

The ducks also have been taking advantage of the rabbit holes in the poultry fencing adjacent to the new Churchyard and have been organising raiding parties onto the fresh green grass therein, sieving it for snails and slugs on a regular basis.

So today, acting like Kommandant von Luger from The Great Escape, I have implemented a six prong attack on the escapee poultry.

Number One: I have nailed chicken wire to the entire length of border fencing between my field and the Churchyard.

Number Two: The turkeys now have an escape proof enclosure at the very bottom of the field (unless they learn to use a spade and tunnel their way out!)

Number Three: The nesting boxes have been removed from the Church wall and now have been situated in the centre of the field

Number Four: After some detailed "field" observations, it has been noted that four hens (including the fat Buff, Kate Winslett have been using a piece of concrete next to my shed as a platform by which they can negotiate the newly reconstructed Church wall. This I have now removed

Number Five: Laboriously I have started to clip the main culprits wings, to limit their flight abilities...However I am fairly loath to do this with all of the hens. Limiting free range hens' flight abilities , I think is rather stupid, especially after the fox attack recently.

Number Six: I have started to fence in the top of the Church wall where the hens have been used to going. I will heighten the wall also when I have a little more time.

When I was working away at the fence one of the recently widowed ladies came over from her husband's graveside to see what I was doing. I explained that I was ensuring escapee hens and ducks don't bother anyone and she suddenly sounded quite aghast.

Her husband had been a farmer, she explained, the gentle movement of the hens as they picked at the grass, she had found wonderfully supportive and restful.

I will evaluate my escape measures tomorrow....

Perhaps I need a watchtower and a machine gun?

ps. Rogo is still hanging on....I have set him up on some straw in the spare henhouse

Theresa, Rogo, a friend of Dorothy and Micmacs

I have a new mouth to feed, albeit for a fairly short time! Chris, a fellow small (small) holder from the other side of the village brought around a rotund, benign and rather dopey bow legged female white turkey called Theresa to be mated with Boris (who has just got the hang of this sex thing); she sat quite contentedly inside his car boot during the short journey, and confidently laid an egg inside the turkey house within minutes of her arrival.
I have left her in a Ménage à trois alongside Gloria and hopefully love will blossom !

On a downside, Rogo remains very poorly despite his antibiotic treatment. He has spent another day sat in the sun by the Church wall and has hardly moved all day. He has eaten some bread and a few handfuls of cat food, and I have made sure he has taken some water. The other cockerels have ignored his presence, which is worrying. Obviously he is no longer any threat to them. In the above photo he has been joined by the lace Buff, Lillian, she has sat with him for most of the afternoon

The juvenile turkeys, who have spent long hours escaping from their enclosure have now been housed in the pig house. I have repaired their fencing and have made them a new enclosure well out of the way of mourners, and the graveyard. Not happy at the move and their confinement
all four have squawked and called throughout the afternoon. Tough titty I thought!

This morning I sold some some eggs and took the opportunity to go to a morning pensioner showing of Jean-Pierre Jeunet's Micmacs.

Going to the cinema at 11am!! That is a treat and a half!

I paid my 4£ (OAP discount!) and went to the cafe to have a cup of coffee before the showing. The sweet waitress at the cafe told me that because I was going to a "senior citizen" showing I was entitled to a free cup of coffee and a chocolate biscuit!- which I thought was great fun!

An elderly lady on the next table asked if I was going to the film showing and introduced herself as Dorothy! Apparently we were the only members of the audience!

We went into the cinema together......I didn't think that she enjoyed the movie very much, but as she said...she only really came for the lovely coffee!

Now I love Jeunet's movies.

Amelie and A Very Long Engagement are two of my favourite movies of all time, so.... I had high hopes for his latest offering-and generally, I really liked this sweet, off-the-wall tale of whimsy, even though it wasn't quite in the league of the Audrey Tatou star vehicles.

Micmacs is filled to the gunnells with Jeunet's usual visual jokes and his comic strip touches and I absolutely love the way that he holds huge amounts of affection for his main characters , a fact he celebrates, by giving them tiny and wonderfully human eccentricities which warm the cockles of your heart. As in Amelie, where Audrey Tatou gained vicarious pleasure when she placed her hand in a bucket of beans, Jeunet captures the small pleasure of his leading man (Dany Boon) when he squeezes the contents out of a cheese triangle; he spends time and patience in isolating these tiny moments, and they serve him well, as the audience warms, as he has done , to his leading characters.

As in Amelie we follow the misfortunes of an eccentric who has lost parents and happiness. Bazil (Boon) is orphaned after his father is killed my a land mine in the Middle East. Years later,after he is nearly killed by a gunman's bullet, he is left destitute, potentially fatally injured and forlorn but is "adopted by a group of misfits who live a recycling life of sorts in a local junk yard.

Together with his friends, he finds that two city arm dealers are responsible for manufacturing the weapons that killed his father and injured himself, and the motley group devise a complicated plan to exact his revenge.....

So the scene is set for madcap slapstick chases,some complicated twists and turns and for gadgets galore...and although the leading man doesn't have the draw that the beautiful Audrey Tatou may possess, Dany Boon makes for a rather charismatic and likable hero.

With his distinctive facial tics and sad expressions, Boon is an up-to-date Charlie Chaplin. Comfortable in both physical and verbal humour, he commands the audience' attention despite some scene stealing turns by regulars Dominique Pinon and Julie Ferrier, and exactly as Jeunet
planned, the audience, , falls head over heels for his easy charm, and sweet nature.

Mimacs, is a likable, complicated and enjoyable comic romp which zips along like a bullet. Not quite as charming as Amelie, which it echoes constantly, nor as emotionally satisfying as A Very Long Engagement , it is however a joyful and zany journey into the mind of a filmaking genius

8/10

Underplaying

Chris underplayed his night out in Liverpool when I asked him and concentrated on my sisters' level of enjoyment rather than his own.....
Ann sent me this photograph today.....hummm......quite the wallflower!

Tee hee

Mistaken Identity

Comments from Sharon and Louise on my last blog entry reminded me of a funny story I remember being told by my mother!

My mother was a big movie fan, yet she didn't go to the cinema a great deal when she was in her forties ( remember she had twins later in life!)

In 1969 she saw that there was a murder mystery on at the local scala and feeling as though she needed a rare night out she called my Auntie Greta and the two ladies paid their for their cinema seats and the obligatory box of chocs and sat down in a very quiet cinema to enjoy the cinematic whodunnit!

How shocked these two middle aged conservative ladies were....

They had gone to see THE KILLING OF SISTER GEORGE!!!

They nearly killed themselves galloping out of the cinema before anyone recognised them!

The 5am flat footed ex dancer

Chris had to get up at some sort of ungodly hour to catch the early train to London, so I am awake and wide eyed now at 5.15am! No matter how quiet he thinks he is when preparing for work, he still possess the heavy flat feet of the dancer that he used to be.
Flat feet on bare floorboards ......means no sleep at 5am!
I am not complaining though, usually I can fall back asleep at the drop of a hat, today for some reason I am now wide awake
So I have walked the dogs who were not really happy to be dragged down the lane in the dark, had a coffee and now am doing what any self possessed blogger would do at this time

Yesterday I caught up with more spring planting. More cauliflower, cabbage, and neat rows of leeks joined the mange tout, early salad fare, spinach and strawberry beds....I am worried I may have peaked too early as I hear severe frosts are on the way. I have some frost protection covers, which I shall unearth today in readiness, but the job of protecting the seedlings is an arduous one to say the least

Rogo looked a little droopy yesterday too. He sat quietly away from his flock looking rather sorry for himself, so I caught him (he must be ill if he allowed me to catch him!) and gave him the once over. Apart from feeling light (a worrying fact in itself) he looked ok...no parasites, no injuries, no sour crop!.
I gave him some wormer, and a broad acting antibiotic and offered him some extra titbits by hand which he took gently from me (not like him!) so I will have to see how he goes. He is three years old and he and Bunny (the hybrid runt with the deformed hip are the only survivors now of the little group of baby hens that were attacked by the riding stable Alsatian a few years ago now. Only 4 out of 8 escaped... I hope he pulls through

Cinema in the blood

Micmacs (à tire-larigot) is Jean -Pierre Jeunet's latest movie and finally it is showing this week at the Scala down in Prestatyn. I missed the evening showing yesterday, so I may have to go to see it at the Pensioner's special on Tuesday morning.

I was thinking about my love of cinema this afternoon and where it all came from.

Visiting the cinema in the 1970s could have been viewed by some as a rather dismal activity. The decade was not known as an uplifting period in movie history as some of the bleakest films found their way to the screen (Straw Dogs, Clockwork Orange,Dog Day Afternoon, Taxi Driver and One Flew Over The Cuckoo's nest) yet as a baby faced adolescent I was spared the trauma of trying to get into see an "X" certificate movie.....favouring the more teen friendly "A" and "AA" movies..............so of course we had the plethora of disaster films of the mid 70's to enjoy, as well as the likes of Jaws, Bugsy Malone,The Omen,The Spy That Loved Me, Close Encounters and Alien)

The cinemas were large cold, uncomfortable orange and beige places that smelled of cigarettes and damp, but I loved making the effort to go to Rhyl on the bus to sit though a matinee by myself, the trouble to go the four miles, really made the ritual worthwhile.

There were always two features on offer,and always an ice cream lady with proper ice cream and wafers all set out in a box strung around her neck. (I never had the money to get an ice cream!)

Matinees were almost deserted every time I went, so even to this day, there is something quite reassuring and familiar when I am surrounded by empty seats and all alone in the dark, the lighter side of seventies movie life (remember the 1970's was a bleak economic, news worthy and political time), could wash over me.

This love of film fantasy has continued to be an important part of my life today. Love of the technicolour epic continues ( and always will do), but thankfully my cinematic interests and experiences are now wide and varied!

The ritual of choosing the film, the paying for the ticket and the sitting down in a chosen ( and quiet) seat remains a joy and on Tuesday if I do go to the pensioner's showing of Micmacs, my experience of the Jeunet movie will be as fresh and as enjoyable as my 1974 trip to see The Poseidon Adventure!

detox

After lots of fruit juice, a good sleep and gallons of water, I feel detoxed and back to normal. I have taken the advice of my city friends who all commented "Haven't you a red face?" when I saw them on Friday, and have put some sun screen on today!
It is another lovely day, so I was up early to walk the dogs (Chris had a late night so slept in) before I moved the new chicks out of their "nursery" cage into the shed proper
A mixture of bantams and cross hybrids, an increase in the number of white chicks leads me to believe that new boy Jesus has got the hang of mating with anything and everything. The bunch seems happy and healthy so far....10 hatched and 10 healthy...so I am happy.

Right must dash, am now off to water the new growing vegetables, walk the dogs, then I will plant some sprouts, cabbage, and more cauliflower

I am too old for all this

I got to Sheffield by mid afternoon after catching up with old friend Joy (below) who was a little under the weather and couldn't make our evening meet.

After a mooch around the city centre (above Sheffield's version of the London Eye) I over indulged myself in the usual wine fest/gossip fest/laughter fest that is a Sheffield reunion
night out.

I won't do into too many details, but suffice to say that I am far too old to be trying to get into the wrong hotel bedroom whilst being much worse for wear!

Nuala and I woke up this morning with very fuzzy heads, but enjoyed the usual night out "post mortem" amid fits of giggles whist hiding under the duvet....

You wouldn't think we are in our forties would you.

Typical bad photos after too much vino! The hangover left me at 4pm