Going Gently

Ticking a box

My Brother (right) walked the height of Snowdon in miserable conditions supported by his son ( my nephew) Jon, Brother in law Tim (pictured left) and two ski sticks!
He has exhibited a strength of will inherited from our formidable Gran Fry and after the trek didn't retire to his bed as most of us would have done but jumped into a frenzy of more work by acting as a musical technician at a local concert.
We are all very proud of him

seeing

As the laptop is in the bedroom with me, I felt the compulsion to get this little vignette of village life "on blog" as it were.
I slept for four hours then got up with my t shirt the wrong way round to make sure the animals were all watered and that Boris got his extra titbits. My friend Geoff and some visiting family called around for eggs so as I was seeing to them, I hardly noticed four walkers standing my the cottage wall. A young man was linking arms with an older man and both were admiring the back garden, so I left them to it,said a quick hello and went inside to collect some egg boxes. It was only after I had passed them for a second time did I realise that the younger man was blind and that the older chap was "showing" him a buddliea flower by describing it carefully as the blind man felt and smelt it.
I had almost overlooked this little moment in time due to over tiredness..hey ho
Off to bed again

Bliss

It is ages since I have done two night shifts together.
Unlike my normal "no sleep and get on with things", I have got to go to bed during much of today so that I can face another shift tonight.
So Chris has just fed me a nice cooked breakfast, I have no dogs to walk and have just fed and watered the birds so I can climb into a clean crisp bed without the guilt of jobs to do.
Our bed is quiet! and empty.....without the usual cacophony of grunts,farts and dog dreaming woofs it is now a haven of peace and tranquility where I can spread out in peace and decadence....
bliss

The Ghost

Today is wet and misty. I am working night shift tonight and tomorrow night, so I wanted us to "do something" this afternoon to ensure that the weekend was not a total bust.

So we went to theatre Clwyd to see Polanski's The Ghost.

It wasn't a half bad thriller , well that is for a rainy miserable afternoon that is and I liked the showy cast of thesps:.Pierce Brosnan, Olivia Williams ( a particular fav of mine), Kim Cattrall (a nice cool and sassy performance here) and the ubiquitous Tom Wilkinson, not to mention surprise pop ups by an almost skeletal Eli Wallach and a bald James Belushi.

The plot centring around the ghost writer for an ex British PM's biography, a CIA plot and murder, is far fetched to say the least but the direct comparison with the grinning Tony Blair is pleasing enough for the audience to enjoy and Polanski's use of a wintery New England and a strange colour tint to the filming makes for an interesting movie.

Don't look Nigel

but I gave it an 8/10

The raping of the hens

Chatting to neighbour Mandy over the compost heap yesterday, I was in an ideal position to see the sex crazed drake Halleh molesting another juvenile Hen. Being adopted by a hen, has given this handsome drake a penchant for nubile young chickens and 2 poor hybrids Ripley and Newt have been repeatedly flattened, mouthed and harassed by him
Mandy watched open mouthed when I interrupted our conversation with a sharp "oi!!!!!" and on impulse and with some frustration I lobbed a metal feeding bowl at the duck as he tottered past with his mouth full of hen feathers.
The bowl unexpectedly clacked Halleh on the head, and the poor thing stopped and immediately fell over, shaking violently.
"Bloody hell!" I cried to Mandy "I think I've killed him"
Mandy got on with her weeding, used to the somewhat bizarre goings on on the field, but as I checked on Halleh she did ask "well?............is he alright?"
In fact he was alright.....well, eventually that is.
He came around slowly, shaking his head from side to side then went to sulk in a patch of nettles for the rest of the afternoon.
Gawd I felt guilty, and checked on him occasionally, just in case he suffered a delayed subdural haematoma.
Every time I found him, he watched me warily with beady black eyes following my every move.......

Post Office Gossip, George and Dan's duck eggs

I bumped into Aunt Gladys in the post Office this morning. Deaf as a post but with her eyes bright and interested in all village gossip and news she eagerly asked me how the open allotment went. (although I am sure she had already had a detailed run down of the day)
When I informed her that her 60 "world famous labelled" scones had been sold within minutes of our opening I was delighted to see her beam with pride and mischief.
It is this almost childlike quality of enjoying life's little victories that seems to keep Gladys "younger" than most people in their twenties, and her genuine pleasure over the success of our open day was rather moving.

The only other bit of drama of the afternoon was the fact that George got a twig stick in his throat when we were out for a walk up the gop. A blue light dash to the vets, a quick anaesthetic , a nifty twist of a set of magills forceps and thirty five pounds later he was returned home non the worse for wear.....
These animals will be the death of me.......

......and finally....... the second batch of this year's duck eggs have just had a clean and polish and have been set up in the kitchen incubator!
I am hoping to hatch out a score of ducklings for a guy that attended the open day and for Dan, a fellow blogger over at http://allthatcomeswithit.com/, who is risking divorce by agreeing to add several runners to his back garden menagerie!
hey ho

ps welcome to another village blog reader at Anchor house!!