Palm Sunday and Queen Latifah

Service in the sun

 The small congregation of the St Michael's stood outside in the graveyard next to the 14th Century Church Cross for Palm Sunday service.
Although I am not a Church goer, I stood and watched the service for a while in the bright and warm sunshine, and did so with a great deal of affection.
Now where does that come from?

Chris is third from the right

 I am working tonight, so this morning I have tried to take advantage of the springlike day but real life gets in the way, as it has a want to do, and much of the morning has been taken over with the arrival of a new charity case,
The phone went early and yes it was another plea to help out a fellow poultry keeper.
This time the problem was a very loud buff orpington who thinks she is a cockerel
(not good for a semi detached garden in suburbia)
Described as a "big bugger with a large gob" Queen Latifah is a handsome and rather vociferous girl indeed, and on reflection I would have been a fool to refuse her admission to the field population....
so here she stays........

Queen Latifah!

Roft or Crofft

 Ok we are slumming it slightly with the plastic Union Jack bought from the "Royal Wedding" shelf in Sainsburys but from today we are flying the flag for Royalists everywhere and will be building up quite nicely thank you towards the Royal Wedding celebrations.
I know its not trendy
I know its not fashionable
But I don't give a stuff.
"Gawd love 'em" that's what we say!
(thanks Craig)

One of the St Trinians killing a mouse on the field

 Its been a quiet-ish sort of day. Chris has spent an age weeding the garden (!) whilst  I have pottered around planting out violas. and clearing the winter dead wood..
By mid afternoon, I decided to walk the dogs around the village and what started as a brief amble

aubretia growing on the old wall in Chapel Street

 turned out to be a bit of a marathon, as nearly everyone I bumped into provided me with some help with my new blog..
The nice Chap from Ty Wynne ( Wynne House) in the centre of the village stopped me with some interesting historic photos and information about his house, another lady from Bron Haul called me over to collect a book which would be useful for some background research for the blog and amateur sleuths Kit and Stan Hopkins waved me over to their neat bungalow to give me the results of their investigations into the historic term "The Roft" which older villagers' remembered  as the nickname for some open waste ground just off the hight street, where the pensioner bungalows are now situated  .
I could not find out if "roft" was indeed a real Welsh word...but Kit could and I was impressed that after discussion with her Welsh academic minister she found out that "Rofft" was indeed a mutation from the Welsh word " crofft" which literally means a "small holding or small field next to a house"
(Interestingly similar to the Scottish word croft: "A croft is a fenced or enclosed area of land, usually small and arable with a crofter's dwelling thereon."

Local Miss Marple Kit and hubby Stan

As I walked back to the cottage laden down with information  I was stopped by Ralph the gentleman farmer's missus, who had read the blog and who kindly offered me some information on one of her relatives the powerhouse old  village character Miss BA Jones, schoolteacher,staunch Tory supporter and Flower Show veteran.
It was a fruitful walk

Happiness is........

Old Thomas in his blog of a few days ago, debated the concept of personal happiness. I commented then that I believe that happiness is a short lived emotion and the best that any of us could really hope for was a state of contentedness with "one's lot"....but happiness does occur in the smallest of moments ...so I thought I would "document" mine today .
I have spent much of my post night shift jet lag day cleaning and sat down in the silence of the cottage at 2pm to drink a well earned cup of coffee. Within a minute or so ,the dogs, all tired after their walk, snuck up to me on the sofa in drips and drabs..... I find that there is something quite satisfying about their constant need to be close.......
(for those that might of missed him George is curled up on the arm chair)

et tu brute........

et tu brute


now, sometimes we are lucky in the nhs...we have breaks,
in a nice  coffee room
with access to a computer


so I have just read the following, scathing (ney cutting)
comments from my so called friend ....Thomas Stephenson ,
who said this in last night's somewhat fruity blog entitled "my Arse":-

"Now it's not often that I slag someone off behind their back, but I know John is at work tonight, so he won't be able to defend himself until everyone in the North Eastern Hemisphere has gone to bed, so I feel safe. Let's hope I don't find myself in intensive care in his part of Wales, but since I never choose to visit on a matter of principal, the chances of me having a head-on collision in his jurisdiction are virtually nil, and I am hoping to get up early enough to erase this post before he has a chance to read it.
What have I got against him? Well, he seems to be surrounded by sycophants for a start - have you seen how many people respond to one of his posts announcing the arrival of a sick chicken at his hoarding-centre up there in sheep-shagger country? I sit here day after day, making profound comments about Life, the Universe and Everything, and attract about 5 comments from mad old women in Canada and the USA - half of whom are retired/failed interior designers, and the other half that seem to spend their retirements knitting cup-cakes for fictitious Grand-Children and deliberately mowing down pedestrians in their 4 Litre Jeeps - and HE just has to mention one of his fucking dogs shitting on the carpet to get about 50 ecstatic comments telling him what a wonderful, caring person he is, and how only God understands how he must keep it all together in such an efficient and caring way!.............."

All I have got to say in reply  is....


"envy is a terrible emotion for an over-the-hill artistic-type to acknowledge....."

Now I may have an adoring following..but let's face it who wouldn't when you are blogging about fluffy bunnies, sweet fat old chickens and incontinent bulldogs....?

perhaps that is the lesson in point.....

an essay on the merits of slabs of stone,  old sets of candlesticks and some knackered old wine glasses.....perhaps just doesn't cut the mustard....let alone capture the imagination

much love and as grouch would put it

oxoxoxoxoxo

john

PS. to all those so called sycophants......please feel free to pop over the old fart's blog site and leave him a pithy comment.....he doesn't receive many!

My Favourite YOUTUBE video

Today will be a bit of a non entity day.
It is raining.
It is Grey.....
I am working tonight......
You know !...its the sort of of day that isn't very bright...

I know I have posted this a few times before...but it's always worth repeating.......
Watch it, shed a tear and smile a little

The Standard of Nursing & Russell watch

 As I planted out broad beans this afternoon, I listened with interest to London Talk Radio's Julia Hartley-Brewer. She was endeavouring to discuss the standards of the modern UK nurse, which I thought was interesting given the number of non UK nurses presently practicing in London..However I digress...
Much of the conversation was given over to the age old debate of bedside nursing versus degree nursing which I am sure makes interesting radio time (especially once the horror stories of "bright nurses" refusing to wipe an arse or a snottynose started to surface) but personally I feel that the presenter and the general public failed to touch upon why nurses are perhaps not viewed as they once was.
Ok alot of people's perceptions and expectations of nurses in this modern day and out dated nhs ,I feel are a little unrealistic at times. Three trained nurses and a couple of health care workers cannot hope to work miracles on a 32 bedded orthopaedic ward on theatre day without looking as though they have been ravaged constantly by an over zealous house officer......but there is an expectation by everyone that they indeed look as though they are a cross between Audrey Hepburn in The Nun's Story and Mary Poppins.

Having said this, I have been witness to some atrocious behaviour from nurses that will inevitably let the side down despite the emphasis of top heavy nursing qualifications nowadays.
Sloppy communication skills, lack of personal grooming, and moreover a kind of modern day informality are just three things that I feel fuck up nursing standards today......In the acute sector nurses are not everyone's mate....and they are not,(in my mind) autonomous professionals that don't have to think about "old fashioned but necessary professionalism.......and what I mean by professionalism is that they need to "look" disciplined

Today many nurses look sloppy...this goes hand in hand with a more liberal and relaxed attitude to everything from shop service to being given your tea and bun in a cafe.........yes we are churning out bright young things that hopefully will question their practice but are we instilling in our nurses a discipline and professionalism required and wanted by the patients?

I would say no to this.......and believe me, my nursing career comes from a rehabilitation perspective where a relaxed and non conforming approach to nursing care was not only encouraged but vital to get our young patients through hospital; yet I still think that we can learn a few lessons from the starch and terror days of pre project 2000 nursing.

Funnily enough I was reading Cro's Blog today. He had written an interesting and amusing piece about his mother who was a red cross nurse. It reminded me of a story I was told by a patient of mine in York who described an incident when he was a child in war torn Singapore.
He told me that when the Japanese pushed forward to surround the city, there was a general call to evacuate the European population. and the civilians and nursing sisters where lined up on the dock sides ready to be placed upon the few ships destined for Australia.
I remember how he described the scene when bombers attacked the city and how the Europeans dived to cover as the planes strafed the harbour. Only the army nurses in their clean white uniforms, starched hats and capes stood their ground in two stiff lines as the planes roared over...and the sight of them (all young girls in their 20s) rallied the panic of the civilians on the dockside.

Now I tell you this story, not that I am expecting nurses in a district general to provide to act with such unblinking (and to some foolhardy) old fashioned military stiffness...no ,of course I am not, but I do think there is a place for a more precise,less relaxed professionalism amongst nurses as a whole.....a little strach in everything wouldn't hurt..........
We need the informed and the bright degree nurses, oh yes of course we do....we need nurses that think outside of the box.....we also need those bedside nurses that can wipe a brow and hold a hand and wipe an arse......can we please have a nursing profession that perhaps will also look as though they could snap to attention (straighten their aprons-just a little please) when matron comes a clip clopping around the ward.................or am I an old fashioned prissy fart?

Russell (centre) with Winnie (left) and Jo (right)

Anyhow........enough already...
When I have been outside in the lovely sunshine, I have kept an eye out for newbie Russell the goose. He looks happy enough. slightly battered by his previous bullying gander ( various feathers pulled and broken) but generally he's a handsome chap indeed.........
The girls seemed to have somewhat shyly accepted him.....so far!

Russell The Gander

Last night a couple who were visiting a family grave called me over to the fence as I was locking the stock up for the night.
They told me a sad tale of gander bullying ( an older and more powerful male picking on a quieter juvenile )  and hesitantly asked me if they could re home the victim .
What could I say?
...and so the ebb and flow of comings and goings continue on the field....yesterday a tired old ghost hen died, today a shy young gander arrives........
His name is Russell

Tearful Sunday "sur le fil"

The saddest of Yann Tiersen's themes from Amelie