Mum-in-law

Mother and Son

Just waiting for the mum-in-law to arrive, so I have a few sneaky minutes of blogging to share!
As I said yesterday, I am extremely lucky having Sorrel as a mother in law.
She's sociable, easily pleased, undemanding and house trained
She is also young-at-heart. terrified to the point of abject hysteria of mice and birds (yes not a good mix with our lifestyle what?) and in her smart "Broadstairs" designer wear, is certainly not built for schlopping through mud with a pig under her arm.
But I do love her dearly!
Like any retired lady of independent means who has a middle aged gay son, Sorrel has often gone on holiday with the two of us,These "adventures" have always proved to be  entertaining affairs, as something "unfortunate" often seems to happen to her when abroad
I have blogged about this before, but I think the story of her first day at the rather select resort of Sitges in Spain is worth repeating for comic effect !
We arrived at Sitges by train, which was not a good move as Sorrel who is a trusting little soul, got herself pick pocketed by two Albanian scumbags before she got off the coastal express!
Hyperventilating and shaky we got her to the very select hotel, checked her into her lovely sea view room with instructions to , freshen up, get changed and meet  us downstairs at the heaving lunchtime restaurant for a stiff gin and tonic and a rejuvenating lunch!
And so, a short time later, dressed classicaly all in black, Sorrel met us outside the hotel where hoards of affluent Spaniards were enjoying their late lunches at the open air dining area.
As we ventured out onto the pavement to pick a table, Sorrel slipped out of one flower encrusted sandal and immediately fell into a large, shallow and incredibly dusty manhole!
It seemed like an absolute age before she managed to climb out, and as "older" ladies have a want to do when they fall over, she rolled over several times before managing to get to her feet!
Chris, mortified with the spectacle of his mother looking as though she had been trampled by a herd of buffalo hissed "Get up get up!!!!!!!!!" rather too loudly as Sorrel, sandal-less and filthy  clambered out of the hole in front of a hushed restaurant
And were was I when all this was happening?
Yes...I was hiding in a nearby doorway , sobbing in hysterics
And that was only day one
hey ho 

The Santa Maria Hotel Sitges (right)

I am Sorrel Ready!

All the dog snot has been removed from cottage windows/paintwork/doors and strangely enough the cat flap
A mummified mouse has been removed from under our bed
Fresh flowers have been put into the spare bedroom alongside a pair of worn fluffy slippers and of course, a spare towel has been laid out tastefully upon the neatly unwrinkled eiderdown
and  every surface has been double sprayed with a generous helping of febreze


I am ready!

Broody despite the weather

I was due to take neighbour and friend Carol over to Alfreton in Nottinghamshire today to collect her new Welsh Terrier puppy from the breeder we bought all of our terriers from. However when I got up, the weather had changed from being a benign spring back to a  rather chilly snowy winter , so reluctantly we thought it prudent to cancel the trip,
I am glad we have, crossing the Pennines in snow is not a bag of laughs
Animals HATE being very wet and very cold. They can do one or the other quite easily, but do not fair well if both are on the cards, so I placed extra feed inside the hen houses today as I know the birds will not be venturing too far from home.
One old buff is holed up on eggs in a broody box which is safely tucked away on the allotment. All of the broody boxes this year have been set up inside donated dog crates, making them impregnable against the marauding badgers which still troll through the field at night.
In the duck house another old runner has made a nest for herself. and in the goose house both Winnie and Jo have laid their huge white oval eggs together in the name nest. This accounts for their behaviour with Camilla, I suspect as the juvenile female is "too close for comfort" to be allowed into the same nesting area.
Out grazing the Canada goose seems to have rejoined her companions safely. only at night does she separate off to join the slightly bemused "crackheads " in their house

Brooding birds never cease to amaze me. They possess a strange ability to completely "Zen out" to everything around them and will possess that strange faraway look which is usually employed by habitual drinkers when you try to engage them in conversation.
Poke a broody hen and they will fluff themselves up and will growl like a dog, but they won't leave their eggs for anything.
This is motherhood in the raw. Instinct and innate behaviour.
No thinking whatsoever.


The cottage looked very dark and rather forlorn when I gazed back at it from the icy field.
Time to light the fire and switch on the lights.
Winter has returned for the day

Mothering & Things

Question?
Does anyone know the movie which featured Donald Moffat yelling the following line?

"I know you gentlemen have been through a lot, but when you find the time, I'd rather not
spend the rest of this winter TIED TO THIS FUCKING COUCH! "

Geeks and fans of horror films may recognise that this came from the cult John Carpenter alien-on-the loose slasher flick The Thing, where a group of scientists on an Antarctic research site encounter a shape shifting monster with rather stomach churning results.
The film was not a hit at the time, but its tense storyline and state of the art special effects coupled with a mean and moody hero in the shape of Kurt Russell gave it cult status on video and on tv, so it was with some interest that I watched the 2011 prequel, which was also rather confusingly entitled   The Thing 

Stig Henrik Hoff just of the "lumberjacks"

The prequel is in fact just a remake of the original, with the Norwegian scientists glimpsed at the beginning of the Carpenter movie taking on the American scientists roles.

Instead of a mean and moody Mr Russell, the remake gives us the more politically correct female warrior hero in the capable hands of Mary Elizabeth Winstead but thankfully as the research station was filled to the gunnels with Nordic viking types, there was plenty of hunky lumberjacks to keep me happy, especially as the film was a little disappointing!7/10

Joel Edgerton (swoon)

On the other hand, the other dvd I watched this week is a must see
We Need to Talk About Kevin is the filmed version of the acclaimed novel by Lionel Shriver
and tells the story of Eva, a middle aged woman who in a whole series of flashbacks reviews incidents in the upbringing of her imprisoned son which chronicle his decent into a psychopathic behaviour and murder.
The strength of this film lies in it's total ambiguity when appointing blame for Kevin's antisocial tendencies
Eva's lack of emotional warmth towards her son may have have caused his problems, then again it is hinted that physical illness may have caused the damage, whatever it is, Eva ( played by a haunted looking and icy Tilda Swinton) is left with the terrible guilt of her son's crimes and the terrifying burden of trying to work out whether it was nature or nurture that irrevocably damaged him.

Its not an easy film to watch, especially as Swinton plays a rather complicated and at times unsympathetic character, but she is truly compelling as the world weary Eva and should have won an Oscar for her performance.
9/10

Jobs

Mother-in-law arrives soon

The Cottage Needs Spring Cleaning

so today is Operation

"dog snot removal"

2 years ago!!!!!!!!!!!

Winnie and Jo the female geese are giving poor Camilla a bad time at the moment!
But they to were sweet little babies only 2 years ago now!
Here is an old video of the two of them in 2010.
God I love goslings!

Monday's Diary

 In 2006, shortly after we arrived in Trelawnyd, I decided to write an on-line diary chronicling the mundane and the new in our new country based life here in Wales.

Ok some days I will go off on one ( as the meandering rubbish of yesterday will testify to) but generally the purpose of Going Gently is simply that of a daily journal.

So today, I will return to those little daily dramas...those tiny snippets of the every-day, so to speak

Yesterday was Palm Sunday. It was a beautiful spring day, and as usual part of the St Michael's Church  service was held by the ancient 14th Century prayer Cross in the old Graveyard.

I snapped a few photos of the small congregation and remember feeling suddenly  a little melancholy at the thought that in perhaps ten years time, the congregation would have been whittled down to almost nothing

 Today, everything is all very different. The weather is cold, wet and miserable, and the bright greens of yesterday have morphed into the more traditional browns and greys of a damp spring.

The rain has however transformed our tiny back garden from it's winter "nothingness" into a pre flowering  greenery, as great clumps of Aquilegia vulgaris have started to flourish. 

Mother-in-law Sorrel arrives on Thursday, I am hoping that the granny's Bonnet's will be flowering by then.

On the field, not all the animal relationships have remained Walt Disney-esque, and a marked split within the ranks of the geese has resulted in Camilla the Canada goose being ostracised from the flock.

The only reason I can think of that this may happen, is the fact that Camilla may indeed be a "Charles"

and that the resident gander, the benign Russell, has decided that another male is surplus to requirements, but watching the interaction between ALL of the geese, it is noticeable that even Jo and Winnie seem somewhat wary of "Camilla" when "she" approaches.

Last night a somewhat lonely Camilla was housed with the "Crackhead whores" in the hen house next to the goose house

(perhaps the more knowledgeable goose keepers amongst my blog readers could give me a few ideas of what is exactly going on?)

Camilla or could it be Charles?

Yesterday ,several of the neighbours made a point of happily  mentioning that Albert seems to be "back on form" now. The skinny, somewhat elusive cat has obviously endeared himself to the residents of the five houses in our part of the village, and his recent absence from their gardens has been worrying for all of them that enjoy the company of a cat who resembles Sammy Davis Jnr 

It's funny howmany people enjoy vicarious pleasure in someone Elsie's pet.

This morning I snapped this somewhat blurry photo of Albert,wrapped around George and Meg after they all had returned from their morning walk.

It is nice to see Albert back on form............
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Weight Watchers weigh in 14 stone 5 lbs

No weight loss this week

Must have been all that white wine!!!!

Bugger!!!

The Clothes Maketh The Man

I have never had much of an idea when it comes to clothes.
My "style" ( and I am using the term style VERY loosely here) comprises of a mixture between man at Marks & Spencer's, teenage "I am wearing the bonfire pile of rags, I threw on the floor last night" grunge and a faded 1980 preppy college look
It is all a bit of an uncomfortable mix.
I must be a huge disappointment.


Chris is precise, fastidious and stylish in how he dresses.
My "Dried Chicken shit on the kneecap" look has him rolling his eyes with an exasperation which often borders on the desperate, and on those few rare occasions I have actually worn a suit ( the last time, I think was when he collected his doctorate from York Uni) his excitement was almost palpable.


When I get down to my target weight of 13 and a half stone ( after shedding my  35 lbs of rancid fat) I have promised myself a few new items of clothing.
They may not be age specific
They may not be expensive
and they certainly won't be cutting edge
But at least..they won't have elasticated waists
and they will be clean!

*painting is "Mutton Dressed as Lamb" by G Bunt