Finding Pennington Gap and the incredible Eldad Hagar

Don't you just love the internet?
I have uploaded " google maps" on the old ipad recently and have enjoyed flitting around the globe taking snapshot views of various places of interest at random......the activity reminds me of the times I used to go to the reference library in Prestatyn as a boy......I would pick a heavy encyclopedia and open a page at random...........learning something completely new would be a real and delightful treat.
Now Google Maps has a gadget that can drop a pin . The pin literally " pinpoints" a place on the map, a place that you can zoom in on , and bingo.....you are looking at a place you have never seen before.......it's the map equivalent of picking an unknown page in that reference book.
A few days ago I closed my eyes and dropped the map pin on the globe......out of all the places it could fall, it managed to fall on a small town in Virginia by the name of Pennington Gap.
Now, perhaps it's just me, but I have been ever slightly obsessed with Pennington Gap ever since.
I have gone on street view and have taken a drive through the town. I have looked in the shop windows, tried ( and failed) to see what was playing in the local cinema and got a sense of the place's slightly run down feel.....it reminds me of a slightly faded Welsh town, surrounded by hills, cut off from the rest of the world....
Am I alone in playing this slightly asperger game with myself? Perhaps I am  , but
I would love it if someone from the Pennington will read this ( via google) and leave me a comment!... My obsession would have come full circle.....
Another idle internet obsession I have  is YouTube
I especially love to indulge in the emotional romp that is the work of the incredible odd sounding Eldad Hagar . Eldad is an amateur dog rescuer, who collects strays around Los Angeles, and he employs a gentle and incredibly effective method of gaining the dogs' trust before capture. Of course the videos have the ability to melt the heart of even the most cynical of nasty bastards, after all they are designed to raise money for the local animal shelter, but after a hard day, they do have the ability to lift one's spirits, albeit through a veil of tears.....and make you appreciate the good things in life.

Enjoy this video and I bet you shed a few when you see little Monty sat safely on that car seat.........

Sherlock

Well, Sherlock is back....the multilayered  love story between Holmes and Watson continues energetically c/o Mark Gatiss' clever  screenplay, and the jaunty chemistry between Freeman and Cumberbatch....and although it is , in essence, a frothy bit of light entertainment, the whole romp is an absolute delight to watch.
Series 3 got off to a cracking start.........complete with a screaming Mrs Hudson,an appearance by Sherlock and Mycroft's suburban parents, a terrorist threat complete with  a plot to blow up Big  Ben and even an appearance by John Watson's new big hearted fiancé Mary.....
The series gets better and better
It will  fill the gap quite nicely before The Walking Dead returns.......
Enjoy

My Secret Santa

Now, I know I risk sounding rather ungrateful here, but I have to admit that I have never had a " good" pressie from work's secret Santa.

It is such a regular anticlimax, that I no longer look for my gift when I go to work over the Christmas period.

Last night some bright spark " found" my pressie and in front of the other staff proudly brought it out for its official unveiling 

Now I may be many thinks to many people......but I am not..... ( and I repeat) am not a person who would EVER be seen dead in a cheaply made, all in one , superman themed , red and blue baby grow

Having said that, there is one person, not a million miles away from me, that HAS taken a shine to the offending piece of clothing

He has been wearing it all morning

Wonders never cease

2013

Like any year 2013 has seen its fair share of comings and goings in the village.
The phrase " They don't make them like that anymore" was uttered more than once, I can tell you after we lost John Lloyd- Ellis ( aka " The Red Faced Welsh Farmer" ) in Feburary and Sylvia Evans in the summer.
The RFWF always reminded me of a scruffy and harder Brian Blessed. Big in voice and big in heart, he was the marmite of Trelawnyd. you either liked him or loathed him...... I was lucky for I liked him and after a shaky start ( we had a huge row over some water containers) we became good friends.
I still miss seeing his red landrover careering around Trelawnyd, with his fat red face grinning through its open window....and I miss his vocal tirades at the  community Council meetings where he gave the local counsellors a run for their money.
Trelawnyd is a much quieter and less colourful place without him.

The R F W F

Sylvia Evans was equally colourful in her own indomitable way A local matriarch, champion cake bake provider and village ' organizer', I got to know her when I joined the most elite of all village committees, which Was and IS The Trelawnyd Flower Show Committee.
Now Sylvia kept a tight rein over the committee, and presided over meetings around  Auntie Glad's kitchen table with , I am sure, a diastolic blood pressure of way over 100 and a very firm hand.Think of a more polite Agnes Brown from tv's Mrs Brown's Boys.....and you will understand where I am coming from. The flower Shows, under her captainship were always successful, and energetic affairs
I miss her dearly.

Sylvia Evans

It has not been all gloom and doom losses in the village however. Winifred arrived like  a whirlwind and in a relitively short time has dovetailed rather neatly into life in a tiny welsh cottage and on the field nearly forty " refugee" birds took up residence amid more unwanted ducks, hens and a disabled wild rabbit called Mary, who has gone from strength to strength in her neat little warm hutch by the field gate.

Winnie

What will 2014 bring?
More of the same no doubt.
Watch this space
Happy New Year x

Master Bedroom

This is my third favourite Andrew Wyeth's painting entitled Master Bedroom
To me the dog looks old and frail.......it's a painting that always makes me a tad emotional

Lucky I don't " do" emotional romps on New Years Eve either
Am working night shift tomorrow night..........I have never liked New years Eve since 1989 it must be said
My Father and a good friend of mine , newspaper photographer Ian Parry died tragically a couple of days from each other......around new year Eve almost 24 years ago

Since then, I have never really had the stomach for it all

Turkey Emergency

Chris returned from his daily morning jog yesterday, which proved to be a little bit disappointing owing to a bit of " over indulgence " over the Yuletide period.
When he returned home he gave strict instructions for any calorie busting flotsam to be removed from the cottage and out of temptation's way..and so leftover Christmas pudding, Half eaten oatcakes,biscuits,   crackers, old mince pies, a large  tub of forgotten brandy butter,a large packet of Bombay mix, peanuts and a box of unwanted dark chocolates were all emptied into a bucket and dumped in front of the field population.
The chickens literally thought it was Christmas!
Within seconds chicken lips were smeared with crumbs and brandy butter as coffee cream chocs and the remains of a Yule log were  fought over by eager beaks.
Now, I have some advice if any of you are doing the same thing with your Chrimbo leftovers....make sure that you soften your biscotti!
For the one piece of uneaten Italian confectionary that had been discarded, was snapped up by Bingley , the turkey, and swallowed in one gulp.
Now, I think Bingley's eyes were just too big for his head, for the biscotti biscuit, quite clearly had become stuck in his throat as the turkey started to choke and bob his head frantically .
Years ago,when I was a student nurse,  I once removed half an apricot from an senile old lady's gullet by employing the Heimlich manoeuvre and so I roughly sort of knew how to approach this kind of emergency and so I clambered over the fence and went to Bingley's aid.
I shouldn't have worried, as turkeys are made from stern stuff, so after a few frantic gulps and a bit of manhandling from me , the offending biscotti disappeared and Bingley grabbed a whole mince pie to wash it down with....

Maga's Daughter

Watching tv this evening , I was reminded of one of my most favourite pieces of art.....I have blogged about Christina's World by Andrew Wyeth before.....which is was a painting that captured my heart and my imagination when we visited MOMA in New York many moons ago but it is Wyeth's 1966 portrait of his wife Betsy that really takes one's breath away
Enjoy

The Mysteries Of The Gop

The storm of a couple of days ago

Today will be sunny and calm, a respite from the stormy weather we have been experiencing of late. I spied village elder Islwyn in the churchyard yesterday, who is he unofficial " weatherman" of the Trelawnyd....he warned me in that Dad's' Army way of his, that another storm is on it's way, and will hit the area with its 80 mile an hour winds sometime tomorrow...

" we're all doomed!" 
Luckily, Trelawnyd is protected  by " Gop Hill" which shields the village from the worst of the Northerly winds.......for those that may be interested this is a video I found on YouTube , it gives a little background of The Gop....
I found it interesting
Unfortunately the storm winds that are expected tomorrow will be blowing from the west