The Russell Crowe Lasagne

I make a mean Turkey lasagne
The secret is to sneak in two layers of sage and onion stuffing between the tomato layers and the pasta.
It tastes bloody lovely too....even Albert loves the eclectic layers already,, for he has stuck his face into the sauspan of cooling cheese sauce at least three times this morning
The bloody thing generally ends up the size of a small suitcase.
My lasagne could feed a family of 8
It's a man's lasagne!
One that the likes of Russell Crowe would be proud of

I walked up to the garage shop around 8 .30 am to buy packet stuffing.
And four people stopped me to ask where the dogs were......seeing me alone is a bit like seeing Laurel   without Hardy.........you know something is not quite right but can't immediately put your finger on.

Anyhow today's blog is not really about a monster lasagne. It's not about Laurel & Hardy either or about how I feel somewhat jet lagged because Ive worked two nights out of the last three and am due to work this evening.too
Today's blog is about very little at all
As  I said ....my body clock has gone all arse over tit.
I've not caught up with jobs, my blog and blog reading have all gone to shit and I've yet to catch Alfie Boe to prevent the little bastard keeping the neighbours up all night
I think the cheerful father , I generally wave to when he is collecting his kids from school summed up just how I feel this morning when he saw me marching back from the shop with stuffing under my arm
" you look lopsided without the dogs!" He  called
Yes.....I feel somewhat lopsided today.....

Winnie Weightwatchers

The dogs, comatose when I was enjoying The Walking Dead  this morning

Message to self

When you own a bulldog who is on a strict diet

Always make sure that the dog feed cupboard has been secured when you go out

I got home this morning 

Only to find that she had broken into Albert's dry "kitty scoffs" quaffing half the box, most of the cardboard packaging as well as wet mouthing a nearby packet of paper doilies

The Walking Dead Season Five Premier ( Beware Spoiler)

I know I am working tonight, so I shall miss the premier and will have to watch it all tomorrow morning
But I couldn't resist just watching this brief clip before I went
For those that don't know ( and don't care) the scruffy guy with the crossbow is a redneck, asperger character called Daryl Dixon who has become a sort of anti hero during the five seasons of The Walking Dead. The woman he is reunited with is a friend, an abused wife and mother called Carol, a character he bonded with throughout the series.
Their scenes have always been underplayed in favour of the action pieces, and brief as it was, I thought it was one of the best scenes in the whole five series...
Hey ho

Lessons learned

Well the comments from Val in yesterday's post made my day when I read them at 2 am this morning
I had just got home after a stint at SAMS.......and had checked Going Gently before going to bed......
It's nice to bookend a blog entry is it not ?
Anyhow
Does anyone remember the movie Airport?
It was the precursor of the 1970's disaster movie and was basically a cinematic " Grand Hotel" with 707s  and George Kennedy chewing on an unlit cigar.
Well the heroine of Aiport was Helen Hayes who played the 70 year old stowaway Ada Quonsett.... And tonight I worked until the wee small hours at Sams with an Ada Quonsett lookalike.
I've not worked with this lady before, so I sat back and listened to some of her interactions over the phone.
It was a revelation
Insightful, challenging, objective , caring and oh so appropriate I listened to a real master of the craft deal with several acutely distressed and potentially suicidal callers.
She looked like a dotty older lady
But what I listened to was pure class.....class that would put the best psychoanalyst to shame

I learnt a great deal tonight

Goodbye To Friends

An infrequent commentator on Going Gently is a certain local character called " Val of Trelawnyd"
Val and her partner Peter have been active members of the community since they arrived in the village six years ago now. They have supported the pub in times of change, entered the flower show with their famous five foot " fucking fuchsia " and caused a bit of a stir in the Conservation group's garden competition by having a small square of AstroTurf in their back garden.
Val has provided cakes for our allotment open care stall, Peter has officiated in my " name the turkey" competition and both could be assured to give anyone a sociable chat and hello when spied at the bar of the Crown at early doors.
They are ideal village fodder........for they join in
They also very kindly have dropped me off a quality scotch egg on more than one occasion

So, yesterday it was with a heavy heart that I heard the news from Val herself they were moving to pastures new in a few weeks. Trelawyd's loss will be the village of Caerwys' gain as the couple downsize.
I am pleased they are happy and I wish them well but I will miss their everyday " Bon viveur"...on my daily trips around the village with my eggs and my dogs......
I did stipulate that they come back to Trelawnyd at the very least one day a year..........and on that day they will have to transport their monster fuchsias to the flower show, on the back of a lorry.
It's become a tradition

Val, Bingley and Peter

Hey Ho

Funny how you can forget things
Tonight we met up with my sister's , brother in law's and sister in law for a very nice supper.
My sisters recalled one christmas in the very early 1970s when my father let a tramp set up home in our garage.
...and try as I may, I could not recall the event at all.......
How odd is that?
But what a nice thing for him to have done

" Work Gets In The Way, doesn't it Alfie Boe?"

Alfie Boe......the noisy fucker

It's Saturday and Chris has had to go into work. He's been away all week, went to bed knackered at 7.30 last night and was up at 6.00 am with the cockerel. Having said this, he wasn't up with the new cockerel for the little bastard was crying lustily at 3.00 am, 4..00 am and again at 5. The neighbours are going to have a fit, at least he slept through it all.
They ( the neighbours)  were very nice about things when he first arrived, for they understood that he preferred to roost in the Beech tree in the graveyard...the one right next to the light in the lane. Subsequently he's awake in the wee small hours, and so belts out a lusty pubescent cock-a-fucking doodle whatever throughout the night. One neighbour, rather diplomatically, described him as resembling the tenor Alfie Boe.
" he's only small but he has a big voice" she explained
Well I am sure she called him something else last night for the bugger escaped from his sound proof hen house ( where I had effectively imprisoned him a week ago)  and back up the tree he went again.
I shall have to recapture him today, for I didn't get much sleep last night.....and unlike Chris who slept  a good eight hours, my eyeballs resemble two fried eggs in a bucket of blood.
I thank goodness that I don't work the hours I once did when I was a ward manager. If I did, Chris and I would never see each other. The house would be left to wrack and ruin, and there couldn't be any animal in the cottage,( let alone a gobby cockerel up in the trees) .....
No my work and it's one long shift a week is the easier work to juggle.....
Having said this....I am mortified to see that I am working Monday night.......
Monday night.....no big deal I hear you cry
Oh fucking no!
It's the night The Walking Dead season 5 premiers in the UK!
I am devastated that I'll have to wait until Tuesday to see it!

Slut

When I was a child I remember asking my mother what a slut was.
I remember exactly what she said......she said carefully " a slut is an unkempt woman"
I have always remembered it......especially as in modern usage slut is a little more colourful.
I was moving a new desk from One of the Church councillors' houses to the church when something odd could be felt down the back of my trousers.
It was my pyjama bottoms going south.
With Chris being away, I had not bothered taking them off for a day or two.
I am such a slut