Apologies

I have to apologise to the residents of Rhodfa Arthur for the big creamy stain on the road by the Church. I've been ferrying flower show stuff to the village hall and left one of the raffle prizes ( a bottle of Irish liqueur) on the roof of the car.
One less Raffle prize....hey ho!
When I got back this little fella was sitting on the garden wall. No note, entry form ...nothing..so if anyone wants to claim him, please give me a ring

Laughter and Tears around a table

The train was packed.
I was on the 9.10am from Euston and was due back in Wales by midday, which was good as I still had a ton of work to do for the Flower Show and I am on a six hour Sams shift this evening to boot! So much for retirement.
A large Jewish family of five took up most of the seats around me leaving me and another middle aged couple opposite me, the only strangers in our part of the train. Next to me was teenage son of the family who looked perhaps fourteen. He was busy on his ipad
The mother of the children spent most of her time fussing away. She handed out food, constantly asked the children and her husband questions and organised the journey within an inch of its life.
In between all this she engaged me and the other couple in polite conversation.
Where we were going?  how awful it was to have only one toilet in our part of the train working ( yeah thanks Virgin Trains) would we like a polo mint?
All very nice stuff I must say, but dovetailing all this she kept on at her teenage son about what he was doing?
Was he on facebook? Was he emailing his brother in France?
What was he doing on his ipad?
It's terribly antisocial you know......!
Finally the boy snapped but did so in such a delightful way the couple opposite to me and I all burst into fits of laughter!
After the mother had asked him for the twentieth time what he was doing on his ipad.
The boy slowly put the ipad down, and said in a very loud and serious voice
" I 'm watching gay porn on it mother!" 

Anyhow, this afternoon I have been making traybakes at the kitchen table and as I did so, watched Mark Gatiss' recent Talking Heads tv show QUEERS. One monologue where Ben Whishaw plays a World War One soldier  in love with his commanding officer was incredibly moving, and I must admit I shed a small tear as I
Folded in the self raising flour.
Try and watch it, if you can get BBC IPLAYER
Hey ho

Ben Whishaw

Gay Britannia

Gale's parents on their wedding day

The novelist Patrick Gale talked about his father in a recent interview. His father, a prison Governor always slept in a separate bedroom from his mother and when he was in his early twenties Gale found out the reason for this was the fact his mother found out that her husband had embarked on a love affair with another man before her marriage.
The secret was never talked about, and two lives were shattered because of it. A wife bitter and lonely and  feeling second best to her husband's best man who lived a lie as most gay men did in the middle years of the twentieth century!
A tv drama based on the story of Gale's parents, Man in an Orange Shirt airs tonight as part of the BBC's Gay Britannia season

I came out when I was in a relationship with a closseted man.
It was a terribly conflicted time for me as I was torn between kind of respecting his " need" to be hidden and private with the overwhelming feeling of not wanting to be some way ashamed ( albeit by proxy) by being publicly gay.

The relationship was shit anyway, so it wasn't hard for me to eventually walk away from it, but I still look back with incredible sadness on the fact that my boyfriend then found it necessary to wear a wedding ring at work in order to look straight in front of a  boss who was a virtual stranger when I wanted to hold my head up and look at everyone in the eye

When I eventually came out, I did so to everyone I knew with the only exception of my mother. I spared myself that experience, not because I was in anyway ashamed or worried;  I just could not be bothered going through the drama , guilt trips and subsequent angst that would have ensued from an elderly lady with massive psychological problems all of her own.

With everyone else, I simply shared the truth.
And although, it was, at times, somewhat stressful.

I never had a problem with any of them.

LITTLE Bits Of News

The bachelors are getting somewhat pugnacious with strangers and ambushed several elderly hikers this morning who had to fend them off with their ski poles!
It's a case of little men syndrome
Well little cock syndrome actually!
At least the hikers took the assault with good humour- unlike the meter reading man a week or so ago, who was decidedly muffed at being chased down the path by three six inch birds with feathery feet.
I think we all know someone with little cock syndrome!
I'm behind with things with the Flower Show today and feel it.
I've still got 200 raffle tickets to sell, all of the hand embroidered tablecloths to wash and iron and still have a mound of baking to do and that's before all the admin bits to sort, people to bully, oh and notice boards to pick up.
There are not enough minutes in the day
The Prof is feeling neglected as is the norm this time of year, so I did make him " cock-eyed egg" for breakfast in bed! this morning as a treat! ( cock eyed egg is in fact egg in a basket!)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg_in_the_basket
Oh And I cleaned the crap out of the fridge in way of saying that I hadn't forgotten the housework, but the cottage still looks like a jumble sale venue with cakes, knitted items of all descriptions and brick a brac piled high in every corner.

Jo the policewoman caught me yesterday with my Bluetooth earphones on when we were out with our respective dogs, I could see she was impressed with my leap into 21st century technology.
" listening to anything nice ?" She asked me
I didn't have the heart to tell her that the Bluetooth headphones had not been charged properly and were only there to keep my ears warm.

There's a big gig in the church this morning, I waved at Gaynor - the- mad- organist as she drove in early to get a parking space .....seeing her reminded me that I 'm thinking of organising a village fete again next year to raise funds for the Church and Samaritans ......what Am I thinking of? ...it's a case of
if you want a job doing...ask a busy man

Butterfly Bushes

William searching for butterflies

Saturdays are most suited to a bit of relaxation .
Lunch out, some shopping.....a snooze on the couch for The Prof.......it's all mundane but nicely so.
William, with his failing eyesight, can no longer focus of the small honeybees as they potter around the garden, but with the three buddleia in the garden, the cottage garden is now filled with butterflies.
William can see butterflies .
He has just spent a free spirited half hour chasing several red admirals and a bunch of delicate cabbage whites as they flutter inbetween the shrubbery

F..K OFF!

Now I am not all Julie Andrews when it comes down to a good swear, but I do think that there is a time and a place for expletives to be unleashed!
The odd " fucker" is acceptable , especially at times of high emotion but I hate any thought of swearing in front of children, and in public generally especially if you don't know if your chosen words of expression could insult or upset.
Donald Trump's new communication man, Anthony Scaramucci's foul mouthed attack on his predecessors underlines a predictable and worrying step by the Trump administration back into street behaviour. It isn't, as Scaramucci would insist, just colourful language. It is a way to bully and to intimidate, very much like a mean dog barking at the wind.....and in my mind it shows just how unstatesmanlike TRUMP is to pick a foul mouthed thug as his communications  man! ( communications man for Christsake! )

Having said all this I remember I once worked with a Hospital Chaplain who was the most irritating , patronising and thoroughly pious individual one would ever have the misfortune to meet. One day I saw him stop a entire Church service to theatrically remove a box of smokes from the hands of a long term psychiatric patient, and with his nose in the air as he slipped the tin under his surplus, another patient, a woman in her sixties , chirped up very loudly in a home counties crystal cut accent
" You are a real first class cunt !"
Like I said there is a time and a place

No Winner!

My novelty veg for the Prestatyn Flower Show look more like friggin wombles than penguins !
I've only just realised however, that the class is not novelty vegetable but MONSTER vegetable! 
Hey ho
I had to laugh, as after I had placed my two entries into the " herbs in a container" carefully onto the exhibition table, three men marched in carrying a two tier herb container festooned with sprigs of rosemary and crammed to the nippleline with glorious, luscious herbs of all kinds......
The steward looked at my efforts and quipped " do you want to take yours home now?" 
Hey ho x 

The Prestatyn Flower Show takes place tomorrow and Saturday at the old vicarage gardens High Street