If You Can't Say Something Nice ...don't say anything at all

Stans garden in spring

My mother used to use this statement a lot when I was a child. She' was referring to gossip in the main and how some people always remarked about someone else's negative points rather than their positives.
This was rich as my mother could be waspish as they come, but you sort of get the gist of where she was coming from.
One of the trophies in the flower show is in need of replacing . It's a cheap looking cup and so the committee were unanimous in the decision to change it and it seemed fitting that the cup was renamed as a dedication to someone who has supported the flower show so well over the years.
The name of Stan H was mentioned and agreed upon, as he always produced the most beautifully kept pensioner garden in the entire village and yesterday,, I had the opportunity of asking him if it was alright if we did so.
Typically Stan, who is in his nineties , was gardening when I asked him and at first, he slightly misunderstood what I was saying, thinking that I wanted him to purchase the cup for us.
When I explained that the committee was buying it and wanted to rename it as a mark of respect of what he had contributed to the show over the years, he grew silent and seemed greatly moved by the gesture.
He offered me his hand still in its gardening glove and we shook firmly.
" Thank You" he said quietly.

A Ghost Story

With Halloween approaching today Village Elder enjoyed sharing a tale of how , years ago, a troubled local stalked the dark lane outside our cottage with a loaded shotgun.
He enjoys telling a good story and should be employed as a teller of tales, as he'd make a fortune
scaring  the  bejesus out of any small child with a healthy imagination.
Years ago, on a cold and very dark autumn evening , I am sure the dogs saw a ghost in the garden of a bungalow next to the church. We had three dogs then. A five year old Welsh terrier called Finlay, Maddie a Scottish terrier and Meg a Welsh terrier puppy and I remember clearly that when we passed the Church gates all three dogs stopped short and refused to move forward along the lane.
They did not appear frightened but looked more curious and a little perplexed and all three seemed to be looking at the same spot several feet from the ground in the centre of a lawned part of the garden.
It was the oddest thing to witness as there was nothing for me to see, but the dogs, in their stillness had seen something and their quiet vigil was the most unnerving of experiences I can tell you.

That walk was cut very short I can tell you!

As we slowly approach Halloween......please share your own ghost story!
I'd be interested to hear them

Underpants

Walking Back from the Flower Show Review meeting tonight the committee members all stopped to admire our new kitchen window on the lane  which no longer sports it's usual antique French lace curtain.
" You'll need to sort that out " said Pat the  animal helper
" I saw you in your underpants the other morning" she remarked dryly

Ps this photo is NOT ME

Love 'n Death

Many years ago The Prof was overcome by carbon monoxide fumes from a faulty boiler.
He was alone in his flat and was only saved, literally from death, by a neighbour who heard him collapse against a mirror in the bathroom.
Fate, destiny, good fortune, luck was smiling on him that day.
Without that neighbour he would have died.
And I wouldn't be sat here writing this
I was thinking about this today after a farm lorry just skimmed me as it turned up the Marian. The driver had misjudged the gap between me and the trailer and as I picked up Mary before stepping into the hedgerow to give it room, I felt the whoosh of the metal body work an inch from my face.
I nearly drowned when I was ten.
It was in Lloret del mar and I slipped out of my rubber ring!
It was a near silent drowning and I never met the man who pulled me out at the last minute.
Without him, The Prof would be without a husband!

We never think that life can be so fickle and death so arbitrary
I've thought it today and it frightened me. 

The End Of The World

11am Trelawnyd

Ophelia hit West Wales harder than here in Trelawnyd so The Prof's University closed for business at midday. With him home with the car I was able to take William to the vets for his medication review.
The Spanish vet, with the sexy lisp saw us and she mentioned the strange phenenomen this morning when the sun went all red and the sudden darkness sent the bachelors scurrying back to their hen house.
" I heard it was Sand from the Sahara , pushed up into the atmosphere by Ophelia " I told her
" It was like the end of the world " she lisped seriously

Didn't Ophelia drown?

I had jobs planned today but with Ophelia sneaking up on us and with the prospect of the coastal trains being stopped the Prof has taken the car to work.
The sky is presently an odd shade of pale yellow and it feels somewhat strange outside so much so that two sets of passing walkers have already commented on it as they saw me cutting the last of the decent flowers in the garden.
It does feel that a storm is on its way

I am having one of my Jane Asher days today.
Cutting flowers, mowing the lawn,making banana bread, washing clothes, making a broccoli and broad bean tagine.
It's all go here. 

The Leadmill

Now apart from Diane M and YP, I suspect that not many people here will " get" this blog entry, but it was sparked by a photo Diane took which I have shameless nicked to illustrate this trip down memory lane.
In the 1990s nurses, as I am sure they do today, worked hard and played hard. Unofficially nurses from Lodge Moor Hospital went out en masse on a Thursday night and tanked up would all end up at Sheffield's famous Leadmill nightclub.
Now the leadmill had been going for years before I went to it, and indeed is still flourishing today and I am sure the inside of this former factory and works building situated a stone's throw from The Midland Railway station, has not changed very much from its original industrial form.
On Thursday nights there would be at least five or six young men in wheelchairs at the night club. Each one would be accompanied by a nurse and each one was still an inpatient at the city's Spinal Injury unit. The night club was a kind of rite of passage for many a patient who was physically and more important, psychologically adjusting to their paralysis.
Of course it was a chance to test the boundaries of their condition. Bladders no longer able to function properly were pushed to capacity by too much ale, spasms knocked unfeeling legs out of foot rests and negotiating a thousand or so drunken people all dancing to Abba when you want to get to the bar in a wheelchair is no mean feat.
The Leadmill management quickly Sussed that most of these patients were being accompanied by a nurse " carer" who pretended to push the patient into the club and therefore circumvented the long queue outside.
Only the most disabled ( and by that they ment patients who couldn't push themselves ) could have a nurse they said 
This was an easy rule to break. The patients just pretended to be helpless and the nurse carers pushed them in before a grumbling queue!
Of course there was the odd mishap. One lad, I remember got into a fist fight with  Barnsley thug and ended up on the head injury ward for his sins but most patients survived their late night rehab sessions at Sheffield's premier night spot.
That's more than many a student did.....after all.....students that mineswept drinks ( minesweeping for those that don't know is where you go round stealing drinks left by the dancers) often had a nasty surprise. For when a patient's urine leg bag was overfull of lager looking piss, it was common for the nurses to teach them to empty it into a pint glass which could be then left on the shelves at the side of the club for disposal !
Happy days

The Snowman

We went to see the serial killer movie The Snowman tonight, which was two hours I am not going to ever get back.
The Prof enjoyed the gratuitous shots of Michael Fassbender in his underpants though