A Thought On The Way Home

I haven't heard the word cahoots for an absolute age! 

Baking Day

I haven't got the car today, so I've decided it's going to be a baking day.
Mary and I collected eggs from Eirlys's farm from The Marian and soon I shall be making chicken and leek pie, a meat and potato pie, banana loaves and custard tarts.
Eirlys kept me talking as did the old miner in the corner house by the garage.
He always asks me the same question
"How's your friend, keeping well?" 
" My husband is fine" I always reply

In one way baking is diversionary  tactics from the sweat fest that is moving old Trevor's collection of wood onto the field bonfire ( a job I'll have to do tomorrow), but in another way its therapy.
Baking is a sweet mindful activity.
It clears the mind of bad thoughts.

Trendy Carol (in designer jeans, bright training shoes and bright hipster jacket) was out when we returned with our eggs. I see she  has a new outdoor sofa literally smothered in cushions...I forgot to tell her it's longer than the width of our cottage.

I'll post pie photos later
Hey ho

I ran out of plain flour so had to use gluten free flour for the meat and potato pie

( which looks shite) 

I've yet to make the custard as neighbour Trevor has just caught me

A Moment Of High Drama

Have you ever witnessed a moment of high drama?
Something that lingers long in your mind.
Something that touches your soul.
I was flicking through YouTube yesterday and stopped briefly at a moment on the Netflix production of The Queen. 
It was a clip where the new and grieving Queen Elizabeth (Claire Foy)meets her grandmother The Queen Mary (Eileen Atkins) for the very first time since the death of George VI
It's a wonderfully dramatic moment where the old Queen curtseys to the new.
It's a scene that gives you goose pimples.

The video reminded me of a nursing moment, years ago when I witnessed an estranged daughter entered the side room of her dying father.
The daughter had not seen her father for I think forty years and had been asked to come to her father's bedside by other family members. I knew nothing of the fall out but I remember that the air was almost electric as the daughter walked into the room and the other family members all stood as she did so.
The daughter looked at her father and knelt at the side of the bed like a child saying her prayers and as she lowered her head to cry her father rested his hand onto the top of her head in a gesture of forgiveness.
Nothing was said, but everyone seemed to be weeping
And I remember exiting the room like a ghost with my eyes to the floor

Colour and picnic

Today is overcast and cooler than yesterday. Yesterday the dogs and I spent all afternoon in the front garden in glorious sunshine.
Our front garden faces South and absorbs the warmth in seconds of the sun coming out.
Winnie, William and George slept as I weeded the beds and Mary watched an exhausted pair of blackbirds scoot back and forth from their almost completed nest in the Holly.
Slowly the colour is edging back into the garden. The mock orange is starting to blossom , the white bells, aubrietia, tulips and grape hyacinth are all flowering as is the delicate blue clematis on its frame by the wall.
The cottage in spring looks rather pretty I've always thought.

I've made a picnic lunch. Cheese and pickle sandwiches robust in silver foil, tuna mayonnaise sandwiches ( with a squirt of lemon), - slightly more refined with the crusts cut off. Asparagus cooked in butter with garlic and sea salt with tiny cherry tomatoes and fresh fruit salad.
I would have prepared coffee but the thermos is broken.

What are you doing today?

New Bestie

During all that hand holding

I got the sudden impression that both men were going to start to skip

A Little Drama

I was sat at the kitchen table hand writing letters to cancel our flower Show Judges for this year when I heard the stand off.
The stand off happens at least four or five times a day!
It's a game between  Tom cat and Welsh Terrier bitch.
They enjoy the drama of it.
Because they actually like each other.
Cat wants to go up the stairs
Welsh terrier wants him not to.
The Mexican stand off is complicated and noisy and I can't work out all of the rules
Hisses, barks , loud licks on the face, silent pads to the chops.
It's the animal equivalent of a baby drag queen spat
Suffice to say, even though a clump of jet black cat hair was left on the first step

Albert always wins.

Brian Sewell

Last night, after I had cut the lawn, I took a cup of coffee and a book over to the Churchyard and sat in the faint glow of the setting sun to read.

My book was a gift from a blogger . 

Sleeping With Dogs by Brian Sewell

I never really took to Sewell . On tv I always found him snobbish, acerbic and rather pompous. But this " peripheral" autobiography which is a lyrical chronicle of all of the dogs in his life, has rather charmed and moved me, so much so that some of his writing actually reduced me to tears.

I will share this moment from the prelude.

"......I have ever since slept with all my dogs, one, two, three, or four at a time, waking, as I always do,with the not-quite dawn, but often making no attempt to leave my bed, so luxuriously seductive in the warmth on all sides. For an hour and more I have lain in this cocoon at least ten thousand times, ignoring the insistent thoughts of coffee and the working day, mindlessly drifting in and out of sleep, as immobilised by my companions as by anaesthesia. This, when the time comes, is how I wish to die"

After I read this I put down the book for a moment and sipped my coffee to think. I later found out that Sewell died of cancer in 2015.
I wonder if that final wish was granted.

Gob Shite

I've fallen out with at least two people fairly recently over the behaviour of their dogs.
I'm not shy when coming forward when I see a dog which is out of control, non socialised or ill treated and nothing sparks friction more than a critical word or a dirty look, when dogs are sparking and anxieties are high.
I am also intolerant of a phenomenon I refer to as " dog chatter" 
Dog chatter infuriates me.
I know it shouldn't . I understand why people do it, but it drives me batty.
Dog chatter is the often inane conversations pet owners have with their dogs.
I will give you an example of what I mean.
The other morning I was at the vets. I took Mary in as a rush job, after she started to cough unexpectedly. I feared it was kennel cough, (it actually turned out to be a plastic tooth pick lodged in the side of her throat. ) and as I stood at the reception desk I overheard the " conversation" a woman had with two morose looking basset hounds .
"Now Bertie will you stop pulling, mummy's arm is very sore.......Molly will you behave , look at that sweet dog over there being all nice and friendly........now please sit down and let me get my handbag out , it shouldn't be too long now then we can go home and get some Shopping done" 
The conversation went on like this for an age and before you tell me off for my thin skin, I know, I know" it shouldn't bother me but it does.
Similar conversations parents have with very small toddlers also drive me potty.
DOGS AND VERY SMALL BABIES DONT UNDERSTAND CONCEPTS SUCH AS " BEING NICE and FRIENDLY" AND WOULDNT KNOW WHAT A HANDBAG WAS IF THEY WERE BELTED OVER THE HEAD WITH ONE
I wanted to shriek the statement at the basset hound lady.
But that would have been inappropriate and cruel and so I didn't
...but I oh so wanted to.

Eight years ago I once took a racist woman to task over a comment she let fly in a vet's waiting room.
I must have cut an odd figure as I had a bald Indian runner duck on my knee wrapped in a tea towel
I've just been reminded of it and surprisingly found an account of the incident here
https://disasterfilm.blogspot.co.uk/2008/06/nellracism-and-red-valerian.html

What thing that shouldn't irritate you DOES.?