Do you remember the covid lockdown daddy? The nights we had Zoom night quizzes with the family? Where The Mummy, A cowboy, Indiana Jones, Johnny Depp, Charlie Chaplin and Princess Leia amongst others battled for a single Cadbury's cream egg! Do you remember those days daddy? Do you remember?
Yesterday I planted out deep red geraniums in pots, Spanish style,on the kitchen wall
The winds increased to gales this morning and I found all of the pots hidden safely in the shelter of the front garden stone wall, saved by a kind passerby.
I was going to use the word nice here rather than kind to describe the Good Samaritan but in my considered opinion many nice people are not kind.
Kindness is an action
Painfully nice people just use words
I made avacado on sour bread toast with eggs for brunch
Sorted out cupboards and drawers
I took Dorothy and Mary for a walk out of the village to the East, past Chic Eleanor's. LargeWhite washed home
By chance she saw me passing and invited me onto the patio with a swirl of her scarf in the wind " Darling John, do have a socially distant double shot coffee and we 'll brave the storm together!!"
I sat on her windswept patio as she made coffee from scratch "Forgive me, I look a right sight!" Eleanor gasped " I have my lockdown tat on"
This made me laugh as Eleanor would look good wearing a bin bag
We chatted for a while before the dogs got bored and needed to move on
I made chicken salad for lunch and prepared chicken noodles for my lunch tomorrow at work.
For the first couple of months of lockdown the Hospice kindly made all of their staff a free lunch, which was incredibly kind. Now, realistically that kindness cannot be sustained so it's back to preparing my own.....
Not a bad thing
This afternoon I'm making a hat with a sign on it
The sign reads Happy Birthday Chris written backwards
I'm attending a Zoom family quiz and it's my nephew's birthday !
I ve just popped into Church to leave my donation for bell ringing , I re positioned a painted stone I found on my wall yesterday...it's a pass it forward good wishes stone left by a local child and videod the laburnam , which shines golden in the sun.
Affable despot Jason has added to his huge collection of morale boosting videos on the Street warden's social group...I'm watching them now as I juggle writing this and making soup
Well I must say Deborah Kerr in Black Narcissus made pulling the fuck out of the Great bell on the side of the Himalayas look like a piece of cake.
Hattie and My efforts were all a bit shaky compared to that nun in a heavy habit
As you can see
Great fun !!!!!
One less thing on my bucket list
Today's glorious sun has taken over from my aggressive tendencies and after a long sleep in after getting up too early
My mood has lifted.
It's 7pm and the cottage windows are wide open to the near summer conditions
Mary is out with Hattie and her boyfriend Adam
Hattie and I will be ringing the Church bell tomorrow at 8pm
The bulldogs are down at Trendy Carol's, respite which allowed me to clean the floors and scrub the patio.
Trendy Carol is wearing her summer linen.
We have our old , more cheerful postman back....he left me my ordered Korean disaster movies and an early birthday card from Marilyn ....thank you! My birthday is not until June 1st
Yes , I'm a Gemini
A week or so ago I posted a wonderful dance video from classic Hollywood movies. Today I will leave you with this more modern day version.
My old blog friend Mike (Should Fish More), didnt know what a Bunfight was yesterday.
Perhaps it is more a British word than an American one.
It can mean one of two things
A grand , official tea party.....
Or a heated argument.
If I write bunfight, invariably I mean the latter
I've been overdue for a heated argument for a while
One has been simmering in my post decree absolute psychi for a long time now
I've known that for a while now,
I know myself very well.
This morning I was called a fat prick by a skinny, ratty looking man in a sports t shirt .
He had obvious shortness of bone, a shopping trolley full of cheap lager and two badly behaved children who were doing their own thing near the avacados
After trying to negotiate the brats for a while, unsuccessfully I may add, I remarked quietly to the man to "take control of his children !"
Obviously the rebuke hit home and the man kicked off
A bunfight ensued.
Now I know rebuking another guys kids in front of him never really ends well,
But my blood was up ( as was my blood pressure) and transference needed a way forward
Well, I must thank the young lady who joined in the " debate" after the young ratty man referred to me as a FAT PRICK !!
She reminded the man that it was still dangerous to let kids wander ad hoc and given that covid rates are rising in North Wales
Ratty man told her to "fuck off too!!!" This was no arguement that could be won by my usual resort of " Cheap Shoes!!!" As ratty man was wearing very expensive looking trainers And so in my best Joyce Grenfell voice I countered with
" I may be a fat prick but you are a fucking ignorant arsehole !" On reflection A double edged sword that reply lol .........
I almost missed choir " Zoom"
I fell asleep dribbling in my arm chair at 5pm
Choir was 6.30 pm and we sang a Welsh lullaby which was sweet, but I'm too tired to catch up with friends for a proper chat...I wouldn't give it justice
I will do all that tomorrow
Tonight I've had several gin and tonics and with Mary balanced in the crook of my arm have watched Gogglebox and I'll Get This Two brilliant tv shows Cro in his blog today talked about alcohol and the lockdown ......and boy did that bring out a bunfight out of nowhere
Bed soon, in clean, field scented sheets
Stretched taught like when you were a child
I needed to be home tonight
I washed my bedding when I got home after my last night shift and as usual hung it on the field gate to dry when I went to bed.
It tells people I am home
It's a lovely day, bright, warm and full of birdsong.
I took advantage of the fact that the council workmen have not cleared the grass in the Churchyard and cut myself a large bunch of the blue Pentaglossis which I have coupled up with Cow Parsley from the lane in a spare jug for the kitchen table.
It feels so good to be free of work for a few days
We would all like to to think that we grew up in a Town called Maycomb Alabama
Obviously the backdrop of the Great Depression and of racism are not subjects to be trivialised Here , but the thought of growing up with a parent with the stature of Atticus Finch is perhaps every child's ( and indeed Adult's dream) when they survey their childhood with rose tinted or tired eyes
My parents were too wrapped up in their own issues to really be bothered with the moral dilemmas in side their kids' heads. Having said this I do remember one Atticus moment amid a brown 1970s childhood. I had gone to bed , but had got up to listen to a family discussion from the safety of the top of the stairs. The discussion was centred around someone known to the family who had been caught in a gay clinch so to speak and it is important to remember here that in the 1970s, this sort of thing was deemed rather shocking to say the least. Amid the head shaking and the " shame" comments one voice proved to be the voice of reason and balance and that was the voice of my mother. Like Henry Fonda's juror number 8, in Twelve Angry Men , she calmly stuck up for the person involved, patiently giving a human face to the whole situation and pouring oil on a very stormy sea.
Even at twelve , I remember being rather proud of her individual stand against a tide of small mindedness...and even at twelve I knew that she was right and they were wrong.
