Let The Right One in

 

It was a lovely talkie evening all told. 

We met in the city centre, found a pub where we could talk and 

then found a tapas place near the Royal exchange where we could relax and talk some more.

After the play we returned to the hotel and watched the apartments opposite as if we were James Stewart and Grace Kelly in Rear Window. And we drank Prosecco cooled in the sink in the bathroom and yacked a great deal more.

Jack Thorne’s stage adaptation of the Swedish horror/ drama was excellent.

Essentially a study of bullying and loneliness it follows shy adolescent Oskar’s life , from sad school time to his quiet existence in a snowbound apartment with his alcoholic mother.

As gruesome murders affect his community , Oskar meets up with Eli, his new and equally lonely next door neighbour, and a somewhat sweet, mutually support relationship blossoms between the two despite Oskar’s growing awareness that Eli may be a vampire.

The performances in this production are top notch. Rhian Blundell ( who has the look and energy  of fellow actress Jessie Buckley ) brings an alien type physicality to her role as the ambiguous Eli and Pete Machale, ( who is probably in his mid twenties in reality) looks and acts every inch like a gauche thirteen year old boy from a damaged home and a sad school life. 

The horror moments are well handled with flashes and hints at gore which certainly makes you jump ,rather than a explicit blood fest  seen in the movie. 

I’ve been to the Royal Exchange before but had forgotten just how beautiful the impressive the building and design is.

This morning we walked up to Manchester’s northern quarter for a fab breakfast at the North Cafe before catching the train homeward 

Larks

 Aviva Trains Wales are notoriously a bad ride.

I’m on the 12.18 straight through to Manchester and already it feels that I’m on something out of the Wild West. 

I messaged a friend so, as the usual rough looking yobs that often frequent the coast trains got off in Flint.

The refreshment trolley man was a breath of fresh air though.

Small and wiry and used to being ignored I suspect, he ambled down the aisle muttering a low chant of a list of his refreshments like a Monk chanting a prayer.

“ Tea, coffees, hot chocolate……..soft drinks…hard drinks……very hard drinks, snacks, crisps, sandwiches, all manner of things to stuff your faces with……complementary napkin….with every purchase.”  

Can anyone suggest a nice place for breakfast in central Manchester…I haven’t got a clue.

Off for drinks and a meal later and the well reviewed horror play Let The Right One In at the Royal Exchange

What Larks Pip

Pee Stains On The Landing

 

Old Albert has been having accidents fairly regularly now

I think his “ thinking” has changed a little…some organic changes perhaps 

He’s clingy and reluctant to go outside. 

He paces the house and is awake on the bed at night when he used to patrol the garden.

I’ve tested his wee stains no sign of infection.

I’ll buy a litter tray on Saturday 

In the meantime I’ve got a carpet cleaner.

I looked at the old boy this morning before leaving for work.

And my heart ached for him just a little 

He was sitting on the window sill , his deformed leg bent painfully to one side. 

Waiting for his breakfast .

He’s been a constant here for fourteen years

A best supporting actor to the leading dog actresses 

They break your heart don’t they?

Objects Of My Affection

 

The Anonymous Arsehole Commentator will be shaking themselves into a apoplectic fit of the vapours with today’s post for sure as I’m talking money. 

Ok I’ve got a few theatre trips booked, ok I’m off to London with my nephew, but like everyone else in the country, I have and increased amount in bills per month now so have a need to save a bit of money where I can.

I’m going to have clear out.

Only yesterday I looked at a wood cut print of two geese, I have hanging on my stairs .

I looked at it as if I had never seen it before.

It’s pretty enough, I thought, but over twenty years it has been ignored and not enjoyed and so I moved it where I could see it more clearly.

This one thought and action has prompted me to sell some of the unseen, unwanted and not needed items I have around the house. 

I feel a car boot on the way

With a few smaller items earmarked for eBay 

Within three minutes I had the starters collected

A bespoke early Victorian corner cupboard from a Northumbrian farmhouse.( above)

A broken Art Deco mantle clock

Some silver pieces, tarnished and isolated on a bookshelf 

A pretty Staffordshire sheep

A tea caddy without its liner

Old dvds and books , flamingo containers, bits of treen, plant pots , an Art Deco bedside cabinet, 

Oh and some antique Italian marble fruit bought from an antique shop ran by my sister’s mother in law in the 1980s.

I must admit that a proud little Staffordshire Greyhound who was sat unloved in the duck egg blue bookcase I fell in love with all over again and I moved him to a new spot in the limelight in my bathroom but the cull will be extensive yet compassionate me thinks 

Sentiment is a big emotion with me and the pieces that I love will be kept and dusted and looked at with affection. 

I will leave you with this video. 

An audience made into a choir

Rather stunning

I have sung in a choir that seemingly out of nowhere made something equally as emotional and as beautiful as that video and it’s a magical place to be 

Bra

 I forgot to blog this tiny moment of surreal joy today, what with the family news and all that

Zoe Ball was shouting a lot on radio 2 this morning as she has a want to do 

But this sentence did make me laugh out loud in the dog walking car park early doors

“ Ooooh I’m all out of sorts today” she moaned  ……”I’ve put the wrong bra on!”

Ps Leslie Thomas never said “ Goodbye”

Sadly until now x

Family News

 It’s a day for celebration, family celebration. 

Nephew Pete, My sister Ann, Brother in law Tim and nephew Chris

My sister Ann’s husband Tim is in Windsor Castle with the family  as I type this. Princess Anne will be awarding him his MBE today for services to the local business community. 

Several years ago Ann was awarded a British Empire Medal for her services to the community 

It’s lovely to have some good news 

Shouting Into The Wind

 Trendy Carol and husband Ewan took the dogs this morning so I could spend 5 hours in the library and at work .

I have a college presentation to prepare for and Google slides baffle me to the point of extinction.

I was surrounded by 20 year olds, most with headphones and ear buds in . 

Kids making their way forward in an uncertain world. 

I got stuck inserting photos on my last slide 

It was a slide that was suggesting what moral quality I thought I possessed which could be linked to the BACP ( British Association for Counselling and psychotherapy ) ethical framework. 

For better or worse I chose wisdom and I attempted to illustrate with various photos…of me looking old ( and therefore wise?) a photo of Winnie looking thoughtful, me in PPE looking like a pig in a condom

And a photo of a little Mongolian girl yelling joyously into the wind 

( I was going to use it as a metaphor for not peeing into the wind …hence wise….but ok I know the link was weak) 

Like I said I got stuck using the software so looked around for someone to help me. 

The librarian had already pissed me off for telling me it was bottled beverages ONLY and her halitosis was striking even a yard away, so I asked the young chap in a beanie hat on the next computer if he could help.

Bless him

He was gauche and shy but soon sorted my slides out with his long white fingers , and was kind enough to centre the text up too

He loved the photo of the Mongolian girl and of Winnie too and asked me what I was studying 

“Ahhh counselling ! “ he repeated, “ Ive had that at school… I was very depressed when I was eleven”

He looked like a child now, I thought , so bugger only knows what he looked like when he was eleven .

“ It helped” he said cheerfully before moving back to his desk with a wave

Suddenly I felt happy that it did.

I’m bit Bored

Omaha Cat Lady has brightened up today. She’s a bright spark for sure. 

I enjoy listening to her talk through online recipes 

I forgot to help out with other volunteers to clear the garden of the a memorial Hall 😥

I made chilli con carne, with sticky white rice  as my mother used to do, and in a nostalgic rush organised the rice into a ring to encircle the meat.

I ate it with chopsticks in front of the fire watching the British Social Realism film Woman in a Dressing gown in longjohns and my third best Walking Dead T shirt  but the film depressed me so I turned on a recorded Only Connect instead after listening to The Archers

I’m bored today . 

I feel as though everything feels rather anticlimactic, which is strange. 

As little of note happened in the week.

I showered the Welsh terriers and cleaned their ears properly . I do this as I have a shower with them , which sounds odd but it works .

Dorothy watched the action with her face pressed against the shower door 

She’s recovered from yesterday’s Bonfire night fireworks, where she spent the evening trembling behind the Trendy Blue Sofa covered in a blanket . 

Lots of italics today …..lovely