Going Gently

Sulk

This afternoon......I am forgiven

Last night frustration coupled with one of the worst rainstorms I have ever experienced resulted in a diva - sized strop of gigantic proportions.
The sulking lasted many, many hours.
It all started when I needed to leave the house around 9pm. The Prof had gone to bed and the dogs all needed a final wee before bedtime, so I leaded them all up and took them out in the rain.
Now old dogs hate icy wet conditions and after several minutes it was very clear that not one was going to have even a 'crafty one' along the lane and so drenched to the skin and frustrated that I wouldn't be back home until the small hours of the morning to walk them again, I lost my temper and gave the whole pack a good yelling at.
Now for those that don't know, you can shout at a terrier and although they will initially be upset they will generally forget the slight minutes after it has been given. Bulldogs however , do not cope at all with any form of chastisement.
Like elephants, they never forget.
I bundled the pack into the kitchen, hoping against all hope that there would be no puddles on the floor by the time I got home and four hours later I returned to a chorus of happy barks and smiling faces.
Only Winnie wasn't amongst them.
When slighted Bulldogs will sulk for the longest of times and Winnie, I must say, can sulk for Britain.
I found her in the living room, standing with her face to the wall. She refused to acknowledge my presence in any way.
I apologised for shouting at her and gave her a pat on the head , and all she did was to turn her face slowly in the opposite direction.
I knelt on the floor and tried to kiss her, and she blinked her eyes ever so slowly and snorted like a pony. She turned again presenting me a fat blank arse.
At one o'clock in the morning I didn't need the drama.
I took the other dogs out , cleaned up the kitchen floor and returned to the living room with a cup of coffee and a piece of toast
Winnie hadn't moved .
So, I put on some shit tv and started to eat my toast.
Winnie remained still but I could see her nostrils twitching so I ate everything but the crust and placed the remains onto the floor.
Still she didn't move.
She was good, real good I thought.
I slipped the plate with the crusts on it under her nose and went back to my tv watching. It did the trick, for seconds later the plate was empty.
" Are you going to forgive me now ?" I asked her as I knelt again onto the floor and for the first time I was fixed in the big brown eyed glaze of an elderly bulldog.
She obviously thought about what I said for a moment or so,
And snorted her loud bull like snort, before turning and walking off to her nightime armchair.
She didn't look back , even the once.

Double Entendres

We have a rather vital neighbour called Mandy who can be seen marching around the village on various chores and errands several times during the day. She is always cheerful and never still, even in the worst of weather.
I saw her during one of her jaunts this afternoon and rather breathlessly she called out a greeting followed by a somewhat interesting observation

" We heard young Mary bashing the hell out of your catflap the other night!"

She stopped short , caught up in the possibilities of double entendre and we both giggled like schoolgirls. Thank goodness for dirty minds.....
Years ago I was in Sainsbury's in a hurry. I couldn't find what I was looking for and in a somewhat exasperated tone called out to one of the male supervisors " I CAN'T find your dumplings !" Again I received a load of giggles in reply .
I love surreal little moments like these.

This morning was another case in point, I went to Morrisons this morning to use their car vacume cleaner and got all excited that there was an attachment that dispensed a " fragrance" liquid spray for an extra £1 coin....Not being " au fait" with the equipment , I put in my pound , picked up the gun and promptly sprayed myself in the face with it. Now two Eastern European looking men who were watching me from a nearby path promptly burst out laughing causing me to blush like a schoolgirl, but at least I had the good grace to laugh with them.

The best double entendre is always an unintentional one.......Years ago, I remember Look North news anchor Clair Frisby commenting on a report from a bonfire night celebration somewhere in Yorkshire.....she said
"There's nothing like a big hot sausage inside you on a cold night like this"

Hey ho

The Car Man

We went to see a cinematic version of Mathew Bourne's

The Car Man this evening

Unfortunately the Projector was malfuctioning and the focus was out, so we left early

Pity!

Marriage One Year On - Some Thoughts

We are in the middle of a snow blizzard here in Trelawnyd. It's not sticking as yet but I 've been effectively marooned in the cottage until it's all over.
Mary, I note is the only animal awake, she is stood with her head out of the cat flap.
She is watching the snow fall.
She has never seen it before.

This weekend marks our first anniversary.
I cannot believe a year has passed since we got married.
Here are a few thoughts I have on the whole thing.

A married colleague stopped me soon after the wedding and asked me " If things felt different". I wasn't sure just what she meant by the question and asked her if she felt different and she replied with some feeling that " getting married validated her relationship " " It said to the world that we were together" .....................instantly I understood what she meant. Marriage , didn't validate me as a person at all ( Gawd I had been happily single for most of my early adult life) but it did validate the Prof and I , as a couple and that felt wonderfully inclusive .
Before we got married , the Prof and I underplayed the whole thing. This underplaying, on reflection, was a product of the fact that gay marriage was such a " new" phenomenon. For us , civil partnership, always seemed like a second class event so I think we were not quite sure just how the whole thing would eventually pan out. As it happened we were overwhelmed by how people saw the whole thing. They seemed to embrace the event, they seemed to embrace the celebrations and they embraced us as a couple and this suddenly mattered so very much ......as my best " woman" Nuala said in her after dinner speech " who would have believed a few years ago that two men who loved each other could ever get married......how wonderful is that?" ....and she was so bloody right
Getting married is the best thing I have ever done..........hey ho

International Competition !

It's St David's Day here in Wales today.
No doubt the village school children will be dressing up for it's traditional for the girls to wear the old fashioned tall black hats with lace trim or to have small leaks or daffodils pinned to their clothing.
I've filled vases with daffodils and have put them on the window ledges to mark the day.

Anyhow to the subject of today's post!
It concerns all of you readers!
After much discussion by the Trelawnyd Flower Show Committee, it was eventually decided that the " International Novelty Vegetable/ fruit Photo Competition " (which has been such an informal but popular part of the Show's schedule over the last two years ) will be made an official part of the show from now on!
So have a look on the schedule and you will see it proudly entered into section 4 - The Floral Art & Photography Section. This year it would be great to have around a hundred photograph entries ( for those that don't know the photographs can be emailed to me for printing)

The link for the Flower Show BLOG is

http://trelawnydflowershow.blogspot.co.uk

Knots Untie

Jesus has lovely eyes!

One of the strengths of The Walking Dead is it's a characteristic snapshot of rural Georgia caught up in a world apocalypse where zombies rule. In knots Untie the new and likable character of Jesus ( Tom Payne ) informs the Alexandrians that their world is getting a whole lot bigger, as he introduces our favourites to the fellow community of Hilltop , which is a trailer dominated version of Alexandria .
Although this fresh move towards a new alliance and a confrontation with the new threat of uber baddie Negan is exciting, I hope the series doesn't over stretch itself to a more complicated narrative.

Having said this, I like that Maggie ( Lauren Cohan) had a chance to shine as Rick's new ambassador
with Gregory, the odious leader of Hilltop , but the blasé way Daryl thinks that dispatching Negan for the greater good will be a done deal......is worrying for team Rick me thinks!
Hey ho

A Dying Breed

Trelawnyd Phone Box

This morning I saw someone in our village phone box.
It was a sight that I have never seen before, so I had to stop and give the woman visitor another look.
She was indeed using the phone!

I am always surprised that British Telicom hasn't decommissioned it, given the fact that no one ever uses it, but I guess it has survived so long because it is situated on one of the main roads from the A55 and the coast.
I was impressed that the phone inside the box was indeed working.

Many villages now adopt their outmoded telephone boxes. The village of Sandon in Herefordshire used theirs as a goose house until their famouse gander was shot in a drive-by shooting recently. Other villages have made theirs into miniature lending libraries or " honesty" shops but I have always been impressed by the idea of converted old telephone boxes into a place where a community defibrillator can be stored. ( see http://www.communityheartbeat.org.uk/adoptatelephonebox.php)

Any idiot can use a modern defibrillator. For fuck's sake, the thing tells you exactly what to do ! All anyone has to do is to press a button!
Alas, at the moment it looks as though our box will remain a phone box .