Zombies to look forward to.....

I hate Saturday mornings
They shriek of couple time and wherever you go , you seem to be surrounded by couples catching up on the mundane and the routine things in life.
I tried to divert myself from coupledom by reading the latest twitter feeds
But it would seem all the gay twitter feeds I follow have hirsute men selfies on them proclaiming goddam awful hangovers and showing a beautiful range of bed linen.
I bought some nice bed linen this morning on the back of it ( special offer in Sainsburys )
It was either that or a cat flap, and I couldn't face the pet store this morning
Not with all those doggy couples about!
The bed linen looks crisp and inviting so bedtime should be a smallish treat tonight
Having said that the wind whistling through the catflap is a pisser .
I've had to fashion a curtain of kitchen tissue in the meantime, which has thrown Albert into a dicky fit.
Later I'm catching up with Jason the affable despot.
We are going to theatre Clwyd to see Night of the Living Dead remix, which is a " remaking" of a famous original zombie movie on stage!
Frothy and rubbish , I suspect, but frothy and rubbish is ideal if you are in the company of some who laughs easily.

A sudden sleet/ snow shower has whistled through the catflap like a rat up a drainpipe, sending the dogs scuttling back into the warmth of the living room.
I now friggin regret not buying one....
Hey ho

Yes, but is it art?

I took some annual leave and went back to bed this morning.
I walked the dogs ,
Brushed my teeth ( yes I have all of my own) and pulled up my bra straps
I also collected my latest creations from pottery class
The bowls are from an artwork instillation I have been recently working on called  " fish" 
As you can see I am inspired by nature .....
Lol , and before of you get carried away, yes I am taking the piss out of myself.
The bowls are rustic to say the least  

Thank You Dorothy

Thursday was a surprisingly down day
I had contacted my husband by email  re the final death throe paperwork  of my marriage first thing in the morning and the down feeling never left me until I got home after the cinema

Dorothy had a mad half hour of glee when I let the dogs out for a wee walk and she suddenly decided to leap around like a fat antelope and in a fit of showing off like a toddler who is just feeling their mortality often does, she galloped around the garden and bit the heads off nine daffodils just because she could.
So proud she was at her her work!!!!... I just couldn't tell her off....as she finally stood gasping for breath at my feet with shredded petals in her mouth  ...and with a grin the size of a split water melon .
I bent down to hug her like she was my own personal star.
And her stubby tail span around like with bulldog pride as if it was a 1970s foodmixer
So happy she was.........at making me feel so happy

In The Mood

I have been intrigued to see the much discussed Korean movie Parasite since it pissed off Trump by winning best film at the Oscars.
So I popped over to Chester , had soup and a pretentious tap at my iPad in the Jaunty Goat 
before walking around the corner to the Storyhouse for the 3pm seniors (!!!) showing

I didn't get it.
I mean I understood its message about the haves and have nots in South Korean society
But I just didn't get it!
Sometimes you just have to be in the mood for a certain movie
And I think today I needed something rather different

The dogs shared a pizza tea with me
Happily crunching the crusts noisily in front of the fire
I was glad to get home

I had a hot Bath
A weep
And watched Double Indemnity in bed
Cracking!!!

Barbara and Fred never liked Aldi

76 Years

As you all know I work in a hospice
I am used to watching people closely
And today I was privileged to watch one old friend say goodbye to their lifelong friend.
I noticed the moment when no one else did.
I noticed it because I was looking for it
Unless you are Scarlett O'Hara saying her goodbyes to the saintly Melanie 
I think friends can be slightly overlooked in the access to their chums in the dying process as family members often take centre stage and today I watched the briefest of a hand hold and a brave kiss on a forehead before the family took things over
I followed the visitor outside and asked if they were alright
" Seventy six years" they said quietly with tears in their eyes " we've been friends for over seventy six years," 
And I nodded an acknowledgement
" Seventy years is special " I said lamely
" That it is !" The visitor said and we shook hands carefully before they walked head down across the car park

Oh Lord

Sometimes you are just glad that you made the effort with something unknown.
The Royal Ballet's Dances at a Gathering proved to be a pared down and joyous Jerome Robbins journey into Chopin, with a bare stage allowing the dancers to show their skill and their personalities
Stars Marianela Nuñez, Francesca Hayward and Alexander Campbell were real standouts and after an hour of watching them literally open mouthed We then had the fortune to sit through a brand new ballet, Cathy Marston's The Cellist.
Being " back" at the Royal Opera House was always going to be a moving experience for me  but I am so glad I was able to see something of so much depth and quality
The ballet centres around the aclaimed Cellist Jacqueline Du Prè and through a series of set pieces we see how Jacqueline fell in love with the instrument which catapulted her to stardom.
The cello is played with sublime skill by Marcelino Sambè who initially and magically becomes the instrument she obviously bonded with as a girl.
The two have a love affair on stage which is incredibly moving to watch and the humans in her life, her parents, sister and husband Daniel Barenboim sort of play a supporting role as multiple sclerosis starts to limit her abilities to perform.
I have never been so moved at the end of a ballet as I was at the end of The Cellist 
Unable to move on her own, we see the dying DuPré positioned around the stage by a series of grey figures as she says her goodbyes to her loved ones and as she melts into inactivity into an armchair her cello spins , almost out of control across the stage, playing frantically.
Lauren Cuthbertson literally broke my heart in the lead role.

Royal Ballet

Going to see the live filmed performance of The Cellist and Dances at a Gathering tonight

I'm tired xx

The Journey Home

My journey home tonight was delayed by a couple of hours, so I am thankful to Trendy Carol and her hubby for seeing to the dogs at short notice.
I managed to get The Walking Dead on my iPad but most of the action was set in a cave so I couldn't quite work out who was chasing who.
Also the zombie growling was a little too loud for the other passengers to stomach so I had to turn the volume down.
Not good if you want to enjoy the zombie apocalypse at its best
I'm not an avid shopper but I did have time for  mooch around Waterstones ( where I bought three books and birthday cards) primark ( where I bought some woolly hats..) and a posh kitchen shop ( where I bought a frying pan) 
When I met my friend I noticed that he studiously ignored the fact I had bought a frying pan
" Only You" he remarked shaking his head with a sigh when I finally got it out

There is nothing quite as lonely as the last train home.
The carriage ( even on a Monday night) has the vague wiff of alcohol and tiredness

.

The Venice Sleeper

The Welsh rail system is abysml
The rolling stock is outdated and feels dirty and unloved and carriages can be cramped and uncomfortable.
Im on the 14.20 to Manchester and already there is no wifi and I am unable to buy a coffee with my debit card
The train is the sort you  have to open the windows to gain access to the door handle and the guard although English is giving his announcements in a sort of strangled Welsh first.

My spoken welsh is almost  as good.
But at least he's giving it a try.

Not very romantic
Not very mysterious

I feel as though im travelling in 1978.

I'm planning a holiday of sorts in my head. It will have to be funded by overtime and from a jar in the living room cupboard where ive placed money made from the selling of unwanted items on ebay

Im going to venice on tbe train
Apparantly there is a sleeper train from Paris. A friend of mine catches it every year and his stories of waking up in the centre of the city after a night lulled by the thump-thump of the train wheels is the stuff of Agatha Christie

Lets hope the venice sleeper is better than transport for wales eh

Theatre On A Sunday

What fun
Theatre on a Sunday afternoon!!!
The Storyhouse in Chester's own production of Miss Julie was an interesting choice for what I suspect is an experimental foray into Sunday productions and I think my Sister enjoyed this adaptation of August Strindberg's 1888 play as much as I did .
This production has been moved from the original Victorian Swedish setting  to 1940s Hong Kong
Where Miss Julie, a brittle and somewhat lost colonial daughter plays a dangerous flirting game with her father's Chinese chauffeur as his fiancé, the family cook and nanny, looks on.

The original play has a great deal to say about rape, mental health and class. And this Amy Ng's version adds race, English colonism into the sexual mix.

Sundays can be depressing days and my sister described them as having that Sunday night before school feeling! 

It was nice to do something different

Deva memories reworked

This video was forwarded on to me by Miss Norm
It's been 34 years since I left
I knew most of the staff and a few of the patients shown

Reclaiming

Mary watching Albert

Night shifts make the cottage feel unloved, cold and miserable
I find I have to reclaim it back, so to speak after I finally get out of bed with the dogs and Albert in tow.
After walks and the extravagance of buying two bunches of spring flowers ( one bunch for the kitchen and one for the living room)
I reclaim my home
The fire is lit first as the cottage's 18 inch walls take an age to air against the damp cold of winter's nights and the flowers are illuminated by the glow of the standard lamps hidden away in green corners
The cushions are returned to the kitchen reading chairs as Winnie moves her heavy botty onto the sofa for the duration.
Supper is warming in the oven and the scent of beef hash mingles with the smell of wood smoke and the wiff of linen from the  gift candles that I saved from Christmas.
The dogs are fed and settle down in untidy clumps and the dishes from the last four days of snatched tea times are washed and stacked and then put away.
My Sitges lamp warms my art wall in gold

The washing machine whirls quietly behind music picked just for me from Spotify
Its warmer and I can now take off my fleece
and my new bobble hat.

I am home

Be Careful What You Wish For

More stormy weather had the five of us scuttling off to bed after my second night shift of three.
By 1pm, the wind had woken most of us to a restless mass and we resembled a nest of baby blackbirds waiting for their mom to return with food until I couldn't bare it any longer and I took the younger dogs for a walk in the old Churchyard.
The new Postman was standing at the cottage gate when we returned as the driving rain started.
He was afraid to walk into the garden as Winnie was Standing guard in the doorway, and passed me a small parcel to me before running back to his van.
The parcel contained a hand knitted bobble hat.
It was just like the one I described earlier this week. The one I coveted from the amiable gay smoking guy on the railway line.
And it fitted perfectly.
Thank you Lee it was a lovely gesture.
I banked up the fire, ate some baby bananas and drank tea as the wind and rain increased
And I'm typing this , in bed
Still with my bobble hat on

Bed

Another Atlantic storm is whistling through the brazen cat flap as violent as the tornado did in Dorothy's wooden farmhouse in the Wizard Of Oz 
I've lit the fire
And I'm off to bed

Returns Monday

Being Unfaithful

Have you ever been unfaithful?

I guess I am in an ideal position to be able to ask this question because I have an anonymous feature in my comment box, so if you would like to share things with the group , feel free to unburden yourself without judgement.
I'm asking this because I have had the conversation with an acquaintance who admitted that they could have been unfaithful a couple of times within a long term relationship, but didn't .

I have never been unfaithful inside any of my relationships but I was tempted once as I recall, after being approached by a drunken hunk  of bearded god who gave me the glad eye on a ward night at Sheffield's Ledmill. 
For me, the frisson of excitement and flattery couple with the fact a red cheek was rubbed against by a lumberjack the size of Norwegian Christmas Tree was almost enough to get me giggling like a Schoolboy on heat....but I kept my head ( and my knicker elastic) firmly under control and went back home to my partner.

Being unfaithful is a complicated phenonomen
It's swathed in guilt, sometimes a rewriting of the truth,
Bargaining and denial.
It can be a springboard to a new begining or a death knell of a relationship
It can be something you just think and fantasise about
Or it's something you can do without guilt or remorse

What's your story?

Temper

I have owned four bulldogs and all but one have had the tendency to tantrum when things don't quite go their way.
To stop squabbles among the troops all of the dogs are fed separately and this morning because she was fed up with being outside a few moments longer than she expected Dorothy had the mother of all tantrums at the back door.
Within seconds she had broken Albert's cat flap, knocked over several potted cyclamen and kicked the shit out of the recycling bins
When finally allowed into the house she threw herself, gayman style onto the reading chair in the kitchen and refused to look at anyone for over half an hour

Mary, surveying the damage

Tantrums in Bulldogs are much deeper and more graphic than anything a terrible two toddle could bring to the table.
After years of practice , I did what any responsible bulldog owner would do in similar circumstances

I went to bed

Went The Day Well

My day got better after the making of the will
I had found it rather sad to change my beneficiary, from someone I once would have happily left all of my lifelong savings and assets to. So much so that my solicitor who had originally overseen our will making, was sweet and thoughtful and timely with her tissue box..
But like I said, the day got better,
As days nowadays often do.

I met a friend for lunch then caught up with the affable despot which is jason who sent me this video via what's app, as he a want to do with viral gems

Now I may have to explain that " Bashing someone's back doors in " is a more lurid example of one of our British euphemisms relating to anal sex......
I won't draw pictures but The Despot cackled like a loon when I saw him, so ticked by the schoolboy humour of it all .
Jason and I are off to see some sort of Zombie theatre performance at Theatr Clwyd next week.
What fun.

Trelawnyd's full choir contingent was present tonight as Heulwen was back after her two months journey to Europe, so after a somewhat spirited and balanced version of Hallelujah ( the choir was so pleased that we had impressed Jamie with our singing) we ( , me Hattie and Heulwen) went to the pub to swap personal and village gossip.

We are arranging to see the sentimental Military Wives movie ( the one about the choir)
I think a filmed version of our choir would have been a better story, but then I would.

Last Will & Testament

I'm sat in the solicitors
Not my divorce solicitors
But another, more local one
I'm just about to amend my will

I'm working out who to leave my fortune to
The solicitor's clerk has just made me an Americano and offered me a Danish pastry

I feel strange

Thank You

Thank you to David Hastings who sent me this Walking Dead car sticker today
Thank you Nu for my London treats.
Thank you to Roscia for your theatre gift
And thank you to Chic Eleanor for more yellow roses, all wrapped up by a simple black ribbon
How lucky am I ?

The Walking Dead starts again next Monday
David's message that accompanied the sticker was only half washed away by Dennis' storm
"You're a funny sad git that man " it said.......
Lol
Got it in one!!!

To My Face

The sad death of Caroline Flack has galvanised the ongoing debate about trolls and social media.
There is, I think, an underlying truth about some people that patrol the internet
And that is they feel vindicated to say exactly what they like on line,
Words and phrases that they would never say to anyone face to face.
The internet buffer allowing a type led Tourette's to be unleashed and unchecked.

I last lost my temper a week ago.
I was in the gents toilet in Sheffield's Lyceum Theatre and had just washed my hands when three giggling young women boldly walked in and stood next to the one occupied cubicle.
In front of them stood six men all in the process of having a wee.
I went off like a fire cracker
" How DARE YOU COME IN HERE, HOW DARE YOU! Get OUT! GET OUT! A MAN WOULD NEVER BE ALLOWED INSIDE A WOMAN's TOILET GET OUT!!!!!!" 
You get the gist
I had the three of them scuttling for the exit like panicked chickens and before anyone of you jump to their defence at the poor provision of lady's bogs in theatreland compared with the average size of a woman's bladder..All I will say is that ....I DONT CARE!!!!
(Btw I did note that in the Albert Hall , all of the toilets are multisex)
Privacy is privacy and men deserve it just as much as women regardless of the fact they can effectively wee into a hole in the wall...

Like those women in the theatre, or the man that can't control his Huskey dogs on the railway walkway. I am quite capable to say my piece, but I shall always do that to their face.
This ability to speak my mind has improved the older I get, but immaturity and low confidence or low self esteem is no excuse for trolling insults.
Trolls feel they have the right to say anything they want
They feel that they have the moral right to speak their own truth and I guarantee that they would never speak the shit they do online to anyone's face.
I guarantee it...

I'm sat in my favourite cafe , the one with the bad tempered barista .
I've got some small jobs to do
I've collected Albert's "rustic " bowl from pottery
I have to buy a belated birthday gift for my brother in law ( Ive decieded on some fresh steak and trimmings)
And I want to visit my aunt who is home from hospital
I bumped into labradoodle guy,again this morning. I think he is gay but I've gone off him as I caught him chainsmoking in his car!
It's a shame really,
I really did like his bobble hat