Going Gently

Chameleon

On Friday I collected prints and paintings bought a while ago before lockdown .
They have been framed and hung in the cottage alongside the drawing by Monika's daughter
The whole personality of the cottage has changed over the last two years
It's mine now
I took the opportunity to go shopping and went to Waterstones to look and smell the books.
And saw something I bought on impulse
Not a book,
Not stationary, pens or magazines
But a Chameleon
A cheefully stuffed chameleon with odd eyes
I'm fucking 58 !
He's now sat beneath my art wall,
swinging his leg at a Jaunty angle
And smiling his odd smile at the world

What's all this about?

Masks

Strange as it would seem Dorothy seems to enjoy wearing her face mask
It smells of me that why I think she feels comfortable in it mind you ...bulldogs generally don't mind dressing up at all.
It's a breed quirk!!
After work I was called around to Polish Monika's house to check a chicken who is suffering from Bumble Foot. I wore gloves and a mask , something Monika's daughter captured quite well as she watched me from her drawing spot at the kitchen table.

She gave me her drawing as a thank you for coming round
I felt awful
I think the hens not going to make it

Doppelganger

I stopped at some traffic lights in the centre of Llandudno whilst out on my rounds today
A car pulled alongside and the driver told me I looked like Harry Potters grandad!

Swear Away

Blogger is playing up
I have no idea why, but I suspect it's the new upgraded version
Just for now I've put comment verification on in an effort to stop the spam commentators who have swarmed to fill the comment boxes
I've literally had 1000s

Can followers comment with a one or two word hello to see if things are working
The words can be your favourite swear word

Old Videos

Village Elder was 70 yesterday

Belated happy birthday to him

Hygge Mugs and New Arty Stuff

Last night I met Gorgeous Dave and we chatted and drank beer at his allotment
It was a nice meet
Today is my one day off before another three long days at work and I was suppose to drive into work for a study session this afternoon.
I didn't go
Instead I answered a request by a local art gallery to pick up the stuff I had bought as lockdown befell us all too many months ago.
The screen prints of sea birds are by Liz Tool, The Spanish tile Print by R Moxon
The mugs are called Hygge mugs ......
The jug is just sweet and will be used as a flower vase.

It's hot.
I'm just pottering
Today

Apologies to Dr Barnsley today, I didn't see him walking down the lane as I was flinging stale cat food over the lane and into the Churchyard for the rooks to eat

Reflection

My patient died at home
Peacefully with her pack of dogs and her daughter by her side
The way she had wanted to.
The Hospice at home team made it happen through talented design and planning
And initiatives such as the Cariad training scheme where lay carers are taught to administer medication subcutaneously and appropriately helped enormously
It was a multi disciplinary approach and as the newbie
I was very humbled to be present.
And when the daughter asked me what to do in those very last moments
I said quietly
" Just talk to her, and say what you want to"
And as she did so with buckets of love , I stepped back quietly into the corner of the room

Turning Into My Father

Elizabeth Taylor hated anonymous trolls too

I am not a vain man
But I have noticed that I'm much greyer than I once realised
This has happened overnight ( or so I thought )
Less salt and pepper around my hamster ears
More Helen Mirren or Judi Dench
I'm nearing 60 in a couple of years
And I'm shocked to see that I've turned into my father..he was 7 years older when he died !!
Photograph taken during The Relair Shop tonight...which is a right sob fest

Winnie's bolster cushion

After work tomorrow
I am meeting up with Gorgeous Dave .
A pint and a chat , in my first pub visit and meet with him since March

Marks And Spencer Flowers

Yesterday it was Chic Eleanor's birthday.

I took some Marks and Spencer flowers up to the big house but it looked deserted and so I messaged her and as I suspected she answered as she sipped coffee overlooking Lake Como alongside her sister, presumably both of them in matching pashminas

I photographed her flowers and sent her the photo

" Exquisite Darling John " she texted back

Even Chic Eleanor's texts are delightfully upbeat.

We arranged to meet for gin and tonics in a week's time

I braved TK Maxx and bought a bolster cushion, a pizza wheel and a trendy t shirt.

Winnie kicked the cushion around the living room and seemed quietly delighted that it rolled well

She played with it for at least half an hour.

No other news today

Normality

Yesterday I met a friend and

Had sit down coffee at the Jaunty Goat
Watched a matinee cinema performance
And went OUT for a meal afterwards!!!

Simple pleasures but oh so welcomed after so long a hiatus
I felt almost normal!
Ok there are differences
The covid contact slips, the masks, the camp barista with a face visor wider than his hips
but , for an absolute age I felt that I had experienced a proper afternoon and evening out.

The movie was somewhat of a let down for me. Love Sarah is kind of advertised as one of those London based comic dramas the likes of Richard Curtis would adore.
Big characters, implausible plots, angst, romance and tearful asides all set against a beautifully shot London with its mews, and bespoke shops and floppy hair.
Here we have talented baker Sarah, killed on the eve she is about to open her first niche bakery. The accident leaves the three women in her life rudderless. Best friend Isabella (Shelly Conn) has sunk her savings into the venture and is now at risk of ruin. Her estranged Mother Mimi ( Celia Imrie) a retired trapeze artist! is racked with guilt for not supporting the initiative initially and her dancer daughter Clarissa ( Shannon Tarbot) finds herself alone and homeless and grieving
Can you see what is about to happen?
Of course the three women reluctantly join forces in order to open the bakery and with the help of a token sexy chef with a past ( Rupert Perry-Jones ) and an odd inventor ( Bill Paterson) they do
Cue heartwarming story and Notting Hill cuteness.

For me it just didn't work , which is a shame.
The characters are so under written that the actors , although an impressive bunch indeed, can't flesh out the bones of the story and all come across as rather lacklustre and bland

If you can't believe in the characters, you don't enjoy the story
Which was a shame

Where The Mountains Sing Through The Screams Of Seagulls

I'm not a man who enjoys poetry
But at times, the beauty of a phrase whether spoken or written can grab me around the neck and almost throttle me with its beauty or power.

A verse in that fake Eurovision ballad Husavik - My home town captured my imagination just the other day

" Where the mountains sing through the screams of seagulls "

Isn't that a fantastic description of an Iceland we all have in our imaginations?

When I was a child I loved a tiny poem Little Fish by D H Lawrence for exactly the same

" The tiny fish enjoy themselves
In the sea
Quick little splinters of life,
their little lives are fun to them
in the sea"

" Quick little Splinters of life"
A beautiful description again, economical and bang on the money

I borrowed a book from the hospice last week and found myself reading it last night.
It was a collection of " Best Loved Poems" illustrated by Isabelle Brent
I was unexpectedly melancholic, a moment's revisiting of old wounds and the feelings around them, and the book provided me with the escape that I needed

This poem by Emily Dickinson lingers in the mind

" A word is dead
When it is said,
Some say.
I say it just
Begins to live
That day"

Jealous Legs

Albert playing dead in the lane

There's always drama

" I love it when you hang your washing, the lane is always filled with the scent of washing powder"

Pippa from the Rectory called this over the sound of the music in my earphones as she passed Bluebell where I was cleaning bulldog snot from the steering wheel
I had hung a newly washed bedspread on the field gate half an hour earlier
The wind from the west fill fluttering laundry with the vague scent of greenery tinged with the sea

It's been an odd day.
I met a friend for breakfast ( great tasting Americanos and thick white toast !! Served at the seaside cafe on Colwyn Bay promenade.
He is just about to end a long term marriage and needed to verbalise what he felt.
It was easy for him to talk as I fed the girls crumbs and kept my gaze from his
" It's not the breaking up that she will ultimately remember but the kindness or not of how you do it"
This was my only advice
He needed to talk and hear his own words
I just needed to listen.

The meeting unsettled me a little not because of the subject matter but because of the jealously experienced by my friends' husband . He couldn't be told of our meeting
I've had this before from some of my straight female friends whose male partners find my presence difficult.
I don't get it...myself
dog jealousy I get
Jealousy by straight men over a gay friend
Naaw

Oh and there's more sad news

The last lady of classic Hollywood died today

Olivia deHavilland

I have a signed polorid snapshot somewhere

She sent it me in 1978 after I had seen her in Airport 77 and I wrote to her in Paris

Mary and Albert

Waiting for me to come home
Look for the glowing eyes

Husavik

I love it when truth becomes stranger than fiction
The Netflix movie Eurovision Song Contest - The Story of Fire Saga seems to be a heavy handed comic farce centred around Iceland's bid to win the camp as Christmas competition
The final song Fire Saga ( the band) performs is a sacarrinesque ballad Husavik ( my home town )
And suddenly it's captured the public attention and has become a real hit !
Go figure

The Office

I'm working at the " hospice at home" initiative for one more week. The H@H nurses care and support patients who want to die at home

I'm waiting for calls to come in and have patient appointments later today.
The office is quiet save for the constant screaming of the herring gulls that populate this part of Llandudno beach

I am reminded of Broadstairs

The Ticking

My day off therapy has a a three or four hour cleaning element to it
I've filled glass jugs with garden buddleia and opened the windows wide so the butterflies can come and go like miniature angels.
I've even found the key to my grandfather clock, which after being silent so long is ticking away so loudly that Albert came downstairs all wide eyed to see what the commotion was all about.
There is something quite restful about the ticking of an old clock .

I've washed my uniforms and the cheerful blue of them provides a colourful backdrop to the garden as they dry in the sun, hung swinging from the beams above the patio.
As I worked I listened , with interest to the eloquent speech by Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as she replied to insults dished out by her fellow congressman Ted Yoho who referred to her as a " fucking Bitch"
If you haven't heard it, try to , it's a wonderfully powerfull and important speech.

More therapy now

Making sour dough bread and soup , and will video call some friends later
Oh and there's a meeting of the Memorial Hall Commitee at 2pm
To look at fundraising !!!

The clock is still ticking, I started it just after nine

pizza Crusts

I bought a pizza on the way home from work tonight
The nights seem to be drawing in
I collected the dogs from Trendy Carol's
And fed them and Albert before carefully removing the pizza crust with a knife after it had cooked
The dogs adore pizza crusts and sat shivering with excitement in a line for their treat turn

I'm tired

Pride Again

This is a formal reply to those readers who don't get the Gay Pride moteif of yesterday's blog

I get what you say and why you say it..but your comments, to me were ill judged and rather offensive

I will endeavour to explain just why

The excesses of some gay flag wavers , to many seem irrelative. I know that

I am not particularly a fan of the sight of a sequinned budgie smuggler snake hipped twink flouncing atop a float myself but as a gay middle aged man whose sexuality is probably the least interesting thing about me, I will always fight for the right for that twink to wave his tush and raise his rainbow flag in anyone's face

Straight people will never understand how it feels to be gay

Christ it was only 50 years or so ago since homosexuality was made legal for men over 21in this country .

Legal !!!!

Illegal meant wrong, against the law, dirty, bad, terrible ............deviant ......

All the building bricks for negativity and prejudice and being hated

All the building bricks for guilt and shame and self loathing too

I grew up in the 1980s

Gays were hated then. AIDS was a monster avenger

And still over the 60s, 70s , and 80s men and women fought for equality and a chance to be viewed to be as normal as you straights

They fought long and hard

Straights , as I recall were never spat at in the street for holding the hand of a person they loved ( or even just liked)

Straights could marry the person they loved

And as many did so, the World and his wife would applaud

You straights will never know the trauma of comming out

The constant fear of rejection a gay child experiences when he knows he is different

The low level abuse , snide comments , put downs and stupidity of people fearful of something so alien they have to attack it

You will never know, like I don't, the true struggles of those brave souls that fought the system only a generation ago now

Souls that helped to eventually turn the tide on bigotry and hatred even though it's never really been totally eradicated

So dearhearts , please take it from me that it's fine for that sequinned arsed twink to have his excessive gay pride dances!!!

And it's fine for me to wear my occasional gay pride t shirt and post a blog about feeling all gay

I am proud to be gay , I'm proud to now have those rights straights have have enjoyed for ever !!!

I don't do it often

Like I said , being gay is not one of my most interesting facets

But when I do, it is the RIGHT thing for me as a gay man to do

Please instead of pouting with a narrow minded "We straights never hold straight pride tight arsed pout!"

Just try seeing things from another's perspective

If you can't , well then I would prefer that you didn't follow Going Gently

with its rainbow warts and all

Pride

I got home far too late tonight
Work busy at the very last minute
I got to virtual choir very late.....but just in time to sing the final song You Raise Me Up
And to show off my new, very gay T shirt!

I will leave you with this Pride Walk which although incomplete
Has a certain power and true emotion about it