Tuesday, January 08, 2008

A National Trust day - carvery lunch

Too busy today for taking snaps so I've raided my recent bird archive for todays pictorial interest. Our colony of great-tits thrives and this young fellow is particularly fine, and of course, my real pride are the goldfinches as per picture 2.

Such handsome birds and how best to provide an environment which they enjoy rather than imprison them in an aviary.

I disapprove of photographers who take 'wildlife' photographs (so called) in aviaries as much as Blake ever did about 'Robins in Cages' et al.

Our National Trust Committee meeting was a joy to attend. Good humoured, productive and although different views were expressed they were made and received in a constructive spirit. I would not for a moment suggest that this was due to the absence of a committee member who has the knack of annoying his colleagues.

My blog is my resposibility and should not be considered as 'minutes' by the way.

After that we lunched at The Rufford Hotel. If you remember, last time the meeting had made me so tetchy I took it out on the young barman at the same Hotel. Today I was sweetness and light and enjoyed my carvery meal. We both enjoy a good carvery.

Smiley Xtra 4, one of my favourite 'smiley' sources has dried up. The site-owner says he can't deal with the spam anymore. Fortunately I have saved some of them so all is not lost but I shall miss the copy/paste facility.

Comments.... Lovely comment Bungus. As ever amusing, informative and a joy to read. Re the Long Red Florence shallots - my snap was of them still mostly covered by their brown skins. Once stripped of them their appearance is much redder. Next time I use one I shall send you a picture.

Quotation..........Although I don't drink anymore I can vaguely remember.......etc., and this caught my eye.

"It takes only one drink to get me drunk. The trouble is, I can't remember if it's the thirteenth or the fourteenth".


I'm stopping there because after a sandwich we need to set off for Mansield again for our National Trust lecture. Sleep tight..........Catch you tomorrow.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

In spite of what you say I suspect you were not displeased that a certain committee member was absent.
Pleased to hear that you managed to tolerate Rufford ‘matey’ (or was he not on duty?).

Great quote. I always enjoyed The George Burns & Gracie Allen Show immensely and wish someone would repeat it.

Current complaint is that my heels feel bruised as though I had just finished 30 overs of fast bowling. It is something which I had years ago so probably is not a ‘side effect’. Oddly, it is at its most painful when I wake up in the night. End of moan.
From what RG has said in the past, I am sure he will have found, as I have, that the opinions of the medical ‘experts’ differ to a quite marked degree regarding approriate treatment. Even the District Nurses (6 or so) who, for several weeks, visited to dress my wound daily, had their own ideas on procedure.
Presently I am trying to concentrate on the advice given at City Hospital but my GP now seems to be trying to put in his two penn’orth. It probably doesn’t matter much anyway whose advice is followed.
I recall a respected consultant on ward rounds at King’s Mill who had suggested a change of nmedication for one patient.
“What dosage?” asked the nurse.
“Doesn’t matter,” said the consultant, “It’s not scientific, is it?”

About half an hour ago, Sandra received a phone call to say that Simon was in a&e at Bassetlaw Hospital having been knocked off his cycle by a car and thrown into the windscreen of another car. We assume that he was on his way home from the station in Worksop. Amazingly, thankfully, it seems that he has no broken bones and is conscious and swearing at the pain.
A call to the hospital has revealed that he has been transferred to an orthopaedic ward with a possible back injury and will not be sent home tonight. The fact that that was even considered suggests that he was not unconscious at any stage (he would have preferred to have been when they did blood tests as he is needle phobic). One of those cases where people will no doubt say how lucky he has been!

quotation:
"If a Frenchman goes on about seagulls, trawlers and sardines, he’s called a philosopher. I’d just be called a short Scottish bum talking crap."
Gordon Strachan in response to Cantona's famous quote following the 1995 Crystal Palace-Simmons incident.
ي

Anonymous said...

Lovely goldfinch picture, and what a smart-looking great tit......

I've had two e-mails from Waitrose, one saying they are investigating, and a further one today saying that their experts are consulting other experts...see what you started, Bungus!

We enjoy a good carvery too, but it's finding a good one. The pub-chains round here seem determine to undercut each other in cost, but the quality of the meat/veg suffers, would far rather pay more for a decent dinner. Pub across the way has recently changed from a 'chips with everything' one to a gstro pub (calamares/goats cheese/cous-cous sort of place) which really doesn't suit us much better! However another restaurant 100 yds away (whch has been shut for 2 years) is going to open as a fish restaurant, we hve hopes of that.

Love the George Burns quote. I used to like his tv shows too, also Sergeant Bilko.

Anonymous said...

I failed to take my own advice yesterday as I called in to Durban House to have a look at the Nempf exhibition. Well, in the interests of pedantry, Elaine and I called in to check it out as a possible wedding venue (not suitable) and had a look at the exhibition whilst there.

My advice still holds good. I wasn't too impressed, lots of very/over sharp colour prints but little mood or atmosphere in many. Relatively few monochrome prints and I'm not even sure there was a darkroom print at all. There were a handful of very strong images that somehow failed to win awards but that's often the case. Judging by the amount and size of the individual colour prints, there must be a lot of well-off amateur photographers in Nempf. The cost of inks to print them must have been quite high.

Bungus - if you are so inclined you can buy a set of George and Gracie DVDs from Amazon for about £53 plus postage.

Rob