Please excuse a brief blog but I also am feeling groggy, and I can't blame it on a fall. Just a sort of generalised malaise.Picture 1 is a final snap from the 'Nosy-Horse' series because I definitely get a feel that they aren't people's favourite animals.
I was parked in a little unofficial lay-bay this side of the hedge and whenever I moved he/she (I didn't check) followed me. Probably thought I had sugar lumps or carrots or whatever does it for horses.
p.s. 'Nosy-Horse' was a famous native-american scout around 1860.
- editor
Picture 2 has been submitted by a reader in the 'Naffest Xmas Card' competition. At the moment, continuing with an equine metaphor, the card is leading by a short head. Further entries are welcome. The final will be judged by a panel made up of Mrs. Radiogandy and myself. We will, of course, weigh carefully the views of readers. But telephone voting is positively discouraged.
Comments
bungus ....... Congratulations to The Dukeries College Always good to hear of state schools doing well. You can open the link to read all about it. It was due to her exemplary work with the workshop component that Sandra was appointed MBE.
Both you and Jill have picked up on the 'supernaturally threatening' look of my snap of Greasley Church. When I feel up to it I may well give it abit of Photoshop and introduce a couple of ravens as Jill suggests.
Also see Reg's comment about the background to the house.
I liked the sound of your bubble & squeak. Using up whatever is around appeals to me too. At the weekend we had some left-over mashed potato with chives. Together with the remnants of Roy's excellent Lancashire cheese plus an egg to bind them into cakes and toasted breadcrumbs for body, I made some tasty cheese-cakes which vanished off the plates remarkably quickly.
You say you recall 'Woodcock on the wing'. I suppose that would be the poor creature's natural state before some upper class oaf took a gun to it.
Reg ..... Thanks for the info. on the house at Greasley. As you will have read, The Architectural Desk was unsure of its provenance.
I must ask Duggie if he would dig out his earlier picture, because I would very much like to see the house as it once was.
Jill ....... I hope your grogginess passed. "Lots of rest interspersed with periods of inactivity and naps" would be my advice. And I am pretty much doing just that myself. Roland is very lucky - being permitted to read edited extracts from the blog !
My position on 'bravery' must remain different from yours and bungus's. In my dictionary/thesaurus "pluckiness, indomitability, grit and determination" are all mentioned. I think you both are veering to "valour, heroism, courage and gallantry". We wont quibble though 'eh ?
I don't blame you at all spending £550 on glasses if you wanted them and they have proved a success. My new little Asus netbook was an indulgence but I know I shall love it and use it widely. And what the hell ? In a year or two when we need to take a barrowload of £s sterling to buy a loaf of bread you will probably still be enjoying your glasses.
When you go 'pavement measuring' please be careful not to trip over anything !
Commentsbungus ....... Congratulations to The Dukeries College Always good to hear of state schools doing well. You can open the link to read all about it. It was due to her exemplary work with the workshop component that Sandra was appointed MBE.
Both you and Jill have picked up on the 'supernaturally threatening' look of my snap of Greasley Church. When I feel up to it I may well give it abit of Photoshop and introduce a couple of ravens as Jill suggests.
Also see Reg's comment about the background to the house.
I liked the sound of your bubble & squeak. Using up whatever is around appeals to me too. At the weekend we had some left-over mashed potato with chives. Together with the remnants of Roy's excellent Lancashire cheese plus an egg to bind them into cakes and toasted breadcrumbs for body, I made some tasty cheese-cakes which vanished off the plates remarkably quickly.
You say you recall 'Woodcock on the wing'. I suppose that would be the poor creature's natural state before some upper class oaf took a gun to it.
Reg ..... Thanks for the info. on the house at Greasley. As you will have read, The Architectural Desk was unsure of its provenance.
I must ask Duggie if he would dig out his earlier picture, because I would very much like to see the house as it once was.
Jill ....... I hope your grogginess passed. "Lots of rest interspersed with periods of inactivity and naps" would be my advice. And I am pretty much doing just that myself. Roland is very lucky - being permitted to read edited extracts from the blog !
My position on 'bravery' must remain different from yours and bungus's. In my dictionary/thesaurus "pluckiness, indomitability, grit and determination" are all mentioned. I think you both are veering to "valour, heroism, courage and gallantry". We wont quibble though 'eh ?
I don't blame you at all spending £550 on glasses if you wanted them and they have proved a success. My new little Asus netbook was an indulgence but I know I shall love it and use it widely. And what the hell ? In a year or two when we need to take a barrowload of £s sterling to buy a loaf of bread you will probably still be enjoying your glasses.
When you go 'pavement measuring' please be careful not to trip over anything !
...........................................
I promised a brief blog - but when my fingers start to thump the keyboard.......................
.
.
RG
ReplyDeleteThink you misread or misunderstoud Doug took a pic of the shed on Wed.
DIARY
ReplyDeleteFriday we met Sandra’s closest sister (in any sense; they are from W Bridgford)) and her husband for lunch and present exchange at the White Post (Farnsfield).
The food was better than OK if not marvellous and, on a ‘2 for 1’ basis, at little over £40 total, including a drink each (“a pint for the men and a coffee for the ladies” to paraphrase Al Murray’s alter ego), very good value.
Certainly worth considering if you are ‘round that way’
BLOG COMMENT
If a horse can be nice you have found him/her. Auburn, lovely looking and obviously very sociable.
I would suggest that grog is good for grogginess but it would mean your getting off the (not horse-drawn) wagon.
Now you are at it again. 'Nosy-Horse'?
A pretty good example of the 'Naffest Xmas Card'.
I tried to find one for you, knowing your interest, but was perhaps too intellectual rather than folky in my selection.
This seems an opportune space to say thank you for the two cards from yourself and Yvonne (left hand,/right hand I suppose), and to Rob & Elaine for theirs.
I don’t have their address to respond so will now wish them and all other contributors ‘Very Merry Xmas and a Happy and Successful New Year’ en blog.
On a technical point, I think I should say that although the Dukeries Community Workshop, like the Notts Fire & Rescue Training School and the Dukeries Leisure Centre, is on the Dukeries Community College Campus, they are separate entities. The workshop is a unique charity which rents accommodation from the College with whom they have a mutually beneficial relationship (eg, fresh eggs from the farm unit for whom they carry out repair work).
End of advert.
It niggles me a little bit that although the College is in Boughton, its address is New Ollerton (as ours now seems to be).
And someone may be interested to know that several Notts County Council Departments are now located at Sherwood Energy Village in New Ollerton. That means that my stepson-in-law (until the decree absolute) now has a five minute rather than fifty minute journey to work.
If you do enhance the church photo I shall be pleased to see it.
Your cheese & potato cakes sound good too.
I recall my parents going on holiday, when I was in my mid to late teens, and giving me the opportunity to run a six night ‘ha’penny knock’ (dominoes) gambling den for my friends. One evening I fried cheese & potato cakes and served them with what I thought was apple chutney but which turned out to be gooseberry jam. It worked so well that I later tried is, successfully, with bacon & egg.
Pleased you picked up on my 'Woodcock on the wing'.
My impression is that it is no longer just ‘upper class oafs’ that shoot. Even in the seventies that would have been an inappropriate description of the ‘shooters’ from whom I was able to obtain a supply of game for Sandra to cook for the pub.
Like you, however, I deplore the downing of several hundred birds in a day, for most of which there is no available market. The farmer I know who organises shoots also dislikes that aspect of it but it is only such diversification that allows small-scale farming to continue.
I also have an unproveable feeling that many shooters are members or potential members of BNP which is probably worse than them being ‘upper class oafs’.
Argue the pros & cons in no leass than 1,000 words.
My dictionary gives ‘courage, valour’ (or ‘showy display’!) for 'bravery'.
There are certainly murky boundaries between the several words you mention and all writers know that Thesaurus ‘synonyms’ can be very misleading.
The Chad, and other newspapers, also makes frequent and, in my view, often inappropriate and deplorable use of the word ‘hero’ and its derivatives. For instance, I think very few Olympic comepetitors should accurately be described as ‘heroes’.
But there are, as you imply, often fine lines.
Jill:
Your daughter’s analysis of the after effects of falling sounds sound (and RG’s remedy exactly right). The other big danger, to which I referred and which you happily avoided, is putting out a hand and breaking the wrist.
I briefly got to ‘smoked’ before, and separately from, ‘haddock’ and thought you had taken to the weed for consolation.
Re that photo of the church. Snap.
Do try kipper pate too (boil-in-the-bag OK). I usually use a very soft cheese but double cream or mayo seems to work just as well. I shall be using up some smoked mackerel similarly today. I think finely chopped capers and/or gherkins, onion and/or garlic (otherwise tartare sauce) are essential.
Freddy Mills was a much-loved character who was reputed to have opened and run the first Chinese Restaurant in ther UK. Less happily, he was befriended by gangsters and there were uncertainties about his ‘suicide’.
Re ‘bravery’. Snap.
Your ‘dude ranch experience sounds great apart from being on horses.
Is my impression correct that ‘cowboy’ horses are appreciably smaller than most UK horses? Or is that just the ones ridden by Native Americans? I suspect they were often the same, being tamed mustangs.
I used to like our greengrocer’s horse which was of small stature, who, like his owner, was called Billy and to whom I used to feed apples (always keeping my hand flat to avoid it being eaten, as instructed by my mother, who, as a small girl, rode her uncle’s farm horse bareback, one leg sticking out horizontally on either side). And that same uncle delivered our milk, from churns, by float, drawn by a horse that I also fed apples.
It’s the big hunters that frighten me when they get too close. And those aboard them cannot avoid appearing arrogant and intimidating in close-up.
For many years I only needed glasses for reading and always had ‘National Health’ frames. Were that still an option I would take it
Having been told that I need glasses for driving (it is a close run thing and I sometimes I am unworried to find I have left them behind) I was in turn ‘driven’ to varifocals which I managed to persuade myself to pay over £100 for, and had no trouble adapting to. I do not think I could ever persuade myself to pay as much as £200 but Sandra, like you, does not see, through her expensive spectacles, that £500 plus is a problem!
Strange really, because at one time I would never have considered buying a pair of trousers ‘off the peg’, much less a suit, having been brought up bespoke!
All that said, your argument persuades. “Go for it, gal!”