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My thanks to Donna for this lovely Tag.
Yesterday was my ‘work’ day instead of Tuesday.
Driving along the country road to the farm I was watching out for the pheasants of last week. The ‘ones that got away’. My camera was ready sitting on the passenger seat, batteries charged to the full, so I drove along in hope.
I wasn’t disappointed as there on a raised verge beside the wall on my left was one lonely cock pheasant. He froze as my car approached and didn’t seem to know what to do.
‘Photo Shoot!’ I cried out loud to nobody but myself…Lol!
I took one whilst he was stood like a statue but it was from inside the car and through the windscreen. The flash wiped it out. I thought ‘next time’ and set off for work.
This silly old pheasant hadn’t got a brain. Instead of flying up and over the wall it ran down off the banking in front of my car hither and thither..lol! At slightly over 0 miles per hour I snailed slowly along the road so as not to run the silly ‘Road Runner’ over.
I stopped, it stopped, I stopped it stopped, and I thought…its a stand off. Make the most of it so I got a hold of the camera again. This time the photo took, but it was still taken through the windscreen. It wasn’t too bad I mused. Then I set off in the hope he would get out the way before I squashed him. He took flight and landed on the wall parallel with the door on my right side. I was so close! Had the window been opened I could have grabbed him without hardly stretching out my arm. He stood there looking at me all wide eyed, so again I thought..’ wind the window down and grab the camera’ but when I turned to take a picture the batteries dropped out of my camera. Two days before we left to go on holiday to the Highlands and Islands of Scotland I dropped it and have since had it taped with gaffer tape. When the camera is switched on the surge of power pushes the blessed batteries out the camera. The pheasant was still there!! On the wall ..looking straight into the car at me and I missed it! ****Bleep! ****Bleep! And I’m not practising to be a road runner here either.
What an opportunity missed. Oh well! Next time. Lol!
Today I’m off out looking for fungii. I got lots of photos of various fungii last year after the rains of Autumn, so I hope to see a nice variety today.
So for today…be happy. I know this week has been a sad one in JLand at the loss of dear Penny who we all prayed would ride through her latest chemo’ treatment for leukemia. It was not to be. I don’t think she would want us to be sad forever. I for one want to smile and remember that brave lady who still walked down the hospital corridor to keep in touch with us all even though she was so poorly. How much love did she shine out to us all by doing that? No…I will remember her love and thoughfullness and smile.
Have a good day and stay well and happy.
My quote of the day below..
The happiness of life is made up of minute fractions—the little soon-forgotten charities of a kiss, a smile, a kind look, a heartfelt compliment in the disguise of a playful raillery, and the countless other infinitessimals of pleasurable thought and genial feeling.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
THIS IS BREAST CANCER AWARENESS MONTH.
DON’T FORGET TO CHECK!
GOD BLESS!
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Hello Again!
I have decided to enter this months Judith Heartsong’s friendly ‘Artsy Entry’ Competition again. I so enjoyed visiting all the other entries last month!
I wrote this last year and have since tweaked it so that it falls in to line with the competition requirements.
We had to create an entry using some or all of the words on Judith’s list.
I have used some of the words she provided and have dotted them about my essay for you to find highlighted in blue.
I hope you enjoy the walk as you look for the words on loan from Judith’s list. It is one I take regularly all year round with Nature’s various changes to distract me en-route.
Please note I have copywright on all of my entries so please do not copy or save them to your computer. Thank You.
***************
An Autumn Walk
by Jeanie Kirkby © 2006-10-07
I see the warmth of summer escaping from the land like a ground oozing wraith.
In the middle distance the lake wears an atmospheric cloud inversion.
Autumn has stepped into the landscape. With a sweep of her cooling hands, she paints the leaves with copper and gold tints.
Flowers shudder in her presence, maraca shaking their seed pods at her feet.
Berries and nuts ripen too, tossing their sun roasted bodies to the ground in their haste to withdraw from the coming winter.
These ‘tumbling’s’ which I find myself crunching underfoot, are as though a jar of pebble-like winter toffees has been spilled and scattered around for all those sleepy hollow creatures to devour; through the lean dark days to come.
Squirrels scamper up their larch ladders, like circus clowns on a tightrope, harvesting cones to add them to their cache of nuts for those rare bleak short days when wakening hungrily from their hibernating torpor.
The swallows have left as a squadron, navigating the European landfalls to their African hunting ground; with its beckoning sun and plentiful flies on the wing. Their summer holiday retreats are still stuck to the eaves of roofs and barns, abandoned for another year.
Skeins of Greylag geese begin to arrive from the Arctic regions to our warmer climes. Airborne in the high stratus thermals for so long their legs have become strangers to them as they land on the marshes. They tumble forward with an undignified nosedive along the margins of the lake.
The wind enters this scene fitfully.
Now and then it tests the fallen leaves for their flap ability; skirmishing with them along the paths and under the trees.
Small whirlwinds suck the leaves from the forest floor spiralling them lightly aloft. Then, just as suddenly, released of this new mode of travel, they skitter like a covey of pheasants at the sound of the hunters gun, change tack again, then glide like goose feathers to the ground.
A window opens up down through my woodland vantage point, showing more of the lake in the distance.
The mist has begun to shift and rise revealing more in its translucency as the day moves on.
I can see that the lake hasn’t escaped from the testing parries of the wind.
Small white horses can be seen rearing southwards, away from the prevailing autumn wind whooping down off the high northern fells which are receding to a vanishing point somewhere beyond Grasmere.
A startling crack of laboured feather like flapping draws my eyes to a pheasant whose feathers camouflaged him so well on the forest floor. Looking up through the trees, a watery sun flickers leaf and branch shadows down through the opaque shafts of light to the golden, crunchy, sloughing carpet beneath.
Here and there amongst the damp detritus of past storms are rotting limbs colonised by mosses which compete with one another so that they almost create their own isomorphism’s. All living in their own chosen microcosm; sharing the nutrients from the fallen skeletons of previous year’s storms.
These limbs are wrapped about, as if for protection, by looping barbed wire-like tendrils of brambles, whilst sentry like nettles ward off my reaching fruit picking fingers.
The trees are not alone in their transformed autumnal attire.
Poking out from under each genus of woodland tree is fungi native only to that species and the nutrients which it releases.
Rust, tan, red, green, blues, blacks, red spotted with white fungi, are all vying for attention as I pass by. Umbrella shapes, phallic, fluted and frilled. There are even some who turn their rims up to show their gill like undersides; as though stood on the same warm air grid as Marilyn Munro in her famous floating dress scene.
They slide slowly into the light, like snails, through previous years of wet mulched leaves, revealing all in their moment of glory; whilst offering their spores to the damp air.
In the surrounding suburban gardens, which I pass on my outward and return journey, nasturtiums are one of the last splashes of vivid colour to offer their faces and leaves to the autumnal shivers. Their long saucer shaped leaf stalks trembling in the wind like the many plates balanced on top of the tall canes of performing jugglers.
Back home, and in the warmth, I look out my window to a spangled shimmer of sun bright water, which breaks the mirrored reflections of the plants and trees protecting our pond from the worst of the elements. Water lily’s slip slithery, skeletal and translucent rotting leaves lower into the dark water, joining the sluggish fish lurking closer to what’s left of the summer’s warmth in the depths.
The rain arrives washing the laurel and rhododendron leaves to a glossy wet slicked greenness. The uncut grass of the lawn has had a last spurt of growth; Foxing the gardener who has put his lawn mower away until next spring.
Its Harvest Festival time and there is much to rejoice in Nature.
Have a lovely day.
Jeanie xx
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Since I have another journal over on AOL I find I am kept busy over there from time to time as I have more readers.
So forgive me if I copy and paste and then talk of something a bit out of date. Its easier for me to copy and paste rather than try to re-write everything all over again.
So here are mutterings below for you to read and pass the time. I hope you enjoy.
Good Morning..
We all seem to be crying out for summer and its heat again now that Autumn is here.
Gas fires are turning on, extra layers are being worn to bed and in my case the central heating is on already. It’s amazing how quickly we all get used to the heat of summer and miss it when it disappears. The cold fair nips at my outer layers of fat these days and tightens it up dreadfully..lol! It can be quite painful when fat solidifies on a ‘human bean’. hahahaha!
I have been getting my nose into a few good books this last week and enjoyed the transportation to another world. Tha’s been taking up a bit of my computer time too.
And I also had a little play with the planter that Samantha gave me. I turned it into a miniature ‘Rock Garden’. See photo…
All last week, and the week before, Bryan got stuck into digging and overhauling ours and our neighbours garden. He is making a big difference out there.
Unfortunately, last Friday morning he showed me a bite which he had been scratching all night and when I saw it I thought..’We can’t leave that over the weekend’ so we popped off to the doctors after getting and emergency appointment where he was given some antibiotics and steroid cream. I have seen one of these bites before and they can eat into an ulcer if you leave them too long. Samantha our daughter had one a couple of years ago. She left it over the weekend and it had got a grip on her flesh and ate a deep hole before she knew it.
In both cases we have no idea what caused it. Bryan remembers hitting an ants nest and whacking his trouser legs to stop them biting so we presume it was one of those with an infectious mouth. Yuck!
I don’t go in the garden these days as I inevitably get ticks, brought in no doubt by the deer. Bryan has yet to get them and he is always in the woodland and garden. Not that I wish them on him but I just don’t understand why they jump on me! Maybe they like blood that has had chemo and radiotherapy…maybe I glow in the sunlight..who knows..but they jump and shout Geronimo and aim for Jeanie all the time! …lol!
As I mentioned in my previous entry I have been having problems with signal and connections on my laptop. I gave up making entries most of last week and just made little sorties in and out of folks journals instead. My computer kept disconnecting me in the middle of my writing.
I have been trying to update my mainframe computer since I have hardly used it this summer. Its cold down in the cellar, where it sits, without the heating on. Now that its back on elsewhere I will be back down there and get on with my writing soon.
I can write my stories much better down there as I have no distraction or awareness of time passing by. Up here in the kitchen I get distracted by the garden and the changing lights and weather on it.
I took a little ‘tootle’ around the lanes behind our houses the other day..the results are in the album above. At one part on the walk I stopped to take a picture unaware that there was a chap behind me until he let out an ‘Oops!’. I never heard a sound…I know I should wear my hearing aid more. But the noises that it gives you back again arrive like a crescendo of drumrolls made by a mad orchestral tympanist who has forgotten that there are gentle little symbols too.
I won’t be around much tomorrow as I am going to a little job that I said I would take up again for my friend Cally. Her daughter has just had a new baby two weeks ago and I said I would go and ‘move the dust around for her’. This is an old farmhouse in the middle of nowhere with peace and quiet and views that go clear across to the Pennine Chain. It is so pastoral and a place that we would all aspire to owning. The views are breathtaking.
Meanwhile…Bryan’s obviously missing not being out in the garden…he keeps interrupting me with questions about which mail shots that have been lying around need chucking out. I’ll get no peace until I go see to him. Lol!
Take care and stay well.
Quote of the day…
The best kind of friend is the one you could sit on a porch, swing with, never saying a word and then walk away feeling like that was the best conversation you’ve ever had.
Bryan and I do that a lot…lol!
Bye!
Take care……
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My thanks to Donna for this beautiful Tag.
Good Morning!
I have had such a lovely time browsing everyone’s journals recently. You are all a talented bunch!
I may not have had time to leave a reply in each of them as I have many alerts…like the rest of you no doubt. Sorry about that.
Congratulations to Donna for winning the Artsy Entry. That was one supremely well written piece of work. Very well done!
I’ve been taking a review of summer, off and on over the weekend. I’ve looked back on many happy moments and smiled.
One stands out and I want to share it with you.
I wrote of Hollie my grandaughter coming to visit and I posted some of her activity pictures whilst she stayed with us for a whole week.
It was a day when we were setting off early as we had planned lots of things to do. We all mucked in and made the picnic sandwiches etc. Before we set off we checked all the regular security things we all do. Lights off, no dripping taps,doors locked, grandma checking she has her purse and keys, lastly we fed the fish. On turning to come back in Hollie said…"Grandad better turn the tap off over the pond or it will overflow while we are out."
Bless her!
She was unaware that the filters recycle the water via a pump and the water level is a constant. (Evaporation excepted).
*******
One day last week I asked Bryan if he thought Post Knott was too difficult for me to walk up as its been a few years since I attacked that vantage point. Its the hill opposite my stone seat when I go for my ‘walk around the block’.
He takes the children up there regulary when they come to visit.
I have sat there on my stone bench opposite it wishing for the day when I could attack it and look at the view, take pictures and bring them back to share on here.
We set off but it wasn’t to be. I was stopping too many times and it was a struggle as I was quite breathless climbing the long steep relentless sloping path which leads up to the bottom of the hill. There is the hill itself to climb after climbing the path.
Bryan disappeared round a corner as I stopped to take some pictures, (and have a rest) as usual! Then he came back to look for me. He got cross with me and said "Right we are going home, you can’t make it if you are stopping too many times. It’s obvious you are struggling". So….I never got to the top. I would have made it on my own, eventually, ( I think) but it would have taken quite a while as I am a stubborn old biddy! I wouldn’t have given up, even if it had taken all day. I live up to my zodiac sign…Taurus the bull. Lol!
He was right of course. It was too difficult for me. I was upset as I became aware once again of how weak I have become since my treatment and I am not a happy bunny. I was exhausted when I got home and stiffened up quite painfully. I took another shorter walk another day, just around the block, and that wasn’t too bad. We took it easier and it isn’t as hilly. Besides we got to chat and ‘rest’ when we bumped into some dog walking friends. So that gave my ‘old ticker’ a chance to take a breather.
It’s quite upsetting to find that I cannot do some of the things I once took for granted but I hope to goodness they will return with perseverance.
I have slept on and off over the weekend since then. My body must need to build up again. Drat! I’m not used to this weaker ‘me’. I have always been such a physically capable person. Plus I thought things would have returned to normal by now.
Still there are worse off folks than me. So I must be thankful.
I have placed some photos in my album above for you to see. You can’t tell how steep the slope is from these, but it is relentless until you get to the top. I reckon I am just going to have to build up with longer daily walks until I get there. Probably some time in the winter at this rate….Lol!
I did notice that autumn has raced in when we weren’t looking. The leaves are falling, the brambles are fast ripening and some of the ‘Conkers’ *chestnuts are already dropping off the trees. They are lying on the ground in their sputnik cases waiting to be stamped on for their hidden treasures by the child in us. I love doing that. Its too soon yet as the nuts are still small.
Meanwhile…I have turned off alerts for a few days just so that I can catch up on myself. I will be back….what’s that I hear? A groan? Well thanks a bunch! Lol!
Quote of the day..
Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.
Henry David Thoreau
Bye for now…take care and God Bless.
Hugs
Jeanie xxx
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Morning!
I chose to sit and watch these little ‘ducky duddles’ or goosey..goosey..ganders (I stand corrected Jan…lol!) whilst I had my picnic lunch yesterday but.. they gave me no peace.. so they ‘saw me off the premises’ just because I was loath to share my fresh salmon mayo’ and dill ‘sarnies’* with them. Lol!
*Sandwiches.
Look at them…pretending I’m not here…lol!
I ended up picnicking on my stone bench (above) whilst watching the sheep sleep in the shade of a tree, and watching the more energetic walkers climb the hill to the vantage point called Post Knott. This overlooks the whole of the lake and offers views, on clear days, of the vista clear down to Morcambe Bay thirty miles away. I could do that once, and will do so again one day too. The chemo’ has played havoc with the muscles in my legs and elsewhere. I get so sore and stiff if I sit just for a short while and find hill walking a wee bit painful. I take paracetamol now before I set off on any reasonable trundle I care to call a walk. So that sorts that out! Lol!
It’s nice to sit below the Tor and watch others climb and use their energy instead of me. I have taken many a photo in that direction, whilst I have rested, and the view always has a few distant bodies perched on the top admiring the spectacle for a while. I sit relieved some days, thinking that I don’t have to do it …lol!
I have shrunk this one so I’m afraid you need to look closely for the people on the top.
I have also placed a few at normalsize in my album above, so you might want to peek in there if you have time to browse.
The marsh in front of my picnic bench hides wild fowl and wagtails amongst other birds. Much too well camouflaged to see from where I sit. I sat and watch the swallows diving and swooping for insects on the wing. They are too swift to catch on my camera but I did spot some on a telegraph wire further on as I got up to carry on my walk.
I wish I could translate the silence, of a sort, that lends background ‘music’to the scenes I see and sit amongst. Especially when sitting on ‘my bench’. Distant bleats of this years late lambs calling for their mother’s who are hiding from the sun in the shade, are heard intermittently. The shreek and high pitched whistle of the swallow can be heard as they swoop past. The caws of a murder of crows flying from distant trees and passing overhead. I can hear the crow of the cockerel I passed by at the little tarn I showed you below, in the distance. His little ‘harem’ of hens were hiding in the shade of the trees behind the hen huts to stay cool. He strutted about in the blazing sun looking quite resplendent with his plumed tail held high.
Harebells, thistles, buttercups and the ‘odd foxglove still standing’ were balm to my eyes as I passed them by. I so love looking out for different hedgerow, and field, wildflowers. I noticed the brambles are beginning to ripen too…huh! A miracle after all the rain we have had this summer.
There was a breeze yesterday, much like today, that leant a rustle to the grasses and the leaves in the trees around me. The undersides of the grasses and leaves shone silvery which from a distance made them glisten as though they had been touched by the silver of the moon.
Just before returning home I took a walk up to Biskey Howe which is another vantage point just behind our home. The views from there are stunning too. See below and in my album.
I had it all to myself for a little while and then some foreign tourists appeared, excited by the view. Excitement and amazement need no language translation. Their utterances are universal and understood.
A lovely walk…and one I hope to repeat soon.
I was a bit wary, since my last walk with Bryan and the episode of the young man, if you remember that entry. But…I refused to dwell on the what ifs and set off to enjoy myself.
I’m glad I did.
I hope you have enjoyed ‘walking’ with me too?
My Quote for the Day is below…
|
We cannot change our past. We can not change the fact that people act in a certain way. We can not change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. |
— Charles Swind
Bye for now…have a lovely day.
Jeanie xxxx
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Hello!
At last I have found time to make an entry since we travelled down to our grandaughter Amy’s christening at the weekend.
The motorway was busy! At one stage near Blackpool we came to a halt, then we slowly crawled past a couple of junctions in the pouring rain. That was maybe a good thing as I hate motorways and spray off the other vehicles when its raining. At least there were no speed merchants flying past at warp speed! Just the usual ones who used all the lanes for overtaking, I’m sure you have all experienced those. And passed them in the end wearing a smug smile at their vain attempts to pull a fast one on everybody.
Well I must admit ….I did. lol! There are some idiots on the motorways these days.
There was a large Festival taking part in Weston Park, the Stately Home where my son and daughter-in-law got married. Some roads were closed, as were junctions, in order to help the flow and congestion of those attending the Festival We avoided that by setting off later in the day arriving at teatime instead of lunch. Thank goodness Martin mentioned that to us before we set off.
The motorway was just as busy even then!
Anyway…as for Amy Grace’s Baptism….it went wonderfully well. She was so alert and awake, as well as so good, that the vicar attempted to hold her during part of the service when the parents and godparents left the alter to sit down. He was enamoured with her.
She was a little angel!
There wasn’t a peep out of her even when she was annointed with the water from the font. As good as gold she was! Bless her!
The church, if you look at the photos, has been adapted for modern use. A floor has been put in mid way up the height of the church and now the actual church is upstairs with function rooms downstairs which serve the local church going community.
At least this church is being used well, although at the service the vicar was forced to ask local churchgoers to walk past of an evening to check on things, as the roof is being renovated and there are some bad people climbing up there onto the scaffolding, from time to time, stealing the lead off the roof! What is the worlds coming too? There is nothing sacred!
The hymns and service were relayed onto the screen above the altar. Very high Tech!
There was a singer and keyboard player as well as a flautist backing up those of us who could reach the notes. Am I alone when I say some of the hymns these days are sung a wee bit too high for my vocal chords? I enjoyed joining in though when I could.
We all trooped back to Martin and Rachel’s for tea followed by a lovely buffet lunch.
Rachel’s mum made the fruit cake for Amy’s cake and a friend decorated it for them. As you can see by the photos it was beautifully presented!
I can be seen eating a Raspberry Pavlova cake which again Rachel’s mum made. That was to die for! Yum! (Even though I have diabetes type 2 it was worth it.) Wicked!
If Bea is reading this my hair is not as bad as she envisaged..bless her! My bald spot can be camouflaged by backcombing it and ‘nailing’ it with hairspray….lol!
Some of Rachel’s nieces made chocolate fudge cake and chocolate brownies which went down a treat too.
In one of the photos of the christening cake is a view of Rachel’s Nan. The christening gown was made or her 94 years ago. It has now seen 19 Christenings since then.
So, there you are, we all grazed and chatted and grazed some more and learned a bit more about each other since last time. I really enjoyed myself. The thirteen children who came too were very well behaved, even though it rained and kept thm indoors most of the day. Congrats to them!
Rachel’s Dad Paul told me he has volunteered to be a driver for CancerCare in his area and says that he enjoys helping in this way. How very generous of him to do this for folks like myself who have/had cancer and need transport when they have none of their own or are too unwell to drive. Since my Bryan doesn’t drive I needed this help sometimes throughout my treatment and it was a relief to know that help was there if needed.
Where would we be without volunteers I ask? Thank you Paul and others like you!
Hmmmm! As I sit here typing and looking out my window onto the garden I can smell the scent of fresias. Its too cold to be outside but I have them sitting in a vase beside me here at the kitchen table. The smell is divine!
I can’t help but stop typing and inhale their intoxicating perfume.
Today, here in the Lakes, its cool but sunny. There is a breeze which is sweeping the grass and leaves onto their shiny silvery sides which has created a wet look, to my eyes, although it’s really dry and hasn’t rained all day.
I’m told we are to be comforted for our lack of summer and sunshine by having an Indian Summer. Please make that soon!
I had to put the heating on last night. I was numb to my bones.
When I spoke of summer and how I don’t call it summer until my dragonfly has visited…I had no sooner written that in my journal when I went outside and there he was. Sizing up his mating arena.
By the time I got back outdoors having found my camera, he had disappeared, again! Fiddlesticks! That same morning that I speak of, I saw a fox in the woodland behind us. Strangely enough, although we have deer visiting and once had red squirrels too, (now only grey ones) it is unusual for us to see a fox during the day. Suburban folks see more than we do here. Even city folks do too.
I reckon it’s because the farmers shoot to kill in the countryside.
Talking to my masseur the other day she said she keeps a smallholding. She recently lost seven hens to a fox. They don’t eat them all. They just get a blood lust and kill as many as they can. Beautiful creatures though they are they are murderers too.
*********
INSPIRATIONAL QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Have you ever sat in a train and watched another train passing
you? You can look right on through its windows to the green fields
and pleasant vistas beyond. Or you can gaze at the partitions
between the windows and see nothing but their dingy drabness. So it
is with everything in life. You can look for the good, the joyful
and happy — and not merely see only these but manifest them in your
life. Or you can look for trouble, for sickness and sorrow — and
find them awaiting you around every corner."
— Robert Collier
Bye for now.
God Bless
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MySpace Graphics at GlitterBell.com
This weekend we will be travelling down to celebrate the Christening of our fifth grandchild, Amy Grace.
Amy is four months old already. Before we know it she will be up and running around with her brothers. Time waits for no man.
We last saw her three weeks ago and already she had grown and smiled at me whenever I talked with her. She is a little gem.
Today I took myself off for an hour long massage through at Kendal. My daughter’s school friend Elsa is a partner in a beauty salon which offers all sorts of treatments. I noticed an Indian head massage on the list. I think I might have one of those soon to see what its like. Although I had a block of aromatherapy treatments at CancerCare during my chemo treatment, this woman who massaged me today was able to shut me up from talking and relaxed me. Unlike Rosalie at the CancerCare Unit. I lay ther in a semi drowse for the last fifteen minutes of my treatment. I didn’t want it to stop. But….I will go back.
My thanks to Elsa who gave me the massage voucher for my birthday last May. I still have a hairdressers voucher to use from another friend. I think I might have my hair cut very short. Its easier to look after. Now that I am on this anti cancer treatment, it causes thinning of the hair and my hair has lost all its body and life. It just looks thin and neglected all the time…. so short it will be….sooon!
After the massage, I had a slow trundle around the shops in town and I ended up buying myself a skirt and top outfit in black and gold and another black top which once was £40.00 reduced to £4.00 in the Evans (Fat Shop) shop. This one was a size 16 which fit me perfectly so I am chuffed with that.
Well…time to leave you but I hope to be back soon.
My dear friend Sybil sent me this ….I’m sure you will like it.
The ARk
In 2007, the Lord came unto Noah, who was now living in Tewskbury, England and said,
"Once again, the Earth has become wicked and over-populated, and I see
the end of all flesh before me. Build another Ark and save two of every
living thing, along with a few good humans." He gave the CAD drawings,
saying, "You have six months to build the Ark before I start the unending
rain of forty days and forty nights."
Six months later, the Lord returned unto Noah and found him weeping in
his yard, but of the Ark, there was no sign. "Noah!" the Lord roared," I
am about to start the rain, Where is the Ark?"
"Forgive me, Lord," begged Noah, "but things have changed. I needed
Building Regulations approval because the Ark was to be over 30metres.
I’ve been arguing with the Fire Brigade who insist that it is fitted with
a sprinkler system and fireproof doors and my neighbours claim that I
should have obtained planning permission prior to building the Ark in my
garden because it is a development of the site – even though in my view
it is a temporary structure, but the roof is too high. I had to appeal
to the Secretary of State for a decision.
The Local Area Access Group complained that my ramp was going to be too
steep and the inside of the Ark was not fully accessible to the disabled
and that there were not disabled toilets or the gangways were too narrow
for wheelchairs Then the Department of Transport demanded a bond to be
posted for the future costs of moving power lines and overhead
obstructions, to clear the passage for the Ark’s move to the sea. – I
told them that the sea would be coming to us, but they wouldn’t listen to
me.
Getting the wood was another problem.. All of the decent trees have Tree
Preservation Orders upon them and we live in an area of Special
Scientific Interest, set up in order to preserve the spotted owl that
lives around here. I tried to convince the environmentalists that I
needed the wood to save the owls – but again, they wouldn’t listen. When
I started to gather the animals, the RSPCA threatened me with
prosecution. They insisted that I was confining wild animals against
their will. They argued that the accommodation was too restrictive, and
it was cruel and inhumane to put so many animals in a confined space. The
gay rights activists threatened to hold a demo in my garden as they
learned that I was planning on only taking on a female and male of each
species – they said that was homophobic and was against the Civil
Liberties Act.
Then the County Council, The Environment Agency and The Rivers Authority
ruled that I couldn’t build the Ark until they had conducted an
environmental impact study on your proposed flood.
I’m still trying to resolve a complaint with the Equal Opportunities
Commission on how many ethnic minorities I’m supposed to hire for the
building team.
The Trade Unions say that I cannot use my sons as they insist that I have
to hire only CSCS accredited workers with Ark-building experience. To
make matters worse, Customs & Excise have seized all of my assets,
claiming that I’m trying to leave the country illegally with endangered
species.
So forgive me, my Lord, but it would take me at least another ten years
to finish this Ark." Suddenly the skies cleared, the sun began to shine,
and a rainbow stretched across the sky. Noah looked up in wonder and
asked, "You mean you are not about to destroy the world, Lord?" "No,
Noah" said the Lord, "The Government has already beaten me to it."
Oh well….that’s the way of the world now.
Take care …Stay well…God Bless.
Hugs
Jeanie xx
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I came across this little poem which must have been in a newspaper at one time as the paper is going yellow with age.
Its looking a bit dog eared, so I thought I would place it here on my MSN journal for posterity.
I hope you enjoy it….
Just two days in each week
Are all that most will seek,
Tomorrow and Yesterday.
The latter barely done,
The former to be won……
Forgetting that the best is here today.
So don’t put off the will
To do that job until
Tomorrow’s here with all it’s "oh’s and ums."
That phrase you’ve often heard
Is true in every word….
Tomorrow is a day that never comes.
Tomorrow is a day
Still a lifetime away,
And yesterday is part of history.
So do now all you would
You know you really should.
For today is always here, it has to be.
Fro today is always here, it has to be.
Its dry here in the Lakes….and it feels a bit warmer too. We have been experiencing 11 degrees lately.
Hope you are warmer where you are.
Click on the picture below to enlarge it and read the words.
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Hello!
I though it was about time I entered into this journal for a change. My AOL one has been keeping me busy as I have more readers’s on that one than here.
Since my last entry I have been on holiday to Scotland….at last! My breast cancer put paid to that over two years ago. Time moved on and that long awaited event transpired at last!
I dreamt of it all the time I was having my chemo and radiotherapy. Even though I had to do all the driving as we toured the West coast Highlands and Islands, I could have driven forever.
Scotland is so ‘Empty’!
There are hardly any people living there, altogether 5 million, that you almost have the whole of the place to yourselves.
The scenery is spectacular and much grander than the English Lake District which is where I live now.
I have not got enough superlatives to describe the beauty of the West Coast of Scotland. Every time a loch disappears on your right hand side another one appears on your left. Most of the lochs we passed were sea lochs and were wide and long. Definitley on a grander scale than the English Lakes. They have now been relegated in my minds eye as romantic hills and Lakes.
I have never felt so humbled and awed by the spectacularness of my own homeland.
I was brought up in Glasgow and only knew tenement buildings and hardly any grass to talk of ; except in the municipal parks. To think that all this beauty was so close when I was growing up a nd I never got the chance to see it is unimaginable.
I will certainly go exploring there again.
We visited at Bluebell time. The wilds of Scotland are covered in these wild hyacinths. Wherever you go in early June there is an abundance of them on the hills, fields, woodlands and roadside grass verges. They are everywhere. No wonder the song..The Bluebells of Scotland was penned.
I hope the photos I have placed here lend an air or a frisson of the grandeur of the scenery to be seen in Scotland.
Enjoy!
Jeanie xx
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