Sunday, November 08, 2009
Sunday, November 01, 2009
On Pruning Blackberry Canes

Saturday, October 31, 2009
Friday, October 30, 2009
Saturday, October 17, 2009
On Funerals, Eulogies, Wakes and the World Wide Web
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
The Slacker Diaries Part 2

Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Hair Apparent

Monday, September 14, 2009
I Carried The Watermelon
Wednesday, September 09, 2009
Warwickshire Droopers For Delia's Spiced Plum Chutney
Saturday, August 22, 2009

Friday, August 21, 2009
Friday Five: Living Things That Could Be Culled On A Global Scale
Friday Five: Things That Will Drive Me To Homicide
Sunday, August 09, 2009
Early Morning Musings

Saturday, August 01, 2009
JK Wedding Entrance Dance For The First Day Of August
Friday, July 31, 2009
Friday Five: Why I love The World Wide Web
I have lived:
1. The life of Riley
2. On three continents
3. By the skin of my teeth
4. In exile
5. Beside the sea
6. A life that’s full, and travelled each and every highway
7. In Belfast during the shoot to kill policy
8. In a house full with sunshine
9. Endless hours stuck in motorway traffic jams
10. To tell the tale
I have witnessed:
11. A car on fire on the hard shoulder
12. Persian Muslim women speaking sign language
13. Birth certificates
14. A NYC police woman control 8 lanes of traffic
17. A dead teenager at the side of the road, his motorbike beside him
18. Dawn in the Middle East
19. The closing ceremony of the Sydney Olympics
20. A perfect martini made for me in the Oak Room Bar at the Plaza Hotel
I have heard:
21. New York taxi horns at 3am… why?
22. The voices of firemen cutting me from a car
23. The bubbling of a cake as it comes out of the oven
24. Planet Rock at full volume
25. I do
26. The dawn chorus
27. The call to prayer
28. The Angelus in Rome
29. That your eyeballs pop out if you don’t close your eyes when you sneeze
30. If you unscrew your belly button your bum drops off
I have lost:
31. Faith
32. Hope
33. One new earring
34. My temper
35. My university 4x100m relay record to faster women
36. The ability to stay up all night
37. Patience with hypocrites
38. All sense of proportion when buying underwear
39. My taste for chardonnay
40. 41.
I have found:
41. French aluminium coins circa WW2 on a beach near St Malo
42. Lasting friendships online
43. That Nigella’s recipes don’t always work
44. That Delia’s always do
45. Lack of sleep makes me murderous
46. An entire though hollow lobster carcass on a beach
47. That Veronica Wallis’ (RUA) nudes make me cry
48. My best friend at our first meeting, which lasted five hours
49. There’s no such thing as a free lunch
50. The love of my life
I love:
51. Kevin Costner
52. Wearing heels
53. Coco Mademoiselle
54. Lots of detail
55. Certainty
56. Pablo Neruda’s love sonnets
57. Going to the cinema in the afternoon
58. A well-stocked pantry
59. Opening presents on Christmas morning
60. Sainsbury’s tea
I can:
61. Propagate by grafting
62. Follow intricate cross stitch patterns
63. Shuck oysters
64. Do handstands on the beach
65. Stamp about in work boots all day and still look sexy and professional
66. Laugh like a drain
67. Nurture teenagers brilliantly
68. Avoid urgent matters
69. Choose great wine and books by the label / cover alone
70. Discuss Derby County’s premiership campaign
I loathe:
71. Jellied eels
72. Washing poo from baby’s backs when they went up a size in nappies
73. The N word
74. James Woods. Sorry James
75. Missing Gardener’s World
76. People who eat with their mouths open
77. People spitting
78. Being nice to drunks
79. Cleaning the oven
80. Poorly drafted documents
I hope:
81. My gravestone says, “… here lies the beloved wife of Kevin Costner”
82. My passport arrives in time for my holiday
83. To see shooting stars this year
84. I don’t get caught speeding on the M1
85. To awake in Isla Negra, Chile
86. I don’t get my fingers burnt a second time
87. To be as knowledgeable as my head gardener
88. To have an outrageously sparkly ring from Tiffany’s
89. To become Miss Marple (Joan Hickson) on my 70th birthday
90. Therefore I am
I am trying:
91. To find time to get back on a horse
92. To eat more fruit
93. To eat less Marmite on toast
94. To believe, in the chasm of silence
95. To worry less
96. The patience of a saint
97. To read Dante’s Inferno
98. To be good enough to enter paradise
99. To be
100. To stop writing lists
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Monday, June 15, 2009
Into The land Of Carmel


Sunday, April 05, 2009
Smoked Bacon
Each pack cost about £1.80, not bad for something that makes the fridge reek within minutes. I thought the smoke smell might mean the bacon would be too strong, as the packs appeared to contain the most smoked offcuts from the outer side of the bacon joints. No worries. When lightly fried off for inclusion into a suppertime omelette the bacon was sweet and crispy and delishy.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Prayer Of St Patrick, Apostle Of Ireland.
May the Power of God preserve us.
May the Wisdom of God instruct us.
May the Hand of God protect us.
May the Way of God direct us.
May the Shield of God defend us.
May the Angels of God guard us.
- Against the snares of the evil one.
May Christ be with us!
May Christ be before us!
May Christ be in us,
Christ be over all!
May Thy Grace, Lord,
Always be ours,
This day, O Lord, and forevermore. Amen.
But after I reached Ireland I used to pasture the flock each day and I used to pray many times a day. More and more did the love of God and in a day [I said] from one up to a hundred prayers - Confessions of St Patrick.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
The Captain's Verses : A Soldier's Love Letter From The Desert
Monday, February 09, 2009
I shall complain no more about failing to meet the potting up deadline for hyacinths to flower in time for Christmas. There can be so much excess at Christmas; colours, lights, details, lists, shopping, baking, tidying, Masses, Christmas cards to post and the rooms to decorate. In all of this the simple colours of the bowls of spring bulbs are lost. Better to leave them rooting away in the icy darkness of the outhouses, and bring them into the light and warmth after the Feast of the Epiphany.Sunday, February 08, 2009
And On And On It Snows

"Our snow was not only shaken from the whitewash buckets down the sky, it came shawling out of the ground and swam and drifted out of the arms and hands and bodies of the trees; snow grew overnight on the roofs of houses like a pure and grandfather moss, minutely white-ivied the walls and settled on the postman, opening the gate, like a dumb, numb thunderstorm of white, torn Christmas cards."

"Or I would go out, my bright new boots squeaking, into the white world, on to the seaward hill, to call on Jim and Dan and Jack and to pad through the still streets, leaving huge footprints in the hidden pavements."
"Looking through my bedroom window, out into the moonlight and the unending smoke-coloured snow, I could see the lights in the windows of all the other houses on our hill and hear the music rising from them up the long, steadily falling night. I turned the gas down, I got into bed. I said some words to the close and holy darkness, and then I slept."Dylan Thomas: A Child's Christmas in Wales
Sunday, February 01, 2009
Hello Beautiful: Galanthus Nivalis
Galanthus nivalis, the common snowdrop, signals that winter is coming to an end, that spring is just around the corner. Thursday, January 29, 2009
It Was Chinese New Year On Monday, Phantom

I enjoy all the blogs I read, and all of them are invariably written by creative, vibrant, colourful individuals, even that strange, odd little blog that makes me laugh in a most unpleasant fashion at celebrities' misfortunes. There is however, one blog that really created a change in the way I live, and that's Phantom's blog. Well, not really his blog, really it's one of the blogs on his blog roll --> Eggs, bacon, chips and beans. Because until I checked out Phantom's blog roll, and found Russell Davies' great blog, I wouldn't have dreamed of entering a greasy spoon, certainly not actually eat in one. And now, whenever I'm in Nottingham early enough for brekkie, I call into the The Cosy Teapot, 101 Carrington Street, Nottingham, for a plate of eggs, bacon, chips and beans. The Cosy Teapot; the only place in the world where I have eaten chips for breakfast. Now that's creative blogging.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Still Too Cold To Garden
I bet Helen Yemm isn't standing in her kitchen drinking tea and staring out at her garden. At least it was dry and clear enough to get a line of laundry out. I'm thinking of renaming this blog "The Slacker Diaries."
Helen Yemm uses chicken wire to keep cats off seed beds... Amalee Issa uses a hundred pack of Sainsbury's bamboo barbeque skewers, inserted into the beds in random, overlapping directions, but always at an angle of 45 degrees.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
New Year, New Term, New President

Friday, January 09, 2009
Light Up, Light Up
Thursday, January 01, 2009
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Monday, December 08, 2008
Winter Gardening
Sunday, December 07, 2008
Winter Gardening With Birds
"This query, together with the threat of nasty weather from the north, got me out in my own garden this week. I cleared out the mouldy remains at the bottom of my seed holders, tipped out rainwater sludged up with autumn leaves in the various drinking/bathing places that the birds have found for themselves and generally re-stocked the garden with bird necessities. 
Friday, November 28, 2008
Holidays Are Coming, Holidays Are Coming

Sunday, November 16, 2008
Who Can Find A Virtuous Woman For Her Price Is Far Above Rubies
And walk in his ways.
By the labour of your hands you shall eat.
You will be happy and prosper.
Your wife like a fruitful vine
In the heart of your house;
Your children like shoots of the olive,
Around your table.
Indeed thus shall be blessed
The man who fears the Lord.
May the Lord bless you from Zion
In a happy Jerusalem
All the days of your life.
Sunday, November 09, 2008
Saturday, November 08, 2008
There's No-one As Irish As Barack O'Bama
Friday, October 31, 2008
Friday, October 24, 2008
Friday Five: Riding The Las Vegas Deuce Bus

Friday Five: Chuck Norris Part 2
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
On Lists Made In The Library During Wet Afternoons In Early Autumn
Saturday, October 04, 2008
And That's The Joy You Bring
You've got to fight for every dream
'Cause who's to know
Which one you let go
Would have made you complete
Well, for me it's waking up beside you
To watch the sunrise on your face
To know that I can say I love you
In any given time or place
It's little things that only I know
Those are the things that make you mine
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1LEISP6e9c&feature=related
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Where Are You, Gastropunk n Maths Chick?
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
...and back from america
http://thephantomstapleremover.blogspot.com/2008/02/kew-and.html
And where is your post with pictures of your fridge?
Amalee
(just walked in the front door ((OK, I walked in the front door last night then went to bed and slept for 13 hours, then got up and showered then drove to Marks and bought three suits for work complete with shirts, shoes and drawers (I am Virgo, people...)))
Friday, September 05, 2008
Friday Five: Remember These Cheesey Poptastic Rock Toons?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtuvXrTz8DY&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUHecG5wAFk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2IkLGFiKx0
But it was this one, that came on the radio as we flew down the motorway and provoked a laughing fit from the rear seat. When the tears and snot subsided and the laughing stopped long enough for the words to become audible, out came the story behind this song;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TW1LkJNmWzg
"Oh s***, we were drinking in the Honk bar at the back end of the airport and Gerard Rikkard put this on the juke box, and we all joined in until it got to the chorus, when he just took off in this falsetto he could only do when he was plastered. He must have sung it three or four times before they threw us out. Said we were upsetting the farmers at the other end of the bar."
Friday, August 08, 2008
Some Prefer A Bright, Brash Midday Glare With Plenty Of Stuffing
Monday, July 21, 2008
Bulots Avec Mayonnaise
Or whelks, caught, bought and eaten within 24 hours. Drop into boiling water and depending upon size, boil for 20 minutes (because no-one likes to eat the mucoid end of an under-cooked bulot). Refresh in cold water and serve immediately with crunchy bread rolls and shivering dollops of golden mayonnaise.Sunday, July 20, 2008
Summer Days
Best of all are days like today; blustery, coastal winds that dry lines of sheets and beach towels and whip around the garden scattering rose petals across the lawns like confetti. Handfuls of grasses and coastal path flowers brought back to the kitchen and dropped into vases. Sea shells and beach treasures filling the deep window ledges. Lamb roasting with garlic on an impossibly deep bed of garden herbs; rosemary, marjoram, too much bay, thyme. And sunlight everywhere, bouncing through our days here.Friday, June 27, 2008
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Sing Forever
I will sing for you at the start of each day
I’ll sing forever, sing for you
In all things I do in the dawn of my life
I’ll sing forever, sing for you
Shutting out night, my life renewed
Happy for love that is to come
Opening eyes I’ll follow you
Glad to see, glad to be yours
Echoing what you say, echoing what you say
Shining out what you are, shining out what you are
Out of dark into your light
I will sing for you in the light of each day
I’ll sing forever, sing for you
In all things I do at the noon of my life
I’ll sing forever, sing for you
Shutting out night, my life renewed
Happy for love that is to come
Opening eyes I’ll follow you
Glad to see, glad to be yours
Echoing what you say, echoing what you say
Shining out what you are, shining out what you are
Out of dark, into your light
I will sing for you at the end of each day
I’ll sing forever, sing for you
In all things I do in the eve of my life
I’ll sing forever, sing for you
I will sing for you each and every day
I’ll sing forever, sing for you
In all things I do to the end of my life
I’ll sing forever, sing forever
Sing, sing for you

Saturday, June 21, 2008
Midsummer
First, choose a night that keeps the heat of day.
Monday, June 16, 2008
But I Only Love Your Feet
because they have wandered
over the earth and through
the wind and over the water,
until they brought you to me.
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Friday, June 13, 2008
Breathless, Of Derbyshire
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Lamb Kebobbies

Guess the star sign of she who lays vegetables on her barbe in ordered rows... We made Sophie Grigsons' htipiti with the yellow peppers and cream cheese stuffed chillies with the... chillies. The aubergines were bashed to bits after a good old charring and made into baba ganoush. And next time there will be the Phantom's kebobbies and everything else Jamie does on his garden barbe / bread oven.
Monday, June 09, 2008
From Sacred Space, This Week
"Jesus said, ‘Take up your cross.' (Mark 8:34-35) It is not something you go looking for in faraway places. Sooner or later the Lord hands us a cross, and our job is to recognise it. For each of us there are events that made a difference. Our sorrowful mysteries will be different for each reader. Maybe it was a meeting with a friend, a lover or an enemy. Maybe it was a sickness, or a triumph. We try to see our life through the eyes of faith, with a confidence that God in his Providence can draw good out of the most awful and unwelcome happenings. This is true wisdom, to find a faith that can carry us through darkness, doubt, and suffering. They call it the mystical phase of religious development, and many of you who form the Sacred Space community are there."Saturday, June 07, 2008
Helen Yemm's Blogging, Or Can My Life Get Any Better
Sunday, June 01, 2008
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Those Three Words Are Said Too Much
We'll do it all, everything
On our own
We don't need anything
Or anyone
If I lay here, if I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
I don't quite know, how to say, how I feel
Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough
If I lay here, if I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
Forget what we're told, before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life
Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads
If I lay here, if I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
All that I am, all that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes, they're all I can see
I don't know where
Confused about how as well
Just know that these things will never change for us at all
If I lay here, if I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Thursday, May 08, 2008
Early May Sunshine
A week ago, I awoke on the first morning of May to the dawn chorus. It had been warm overnight, and I remember getting up during the darkness to open the windows. When the dawn chorus began a handful of hours later, the birdsong filled and filled my world. Each morning since began mistily, chilly, with heavy condensation coating the lawns, the pots, the car. But during the long drive to work after the school run, the sun appeared and burned off the morning mists, leaving glorious mornings of pale blue skies and the promise of a lovely day ahead.

Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Corey's Dad
Gone where? Gone from my sight, that is all. He is just as large now as
when I last saw him. His diminished size and total loss from my sight is in
me, not in him.
And just at the moment when someone at my side says his is gone
That is what dying is.
Lift us up, Oh Lord, that we may see further
Bishop Brent
Sunday, April 06, 2008
On Snowing All Day


Tuesday, April 01, 2008
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Alstroemeria In Easter Flowers
On The Arrival Of Frogs And Toads
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Friday, March 21, 2008
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
On Avoiding Gardening, Part 2
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Palm Sunday
Coming down the clouds with fire
The whole earth shakes, the whole earth shakes
I see His love and mercy
Washing over all our sin
The people sing, the people sing
Hosanna, hosanna
Hosanna in the highest
I see a generation
Rising up to take the place
With selfless faith, with selfless faith
I see a near revival
Stirring as we pray and seek
We're on our knees, we're on our knees
Hosanna, hosanna
Hosanna in the highest
Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like You have loved me
Break my heart for what breaks Yours
Everything I am for Your Kingdom's cause
As I walk from earth into eternity
Hosanna, hosanna
Hosanna in the highest
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7SMUf6QcyQ
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Oh Dear
Looks like it's Gay Porn Day over at Pioneer Woman's site...
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Some Kind Of Wonderful
Friday, March 07, 2008
Homesick
Sunday, March 02, 2008
Narcissus Obvallaris
Narcissus obvallaris, or the Tenby daffodil, appears in my garden about three weeks after the little Tete-a-tetes and Jetfires make their appearance around the pond. N. obvallaris is taller and a more buttery yellow than the perfectly-formed wild N. lobularis which has yet to make an appearance. When my little beauties begin to flower, spreading through my garden like a creamy wave of baby smiles, I know that spring is truly here, that the long days of winter are finally behind us and soon I'll be eating breakfast on the terrace again. The cowslips flowered throughout the winter, the prostrate rosemary too. At least the pinks had the decency to stop flowering in December and make a stab at dormancy.
Monday, February 18, 2008
Walk Of The Month: Derbyshire
I've lifted the enclosed in its entirety from this weekend's Daily Telegraph, because that's the view I have driving merci beaucoup enfant deux to school over the mountains. Although obviously, I don't actually climb Stanage Edge...On a pub sign I spotted a likeness of Little John, Hathersage's most famous son. The fierce but genial giant who once tumbled Robin Hood into a stream stood depicted in tunic of untraditional blue, his nickname abbreviated to a curt, if trendy "LJ". Up in the churchyard of St Michael and All Angels I found his grave, long enough for two ordinary mortals.
Those who opened the grave in 1784 reported finding an immense thighbone nearly three feet long. Little John's mighty bow and cap of Lincoln green hung in St Michael's Church for hundreds of years; his cottage near the churchyard stood until it was demolished in the 19th century. Whatever the facts about Robin Hood's right-hand man, Hathersage continues to bask in the reflected glory of the Big Man of Sherwood Forest.
I pondered his provenance as I climbed the frost-whitened field paths north of the valley. In the 12th century the Hope Valley lay within the northern bounds of Sherwood Forest. Could bold Robin and brave John have lain among the ancestors of these oaks and beeches, the grey goose-feather flights pulled tight beside their ears, a fine fallow hart in their sights?
The handsome Tudor house of North Lees Hall stands close under Stanage Edge. Its tower spawned a tale in the mind of a 19th-century governess, a fable that has earned an immortality to equal that of Robin and his Merrie Men. Charlotte Brontë first caught sight of the pale stone tower in 1845 when she came for a three-week stay in Hathersage with her friend Ellen Nussey, sister of the village vicar.
The local surname of Eyre caught Charlotte's inner ear, too. Soon Jane Eyre would apprehensively approach the dark tower of Thornfield Hall, lair of the saturnine Mr Rochester: "It was three storeys high, of proportions not vast, though considerable: a gentleman's manor-house, not a nobleman's seat: battlements round the top gave it a picturesque look."
Those battlements were the setting for one of the most dramatic scenes in literature, as poor mad Mrs Rochester made her final bid for freedom from a terrible fire she had started: "...she was on the roof, where she was standing, waving her arms above the battlements, and shouting out till they could hear her a mile off... She...had long black hair; we could see it streaming against the flames as...Mr Rochester ascended through the skylight...we saw him approach her; and then, ma'am, she yelled and gave a spring, and the next minute she lay smashed on the pavement."
Stanage Edge, the rocky rim of what was once a gigantic dome of millstone grit, is a climbers' and boulderers' heaven. The grey adhesive rock, fractured into steps, cracks and layers, offers challenges to test tyro and expert alike. Famous names from that introverted, macho and phenomenally athletic world, the hardest of the "hard man" school - Don Whillans, Nat Allen, Joe Brown - cut their teeth along these modest-looking crags.
They and their successors dubbed every climbable crack and interstice with names superbly curt and clipped: Goliath's Groove, Agony Crack, The Unconquerables, The Vice, Blockhead Direct, Queersville, Eliminator.
I strode the flat, tricky gritstone pavement along the Edge, face to the wind, in a kind of high-level ecstasy. Climbers crouched and sprawled in impossibly heroic poses on every crag. Beyond them, a most enormous view opened to the south and west across the frosted fields and shadowy moors and edges of the Dark Peak. To the left ran cream and purple moors, the wind streaming their pale grasses so that the whole wide upland appeared to be in motion, racing north into Yorkshire.
Quitting Stanage Edge at last did not mean quitting these wonderful heights. Higger Tor and Carl Wark lay ahead, flat-topped tors like castles. I stormed their walls in an outpouring of supercharged energy.
Then, breathless and buffeted by the cold and wind, I dropped down through tumbled meadows around Mitchell Field Farm and the mock-baronial miniature fortress of Scraperlow House; down towards Hathersage, the warmth and light of the Scotsmans Pack inn, and the grey church spire that marks where Little John lies sleeping until Robin's horn wakes him for one last chase through the glades of the eternal Forest."
Saturday, February 16, 2008
Freezing February Morning

Saturday, February 09, 2008
This beautiful picture appears on the Telegraph's website this morning, and makes a delicious header for my list of gardening tasks to do this morning. Clear skies overnight made for a stunning display of stars, and a "red sky in the morning," dawn. Makes it jolly cold, too. So here I am, my breakfast of toasted prune and chocolate bread and the ubiquitous cup of tea to hand, listing tasks;Of course, it's far too early to be moving the damson, as stone fruits really need delicate and well-timed handling. But sometimes irritability outweighs horticultural sense. Now let's get moving, we have a glorious morning in the garden calling to us.
Sunday, February 03, 2008
"You could ride an elephant through the Tube and no-one would be particularly surprised."
Saturday, February 02, 2008
Early Morning And A Dusting Of Snow

Friday, February 01, 2008
Friday Five: What Are You Eating This Week?
Germany: The Melander family of Bargteheide. Food expenditure for one week: 375.39 Euros or $500.07
United States: The Revis family of North Carolina. Food expenditure for one week $341.98
Italy: The Manzo family of Sicily Food expenditure for one week: 214.36 Euros or $260.11

Mexico: The Casales family of Cuernavaca. Food expenditure for one week: 1,862.78 MPesos or $189.09 .
Poland: The Sobczynscy family of Konstancin-Jeziorna. Food expenditure for one week: 582.48 Zlotys or $151.27 
Ecuador: The Ayme family of Tingo. Food expenditure for one week: $31.55
Bhutan: The Namgay family of Shingkhey Village. Food expenditure for one week: 224.93 ngultrum or $5.03
Chad: The Aboubakar family of Breidjing Camp. Food expenditure for one week: 685 CFAFrancs or $1.23
Sunday, January 20, 2008
I Want, I Want, I Want.


Ungrateful wretch, I know. But I enjoy this gallery's choice of online art, and I really, really, really want someone to buy me these pictures. They are probably sold already, so lucky fellow whomsoever bought them. Oh Abbott & Holder, I surfed into your website a few years ago chasing a link to Edward Ardizzone (now there's an illustrator way out of my reach). I have day dreamed over your lists ever since. Saturday, January 19, 2008
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Happy Birthday, London Underground
"Many Happy Returns to the Tube. On the 10th January 1863 the world's first ever public underground line opened. The Metropolitan Line had trains running every 10 minutes and carried 40,000 passengers between Paddington and Farringdon that day."
Sunday, January 06, 2008
The Epiphany




Monday, December 31, 2007
This Precious Stone Set In The Silver Sea

This royal throne of kings, this sceptre'd isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,This fortress built by Nature for herself
Against infection and the hand of war,
This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall
Against the envy of less happier lands,—
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.
King Richard II Act ii. Sc. 1.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Victorian Treasures In A Clinker Path


Friday, December 28, 2007
Friday Five: How I Know I Lead The Life Of Riley
2. Merci beaucoup enfant deux dropped the house phone down the lavatory this afternoon. That this happened exactly one week after she dropped her mobile down the lavatory whilst out with the girls, is slightly remarkable. What is utterly remarkable, is hearing her clattering about in the bathroom this evening and asking her if she had a phone in there with her... and she had the audacity to laugh and reply, "Is that an offer, mum?"
3. That I have WD40 in the garage, although it won't revive the house phone any more than it revived a mobile last week. What is she doing with phones in the bathroom?
4. I'm sitting at my pc with a glass of French bubbly (is there really any other sort?) and a slice of Christmas cake made for me by my dearest client.
5. NCIS is about to start on Channel 5. Sigh....
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Monday, December 24, 2007
Friday, December 21, 2007
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Frailty, Thy Name Is Woman
And this has remained, seared into my memory during my formative years. Until December 2, 2007 when, accompanied by merci beaucoup enfant deux, I heard Michael Bublé sing at Nottingham Arena. Oh my goodness. Sorry Kevin. Click onto radioblogclub.com, type in Michael Buble Save the Last Dance, and be transported to American jazz heaven.
Sunday, December 09, 2007
Hark The Herald Angels Sing
"...Glory to the newborn King.
"...Born that man no more may die,Saturday, December 08, 2007
Winter Gardening
Carbon cycles through ecosystems, moving repeatedly from one organism to another, and between organisms and the environment. The Carbon cycle is a key factor in maintaining the balance of an ecosystem, and works thus:
Plants photosynthesise, taking Carbon in the form of Carbon Dioxide from the atmosphere and locking it into the carbohydrate glucose: Carbon Dioxide + Water = Glucose + Oxygen, or 6CO2 + 6H2O (+Light) = C6H12O6 + 6O2 Chlorophyll is the green pigment that enables plants capture light energy.
Animals get their Carbon from eating either plants (carbohydrates) or other animals (proteins and fats). They respire, releasing Carbon Dioxide to the environment. Plants also respire, taking Oxygen from the atmosphere or the by-products of photosynthesis: C6H12O6 + 6O2 > 6CO2 + 6H2O (+ released energy)
Waste Carbon-based material is excreted by animals, and is digested by decomposers, mainly microbes and fungi. The decomposers also respire, releasing Carbon Dioxide.
When animals die, their remains may be either eaten as carrion by scavengers / roadkill by you-know-who, or digested by decomposers. Both scavengers and decomposers respire, giving off more Carbon Dioxide. Here's a diagram:

The growth cycle of deciduous trees and shrubs is linked to day length. Most have a relatively short period of annual growth. New stems begin to grow from overwintering buds when the days lengthen and temperatures are warm enough to support growth. For most trees, growth is usually completed by late June in the Northern Hemisphere. The following year's leaf buds are set at this time and will not open until they experience the chill and short days of winter followed by the warmth and increasing daylight of spring. Once the leaves are fully expanded and the buds are set, the work of manufacturing and storing carbohydrates to support the following season's growth accelerates. These carbohydrates are stored in the branches, roots, and buds throughout the growing season to support next year's growth. In late summer or early autumn, the days begin to get shorter, and nights lengthen. Like most plants, deciduous trees and shrubs are rather sensitive to length of the dark period each day. When nights reach a threshold value and are long enough, the cells near the juncture of the leaf and the stem divide rapidly, but they do not expand. This abscission layer is a corky layer of cells that slowly begins to block transport of materials such as carbohydrates from the leaf to the branch. It also blocks the flow of minerals from the roots into the leaves. During the growing season, chlorophyll is replaced constantly in the leaves. Chlorophyll breaks down with exposure to light in the same way that colored paper fades in sunlight; the leaves must manufacture new chlorophyll to replace chlorophyll that is lost in this way. In autumn, when the connection between the leaf and the rest of the plant begins to be blocked off, the production of chlorophyll slows and then stops. When this happens, the leaf falls. It retains little nutrient value, is almost wholly cellulose, and thus takes at least two years to rot down. It makes a good soil conditioner, and mulch, and that's about it. So under the hedge go the fallen leaves.
http://www.usna.usda.gov/PhotoGallery/FallFoliage/FallFoliage02.html#Betula
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
She's Back
And about time too. I'm sick to death of wannabe cooks, especially that woman in the warehouse. I want the real thing. I want recipes that work. I want Delia. Thank you God. "Now people want to be entertained, whereas I was trying to teach how to cook, that's where it's different," she said of the new breed of TV chefs. But the 66-year-old is back this winter with a brand new BBC2 series. The programme will give a glimpse into Smith's life.
And it will show Smith using ready-made products alongside her own techniques, revealing her shortcuts to taking the effort out of cooking. Nigella Lawson's latest series Nigella Express also focuses on fast and easy recipes, and features scenes from the cook's family life - although her 'kitchen' was revealed to be part of an industrial estate in south London.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Friday, November 16, 2007
I Shot These
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Early Winter Musings
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
First Frosts At Cauldwell's Mill, Rowsley



Up early and off over the mountains with merci beaucoup enfant deux on the coldest school run this autumn. Cold and clear and beautiful. Safely dropped to the hallowed portals of the slave drivers, I drove back to Cauldwell's Mill for a bag of jumbo oats and some multi-grain bread flour. The river was so low and the morning light bouncing off the water so enticingly, I grabbed the camera from the glove box and recorded these lovely pictures. Then a short drive to a nearby deli for the best of Derbyshire breakfasts, a full English of course, then up and over to Chatsworth. Didn't stop for the tour of the house itself, all done up for Christmas, as I'm saving that treat for next month when friends arrive from Ireland. This time it was a quick tour of the converted stable block for Christmas present ideas. 
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Tuesday, November 06, 2007
Call To Action, My Lovely Readers
Thursday, November 01, 2007
Canada's Gifts To The World

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flfDuYuy6aQ&mode=user&search=
Another summer day
Has come and gone away
In Paris and Rome
But I wanna go home
Maybe surrounded by
A million people I
Still feel all alone
I just wanna go home
Oh, I miss you, you know
And I’ve been keeping all the letters that I wrote to you
Each one a line or two
“I’m fine baby, how are you?”
Well I would send them but I know that it’s just not enough
My words were cold and flat
And you deserve more than that
Another aeroplane
Another sunny place
I’m lucky I know
But I wanna go home
I’ve got to go home
Let me go home
I’m just too far from where you are
I wanna come home
And I feel just like I’m living someone else’s life
It’s like I just stepped outside
When everything was going right
And I know just why you could not
Come along with me
This was not your dream
But you always believed in me
Another winter day has come
And gone away
In even Paris and Rome
And I wanna go home
Let me go home
And I’m surrounded by
A million people I
Still feel all alone
Oh, let me go home
Oh, I miss you, you know
Let me go home
I’ve had my run
Baby, I’m done
I gotta go home
Let me go home
It will all be all right
I’ll be home tonight
I’m coming back home
Monday, October 29, 2007
On Avoiding Gardening
I'm with Edith at the link below, on modern TV cooks...

























