Blog themes, and my Christmas card to you

When I started this blog, I had the intention of actually showing work I was doing. Well the less said about that the better at the moment because life didn't turn out like that. This is, if it is nothing else, real life. You'll have noticed, I'm fairly sure, that there have been no posts about my sewing.

I also thought, originally, the layout would be sufficient to show the photos of stuff in progress and finished. Except I hadn't really thought it through. I discovered that photos which needed big space don't fit in this theme, so I started another blog to fulfil this.  On the other hand, I love the brightly coloured thread lines of this theme, so it's staying put.

Which leaves me with the point of this post - to direct you to your Christmas card from me.  Click here and go fetch! You could print it out and hang it up if you want, whatever - there is no copyright involved.  I would just like to thank anybody who's been here and wish you Merry (and peaceful) Christmas. 

But I'll be posting as usual, and getting to grips with why my mother isn't entirely happy with her new life. So I suspect developments on that front. And blogging about anything else which catches my attention of course. Especially the mysterious life of chickens. Who, you'll be relieved to hear, have survived the desperate temperatures they've been exposed to recently, roosting close to the house in laurel bushes.

Brief memory

Something in the haze of today's early morning reminded me.

I was living in Shetland and at long last getting some sensible treatment for the injured spine. My hospital physio, Mike, was excellent. He lived not far from me at the south end of the 'mainland'. It's often the case there that you recognise people while you're driving around, so it's customary and expected to acknowledge them - a wave or a quick peep on the horn, whatever.

Lying on the padded table in my lunch hour, ready for manipulation, I heard Mike say "You must have been in a rare old hurry to get to work this morning".
"Why? Did I not see you?"  I was mortified. He must have been out jogging early, as usual, and I'd been too preoccupied to notice. "I'm so sorry."
"No", he said. "You've got your knickers on inside out." 

Getting warmer

For once, I don’t mean my tiny world in Derbyshire, although yes it’s drizzling and the snow is subsiding slowly and gently.

I mean that I just clicked on one of my listed reference sites to the right here, and saw a picture (well two pictures, years apart) and was shocked by their honesty. They said, truly, what a thousand words and endless arguments could not. They also have a text worth reading below. See this in the light of some of the current Cancun pissing–in–the–wind behaviour.  Go ahead, click here.

Small bit of Big fun

Prologue - hen-food kindling coal oil - all low or non-existent. Snowy roads not conducive for trip to usual corn mill. Local feed shop and hardware store instead.

Had been thinking of rigging up some sort of pallet to get the stuff down the hill from the car. Wouldn't have been surprised if I actually had a pallet lying around somewhere. Remember the 'has own drain rods' business?

Standing yakking at the hardware counter, my eye fell on the bright blue plastic sledges. Oh, yes. Very yes.

Eleven quid. OK. Needs must. Think 'Investment'. Might eventually pass it on to a convenient child if there's one handy.

Into the boot with it and away home.

When the car was safely back in its snowy noost (Shetland word for slightly hollowed out piece of ground where you lay up your little boat, right way up with the drain hole open) up in the top field, I loaded up the sledge with the sack of hen food and a huge heavily-loaded fibreglass-type shopping bag, and started dragging it down the hikers' track. 

Gravity and slidey frozen snow being the perfect combination to set it slamming into the back of my boots, I thought I'd let it lead me, like a large dog. Then I noticed that the channel stomped into the snow by the dell-dwellers next door was the perfect width for the sled. And I let go.

Away it went, only grinding to a halt once, all the way down the track.  Brilliant. Double brilliant because it made me burst out laughing and I really needed some silliness.

At the bottom, it stopped and I caught up in leisurely fashion.

Placed nicely for the final run down the lower part of the access drive, off it went again. It even took the curve on to the bridge over the river like a real bobsleigh. Triple brilliant. 

The flat bit to the house was as effortless as a stone skipping across water. 

I was still laughing when we both got home and, needless to say, the hens were absolutely delighted. 

 My hero

Emergency measures

I could have explained before now that the hens live in trees. It's lucky they don't lay eggs up there. There'd be a royal mess round the garden. Anyway it's a natural habitat and this lot were born to it.

Since the snow is 2 feet deep around Geronimo's conifer home, he's been playing Let's Go Camping in the beech hedge near the front door. Coaxing him out of there took half an hour the other day when it was still blizzarding. Eventually he was able to get down to the food and water, and actually used my emergency shelter for a day or two. Then today he was back up in the beech, and after expending much of his energy and thinking power (limited, it has to be said - hens aren't renowned for the size of their brains) and a load of chuckling and chortling, he got to a place I could actually reach in and grab him and plonk him on the path to feed. That beak may look fearsome but he's a pussycat in disguise. Really never minds being picked up. Unlike a certain real pussycat I could mention. He almost said Thank You. I know this because he just chortled again and started eating.   

 

anti-blizzard shelter par excellence

His little tribe has been sheltering each daytime around the corner under a convenient window, which made feeding them ridiculously easy. Once I'd tracked them down, that is.  Since 3 out of 4 house exits are severely snowed up, it was a long trek round the garden but needs must, to give them water. Tonight they're all perched in the beech hedge by the front door next to His Lordship. They opened sleepy eyes when I arrived home after an epic and successful trip to The Shops. Took an hour to dig out the car, a block 2 yards by 2 yards by 18" deep between car and a bit of track to the gate already cleared by neighbour. 

only half an hour to go - why only 6" on top and 18" on ground? Not fair.

It's done my back no good whatsoever. But I will sleep with a clear conscience. I spent a bloody fortune on birdfood and got four packs of lard to do the special bird treat I do every winter, at least twice a week. 

Recipe:

• roasting fat congealed in the bottom of the roasting tin, grill pan, whatever (there's none available just now hence my buying lard)
• cheapest porridge oats (not rolled oats - they're too rubbery)
• if you've got them, sultanas or raisins, preferably out of date  - these are optional and are best mashed up or cut up in a blender first. Same could be said for any stale unsalted nuts you might have at the back of the cupboard.
• stale catfood leftovers from you-know-who  -  this too is optional
• some sort of suet, even if it means using 'suet treats' which are expensive and happen to be Geronimo's favourite food
• hot water
• low to medium heat on hob throughout.

Heat the fat and pour in the porridge, stirring until it absorbs the fat completely. 
Adjust amounts to get flakes nicely covered. Throw in sultanas and smelly catfood and stir into mess. 
Add suet and melt it down while stirring.
Scrape up bits which have fallen out of pan while stirring too enthusiastically.  Add to pan.
Add hot water and stir all into one big mass of gloop. (This is the magical chemical reaction of hot water and suet.)
Spoon gloop into suitable receptacles like empty coconut shells (previously filled with commercial gloop), plastic chinese takeaway cartons etc. Squash in and tamp down.
Leave to cool and set. 
It might sound a bit involved but only takes five minutes. Honest. (Basically if you have only fat, oats and hot water it will still work. I did that for years before discovering the wonders of suet.)

Hang up shells where birds are sitting waiting, singing silly songs and telling jokes to keep themselves amused.
Empty cartons out and break into pebbles size for hens, pheasants, blackbirds, chaffinches, robins, magpies etc. Sounds wrong but I've noticed robins do not like trying to hang on by their claws.

Count to twenty by which time most of the pebble crumbs will have disappeared.  The shells take a little longer, being besieged by bluetits et al with teeny beaks.

Altogether a better day and more exercise than I've had in months.

Smidgeon of the week

It's been a weird and difficult week. Not going to blab on about it just now but the best bit was the huge snow which I could enjoy because a) I adore snow and b) I had tons of food and everything all loaded in, and didn't run out of oil. Yet. (Last delivery didn't make it in time.) Coal has gone, and sawdust 'heatlogs' are on rations. One fire's worth, I think. Amazing how a deep cold can overcome really hot radiators. On Monday night I drove the car up the steep access drive and parked it in the little field next to the main 'A' road above me. This is a clever trick we in the dell use every winter. Then they closed the road and that was that. It reopened yesterday but I didn't have the energy to go out.

Except I didn't enjoy the snow. And this is a girl who frequently uses the word in passwords and usernames and what all. (But had better change them now I've said that.) (Come to think of it, none of them say snow at the moment except my twitter name which I haven't used yet. God I'm waffly today.) So I'm the one who jumps up and down like a kid at the sight of a few flakes, but I almost couldn't have cared less. What a state. Something is not right. Could be to do with the weird week it's been, obviously. Not rocket science, is it?

Today's big question is Will She Get the Car Out and To The Shops?
Going to tramp up the hill and take my spade, and rubber car mats to put under the wheels etc. I have just about run out of bird and hen food and my rice milk. Black and green (and white) teas are great but black coffee is not. And if I can find a couple of bags of coal I'll be very happy.
 
Meanwhile here's a bad photo of the view from the kitchen on Wednesday 1st, complete with desperate pheasant and hesitant bluetit -

The dragons are frozen

Dear Landlord,

The stone dragons are frozen, as is everything else in the garden, including the non–existent chickens, including the waterfall, except for – why does the spring feed never freeze, not even at –20C like last winter? It’s a mere –5C just now, lunchtime. I filled loads of plastic 5-litre bottles last winter, just in case, and there was no need whatsoever.

a waterfall not falling, but the important bit is still dripping somewhere on the right

A dragon with frozen bamboo overcoat

Had to call off the gardener yesterday because there is absolutely no point in trying to sweep up leaves which are welded to the ground. We could have done it with a hammer and chisel but frankly  – 

Now I should warn you, there will be an invoice for Steve the Sainted Boiler Man.

And this time it’s Not My Fault!!

The boiler has suffered something well–known to owners of Condensing Oil Boilers. It is a Burner Lock–Out.  Apparently it happens when there is condensation in the pipe.  I know this because last winter I remember hearing lots about it and thought thank god mine hasn’t done that. I also know this because there’s a button on the panel saying Burner Lock–Out and it’s lit up bright red.

There is plenty of oil in the tank. (Well I don't blame you for asking....)

So the engineer’s on his way, this afternoon. Hallelujah!  I am frozen, after two days of wearing umpteen layers and fleeces, and the fan oven’s on with the door open. The cat is frozen. He needs lots of cuddles all of a sudden because my fleece is so inviting. I am grateful for the open fire (haha), and for a couple of plug–in radiators.  I am trying not to wonder how often this might happen this winter.

But I’m a glass–half–full girl, so keep your fingers crossed.

Update evening –

Like the tennis players on the telly, I have apparently served up a double fault. Neither of which are caused by condensation. Clever Clogs was completely wrong.

Not only was the pump knackered but the fire valve was stuffed.. Blowed if I know what that infers. Could the place have turned to cinders without a shut-off? Probably. And the old metal tank isn’t contributing to the cleanliness of the oil within it. Which seems to have caused the problems.  He drew some oil off and it had floaties and grit in it. Yuck. (Don’t suppose you fancy installing a new plastic tank, do you?)  

And guess what we found when we looked inside the boiler? The makings of a lovely nest, choice insulation complete with imported leaves. But since Ratty's disappeared (I suspect next door's terrier doing what he's good at, and mercifully I never saw it happen), it might be a mouse. I'll know if and when the nesting reappears.

not in situ - only the engineer got that treat. Personally I think the shreddings are too big for the mouse category. I speak from experience.

AND IT'S MY LUCKY DAY ! – he did have a spare pump in the van. Usually only carries one but used it yesterday for someone else, and just happened to have a second one! Something to do with ordering schedules.  Gosh.   

And by the way this is the engineer who brought the details of a good chiropractor to my notice back in the Spring.  We had got chatting about him and his wife getting treatment after a car crash. I had seriously smacked my head on the ice falling backwards in January (well you can blame that if you want to) and the xrays were hilarious. I looked like battlements from the side, vertebrae too far back and too far forward in turn, and from the front my neck looked like the letter C. It still does, really, but we’re getting there. It’s even better when I remember to do the exercises.  One clinic I’d been to was brilliant for my back but not my neck. I was more used to the treatment where they grip your head firmly and tell you to breathe out, and an enormous crack works wonders.  So that time the engineer had a double solution for me – oil boiler mended and the end of many very painful nights unable to sleep for the pain lying down - was only better when I stood up. I hadn't been able to find a chiropractor in my local town, but this one was close to my mother's flat, forty minutes away from here.

Amazing small world this is.

Heat!!!  Feels like a luxury. And the good thing is that these faults shouldn’t happen again. Well not this winter.

A couple of greenbacks

They were a spontaneous gift from my first sister–in–law Big Mama–san this summer, when tons of family converged on a large borrowed house in Deepest Daarrrset for the birth of her daughter Jen’s second, a girl this time. You out there who haven’t been updated yet (was going to get round to it this Christmas I suppose!) will only remember Jakob (pronounced Yakob) born three days before Christmas 2005 in the same hospital, for the same reason:- Andreas’ ancestry means that if the baby was born in Switzerland (while they live in Geneva) the Swiss birth & passport bureaucracy would go into orbit trying to establish what happened when and in what order, trying to trace him back through the East German bit and his wonderful highly unorthodox Russian mother, and they will not  take it for granted that someone else has done any digging necessary, ie German, French, US, Iranian and Iraqi, Azerbaijani and British governments who have all passed him fit of mind and body and a fine fellow. There is nothing to find, but try telling the Swiss that. He’s an international human rights lawyer and has been training Iraqi judges in Brussels. God this is getting complicated. So little Delphine has a British passport like her English mum, and that’s that.

Anyway, there’s $40, Big Mama–san’s contribution to my Campaign to Keep Me and Mother Afloat, stuck inside the mirror frame on my mantelpiece. I thought if I put them on the mirror they might mysteriously double up. Actually I think it worked - just won £25 on my premium bonds, my first ever prize! And I've just realised, writing this, that the mirror was from Big Mama-san too - payment for some graphics work I did for her when we all lived in London. So I've always treasured it.

PS – emailing to family recently about blogging names –

“how would this be ?
PMW
LW
MJW
TJW
JKW
AKW etc
I think that would get around the problem nicely - do you agree ?”

Reply from MJW –

“I am fine with either abbreviations or first names. Honestly, any internet predator would run into our real names which are nothing like our nicknames.”

and reply from Andreas –

“AKW in German is an acronym for Atomkraftwerk - nuclear power station. Please not. The first name would be nicer.”

And what struck me as delightfully strange was this – (P M & J are my brother's first family)

Mia lives in caMbodIA,

Jen lives in GENeva (stretching the argument slightly), and

Pip (Philip) lives in the PHILIPpines.

How amazing is that?!!

And since Pip's a Media Director he's not worried about publicity either, apart from being related to a mad aunt. 

Anyway, enough of this nonsense. Got to have an early night for mother's Big Day tomorrow.

Caught napping

A bluetit on the peanut feeder, late afternoon. Fast asleep, in fact. Eyes closed, snoozing as he hangs there for three minutes, the length of time I watched with a smile from ear to ear. Then other birds came around, and he awoke and flew to the bush.

Not just the colour of your skin

Female forensic anthropologist – in the lab, trying to find out who this person was before they became a ruckle of bones. She discovers that he was Cro–magnon (once in an anthropologist’s lifetime), or she discovers she was a lady of late Saxon period, or she discovers he was of asian extraction, or that he was black. And how does she know ? Because of the bone structure, the type and arrangement of teeth and cheekbones, the way the leg bones sit one upon another, the way the spine is, the brow shape, the pelvis. We are different under the skin, but we mustn’t say so for fear of being misinterpreted. If we move in the exalted circles of the lab we are already those who understand without casting opinions. And if we don’t move in those circles, it behoves us in public to behave as though we are ignorant. And we are all just innocent bones with stories attached.

Hardly dare

Hardly dare but have to anyway. (It’s that ole hubris stalking me.) Things are looking up. 
Room in lovely care home (the new one I mentioned, key-lime-pie-fridge and all) is reserved for my mother who should be there on Tuesday cross your fingers – knock on wood – don’t mind what but feel free to do something. Even if it’s just stroking the cat. Hospital happy, home happy, me happy but obviously best of all mother sounding positive and mentally bright by actually asking how big her room will be. She feels ready.

Mother, Thelma & Louise and a Key Lime Pie

Mother’s still saying things like
"Must do that when I get home" or
"I'll get one of those lovely key lime pies for my fridge". (Has to be the Waitrose one though. Way better than the others.)

After talking about the two best & most probable care homes, she said five minutes later
"Is it a flat or a house we're going to?" and
“There won’t be any stairs, will there?”

More variations on the theme of Not Getting the Point were
"Will you be living there with me?" and
"We'll start looking at places when I get home".

And is still unclear why she’s in hospital in the first place, and I really don’t dare mention the Accidental Brandy again (why are we not surprised that she doesn’t remember a thing about it?!), so just for the moment the whole incident is referred to as a Really Bad Fall.

Her first question at visiting time Saturday evening was how many grandchildren did she have? (Five, and this is a recurring question.) She had thought it was 6 or 7, but got stuck after P M & J. There are also 6 great–grandchildren so her combinations are many and various.  
First question on Sunday was what was her address? Thought Flat 2 but couldn't get any further. She’s been there since 1982.

So am in the midst of hospital and care homes, and my poor mother’s sitting in her chair by the bed looking so lost and woebegone it weepens me. My brother and my friends, the accountant and solicitor are helping me sort through what happens next (and in what order, which appears to be crucial). The ever–faithful car’s never done so much mileage since I lived in Scotland, and that thought brings me back to this –

If there was one single thing which broke my heart this week and had me crying all afternoon (and night – couldn’t shake out of it) it was when mother said

“I’d love to get some fresh air – just get me out of here and into the car, with you behind the wheel…..”  

 “and run away to Scotland,” I joined in, sort of wistfully, knowing exactly what she was talking about. And for a moment, I was actually meaning it. Thinking to hell with all this, let’s just go and LIVE.

She never minded where we were going because it was fun and we could have the craic, like the umpteen times we’d set off to my place in the north of Scotland, and I’d just settled in and driven happily for 8 hours with two loo stops, sharing stuff like biscuits, nuts, fresh pod peas, cheese or salami slices, trays of prawns, raspberries, and scraping sugar snap peas through hummus.

Speaking of food, one care home I visited yesterday which seems really good and has a VACANCY, being fairly new, has a mini fridge in the bedroom. So she could have her key lime pie after all – hurray!!

Then driving between home and hospital I saw this. Amazing what you can do with five minutes, a sharp knife and a ladder. There might be a story behind it. Did someone get ripped off? The right hand (correct) side is a bit blurred. But it gave me a big fat silly smile –

The Tipping Point

After the fall on Monday, it was a busy week of all the agencies jumping to attention. Have to put it on record that the Social Work dept and the two care agencies she uses were all brilliant and got straight on to the case. I was only mad as hell at the doctor’s home visit. It was the on–call doctor and they said she would have to phone me first. I hung around at home waiting for the call then dashed over to the flat or I would have been too late.  She didn’t phone, so she had no knowledge of what my mother’s normally like, and couldn’t see that slurring her words 48 hours after the fall wasn’t normal. Nor was the fact that she was now having trouble getting out of the chair. As I arrived at the flat I found a quick voicemail from doctor saying she’d done the visit and my mother was fine. Doctor said "give me a call back", but withheld her number, and the surgery was closed.

She is obviously too vulnerable to be on her own at all. She's been home for one week and fallen twice. One minute she wants to go into a care home and the next minute she won’t entertain it. Which is understandable. Been having this conversation for so long, of course, and I have never pressured her into anything she’s uncomfortable about. In fact have outright defended her autonomy and her right to make her own decisions. (And she flat–out refuses to have a live–in carer. Says she would feel responsibility for them, like a guest.)
I was contacting care homes and Mother perked up and went back to speaking normally. And moving better, but getting exhausted walking. Things were moving along nicely

Until Thursday afternoon when it happened again, only worse.
And it would be the only day I hadn't spent there with her.

Having run out of pre–lunch sherry, she’d found a large bottle of brandy where it always lives in the kitchen, there only to refill the little miniature she keeps by the bed to sip with water, in the middle of the night if she can’t get back to sleep. After donkey’s years of doing this, wasn’t expecting a problem. Except she didn’t know it was brandy, all of a sudden. For some unfathomable reason she thought it was beer. I dropped some stuff at her flat on the way to the hospital and found it in the fridge, one third gone. It had been unopened the evening before, when I left after putting her to bed.

So this time there’s no argument.  At 1 am Friday morning I arrived home and emailed my brother with latest details. This is most of it -
<< I'm actually home for the night. Too worried to go back to mother's flat. Needed my own space, to think clearly. Just got in. And her replacement dressing gown’s here anyway in her room. Before I left we had yet another argument about the large bottle of 'beer' I’d found in the fridge. Told me to put that beer down the drain because it was obviously poison. Being reminded gently for the fifth time that it was brandy, she went off again.  How dare I suggest it was brandy. She knew what she’d had to drink, thank you very much.
As I speak she's in a bed in the Clinical Decisions Unit on ground floor (just phoned them to clarify the heart pill dosage), then she will go up to a ward.
"Nobody has asked me what I want" she said when I said I’d take her clothes home and get other dressing gown etc. She was not impressed by my saying it was her safety above all which mattered. We spent a long time on that one.

You could see the penny drop when she finally realised she wasn't going back to her flat or my house any time soon. Her frown was quite something. Extreme pursed lips. She was trying to find words to bully everybody into taking her home. You could see the usual reaction setting in against making any decisions about the future. Backtracking like mad, except now in a position where she couldn't do anything about it. Half an hour earlier she’d been quite excited about the home I’d been telling her about.

In the CDU I said "I've put your slippers here by the bedside cabinet".
"In case I need them to run away" she shot back.

Between A&E and the CDU, we went through a glassed-in connecting corridor. She was amazed to see it was pitch black outside. For the umpteenth time in six hours it was explained that this has been the evening, not the morning. She didn’t really believe the nurse either.

Going to eat 4 lamb cutlets and go to bed.

xx
Oh and when I mentioned you were coming up tomorrow or Saturday she said "Where will he come to?"
"Well wherever you are. Here at the hospital, probably."
And she looked so angry.
I'm not used to her being like this. Usually she's so glad to be looked after and to feel safe. But I think she's scared. >>

Conversations with mother (44)

The neighbour phoned me Monday morning because the carer hadn’t been able to get in, so neighbour let her in. They found that mother had had a wee crisis in the night, and all I can say is thank god for the underfloor heating in her flat. She was nice and warm when the ambulance arrived. Lying neatly beside the bed, fast asleep. Her call button (emergency Care–Call company who are brilliant) was out of reach. (She got a telling off from the ambulance guy for that. It's supposed to be round her neck 24/7.)

I spoke to the ambulance crew and got over there. She was still a bit slurry but all vital signs were good including heart and blood pressure so everybody agreed there was no need to take her to hospital. And she didn’t want to go either.

A bit slurry because of last night’s sleeping pill together with too much red wine. Both wine and pills have now been removed and pills are where only carers can find them. So after lunch she went back to bed “for a nap” which was really to sleep it off, between you and me. She woke around 6 pm and I’d ordered Chinese to be delivered. She got up and came to the table.

Why are we having Chinese? she asked. (It happens to be one of our favourite foods.)

Because we need dinner and I haven’t got out to the shops yet.

Dinner?  Which she means is evening meal.

Yes this is dinner.

Oh I thought it was breakfast. So it’s evening.

Yes.

I’ve had a lovely night’s sleep.

A few minutes later she asks What did the Chinese say, when you ordered. Were they surprised?

Why do you ask that? (Knowing full well what she means.)

Well, ordering it at this time of day.

I explain again.

(Pause while we had our won ton soup and watched the telly.)

I said the carer would be there at 8.

That’ll be a first, she snorted.

This is the evening carer. (It was too late to cancel her and besides I wanted her there to reinforce the idea that it was night time, and to show her where we were going to hide the pills from now on.)

But the carer doesn’t get here until quarter past nine.

That’s the morning carer.

This happened more in the next few minutes in varying formats and then she decided to go back to bed. I said – This is you going to bed for the night.

Oh, she said. (She really didn’t sound convinced.)

Five minutes later, being tucked in, she said

Thank you for getting my day off to a good start. Who’s doing my lunch?

Best Friends and a Best Friend's Book with update

There are three best friends. One lives in Shetland, and is unlikely to drop by for coffee. There are more great friends and I don't visit them as much as I'd like to either.  So …..

Two best friends come to visit today. As I am truly Out in the Sticks, I do not treat this lightly. They have made a joint heroic effort during an individually busy but beautiful autumn day.

We talk about many things, and I realise that much of the catch–up is covered by the blogging, which neither of them has read, for their own reasons. One hates computers and will only use one under duress, and the other hasn’t had two minutes to rub together.

Friends One and Two are only designated thus by the time I’ve known them.

Anyway.

By way of catch–up explanation I read one blog–post printout left on kitchen table which was for my mother to read with her scanning mouse, but got left behind when I took her home. It can join the pile....

You’re getting very strident in your old age, says Friend One. Whose middle name can be strident when she needs to be.

Friend Two wisely says nothing.
They both know this stridency is actually my stomping over the cinders of previous confusions and difficulties and marching towards what HAS to be better.

By the way, F1 has written a book. It is a brilliant book. It’s about the planets and how they make merry with the lives of men, and this case a man’s girlfriend, our heroine. It illuminates what’s going on Down Here, in the light of what an arse they’re making of it Up There. Mars is the consummate Medallion Man. Really does think he’s God’s gift to women. Saturn turns out to be twins, living in a huge dour mansion which reminds you of Psycho Hotel.

Venus is a piss–artist and pill–popper par excellence. One year she gets so completely out of it, she misses Valentine’s Day completely. Oh, the humiliation.

 “Now look what you’ve done,” says another planet to Venus. “Fucked that up good and proper, didn’t you! Wrong people falling in love with the ones they were supposed to be avoiding, the plot’s gone all to hell and what are you doing? Staring at the cctv monitors and giggling. For crying out loud, get a grip!” * And she sort of does, in the end. Most of Venus’s belongings are pink, from her fluffy slippers and flouncy negligées to the plastic flamingo in the pond. She’s worth the book, all on her own.

* I am paraphrasing....

And the book isn’t being published. If all goes well, it’s being made into a film. Keep your fingers crossed. It’s very early days. 

Update Sunday 7 November

This is what happens when you decide to blog after a skinful.** Definitely got somewhat ratted** last night. Opened my Big Mouth about diseases and marriage and all.

Made it sound like I'd had a hard life! Which I absolutely have not. Might stick some stuff back up sometime - see how I feel.

Mars, by the way: I seem to remember he was all bulgy muscles, always working out at the gym and going for a jog, far too much energy than was good for him. But that might just be the impression he left me with.

Going to get another coffee, the third of many, and have a sober and dutiful day.

PS and final - actually think it did me good to get rat-arsed for once. **drink a whole bottle of wine in 6 hours in a ladylike manner.

Who–Wants–to–Make–an–Idiot–of–Themselves–in–Public?

Me, obviously. 

What do the last three letters of the acronym NASA stand for ?

A : Aeroplane and Space Association

B : Astronaut and Satellite Authority

C : Association for Satellite Administration

D : Aeronautics and Space Administration

‘D’, Chris.   Aeronautics and Space Administration.     Final answer.

Congratulations, Rachel,

you just won

ONE MILLION POUNDS !

Then I woke up.

Bugger.

HAVE to see these Maps of Prejudice

These brilliant ‘prejudice maps’ are visible either with a commentary, on a favourite website of mine -  Strange Maps at the Big Think  (and while you're there have a peek at the more recent/old Australian map from the 1920s which is outrageous)

http://bigthink.com/ideas/24357

OR in detail without preamble and with more of the man's prejudice maps on original website -

http://alphadesigner.com/project-mapping-stereotypes.html 

PS Testing this link throws up a problem with alphadesigner and clicking Back goes into a loop. Bugger. Put it directly into browser URL where it works perfectly.

And just when I was thinking about Shetland, this, on the BBC News website:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-11666366

Caption got it exactly right. 

Hurray for Shetland!

a Wet and Windy story

The setting:
I am a Baby Coastguard in Shetland. Have just taken my exams after a year of training. 
I am number 3 in a 3-man watch. (Yes I know - womenpersons and stuff.)
It is a quiet Sunday.
We have done all the usual Sunday morning chores and are waiting for the next broadcast time we – well, I –  put out the local weather and shipping forecast. Yes I read out the shipping forecast exactly like Radio 4. (But we don’t have a time limit like they do. We can read it out at a reasonable speed so somebody can actually take notes.)   Anyway.

I get this funny feeling. An urgency. A je–ne–sais–quois but it's driving me bonkers. Something is about to happen. We are going to get An Incident. In the next hour or so. Before 1 o'clock. My Senior Watch Officer Bill asks me what it could be. I haven't the foggiest, but The Feeling is getting worse by the minute. I even go and get my sandwiches from the Galley ('tis true – Coastguards, ex-mariners nearly all, are prone to calling the kitchen by sentimental names) and eat them at my desk. Just so I will have food in my belly before the fun starts. And before I have to broadcast Mayday Relays in a hurry with my mouth full.

And time goes by. As it does, on a quiet Sunday.
I am baffled. I KNEW something was about to happen, and more to the point I knew where.
Where? asks Bill, humouring me. Here, I say, getting up from desk and going over to the chart table. I pull out a large chart of Shetland’s west coast waters, and draw an upright rectangle with a pencil cross at each corner, spanning quite a stretch. About 40 nautical miles top to bottom and about 20 across. Just to exorcise the details which are crowding my bewildered brain. And go back to my desk, quiet and thoughtful. But the chart stays out on the table for a while.
So for the rest of the watch I put up with the "And what Major Incident were we having? Can't hear anybody shouting yet....  Was that a red flare going past the window? No? Oh what a pity…   – was that a Mayday I just heard? No! Oh well, maybe later" etc. They are getting so much mileage out of this and I have nothing to defend myself with, not even a lost crab pot.  Not that anyone would bother us with a lost crabpot.
And then it's Sunday evening and our watch goes home. 

On Monday it's my day off between the 2 consecutive dayshifts and the 2 consecutive nightshifts. If ever there was a job where you could meet yourself coming back half-asleep, it's this one.
So I sleep in, then go off to my amazing local rural supermarket + garden shop + off licence + garage. It is lunchtime. The wind is really strong today. I am being buffetted and thumped while trying to fill the car with petrol, when the shop owner wanders over to speak.
"That's some job you lot have got on just now."
"What job?"
"There's some drilling rig in trouble off the west side. Drifting out of control. It's on the radio."
I sort of have a mild heart flutter, and a moment where things go a bit sideways.  Dammit.  Was I right but on the wrong day?

When I get into work at eight that night, it is still going on – nay, is still getting going. After hours of struggle the Petrolia rig is destined to fill up half the night.
I look at the chart they've been using since lunchtime, when it kicked off. And there is the story so far, the track of this thing, from the top left down to the bottom right of my rectangle. This feels very peculiar, as if I'm looking at somebody else looking at the chart. Can't believe my eyes. 
And it's getting closer to the cliffs all the time of course. The rig had been on its way round Shetland to a new drilling position before the weather gave it something else to think about. 

It has two very powerful ocean-going tugs attached. Both tugs are straining to go full ahead. But the whole kit and caboodle is being blown backwards (at 1½  knots if you're into this).

There is still a full crew on board the rig. By this time such a camaraderie has been established with us that the crew are promising to take the entire Coastguard Service out for a pint if they ever get out of this mess.  Then suddenly it’s the right time to get everybody off.

So we do all the business: get helicopters airborne, Coastguard auxiliary teams organised for reception of the crew ashore (names, numbers, next of kin, phone calls, toothbrushes required etc), and the crew are airlifted in batches. Our Coastguard helicopter takes the first lot to the nearby clifftops, site of car park, panoramic viewpoint and major lighthouse. The wind is so bad they can't get anyone off the aircraft without them being blown instantly to Norway so it flies further inland about a mile. Still no good. Along the road to the next junction, about three miles inland. Which by the way is the furthest you can get from the sea anywhere in Shetland. They try again. This time everybody crawls out saying their prayers and into cars and jeeps and takes over a local hotel.
A second batch is instructed to give up on that idea completely (and besides we hear the hotel has run out of beds and blankets – and probably whisky – and their local shop has run out of toothbrushes) so this lot is taken to Sumburgh Hotel, at the south end of Shetland by the main airport. Well it's handy for this second helicopter which we'd borrowed from Lossiemouth, like you do. It can refuel and get home before we come up with any more ideas for it. 

And after the fuss died down, and everybody who wasn’t vital to something had been taken off the rig, and it still hadn’t hit the cliffs, and the wind started to drop, and the two tugs managed to start pulling ahead, Bill decided he'd been a bit hasty. He proudly announced that 'C' Watch was now to be known as The Psychic Watch, and just let anybody dare to contradict us, since he had the pencil marks to prove it. 
I still don’t know why this stuff happens to me, but happen it does. “Happen,” as they say over in Yorkshire.