A Christmas card

A Christmas Card to all of you


And some music that both Paul and I would play for serenity. It was one of the last things on his blog

Rain on the Temple xxx

Daily Mash - "Britain kicks itself in b*locks again" AND it is Friday the 13th

Satire by the way is not dead in this country, try  reading the Daily Mash! though they can get near the knuckle....

Let me start: By congratulating the conservative candidate who took Bolsover from Skinner overnight.  I do really think at the age of 87 years old that Skinner has had his day.  But the warm conciliatory speech of the conservative winner (still don't know his name) made me think, gosh they have polite and caring people in that party.  It was all a great win for that party - shame of course but Corbyn has not shown one iota of where he wanted to go over the last few years and he has paid the price.  

Johnson is prattling more dreams in the air on the radio, and all I can say to my country - you have got what you wanted, now pray the lying git holds true ;)

Now to more parochial affairs, I might even say climatic.  The strong winds of a couple of days ago blew down an electricity pole in our neighbouring village, so now a string of generators grace the verges outside the village hall.  Going out shopping yesterday, came back along the road only to be greeted by the inevitable 'Road Closed'.  So I diverted around the single tracked back lanes with confidence because I knew them. But these narrow lanes bounded by grass verges and deepish ditches became a nightmare, mud on the tarmac from the tractors and deep ruts in the verges where people had pulled over.  Alright when there is no traffic it is fine but having to squeeze past large cars and vans was worrying, almost lost it when the car got into a spin but luckily no one was there.  I think it will be wise to stock up just in case we get locked in to our homes by unforeseen circumstances......

Thursday the 12th December!

The holiday period draws nearer, and I have still to buy cards!  Yesterday was the gardening club lunch.  Actually it became a party for we did games... a quiz, pass the hat, and something ridiculous with paper plate ears.  Not forgetting pass the parcels, which hinged on a story about left and right.

The food was good, three large quiches from someone who bakes, probably professionally.  Salmon/asparagus, stilton cheese/broccoli and an ordinary quiche.  The butcher also from Kirkby had cooked a large ham which was delicately sliced and then a dozen salady things.  From Tabouleh, to apple/walnuts/celery salad and a beautiful dish of rainbow tomatoes.  Then came pudding, though in this instance I shall call them 'sweets' an abundance of meringues, cream, trifles, pavlovas and a chocolate cake.

It was Jo's first time at the lunch and she was impressed, various drinks, and tiny jewel like mince pies with cheese. Appleton-le moor club did us proud.  We caught up on news.  Another sad death of a widower in our community, self inflicted.   This little village buzzes with activity, nature and history adorn the walls and it is very much a moor's village curtailed by farm land.  You have to negotiate the sheep that wander around on the road.

A few more photos of the area around this part of Yorkshire, but first a photo from just outside Bath.  The place is called Langridge (long ridge) and was a favourite walk.

Moss on the lookout for bullocks, being an intelligent collie he would dive over the nearest stone wall and keep a distance following me

I love the darkness of the landscape that comes when the heather turns brown with death, and see below when it is burnt

Light and airy trees at Cawthorn Roman Camps

The actual ramparts of these three Roman forts, were they practice or did they indeed form part of the defence barrier that ran from Malton to the coast round Whitby?

Excellent defence

the burning of the moors

The landscapes of Britain (I no longer think of us as Great) are varied, the hills giving a diversity of shapes through their underlining geological rock.  There is a certain drabness after the bright colour of the heathers, if you look carefully at this last photo you can see a grouse looking up.  The privatisation of land for the simple act of killing grouse is an argument of strong contention.  But all over these moors you will see the little grouse hideways for the driven killings.  And never forget the thousands of pheasants commercially produced for killing as well. 

Wednesday 11th December

Gosh the count down is happening, swords are levelled, and the war of words, lies and deceits go on. It will all be over soon.  

My day began at 5.30 am, after the storms of yesterday as rain and wind beat against the front of our west facing house, I had to try and get all the wet cardboard, which I had religiously trodden down out onto the road for the waste recycling lorry (before 6 am is the rule) without it blowing away.  Luckily the moon was out and helped me on my way.  Lucy was excited by all this fun and games and trotted round the garden as we put food out for the birds and opened the chicken hatch.  

Soon the making of bread, and maybe mince pies, and then later Xmas lunch in Appleton-le-Moor.  So a quietly busy day. 

Pottering through my photos and I find Rosedale village, this is the place where our river starts from.  The photos show summer, harebells amongst the heather, and old stone.  The church has a stone seat as well, Rosedale was a priory in medieval times.  Moors, fields, villages and churches.

Yorkshire moors

part of the priory

Sunday thoughts

Sunday thoughts;  Wandering round old churches and pubs.
  

People are already asking what will I be doing for Xmas.  On the day itself I will  not be alone but with my darling Paul, I will light the candles and smile at the christmas's we spent together never quite finding the right food to eat on the day.  I will not be lonely for my son will come earlier in the month for a few days and then my daughter over the weekend before.

We never made it a big spectacle, and I am happy in the knowledge that my daughter will be happy in her home with her four children at the kitchen table.

My fairly shy nature has made socialising a bit of a nightmare, in actual fact I am happy to think, to wander at will over old walks and with my beloved.  Tears are always shed but they are not harmful, they allow the soul to grieve.

Some music will always make me cry, Paul would not dance but was the perfect centre in my life, a magical gentle being who had appeared late. Yes I rage against the illness the took him away from his beloved home, the last fight to get him home to die that I lost, but I treasure every moment with him.

So on this day, I remember the happy times, here at the Cat Pub in Essex.

And as a late note.  Dear Jo called round yesterday with what looked like a very dead plant in a pot.  It was a Japanese Anemone, a favourite of mine. She is small, talkative and great fun.  She is the keeper of an old pony, a blind sheep and four wild kittens and a very tall husband who is a town crier - life still goes on!

Stone figurines

I start with books.  Chosen for their Celtic stories, Miranda Green and Anne Ross for introducing me to the wonderful world of gods and goddesses.  Ronald Hutton for explaining the history of the 'Druids' to me.  'Celtic Mythology' written by an Irish writer, whose name is impossible to spell but whose books hold the most glorious spooky black and white photos.  There is Barry Cunliffe's The Ancient Celts.  And if by accident Leslie Webster's Anglo-Saxon Art has found its way in.  If you want Saxon gold bling then read that and be inspired.

There are tales, myths, stories, call them what you like but they represent a rich heritage of history and tradition. Why have I chosen these though? Well it was Jennie yesterday messaging me about an exciting find up in the Scottish Isles. A series of oddly shaped stones round a hearth.  They reminded me of something, the Cailleach, or the old hag that haunts the mountains of Scotland, you can read her in the landscape.  She belongs to a trio of females, the old woman, the mother and the daughter.  In Irish mythology she is represented by the wicked Morrigans.

So what did she remind of, the memory whirred round for an hour or two then came up with the little shrine in Glen Lyon.  This little family of stones represents a story, and over time when winter approaches the stones will be put in the little turfed roof house and then brought out in spring.  According to Anne Ross it was a shepherd who did it in her time, but now others do it.  You can read the story here

The largest represents the Cailleach (old woman), accompanied by the Bodach (old man) and their daughter, Nighean.  

Glen Lyon is a long valley and requires some hours of walking to get there, the story is probably early medieval, but has a wonderful resonance when you arrive.   

Iron Age battle shield found at Pocklington

I love Celtic, I do not quibble over the word as so many intellectuals do, I welcome the artistic heritage that goes into the beautiful curvilinear design of  their work, only perhaps picked up in the 1920's in the Arts and Craft movement.

The above is a shield found in a 'square barrow' of the Parisi tribe who in the Iron Age lived in East Yorkshire.  Their barrows with body, chariot and horses are found in their cemeteries, the above shield comes from  Pocklington.  The body is dated somewhere between 320 bc to 174 bc, which is rather a long dating sequence.  The ponies found in the grave were deliberately displayed as almost leaping out of the grave, a reminder that there is another world to be entered and their owner has only seen a temporary residence in this world and now go on to better things.  Groaning food tables, beautiful women (gosh have I not seen this elsewhere?).

The newspaper article says it is 'the most important  ancient find this millennium' and perhaps it is but such work continued through the century, and by the way, was not the product of this country but came from the Europe we are now departing.

Here is something similar, the pony was after all the 'Ferrari' of the Iron Age, it is a copy of course, but also needed protection from the constant war faring.

I get quite excited by such work, lying in the earth for hundreds of years, they reveal on their discovery a world that was equal to our own and are a humbling experience. And how the belief in another world was so embedded, look at a much later Saxon burial at Loftus, the lady buried in a bed with her jewellery.

Parisi wiki entry: Burials in East Yorkshire dating from the pre-Roman Iron Age are distinguished as those of the Arras Culture,^[ and show differences from surrounding areas, generally lacking grave goods, but chariot burials and burials with swords are known but are similar (chariot burials) to those ascribed to the La Tène culture of areas of western and central Europe, giving a potential link to the similarly named Parisii of Gaul

https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/heritage/iron-age-shield-found-in-pocklington-is-one-of-most-important-ancient-finds-this-millennium-1-10137418

Amazon Forest - Extinction Rebellion

The video speaks for itself.

Zummerset

Somerset.  Okay, Tom Stephenson mentioned  Jacob Rees Mogg and like a fish having a worm dangled in front of her nose I dived in - cannot stand the man.  So on hunting for him through Twitter found him at one of my favourite places, which is Stanton Drew Stone Circle yesterday.  He is the candidate for Midsomer Norton, which is but a few miles from Bath.

My mind began to question why on earth was he standing lonely surrounded by megalithic stones. Then the word 'symbolism' came swanning through my brain, he was drawing our attention to our 'ancestors'.  Sods law will probably tell him that they emigrated across the channel from Europe, if not before when there was a land bridge between us and them.  He mentioned a song by Adge Cutler, front singer of 'The Wurzels' popular in their time for their Somerset renditions of terrible songs, I will put a video down below.

Now Stanton Drew Stone circle is I think the third largest stone circle in Britain, not as popular as Stonehenge and Avebury, and slightly way out in the countryside but spectacular in its own quiet way, and somewhere I would go for peace and quiet.  Before the stone circle, archaeologist had discovered that timbered posts laid out in nine  concentric circles was had been built, in fact before the stones were set in place.  Similar wooden posts have been found at Stonehenge.  The fascinating thing about Stanton Drew is that in the pub garden, set adjacent to the church is 'The Cove' thought at first to be three stones set together but now it is thought in fact was a Neolithic long barrow.  Note the proximity of church to prehistory, always fascinating.  Just type Stanton Drew Stone Circle into search and you will find photos.

So JRM your analogy is rather poor, as was the history book you wrote, but you do strike a pose with some aplomb, even though you are an absolute idiot!

Okay it is funny, but we will never go back to those 1960s days of dialect nostalgia, our world has grown up since........................

Later edit JRM at Stanton Drew

Monday 2nd December

December 1st, the first day of winter and also Advent.  Not so icy as yesterday morning but cold the windscreen of my car is iced over.  Hopefully it will melt before I go to pick up my daughter from the station.  Plus, hopefully there will not be any work on the road as there was a couple of days ago.  Patch working the road of course.

Corbyn is coming to York today, well I have already made my cross on the postal vote and it is once more thrown away on the Greens, so he will have little luck with me.  This is a conservative area, last time 60% cons and 26% labour and lots of little lines for the rest of the parties.  I cannot contemplate the Liberals, two reasons really, the betrayal of the student loans, and their present leader, Jo Swinson - too enthusiastic by far.

Two days ago at midday coming back from a friends house I heard the sound of geese overhead flying South, clever creatures were escaping the cold coming from the North. This skein of flying birds was something to behold, and calmed my day.

I have been spinning wool, and I think silk, which I bought from a new supplier, the wheel has a soothing effect rather like the geese.  
The soft warm light of early morning is spectacular, frozen fields of white but the trees have a soft amber glow.
The news again is terrible the killing of those two young bright Cambridge people.  Their lives cut short by a terrorist and everyone debating the consequence of religious fundamentalists.  The good thing is that there were  brave people to take him down.  And also calls for restraint from the newspaper articles, the garbage they write about.  What we don't what in this country or on the street is vengeance, and the police handle such incidents fairly well.  We are a multicultural country, many people from other countries come here, there are a few bad people amongst them but then look at a far right 'British' thug, and judge them.

Jack's father in the Guardian - Jack would be livid his death has been used to further an agenda of hate.

"That door opens up a world where we do not lock up and throw away the key. Where we do not give indeterminate sentences, or convict people on joint enterprise. Where we do not slash prison budgets, and where we focus on rehabilitation not revenge. Where we do not consistently undermine our public services, the lifeline of our nation. Jack believed in the inherent goodness of humanity, and felt a deep social responsibility to protect that. Through us all, Jack marches on."

Again words - Celtic Thunder

Wayland's Smithy Neolithic long barrow

This morning the road outside is blocked with weird machinery, goodness knows what they are doing, could be they are really cleaning the drain that runs into the river, the Seven was high again yesterday from all this rain.  I have written so much about Wayland's Smithy that I will not say more, one of my favourite places though.

Came across a video from a megalithic friend this morning, it was done by the following Irish group Celtic Thunder and is about WW1, remember that Xmas advertisment? Much better done here.  This group sings (well) in a dramatically edgy way, you will see the theatrical showy way below.  Never come across them before but they are definitely enjoyable. Words to 'Heartland' below and also the video..... 
A thought to be explored about Nationalism which has reared its ugly head in many parts of Europe, do such things as this song narrow our view of our country or expand them?

Heartland

Out of the mists of Time it comes
Older than the oldest rhyme it comes
Coursing through our veins it comes
Pulsing in our brains it comes
Crashing like a thunder roll
Echoing in our very soul
Listen for it as it comes
The pure, unbridled sound of drums
(Spoken end)

Hear our hymn from the heartland
Hear our prayer
Steer us through stormy waters
Lead us there...

When the storm is raging
And thunder rolls
Deliver us from the ocean
Save our souls

A Thiarna, déan trócaire (Lord have mercy)
A Chríost, déan trócaire (Christ have mercy)
A Thiarna, déan trócaire (Lord have mercy)
A Chríost, déan trócaire (Christ have mercy)

When the winds are howling
Vigil keep
Shelter us and save us
From the deep

A Thiarna, déan trócaire (Lord have mercy)
A Chríost,…

Perhaps two photos more for that old long barrow has sad memories as well.  Here is my son sitting with a black bin bag round his shoulder, cross with his mother for dragging him miles in the rain just to attend a pagan scattering of ashes.  Next to him 'Wysefool' who died not long after this trek and who had a poetic soul.

Flowers from the garden we brought to honour 'Treaclechops' and her wish to have her ashes scattered round Avebury and here amongst the trees.

Friday 28th November

As always the weather is wet, wet, wet.  I cut the last of the things to go into the garden waste bin yesterday, last day collection this morning, and then took Lucy for a short walk.  Met the vicar coming out of someone's house, only to hear that the vicar had found the occupant unconscious outside the house.  He is a widower and is so depressed just wants to join his wife.  The vicar visits him regularly and as I walked I wondered how the village could keep an eye on the man, as he is so uncommunicative and keeps to himself.

Well I had an appointment with the nurse for a MOT, and it transpired the last one was 10 years ago, but my blood pressure righted itself after three goes and my weight has stayed the same during that time.  I asked the nurse what could be done about single people getting old and not wanting to live.  She said something surprising, there is nothing you can really do and the person has the free will to choose.  Also said that my refusal of the flu jab is quite common, the vaccination going round at the moment can only tackle three types of flu, there are unfortunately thirteen types of flu on the move.

But to happier notes.  Called into the library and spotted  several Elle Griffiths on the shelves, must have seen the books on other blogs and wanted to read them so was pleased with my find.  Will also try to find George Elliot's Middlemarch and reread it again, it seems very 'in' on the radio at the moment.  And to get back to spinning, having found some melded coloured tops to spin...

I toyed around with the idea of an e-spinner but threw the idea out when I found out the price, so my old Ashford wheel will have to do.  

Wednesday 27th November

Saw this yesterday and made me giggle and of course feel nostalgic.  The sheds are of course for the 'German' type market which opens tomorrow by the side of the Abbey in Bath.  Before these sheds open, it looks like a square of garden sheds and very bleak.  Wonder if they will 'ice' over the garden bit of Queen Square? but I see a rink  has been established in  the park.

Tuesday 26th November

Yesterday I had a terrible drive to Scarborough, coming back in the dark, and rain.  I had offered to take a friend to hospital for a scan.  We set off at 3 just as dusk was beginning to settle.  It was a close call for timing an hour's drive found me in  enormous car parks, C jumped out of the car and headed for the main entrance, and I sorted out where I had to park.

We had thought of C driving her car with me as passenger, but the consequences of that was something I did not want to contemplate especially when........... she told me that her £25 winter check over had turned into £260 because the garage had found her brakes (hanging on by a thread?) not working.  She had deliberately been driving around with this because she was going to buy a new car in January and did not want to spend on the old - bless her.

The rain beat down as we drove back, and I sloshed through deep puddles of water that stretched across the road.  The amount of rain that falls is worrying and if changed to snow as winter arrives means a lot of us are going to get stuck.  Anyway she treated me to a meal in the pub next door, scampi and chips, and Lucy was happy with her portion of scampi/s?

Scarborough is a place I have never explored, probably due to snobbishness, not sure.  It has a long promenade front I think, but Whitby, and its charm always held our interest.  Never ask my daughter what she thinks of the two towns her estimation is quite cruel.

One of the things about Whitby, and continuing Pat's talk of dog poo, is that Whitby is the dog capital of the North.  Everyone brings their dog there and you will see practically every breed, dog sxxt is cleaned every morning by the council but is run by the unscrupulous council of Scarborough I think.  You thought that it was just central London was corrupt, come up North.

The replica Endeavor, shorter than the original and of course famous for Captain Cook

A favourite early photo of the grandchildren.

Whitby is a town with too many churches but then it is also the Goth centre of England, take your pick!

Three churches lie at the bottom of Brunswick Street jostling each other for space.
Yes I miss Whitby but not its hills....

Comments have been restored thanks to Rachel and me looking once more at the instructions properly.

Words

Chasing words:  This blog was in drafts last week.

"The phrase "OK Boomer" is a pejorative retort used to dismiss or mock perceived narrow-minded, outdated, negatively-judgemental, or condescending attitudes of older people, particularly baby boomers. The term has been used as a retort for perceived resistance to technological change, climate change denial, marginalization of minorities or opposition to younger generations' ideals."  Wiki entry

Millennials, also known as Generation Y (or simply Gen Y), are the demographic cohort following Generation X and preceding Generation Z Researchers and popular media use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years, with 1981 to 1996 a widely accepted definition. Millennials are sometimes referred to as "echo boomers" due to a major surge in birth rates in the 1980s and 1990s, and because millennials are often the children of the baby boomers. The characteristics of millennials vary by region and by individual, and the group experiences a variety of social and economic conditions, but they are generally marked by their coming of age in the information age, and are comfortable in their usage of digital technologies and social media .

I have a love affair with words, how they appear with a little help from academics.  We are air-brushed by society into our compartments.  I even did a sociology A level course many years ago, and my words flew onto the page with a rapidity of analysis - unfortunately.  It is like looking through the wrong end of a telescope at people, judging them by fine lines made up by a curious urge to settle everything around us. The problem is social situations become underlined by the words used to circumscribe them. But I don't know the answer to make this world a better place, all the words spilled into the atmosphere will not right wrongs.

There is a 'babel' of words for politics, we turn off in a weary mood, comfort ourselves in our own lives which may seem from the outside a foolish thing to do.  So I came upon these words this morning, and copied them from F/B.... rather than yell at winter, greet it as a friend who slows us down and make us aware of the difficulty of doing things.

"Winter takes away the distractions, the buzz, and presents us with the perfect time to rest and withdraw into a womb like love, bringing fire & light to our hearth".
.. and then, just around the corner the new year will begin again, and like a seed planted deep in the earth, we will all rise with renewed energy once again to dance in the sunlight

-Brigit Anna McNeill
Art: Jessica Boehman

Life is a gift ❤ a Happy winter to you all...

 past blogs;  Etymology

and then there is this, always loved those Celtic stories of 'opposites' black/white sheep.

https://northstoke.blogspot.com/2008/11/celtic-gods.html

Apologies - Comments

Sharon (Morning Minion) asked me on F/B what had happened to my comments this morning.  I just thought you were all not talking to me! But then I went to my 'comments' in settings and saw that they had lined up there.  So I pressed  publicise on as many that came up.  Sorry to you all, feel such an idiot.

And now can't get rid of those blardy (as Jennie would say) but I am quite capable of using real swear words, REACTIONS.....................

Saturday 23rd November

Life is so lonely without the person you love. Such a simple fact, the tears that spring unbidden at any time.  Round this house, Paul's pride in it was wonderful his presence is still captured, will I end up like Miss Havisham from Charles Dickens caught in a time frame forever.  I have left everything as it was, his watch and glasses in the bedroom, old jumper hanging from the chair.  Razor in the bathroom, shoes in the utility room.

I keep the radio on constantly, and switch the television on in the evening, I will do anything not to remember but memories cloud the head with their bitter-sweetness.

I should not write this of course, be brave and I have indeed tackled all the correspondence that flows through the letter box.  Hung on phones listening to interminable music whilst I was handed from one department to another.  Most big companies have a bereavement department is something I have learned.  Most people are kind and gentle is another.  Yesterday was a great relief and I was happy that a credit card was at last paid for and finished with, the man on the phone so good.

And of course all this happens as winter and darkness spreads around.  Waking up in the dark, listening to the radio at 3 o clock, bet you did not know we could have biased algorithms running the country, especially in the social security department.  Think about it, AI running amok with its logic and lacking the warmth of the human heart.

The Quiz night was something I attended, if you were to ask me why, I would point to the calendar which has Paul's notification on the day he predicted for this year, only one day out.  He so loved the village and was interested in things happening.  The quiz was incredibly hard, sweet Harriet found a lasagne for me amongst all the great portions of pie and chips everyone else had.  And I sat with Elaine, Keith and Alison their daughter.  When we first came she washed and cut Lucy and walked dogs but is now a decorator.  Her parents will build an eco-house on the land next to their cottage, and the village seems happy with it.  David in his loud town crier's voice introduced two newcomers to the village, and the raffle prizes were mostly booze.  The pub is a very friendly old-fashioned place, Harriet's friends intermingling with our older generation.

Well having written all that I am happier and it is getting lighter so that I can go out to let the two bantams out and feed the birds.  The owl has drifted away, yesterday apart from a pheasant prancing around on the lawn there were a couple of gallinula (little hens) or moorhens.  At first I thought they were ducks as they strode across the lawn, then their shape appeared, must have wandered down from the river.  Which reminds me that Keith had said that they had introduced beavers into the river/s at Cropton Forest to slow down the water with their dams.  Must look into that.  Which I did.

Thursday 21/11/2019

Today dawns frosty, the car windscreen is frosted up with pretty patterns.  But I have my defrosting kit from the garage should I need to go out.  My £25 pounds is well spent, they have checked battery, antifreeze and tyres, even taking the car out on a run to check performance.  Not so good news I will need a couple of front tyres sometime in the future.

I pottered around the town whilst the car was in the garage, buying vegetables and watching the small market set up.  Drifted through the church yard and admired the clipped yews, much neater than ours.  The town runs up a hill just above the church is a moated site called Vivers Hill Castle, unusual because it is situated on a hill.  At the very top of the hill is the late medieval Neville Hunting Lodge with just one small part of a wall standing.

When will princes, politicians and unscrupulous businessmen go to jail for crimes committed?  Andrew is being punished by the withdrawal of charity support, he has been turned into a black sheep by his family and thrown to the wolves? Anyway he will not be drawing a state salary.... The Queen consulted Prince Charles on what to do, does it not sound like 'Alice in Wonderland' to you. 

Simon Armitage is handing out his salary he receives as Poet Laureate to anyone who can write a good eco-poem.  Just read Deborah Harvey's poem which is political rather than about nature.

Suddenly I remember a poem by John Masefield, I must have learnt it at school... Sea Fever ... how simple it seems amongst the confusion of the days we live in.

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,

And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;

And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,

And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.

The Ark