25th June 2023

The video of the Schumacher video had some problems, especially when people turned away from the mike and their voices disappeared but on the whole, when you cut out the breaks and listened to the talks, you realised how clever some people are and felt humble at their dedication to a cause.

One of the last speakers was a woman, whose impassioned talk won her the greatest applause, you can find her at 6.22.  As she said "financial globalisation is doing bloody well". Playing round with market commodities does not do the man on the street any good at all, financial institutions, pension funds and the one per cent of rich people playing around with their empty money are the ones that succeed.

There is also the unseemly sight of two rich men Elon Musk and Mark Zukerberg challenging each other for a fight.  Absolute nonsense, have they nothing better to do?

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Things move fast.  Will we see Prigozhin leader of the mercenary 'Wagner' group in a hospital bed soon, ashen white faced from radiation poison, as he dies slowly having given Putin the fright of his life.  Will Putin lose his grip on power and be defeated by more powerful figures in the Kremlin?

Is it a story? or is it real? Whatever, the war against Ukraine is not going to plan and the poor people on either side of the conflict have their lives shattered by warring generals and sick leaders.

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A campsite near Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon) has been reached and if the weather holds off they are going to the top.  They had thought of spending a couple of hours in Solva but the slow puncture put an end to that thought. So I shall put a few photos of this place which if given the choice I would have happily ended my days in.  Well perhaps St.David, because it has a few more shops!

Whitchurch

Solva 

‘We nurture souls in these areas’: The Battle for Preseli | The Heritage Journal (wordpress.com)

The Ecologist

Yesterday thumbing through my emails, one from The Ecologist popped up.  It was about a meeting of like minded people in the green movement.  The video below is seven hours long, and I don't expect anyone to watch it, it is here recorded in my blog that is all.

It was held in Bristol, almost the home of the start of what I call 'green thinking'.  The theme was Schumacher's Small is Beautiful and the discussion ranged round that.  Names I recognised....  Herbert Girardet, Helen Browning (she runs an organic farm in Wiltshire) and Brendan Montague, editor of the Ecologist and who actually organised this day of discussion as to where it all went wrong - for it definitely has.

The book that started it?  Donella Meadows (and others) Limits to Growth in I think 1972.  I bought the book but it was hard reading, Meadows wrote another book on system changes - System Thinking you can find it in pdf form.

Girardet had written a poem "Sacrificing tomorrow for today" you can read it in that highlighted link. He talks of course of the unborn children who will inherit this Earth after we have gone, and yes the world is burning up just take notice in the lesser news.

2

 Let us sacrifice Tomorrow

on the altar of Now and Today.

Tomorrow is there for disposal,

so why not just throw it away?

I am an optimist in the end, and believe that with right thinking we shall slowly come around, after all growth is falling as are babies being born but it is a long road....

Update on the camping trip,  Hired car developed a slow puncture yesterday, so after taking down tent in pouring rain (they travelled from town to town in Wales looking for a tyre. Now fixed, and they are now in Aberystwyth in a B&B.  And did I mention that a fox at night stole Karen's coat?

22nd June 2022

 

Pinks by Charles Rennie Mackintosh

Convoys take farmers' donated pickups from Scotland to Ukraine

Dancing Capercaillie bird makes a tentative comeback in Scotland

In amongst the sad news there are small signs of good news.  Why? it is because people gather together and look after not only the animals and birds but people as well.

The 4x4s donated by local people in Scotland are a direct reflection of people's concern for others.  4x4s are not cheap but are very necessary in a war torn country such as Ukraine, have you not noticed the terrible dam disaster has now slipped by the news.  We are of course into the fate of the submersible and its five occupants, and from what i have read it is probably impossible to save them, though the rescue hunt still goes on.

This is sad news but it also lies alongside other news, and maybe our lack of journalism all round the world needs rejuvenating, and we should not be party to the crap click bait news we are so often offered on our news sources.

One other piece of good news is that Amazon is being questioned over their very deceptive wheedle to get you to join their Prime subscription fee for better service.  Who has not done the dance round when going to pay for the goods ordered the wording you have to not tap to get Prime, apparently it is doubly difficult to get out of the fee.

Small good news

From the Hebden Bridge naturalist group a rare fern called 'moonwort'

has been discovered up at Hardcastle Crags.

"Moonwort is a weird and wonderful looking plant, which comes with its own mythology. It was believed the key-shaped fronds could open shackles and locks, and the lower leaves were used by fairies for their horses' saddles."

Probably a tale made up by 19th century vicars or collectors of folktales but a pretty myth.

Also, my daughter sent me this, Bath Asparagus, a rare plant to be found round the city of Bath. Rather pretty for an edible wild plant (don't pick)

21st June 2023 - Saxon Avebury rerun

Avebury Church the old manor house behind the wall

You think we are in trouble now with mortgage hikes and the price of food at much higher prices but just ask any Saxon in past centuries what  it was like! 

Incarnations of old blogs, how I studied my subject..... A memory first, Paul and I spent a cold week in January together opposite Avebury church.  A small cottage called Teacher's cottage, next to the little village school of course. I was never able to write of it at the time because Paul was under attack from trolls who were very vicious.  May they rot in hell ;) for I never forgave them.  

The Avebury church contains within its fabric the history of past centuries as many churches do.  I came across the name of the priest Reinbold and found I had written another blog on Wordpress, mostly to do with the carvings on the fonts in the area. So from 2008, the moment I fell in love with Saxon poetry..........

Saxon Avebury

Here we come to the sparse written words of the Saxons and their invasive presence on the scene of a probably very untranquil late British land of fortified hillforts. Burl gives the name Aureberie as first mentioned in the Domesday book, probably belonging to one of the first settlers by the earthwork "Afa's Burh" but this is of course late 1086. Early saxon settlement in the Glebe field car park west of the henge, probably a single homestead by the river, was found when a 9th century "grubenhaus" was excavated, this later developed into a rectangular enclosure, surrounding the church and regular house plots, extending westward from the west entrance of the henge towards the Winterbourne- probably late 9th/ 10th.Avebury.

Earlier settlement would have developed round the Herepath , military saxon road, and this can be traced to the west of the henge where regular plots of land are laid out perpendicular to the east/west of of this road, also in times of emergency, the henge itself would have provided good protection for stock and people. It is conjectured that Avebury was probably a "failed" town, Marlborough becoming dominant.

The church of St.James, that lies at the heart of Avebury has displaced anglo saxon sculpture,(as do so many churches in this area have); the north-west corner of the present nave is composed of side alternate megalithic quoins with a fragment of A/S sculpture of late 9th/10th century, originally part of a cross shaftor coffin lid, indicating that there was an earlier masonry church here, contemporary with the burh. The A/S chancel was discovered during restoration in 1878, it was shorter than the present one.Burl says that although the font in this church is elegantly sculptured in a much later style (Scandinavian) it would have been an early undecorated a/s font.

Likewise the english king and the prince,

Brothers triumphant in war, together

Returned to their home, the land of Wessex.

To enjoy the carnage, they left behind

The horn beaked raven with dusky plumage,

And the hungry hawk of battle, the dun coated

Eagle, who with white-tipped tail shared

The feast with the wolf, grey beast of the forest.

Never before in this island, as the books

of ancient historians tell us,

was an army put to greater slaughter by the sword..

taken from the Anglo Saxon Chronicles

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Three ancient roads ran through the parish, the Ridge Way, the Roman road, and Herepath Way, the path of which has been traced for 1 km. along the edge of West Down. In the 18th century the London-Bath road ran through West Kennett to Beckhampton, crossing the Kennet south-east of Silbury Hill. At Beckhampton the road forked. One branch continued northwestwards to Cherhill, the other led southwestwards, reaching Bath via Sandy Lane in Calne. Both were turnpiked in 1742. (fn. 43) The more northerly branch became the modern LondonBath road, the principal route through the parish. West of Beckhampton its path was moved slightly to the south in 1790 (fn. 44) but it had returned to its original course by 1889. (fn. 45) In the early 18th century a coach road led over the downs from Marlborough towards Avebury village. It entered the Circle from the east and apparently turned south-west across the Kennet to Beckhampton. (fn. 46) The downland route fell out of use after the London-Bath road was turnpiked (fn. 47) and was marked only by a track in 1979. In 1675 a road to Devizes left the London-Bath road near Silbury Hill. (fn. 48) In the 18th century the main route to Devizes within the parish was part of the Bath road via Sandy Lane. The road from Beckhampton to Avebury was turnpiked in 1742 and that north of Avebury in 1767 to form the Swindon Devizes road. (fn. 49) Another turnpike road linked Avebury and West Kennett. The lane leading from the London-Bath road to East Kennett was turnpiked in 1840 as part of the West Kennett to Amesbury road, one of the last roads in England to be turnpiked. (fn. 50) The bridge over the Kennet between Avebury and Beckhampton was replaced in 1950 (fn. 51) and a roundabout built at Beckhampton c. 1960. (fn. 52) Few changes occurred in the pattern of secondary roads between the late 18th century and the 20th. A path which skirted Avebury village to the north and west in the 18th century had, however, disappeared by 1979. The main street of Avebury village was linked by a footbridge with the network of lanes west of the river which connected the farms and houses of Avebury Trusloe. From a point on the old road to Marlborough some 700 m. east of the Circle, tracks radiated to Winterbourne Monkton, Chiseldon, and West Overton. In the 19th century new or improved tracks were made to South Farm on Avebury Down, Windmill Hill, and Beckhampton Penning south of Beckhampton. An older path led from Beckhampton village to Tan Hill in All Cannings. Further east a path ran from the London-Bath road at West Kennett to East Kennett across a bridge perhaps built in the late 18th century. (fn. 53) Avebury village was one of the larger settlements in Selkley. Its assessment

From: 'Parishes: Avebury', A History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume 12: Ramsbury and Selkley hundreds; the borough of Marlborough (1983), pp. 86-105.

For the 'c' word - etymology

North Stoke: Avebury Church

20th June 2023 - Lumb Bank House

I was reading a blog by Paul Knight of the countryside round here, especially Hebden Bridge.   The wooded slopes of the valleys, the old ruined building of the farms that have been deserted - so romantic if  you like decaying buildings and the promise of the history they hold.

  

But what caught my attention was Lumb Bank House here, of which he took several photos from afar.  Originally an 18th century millhouse, it was now a writer's centre, with Ted Hughes name  pinned to it.  He had been asked by two Resurgence writers John Moat and John Fairfax,  Hughes bought the mill and lived in it for several years with his  wife Carol Hughes.  He then suggested leasing the mill for a Northern centre for young writers and eventually the Arvon group were able to buy the house.

It requires quite a bit of walking if you do not own a car, or even if you do, because you have to park the car at the beginning of a long lane.  It must be tranquil in its settings high above the valley and should you be inspired to take a creative writing course, than this is the place for you.  I will put the video of its interior down below.

Do not kill insects.  Well I stayed my hand over about 20 caterpillars of the cabbage white caterpillar they calmly devoured the nasturtium plant in a pot, I haven't checked where they have gone but I did notice a large spider dangling over them; I do not interfere with the natural order of things.  All other nasturtiums are doing fine in their separate pots, courgettes are beginning to appear also.  We have had several downfalls of rain and everyone in town are listing the drains that are blocked for the council to view.  And boy there are a lot of drains not functioning well.

Bantams

Hens; There is nothing quite like keeping a couple of hens to potter round the garden.  They are pleasant birds, no trouble, except perhaps in the summer when they refuse to be shut up because it isn't dark yet but I want to go to bed.

I used to love watching them potter through the soft fruit bed, and though I had a period in Chelmsford when I didn't have any when we moved to Normanby we got a pair of bantams.  When I left I gave them to the farm up on the hill.  All their runs and chicken house on the trailer, I can still see it as I wished them well.

The bantams were less tame than my brown hens but would follow me round the garden along with Lucy and even my little feral cat took to them, and would lie stretched out on top of their run.  Companionship in animals is something we do not talk about, but they are not always chasing each other about.

The thought of hens came to mind because of a photo my daughter sent me this morning from their camping trip (the blow up mattress has already gone flat) a photo of a hen pottering  outside the tent, with the caption, another pet to add to my list along with the thousand flies. Camping is fun, I introduced it to her from an early age, we had a canvas tent, the holes prettily decorated with Laura Ashley patches. Camping can be fun, it can also be hell, depends on the weather and whether there is a decent loo around.

My favourite place to camp by myself was at a campsite just outside Solva, it was called Nine Wells, and had a lovely walk down to the cove and even a small Iron Age settlement, Porth-y-Rhaw, one of the many that are to be found on this Pembrokeshire coast.

Photos to come later

18/6/2023

How does the day begin?  Water on the stairs this morning, it was coming from a Velux window up on the attic floor.  There are about 6 Velux windows and the one over the well of the stairs was open.  A brush soon put that right and luckily as it is all bare floorboards with rugs no damage done.  It must have rained heavily in the night, which is a good thing.  Scotland it seems is running out of water.  How did that happen with all the rivers and lochs that cover the country.

I am home alone so feel slightly nervous of being in charge of the house, and was debating in the night whether to pull my blog into 'privacy'. Those two things don't go together by the way.  The reason is more like the influx of visitors I have experienced over the last few days.  I have every intention of working on all the churches Paul and I visited, which can hardly be interesting to most people. But every now and then I gather my blogs together, (to form some sort of sense).

I often wonder what sends us all off on our blogs.  Some like churches, other landscapes and then there is a majority who talk about home life and gardens.

We are happy recording our thoughts and action to what we suppose are ourselves, family and friends, but in actual fact could be read by others in far distant lands. How do they see us I wonder.  Do they judge? Does the English life style make them giggle or do they want the same? 

Church revisitations - St, Barnabas - Alphamstone

Thinking about old churches and their relationship with paganism. Starting with 'A'.  Alphamstone or St. Barnabas church was on the Suffolk//Essex Border.  It was a long drive from Chelmsford but through pretty Essex countryside.  You would think that Essex is all full of 'Essex Girls' and gypsies - not so, not so.  It has a certain lushness to the landscape, wooded and pastured it still retains that Olde England heartland if you look for it.

It was quite a long drive, I notice in the second blog I tell the tale of finding the bible upturned on the lectern at the page describing 'whores' I was so furious that this may have been the subject matter the local vicar had given.

But there is another tale to tell. It is to do with electricity and a labourer called Eddie Tuffin.  The church could not afford electricity but Eddie was not defeated by that.  He took one of his ferrets, tied a line to it and then put him down a land drain on his side of the road that ran across to the church - easy, tie an electric cable to the ferret and electricity  was supplied to the church.

There are a few churches that somehow, mysteriously have large stones incorporated into their foundations and fabric.  It shows that they have early beginnings.  Either the reason was domination by the Christian church, or maybe, when the Saxons were changing their religion from pagan to christianity they overlapped the two. But not being quite sure of the changeover. This letter from Gregory to Mellitus, explains the forces that were beginning to break the bonds of paganism.

Letter from Gregory taken to England by Mellitus; Letter sent June 601

When almighty god has brought you to our most reverend brother Bishop Augustine, tell him what I have decided after long deliberation about the English people, namely that the idol temples (fana idolurum) of that race should by no means be destroyed, but the idols in them. Take holy water and sprinkle it in these shrines, build altars and place relics in them. For if the shrines are well built, it is essential that they should be changed from the worship of devils (cultu daemonum) to the service of the true god. When these people see that their shrines are not destroyed they will be able to banish error from their hearts and be more ready to come to the places thaey are familar with, but now recognizing and worshipping the true god.

Gregory's answer to a letter from Augustine which must have been outlining the English religious customs;

Because they (the English) are in the habit of slaughtering much cattle as sacrifices to devils, some solemnity ought to be given in exchange for this. So on the day of the dedication or the festivals of the holy martyrs, whose relics are deposited there, let them make themselves huts from the branches of trees around the churches which have been converted out of shrines, and let them celebrate the solemnity with religious feast.
Do not let them sacrifice animals to the devil, but let them slaughter animals for their own food to the praise of god, and let them give thanks to the giver of things for his bountiful provision.

Stone built into the wall

Stone was rare in Essex, and these random stones found by the River Stour could have been the result of glacial movement from elsewhere.

North Stoke: Alphamstone Stone Circle

North Stoke: Alphamstone Church

Fascinating finds

Interesting links:  Let us start at the beginning.  Anna Dillon, a landscape abstract artist came through my F/B feed.  I had met her at an Avebury meeting several years ago.  You can see her work here.  Actually though I am not into abstract art, but many of her paintings have a calming effect, the great sweep of the landscape whether in Wiltshire or Oxfordshire welcomes the eye.  A couple of examples taken from the internet.

Uffington Horse

Hackpen Horse - though where the horse is  a bit of a mystery

Tom should recognise this. Lansdown Monument

But I had found this by another unexpected discovery Paul Nash at Avebury, a long article and also a Youtube short film.  The essay, such a better word than article is on 'Inexpensive Progress' blog written by Robjn Cantus.  On his blog you will find short videos of the artists around in the 1930s.  John Piper, Bawden, and I am not sure if he did one on Ravilious (he did).  These artists along with the little colony at Great Bardfield had to work in the commercial world to earn their bread and butter.

Robjn Cantus must be a seller of prints according to his website but at the same time has gathered together smatterings of information which are fascinating.

(2) Paul Nash at Avebury - YouTube

The following two paintings by Paul Nash are of Silbury Hill and though it is still an enigma, certain questions have been answered. But I am not quite sure if that is a little building of some description below Silbury. I have heard mention of a garage there which must have been in the 1930's because when a tunnel was reopened by Professor Richard Atkinson in the 1950s, old tyres were found inside.  Silbury had had a tunnel dug into it by Dean Mereweather in the nineteenth century, there is a link to the BBC site here explaining it.

Not many people will remember or be interested in this, but in May 2000, there was a collapse of earth on the top of Silbury resulting in a 45 feet crater and the tunnel was reopened to 'mend the hole'.  I was a member of a group. who, lets say agitated about how the operation went.  It was about this time that I had met Paul, and the second photo reminds me of one evening when he climbed over the gate to take a closer look at the stones that had come out of the tunnel. 

15th June 2023

 A FORMER Eton headmaster has accused former pupils of the famous elite private school of damaging the “very fabric” of the country.

"Perhaps its most important mission will be to ensure that its pupils are saved from the sense of privilege, entitlement and omniscience that can produce alumni such as Boris Johnson, Jacob Rees-Mogg, Kwasi Kwarteng and Ben Elliot and thereby damage a country’s very fabric. Sadly, I failed in that purpose.”

Nature or nurture?

The headmaster obviously had regrets.  We are into trivia news at the moment.  Boris is sitting back on his heels like the sniveling man/child he is and shouting foul at the committee who are investigating him.  Nadine Dorris is holding her judgement as to whether she should jump ship over the sad news she will not be given a peerage - boo-hoo. The country rocks gently towards disaster and we have two idiotic personalities too contemplate!!

Perhaps I should write about food.  The little birthday party went off well, though the first mouthful of my curry sent me off into a coughing fit and I could not eat it. The splendid chocolate birthday cake was decorated with the right amount of candles and a firework which was supposed to go off like Vesuvius volcano, unfortunately, Karen put it upside down in the cake. But no, the cake did not explode, it was rescued after a couple of minutes, turned the right way round (the instructions were on the side, put the pointed end into the cake) and we had a bright sparkly tower which melted the chocolate on top.

Or perhaps parcels.  You would never believe the amount of parcels that come into this house.  I have notes pinned to back and front doors 'Please knock loudly' and my grinning Amazon driver always obliges.  The other trick we use is to leave the back door slightly ajar so the PO can slip any parcel in.  We are now like many towns in Britain, are almost bank less, the Halifax is closing soon but parcel receiving booths have arrived outside Lidl and Morrison, you can also get things delivered to 'The One Stop' shop and also the railway station - spoilt for choice...

Okay the drivers occasionally just chuck the parcels outside the wrong house, or even on the street in despair but you can bet 'Tod Chat' on F/B will soon be into "has anyone seen my parcel" and little photos of legs and front doors will appear.

  The world is changing but I don't think it is for the better.

Ex-Eton headmaster savages 'entitlement' of former pupils Johnson and Rees-Mogg (yahoo.com)  via Andrew. You have to be a dyed in the wool socialist to get into this household.

Bison and gold cups

This memory was caused by the two copied bison artfully positioned when you entered The British Museum, they took my breath away, though the BM model was very tame to the actuality of where and how they were found, see above photo taken from the internet.  It must have stunned the finders.  These two carefully modelled out of clay.  What did they represent? 

Fourteen thousand years ago is their approximate date, you can find some information about the find in 1912 by three teenagers in this wiki but it is not enough.  The Tuc D'Audoubert cave with this cow and bull bison shows creative artwork whatever the age era was.  And somehow it doesn't show religious significance more like what is on the menu tonight thinking! On second thoughts, we have both male and female so it could be a fertility symbol but I think not.

We had not gone just to visit, but had been invited by the present Japanese curator at that time to have a look at an exhibition going out of 'erotica' stuff. Erotica in Japan is quite near the knuckle by the way;) see the marriage manuals!    Paul had set up this department in the museum years ago, so he was an honoured guest.  

We pottered around in the museum in what I call the Celtic realm, and the following not very good  photos show the gold work.  I saw the Rillaton cup, badly bent though now it has been restored.  And we were very fortunate to be shown the Rillaton barrow where the cup was found out on Bodmin Moor in Cornwall by our good friend Roy when on holiday in Cornwall.

I see this is what I had written at the time on The Modern Antiquarian.

Firstly this enormous barrow is pitted with stone robber pits, a reed filled pond lies in its centre and the entrance pit has been raised up so as to stop school children* going into the hole and damaging the inside stones and the fluorescent lichen, which gives a ghostly green glow inside the tomb. The rather neat internal stones have ferns growing against them, and our proud warrior with his gold cup and bronze age dagger lies buried between the Cheesewring and the stone circles, he also has a marvellous view to the front over the surrounding countryside.

The photo inside is not very good (in fact most of my photos are bad) but you can definitely see the fluorescent lichen on the rock. It is better to click on the photos and go into the black I think.

The two similar gold cups, one found in Kent the other in Cornwall

Battle shield

Battersea battle shield

Rillaton Barrow

Inside Rillaton Barrow

lunch at the British Museum

V and M look as if they do not like their photo taken, not sure why.  Me I am my usual scruffy self! V talked about shopping at Zara , never heard of it at the time but have been since, after all I now live with fashionable people!   ..... 

12th June 2023 - Boreham Church

I just love the colours of faded petals and flowers.

Last night I attached my external drive of photos to this new computer.  Larger than life it all seemed to me. So I went through a few files. Somehow I am glad that I snapped away, for it brings so much back to me and of course the myriad of things I have seen.  Married to an archaeology lecturer for 27 years does give you an understanding of the history of this country, though those years are recorded in ordinary photos.  With Paul I happily 'did' churches, the list is long.

So the first to come to notice was St. Andrew's Church at Boreham, with its covered walkway.  What intrigued me here was the three, I think 16th century effigies, (definitely three Earls of Sussex) with their weird animals slumbering at their feet and heads.  Only of course those Cromwellians had left their mark, with nose cutting and head cutting of what at first I thought of as dogs with chains round them, but I don't know.  Given the marvellous imagination of the time to  what animals really looked like.

I find the carving extraordinary

Essex House, with old 'Jev' our transport that never failed.  It was Paul's pride and joy and Japanese of course. 

This car by the way, pride and joy of Paul's heart was immaculately kept, though Lucy was allowed in it.  But she could never be left alone, for somehow she always managed to turn on the alarm if we left her.  So while Paul mooched round the middle aisles of Lidl for half an hour, Lucy and I would sit and watch the world go by!  Jev is still alive and kicking with Paul's younger son.

North Stoke: Notes; St.Andrews Church, Boreham, Essex

10th June 2023

 Women: Strong women, those that fight and those in drama. Yes well I am not sure where I am going with this one.  But it was the sparky Carol Vorderman who started this train of thought.  She lashed out at the corrupt Conservative government we have with fact and figures and called the media to account for not bringing to the public eye the amount of money embezzled out of our countries fund. She is over the top definitely, but the newspapers like to bring her down to her body parts, forgetting she definitely has a brain as well!

The drama female is of course in the series of Borgen, the Danish female prime minister, who if not being charismatic on the screen is wielding her intellect into compromising on all the government policies that need passing.  A  game that of course can be written well in an excellent script but probably does not exist in the powers of government.

The third women I had my attention drawn to this morning was Cecilia Payne (1900 -1979) an astrophysicist who made the discovery of what the Universe is made of, though sadly another scientist took the credit four years later and her work went unrecognised until it was rescued.

Somehow I am glad that Cecilia Payne just went on working and discovering, she even managed marriage and three children in her busy life but there was quite a lot against her.  Being female she was not recognised as a professor at Harvard.  These were the bad old days for women, when, actually, men thought, we had lesser brains then them.  Sweet!

Coffee break.

Edit: I forgot, it only happened last night after all. Boris Johnson resigns from being an MP.

And then Andrew Rawnsley really hammered the nails into the ground.  The whingeing school boy who scuttled away from his crimes.

Who is Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin? | BBC Science Focus Magazine

Just thoughts

Looking at things you shouldn't:  Bet I got you there ;) No, as you will no doubt have gathered I love animals,  It seems to run in my family on my mother's side.  They have moved through my life, ponies, donkey, dogs, cats and rabbits.  Now I am animal less, no dog or cat to pet and worry over, I have held their paws as the final needle goes in and wept for the loss.  But actually most of them got to a dandy old age.

It started as a child, I wanted a dog, and so my grandfather got me one, sadly it was a St. Bernard I wanted, it was not housetrained, a breeding dog and had to go back to its breeder. There were spaniels and of course poodles in the family.  The poodle was the 'in' dog when I was growing up.  I believe celebrities go for those funny little pug like dogs now, it is sad what we do in the name of fashion.

I have moved away from what I started off with.  Well I love these little videos of animals on the screen and then this popped up.  It was supposedly a dog on an ice floe but when I clicked this frightening page appeared.

A Microsoft page, I had been attacked, do not turn off, phone this number.  So I did, knowing in my heart I had just been scammed, but of course the scammer was on the other end of the phone.  Told him to **** off and blocked the number.  All is well, turned off my computer anyway and it came back on happily.  Talk about teething problems.....

I am questioning myself now, why did I want a St.Bernard?  I think it was because a lovely collie border puppy I had been given for a birthday present died of distemper and it broke my heart. 

I think my understanding of this is that I mourn a life never lived, as I grew older and contemplate death, okay in this household we treat it with humour, I realise we have to make plans for the future though.

Edit:  A favourite blog of the landscape and wild life where I live.  Too old to walk up onto the moors through the woods, but Paul Knight traces the brilliant arrival of June through the last two essays he has written.

Here is the newest, 'Essence' but the one before that is equally as beautiful. 'Luminous'

7th June 2023

 Yesterday Andrew uploaded some photos from the 'Cloud', stuff floating around in space is how I see it.  But the great bulk of photos on my external drive is still not uploaded.  This computer is excellent for its big screen but all its openings for attaching things like external drives and memory cards are at the back which is rather awkward,  But it is also splendid for watching films or television programmes.

I have been watching Borgen, a Scandinavian drama about a female prime minister and what she has to do (often against her better judgement) to stay in power, the latest is divorce.

I notice John (Going Gently) was eating scotch eggs yesterday on a bench with his dogs somewhere in Wales and it reminded me of something I had read a few days ago.  Don't be squeamish from the following but do you know you can have vegan scotch eggs? First thing that sprang to mind how can you have a scotch egg without an egg?

Here is the recipe: Centre part = mashed potato coloured with turmeric. Middle part = white cooked rice of course.  Outer part = a mash of red kidney beans, etc.  A long process with a very funny outcome.  No I won't be trying it.

I had been listening to Henry Dimbley's book called 'Ravenous'  he was the author of the Government's Food Strategy.  A sensible look at how we can focus on better eating for the nation and yes it does incur giving up some meat and dairy products.  But then there are artificial means of creating meat down in the scientist's laboratories, without putting all those animals under the stress of short lives and nasty deaths in abattoirs.  Don't worry it will take a few years yet, it is prohibitively expensive at the moment.

One day I will read up on fungi, apparently it's meaty texture is just that and is equally as good for us. Which brings me to thoughts of another subject.  The stripping of wild foods from the countryside.

There is a bit of an uproar there.  Apparently all those blackberries you strip from the bushes are robbing the birds of their food.  I think we would all agree there are plenty of blackberries and wild garlic for all of us but the mushrooms of the forest and woods floor should be left by greedy and unscrupulous people to serve the fashionable London restaurants with a taste of the 'wild'.

p.s. Just found a new toy on this computer, it read out aloud this blog, there are plenty of voices too choose from  as well perhaps I can dictate to it also.

Just a thought

Links

Stained glass painting by John Piper in Devizes Museum

Yesterday I wrote a small blog with links in it, and then somehow tapped the wrong key and it vanished!  But something had made me laugh with delight, a link to the Tate's collection of photographs taken by John Piper.  Yes I am a John Piper fan. his strong paintings somehow echo in my soul and he has painted pictures of prehistoric stones but his photographs of churches, carvings and general humdrum aspects of life I had never come across.  Well thanks to 'Smell of Water' blog yesterday which comes through my email, he uses it to locate churches and their wonderful carved stone fonts and effigies.

Does the world get smaller I wonder as we are introduced to some of its wonderful history, or does it become larger?  leading us down more rabbit holes till our senses are blown away.  

I notice in this trip to East Yorkshire he had stopped off at the great barrow of Duggleby Howe.  'Howe' by the way comes from haugr an old Norse word.  Reminding me why we had gone that day to see the deserted medieval village of Wharram Percy.  The link below.

The word 'Howe' also remind us of the strong Scandinavian links that Yorkshire has.  From the Vikings in York, to the beautiful drinking horn that went from the area of Normanby where I used to live, a furious  Scandinavian father had disinherited his sons.  

There are traces of strange foreign influences in Yorkshire, go to Lythe just outside Whitby and view the Hogback graves of the Berserkers.  Yes they probably even used drugs in the olden days, magic mushrooms anyone?

A lovely but sad meander through my blogs, but I am glad it was written and the photographs capture the moments.

East Yorkshire Blogs:

1) North Stoke: Tuesday or Valentine's day

2)   North Stoke: A ruined church and Harvest Festival

2nd June 2023

In the olden days of new television they had 'intervals' or at least 'test' pictures, before all this advertising; life was tranquil.  Tranquility has been lost now, advertise, advertise, and more advertising along with the trivia of life.

Sagas erupt, Phillip Schofield and everyone in this minute drama please pipe down, I couldn't care less who you have slept with.  I would like Johnson to retire after making all his money on the American circuit of 'talk'. But just tell me America why do you pay to listen to a liar?

Pat was remembering the old man who lived in a caravan at the bottom of the lane to her farmer husband's farm and I remembered Nelson and his little smallholding just on the other side of the Sun Inn in Normanby.  There was some dispute over the land but he reigned with his little kingdom of animals and the old caravan he lived in.  Sweet baby goats, ducks, chickens geese, sheep grazing the banks of the river and whatever took his fancy from the Malton market.

His chickens would wander into our garden, and obviously liking it would try to stay and I would fetch him to catch them.  Not easy for he lived behind a barricaded gate.  He also at one stage kept bees up on the moors, and had a little table in the pub car park on which he sold jars of honey and eggs.  Paul once brought Karen a jar of honey, but she said there was a lot of 'other' things in the honey so did not eat it.

Nelson would get his water from a stag pipe across the road from our cottage, his white van would stop and a pile of large white plastic cans would slowly be filled.  People brought him meals in the pub, you put your money down at the counter for future meals for him.

His couple of acres ran alongside the river, and my walk was always on the other side of the river and a strange thing happened every year. There would be egg shells along the path, obviously stolen from chickens from his plot, but who was the thief, and did this creature brave the shallow river? 

At Xmas he would creep into the copse behind our garden and cut down the berried holly branches for sale in Malton.  He tried to be unseen but I always saw him.  I am sure the people who owned the land would not have begrudged him though.