One of those middle of the night wake-ups

 Roll on spring, is all I can say.  The first signs are here with bulbs beginning to bloom in the garden, but very few Celendines about along the lanes yet.  I think they must have been hit hard by the hot spell last year as it's certainly mild enough to see them - they were flowering in the snow last year.  The Pussy Willows are starting to put out "paws" though, and gosh, the birdsong in the mornings and evenings is really kicking off.

I wish we had some outings to look forward to, but Keith's blood pressure is as low as mine is high, so we need to get that back in balance more.  He never feels thirsty so getting him to drink is always an uphill battle. I don't know what will come of Keith's seeing the Consultant on Monday - we will have to see what the Parkinsons' nurse says when we see her next.

35 books went off to the Charity shop this week.

I have decided to have my DNA done for my birthday present this year, using Ancestry as they do seem to be the best.  Our girls have been mistaken for having Mediterranean blood in the past, and one of my cousins too, so I wonder if there is a link to that genetically?  At least that will be something to look forward to.  We watched Who Do You Think You Are this week with Mark Wright I think it was - apparently he starred on The Only Way is Essex - something quite beyond my radar.  His "East End of London" roots turned out to be much more exotic than that, tracing back to Sephardic Jews from Southern Spain (Andalucia).  One of his ancestors had been a Sword Master, and of course, they dressed him up and introduced him to a Modern Day Sword Master who gave him a lesson, and boy, talk about in the genes - the lad was a natural - great hand/eye co-ordination (that is something I do NOT have a genetic bump for, and have passed it on to Danny!)  Isn't it strange, what you get in your mix, from an affinity with animals, to artistic talents, to musicality, to sporting prowess, to a scientific bent.  I used to be good with words, and have never had any affinity with figures or legal jargon or spreadsheets!  I was always telling Keith to "jot this down for me" as we drove about the countryside, and little descriptive phrases came into my head, and I would put them in my Commonplace book when we got home.  The words no longer come.  I have really struggled to write anything worth reading recently and perhaps it is time to put the blog to bed, or just have photos on it.  I don't want it to become just a downward health spiral account or Pictures of Kittens, delightful though they are.

Now I'm the poorly one

 We had to go to Hereford Hospital yesterday, for K's appt. with his Neurology consultant.  All went well but he needs another MRI scan - they didn't do his middle spine before so the consultant wants that scanned now.  We both slept very badly the previous night, and so are still shattered today as we had to be up at 5.45 a.m. to get ready to go to Hereford for a 9 a.m. appt.

Oooh - look what's on tv!

Now we have a Blood Pressure checker at home, I checked us both this morning - Keith's was low because he was dehydrated, mine high which combined with Bradycardia, is not a good combination.  I was hoping my BP was a bit lower first thing as it has been high lately, but no . . . I have booked myself in at the GP's later to get checked out.  

When my gran was young

 Well, step-gran to tell the truth, as she was grandad's 2nd wife.  She came from mining stock at Radstock and was the last of 7 children, and born around 1906.  I have a book which I got from the bookshelf, intending to send to the charity shop, but opened it and it will now stay.  Here is what life was like at Radstock school around the time my step-gran was there.

From an article "Tyning pit was more than a mine, it was a living community" by Ron Perrett, Radstock:

"We went to the Radstock Board School.  I don't know why it was thus called.  Then and at no other time in its long history had it ever boarded pupils and never in my wildest imagination can I see it proclaiming itself as 'The Radstock Boarding School, seminary for the further education of collier's sons and daughters.'

    I think my first childhood memory was of the schoolroom where my education started.  I have thought very hard but there seems to be nothing before this.  Initially, we were to be amused rather than educated.  There were large frames of counting beads, bricks and modelling clay and the most fascinating of all, shallow trays filled with sand.  We drew pictures with our forefinger and to erase and start again required no more than a slight shake of the tray.

    The passport to the Grammar School or Secondary School as it was known then, was the School Certificate.  All of us who were candidates for this examination were, for the next year, to be the Headmaster's special charge.  If there had been factory farming in those days, we would have best been described as battery hens.  We were placed in a special class and were fed twice daily.  This was on a controlled diet of arithmetic in the morning and English in the afternoon.  The only time it varied was when results in the morning were unsatisfactory.  Arithmetic would then be fed again in the afternoon. . . . .

"There was a little sweet shop, that conveniently stood on the road to school, halfway up the hill directly opposite my grandparents' house.  It wasn't really a shop at all but a very small cottage converted for this purpose.  It was kept by an old lady by the name of Miss Rivers  She was small and softly spoken, and ever patient as we stood deliberating, sometimes at great length, as to the best way to spend the 1/2d (half-penny) tightly clenched in the hand.

    She always wore black dresses that accentuated the whiteness of her hair.  The sweets were laid out on two large tables facing the door.  They were so big in relation to the tiny parlour that they had veritably taken it over and squeezed the old lady into a corner by the fire.  There she sat in a high backed chair, always knitting when she was not serving us.  To me, it was more than a sweet shop - it was a fairy grotto.

    We could have liquorice in sticks or strips, a liquorice pipe or liquorice bootlaces.  Or we might buy a packet of sherbet with a round dab on a stick for licking, or with a tube of liquorice sticking from its top for sucking through.  We could buy four aniseed balls, a packed of sweet shredded pipe tobacco  or a gobstopper that changed colour as we sucked it.  Of course, we had to watch this magical process which meant its removal from the mouth every few minutes.  But often we would chance all on a lucky dip.  The bag had a magic about it and the mystery of the unknown.  What a permutation of sweetness and with a 1/2d in the hand, who could make a decision?"

(I have to say, all these sweets - and many more - were still available in the 1950s and 60s when I was growing up and Lucky Bags were often the choice then - gone up in price to 3d by then!)

Another, briefer, extract:

"My grandfather was a miner, as were initially all the boys.

    Grandmother baked all her own bread in the huge kitchen stove.  She made every garment and mended every garment.  She planned every meal with economic precision.  Shoes for the family were cleaned and laid in a row every evening, ready for the next day.  She sent her children to school clean and well clothed, even if gracelessly so. 

    I can remember mother telling me that after washing and putting her eight children to bed, she retired to her own and gave birth to her ninth.  No wonder then, in a moment of great stress, she confessed that if things did not improve she could no longer face life.  Grandfather left the pit at Writhlington where he worked, walked to Braysdown Colliery and begged for a better paid position." (He was successful).

Taken from "Where Have All the Cowslips Gone" - Wessex Memories, edited by Venetia Murray.

Changeover accomplished

 AND the tv part too.  Glad that's all done and dusted, and Damien from Sky was an absolute star. I will try and manage a post later but have some gardening to do first.

Tasty soup and something to read on a wet day

 

HERE'S the recipe for this.  So cheap and simple to make and tasty and warming to eat. The original BBC recipe also mentions curried pinwheels to accompany it, but I just had a home-made crusty bread roll.  I made some yesterday for lunch when Gabby came to visit.

The Lakes and Waterfalls booklet is local-ish walks - many of the waterfall ones tell you to take the Heads of the Valleys road . . .  The Poldark book is because I've been clearing a bookshelf and told myself - read it or get rid.  Since I have been meaning to read the last few Poldark books for decades, now is the time!  I'm a devil for putting off till tomorrow . . .  The Alis Hawkins is the 4th book by her, set in the Newcastle Emlyn/Cardigan area of Wales, and about a nearly blind County Coroner investigating a murder.  I can recommend her novels.  The Road to Haworth is one I treated myself to last time I was in Hay.  For once, it focuses on the Rev. Patrick Bronte rather than his talented daughters (although I am sure Branwell was talented though he was so weak).  If you are a fan of the Brontes then I can really recommend this as it gets to the roots of Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights in a way you'd never imagine.  Finally, READ - Sue in Suffolk very kindly loaned me A Patch in the Forest, Elizabeth West's final book (she of Hovel in the Hills fame).  Whilst it was different to the  struggles in North Wales at the hovel, it showed that Alan was working on improving their final home - probably until the day he died, and he died not long after this book was published in 2001.  What I loved about it was they had a good retirement - did what they wanted, when they wanted, no longer forced to live as hand-to-mouth as they had at Hafod.  She clearly devoted a goodly amount of time to studying the wildlife - birds especially - in their garden, and wrote about it in great detail. I am very grateful to Sue for loaning it and will post it back to you tomorrow.

The Castles book was in the window of our local History Association shop, and although it's nearly all just ruins of castles, good to dip into and some interesting history.  Another dipping into book is the one by our old Vicar of Brechfa, Patrick Thomas.  He is a Canon now.

Having finished all 1,000 pages of The Pillars of the Earth, I have two more Ken Follett's to read when I have time.  They also came from donated books at Tesco in Llandod.

A Daphne du Maurier I'd never heard of or read (she was asked to finish it by the daughter of Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch.) The Welsh one I'm really looking forward to, and Peter James is an author whose books I enjoy (but not the ones set in China).

Another for the pile, kindly sent my my friend Gay.

The girls killing a cushion this morning . . .

Holding my breath . . .

 Today is the day I change broadband providers from John Lewis to Plusnet (I think they used Plusnet anyway!)  I have a new router to plug in and fortunately Gabby is coming today (originally to garden but of course it is raining!) so she can help me set it up.  I am toying with the idea of nipping down to Jewsons and getting the yellow paint we have chosen for the Guest Bedroom.  Then we can make the most of a wet day and start decorating in there.  Watch this space.

Hopefully it will be a seamless changeover . . .

The restorative powers of Christmas Cake . . .

 BTW, the new header photo is from May a couple of years back.  There are just Snowdrops out at the moment - how I wish we could fast forward to spring proper, and carpets of Bluebells again.

Here is that rare thing - a photo of yours truly! - with Tam of course.  We were dressed up ready to go for our meal.  We did enjoy it.  Keith's idea of eating out was always a bacon roll at the Sandwich Cellar in Backfold in Hay-on-Wye!  

We did enjoy our meal.  They did a choice of menus including a cheaper one, but we couldn't decide on a main from that so as some of the other mains were things like chicken in a red wine sauce (which we had with our Tesco £12 meal the other night) and something I fancied but was accompanied by truffled pasta and I loathe truffles, I ended up just having cod and chips - but WHAT fresh, sweet cod in the floatiest batter, and the chips - oh my goodness, the best I've ever had - 3 times cooked and fluffy inside.  A small dish of petit pois, home made Tartare sauce and even one of batter scraps.  Tam had cod with creamed spinach, artichoke and silver skin onions, with sauces/drizzles (yum too).  The wine was a revelation after the usual "house white" you get.  No mention of house wine anyway - we asked for dry white and it was amazing. Really full bodied and fruity.  Gosh, we'd have happily sunk a whole  bottle of it!  We shared a pudding - banana fritters with banana ice cream, a spoonful of chocolate sauce and chocolate sprinkles.  My friend whose husband is a chef said it is a really good gastro pub, but there's one in Abergavenny which has a Michelin star, so that probably qualifies for best in Wales.  This was the Felinfach Griffin anyway, if you're in Wales and want a good meal.

Yesterday Keith and I went to Malvern Fleamarket.  It was a very early start - made worse by the fact I woke over an hour before the alarm and got up as I knew I wouldn't sleep on so by 3.45 a.m. I was downstairs getting organized.  Keith just had a few mouthfuls of tea and a toasted hot X bun - not much of a breakfast to keep you fortified for the day.  He has had a change of medication from a pill to a 24 hour patch and I think that is still getting balanced plus he had done more walking than usual at the PD Clinic on Thursday and any over-doing has a knock-on effect for up to a week afterwards.  He was very tottery on his feet yesterday, which was such a worry.  He went into the Gents and several blokes came out and said to me, "Is he going to be alright?"   Well, I could hardly go in and check could I?  Update: Radar key for disabled toilet purchased, and Keith is marching up and down OK today.  Obviously lack of sleep makes a BIG difference to his mobility and energy.

We were late arriving, it took a while to get the mobility scooter out and everything sorted and they had the outside stalls at the far end of the showground.  There were lots of buyers and I don't think they had the field across the road for parking (being winter)  so had to put the overflow inside the actual showground and then on a field off the car park.   Going round the stalls in the sheds was difficult as lots of people and as seems to be the case rather than the exception, people just blocking Keith's efforts to manouvre towards or away from a stall or just plain going forward.  We went back to the car for "breakfast" about 10 a.m. and I was glad to have packed some of my brandied Christmas cake as a slice between us really kept us going - not sure if it was the cake or the brandy wot did it though!

Keith liked the font cover - but let's face it, what would you DO with it?!!

Keith was very thorough with the outside stalls and went very slowly, which is so incredibly frustrating for me, who does everything flat out and normally I would be away and along those stalls like a whippet - I can quickly cast an eye, see if there is anything to suit me, and then move on.  We missed every other row, and there wasn't a great deal of any merit or suitability, but Keith got a couple of things.  

He had to be talked out of buying more Windsor chairs and wouldn't believe me when I said there was no room in the stables, as he suggested that's where any could go.  I have told him he needs to look in and see how full they are and suggested he gets rid of some of the bins of "useful bits of wood" which came with us from Ynyswen.  He isn't able to do woodwork now and it needs to get sorted out.  Me - I'd chuck the lot as with the best will in the world, Keith's not able to make use of it now.  I also need to do as many car boot sales as possible this year to get rid of old stock, now I am winding down from our trading years.

A quick glimpse of some of the things on offer.  The Peacock style chair below should soon attract a buyer.

An old cash  till or a Fairground galloper ?

Lastly, a little painting which quite appealed to me.  I was good though and left it there.

Today I think we won't be doing much at all, just resting.  I can happily write we had a good day out yesterday but much goes unsaid, and to compare it to "the good old days" - well, this is a different experience entirely.