Food for Thought

How can I spend £164 in the supermarket* and yet not know what to make for the boys tea?

The birds have stripped the pink rowan of it’s berries.

I always find it very reassuring that next years buds are ready and waiting for spring.

*OK so it was Waitrose, and not Aldi, but I do have an advanced certificate in spotting the reduced stickers at Waitrose.

Pot of Gold

Only time for a quick whiz up the hill today. With Spud hogging the shots, as usual.

I will get out and about more soon, the end is in sight.  Of course, I could have joined the rest of the world today and gone to town Christmas shopping.

But I’d rather be in the hills.

Spud and I would like to apologise to the small girl in the lavender coloured anorak, as it was obvious that the two muddy foot prints he planted on said anorak were not appreciated. The girls mother briskly took a tissue to the muddy bits and shot us a frosty stare; Spud and I exited stage left.

It was destiny I should be the mother of boys, I don’t have an issue with mud, except on the kitchen floor.

Table Manners

Spud, keep you ears off the kitchen table; please.

Spud has perfected the skill of pulling out the kitchen chairs and taking a seat at  the table.

December Rose

The 1st of December, the last rose in the garden.

Take Five

Joe had some homework to do, an art project, he had to produce five photographs of modern or contemporary architecture, which is a bit tricky around here, as things tend to look  rather vernacular in style; unless you count the ugly tin shed down by the canal that trades under the brand of Tescos;  I try hard to ignore it.

The best we could do in the time available was to nip over to Buxton. It has few new builds of any note (it does however, have it’s own large tin shed, the Buxton Mineral Water bottling plant) But the Cavendish shopping arcade has a very fine barrel vaulted stained glass roof, that merges the old with the new (the arcade was once thermal/hot baths, built in 1820)

Surprisingly (seeing as it wasn’t his home work) Tom was keen to come with us

Joe took charge of the camera

and decided he would have some shots of old building anyway; this the splendid Georgian crescent (which is architecturally more significant that Bath’s Crescent and is a building that has aspirations )

For his homework the prints had to be black and white, but I’ll bring you the last one in colour, its too vibrant not to be shared on such a dismal November day.

Tom took just five shots, I explained the general idea, with photography, was to take a lot more than that and then select the best. ‘Mum, you just don’t get it do you’?’ said Tom ‘It’s home work, five photographs, he’s taken five, job done; can we go to GAME now?

So that’s why he was so keen to join us.

All photographs by Joe Uphilldowndale. (here is some of his earlier work)

Top Dog

Spud is getting ideas above his station. His bed is supposed to be the crate underneath this basket where I caught him napping.

The basket was supposed to be for newspapers, but he’d shredded those earlier in the day, and had a chew on the basket. It is getting difficult to keep things out of his reach now that his nose can appear over the edge of the work top: he’s not eaten anything of great value yet, but we can’t help but feel it is only a matter of time (like young Dave who is a master at munching valuable items.)

We now need to be vigilant at all times!

Spud was so excited when Joe’s friend came to visit yesterday that he just jumped onto the kitchen table in one bound. But can we convince him to jump in the back of the car? No.

Edit.

Here is Spud with  a comb over

Passing Through Prestbury

The day was soggy and grey, but I felt the need to bring you a few snaps.

The quintessential English parish church, with classic examples of communications equipment from a bygone era, a phone box that works (well there was someone in it I’m assuming they were making a call!) a post box and parish notice board.

Across the road the wonderful Priest House,  built circa 1448 it is now masquerading as a branch of the National West Bank (and it must be a bit of a nightmare for the estates dept of the the bank; how do you make a timber framed building with leaded lights and a grade one listed building status secure? Any how, it is a bank with character and you don’t see much of that theses days.

Apparently, during times of during times of ‘plague and sweating sickness’* the priest would deliver his sermons from the balcony, so as not to mix with the germ and flea infested throng. Services were also delivered from here during ‘The Commonwealth period’ as during this time the churches were closed. Now my historical knowledge is scant, at school we seemed to jump from colouring in pictures of Guy Fawkes, in what would now be known as the ‘reception class’ to learning about Operation PLUTO in year 12; I’m sure I must have been taught some other fascinating historical facts in between but I’m dammed if I can remember them. I’m ashamed to say I’d never heard of the Commonwealth period. So I asked the boys, all three of them, no joy, so having established it wasn’t on the time table at Mr Uhdd’s  grammar school circa 1960’s, nor is it on the current national curriculum. It even took a bit of finding mousing around the Internet, but here you are The Commonwealth 1649-53

I think it is amazing that buildings like this have survived the risky, vulnerable period where they went from being the most important place in the village (aside from the church) to being old fashioned, scruffy and not as useful as newer buildings to  becoming old enough and historic enough to be protected for prosperity, looking at the next shot you could imagine how it could have been consumed by the the later developments that surround it.

Today Prestbury is a very affluent village it is in the golden triangle, the area favoured by the Cheshire set, Prestbury princesses, professional footballers and their attendant WAGS, (actually overseas readers, if you are not familiar with the term WAGS, it is more of a visual thing than a Wiki thing) the main street is peppered with wine bars and restaurants and independent travel agents ( serving a customer base that has no need to scrat around on the Internet for the best deal.) That said, the current economic climate must have made a hit even here

The White House Prestbury was once a place to be seen to dine, if that’s what you were about.

The website is still up, so you can go and have a virtual dinner for two if you so wish.

*Sweating sickness, it must have been swine flu, ‘sweating like a pig’, gedit? oh never mind, I’ll go.

Black as a Bag

It has poured with rain today, not like in Cumbria you understand; just miserable, I had to head down to the south of the county this afternoon, it was so dark and dismal when I came out of the house that the security lights on the barn came on, it was 12:45. November eh? Lovely.

The rain made for unpleasant driving conditions with lots of standing water and heavy spray kicked up by HGV’s. On my return journey I came along the A515, Ashbourne to Buxton road, it’s a road with a reputation, not only is it a stretch of road that has a high number of accidents, it has a high number ghastly accidents. The Romans built the road long and straight, but I don’t imagine they did much in the way of speed or overtaking, with pack horses and the odd chariot. Now it is a fast road (in spite of the speed restrictions) and needs treating with respect. I’d just safely overtaken a Landrover pulling a trailer load of sheep, when out of the rain and the darkness, came a black blob, a  blob that was blacker and harder than the wraparound black I was driving through. It took me a second or two to realise it was a tractor, a tractor with a massive bale of silage ( that unhelpfully was shrouded in black plastic) stuck on the huge spikes that stick out of the front of tractors for such a purpose. The bale totally obscured the one 15w light that the tractors driver seemed to think was sufficient lighting for the task. It flashed through my mind, what if, what if that tractor had been a few hundred yards up the road, when I was overtaking, I’d have hit it head on. I flashed my lights.

In my rear view mirror, the strobes of flashing of headlights from the following cars told me they were thinking just the same thing. Not that it bears  thinking about; here look at something sunny and not black, and remember summer.

 

Deluge

Not here, but in Cumbria, the Lake District and southern Scotland the irony is that it is the rain that gives that regions landscape such beauty and drama and yet it can also deliver such misery and tragedy.

Wasdale October 2008

When we were in the Lake District last October, we thought there had been a lot of rain and flooding; but it was nothing compared to what has happened in the the last 48 hours, so sympathies to all those affected, especially the family, friends and colleagues of PC Bill Barker and those still out dealing with the aftermath of the flooding and under the threat of more rain today. These photos show the enormity of the problem with more news items here

Wasdale October 2008

Leisure

What is this life if if, full of care,

we have no time to stand and stare.

                                      

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And Stare as long as sheep and cows

No time to see when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

 

  W.H. Davies from the poem ‘Leisure’

To be continued, but if you haven’t the time to wait, you can find the poem in full here