Grin

This makes me smile every time I drive past

Maybe it is the work of Bansky’s country cousin.

Cut Backs

I am hairdresser in residence to the Uphilldowndale household, a lot of this has to do, not with my skills with a pair of clippers but the fact that my men folk are unwilling to spend time traveling to, or waiting for, a barber or a hairdresser.

(Model, Mr Grasshead, styling and photography by Joe Uhdd aged 11, earring, models own)

Much to the delight of Mr Uhdd this also saves us a wad of money (but no one is coming near my tresses, thank you very much, other than a  professional, somehow a number 3 cut isn’t very flattering on a girl of my age, Sigourney Weaver might be able to get away with it, I cant.)

It’s not a task I enjoy, and its just as well the guys are happy with a short back and sides, because I can’t do anything else, my tools are not the most sophisticated, (although I have got new scissors) in fact, between you and me the clippers are in fact dog clippers.

Not that they have ever been used in anger, on a dog; we bought them for our our old dog (RIP), however with his sore arthritic hips he was not going to let me anywhere near him, whilst wielding a pair of clippers, he would rather have matted fur than that, thank you very much. So he hid under the table and refused to come out and the clippers went back in the box. But his fur was such a mess that we did have to call on the help of the professionals, it was a bit of a blow for a ruffty tuffty working dog, to have go to the poodle parlour, but there you go, not sure the cut he got looked like ‘what he wanted’ though, bless him, it’s not very easy maintaining your dignity, when you are old.

Perfect day

The wedding, was wonderful, the ceremony was all the more meaningful for it’s simplicity, so many of the fripperies  of a traditional church wedding are cleaved away in a Quaker ceremony, leaving the bride and groom, and what we have all come to witness, their commitment to one another, at center of the occasion, it was very moving. Having spent over two decades dealing with the hype and drama of other peoples weddings, when I worked in the flower business, where I am sure many couples had given more thought to whether or not the colour of the bridesmaids dress clashed with the best-man’s cravat, than to the reason why they are getting married in the first place, it was like a breath of fresh air. Most of the ceremony is conducted in silence, this was a bit of a challenge to some of us, in spite of the fact I had checked three time that I had turned my mobile phone off, I still wished I had left it in the mini bus, just to be on the safe side.

We could not have been made more welcome at the ceremony by the other friends at the meeting house, they made us a splendid tea that included my all time favourite cake, ginger cake

After tea, cake and photographs in the garden, we went on to the reception, did I mention I thought some care might have gone into the selection of the reception venue and that real ale might be involved?

 

The meal  at the Thatchers Arms, Mount Bures, in Essex, was divine, I had rack of lamb with rosemary mash, served with a rich gravy, as dark as Tudor oak; the wedding cake was chocolate, with just a hint of something, alcoholic and citrus in the cream, the boys ate two servings, well most of us did actually, truth be told.

We sat out in the sun for a while, and took part in one or two ‘activities’ that had been arranged for us, (I may post more about that) to allow time our ample meal to digest and the band to set up. A cracking band, brought about much dancing, (even Tom felt moved by the music, to get up on the dance floor and he was particularly impressed by the drumming) there was just a little disappointment that the band didn’t have ‘Tiger Feet’ by Mud, in the repertoire but they did have this Elvis

One of the things that made it such a special day, was not only seeing the bride and groom so very happy, meeting old friends, but in addition to that coming home having made some new friends too.

I don’t normally post personal photos on my blog, and I’ve not asked them if they mind, but I’ll chance it: here you go,  ladies and gentlemen, please raise your glasses, a toast.

  ‘The bride and groom wishing them health and happiness, always.’

Proud as a Peacock

This peacock was getting a tad territorial,  seeing it’s own reflection in the paint work of the cars, he took them to be challengers to his male dominance.

He was willing to take on all comers.

The owner of the car with the shiny alloy wheels, was not impressed about having his precious paint work chipped at by a pointy bird beak. He tried remonstrating with the bird, shooing it away and getting rather stroppy with it, much to the amusement of everyone else in the car park, it would have made a wonderful candid shot; but having made a dynamic risk assessment used my feminine intuition, to deduce that the guy was not going to take kindly to someone taking snapshots of him arguing with a peacock, after all it wasn’t just the peacock that was ’strutting it’s stuff’ and showing off his fine plumage, I decided I’d best be discrete, in the end the peacock won and the guy drove off in a huff, wheels spinning, I think his feathers were a little ruffled. 

Jump for Joy

This was fun

Tom was on the trampoline this afternoon, I was lying on the grass underneath it!

 

 

 

 

I think I now understand how war photographers sometimes get themselves killed because they are so busy ’seeing through the lens’ rather than being aware of the dangers around them. I think he got quite close on the big jumps

Me

Just when you thought it impossible to hear any more about me, I’ve been tagged by Noddy

Now firstly I must apologise to Jo who tagged me last month and I failed to get my act together and reply, so this is sort of a two in one post.

Here are the rules, for those who decide to play along:
1) Link to your tagger and post these rules on your blog.
2) Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3) Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4) Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Well many of my oddities are already placed in the public domain, see my ‘can do,can’t do’ and ‘love it, hate it’ pages, but here are few more

I was born with hazel coloured eyes, rather than the factory fitted standard of baby blue.

As a child I was terrified of the sound of the Cuckoo, listen here, I used to run indoor crying if I heard it, now, sadly we never hear it around here.

Aged about four, I knocked the garden shed off its foundations when I crashed into it in my big brothers boggy cart, (sort of a basic ‘go cart’) ahhhh, now those were the days, boggy carts built with proper Silver Cross pram wheels.

Tea, is a passion, but I never drain the cup; I was raised up in a ‘loose tea’ house hold, three spoons to the pot, using the spoon in the caddy, this has over left me with a learned behavior Skinner would have been impressed by. Over three decades latter I still think I will get a mouthful of tea leaves if I drink every last drop even though I made the tea with a tea bag.

In the 1980’s I had a nice cup of tea and a sit down, with the then Northern Ireland minister, Tom King on the balcony of Stormont Castle in Belfast

I loath exterior window shutters on houses, the fake ones that can never be closed to keep out the heat of the midday sun, because A, it never gets that hot in the UK and B, they are screwed to the wall.

Like this, ‘for decoration only,’ close these and you decapitate the window box flowers

I also have a deep desire to liberate road signs from layers of road grime or algae, so far I have repressed the desire to run round the county with a bucket of soapy water and a cloth, but it’s only a matter of time. (You might think this ‘quirk’ indicated that I have very high standards of domestic cleanliness, you would be wrong.)

So here are my tags, play along if you wish, but feel free to ignore and go out to play instead.

Tea Stains

Siren voices

nezza

Gerry

Bo

Robin

Louise

Sullied Reputation.

My reputation at work is taking a bit of a slide

Last week the boss of bosses, caught sight of me in the corridor

‘Ohhhhh, goodness, Heather, I thought for a moment your were….’

Then the security guard (large) was also taken aback,

‘Bloody hell, it’s a bit early for that!’

The cause of this problem is my thermal tea mug. Now regular readers will know I am fond of a nice steaming mug of tea, but what I don’t like is vending machine tea, it is the devils brew; even a bottle tepid aspartame riddled ‘pop’ seems like nectar in comparison to ‘machine tea’.

My work is a bit nomadic, I wander around the site with no desk to call my own, nowhere to hide a kettle, so on the days when I know I am going to be out of range of the cafeteria I take my insulated mug, it’s one of those bits of kit, that does all you could ever ask of it, the right size, not so small as to be like drinking from a thimble, nor so big It’s like hauling a firkin around all day, it keeps my tea nice and hot. I even like the colour, I chose it especially, its green I like green, it’s a little like the green triangles in Quality Street, I like them too.

And this is where it is all going wrong, here is the offending mug

Yesterday was a long day, 12 hours two different roles, so in an effort to stop my tea levels falling so dangerously low as to induce a coma, I legged it from one end of the site to the the other to replenish my tea mug and took my self off outside to a quiet corner of the car park, to sit in the evening sun, to drink my tea, eat my banana and restore a sense of homeostasis, a little oasis in a busy day; that was until I was clocked by security guard (small) he came striding (small) across the car park.

‘Is every thing OK?’ he asked looking a little concerned.

The problem is you see, when grasped firmly in the hand and from a distance, my tea mug looks for all the world, just like a can of Heineken beer, people think I have a bit of a drink problem.

The boss of bosses and security guards, large and small, now know that my real vice is tea and not beer (although I like beer as you know, but not in the same volume as tea) and are somewhat amused by my tea mug; but as for what the rest of my colleagues think, but don’t say, I’m sure I will be the last to know.

Right time for a nice cup of tea and a sit down

Blue Sky Thinking

A good way to start the day, I took this shot on my way to work this morning; delicious blue sky, spring grass and sexy curvy dry stone walls, the last time I mentioned sexy curvy walls, I had an email from a reader who said I needed to get out more.

Velvet soft or as tough as old boots?

Whilst I was at the PC tonight, Joe came and gave me a big hug,

‘I love you’ I told him,

‘I love you’ he replied, ‘you’re all snuggly, like a , like a velvet pillow’

Aaahhh I thought, sweet, what a charmer my boy is; then he realised there was a gap in his knowledge on the subject

he continued, ‘What is velvet anyway?’ then with out missing a beat, he continued, ‘Let’s say a you’re like leather pillow instead.’

Mad House

I have spent some time today searching for my glasses, I could remember I brought them in from the car on Saturday, when I got back from shopping, but I couldn’t find them, not until I  was preparing some lunch and there they were; in the fridge, in the bag with a pound and a half of traditional sausages and a pound of home cured bacon. They have misted up now.

‘Thing one’ made a break for freedom this morning, and who could blame her, it’s a mad house;

she fluttered up into the cab of the delivery drivers van, he looked a little bemused, she looked some what thwarted when I retrieved her. I told Joe what she had done , ‘Oh no she didn’t do a poo, did she?’ no thank goodness,that would have cost us a dozen eggs , by way of an apology.

She isn’t the first of our pets to plan a great escape, Boo the old cat, had to be brought back home by the telephone engineer who had been working at the house, he  found her in the back of his van when he got back to the telephone exchange, at the other side of town.