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| A kestrel hovering at Totley Bents last Sunday |
This week has ended with grey days. Drizzle and rain and a chill in the air. Night-time arrives in the late afternoon. They have not been days for walking and pointing my camera at country scenes.
There was a pub quiz on Tuesday with Mick and Mike but we didn't win. I reckon we have been quizzing together for over twenty years - week after week. It's nice to have friends like that - with whom you can be yourself. No need to prove anything or try to win points. You can just be yourself.
I worked at the Oxfam shop again on Wednesday. It's amazing to think that I have been going there for four years now - pretty much the same amount of time I spent in higher education in the seventies. It's always interesting to see new donations. You never know what you are going to get. For example, on Wednesday we received an envelope stuffed with used German banknotes from the nineteen thirties. For a moment, I paused to imagine whose hands those notes might have passed through.
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| A horse at Totley Bents with a railway tunnel vent behind |
This week I made two visits to Sheffield's best printing and art store. I had been given permission by "The Yorkshire Post" to get a certain magazine front cover printed. It depicts our son Ian and his Bosh! colleague Henry soon after their cookbook was launched.
I am reading a book about a Yorkshire farmer called Hannah Hauxwell. Accidentally, she became a national celebrity in the nineteen seventies. Predictably, I will blog more about her and the read when I have finished the book.
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| Sheffield's Royal Hallamshire Hospital and University Arts Tower Seen over rooftops from Brincliffe Hill |
Last evening Frances and her fiancee Stew came back from London - mostly to attend the church in Tideswell as they continue to fulfil the monthly attendance requirement - in order to be married there next summer. I made them a simple spaghetti for their late dinner with lardons, chopped red onions, sliced and roasted courgette, Parmesan cheese and chopped tomatoes. They seemed to enjoy it after a three and a half hour drive back to Yorkshire in a friend's car. Stew also had the last of my latest apple crumble. For some reason he dislikes custard or cream.
Weatherwise, last Sunday was a nice day. I managed to get out to tread a few miles near the pleasant Sheffield suburb of Totley but after that it all went downhill and our particular sun was unable to pierce that gloomy grey blanket. It could have been depressing but I know that one fine day the sun will smile again and when that day arrives I will appreciate it all the more.
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| Farm sign on a tree last Sunday |
You've been busy with interesting stuff to do. Volunteering does as much for the person who volunteers as the receivers of the charity.
ReplyDeleteYou are right Red. There is a "feel good" factor.
DeleteLovely pictures, I especially like the one of the farm sign. It's nice that you got to see Frances and Stew. When our kids are grown it can be difficult to see them as often as we would like.
ReplyDeleteIf they hadn't been returning each month to attend the church, I am sure we would have seen little of them.
DeleteMust be bad weather if our intrepid Mr Pudding is not outside exploring the countryside.
ReplyDeleteGreyness isn't my thing Sue.
DeleteThe story behind those old bank notes is intriguing - the stuff good books can be made of *hint, hint*!
ReplyDeleteAre you going to put the print of the magazine cover on your sitting room wall?
I am looking forward to learning more about Hannah Hauxwell! My current read is "The Valley", a non-fiction book about 100 years of a Yorkshire family in the Dearne valley.
Send some of that rain over here, please! We are really getting desperate for it, our groundwater levels are at an all-time low.
No - the print is for an Xmas present for Ian. As for water, please send a fleet of tankers over and I will see what I can do for you. I have read "The Valley" - I found it quite hard going.
Deletepasta and apple crumble is my kind of food!
ReplyDeleteI am not sure if these two dishes contained any carbohydrates.
DeleteI remember watching the programmes about "Hannah" - I believe they are still on iTunes if anyone wanted to watch them - a lovely woman.
ReplyDelete"Too Long a Winter" is also on YouTube Margie.
DeleteAh, it's gloomy here this morning as I read your post. Gray and damp and foggy, too. Maybe it will rain this morning.
ReplyDeleteYou have a lovely, busy life, Mr. P.
Seems like the whole world is turning grey.
DeleteYou are a more or less normal person, then. I was beginning to have my doubts. You read. You cook. You volunteer. You have your own quaint weekly version of Trivial Pursuit. You take photographs. You walk about more than all members of the royal family put together. As Clement Clark Moore once said about Saint Nicholas, "a right jolly old elf"....
ReplyDeleteYou omitted my ballet dancing and trombone playing. As Saint Nicholas once said about Clement Clark Moore, "He had bushy sideburns".
DeleteI like the little things in life, and reading about others'.
ReplyDeleteI am pleased that you enjoyed this more mundane post Jenny.
DeleteI read the Hannah Hauxwell book a few years back and its one of those books that I can still remember quite clearly. There was a television programme about her also.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that I remember is how she piled coats on her bed to keep warm and when she had to get rid of her cattle.
I can still see her gentle face in my mind.
Briony
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Just discovered that she has only just died in Jan 2018, lot on you tube about her.
ReplyDeleteCompared with Hannah Hauxwell, you are living the high life Briony! Hannah Hauxwell really struck a chord with the British public.
DeleteFunny how sick I get of our relentless sunshine and long for gloom and clouds and rain !! I guess we are never satisfied.
ReplyDeleteYou have my sympathy Helen as you swelter and seek shade. Can't be easy.
DeleteOh,....and visiting kids is good. We've just has a weekend in Sydney visiting our dear little grandchild. Hard to form a relationship at long distance. On the other hand we have Sally living with us at the moment while she tries to recoup some funds from the cost of this Animal Physio degree at Liverpool uni. So costly to have to fly to the UK for a 2 hour exam. Two dogs and a grown up daughter at home with Tony and I !!!
ReplyDeleteSeems amazing that an arrangement couldn't have been made with an Australian university to save Sally from making that trip.
DeleteShe wasn’t the only Aussie or Kiwi student either YP but even offers to pay the air fares and accommodation for an examiner fell on deaf ears. Very unbending!
DeleteStrong winds blowing dust from the drought-affected western areas to the east have been unwelcome visitors over the past few days. Driving along Main Western Road on my may to and from the supermarket on Friday the valley below, to the west, was shrouded in a dull, brown haze. Many branches had been blown down across the roadway. I was glad to arrive back home unscathed.
ReplyDeleteMany trees, large and small fringe Main Western Road...and many had lost limbs.
Earlier in the week, we had a storm...fairly brief up here on the hill, but the Gold Coast copped the main brunt of it.
Summer is nigh...
Just don't use any of your limbs Lee! Limbs are useful for supermarket visits and cooking in the kitchen! I mean using them not eating them.
DeleteSounds like a busy week! What did Oxfam do with the envelope of banknotes? It's hard to imagine putting something like that up for sale, but at the same time, you wouldn't want to just throw it away, right? Glad you got to visit with Frances.
ReplyDeleteOxfam has various different avenues for making sales. I don't know what will happen with those banknotes. Wanna make an offer?
DeleteA good smattering of everyday things that make up our lives.Oddly we have had a week of very good, sunny weather and I've managed my walk every day. Mind you when I'm able to walk I do so even in the rain and wind otherwise I'd not be doing much walking on Lewis!
ReplyDeleteHow strange that you had good weather up there. Do you wear a kilt when walking on Lewis?
DeleteWhen I wear a kilt it usually involves walking and of ten on Lewis. However I would not put one on especially to go walking. Well you did ask.
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