Women

Gisèle Pelicot's face is now famous around the world. Bravely, she stood up against misogyny and against a socio-legal system that has often allowed rapists to get away, without facing the music for their cruel and sinful actions. This time, they could not blurt out the traditional excuses for there was video footage of their disgusting assaults upon a drugged and sleeping woman. Madame Pelicot's dignity through the tortuous trial and in the brash spotlight of media interest has been remarkable. She could have remained hidden from view, anonymous but as she said - why should she be the one to cower in secrecy? She was a victim not a perpetrator so she held her head up high.

Below, news journalist Mishal Husain left the BBC this week after twenty six years service. To me she was a remarkable interviewer - always calm and fluent, pursuing her interviewees in a polite but purposeful manner. She oozed intelligence and clear-headedness and refused to be intimidated. With the exception of Justin Webb, no other presenter on the Radio 4 "Today"  programme could compare with her.  As she departed on Tuesday of this week she said smilingly that she had been granted a farewell song request and the song she had chosen was "Daydream Believer" by The Monkees. It seemed such a sweet and humble choice.

Finally, not a woman but a little girl who is destined to become a woman in the fullness of time. It's our little Phoebe - less than a month short of her fourth birthday. We took her to Millhouses Park on Thursday afternoon and as she negotiated the climbing structure, I noticed  a possible picture through  the curved opening on the red wall at the end. Winter sunlight was falling nicely upon it. I didn't have my camera with me so I asked Shirley to snap a picture with her smartphone and here is the result...

I don't know how Phoebe's adult life will work out but of course I hope that it is a happy one in which, as a woman,  she fulfils some of her dreams. I want her to feel proud of who she is. Along the way, I hope she meets kind, respectful men who view women as their equals and do not seek to underestimate or abuse them. In this regard, the world still has a long way to go.

Tristan

St Joseph's Catholic Church, Tristan da Cunha

For bloggers and blog visitors who will be travelling to Tristan da Cunha in time for The Laughing Horse Blogging Awards evening, I have been doing some further research. With special permission granted, the ceremony will now be held in St Joseph's Catholic Church.

There are only 250 permanent residents on the island and all are of European descent. They tend to lead simple, communal lives in which fishing, vegetable growing and raising cattle all figure significantly. Tristan da Cunha was never settled by humans before the European era.

There is only one settlement - located on the northern plain which has rich volcanic soils. It is called Edinburgh of the Seven Seas.

Some video footage:-

I am sure you will agree that Tristan da Cunha is very likely the most unique awards venue ever selected by the Laughing Horse team. Those of you who make the effort to get there will be forging unforgettable memories. Those who discard the opportunity will be creating bundles of lifelong regrets...

Edinburgh of the Seven Seas

#2

A second foray into our secret cupboard and another random photo wallet extracted. This time I will scan four selected photos and write about them. All were snapped and printed before I acquired my very first digital camera which was twenty years ago so these prints are now very much historical. 

Long ago I wrote on the "Quality Prints" wallet "Britanny June 91 & 92 + Loire and Normandy 87" so I am expecting a bit of a mixture when I dip inside

Above - pictures taken in the north of France but because I never wrote on the back of my prints I cannot tell you in which little town I spotted the old black Citroen car. And maybe it was the same day but there's our Ian at the age of eight or nine with an interesting lace curtain behind him. It depicts two children walking in rain. I guess I will have said to him - "Just sit down there son!" before clicking the camera button.

Below, that's me - half a lifetime ago with my little darling daughter - Frances Emily. We were sitting by rocks on the north coast of Brittany. She would have been three in that photo - a few months younger than her own daughter - Phoebe Harriet is right now. Frances was such a sweet child blessed with natural intelligence and kindness - foreshadowing the woman she would become.

We had four French holidays that involved driving to campsites where tents were already set up and fully equipped with camp beds, fridges, cooking stoves, pans and cutlery etc.. Below, I believe that "Sunsites" tent was on the coast of Britanny and there's Shirley, Ian and Frances under the parasol. Ian is wearing the Hull City shirt I bought him. They were great family holidays but harder to remember with each passing year. No matter how we try, we cannot hang on to the past. Before you know it, it will become just a bunch of old pictures in a photo wallet, hidden in a cupboard .

Navels

A lot of you entered the belly button competition that I launched a few weeks back. Thank you for your participation. Belly buttons or navels are customarily overlooked as if they were of little consequence but every belly button is a physical reminder of our pre-birth connections with our mothers. It is of course the site where the knot is tied after separation.

Belly buttons can be beautiful or ugly. In some cultures - notably Turkey - belly dancing focuses all eyes upon the centre of the belly - the navel.

From the hundreds of images received at Yorkshire Pudding HQ, the expert belly button judges have picked the following seven for adulation - in reverse order...

7. "Derek" - the squinting navel of John Gray, Wales...

6. "Paddy" - the happy navel of Dave Northsider, County Cork, Ireland...

5. "Tibby" - the tattooed navel of Bruce Taylor, Arizona, USA...

4.  "Humpty" - the bulging belly button of a certain Canadian blogger who understandably wishes to remain anonymous...

3. "Juanita" - the elegant talking navel of Ms Mary Moon in northern Florida...

2. "Chardonnay" - the bejewelled navel of  JayCee Manx on The Isle of Man...

1. "Clementine" - the perfect belly button of Ellen D - retired, grandmother and supportive blog visitor residing in Illinois USA...

Ellen wins a year's pass to "Belly Up" - the top professional belly button cleaning salon in Springfield, Illinois where the world famous Simpson family dwell. Indeed, Homer is a "Belly Up" client.

In time for Christmas, the other six commended entrants will receive a complimentary personal belly button cleaner so that they can keep their navels in tip-top condition at home. (Not for use at the Christmas dinner table)

Finally:-

Great Britain's most famous navel leader (1758 - 1805).He 

was killed during a great navel conflict with French and 

Spanish ships at The Battle of Trafalgar.

Quiztime

Up at "The Hammer" last night it was rather chaotic. First of all, there were quite a lot of people in and secondly the pub was understaffed. Some customers were finishing meals and others had turned up specially for the regular Sunday night quiz. There were also three pet dogs sniffing about and getting under people's feet.

The special Christmas quiz had been devised by Rebecca, the twenty-something assistant manager and I had the strong impression that she had never created a pub quiz before. On the whole, her questions were too damned hard and all the time she was posing her questions over the temperamental sound system, she was also serving at the bar. This meant that there were long, frustrating pauses in the process.

Then at around eighty thirty something happened that nobody was expecting. The vicar from nearby All Saints Church appeared with about twelve members of his congregation. They had carol sheets for pubgoers to follow and in the middle of the quiz a few of us joined in but most didn't. There was no musical accompaniment and it all seemed rather pointless.

In spite of this ropy experience, I feel inspired to create a  Christmas-themed  quiz for  "Yorkshire Pudding" visitors so let's go. Answers will be given in the "Comments" section.

⦿

1) After The Virgin Mary had given birth to Baby Jesus, she placed him in a "manger" but what is a "manger"?
(a) a kind of Palestinian water trough 

(b) a wooden  trough from which animals feed 

(c) a crude box with legs for storing vegetables 

(d) a simply made baby's crib

2) Name the actor shown below. He starred in the successful 2003 Christmas film "Elf".

3) Which Scandinavian capital city sends a large Christmas tree to London every year? It is then put up in Trafalgar Square.

(a) Copenhagen (b) Stockholm (c) Helsinki (d) Oslo

4)  Here comes the chorus of Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You"....but what is the missing line?

Oh, I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know

Make  my .....................................................
Oh, baby, all I want for Christmas is you
You, baby

5) This is a scene from a popular British Christmas pantomime but what is the title of the panto?

6) Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer  pulls Santa's sleigh with several other reindeer but only one of them has a name beginning with the letter "V". Name that reindeer.

7) In the carol,  "Once in Royal David's City" what is referred to in the second line?

(a) a holy citadel (b) an inn without a vacant room     

(c) a lowly cattle shed  (d) the road to Bethlehem

8) In which European country did the tradition of decorating Christmas trees begin?

9) In America, Spike Jones and His City Slickers  had a big Christmas hit in 1948 with  "All I Want For Christmas Is My Two ___  ____". Complete the title.

10) Charlie Chaplin died at his home in Switzerland on Christmas Day, 1977 but how old was he?

(a) 77  (b) 80  (c)  88 (d) 95

How did you do?

Inquisitiveness

Lound Hall, Nottinghamshire yesterday

After my various rambles, I often find matters to research and niggling questions to answer. After yesterday's walk, I wanted to find out who lives in Lound Hall, what the tomb of The Duke Of Newcastle's wife looks like, how much oil lies below the surface of those nodding donkeys and something of the history of Bevercotes Colliery. If you are an inquisitive soul, there is always something more to discover.

This is the  marble tomb of  Georgiana, The Duchess of Newcastle, who died in 1822 during childbirth and the principal reason why Milton Mausolseum was built. Sculpted by Richard Westmacott, you can see that Georgiana is holding her twin babies. The girl died at birth and the boy survived for just ten days. At that point, Georgiana was already dead and the fourth Duke of Newcastle was grief-stricken.

Of course, All Saints Church in West Markham is altogether a much more humble ecclesiastical building. Yesterday, I mentioned its amazing limestone font. Crudely carved, it is over a thousand years old. My own photo of it was too blurry  to share so instead I will show you this picture from the Tate Collection:-

Finally Lound Hall. It was built in the 1930s for a coal mining magnate called Sir Harald Peake. During World War II it served as an orthopaedic hospital and after the war it became a training centre for The National Coal Board. Later still it was to become The National Mining Museum for a few years. Around fourteen years ago the hall reverted to private ownership - purchased by the entrepreneurial Mills family.

One of the sons of that family is called Charlie Mills and he appeared in the TV reality series "Made In Chelsea". Back in 2019, he was arrested and charged with drink driving down in London. He received a hefty fine and an eighteenth month ban. I guess he is a proper Charlie - well maybe to be fair the experience taught him a lesson. I hope so:-

Wandering

The oil well in Farley's Wood

Here in northern England, December has given us too many grey days. Above the cloud cover there was glorious sunshine but here on the ground we have been conducting our pre-Christmas lives in a murkiness that has been almost devoid of colour.

However, today - Saturday 14th, the weather  gurus promised blue sky and yellow sunshine. Needing exercise and the stimulation of previously unknown territory, I headed out into Nottinghamshire. An hour after leaving home, I  was parking Clint near the oil well in Farley's Wood south of Milton. There were two nodding donkeys there.

I drank coffee from my flask and then set off on a circular walk that took me two hours and fifty minutes to complete. This included a longer stop than anticipated at All Saints Church in the village West Markham. A friendly woman who is one of the ancient church's keyholders let me in and we talked for several minutes about the church and life in general. There was an incredibly old font there with figures carved into the side. It is certainly over a thousand years old.

The altar in All Saints Church, West Markham

I saw another Grade I church in the village of Milton. It was built under the instructions of  The Duke of Newcastle to include a mausoleum for his family. This neo-classical building was consecrated in 1833. Unfortunately, I couldn't get inside.

There were periods during my circuit when light clouds again obscured The Golden Orb but on the whole it was a nice day. I am glad that I didn't plan a longer distance. Five miles was enough and consequently my troublesome heel did not play up. Back at Clint's boot (American: trunk) I drank another coffee from my flask before heading home, listening to the Liverpool v Fulham match on Clint's car radio.

Manor Farm, Bevercotes

Notification

In less than three weeks "The Laughing Horse Blogging Awards" for 2024 will be announced on the island of Tristan da Cunha in the middle of the South Atlantic Ocean. This year, the event has been sponsored by Tristan da Cunha Tourism in an effort to attract more holidaymakers. May I say from the outset that there is absolutely no truth in the rumour that Yorkshire Pudding Enterprises have received backhanders from The Governor of St Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha in order to secure such a prestigious event. No truth at all.

Bloggers and blog visitors should note that there is no airstrip in the archipelago which is the most remote inhabited island group in the world. It takes six days to voyage there by boat from Cape Town, South Africa. A ship has already been chartered - "The Jolly Puffin" and it will leave from Cape Town harbour (Jetty 2) on  the morning of Christmas Eve. Berths aboard the party ship will be provided free of charge but of course you must arrange your own air travel to and from Cape Town.

Blogging is an oft-neglected art-form given little attention by the moguls of mass media. The Laughing Horse Awards aim to shine a light on blogging and to give credit where credit is due. Previous winners of the overall "Blogger of The Year" award have gone on to achieve great success in their chosen careers and indeed in their personal lives.

Reading through the list of previous winners is a roll call that reflects the best of humanity. Noble soothsayers who have spoken to the world, sacrificing their time, thoughts and energy for others. Their moral rectitude is legendary.

Here they are:-

⦿

The Roll of Honour...

2008 – Arthur Clewley for “Arthur Clewley”

2009 – Daphne Franks for “My Dad’s a Communist”

2010 – John Gray for “Going Gently”

2011 – Ian Rhodes for “Shooting Parrots”

2012 – Kate Steeds for "The Last Visible Dog"

2013 – Tom Gowans for “A Hippo on the Lawn”

2014 – Meike Riley for “From My Mental Library”

2015 – Lee George for “Kitchen Connection”

2016 – Steve Reed for “Shadows and Light”

2017 - Keith Kline for "Hiawatha House"

2018 - Mary Moon for "Bless Our Hearts"

2019 - Jenny O'Hara for "Procrastinating Donkey"

2020 - Cro Magnon for "Magnon's Meanderings"

2021 - Andrew de Melbourne for "High Riser" (Now "From The High Rise")

2022 - Bob Slatten for "I Should Be Laughing"

2023 - David Godfrey for "The Adventures of Travel Penguin"

 

Last year's "Blogger of the Year" will soon relinquish 

his crown. David Godfrey said, "It has been one of the

 best year's of my life. I won a free cruise for two to Europe 

and got to meet the amazing Pete Hegseth and 

Cher. What a way to start my retirement!"

#One

 

Righto then! Here we are inside the corner cupboard. No single malt collection. No urn containing Colin's ashes. No secret compartment hiding "ten pounds of the finest weed". No sparkly dress and pumps. No Santa costume. No Laughing Horse Blog Awards outfit. Not even any cups!

No my friends, what we mostly have in "The Cupboard That Colin Made" is photographs. Hundreds of them from those good old days before digital photography became commonplace, before the smartphones plague arrived. I am sure you remember those long ago days and you may well be in possession of many old prints yourself. They are part of our cultural history now and young humans born in this millennium are possibly bemused by past methods of capturing images.

I acquired my first digital camera at Christmas 2004 - it was a gift I had requested. Since then there have been remarkably few physical prints. Randomly, for the purposes of this blogpost, I selected the top box and again quite randomly I pulled out a wallet of photos from 2002...

That was the year that Shirley, Ian, Frances and I boarded an aeroplane (American: airplane) bound for Atlanta, Georgia. There was no need to visit a travel agent beforehand because I had planned it all myself - the hotels, the car hire, the insurance, tickets for the Epcot Centre and Universal Studios in Orlando and our very travel itinerary. From Atlanta to Macon to Apalachicola (FL) to Cedar Key to Orlando to Savannah (GA)  and back to Atlanta.  It was spread over two weeks and my plan came together quite flawlessly - apart from picking up two speeding tickets.

It was the first time that Shirley and the kids had been to America and they loved the whole experience. Ian was seventeen and Frances was thirteen at the time. The trip happened during their Easter holidays.

Anyway, back to the photos. Lazily, I have just photographed a small selection of them when I admit that superior reproduction would have happened through scanning the pictures on my printer but that can often be quite a faff. I apologise.

Above - the courthouse in Moultrie GA. There were state prisoners in the grounds on gardening duty but the guard said I couldn't photograph them. They were all black.

Below - Frances at the  Ocumulgee Mounds National Historical Park near Macon, Georgia. Its history goes back over 10,000 years so how come some Americans claim that their country is so young that it has very little history of consequence? Waves of Native Americans knew this remarkable place for countless generations until Europeans arrived with their European ways and changed everything.

Below - two images from one of my favourite places in the entire world - Apalachicola, Florida. Situated on The Gulf of Mexico in Florida's Panhandle, it became a settlement because of fishing and oysters. Today it has growing appeal for tourists and a permanent population of under 2500. As Ms Moon has informed me, the oyster harvesting days are now gone because of pollution.

I had seen Cedar Key on a map and instead of heading straight for Orlando after departing Perry, we headed twenty miles west from Otter Creek on Highway 24 until we arrived off-the-beaten-track at Cedar Key on  The Gulf Coast. Almost as charming as Apalachicola, we could only afford three hours before continuing our journey to Orlando. I remember pelicans and swathes of large flat fish feeding greedily by the pier.

Savannah was a characterful coastal city. There we met up with Chris, my friend from Ohio and his youngest daughter Abby but before we got there, I pulled off Highway 95 to visit the Hofwyl-Broadfield Plantation on the coast of Georgia. Somewhat surprisingly, it was once a rice plantation but reliant upon the same kind of hard-working slaves that  once made cotton production so profitable for landowners. I took the following peaceful picture on the kitchen decking round the back of the main plantation house.

 

And so as this blogpost comes to a natural end, let us close The Cupboard of Secrets. We'll be back again another day. Maybe not tomorrow.

Cupboard

This is a terrible blurry picture of the north west corner of our front room. I snapped it a few minutes ago. It is also one of the narrow alcoves next to our chimney breast. When we moved into this house thirty five years ago, the corner was little more than wasted space because we could not find a suitable piece of furniture to go there.

Along came an old friend called Colin and he offered to make us a cupboard that would fit the space very nicely. Not only that but he would do the job at pretty much cost price. It was something like payback time because I had done him a big favour by looking after several thousand pounds for him. This followed  a house sale when his relationship broke down and he lost his job.

Colin came from Birmingham and he had left school at fifteen without qualifications. He was born eleven days before me in 1953 and when I first met him he was a hospital porter here in Sheffield. He had followed his sweetheart here  when she began her nurse training and besides, he owed a West Indian cannabis dealer in Birmingham a wad of money. It was better to get away.

The one thing Colin had enjoyed at secondary school was woodwork. He had an aptitude for it and was passionate about several different types of wood commonly used in furniture making. He met a man who had his own workshop and was already receiving commissions and soon Colin was working alongside him - producing fine, handcrafted furniture  and achieving something good with his life even though the financial rewards were very modest.

Colin and I drifted apart after I finally gave back the last of his money. I can't quite remember the circumstances. Later, a mutual friend told me that he had been thinking about getting back to Birmingham. Maybe that is where he went.   He was a difficult bloke to be friends with anyway - often on the attack and burdened by the weight of his troublesome upbringing, his cannabis habit and  the painful end of his love if of course love ever really ends.

What I have just written is a sidetrack. Really, the point of this writing is to highlight the cupboard in the corner and to say that there is something in that cupboard that I intend to share with you in a forthcoming blogpost or two. 

What on earth could it be?

Hero

I don't have many heroes. Just a few. Amongst them is Robert Zimmerman or Bob Dylan as he likes to be known. 

It was in 1963 when I first heard one of his albums in a council house on Trinity Close in the East Yorkshire village where I was born and raised. A friend's older sibling had brought it home. It was "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan" and it contained some of his most famous songs- including "Blowin' In the Wind", "A Hard Rain's A Gonna Fall" and "Don't Think Twice It's Alright". I was blown away.

Much later, I twice saw Dylan live in concert. I visited his childhood home in Hibbing, Minnesota in 1977 and in 2005 stood outside his Malibu home in California. I don't profess to be a nerdy expert on the life and music of Bob Dylan but I know a lot about him and I own or have owned a dozen of his albums. His lyrics have often grabbed me by the heart.

This is not the first time that I have blogged about Dylan and matters that surround him. In 2020 I blogged about his younger brother - David  and ten years earlier ,  I blogged about his first significant girlfriend back in Hibbing -  Echo Helstrom.

Checking out this blog's background statistics, I notice that those two blogposts are still viewed regularly. When other posts get buried by the passage of days and years and finally  disappear from view, "Echo" and "David" keep going. Of course this will all be to do with other Dylan aficionados searching through Google for more knowledge about someone who is a living legend.

Dylan is 83 years old now. He was born on May 24th - the same as my mother and my son-in-law and Queen VIctoria too. On the day that he dies, the world will become a poorer place  and maybe this planet will stop spinning for a while. But at the moment he is still working, still creating and fortunately the end is not imminently nigh.

Link to my March 2010 post: "Echo"

Link to my August 2020 post: "David"

Once I had mountains in the palm of my hand

And rivers that ran through every day

I must have been mad

I never knew what I had

Until I threw it all away

Wikipedia

Kiki

 Kiki the Kitten with her little friends, The Cute Chicks:-

Aw! What could be sweeter?

Chitchat

I need to stop the slide. This varied blog could easily morph into one that only offers quizzes - day after day... "Quiztime" ad nauseam. Time to make a stand.

Outside the wind is howling as Storm Darragh passes through our neck of the woods. Flying Debris would be a great name for a band with me on lead vocals, backing singers Meike, Jennifer and Thelma. Dave Northsider on lead guitar, JayCee on bass, Cro Magnon on drums and Coppa's Girl on keyboards. We'd do a world tour, snort drugs, smash up hotel rooms and record a best-selling album in Nashville. Life would be so fine.

Back to reality. The start of December means I need to get a Christmas parcel together for Robin - my brother in France.  His box is now filled and I have just got to post it on Monday morning. That will cost a fair penny in spite of my watchfulness.

I bought him some work gloves from B&Q where, in the very same visit, I purchased a  five foot Christmas tree. It is currently sitting in my car (Clint) ready to be put up next week. That's right - I won't be sending it to France.

We hadn't had a takeaway curry in a few weeks so this evening I addressed that by ordering one from "Bilash" on Sharrowvale Road. Onion bhajis, chicken bhuna, vegetable rice and two chapatis. Plenty for the two of us and as delicious as always. I still can't get used to the idea of food deliveries so I braved the storm to collect it.

I am trying to write a chatty blogpost that resists transforming into another "Quiztime" post. How am I doing? Oh, there goes another question.

My friend and pub quizmate Mike went away on a little adventure this weekend. He took the train up to Glasgow where he had reserved a hotel room in the city centre. Today he will have gone to watch St Mirren play Motherwell in The Scottish Premier League having found it impossible to secure a ticket for Celtic's match with Hibernian.  It will be touch and go if he makes it back for tomorrow night's pub quiz.

We have lived strangely parallel lives. Like me he was Head of English in a Sheffield secondary school. Like me he has a son, a daughter and three grandchildren. Like me he has often enjoyed short trips away on his own - including several obscure European destinations. Like me he is a lifelong supporter of one of England's less glamorous football teams. Like me he is proudly woke. Many similarities but not the same.

Shirley is currently watching "Strictly Come Dancing" on the television. It has become a national obsession but I cannot bear it. Same with reality TV programmes - often involving so-called "celebrities". To me they are so superficial and mundane and yet they attract viewers like nobody's business. Instead, give me a documentary about garden slugs, a travel programme, an intelligent quiz show or a good comedy act - any would be preferable to reality TV show pap.

Anyway, my Saturday evening chitchat is just about done. The wind has calmed down quite significantly and this hundred year old house is no longer rattling as though it was out at sea. Time to bid you adieu. Flying Debris have officially disbanded.

Quiztime

Quizzes? It is hard to pitch them right. Yesterday's quiz may have caused irritation in some quarters because the general feeling was that it was too damned easy. Please accept my sincere apologies. So, okay, let's try another quiz with "More Proverbs". This time the proverbs come from either Albania or Nigeria. You will be pleased to learn that they have been translated from Albanian and from three of the principal Nigerian languages - Yoruba, Hausa and Igbo.

Albanian:-
1) A dog that barks a lot, does not _________ you
(a) love (b) need (c) bite (d) respect

2) As long as you live, you will _____________

(a) fight (b) love (c) suffer (d) learn

3) Do not leave today’s ________ for tomorrow
(a) work (b) dinner (c) bills (d) kisses

4) Everyone builds their own _________.
(a) house (c) family (c) career (d) destiny

5) The big fish eats the _________ one.
(a) succulent (b) small (c) lost (d) biggest

Nigerian:-
6) The child of an elephant will not be a ___________. 

(a) bull elephant (b) dwarf (c) monkey (d) giant

7) What an old man sees while _________, a young man can never see - even when he climbs up in a tree. 

(a) tilling the soil (b) lying down (c) sitting in the dunny (d) watching ants

8) Whoever is patient with a __________ shell will one day have thousands of them. 
(a) groundnut  (b) bullet (c) cowrie (d) conch

9) The day on which one starts out is not the time to begin one’s ______.

(a) preparations (b) journey (c) recollections (d) return

10) One who has been bitten by a ___________  lives in fear of worms. 

(a) warthog (b) crow (c) snake (d) worm

10/10 this time?

Quiztime

Like most other blogs, this one is international. Consequently, setting quizzes can be problematic. I mean, it would be unfair and off-putting to most international visitors if I posed questions about English counties, Horatio Nelson or the history of Hull City A.F.C. (1904-2024). Even today, I am a little concerned that the proverbs that are familiar to me and my fellow citizens may be puzzling to those who dwell in distant lands. 

Yes my dear bloggoids, that is today's quiz theme - proverbs. But don't worry overmuch as I will give you multiple choice solutions for each proverb from which a single word or two has been removed. As usual answers will be given in "Comments". Good luck!

⦿

1. "A_______ in time saves nine"
(a) sausage  (b) spanking (c) switch (d) stitch

2. "People who live in glasshouses should not throw ________"
(a) clods of earth (b) stones (c) bricks (d) tomatoes

3. "An apple a day keeps the _______ away"
(a) fruiterer (b) dentist (c) doctor (c) wolf

4. "Make _______ while the sun shines"
(a) love (b) money (c) haste (d) hay

5.  "A rolling stone gathers no _______ "
(a) moss (b) money (c) groupies (d) ice

6. "Don't judge a book by its ________"
(a) author (b) length (c) reviews (d) cover

7. "You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make it ________"
(a) swim (b) drink (c) gallop (d) talk

8.  "Birds of a feather ______ together"
(a) whistle (b) squabble (c) fly (d) flock

9. "One man's meat is another man's ________"
(a) poison (b) potato (c) principle (d) porridge

10. "The proof of the ________ is in the eating"
(a) dinner (b) pudding (c) chef's talent (d) restaurant

Well? How did you do?

Twofoldness

 

1. Looking from this blog's engine room - our study. Little Margot is at the foot of the stairs and about to climb up for the umpteenth time. She's not walking independently yet but she is getting there and it won't be long. For the time being, it is safer to motor around the house on her hands and knees in the manner of a quadruped. Hurry up Grandpa! You have got to shepherd me up the stairs so I don't tumble down! "Oh dear - not again!" he grumbles.

2. This evening, following yesterday's trip to Buxton, I had another social appointment. This time it was dinner at "The Norfolk Arms", Ringinglow with the eight men who make up our main pub quiz opposition. Let me see now - there was Peter, Geoff, Tony, Dave, Stewart, John, Mike and Den. 

It was kind of them to invite me and the Christmas meal was pretty good. I had lovely, homemade French onion soup followed by a tasty turkey dinner with all the trimmings. Afterwards, there was room for Christmas pudding and custard and a warm mince pie.

The other men are aged between 63 and 77 and all very pleasant. We had some good laughs. I guess I have known them for ten years. There's always  good banter with them and friendly rivalry. To be honest, they have been winners at the weekly quiz more often than my team have been. Hell - what do you expect? There are eight of them and usually only three of us.

"The Norfolk Arms" is more than a mile from the last suburbs of Sheffield. Shirley drove me up there and Peter, who had major heart surgery earlier this year, drove me home.

It had been a very agreeable night out with good company, good food and good service. Below, "The Norfolk Arms" in the summer of 2018:-

Excursion

Today was the day of my quiz team's previously postponed excursion to Buxton. We were going there to meet up with our old pal Danny and have a  handsome lunch with a few beers. Mike's wife Jill kindly offered to drive us out there. She said she would be perfectly happy just toddling round Buxton's shops.

I was picked up at 11.45. There are other ways to get to Buxton but Jill decided to drive along The Hope Valley and then up through Winnat's Pass - shown in the top picture thanks to Google Streetview. However, as Robbie Burns wrote,  “The best laid schemes of mice and men go aft astray"  and sure enough, Winnat's Pass was closed because of road works. This meant we had to turn around and follow a detour via Bradwell and Peak Forest.

Consequently, we arrived a few minutes late at the highly recommended pub restaurant "Lubens" shown above. We had reserved a table. Beers were quaffed, happy flowing conversation occurred and our meals were duly consumed. My lunch was good but not especially memorable. I would just about give it ★★★★ out of five. I had steak pie with chips (American: fries), broccoli, red cabbage and gravy - it was the day's "special". This was followed by sticky toffee pudding with vanilla ice cream.

Afterwards, we crossed the town's marketplace to visit "The New Inn" - shown above. Actually, the Streetview image is a bit dated as the pub enjoyed a major refurbishment just this year. Inside, it was lovely and welcoming. A log fire was burning merrily in the fireplace. Buxton is the highest market town in England and the air temperature is always two or three degrees colder there than it is in Sheffield so that fire was just the job on a chilly afternoon in December.

Jill arrived after her shopping expedition and had half a pint of "Cruzcampo" Spanish beer with us  before we headed back to the big city via Taddington and Ashford-in-the-Water. By the way, all the food we ate and the drinks we sank were paid for with past pub quiz winnings!