18 March 2024

Shopping and Imbibing

Last time I was here my daughter and her partner had to work some of the time. I didn't mind because I'm happy to take myself off exploring. This time they have had the whole time off and it's been a different experience. I'm all for "Lets go and see that church/station/museum" whereas they are "Lets shop till we drop then head for a bar for a few drinks/chats/laughs". I did a fair amout of the former last time I was here so I was happy to do the latter. We've also done a fair amout of eating out, breakfasts and lunches, and relaxing times at home, talking, painting nails, reading, a few drinks and a bit of napping. My favourite breakfast place from when I was last here has gone. The whole block has been demolished to make way for a very nice upmarket supermarket. 


I like travelling on the city cat ferries


admiring the riverside houses


The walk along the river is very nice.


The South Bank area of Brisbane is lovely with parks, pretty night lights,
night market, lots of eating places, bars


 and a very popular purpose built beach.

We've had a mixed bag of weather, sun, cloud and showers.

oOo

The pets are good


Lloyd has some mobility issues but is still enjoying life.


 
Arlo is doing very well. Still enjoying rolling around in his favourite garden spot, and joining me on my bed! He is very affectionate when it suits him.

We're going to a basketball game now, spectators, not playing 😄

∼ Be warm and well∼ 
Polly x 

14 March 2024

A Good Read

The Tenant by Katrine Engberg

When a young woman is discovered brutally murdered in her apartment, with an intricate pattern of lines carved into her face, Copenhagen police detectives Jeppe Korner and Anette Werner are assigned to the case. They soon establish a link between the victim, Julie Stender, and her landlady, Esther de Laurenti, who’s a bit too fond of alcohol, and hosts raucous dinner parties with her artist friends. She is also a budding novelist, and when Julie turns up as a murder victim in the still unfinished mystery she’s writing, the link between fiction and real life grows both more urgent and more dangerous.
But Esther’s role in this twisted scenario is not quite as clear as it first seems. Is she the culprit—or just another victim, trapped in a twisted game of vengeance? Anette and Jeppe must dig more deeply into the two women’s pasts to discover the identity of the brutal puppet-master pulling the strings in this electrifying thriller.


∼ Happy Reading∼ 

Polly x

10 March 2024

G' Day

Greetings from down under. Yes dear reader I'm in Oz visiting my daughter, and this time my eldest daughter is with me, which is lovely, on holiday with both my darling daughters, and my Aussie daughter's girlfriend.


My daughter arranged the flights and chose China airlines because their prices were much cheaper than Singapore, Malaysia and Ethihad that I was looking at, we saved about £500 each. I was sceptic at first, but the flights were just as good as other carriers that I have used. I didn't like the meals though, the breakfasts were ok but not the mains.
We were very lucky with the long leg from the UK to Taiwan, the plane was only about two thirds full, one whole section was empty and once the meal was finished with we asked if we could move there to sleep. I slept quite well across three seats. My daughter not so well, she doesn't like long haul flights, and she is tall so she couldn't get comfortable.

Taiwan airport is huge 

with lots of pretty themes at some departure gates.

Taiwan has a complicated history. It has been governed independently of China since 1949, but the People's Republic of China views the island as a renegade province and vows to eventually “unify” Taiwan with the mainland, using force if necessary. Tensions are rising. Beijing has taken increasingly aggressive actions, which includes flying fighter jets near the island. Some analysts fear the United States and China could go to war over Taiwan. We didn't know any of this when we booked the flights, I just hope nothing escalates before we return home!

oOo


On a lighter note, I have had a lovely Mother's Day. It's the first time my girls have been together to celebrate it since they were living at home. After a leisurely breakfast we walked down to a farmer's market.


The weather was good but we were expecting showers, and when a downpour arrived we sheltered until it passed and then went home. 
Later, back home my lovely daughters made afternoon tea. Assorted sandwiches - egg mayo, tuna mayo, cheese, ham and tomato, we had wine and delicious cakes.


I chose this pecan, caramel and chocolate tart.
It was so rich I couldn't eat it all in one go!

Tomorrow we're having a retail therapy day 🛍

  ∼ Be warm and well∼ 
Polly x 

5 March 2024

Rufus' Diary

Hello dear reader, I hope you are well. My news is - I've had fleas!! I don't know where I picked them up, the vet said they can be in the garden, humans can pick them up on their shoes, or the most common cause, from other dogs. I was given a HUGE gravy tasting tablet thing to eat and before long they were migrating from my skin to the ends of my fur. Polly and her daughter had a great time combing and picking them off, all the while Polly was saying die you ******* die. Language! Whatever is in the tablet is ok for me but poisonous for fleas so although I've only had one or two small ones on me they won't live, and the whole house is regularly sprayed to kill any eggs.
------
What a lot of rain we've had. 

The level of water at the stream is high, we haven't been through it for ages. 

You can just about see the culvert that channels water from the fields.

It has been worse though, we've seen the water level up to that bridge.

The bonfire area is filling up again.
------

I love this chair, I fit it so well, I use it more than Polly nowadays. She tolerates me using it because she doesn't like it anymore. She's had it for years but although it's super comfy it's big and bulky and she wants to get something more modern, hmm if that happens I guess I will no longer have my own chair!!

∼ Be safe and well ∼

Rufus 🐾 

  

29 February 2024

A Good Read

Transcription by Kate Atkinson

The novel begins in 1981, Juliet Armstrong was 60 years old, and while she was distracted by her thoughts, she was struck by a car when she attempted to cross the street. Her story is told between 1940 and 1950 before landing back in 1981 again.
In 1940, eighteen-year old Juliet was reluctantly recruited into the world of espionage. Sent to an obscure department of MI5 tasked with monitoring the comings and goings of British Fascist sympathisers, the work was both tedious and terrifying. But after the war ended Juliet presumed the events of those years would be relegated to the past forever.
Ten years later, now a radio producer at the BBC, Juliet is unexpectedly confronted by figures from her past. A different war is being fought now, on a different battleground, but Juliet finds herself once more under threat. A bill of reckoning is due, and she finally begins to realise that there is no action without consequence. Juliet discovers one is never entirely free of the spy business. Once a spy, always a spy.
One of Juliet’s thoughts from 1981: "The Russians had been their enemies and then they were their allies, and then they were enemies again. The Germans the same – the great enemy, the worst of all of them, and now they were our friends, one of the mainstays of Europe. It was all such a waste of breath. War and peace. Peace and war. It would go on forever without end".


This is an ingeniously plotted story, so much so that I initially had difficulty working out what was happening. But I did, and as usual, with Atkinson's novels, I thoroughly enjoyed it.

∼ Happy Reading∼ 

Polly x

23 February 2024

Lunchtime Concert



Today's Cathedral Concert was Juanjo Blázquez, a brilliant Spanish pianist


unfortunately the programme was not to my taste,
I stayed for most of it though.


The weather was lovely with glorious sunshine which changed to rain and hailstones in the afternoon!


Despite lots of rain signs of Spring are all around
 
∼ Be warm and well∼ 
Polly x 

18 February 2024

A Good Read

The Family Upstairs by Lisa Jewell
For her 25th birthday Libby Jones inherits an eight bedroom mansion in London’s SW3 - the heart of Chelsea. Most people would be over the moon to own a house in that area of multi million pound homes, but the house is dilapidated, and has a very sinister past.
Told from the points of view of Libby, Lucy, and Henry, in both the past and present, this disturbing family drama begins with the previous owners of the house. The Lamb’s were a wealthy couple with two children, Henry and Lucy. Martina (the mother) liked helping people and invited a homeless charismatic stranger named David and his family to move into their home. But David wasn’t as charming as he appeared to be. He was malevolent and manipulating and before long he had turned the house into a commune and had the family obeying his every whim, all except Henry - he wasn’t falling for David’s charms, not one little bit!

The story builds slowly and steadily, developing the characters and revealing their roles in the plot. It's a fast compelling read.

∼ Happy Reading∼ 

Polly x

9 February 2024

Rain Stops Play

Today I should have joined my u3a bus pass group for a trip to Harlow. My village is surrounded by countryside and fields and when we get a lot of rain the roads get flooded, not bad floods, (lots of people have to deal with much worse than some water on the roads). Roads into and out of my village were flooded, and more in the next village. It was possible to drive through the water but single file and slowly, so my journey took longer which meant despite leaving a bit earlier I was late arriving at the meeting point and missed the bus.
Many people who know Harlow think of it as not a nice place for a day trip but there are some nice parts of the town, and our group leader had arranged a tour of the Gibbert Gallery, I'm disappointed to miss that, but I'm sure my friend M and I can go another time.  
However, missing the bus meant I was able to attend the formal opening of my village church's new servery and toilet, attended by the Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch, the new Archdeacon of Chelmsford, a few reverends and lots  of villagers.


It was a nice do with hot drinks and cakes, which always go down well 😋

oOo

We have had a mixed bag of weather here in the UK - rain, wind, mild, cold, freezing cold and sunshine.


This part of our walk is lovely when the sun is shining because that hedgerow is a barrier against the wind.


∼ Be warm and well∼ 
Polly x 

2 February 2024

A Very Good Read

Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens

Kya Clark was barefoot and wild, for years she had been known as the Marsh Girl. As a very young girl Kya watched her Mother walk  away without looking back. Soon, all her siblings followed suit, leaving Kya alone with her drunk, abusive and often absent father, who also eventually left. She had to care for their home, learn to shop, to provide food, cook and clean, all while dealing with loneliness, abandonment, loss and prejudice, and always wondering when and if her Mother would ever return. She spent one day at school but was so badly ridiculed she never returned.

But Kya was smart and clever with a curious mind. She knew the marsh and found ways to make money and provide for her basic needs. She learnt lessons in life, through nature and the wilderness surrounding her, and with help from books and her brother's friend Tate she learnt to read and write. The lovely couple 'Jumpin' and Mable showed her kindness and love, and the store cashier helped by often giving her too much change.

But while she had the skills to live in solitude forever, the time came when she yearned for company. Drawn to two young men from town, who were each intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opened herself to a new and startling world. But when popular but unpleasant Chase Andrews was found dead, locals immediately suspected Kya.

I was engaged with Kya’s story from the beginning. It is beautifully written with poetic prose and wonderful descriptions of the marshes. It has a little bit of everything, a likeable main character who tugs at the heartstrings, romance, murder mystery, courtroom drama and lovely characters who are kind - Tate, the cashier who gives back too much change and 'Jumpin' and Mable. I loved it and so did my book group.


∼ Happy Reading∼ 

Polly x

28 January 2024

Jigsaw Mania

I completed this jigsaw before Christmas, it was a nice one to do

and this one just after Christmas, which was fun to do


and currently doing this one which is more challenging with the darkness at the top, and the lace at the bottom.

oOo


The lunchtime concerts at the Cathedral are almost back to full attendance. I would guess there were upwards of 200 people there on Friday. The concert was a brilliant violinist and her piano accompaniment who was also excellent.

oOo

Yesterday was Burns Night in the village hall. It was a great night, haggis, mashed potato, mashed swede, cabbage and gravy, and clootie pudding and custard followed by lots of Cèilidh dancing. Everyone left exhausted and happy.

∼ Be warm and well∼ 
Polly x 

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