Showing posts with label Friends. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Friends. Show all posts

Monday, 20 September 2010

High Spirits

Crap title but I couldnt think of anything better.

Yesterday saw me taking TP to Rugby practice and I thought I would spend the 90 minutes drinking coffee from a flask and getting cold. In fact I ended up taking part in line-out practices and getting stuck in with the Under 14s. It was good fun and their lack of weight is made up for in suppleness and fitness but me and the two other Dads did manage to take a couple of line outs despite the squad's superior numbers.

It was fun and "yes" I can mange to move this morning.

Popped in to see Dad on the way home and got licked by the new puppy. She is called Tilly and is an absolute delight. Dad and Step Mum are absolutely besotted with her and describe her as the best birthday present ever! She is, of course, spoiled rotten and rules the roost but it is great to see how they are responding to having a new dog - a real breath of fresh air.

Yesterday afternoon saw us invited round to perform a bit of foraging in a local Orchard. C&M are a delightful retired couple who live close by and M decided to spend a portion of C's pension on a 2 acre orchard. It is lovely. She has just purchased a refurbished Shepherd's hut complete with bunk and stove so she can enjoy it at any time.

We reaped a bountiful harvest and came home with cooking apples, blackberries and sloes. We then divided and conquered. 30% produced a few batches of stewed blackberries and apples and I started off a litre of Blackberry Vodka. We were short of gin so will leave the sloe gin until this evening.

Today is work - obviously - but have managed to phone the Land Agents to make an offer on the coppice. It wasn't well received - but it was very low. 30% and I will have a chat later and decide on whether to go higher.

Sunday, 16 May 2010

Its all in the name.

The weekend started with a lie in and 30% volunteered for Guard Duty. Ably assisted by Tyson and Marauder she let the chickens out in to the exercise yard while I threw on some clothes and made coffee.

We then spent a leisurely hour drinking several cups whilst taking in the Breakfast News. Bagels were toasted during the Sports reports. The main subject of our early morning chat, like many households in the UK, was what we would do with the £84 million Euro Millions prize. There is a 60 acre estate for sale just up the road and we decided that it would do nicely but we would knock down the 1960s house and build something much nicer. My preference was for something with a tower that had panoramic windows and a rotating lavatory. Incidentally we did win the Euro Millions or rather £6.84 of it.

We eventually girded our loins and took T&M out for an early walk. We had a lunch date arranged with friends and walking T&M early meant that they would have burnt off a bit off energy and therefore hopefully be more likely to sleep and less likely to create havoc while we were out.

Lunch was with Mr & Mrs/Doctor "Oranges & Lemons" and in true spirit of friendship we took a gift....

..... 6 bags of chicken manure and a dozen eggs. Don't let it be said that I'm not the thoughtful type. Always willing to tun up with a few bags of shit.

This may seem really really peculiar if you are not in to veg gardening but the contents of the coops make a great "brown" compost additive and mixed with grass clipping make a mean compost in about 12 months. Incidentally, talking of coops - a few miles down the road is a Plant Nursery where they advertise Chicken Coups. This conjures up the image of a Rhode Island Red in a Che Guevara pose with a bandolier slung across its breast. It also make me wonder what the chances are of having an illiterate Nurseryman and an illiterate sign writer that meet and do business together.

I probably need to state that the Oranges and Lemons have a huge garden and a poly tunnel and the shit was requested rather than me just thinking that they might like it.

I probably also need to explain why I refer to the Oranges and Lemons in that way too. 30% seems to have lots of friends but they seem to have very few names. If you do the maths this means that several friends have the same name and you can guess how bloody frustrating it is when 30% says "Sue" called and you have to go through about four of them before you hit the right one.

I am not joking, the Sues are as follows:-

  • Service Manager Sue (a folleague of 30%)
  • Pinky (an old School friend of 30%)
  • Mad Bat (a friend in the village)
  • Your Step Mother (self explanatory, wife of a bad man's Dad)
Generally, by the time I have worked out which Sue it is I cant summon any enthusiasm for what they actually wanted.

Doctor/Mrs Oranges and Lemons is also a duplicated name in the crammed address book of 30% - it will probably come as no surprise to learn that my address book is a slim folio and was last updated at about the same time as the Dead Sea Scrolls. I am not, by nature gregarious. Neither am I a hermit but I have a very few very good friends rather than many acquaintances.

Yep - sorry back to Doctor Lemons. She is a "Rachel" and Oranges and Lemons rhymes with her surname and is used to separate her from Psychotic Rachel who we fortunately haven't seen for a good couple of years. Long may that last!

We had a lovely time just chatting, munching and generally chilling.

The evening was spent watching Avatar and I have to say that we all thoroughly enjoyed it. It was visually spectacular and very creative. The plot wasn't particularly original - something along the lines of Dances with Wolves with bits of Braveheart and A Man called Horse pretty much ties it up. But I don't think James Cameron intended it to be High Art so there is no need to tear it apart on the basis that it isn't.

One thought I did keep having while I watched it was did the Na'vi spray like earth cats?