George Mansions

I’m up really early, as today is Race for life day. As Mum used to say, what’s the matter? Wet the bed?

I need to leave here before 8.30 and when the dawn chorus of Bird Scarers, on neighbouring farmland, woke me at 4.40, I just couldn’t get back to sleep.

The play was very, powerful and the acting excellent. The two characters are exhausted and sweating by the end of it, as it involves fighting and sex. But it’s not without moments of humour. Chloe had a short role at the end of the play and comes on to gasps from the audience because her appearance is so unexpected. I won’t say any more in case it spoils it for anyone who may be going to see it.

We were very proud of Chloe. I know Mike was a bit uncomfortable about the content of the play, his baby is only 13 after all. I asked her if she had heard the whole play and she said yes. I said, well I expect there was nothing that you haven’t heard before. She said, No, I hear it all the time at school. As she goes to a private all girls school in Bath, I found that rather amusing. Kids! They’re the same everywhere, regardless of wealth, background and social position.

We went for an early dinner afterwards, on the way back to the car, Chloe and her sister Abigail were in front and doing that thing where you bring your foot up behind you, while you’re walking, to kick the person you are walking alongside, on the bottom. I used to do that to Mike years ago, when we were first married and I was still young and supple. I thought I’d have a go again. So I did. Now the fact I was wearing high heels should have deterredme. But it didn’t. Mike, who should have known better said, that wasn’t very good, you used to be better. So of course I did it again, harder. As I put my foot back down, Mike side stepped, so I stepped on his foot and fell over! I really thought I’d broken my ankle but thankfully it seems I only sprained it! Dear me, will I ever grow up.? Hopefully not. LOL!

Simon was put on standby to be transferred to another submarine and could have gone to sea last weekend, so they gave him a few days off. He asked me to go down and stay with them for a couple of days. The weather was atrocious but it was good to see them and we had some lovely fish meals out while I was there. Platters in The Barbican is excellent. In the end he wasn’t transferred but he will be going to sea soon. I hate that. My step son-in law is away on his boat at present (That’s what they call submarines) and we don’t expect to see him until late summer. It’s hard having family in the forces.

Must go and get showered now and have some breakfast. I know we won’t be making a fast time but at least we are going to do our best and hopefully will be home before dark!!

This isn’t my normal entry. I’ve been so busy lately I’ve not had time to write about what’s been happening at George Mansions.

Apart from the allotment and a dozen other things, I have also been working on a website I am a Moderator of. It’s called Black Country Gob, it’s new and expanding, covering all aspects of life in The Black Country now and historically.

My particular interests are The Gallery, Local History, Recipes and Genealogy. My project this weekend was to trace the River Stour from its source to the point where it joins the River Severn at Stourport.

The photos of the Stour can be found here

I also want to help people searching the Internet for family, or historic photos by putting the links in here, as I believe the names should then come up in the Search Engines, at present the photos in the Gallery don’t. So for my regular readers, please excuse this post, I shall be back with a proper entry soon.

Linda x.

It looks as if Summer is finally on it’s way!! We’ve had two barbeques this week and at last we are getting the garden sorted. It’s been almost 10 months since we did any real work out there. We both lost heart after the terrible flood last July and for much of that time it has been too muddy to spend much time down there anyway.

We did some heavy pruning a couple of weeks ago and then the weather went off again but today we managed to have a bonfire to get rid of all the prunings (so much for our Carbon Footprint!),

Mike mowed what is left of the lawn

and I set about the flowerbeds.

There was still rubbish left from the floods last July.

Lots more to do but the improvement is considerable.

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I still haven’t quite made it to a loss of a stone at Fat Fighters but mine and Mike’s birthdays have scuppered that. I’m hoping that this week I will get there and with that in mind we’re eating fish. That’s what I cooked on the BBQ tonight. Basa, which is a lovely white fish and is apparently a Vietnamese Catfish. (oops, buggered up the Carbon Footprint again!!!). Salmon steaks and Cod Loin wrapped in Parma Ham. All of these are classed as ‘Free Food’ in Slimmer’s World, so, bring it on! I’ll eat as much as I like.

There’s a tale behind the Cod Loins. Wednesday evening, I had literally just parked my bum on the toilet seat, in the hope of wringing out the very last drops of anything, before going to be weighed at Fat Fighters, when there was a knock at the door.

It was Gustov. This is a man, who says he is South African but has the weirdest accent I’ve ever come across and he sells frozen food from a van. I have bought from him in the past but for thelast eighteen months I have made excuses. Now whether it was the urgent need to return to the loo, or what, I don’t know but somehow I ended up trotting, barefoot, up the drive to have a look at his frozen delights. I ended up parting with £38 for a large bag of HUGE Cod Loins. Having seen the price in Sainsbury’s lately, they seemed a pretty good buy and tonight, wrapped in Parma Ham and cooked in one of those vented, foil dishes on the BBQ, well, Mike and I had to keep telling ourselves, it was one of the best meals we have ever eaten.

I just love Sainsbury’s the salad was fresh cut from lettuce they now sell growing in a little pack and as I can’t have oil based dressing, salads could have been a bit dull but not now. I forked out £11 for a bottle of their finest Balsamic Vinegar. What!! you exclaim!! But it isn’t as mad as it sounds. A little splash onto salad, or new potatoes and there is no need for an oil based dressing and it lasts for ages. I bought this bottle last summer in a fit of indulgence, not knowing then it would turn into such a valuable resource now I am dieting.

The allotment is coming along well, I earthed up the potatoes on Tuesday and Sue planted her Broad Beans yesterday, I hope to go and plant mine tomorrow. My only concern now is, with the good weather, I am going to have to try and sort  out watering things, not a consideration until this week.

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A couple of nights ago I turned into 'angry Worcester Woman'. I think this was something from a Tony Blair campaign. They felt they had to target, middle class, middle England voters and hit on the idea of Worcester Woman. Well I am one very pissed off Worcester Woman, thanks to Gordon and his cronies. My job, which gets more arduous by the day, has just been awarded a derisory pay award, which doesn’t anywhere near touch inflation. Then, at the same time I lost the 10p tax band, which means (Thanks Gordon!) now, after my annual increase, I am £1.06 a month better off.

Gordon, realising he has made one almighty cock-up, has tried to pour oil on troubled waters by saying he will make amends by doing some jiggery pokery with the Family Credits and the Pension Credits. Well, whoopee doo!! I don’t qualify for either. So Gordon, mate, @@@@ off!

I wrote to David Cameron, telling him of my thoughts and situation and had a very nice e-mail back from some flunky.

All very nice but basically, Blah, Blah Blah!!

******

Went on a day trip out with Year One, that was a surprise, I was told I was going with Year 2. It was a lovely day out and we went to an Environmental Centre which was a touch odd as it was in the grounds of an electricity sub station. Having a picnic area under an electricity pylon seemed bizarre to say the least.

But, the bluebell woods were lovely and the ankle biters don’t back chat in the way their older siblings do, so it was a very pleasant day out.

Won a tenner on the Lottery. Didn’t win the Premium Bonds, so I guess I’ll keep on working but I’ve been to school the last two mornings with the roof down on my car, which has been wonderful, I can smell new mown grass and flowers as I crawl along in the traffic choked roads that are Worcester in the rush hour! So it’s not all bad.

I’ve been a bad, bad, Blogger!! I just don’t get around to writing as often as I should.

The weekend before last was my birthday and every moment was accounted for.

On the Saturday I went up to Rowley Regis, home of my fore-fathers and checked into a small hotel. There I met a lady I had never met before. We have been ’online friends’ for a couple of years now, maybe longer. We have both been researching our family from Rowley Regis and as she had come down from Scotland on a business trip, we decided to meet up and to extend the invitation to other members of the website that we use.

As soon as we met, face to face, we knew we would get on. We spent Saturday afternoon at the Black Country Museum and had a whale of a time, going down the mine, eating chips fried in dripping and as she said “ Helping out the ladies in the cake shop” by eating up their stock.

In the evening we rolled down the hill from the hotel to an old, traditional Black Country, real ale pub, where we met up with other Members of the website. One of them was a girl I worked with when we were 17 and 18 years old . We hadn’t seen each other for 37 years, yet I knew her as soon as she walked in the door. I’ve no idea when I ever spent from 6.30 until, being thrown out, after midnight, in a pub but we had the best time. Everyone got on so well, it was as if all our online banter had just developed into 3D.

I don’t know if it could ever be as good again but we certainly hope to try.

Sunday was my birthday and I went out for tea and cake with Catherine, Flo and Isabella.

This last weekend was the open garden at Little Larford, Astley Burf . I went two years ago and posted a photo of Catherine, looking largely pregnant. This time I went with her and Isabella. Flo stayed home to watch the Grand Prix.

Mike had done a feature on the opening in his gardening programme. This year there were 20,000 tulips and 3,000 Narcisii.

These were a variety being trialed for a bulb producer. They were my favourite, I think. There are over 140 varieties there, so it's hard to be sure!

And here's my little Isabella Rose, amongst the tulips.

Just a few of the many varities of tulips there.

He’d better not feature it next year! It was far too popular, we couldn’t manage to get any of their wonderful Raspberry fresh cream cake, which was very disappointing.

Isabella is so funny. We went to the farm shop after the garden and as soon as I pulled up outside, she said “Cake!!” She remembered we’d been there the week before for cake.

They had been to Stoke for a fancy dress party the day before. Isabella was dressed as Stephanie from Lazy Town. She looked so cute, I will get some photos of that soon. When the other people turned up in costume, she was a bit scared and started saying. “Mummy’s car, home” She may not say a lot but she knows how to get her point across.

She can count to fourteen in English and six in German. Not bad for twenty two months old. She loves to talk on the phone and will have pretend conversations with her toy phone. This little clip was made for her Grandma in Germany. In German that is Omah, only I don’t know if that is how you spell it.

On my birthday we also went to open a Dog Show at Eastnor Castle. It was for the charity that we got Rowley from.. We managed to get through that without a major incident but he really doesn’t like other dogs. We met up with his ’brother’ Ginger from the family he used to live with. That really freaked him out. They used to get on together but Rowley got very aggressive and then turned his back on Ginger and started backing himself up my leg. I’m convinced he thought that he was going to have to go back to that awful place. Poor boy.

School is a nightmare, never have I known such a badly behaved year group. I have my thoughts on the reasons, they are just not being shown enough discipline and the next year group teachers will be having a very tough time with them in September.

One boy, today, called me a big fat cow! This was upsetting for two reasons. One, I wasn’t having anything to do with him at the time. Two, I’ve lost nine and a half pounds since I joined Slimming World six weeks ago, so I feel that if I’m a big fat cow now, I don’t want to know what I was before.

NO!! This was upsetting for three reasons. The boy that called me that is nine years old and he weighs over fourteen stone! That’s heavier than me. He was obviously using words that have been used against him, which is sad. Then again…. Pot, kettle?????

My football team are going up!! Well, it’s almost certain, so we will be back in the Premier. That’s exciting. I shall have to try and get to a few more matches next season.

The rain is coming down in a way that makes one think of building an Ark, whatever is wrong with our weather? Fingers crossed I don’t have to go and do a chicken rescue in the middle of the night. I pray you all have dry feet.

Linda x.

Well, Mike’s still talking to me after his surprise photo appeared in here. He seemed to find it quite funny and he’s had comments at work by people who have also seen it. He found it hard to believe that happened while he was asleep.

Last Sunday we woke to a blanket of snow, the first we’ve had this Winter, only now it’s Spring!!

I let Rowley out into the garden and didn’t say anything, I just wanted to see what his reaction was. You can see on this clip. (Turn your speakers on there is music too)

My beloved West Bromwich Albion got knocked out of the FA Cup, at the semi final stage, at Wembley last Saturday, which was a bit depressing. More so for Mum and Wilf, they’d got up at 5 in the morning to go.

Then in the week we slaughtered Blackpool 3-1, to go top of the League!!!!!!!

All the males of the family support Watford (Huh!!) and they are just two points below us. West Brom are playing Watford today, it’s a home match for us, emotions will be running high. The winner today will get 3 points, so you can see what a vital match this is. Especially as Watford were abysmal in their mid week match and missed a chance of gaining three points against lowly Barnsley. They were so bad David, my stepson said he’d burnt the tickets to today’s match. The top two teams will go up to the Premier League. I hope it’s both of us, as this is the first year we’ve been in the same League for about 5 years, we keep swapping places.

So Mike, David and I are going together but I shall go and sit with Wilf, the men can go and join the Watford lot. Mum can’t come, she’s been called into hospital for tests on her painful back. She’s in for a week! I can’t understand it, they don’t keep you in that long after major surgery these days. Still, if they can get rid of some of her pain it will be worth it.

I had a blip with the diet this week, gained half a pound, not sure why because up until the day of Slimmer’s World, my scales had been showing a 2 pound loss. My friend lost four and a half pounds, was Slimmer of the Week and won the Raffle If you ask me, that’s just showing off!!!

She’s almost lost a stone now and I haven’t managed to do a half yet, (Message to self) I must make more effort!!! Would Liposuction be cheating?

Isabella’s coming on really quickly with her talking. We were counting marbles and sorting them into colours when she said, “I get one more” her longest sentence so far and the thing is, she did get one more and put it to make a group of five. I want to make numbers fun for her, so that she isn’t like the children I work with at school, who, at the age of nine, can’t add 10 to a small number without doing it on their fingers. They really worry me.

I’ve lost loved ones to cancer but this last week we heard such a sad tale. Mike went to do an interview with a couple, who have young children. The wife had breast cancer a few years ago, she was one of the lucky ones that had Herceptin prescribed and it worked but apparently it can’t prevent cancer in the brain and that is where she has it now. The prospects are poor and I can’t help but be reminded of J-Lands much missed Kim. Only this lady has a youngest child of five years old, who has been told by a school friend “Your Mummy’s cancer is back and now she’s going to die.” You have to ask yourself what on earth some adults can have been thinking of, to let that information be passed onto a child.

The couple did the interview for Mike’s Sunday Morning Religious programme, they had wanted to discuss where their faith, or lack of it came into this sort of situation.

I’m sitting here on a lovely April morning, the sun is shining and birdsong is drifting in through the open window beside me. My adoring dog is curled up on the floor at my feet, the cats are dozing on sunny windowsills. I feel relaxed and at peace. Oh! What a contrast from the sweating, screaming, hordes, of which I shall be one at 5.20 this evening! LOL.

The Easter Holidays are almost over and it will be back to school on Monday. I don’t think I can go, I’ll have to get Mum to write me a note. We’ve hardly touched the garden and the allotment is only about 8% sorted. Half the time the weather has just been too bad to want to do any gardening.

Yesterday we went to Bridgemere Garden Centre, near Nantwich. It’s probably the biggest garden centre in Britain. It’s enormous but so efficiently run . The food, although not cheap, is excellent . We had home made Leek & Butterbean soup with a hunk of real bread and a wedge of Cheshire cheese. Because of my diet, I gave half my cheese to Mike and we shared a piece of Carrot Cake, so I was quite a good girl.

We bought a load of plants to fill some gaps, mostly caused by the floods last summer, although the chickens haven’t helped!

The chickens are now confined to barracks. We’ve moved them back down the garden and made them a run. This summer Isabella will be out playing in the garden (if we get the right weather) and I can’t have her tumbling around in chicken pooh! Also it would be nice to be able to have the back door open without fear of ‘invaders’ on the scrounge for cat food!!.

We have made a start on the garden and I hope in a week or two it will be looking good enough to take some photos. Right now it still looks awful. I couldn’t bring myself to do anything after the floods. It was too soul destroying.

On the way to Bridgemere we stopped to photograph this. A Horseshoe Tree.

When I lived in Whitchurch, Shropshire, we used to pass this regularly but as I was still in my 20’s, it never really interested my that much. Now, with my Family History interests and knowing I am descended from several Blacksmiths, I found it much more interesting.

Especially as the forge is now closed and it looks as if the oddity may be under threat of being removed. I wonder what year the bottom horseshoes date back to?

Just up the road is the village of Hodnet, which has this wonderful shop. The restore Rocking horses and sell them and other vintage and antique toys.

Somewhere to go when I win the Lottery I think.

Slimming World is the diet club I’ve joined and I am trying most of the time and am pretty good with food. It’s just that I do take my eye off the ball with the Syns some days. Saturday we took Flo’s Uncle on the Severn Valley Railway and I’m afraid I really went of the rails then!!

I managed to lose a pound in the last week, so that make 6 pounds in three weeks. If I can keep up an average of 2 pounds a week, I shall be very happy.

Mike’s been working very hard lately and it’s good that he has a few days off with me this week. Last Friday, I think it all caught up with him. I came upstairs to have half an hour on the computer before going to bed. He stayed downstairs to watch Qi. Within minutes I could hear snoring. When I finished I went down and tried to wake him. Nothing doing! I prodded and poked. Nothing. I wobbled his bottom lip, so that he made a funny noise whilst snoring. Still nothing. I was getting a bit fed up then. So I thought I’d get the camera and takes some photos of me waggling his lip. Then a little decoration seemed like a good idea . So I got a scarf from the hooks in the hall and draped it around his head. A rose from the vase nearby added a little extra ‘Je ne sais quoi’.

He doesn't even know I took this. I think I may be in trouble now!!

Mike and Rowley (led by me) have been invited to open a dog show at Eastnor Castle on my birthday, the 20th of this month. I just hope Rowley doesn’t make it a birthday to remember by attacking all the contestants!

Ah well, off to do some more digging now.

Rowley seems none the worse for his incident on the field, in fact, if anything, he’s been slightly better behaved when other dogs have been near him when out walking.

Catherine, Flo & Isabella came for dinner on Easter Sunday but Isabella wasn’t very well, she appears to have a cold. I think this is the cold Mike started last week and then passed on to me.

I’ve had to sleep in the guest bedroom for over a week now, as Mike has had one of those coughs. I think they call it an irritating cough. In fact I’m sure it must be because it’s irritating the hell out of me!! How can anyone be so LOUD? I’ve missed all the important bits from the news, weather forecasts, who did the murder, punch line to jokes. The list is endless. He doesn’t even have to be in the same room to do this. His cough is so huge I think the neighbours are planning to get an ASBO slapped on him. It is about the equivalent to Concorde going through the Sound Barrier! I’ll give him another couple of days and then he is going to the doctor’s.

Today, Easter Monday, we went to my sister’s in Shifnal, Shropshire. She put on a lovely spread and a good time was had by all. Her partner’s daughter put on an Easter Egg hunt for Isabella, which she loved.

After she'd collected them all, without anyone saying a word to her, she started sharing them out with everyone there.

Then Isabella entertained us with songs like Dingle Dangle Scarecrow and some rabbit song I’d not heard before. I wish I had thought earlier about videoing her.

I’ve been practising for the Race for Life and met up with two friends on Sunday, they will be doing the Race with me. We walked round Sandwell Valley, the venue for the Race and visited the farm. My camera was at home, so there are no shots but I will have to go again and take some, it’s an amazing place. I’ll save the details for another time.

My potatoes have been chitting nicely in the dining room, I’m just waiting for some warmer weatherto go and get them planted at the allotment.

This is such a dull entry and that’s how I’m feeling right now, DULL. I’m lacking in energy, my ‘get up and go’ has got up and gone. There needs to be some BIG changes in mylife. I just hope I can find the strength to make them.

I am so angry!!!

I just took Rowley for a walk on the playing field which is just off our road. We go there first thing in the morning, at about 6.30 and sometimes we see other dogs and Rowley barks at them, he’s nervous of them but does seem as if he might be aggressive if he got to them. So, I don’t let him off the lead and he was getting better about being near them. Unfortunately not all other dog owners are so responsible.

I thought I’d take him this afternoon, as I had been out shopping for a few hours.

There were some dogs running loose on the field but they were busy playing ‘Fetch’ and didn’t come near us. Then this woman came on the field with two dogs off the lead. One, a black Labrador came right over to us. That was too much for Rowley, who started barking and got very upset and slipped his Halti. I managed to clip the lead onto his collar but couldn’t get the Halti back on , as I really needed an extra hand to do that. The dog had returned to his owner but then came back over again . Now I didn’t have control of Rowley’s head and he has barking aggressively but I still had him by my side. This dog then started attacking Rowley. I called to the woman to call off her dog and she just looked at me as if I WAS SIMPLE!!! Excuse me, dogs fighting is a good idea is it? She came nearer and her dog returned to her. She shouted that they’re better let off the lead.

There was blood dripping from his face onto his paws.

Upset and anger were waging a fierce battle inside me and I’m not sure which got the upper hand.

When I got home I cleaned Rowley up and was relieved to find no obvious wounds. The stream of blood was coming from just inside his nostril and it seems he had a puncture wound . After I’d finished cleaning him up, there was no sign of any more blood. Hopefully he won’t need any further attention.

I told Catherine about it on the phone and she was incensed and plans to wait in the field until we find the woman. She is then going to give her a good slapping but that will be after I’ve kicked her effing teeth down her throat!

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See that? It’s a line. I’ve drawn it under the episode. I hope nothing like that ever happens again.

*****

It was time to give myself a huge mental kick up the backside, I needed it.

I find I do less and less, whatever I do do is an effort, not only physically but also mentally. I was starting to feel as if my brain was shutting down. My weight was escalating and had reached equal to the highest it has ever been. Worst of all, I was really starting to object to this fat, middle aged woman who keeps following me around. I’ve see her in shop windows and she always seemed to be wearing the same clothes as me.

It’s funny but my bedroom mirror shows me the woman I want to be, is that because we stop really looking at ourselves and when there is nobody there to compare yourself with, things don‘t look too bad. Yet out in the streets, you see yourself alongside others and just lately the comparisons have not been at all favourable.

So, over the last couple of weeks I started to take action.

I’ve joined Slimming World, went for my first weigh-in on Tuesday (normally Wednesdays) I’d lost three pounds in 6 days. Not wonderful but a step in the right direction. I’ve decided, I want to see myself as one of the success stories in the Slimming World magazine.

I’ve also entered The Race For Life. I am doing this with some new friends and my sister and niece. It will be on June 8th at Sandwell Valley Park, West Bromwich. I’m not sure I will run it my be more of a fast walk but I will be looking to do the 5KM in as fast a time as I can possibly manage. Here is a link to my page.

http://www.raceforlifesponsorme.org/BlackCountryLulu

*****

There were some funny things that I had intended to write about in this entry but I’m not feeling very funny right now after the dog incident, so I’ll save them for another time.

Have a Happy Easter and I hope the sun shines for you.

Can't do an entry with no photos at all. I've been looking through some old albums and here is one from 1991, when I was 38 and  living in Dinas Powys. Although I didn't know it then, it was one of the happiest times of my life. If you wonder what I was doing, I was barbequeing and that was a sausage on my fork.

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