Month: September 2010

Good morning to you all. Boy, did I “mis-speak” the other day when I wrote about the “cold” weather which has moved in. That was nothing! We’ve had rain and wind from the north and the temperatures have plummeted to single figures. Come on! It’s still September!

Ms Playchute received a letter a few weeks ago inviting her to present herself at the Daventry Medical Centre on Thursday for a mammogram. Nothing particularly unusual in that – it’s a regular occurrence – women of a certain age get invited to come along every so often and have their breasts mangled by the NHS’s finest breast mangling machine.

What amused me about the invitation was “the new venue” where the examinations were to take place – Car Park C.

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Now, I know we have a coalition government which is determined to cut public expenditure to the absolute bone (and beyond) but I hadn’t realised that their cuts had already had such an immediate and dramatic impact. The image that came to me was of a dreary, drizzly car park with a long, winding queue of women of all shapes and sizes, naked from the waist up, slowly making their way up to a grubby technician in a white coat sat behind a cheap, formica table. The technician takes their details, gives them a quick visual check and then mangles their breasts in a “new and improved” mammary mangling machine. Hey, there’s a recession on and this is the best we can do!

This got me thinking back to a video I had seen some time ago of an advertisement intended to encourage women to do a self-examination on a regular basis which I thought I would share with you. This is, allegedly, a real advertisement which was supposedly banned in Canada although I’m not convinced I believe it. (I can believe it was a real advertisement; I can’t believe that the Canadians would ban it but what do I know).

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukq3UD3q9Lc

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And, while searching for that one I ran across the following which is equally amusing, I think.

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Still, they both make a serious point in a humourous and memorable way. So, to all the women in my life – either give Cam or those boy scouts a call today. Alternatively, make sure you check yourself on a regular basis!

Lots of pictures today. I ran across the following sports-related cartoons during the week. The first rather sums up Ms Playchute’s attitude to the beginning of the football season; the second the somewhat dubious use of Twitter by athletes.

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And finally, finally, there was a story on the Guardian web site about the development of the world’s hottest chilli. I suppose the real question is why?

And finally, finally, finally, our heartiest and heartfelt congratulations to Karl and Katie on what we assume (having received no news to the contrary) to be the success of yesterday’s event.

Love to you all,

Greg

 

 

Good morning to you all on a gorgeous if somewhat chilly weekend. It’s bright and sunny, the sky is clear and shockingly blue but the temperature is suggesting that Autumn may not be too far away. No frost yet but there is that decidedly cool feeling which makes one take notice. The heating went on yesterday and there may be a fire in the lounge wood burner before too much longer. Hopefully, we’ll get a few more weeks of relatively moderate temperatures before it really starts to turn but I have to say, this seems ominously early for my liking.

It’s been a hectic and busy week, so busy that I’ve even had to work for a couple of days. Some mistake surely! When I say “busy” of course I mean that it’s been a struggle to get all the sports in. Not only do we have the baseball season to conclude (shame about the Dodgers and the Red Sox but just wait ‘til next year), but there’s also the start of the football season, both the NFL and college. I’m telling you, it’s a challenging task to get through it all (and, I don’t even record everything that’s on).

Speaking of baseball, we just heard the good news from our friend and neighbour Pete that the book of his adventures is to be published! You will all remember, I’m sure, how he set out to see a baseball game in every major league baseball stadium and at least one game in each of the fifty states; indeed, many of you hosted him on his travels. Yesterday morning he came over to share the news with us, clutching the contract which the publishers have asked him to sign and return to them. The title is still somewhat undecided and I’m not sure it will be out in time for the Christmas rush but when we have further details I’ll let you all know. Part of the condition of the contract is that the Diary of his journey has to be removed from the web so, if you want to have a brief reminder of what it’s all about go to Heaven or Iowa before the diary is replaced by a page advertising the availability of his book.

As if that wasn’t exciting enough, some of the more regular visitors to Stragnell.com will already have discovered that there are now some short video clips of some of the performances from the Royal Command Variety Performance in the Stragapalooza section. Many apologies in the first instance – the quality is not great (I shot these clips on a Flip camera I had which is of a similar quality to what you might shoot on your mobile phone) and, worst of all, several of the performances did not get recorded at all. I know that I missed the first few performances because (a) I forgot that I had brought the camera to the lake and then (b) when I went looking for it I had trouble finding it. So, my “toast” to absent members, Grandpa’s introductory remarks and Sallie, Rod, Amelie and Ash’s performance of the Incy Wincy Spider regrettably didn’t get recorded. Also, for some reason which I cannot remember, Sandy and Carol’s “Six Suckers on the Line” skit is missing as is the grand finale (although I’ve put the words and music online so you can perform it for yourself). So, after that caveat, knock yourselves out! You’ll find it on the Stragapalooza page.

Finally, I ran across this link in the Guardian the other day – it’s a series of photographs of a bear in a zoo in Finland doing some morning stretches. Many of you will know that I too do similar stretches every morning although I think I’ve still got a lot of work to do to get as good as this.

Love to you all,

Greg

Good morning.

Penelope and I were speculating the other day on when our swallows would make their way south for the winter. We were remembering, with great fondness, the gathering of the Chapman Primary School swifts in Portland last September and while we don’t have the extravagant and flamboyant spectacle which takes place there every evening, we were wondering when ours would be departing and whether they also had a convenient gathering point to meet up with all their friends and relations for the long journey to the South.

They are still here, as we “speak” but it won’t be long. I was walking Molly the other day across the fields at Edgcote and, while I don’t imagine that she noticed much, there were indeed swarms of swallows flying in a figure of eight formation just in front of the woods above the cut fields gathering insects and bulking up for the trip. I don’t know whether these were all from Edgcote House (a considerable number nest in the eaves there each year) or whether they represented any sort of gathering from a variety of places but there were certainly a significant number and clearly they were gearing up for the great expedition.

I don’t think I mentioned the tale of Ms Playchute’s rescue of the swallow chicks from the previous brood. Sometime this summer (I’m afraid I can’t be more specific than that but it was certainly before we left for the States), Sally from next door was looking for something in our garage and came across two swallow chicks on the floor. These were relatively new chicks as they had very few feathers and it was clear that some disaster had occurred. It turned out that their nest had broken for some reason and they had been dumped fairly unceremoniously on the garage floor. After much discussion and debate about what we might do to help, Penny eventually climbed a ladder and put them back into another, old nest which had been unused this year. I have to confess, we were not optimistic about their chances, imagining that the parents would not visit them in a different nest. However, they certainly did visit them and the chicks clearly survived judging by the mountain of swallow poo on the garage floor just below the nest and their favoured launching off point.

Before we went on holiday, Ms Playchute fixed up a dentist appointment for some time shortly after our return. It had been something like three years since her last visit and necessitated a change of dental practices – our previous dentist decided to no longer treat National Health patients. I had made a similar change of practice about a year ago and eventually Ms Playchute decided to follow suit. So, I provided her with the details of the practice I visit and she made an appointment.

Unfortunately, when it came time for her appointment she couldn’t quite remember the precise details but she was fairly confident so off she went. She presented herself at the practice at what she imagined was the appropriate time but surprisingly the receptionist could not find any record of her appointment or, indeed, of her. As this was her first visit it wasn’t too surprising that they couldn’t find any of her details but she insisted that she had made an appointment and they kindly agreed to squeeze her in for an initial check-up.

When she returned and told me this tale I did ask whether she had gone to the right practice. Investigation subsequently revealed that not only had she presented herself at the wrong practice, she had arrived on the wrong day. So, our future strategy for making doctor or dentist appointments is clear. Turn up whenever you like and simply insist that you had made an appointment.

Finally, following last week’s article describing the rise of the Mamils, another example of the amusements which the eccentric British cycling public indulge in from time to time, the Knutsford Penny Farthing cycle race held once every ten years.

Special added feature for this week – click this link and see where it takes you! You may need to turn your volume up.

Love to you all,

Greg

Oops! Late start to the morning hence a late start to this edition of the Weakly News; too much to do and so little time! We had a very pleasant evening with Mary and Paul across the road last night and staggered home well past our bedtime and we’re off for lunch with some other friends and acquaintances this afternoon. My goodness, we do enjoy a frenetic social whirl!

It’s been a good week apart from the unfortunate necessity of starting to pretend to work again. Ms Playchute, of course, was right back into it upon our return but I was able to prolong the holiday by playing with photographs and creating a little slide sequence with music which I will share in due course. But, schools did start back towards the end of last week and I have a number of sessions scheduled over the next couple of weeks. So it was time to have a look and remind myself what the heck it is I’m supposed to be doing. Increasingly, a real struggle!

The other unfortunate news to relate is that Ms Playchute has developed an addiction which may prove difficult to cure. She has become a Facebook Junkie.

After, I guess, about a year of having been “on Facebook” but not really knowing how or what to do with it, Pen received an e-mail from an acquaintance from her East African days inviting her to join a Facebook group for those who attended the Loreto convent in Eldoret, Kenya. Since joining she has been in contact with dozens of “girls” who were there at more or less the same time and they have exchanged photographs and reminiscences. It seems that every few minutes she is checking for updates and now spends “hours” hammering away at the keyboard with her long-lost friends. The following show her preparing to play hockey for the “Irish”. It seems that the Irish were short a player and so commandeered Ms Playchute to their side. Of course, since then we have discovered a long, great line of Irish ancestry in her background so she wasn’t really a ringer brought in after all.

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In case you have any trouble recognising her, she is on the left in the first photo and on the right in the second. Click the photo for a slightly larger version if you dare.

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I am about to make a start on the Stragapalooza 2010 cookbook but there are some recipes missing; if those of you responsible could forward them on I would be grateful. Some of these are very basic, of course, but they ought to be included, I think, just to be complete. So, I am missing Sandy & Pam’s meals (marinated beef flank steak, ratatouille & corn bread and whole roast chicken with bacon, vegetarian pasta/bean salad and green salad), Sarah’s Chicken Casserole and Vegetable Surprise and meat/vegetarian lasagne and Sallie’s left-over lamb meal. Have a look here to remind yourselves, if you like and, if possible, let me have your contributions as soon as possible. After all, I need something to keep me from pretending to work.

Finally, I ran across an interesting article on the BBC web site about “The Rise of the Mamils (Middle-aged Men in Lycra)” which struck a chord (although I have yet to feel any burning desire to undertake the spiritual journey to the mountains nor do I take any particular interest in the way in which my sweetheart shaves her legs). You can read it here.

Love to you all,

Greg