Thursday January 20th 2022

 08:00 As usual we postpone getting out of bed, and we try to start the day by exchanging a bit of knowledge. 

our bed, seen here in happier times - when it's not having

to carry our weight haha!!!

I'm looking at the quora forum "knowledge" website again, and I'm very relieved to see that one of our favourite pundits on the forum, Jason Almendra (crazy name, crazy guy!), has at last "broken his silence" (as our sensationalist world media call it), and has addressed the issue of "Why didn't the Romans invade Ireland?".

And, as Jason points out, the question could just as easily be rephrased as:

A lot of nonsense is often talked about the Scots, Irish and Germans being "too savage" for the Romans to take on. Don't people ever understand that for the Romans it was all about zero-sum games. The Romans weren't in the Empire game for the glory, they were in it for the money.

And, as they say, a picture's worth a thousand words, isn't it. And pundit Jason comes up trumps with this simple map. By the way, for "Cooper" read "copper", to make things clearer (marginally!).

See? Simples !!!!!!

09:00 Armed with this game-changing knowledge about the Romans, we stagger out of bed and later go for a walk on the local football field.

aerial plan of the football field (right) and the so-called "extra bit" (left)

We're living in exciting times, that's for sure! Yesterday Lois walked round the field and witnessed some of the very first spade-fuls of earth being dug up from the "extra-bit" field by a Parish Council employee or contractor, marking the beginnings of the grand project to set up a "sensory garden" for local residents to gorge their 5 senses on (all the senses except for the "taste" function, possibly, although the jury's still out on that one!).

flashback to yesterday: Lois sees a Parish Council employee or contractor

poking his spade unenthusiastically into the extra bit of field, 

en route to creating the Parish's first ever "sensory garden"

Exciting times indeed!!! Today we try to gauge what progress has been made.  Well, now today in this blog, I can  exclusively reveal that some raised beds have appeared, although there's nothing in them, admittedly.

Still, it's a start!

I showcase the raised beds that will be the key

element in the Parish's first ever "sensory garden"

Sometimes I feel that Lois and I are "banging our heads against a brick wall" in our attempts to become more popular in our neighbourhood. For some reason, after 50 years of residence in the area, we're continuing to find ourselves regarded with a deep level of suspicion.

But this unpopularity makes the feeling all the sweeter when we do get some recognition. And today, in the football field, at the Whiskers Coffee Stand, we at last get an award for being two of the Coffee Stand's best customers - Monica, who serves at the stand when it isn't the Polish girl, presents us with 2 free flapjacks for our loyal patronage of her treats, which is nice.

Lois showcases the firsts award we have ever won

after nearly 50 years' residence in this neighbourhood -

two free flapjacks for being two of the Coffee Stand's best customers,

which is nice.

At last, we feel, people round here are beginning to like us - not a lot, admittedly, but at least enough to make this award something to tell our grandchildren about, that's for sure!

14:00 A text from Sarah, our younger daughter, who lives in Perth, Australia, with Francis and their 8-year-old twin granddaughters, talking about the Western Australia premier Mark McGowan: 

People in the state have been worried recently about McGowan's pledge last year that he would open up the state's borders at the beginning of February. Lois and I thought privately that if McGowan wanted to go back on his original pledge to open up, the spread of the omicron variant gives him plenty of ammunition in order to do this. And now he's done what we suspected he'd do, which is great.

I check the Daily Mail and find this headline:

Despite what the headline says about the decision being unlikely to be popular, Lois and I have been left in no doubt by Sarah and Francis, that this decision will actually be very much welcomed by most ordinary people in the state. So don't worry, Mark - "everything will turn out all right" (phrase copyright: Brian Wilson).

15:00 I see an email from Steve, our American brother-in-law, about a planned Robert Burns Night in Phoenixville, not far from his home.

I discuss this with Lois - it's tempting! The air fares would be expensive, but we've always wanted to take part in a Burns Night, even though we aren't Scottish. It would be fun to put on our cod-Scottish accents, modelled on "Scottie" out of "Star Trek", and also wear some fake costume bits and pieces - what could be more fun, especially as January is generally quite a grim month haha!

However, as Steve himself points out, the Phoenixville "bash" would also be a good place to catch the COVID, so perhaps not really advisable! We're not sure if Steve himself will risk it - perhaps he won't, but who knows? Well, we'll see!

They reportedly always do a nice "Burns Night" at a local pub in Prestbury, the Royal Oak.

However, our big chance was to go to a Burns Night at a pub in Leckhampton a few years ago, in the days when we used to look after Sarah's twins 2 days every week, when they were just babies. But we didn't take that chance when we actually could, in those wonderful pre-pandemic days, so it's all our own fault!

place name origins (all Anglo-Saxon); Leckhampton - named as "the village

where lots of leeks grow"; Shurdington - obscure, possibly "the farm of the 

sons of "Scirheard"; Birdlip - a 'lip' or steep place (cf "to leap") where birds abound

I stop the pram outside The Bell inn on the Bath Road, and read the advert in the window

flashback to January 2014 - I take the twins on a 30-minute

pram-ride walk around Leckhampton, and pause to look longingly

at an advert for a local £25 Burns Night in the window of a local pub, The Bell.

Awww - how cute our 6-month-old twin granddaughters looked in those far-off days !!!!

Happy times!

20:00 We watch some TV, today's edition of "Winterwatch", a series which monitors wild life in the UK with the help of a network of hidden cameras and a team of live presenters.

Although most elements in this show are live, a lot of preparation goes into it - that's for sure. But sometimes the most interesting items for me are the snippets sent in by Winterwatch viewers, like these pictures from somebody called Mike Fenton in Angus in the north of Scotland.

Mike got hold of a dead mouse and carefully placed it on a log for the local tawny owl to feed on. The owl didn't turn up for a few days, and then weather conditions got really cold, eventually freezing the mouse to the log.

A few days later, the owl turned up but it couldn't prise the frozen mouse off the log. So, to deal with the problem the owl sat down on the mouse to "brood" it, staying in that position for half an hour until it had thawed the mouse out. 

a tawny owl can't prise a frozen dead mouse off a log

so sits on it for half an hour to "brood" it and thaw it out

Eventually the owl was able to prise the mouse away from the log and swallow it, thereby getting its meal. 

Finally the dead mouse becomes warm enough to prise off the log

and the owl is able to swallow it 

This kind of behaviour by owls is quite a rare occurrence in the UK, says presenter Chris Packham, although it is observed in Scandinavia with some of the more northerly species of owl, which will catch their prey in winter, then cache and freeze the victims, and then subsequently sit on them to thaw them out whenever they get hungry. Just like we might take frozen food out of the freezer. 

See? Simples !!!!!

But what a crazy planet we live on !!!!!!

Presenter Michaela Strachan does warn viewers not to try this at home - i.e. to sit on frozen food to defrost it, but we wonder why not? As long as your "sit-me-down" can take it, why not haha! 

For ourselves, we tend to take our stuff out of the freezer and then, if it's sunny, we plonk it on our front window-sill, which is south-facing - I think Lois and I are getting too old for the "brooding" approach now, probably. We could try it the once and just see what happens, maybe? But we'll see. 

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzz!!!!!