Lois and I are staying in our daughter Alison's house this week - she and her family are having a week on the English-Welsh border, at a little place called Llanthony, near Hay-on-Wye.
We're having a fairly easy time here, I have to say. I get up at 6 am and feed the family's 2 cats and the tank of tiny marine fish, and then I get back into bed with Lois. Later we have to feed the cats some biscuits at lunchtime if they seem to want them, and then Lois gives the cats their second meal of the day about 3 pm. Then there are more biscuits at "bedtime", which for the cats is about 9pm.
Apart from that we just have to remember to feed ourselves - our usual 3 meals a day. And strangely that's something we never seem to forget to do - we're not suffering from dementia yet, that's for sure!
See? Simples!!!!
the cats who depend on us for food - Otto (left)
and Dumbledore (right) : they always eat together, which is nice!
Llanthony, where Alison's family are staying, is in the Black Mountains of Breconshire, and also is the site of the ruins of a 900-year-old medieval priory, slap bang on the border.
It's a pretty empty part of the country, as you can guess from this map:
Later today Alison sends us a charming picture of her 13-year-old daughter Rosalind, pictured here on a walk in the nearby Black Mountains.
our 13-year-old granddaughter Rosalind,
seen here on a walk in the Black Mountains of Wales
We wander down the town's main street and see a wool shop all decorated up for the Queen's Platinum Jubilee on Thursday.
a wool shop all decorated up for the Queen's Platinum Jubilee on Thursday
Then, for the next leg of our crazy outing we choose the Red Rose Tea-Room in Grayshott, on Ed's recommendation. It's run by a Polish woman who is doing a lot for Ukrainian refugees, and also the cake's very nice, Ed says. Altogether, that's more than good enough for us!
The Red Rose Tea-Room in Grayshott
Then after our visit to the tea-room, we go down the street and into a little dress shop to buy a dress and a skirt for Lois's upcoming birthday - my god! We're living dangerously now!
And the woman in the dress shop sends me the receipt in a text message to my smartphone. Who knew they could do that nowadays? It's technology gone mad, I tell you!
part of my texted receipt - it's technology gone mad, I tell you!
part of the Eliza Wray Dress and Knick-Knack shop in Grayshott
the red dress and the striped skirt that I buy Lois
for her upcoming birthday, pictured here lying peacefully in the Eliza Wray bag
that we took them away in - how cute they look !!!!!
17:00 And there's more craziness to come at 5pm, when one of Alison's cats - Otto - brings in a live bird in his mouth, probably a blackbird or a thrush, that kind of thing. He takes it into the cavernous cupboard under the stairs, where the bird seems to find some nook or cranny where Otto can't reach it: and there are black feathers everywhere in the kitchen and hall. My god, what do we do?
Now it's mine and Lois's job to keep Otto away while we try to get the bird out of the house - yikes !!!!!!
I wrap it in a cloth and put it in a bucket, and we take it out to the greenhouse, thinking to lock it in there overnight to see if it survives or not. Unfortunately it manages to escape from the greenhouse, so we can't do anything now except keep the cats indoors overnight - either the bird will fully recover and fly away (it's only lost a few feathers, we think); or else it'll be dead meat in the morning, and no longer of any interest to the cats.
But what madness !!!!!
And it's a reminder that those 2 cats aren't as dependent on Lois and me for food as we had imagined - oh dear!
19:00 I look at my smartphone again and I see that our daughter Alison has put some more charming pictures from Wales onto social media. The family has been walking over the hills and visiting the ruins of the 900-year-old medieval Llanthony Priory, and "the boys" - Ed and 11-year-old Isaac - have been getting Welsh haircuts.
(left to right) Josie (15), Rosalind (13), Sika the family's Danish dog,
Ed and Isaac (11)
looking down from the hilltops at the ruins of the
900-year-old Llanthony Priory in the valley below
at the ruins: (left to right) Ed, Isaac, Sika, Josie and Rosalind
Isaac sporting his shiny new "Welsh haircut"
20:00 We settle down on the couch and watch a bit of TV, an interesting documentary about the Queen's coronation on June 2nd 1953.
There are a few other countries in Europe that still have monarchies - Spain, Holland, Belgium and the Scandinavian countries, I think that's all - but who knew that Britain is the only one of these countries that has a special crowning ceremony?
And who knew that during the ceremony in 1953 the Queen was anointed with oil in a tradition that goes back to the anointing of Saul (c.1000 - c.1020 BC) as God's chosen King of the Israelites in the Old Testament? [I expect a lot of people knew that! - Ed]
Lois and I sit down to watch the programme, although Alison's fish (left)
appear to take little interest. A pity - they might have learnt something!
Before Elizabeth's reign the coronation had always been regarded as a secret, holy and private ceremony: and it was Prince Philip's wish to make it a public affair and to have it televised for the first time - he wanted to make the monarchy more accessible to the people.
And what a good decision. Because we'll never again have the unique circumstances of 1953 - a people broken by the sacrifices of the Second World War followed by 6 years of post-war austerity and food rationing, living among bombed-out buildings, all longing for a bit of brightness in their lives: and what could have been better than to have a beautiful young woman of 26 ascending the throne amid the pomp and splendour of a thousand years of tradition. And in the abbey, to hear the majestic sound of Handel's anthem "Zadok the Priest", performed at every coronation since that of George II in 1727.
My god - you couldn't have beaten that, could you, really? Be honest haha !!!!!
Lois and I were only about 6 at the time of the Coronation, but we both remember vividly watching it on TV, although only in black and white. Our house was the only house in our street where there was a TV, and it only had a tiny 9 inch screen, magnified slightly by a 3 inch magnifier. And I remember all our immediate neighbours crowding into our house and filling our front room - what madness (again) !!!!!
Apparently a survey was done after the ceremony, where it was discovered that there was an average of 17 people around every TV in the country. My god (again) !!!!!
flashback to 70 years ago: me, aged 6, with my little sister Kathy (4)
at a photographer's studio in Bradford - happy days !!!!!!
