11:00 I drive Lois over to Ashchurch just outside Tewkesbury so that she can take part in her church's Sunday Morning Meeting - I'm a bit surprised she wants to go today because she didn't sleep well last night after all the excitement of yesterday, the day we spent with our daughter Sarah and our twin granddaughters.
flashback to yesterday, when we drove to Alcester and had lunch with
our daughter Sarah and our 10-year-old twin granddaughters, Lily and Jessica
But was it excitement that stopped her sleeping, or was it just sheer naked terror? When we got into bed last night Lois was talking about that article, you know, the one about all the spiders that are invading our homes just at the moment.
Have YOU got them too? Have YOU noticed how there seem to be more and more spiders around currently? Well, last night Lois and I heard an explanation from a local academic. Apparently it's because male spiders are getting more and more desperate to find mates this year.
Local spider-buff Prof. Adam Hart of the University of Gloucestershire says it's because in the spider world it's now the mating season, which will continue now until mid-October. And the problem for male spiders nowadays is that they need to cover a lot more ground these days to find a female.
The males have long gangly legs - some spiders from the house-spider species Eratigena Atrica, for example, have legs that are 9 inches long (23cm). And the spiders have so-called "pedipalps" at the front, which they use for mating, says Prof. Hart, and which become so long that they sometimes almost look like extra legs.
a typical "Eratigena Atrica" (house spider)
Lois and I discussed this article last night after we got into bed. We assume that the females prefer to live in houses, because it's warmer and more comfy, but we wonder if they are also finding the modern male spiders physically unattractive, and are trying to get away from them, just like people do.
Our personal opinion is that the male spiders need to "shape up", make an effort for once, and perhaps take a bit more care with their grooming, maybe putting on a bit of weight as well, so that their legs become more chunky and welcoming, and less gangly: and we think that a few minutes spent on grooming each day in the morning might get the females to show more interest.
What do YOU think? Answers on a postcard, as usual, please!
12:00 Be that as it may, however, tired though Lois is today, she's keen to go out to the meeting this morning; and it's nice for her to sometimes mingle with, and chat in person with, the other church-members, rather than just seeing them on the laptop screen, so fair enough!
When we arrive at the Village Hall where services are held, the lunch-break is in progress, which is nice, because we can slip in at the rear entrance and unobtrusively grab a table at the back.
flashback to August 2021: we made our first visit to Ashchurch Village Hall
where the church's local services are held
The church's numbers have, in the last year or two, been swollen by a bunch of Iranian Christian refugees, who are being accommodated in hotels in the Gloucester area by the Home Office, pending being granted permission to stay in the UK.
Today Lois has brought with us some more bags of nuts and raisins for the Iranians - they love nuts and raisins, and the bags disappear in no time as soon as Lois puts them down on the kitchen table.
a typical bag of nuts & raisins
I'm not sure why the Iranians get so crazy for these particular "nibbles" exactly, but I know they don't care for the typically English food that they get served in their "migrant hotels". I personally don't blame them for this one little bit, because I know that the meals being selected for them are chosen for them out of some of the more horrible dishes from the so-called "gamut of British food".
Poor Iranians !!!!
Lois has also brought with her today a big bag full of skeins of knitting wool in various colours that she bought in a shop in Alcester last weekend.
some typical skeins of knitting wool
Today she hands these skeins of knitting wool over to the Iranian women, so that they can knit some warmer clothing for themselves and for their menfolk. The British winter is always a bit of a nightmare for them compared to the hot country they come from.
Isn't Lois kind-hearted!!! I wish I could be more like her !!!!!
Lois chats with fellow-church member David (right of centre).
In her hands can be seen her bag of nuts and raisins,
and her bag of knitting wool, all for the Iranians, bless her!
Later, while Lois and I sit at the back of the hall having our lunch during the lunch-break, and waiting for the meeting to start, Lois casts her eye over a Farsi bible that one of the Iranians has left on the table, but she can't make much of what it's supposed to be saying, and I'm not surprised, frankly. But at least she's holding it the right way up, which is a start, I suppose!
It's a bit alarming to me, as I sit here, to know that some church-members have had COVID recently, and/or their partners have had it, even though the reported symptoms generally seem to be just like a bad cold. Chief Elder Andy tells us today that his wife Angie has still got it, but that he himself didn't catch it.
Also our friends Mari-Ann and her husband Alf have had COVID too recently: Mari-Ann had the "bad cold" symptoms, but Alf didn't have any symptoms at all - although he knew he'd had COVID because he'd paid for a test. Anyway they're both over it now and are both here in the hall today.
I guess all these young or middle-aged people do a lot of day-to-day mixing with others, either in their jobs or socially, in contrast to Lois and me, who mostly consort with each other 24/7, which must cut down massively the chances of being infected.
But YIKES all the same !!!!!!
Chief Elder Andy is also today's preacher. For the benefit of the Iranians present, Andy's talk is being simultaneously translated into Farsi by Google Translate software and flashed up on the screen behind him.
Chief Elder Andy, who is today's preacher:
seen here with his wife Angie
Andy is a really nice guy with a great sense of humour, but he unwisely includes an English joke in his exhortation today, which I realise immediately will sadly just not work in Farsi. He says, "Seven days without prayer makes one weak" - a pun on the homonyms "weak" and "week".
My feeling is that it would be a bit of a minor miracle if Google Translate could make that sound funny in Farsi, and I notice that the ripple of laughter that greets Andy's joke is coming entirely from the Brits in the hall, and that the Iranians are looking puzzled. However, I'm going to let that one slide, because, after all, Andy means well and his heart is in the right place, isn't it, which is the important thing!
But what a crazy language we speak !!!!! Steve, our American brother-in-law recently sent us some more examples:
I bet Farsi doesn't have all these problems. Or DOES it? I think perhaps we should be told, and quickly!
15:00 Lois and I arrive home and go to bed just as the rain arrives and starts beating on the bedroom windows. It looks like the rain is set in now for the rest of the afternoon and evening, just as the weather-men said, but we're warm and dry, which is the important thing!
20:00 We "wind down" (haha!) on the sofa with a bit of telly, first with Antiques Roadshow, where members of the public bring along the heirlooms and curiosities from their attics to some stately-home or other to have them discussed and valued by experts in the field.
For tonight's programme we're in Scotland, and it's nice to hear a bit about Scotland's national bard, Robert "Robbie" Burns. Chris Waddell of the Burns Museum tells presenter Fiona Bruce a bit about the great man, and about his most famous song, "Auld Lang Syne".
The tradition of singing the song on New Year's Eve has gone global apparently. And the song is even the National Anthem of the Maldives - who knew that?
Burns was a collector of Scottish folk songs, but also a writer of songs, some of which he wrote from scratch, and others which were older songs that he had "tweaked" and adapted. And tonight it's fascinating to see the poet's own printed copy of a set of traditional folk songs, a book that had interleaved blank pages, on one of which Burns had written his own version of Auld Lang Syne opposite the original, which was by Allan Ramsay.
Burns' own copy of a book of Scottish songs, with Allan Ramsay's
original version of Auld Lang Syne on the left-hand page,
and Burns' amended version in his own handwriting on the right-hand page
Do you remember the last time that Lois and I linked arms with a load of revellers in a pub on New Year's Eve and sang Old Lang Syne etc? It was actually the New Millennium Eve, if that's the right expression - or the Eve of Minnellium as Victoria Wood used to call it.
look at us - all dressed up and ready to party like it's 1999 !!!!
We went out to the Clocktower pub in Charlton Kings, Cheltenham, and had their eve-of-millennial meal plus drinks.
And then we boogied with the rest of the crowd to the New Year's Eve disco, with live singer. You must remember that!
the live singer at the Clocktower's Eve of Millennium Disco and Karaoke
- tremendous fun !!!!!
Sadly, not all the exhibits we see tonight on Antiques Roadshow are as undamaged as Burns' song-book. A collection of statues amassed by British male aristocrats doing the "Grand Tour" of Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries, unfortunately includes some damaged items, something that presenter Fiona Bruce has already noticed.
Don't get too excited, Fiona. It's only a statue haha!!!!
Another couple on the programme tonight bring along a family heirloom dated 1909 and associated with Kaiser Wilhelm, the last Emperor of Germany.
It turns out that the man inherited the jewel plus some books and other memorabilia of the Kaiser through his family, and that they were all originally presented to his great-great-great-aunt Anne Topham, who was a governess and tutor in English to the Kaiser's only daughter, little Princess Victoria Louise from 1902 to 1909.
Great-great-great-aunt Ann Topham
Little Princess Victoria Louise was Kaiser Wilhelm's last child, who was born after the Kaiser and his wife Augusta Victoria had already had six boys in quick succession.
Kaiser Wilhelm and his wife Augusta, seen here in 1898
Lois and I discuss this familiar situation, where the wife keeps having children of the same sex, whereas one of the parents, usually the father, is trying to get his wife to "pop" at least one child of the other sex. Lois thinks that Augusta probably breathed a sigh of relief when she finally "popped" a little girl for a change, and realised she would at last get a bit of peace and quiet from old Wilhelm!
Poor Augusta !!!!!
Do you remember reading that story about the Greene family on the Onion News website recently?
JUNEAU, AK—Saying it was clear the parents never intended to
have such a large brood, sources confirmed Wednesday that the Greene family has
way too many daughters for them not to have been trying for a son.
“Obviously, after Jessie and Katie, they started to get
desperate for a boy, otherwise they wouldn’t have had Ashley,” said family
friend Lisa Contreras, who noted that the Greenes showed no signs of stopping
even though they were both nearing 40 and had daughters in day-care, elementary
school, and middle school.
“I thought for sure they’d be done once Sophia was born, but
then a year and a half later, along came Charlotte. For everyone’s sake, I hope
the fifth time’s the charm.”
Sources later confirmed that the Greenes had posted a photo
of pink balloons on Facebook to announce their latest pregnancy.
Oh dear! Let's hope the Greenes have enough energy to keep up the battle haha!
[Oh enough already! Just go to bed, will you! - Ed]
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!!
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