To go with your menu

Photo of JC our new skool cook.

Is there anybody there?

Have you all gone on a school trip and left me behind all on my ownsome? I bet you're all somewhere nice like restaurants or cinemas and I'm here bored out of my tiny mind. I found some purple fairies in my garden today - honest.

I can't wait to go to bed cos we got a new one today with a memory foam mattress, but it's only 9:30 which is far too early for me. If you are reading this just post a comment so I know I'm not all alone at school.

Snailbeach Shepherdess this is for you !

This is snailbeach sheperdess with her new bionic arm after the hydro therapy and all!! Bonne Chance dear and good luck!! get well soon and if it gets too much just scream Wailey Wailey and we shall come and rescue you!

Get well soon...ps the caption for this poster reads "we can do it" which is a bit presumptive as it is you and not us doing it and smacks a bit of "we are right behind you dear!" whilst hding behind a wall and keeping our heads down. As you cannot drink in hospital I am going to be very kind and drink an extra bottle a day for you so if you would like to state your favourite tipple I shall start tonight!

Slideshow tutorial

Here's one I made earlier, with a link to the tutorial, if anyone wants to have a go. It's a bit of a long read but worthwhile in the end, and, surprisingly, fun.

Heres one of my favourite flowers at the moment, i call it knapweed.. i can't believe you where all being so mean about humphrey comphrey yesterday it's one of my favourites i've got 4 types, its a brilliant green manure,and the bees love it, and you can wrap it around your broken limbs, can't guarantee it'll work though..xx

A purple patch

In the spirit of purple-ness:

I've just looked up what 'purple patch' actually means - as opposed to what I thought it might mean. Google and I thought more-or-less alike:

'To have a purple patch means to have an exceptionally good period in, say, that game of football. The origin here is a little obscure but could be based on the fact that Roman noblemen wore purple togas. They were clearly exceptional people, hence the analogy. Alternatively the emphasis may be on the patch since purple and other multicoloured areas were sometimes set into ancient illuminated texts and other ventures in order to make them look more distinguished than they truly were. In Horace's De Arte Poetica he says "Often to weighty enterprises and such as profess great objects, one or two purple patches are sewn on to make a fine display in the distance".'

How educational is that? On a Saturday as well.

Double entry blog speaking

Don't know why but the comments box on the Announcements page was playing me up this morning, and although I announced there I've come here as well to put a clickable link to today's blog, Grassed off, which I couldn't properly there. Click on the link or the pic to go there.

FOOD FORCE

Hi, just written this up for the Europaworld blog that I contribute to. Thought some of you with younger children might possibly also be interested as well.

FOOD FORCE - A VIDEO GAME FROM THE UNITED NATIONS

Need something to keep the children quiet on a wet Sunday that is also educational and may even help others? Well, how about a computer game that models getting humanitarian aid to victims of a country in crisis?

Called Food Force and targeted at children between the ages of 8 and 13, this free UN sponsored game consists of six missions in which players join a crack team of emergency aid workers on a fictitious island called Sheylan.

Children are faced with a number of realistic challenges: piloting helicopters on reconnaissance missions, assembling nutritious ration packs on a tight budget, air-dropping food to remote villages, sourcing and purchasing food supplies, delivering truckloads of food through minefields and rebel-held territories, and using food to help people as they rebuild their lives.

Produced by the United Nation's Food Agency - the World Food Programme - with assistance from companies such as Yahoo and Quicktime, the video game explores the problem of global hunger and the logistics of humanitarian aid work. It is designed to teach children something about the harsh reality of delivering aid in conflict zones such as Darfur in the Sudan, or Sri Lanka.

Food Force was launched in 2005 and is available as a free internet download from www.food-force.com, from where it has been downloaded about 5 million times (so they tell me). There is an interesting mini-video trailer on the download site. The game file itself is quite large (227 MB - about 30 minutes on broadband they say) and there are versions for both PCs and Macs.

Like your really interested..xx

Just to show you what i'm upto today i'm burning the old caravan, its got to go today so the jcb thats here can cover the mound up, and guess what it started to rain! even i'm fed up with it now..

Its 'bye for a bit.....

I am disappearing off the blog scene for a while, I am going into hospital first thing on Monday to sort out my rather strangely angled right arm ...looking at it ..I may be a little while!......no tales about being hung from a rack please - am getting enough of those here! I shall pretend I am visiting a health farm, shall stay on salads and fruit, drink loads of water to detox, have to take cozzie for hydrotherapy pool so will get some swimming in, a bag full of books, yes En Peu there is a TP in there, I've just checked. I shall miss you all -but keep at it girls (and boys)- and please do not move when I am away coz it took me long enough to get here and sort me bits and bobs out! How I shall manage without a daily dose of MMe Gorgonne chronicles ....I do not know! But I will have an awful lot of reading to do when I come home! So its off now to bake, clean and wash to leave all these males provided for in my absence.. well if I dont do it I shall worry - they won't....... but I will! So take care - no squabbling on the playground - no you cant have my yellow room for someone else .....I'm locking the door......and would someone feed the purple sheep for me please? Byeeeeeeeee x

Confessions of a serial mower

Well Saturday, 19th May has dawned blue, bright and dry. Just as it did 23 years ago, for my wedding. Many things have, of course, changed since that day; GOH goes to the office on Saturday mornings - once was a time when we might have lingered in bed for a couple more hours; I spend the morning with my Saturday man and not my husband!
Today we are dismantling an old outhouse to tidy up a rather neglected area of the garden. I am also pottering about with my container plants and have taken this picture of the Hostas which are wonderful this year; early and as yet uneaten by slugs.
We have exchanged cards and little gifts (GOH and not Saturday man!!) and have decided we will get up early tomorrow and wizz down to Portsmouth to cuddle and coo over The Heiress. She is by far our greatest gift.
Have a lovely weekend everyone.

all clear

Just to let those who asked know that the scan was clear. Onward and upward.

£17,550.00

Thank you for all your lovely suggestions for the £17550.00. As things have moved on apace during my visit to Lunnon and we now have the delightful JC Novelli to cater for our culinary needs, I have decided that half of the money should go towards converting one of the many redundant outbuildings to grace and favour accomodation for our old retainers. Never let it be said that we don't look after our own at Cowarts. So Cook who is now surplus to requirements can live out her days soaking her feet in the jam pan in a lovely apartment that will be fashioned from the old shippen. The Janitor is currently down there with the mini digger scraping away at the twenty years worth of dung deposited by the purple coos. All you gels with roses bring your own wheelbarrow.
Meanwhile JC as he likes me to address him, and I will be flying down to Bordeaux this weekend to visit his cousin's chateau in order to facilitate the restocking of the wine cellar that has become somewhat depleted. Gosh all this gadding about is so exciting.

Mushy Midnight Blog from Almondbury

Helloooo everyone (in the style of Mrs Doyle from father ted...)
I have blogged... sweet dreams
Sue xx