The Staffordshire Hoard (2)

 You know when you have to keep quiet about something, even though the words are around  inside your head, and you have all the pictures in 640x480

THEN THE MOMENT COMES 

AND YOU KNOW GO FOR IT!

I have reached that moment. No doubt my Cheshire sibling has been waiting for me to say a few words about the time we waited in a well disciplined and highly organized queue  to see the Staffordshire Hoard.

We snaked curiously past glass fields of cow creamers, water softeners, beautiful tiles and 50's crockery , we knew the people standing behind us and ahead of us just as St Patrick knew his breastplate. 

The Hoard of small and crumpled, twisted and bittersweet gold bits delighted us all. We stood leaning over the display cases, learning together by talking, asking questions, viewing and reviewing, in an all but perfect learning environment. Touch would have been good. Thousand of fragments of bits of swords , and stuff, all hidden for hundreds of years just beneath the good red earth have now been saved for the nation.

I think they should go back to their rightful owner, for they have got it wrong. They are not the remains of an Anglo Saxon hoard.  They are 2000 years older than that. I suggest they were left by the Staffordshire Mug people for their cousin Eileen to recycle . She of course after all the ritual and assaying was going to order the Production of a limited edition of Tea Lights. She just has to finish the book she has started ,  

WELCOME BACK,  EVEN FOR A SEASON , ARCHDRUID EILEEN!

Fulfilling a dream

Last year we went  on a Parish outing to visit  the gardens and Brewery of Hunmanby Grange, home of award winning Wold Top Beer. 

I have known these gardens since they were first opened to the public , and to my gardening mind they are an absolute joy and inspiration. Archdruid Eileen would feel at home in them , as the landscape around them is pure first farmers , and the gardens are as up to date as Eileens apps were.

Now you all know I yearn for an iphone3GS, an iMac  or even the latest iphoto app but you do not know that I have dreamt of having some mushroom compost, as my children yearned for every Smurf, Pokeman and My Little Pony. I have not dreamed of having Processed Mushroom compost from a Garden Centre , sterile and clean in a neat plastic sack with air holes and advertised on Band Q flyers, or praised by Alys Fowler.  I have yearned for spent compost ,because it is not really spent at all just tired , wanting a rest in my garden before it pays out for its final fling.

I have kept this thought  . I keep bringing it  to my mind, I mulch the thought with my dreams of perfect peonies, of  Echiums 17'high again, and of our mushroom , Paneer and pea curry.


Today was the DAY.  Yes! said Colin , I will come with you-if we go now! That was after the phonecall revelation that it was 50 p a bag , bring your own sacks and shovels. Easy!

My best trip  this year so far, 3km From home as the crow flies . Another lane, I do lanes rather well now.

And the newly planted Potato fields-that's another Post............

The road across the Wolds

 

2nd attempt at this post-due to using less than signs and mucking up the html.

View Larger Map

Travelling to Beverley to visit aged parent I have been James Bond today. The  journey from Hutton Cranswick to Watton takes a couple of minutes on the A164, so I was glad that finding the road blocked ,Police cars, ambulances ,Oh dear hope they are all right accident ahead ,I had the OS map to hand and found a neat by- pass. I love the potential of a  by-pass. 

You can play around with the Google Map as long as you like. I love it .

Let the reader understand: Country lanes leading off the A164 are just that. My Os map told me that I would be using a less than B road, with no fences , and acute bends looking like bird beaks From the air.

I cannot believe that travelling in the Watton to Hutton Cranswick direction  Sat Nav sent Juggernauts , White vans, and all the local tradesmen to avoid the Accident on the main road. 

At one place I had to reverse around what looks on the Sat maplike the bill of a bird, whilst coming towards me were about 20 lost cars, and behind me 20 more also having to reverse. My James Bond bit came later , as a vast lorry realised that the impasse of  narrowness would necessitate a tilt of 20 degrees from the vertical , up a bank to pass me.  I was not having any. I did the best reversing of my whole life.

I am now  brilliant at reversing, even round the bills of birds, that I am not an extra in a James Bond Movie, BUT I have managed to act the star role , plot the Script , Direct and take all the Credits. 
By complete contrast my Drive home across the Wolds  from Driffield to Hunmanby was an interlude . I was able in empty lanes to watch
the progress of the Rape Fields.

This time next week will do it

My Favourite tree , THE ASH the last to secombe, the first to leave Summer behind , the best to burn, the ancient and mythical, lines the route . David Hockney has been here with his Hand and  Eye and Heart.

I see the froth of the Blackthorn for miles and miles of laciest delight. I enjoy the Wolds farms proud in their shelter belts, names like Howe Farm and Refuge Farm. I am just in time for the Wolds Rush half hour, as the Farm children are picked up from Kilham school and Wold Newton School and wonder what red Volvo is doing  pulled into the road end of their drive. They cannot know that one  careful lady owner  already has History in the country lanes.

Is this typical?

It made me laugh, I think he ought to do this again with another random selection of people.
And again,
and again
-much better than the Election broadcasts!

We shop they drop

Sutton in Holderness  had at least 3 village Grocery  shops in the 50s and 60s. We always used Myers in Church Street. Nellie and Steve Myers were a vital part of  our family  network. Once a week one of us dropped the Order in . Mr Myers brought the boxed order in his car, to the back door of course. Cornflakes, sugar, cheese, butter,Stork, flour,Omo,  and biscuits every week. I have started to recall other essential commodities, and I am going to note them here for posterity and children doing projects on Postwar Childhood.

Lard, bacon, matches, firelighters, bundles of  kindling, oats, Surprise Peas,tinned spaghetti, 

A million housewives every day
pick up a tin of beans and say,
“Beanz meanz Heinz!”

Gibbs Dentifrice, Vim, Brillo Pads, Bisto, Oxo cubes, Birdalls Gravy Salt, Brown and Polsons  Cornflour,tinned Carrots, tinned Marrowfat Peas, Fray Bentos ,Corned Beef, (except the year of the scare), Tinned Pilchards, Tinned Sardines, Heinz salad cream, Tinned Stewed Steak, Carnation evaporated Milk,Instant Whip, Pudding Rice, Bournville Cocoa Powder,

Camp Coffee--on the bottle of Camp on tray, you could see the bottle of Camp on the tray, you could see the bottle of Camp on the tray-I love the notion of infinity of this idea.

For several weeks running my mother was perplexed by the biscuits that had arrived in the Order. One week it was Bourbon Chocolate Creams, another week Custard Creams , another Gypsy creams. We children were delighted.  Usually we had Marie or Malted Milk or Digestives.  Mother questioned Mr Myers, where are my Nice (pronounced to rhyme with Fleece) biscuits.?  Mr Myers said Oh , I thought you just meant Nice (pronounced to rhyme with ice) biscuits !

Of course the weekly order didnt last a week always. We children would be sent shopping down to the village for extra staples (which were then put in the Book-for the monthly account).We were sent with the Paraffin can  for a gallon of Pink Paraffin,sent for a Farmhouse white or a loaf of Procea. Mr and Mrs Myers knew us but were not familiar , they did not ask questions  or gossip, and we were schooled by our mother 'not to tell the village our business'. 

Shopping for our aunt in the village was more fun. We took her dog Tammy, then Bonny to Myers for her, tied them on the metal pole for the awning and bought fascinating products-Cydrax fizzy apple juice, crab paste, danish butter and Hovis. (Best of all was going to Fanthorpes the chemist to change the Soda Syphon over. )

We were not allowed to shop anywhere but Myers for groceries, and we children always wanted to know why we couldn't get stuff at Turners which was much nearer, and Mr and Mrs Turner were very nice too and more friendly.

So I have come full circle. I have just placed an order, paid for it and it has been delivered. I feel a bit guilty.  I dont want my small local shops in Filey to shut down.  So I have only bought staples, and things I can't get here,tins of shrimps, extra low Flora and Hellmans, frozen baby broad beans and oats milled in Congleton. 

In 1967, my mother discovered that by shopping at Frank Dees supermarket along Holderness Road Hull, taking the car, she could buy shopping much cheaper, and she discovered unusual and exciting items like Caramel wafers, Twix Bars and Blue Cheese, Jogurts and Knorr soup. Within 5 years most of the village shops ceased to trade, their livelihood had been killed by Supermarkets.

For 20 years I have bought and still will ,my meat from  the likes of a local butcher as Adrian , my fruit and veg from Angela the greengrocer, and my Groceries from the same supermarket which has been Presto, Safeway, and now Mills. I have been doing a trial run.only of online Grocery shopping. I now know that I can do an order for my Aged Parent 30 miles away in Beverley, My Aged Cousin 200 miles away in London. I will be able to shop for them 

online.

It is perfectly easy to do, and carried right in to the kitchen at 8pm in the evening by appointment. Spouse and I had a lovely time ordering it, sitting side by side looking at the sheer range, what option excess.As the dust settles in my conscience and I work out whether I will ever shop this way again, I need to take serious stock of the ethics versus the convenience of Food Shopping online.  I hope that now that my other local Supermarket has become the Co-op , more of the fairly traded products I buy , and basics unavailable in Filey like Golden Granulated Sugar and organic apples (so I can eat the skin) will hit the shelves . My AGED ones , however , CAN  now be SORTED.

A day at the seaside.

You will know that Bridteacher taught  in Bridlington , East Yorkshire for 15 years. I have known Bridlington all my life, as it is an easy car ride from my birthplace in Hull. I have had a fondness always for beaches of clean sand, and for me a summer day is always profitably spent sitting on one, near one,or  above one on a cliff with a book. I  love the sound  of the sea, the smell of the brine laden air, the prospect of the changing skies, the continually moving landscape afforded by the tides.

My  nurturing and childhood were informed and moulded by all that a seaside resort offered a post war childhood, and indeed a post war parent. My parents had not been able to enjoy a beach from 1939 until 1945 because of the defences, barbed wire, pill-boxes and mines that protected an island nation. I don't know whether the thrill of the Piers of places like Southend,Brighton and Cromer were viable during the war, but I do know that in Yorkshire today only that  Saltburn -by -the -Sea  remains. Post war trips to the coast for this child of austerity were magical , delicious and risque. Here is why

• Fairgrounds
• smell of Hot dogs
• smell of fish and chips
• loud music
• crowds
• 'cheap jack' shops
• boat-trips round the bay

It seemed to me that fun though sitting on a beach was, it was the  vulgar stuff that appealed to the base nature of the child. Everything about Bridlington in the 50's, and 60's that I loved is still there now. That is why my parents only took seaside Holidays in select twee resorts like Sutton on Sea or Hornsea. They always said it was for the clean beaches, but I now know it was for the absence of 'kiss -me- quick'.

I remember when I was about 14 being terrified in case my mother found out the I had sampled 'Candy Floss' at Withernsea one afternoon.  

So to Easter 2010. Tastes change as maturity brings honesty. A trip on the bus(with pass) to Bridlington for Bridteacher, spouse and two small boys beckoned as a way to spend the day that grandparents are privileged to offer.

 View from Bay View Cafe on Boyes 2nd Floor

 Ill work backwards now.Spouse and I slept soundly for a long time last night. The Microwaveable Chinese meal for our dinner at 6pm last night was as much as I could have prepared.  Thank -you Imogen for supplying it when we agreed to have the boys for a night and day.The bus-ride back from Bridlington to Filey was very successful thanks to the benefit of hindsight, knowing where to sit. 

The boys sat on the front seat on the top of the 121 Double Decker bus and loved every minute.  They entertained all the pass holders out for a ride, the caravanners going  back to Primrose valley and the shoppers  for every minute of the 45 min journey home.  The running commentary  3 and 5 yr old boys perform effortlessly ,and  'whats that Grandma?', and to each other about what they were going to do in the next fast bit, and especially the next hill could have been recorded for an essay on Child Development. It is a great ride. The hill from the Hunmanby brow down to Muston is as good as a fairground ride to a small boy. 

I regress further. 

For several hundred yards along the traffic free promenade at Bridlington ,  you may worship at the Fairground shrines .Spouse and I recalled once again our austere childhoods where 'Common' was not done, but longed for by our inner children. So we did it with the boys, just a walk past it, with one ride worth every penny.It seemed a totally foreign place to us now we may have it but don't want it.

Before our stroll amongst the Las Vegas by the sea, where I had spotted several children I had taught over the years working the rides, we had a lunch at 11.45am.  We had been up since 5am , breakfast had been at 6 ish and the boys had been saying 'are we going to have a snack for 2 hours?'

BOYES for Good Value .

Never has the advert been so true.
The cafe on the 2nd floor of the Bridlington Shop (once Hammonds of Hull) is the perfect refined place for cheap lunch with 2 small boys.  Great chips, Tea in shiny pot , good china, perfect and attentive staff  and spotless loos-we customers of the North thank you. 

I am back at 11am now, waiting for 11.30 start to slow walk to lunch in Boyes. Spouse and I are tired already, after a disturbed night ,even tho the boys only woke a couple of times on their sleepover. We have been good grandparents, answered every question, been firm but kind, have remembered to offer frequent loo stops, have supplied very modest and tiny sweets.  We have realised that Bridlington harbour is fascinating to us but boring for Scarborian boys.We need a safe sit down.
 

Never have I been more grateful for remembering  Victorian Ironwork, seaside benches and Shelters in front of the landmark Ebor Flats. We managed 15 mins here with the boys having race after race after race, and never tiring of them . Safe , empty, lovely view of the sea and harbour and right next to the Public WCs (very clean). Years of working in Brid were paying off.

The Journey to Brid had been frought with danger, and stress. The back seat of the 121 bus did not work. The boys were too hot, too talkative,'why are their no seatbelts?, 'why cant we sit somewhere else?', 'when will we get there?'.  I stupidly said the elder one could ring the bell to get off. Younger one was cross.The driver did the journey at 50mph all the way,10mls  over the potholes, down the hills, up the hills, round the corners or so it seemed.

We live in a more sedate Seaside Resort.

Yesterday I  was gobsmacked when the owner of one of our  specialist small shops here in Filey was less than discreet. She was not racist but Londonist if that will suffice for the word which means running down Londoners who spend a small fortune in your shop. I hope she is the only small minded trader here. I did tell her that personally I liked London,  and was married to a Londoner. It is good in  these days when children do gap years in Oz, honeymoon in Cuba, whalespot in the southern Atlantic and settle back down in Yorkshire that seeing the world gives a broad view of life . We took our little boys only on a bus trip for 10 miles. They need to start to understand the world they live in does not revolve around the one small place where they spend most of their time.

Filey has not got much in the way of Fairground delights, it has excellent fish and chip shops and small cafes like Bridlington. In fact, Filey is in a little time warp really, in that you can not buy fish and chips after about 6.30pm, it doesn't at present have any large shops or supermarkets. For some people that is its charm. It depends for its economy, like Bridlington on the purses of Day visitors and Holidaymakers, many staying on nearby Caravan Parks. Bridlington is much more worldly than Filey, has many more empty shops, even in fairly recent malls. It needs an economic boost . A good summer will really help.   We have not only miles of golden sand, but oh, ROCK POOLS, we too need a sun filled summer , to boost trade, fill the holiday accommodation, and revive that sheer joy which is a day at the seaside.

Archdruid Eileen

How very clever -to know when to go.  Just when dependency has linked us.

My friend @wilbaric thought I was following a dubious site at first, so clever were her wheels within wheels.  I persuaded him she was as clever as Monty Python, as subtle as Piltdown Man, as well as being more popular amongst the discerning blog readers than The Churchmouse or Cranmer who are clever but not funny , and Deep Church who is so clever I don't understand it, and Bible in Broad Strokes who is clever and funny but hasn't done a post since January.(  I hope he is OK , we have enjoyed his take on the OT, in Filey)

So a fond farewell. I am lighting a tea light outside the back door, and showing you all a photo of the landscape inhabited by a Class 2 henge called Maidens Bower near Burton Fleming , just up the road from here. Nothing , like the Archdruid , is to be seen. It unlike her has been ploughed out.  She no doubt will reappear like the fantastic new Dr Who and we will all recognise it is SHE.

Showing Nick Blogger

This is how you do it Nick
Link to Fresh Expressions

I was going to delete this post as it was only  a demonstration of Blogger  for my highly educated son in law the computer whiz kid. He reciprocally showed me the new Fronter system that North Riding EA are trialling now. I'm going to leave this post however for my daughter Alice . These are the flowers you sent Grandma last week for her 90th birthday Alice. 


Now perhaps someone will show me Joomla.

Happy Easter

We had a lovely day today

 Last years Flower Spikes of my Echiums, saved to use as supports for Morning Glories or Canary Creepers

It has been too cold to Garden recently on the days when we have had the inclination and time.  I say WE because that is how it works here in our Kiaora Garden. We garden together, Colin and I. He is the arty one , arranging , moving around, buying BOLD , putting audacious plants alongside each other.  I am the ruthless getter ridder, the scientific gardener, messy , careless and haphazard. We make a perfect team. Just like the Easter Triduum.The days all go together and give the significance to the others.

Today is an in between sort of day. It was warm enough to start the onslaught on the garden. We have great rows (rhymes with cows) in the garden. Today it was Colin putting too many wrong hard sticks and lumps of cardboard in the Compost bin.  When I emptied it , to fill my Sweet Pea trench it was like opening a giant 100 L bottle of Brown Slime complete with those huge yellow slugs. It will be all right , will soon rot down properly, and the Sweet Peas will never know .Tomorrow, or Monday it will be me bringing clods of soil all over the newly swept paths or digging up Colin's Lily Bulbs. We had a great time. It was a day of knowing that something is about to happen.No family tomorrow, they are coming on Monday.

  It will be the first Easter Sunday without a family Occasion. Gardening doesn't usually happen on Holy Saturday.  I am cleaning the house , scraping Jersey Royals, making a Simnel Cake, a trifle, buying the Spring Lamb, doing the Mirrors, cleaning the best cutlery and so on. SO today was a real in between day. By Yesterday all the Easter grocery Shopping had been done.  I don't shop on Good Friday.Today just gardening.

We have made what they call a GOOD START.

Mostly we have had to remove the many dead shrubs. All my overwintering  Chard is dead. The first year I have had no Purple to sprout. I don't know how the October sown salad greens have all survived.  Maybe because they are some Japanese variety that last appeared in a painting of  a snow capped Mt Fuji by Hokusai.

Tomorrow we will be going on the Cliff Top above Filey Brigg at 7am for the 'Sunrise' service to greet Easter Morn.

I know that My Echiums are truly DEAD. The overwintering ones though covered with fleece did not survive. They were promising to be as magnificent as the ones in the picture. I have had to put them in the Brown Bin. 

I have told my Facebook Group 'I got an Echium Through the Winter 'that I didnt.

But this in between day is just that. I have remembered that I will have hundreds of seedings soon appearing all over the garden, easily recognised with the spots on the second leaves. I will get them through the winter for their 2+ years growth before astounding passers by again.

Guilt , Excuses or get it in preportion and wash the net curtain.

Some people must spend all their time cleaning, dusting and putting the Dyson round. Or, they can afford to pay a Treasure to do it.

I love Spring . I love all the seasons. Spring brings a lifting of the moods of those I live with.There are some downsides to Spring though , and I have known them all this week.

Firstly, the improved bright light shines up the finger marks on the doors in the sitting room, dining room , kitchen door , kitchen cupboards and front of the cooker.

Secondly the North wind doth blow and we shall have an awful mess in the garden. Such a lot to do!

Today is a very busy day ,I sit for three hours ,I sit for three hours and do nothing. I am supposed to sit for three hours and meditate on the events that are remembered today. Last year I sat and thought about Easter Sunday lunch, what time to put the Lamb in to time around Church,all very Passover but very much Sabbath Work. Then I thought through all the Good Fridays of my long ago Childhood still as yesterday.

• The crosses at St James Sutton in Holderness all covered with purple velvet bag things
• The altar frontals removed
• Exciting breakfast of Hot Cross buns
• one hour of the three hours with Mother ,on and on and on silence, boring
• Fish Pie for Dinner
• Jesus of Nazareth  on BBC
• Shops all closed after mid-day
• Father home from the Office
•  no having fun

Then I thought of our trips to Israel March 08, March 09.  Like Phil Ritchie in his blog 'Phils Treehouse'  a trip to Israel informs all you write ever afterwards. All I think about Holy Week has taken on a new twist.  It is not the visits to endless basilicas and churches in  that special land.  They only for me have acted as windows to the Bible narratives.  It is the LAND. To have walked in the land where Jesus walked, died and rose again in a place where strife and bigotry , politics, evil , good, and the Love of God are still tangible is the most powerful aid to Good Friday thinking that I know.

After the 3 hour service of Quiet Meditation today I am still busy. I might wash my net curtain in the sitting room tomorrow, I might make a Simnel cake , I might dig my trench for my Sweet Peas. I will be helping to decorate the church for Easter, the greenery is cut, and conditioning outside the back door in a bucket  and drinking up the water (from the lamb covered  chalk hills of the Yorkshire Wolds). I am already thinking about whether I will listen to 'St Johns Passion' on Radio 3 tonight.

Busy , Busy , Busy mind.
Here is the challenge

I am going to sit for 3 hours, quietly and prayerfully, stay awake (I dropped off at Filey Methodists Meditation in Song last Sunday), How will I do it? God Knows .

History Maker or Earthhour

 I am 63 years old. I felt at home when I went in to the Newsagents to get the Times this morning and recognized the  song playing on Yorkshire Coast Radio. So I said to Julie behind the counter' 

'I know this one, this is where I came in!'  She gave me a dutiful smile. I was in Halls of Residence in 1965. I know every single one of every Beatles song . We all do . All the young people in college from 65 -68. In those days we had to show our Radio Licence to the Vice Principal before we were allowed to use our Transistor Radios. Mine cost 25 s and was a bright red Fidelity. I had never spent so much money on something not shoes before.

During 'O' levels and 'A' levels I had to do my homework in our Dining room, sitting around the table with my sisters doing theirs. We had to sit there. We were not allowed to be anywhere else, even in the summer when it was not cold and we could sit in our bedrooms. The Dining room was a prison of heat, from the Coalite, and fear ,of scratching the ancient mahogany table. We lightened the confinement with judicial use of the Wireless. The Home service was allowed, and the Third Programme, and Alan Keith  of the Light Programme. Not for us though . We had Radio Luxenbourg on low- 208 the Station of the stars.When we heard the sitting room door open announcing Mother on her way to see we were OK we quickly turned the dial to Allowable air waves.

I was looking after Reuben recently, 3 years old, whose favourite phrase is '..puter Grandma?'. It was after lunch, I was exhausted. By 10 o'clock I had done Playdough, Crayoning, the Ladybird game, walked round all the Filey shops and been to the budgies. By 12 .30 , (we had had lunch at 11.45), I suggested books and a story and must have dropped off. Reuben meanwhile had sneaked off the sofa, opened the laptop, booted up , logged on and found Poisson Rouge .

My point is that no one seems to  mind these days if their offspring use the available media. Cbeebies, CBBC, Milkshake are available all day for small  children. I know blue stockinged mothers whose babes have CD players strapped to their cots so the little ones can access a Story CD at bedtime.
I however at 18 had to learn the latest POP songs by Stealth. It is a wonder I ever got through my adolescence without being ridiculed, so strict were  my parents. My grandchildren by contrast are fully media-ed up at 3 years old. 

So dear babes I am DOING THIS FOR YOU, I am showing you that I am in touch, and media-ed up.

I am not going to take it too far, my mobile is of the one piece variety. I do predictive text. I have just realised that the Digital Camera will do videos. I think I know what an ipod is. I certainly know what an iphone 3G S is because @Simon Rudiger has one, and I want one but realise I cant really afford the monthly tariff.

So in the next few days I am going to buy my very first Download. I don't have an MP3 player, at least I don't think I do, unless this PC is one. Anyway I am going to save History Maker to my hardrive, having paid for it properly, and then burn it to a CD as explained to me by @James Belshaw. Then I am going to give it to my young people who will love it and store it in their ipods or MP3 players   (I dont know the difference).
I haven't taken advantage of the generous offer/idea  of some Twitter friends to switch off my lights for an hour to save money /the planet because I needed the light to process this blog.

St Pauls Onslow Square

Imagine going into a church like St Johns, Filey.We are met outside by 2 young men ,could be angels, who say Hi Guys.  People are getting coffee , tea and cake (paying for it). Church is just an open space with cushion pads on the floor. Few settees around periphery (going to the wall!) for the olds. Loud young peoples music playing.Ten mins later the whole place is full of people on floor, chatting and drinking  and reading Sunday papers. 20 mins later the vicar-wearing jeans and shirt says 30 secs to go folks.

A band plays in the middle of the floor(3 guitars-LOUD) worship for 10 mins, then sit down and on settee at front where altar rail once was Nicky Gumbel interviews Andrew White-for 15 mins or so-all seen on huge screen as well. Lots of gentle evoking of HS. Then more worship, prayer-all together praying for Middle east out loud, then all close eyes as call to ministry time and a call for anyone not a Christian yet-then music -people prayed for but not in out front way, Time to leave -90 mins felt like 5.

No I didn't take any pictures, I did , but then it came up on the screen about no pictures and switch off mobile phones so I erased the ones I had taken . I leave you with a picture of a Peter Jones  window display. I also worship here.

Great Railway Journeys. Sheffield to Leeds

Great Railway Journeys I have done (6)
I had intended to make this a Great Railway Journey ,after all, this lover of train rides, this discerner of the track side had never been to Sheffield before. I was not disappointed only enlightened, enraged,amused and informed.

• Now I know why Filey is the goal for the retired of Rotherham
• Now I know how Geography should be taught
• Now I know what Urban Distressed means
• Now I know what Regeneration means
• Now I know how Japanese Knotweed spread

So then. The approach to Sheffield Station is very upbeat.It is Known as Sheaf Square, and was an obvious regeneration project, water, steel, light,easy  perambulation, like part of an installation at the Saatchi. I haven't taken a picture of it. I need to see it on a gorgeous sunny day, when I have an hour to wait for a train, or like the Blinking Eye in Newcastle when coloured lights are playing. It will be a treat to look forward to.

My train to  Leeds was of the Metro variety. Empty until Meadowhall , it filled with shoppers who disgorged in dribbles until Wakefield, then filled with young people, and single Dads on their day for Access, with small children with hand held computer games, whilst Dads did Facebook on their iphones.  I felt I was in a different world . Even the older people were all texting and talking to their Christmas list , whilst I thanked God for the family playing football Top Trumps with their 2 boys . I was the only person with nothing to do but look out of the window on this 60 minutes amongst Everyman of South Yorkshire.

I have never seen so much for  ticking  in multiple choice Geography GCSE boxes.

1. Signs of an industrial past ,present , or future?

Answer all three in this recycling plant CP Booth , buyers of all types of scrap metal.

2.  What signs of Regeneration of the area can you see from the train? 

a)Leisure facilities  b)Housing  c)Agriculture d)Economic Growth e) Art and Design

Answer all five

a)Leisure Facilities-Track for exercising your 4 wheel drives

b)Housing

c)Agriculture-Mushrooms or Chickens?

d)Economic Growth-New Retail Park

e)Art and Design -New office block and  Great Graffiti

Now I know it is cold March, no leaves on the trees, and all the bushes and herbage is as bare as it could be BUT the litter, rubbish, dumped fridges, bikes and old plastic items nestling at the side of the track was seriously PLENTIFUL. If it thought it would be unobserved  , or is just loitering for the arrival of the Refuse Services it is going to be depressed. I have NEVER  seen such TRASH since Slumdog millionaire.

The 2 highlights of the journey were

1.the Salt Depot. I have wondered for years what the use of these dome shaped constructions is? I have thought Planetaria, Nuclear Laboratories, Wheels of Death. The one on the Carnaby  Industrial Estate  has truly fascinated me. (See Hull to Filey  blog). How simple the answer. A salt depot. I feel I've found a pearl of great price.

2.The neat Allotments near Wakefield-and not a hint of Chris Beardshaw.

And so to Leeds.


 Leeds to Scarborough -no rubbish, just rabbits, pheasants, and fertiliser bags tied to sticks waving away the pigeons and crows.
And the Japanese Knotweed. That's another post!

Delirious , Yes I am

Insomnia

I have done everything I usually do

• turned over
• been for short walk to bathroom
• prayed through the alphabet twice for people whose name fits the letter. This time I even remembered an X
• gone downstairs and made a cup of de-caf tea
• eaten 20 black peppered cashew nuts, or maybe 25
• been on Facebook and looked at the pages of all the friends I havent noted for the last 6 months
• been on Facebook and seen the pictures of my new great-and as yet un-named niece born yesterday, sorry the day before yesterday.  It is 3 in the morning so its technically Today for me.
• been on Facebook and tried to chat to the only 1 person online that I knew but by the time I had pressed his name he was offline 
• put some socks on as my feet are cold
• decided to go back to bed and try again

The Staffordshire Hoard

I am really thrilled as Cheshire sister has just phoned to tell me that the recently discovered Staffordshire Hoard is going to be on display in the Potteries Museum in Stoke on Trent from 13th February until 7th March.

I am planning our visit.

The Staffordshire Hoard website   has 659 Photos are of the artefacts .I have chosen to download this picture of a strip of gold,with the inscription from Numbers Ch. 10 v 35 and reads:

"Surge domine et dissipentur inimici tui et fugiant qui oderunt te a facie tua", equivalent to:

"Rise up O Lord, and may thy enemies be dispersed and those who hate the be driven from thy face." 

This could be the beginning of an Orthodox prayer suggests one of the comments on the Flickr site hosting the pics. You may download pictures from the 'portableantiqities' Flickr pages as long as they and all the partners in the 'Staffordshire Hoard' project get credit for them . Of course they do. The pictures are all fantastic. The website shows just how far Open Source benefits the user and the creator.

It has to be one of the best presentations I have ever seen promoting anything, since my love affair with the Sparklehorse website a few years ago.

I have just found my handbook to the Sutton Hoo Ship Burial. It says '1968 Margaret Bruce 'inside and  my 'Early Medieval Designs Pattern Book' 1995. They are going on my bedside table next to my Thomas a Kempis, Derek Prince and my current detective novel (gruesome Swedish and rather good). I shall sleep tonight thinking of curly patterns, border patterns, my trips to Iona and Lindisfarne, and the Lilla Cross on the North Yorkshire Moors .

As coincidence would have it , a new series has just started up this evening on BBC1-one of the Dimblebys having a trip round the world looking at artefacts showing that these fair isles were a cradle of World Art History. To be fair I had no idea that the earliest surviving  Complete  Bible the Codex Amiantinus ( Vulgate) housed in a Florentine library had actually been written in Wearmouth or Jarrow.  A facsimile may be seen in Sunderland . I am going there too. Seeing the  electronic copy of the Lindisfarne gospels for the first time was a revelation. You can do this at home now on the 'Turning the pages 'facility on the British Libraries website. Oh , I am so not going to be bored.

I have dug around in the garden here for nearly 20 yrs. I have found bits of old pocket watches, clay pipes, lots of nails, a cat skeleton, and bits of what might be horse harnesses. No flithers, no Roman tiles, lots of shards of domestic Victorian and Edwardian pottery are all I have to offer.

Westminster Libraries

I am very impressed . I do not have to bring my PC to London when I can get an hour a day here at Westminster Library just near the Chelsea  flat ,free, warm and quiet, with 2 USB ports . All I had to do was join the library, which any UK Citizen may do. They are open until 7pm every night but Saturday too,
I am very impressed. My bus pass takes me all around London.
I am very impressed. The 1 day Travel card allowing me to get to Aunty Jean quickly by rail (16mins) at East Croydon only costs £5 for the off-peak day.
I am very impressed.

The wood between the worlds.

Great Railway Journeys I have  done  (5)

I cant really say that it is a great journey from Brighton to East Croydon, not like going all the way to St Pancras on First Capital Connect.I travelled on a frosty , sunny day. That should have been enough to suggest scenic views of field and woods bathed in winter light and shiny with frost but it just wasnt. Once again, the windows were so dirty that no photo would do actual justice to the charm outside. I glimpsed really pretty scenes between Wivelsfield and Haywards Heath, but may only tell you about them.

After Haywards Heath the recent snow melt had encouraged small pools to look like 'The wood between the worlds '  in the first Narnia story , in events order, 'The Magicians Nephew'. This part of the great Narnia Chronicles has always appealed to me. I have spent the last 50 years spotting 'woods between the world' from railway carriage windows. Todays one ,  was not quite right , as in the book it is not winter in the wood, but it had a narnian feel, albeit in a fleeting glance. My best Narnian 'wood between the worlds' is just south of the railway line after Burton Agnes and nearly at Nafferton , one of my other great railways Journeys. Here I record  that I wrote about it before Michael Portillo did, and I mean the Hull to Bridlington line.(see September Archive)

My search will continue. I am a devoted collector of views of the world as seen from the windows of trains, buses and cars. I am even thinking of taking a wash leather with me on my rural rides.

East Croydon meanwhile is as far removed from Narnia as Jadis was from victorian London. I love the new urgency of its approach now that the Tram links are completed. So I have taken my beloved spouse a la Bishop Baines standing as if waiting to go to Sutton.