Woman at the well

After Todays Reading H/T Emily Finch

Spring Clean

Lovely to have the sun out yesterday. 

It took me a long time to change from Nagging wife to Happy Gardener. 

Every year it is the same. I nag , nag , nag spouse about the importance of a can of Jeyes Fluid  and showing it intimately to the greenhouse. We never agree, as C is artistic, and into the look of things, especially where Garden Pots and plants  are concerned. He thinks Vine weevil grubs  are rare treats for blackbirds, and algae covered greenhouse windows spare the trouble of shading. 

I nagged and raved for an hour about science and soil and throwing away useless bits of ornamental tat from the greenhouse shelves. We agreed to keep what you see;

Really I am having to write this by way of an apology to my longsuffering C. He will read this , probably  a week after its posted, and the clean  GH shelves are laden with pots of this and that sprouting hopefully. He will be waiting for my 'Damping Off' speech and my annual 'wash out the watering cans' speech. I will be waiting for his 'too leggy' speech and his 'we don't want thousands of tomato plants' speech. We will have a good laugh, we are both right and wrong.

By suppertime last night we had had such a productive garden time together. We managed a job, (removing some old wooden planks) that was started 15 years ago. We decided that the Solanum was dead, and the grapevine was very much alive though looked dead. We said farewell to the Dead Acanthus, brought as a tiny plant from the Roman Forum in 1974, only to find it had sent a runner out about 50cm away , which was alive. I agonized at the state of my national collection of Echiums, 2 varieties only left, and C agonized at the loss of both our bay trees.  

Grandpa White(Sedum seboldeii, top right)) lives on for another year. Named by the family after Aunty Ann Whites father  all Cs family know it . We all have a bit.  It is Spring  for us , up again, out again and Im waiting for the lovely pink flowers. It doesnt care if the greenhouse has been swept out, cleaned out . 

I really am one

The Fileygardener in me has realised that I really am one. The long winter spent digitalising 35mm slides ,mine from 1969, my fathers from 1959, my aunts from 1960, is now left for rainy days when spouse is Coming and dining with me. We are back to Jeykll and Lutyens in our small garden. 

Today has been a perfect compost bin day. I  like the green box. It is a perfect perching place for Samson. I am not sure whether it is more effective as a wormery  than as a compost bin of the heap sort. The trouble is that it is very difficult to  aerate, wheras when I just had a heap I could poke it about with a fork from time to time. However, I have never found so many worms in a scant few cubic feet of vegetable half soil as I did today. I enjoyed a weird pleasure in recognising the labels of pineapples and mangoes from Dec  2010 unrotted and proclaiming past fruit salads. I never realised until today that two people could get through so many avocado pears. Not a teabag  left. My new brand rots down immediately, unlike PG tips. All the cardboard from our daily Aynsley Harriot cup a soup boxes was a memory only of Hot and Sour and  Spicy Lentil, not a letter or Logo could be recognized in the compost soup. 

I have emptied all the half-rot on to my old site de heap to await its next resting place after a final rot down. It will finish very quickly now . 

My veg beds are all ready, my Sweet Peas are waiting to be sown, a visit to Reighton is the next job. This is not really a Garden Centre. It is a proper Nursery, complete with Liverworts and acres of must buy  normal plants. It is a place to keep away from really, but I need several sacks of their own all purpose compost.

Not a single Echium pinina x wildpretti has survived the Filey winter. I had hundreds, in the greenhouse , in the garden , and even in the house. My Facebook Group We got an Echium through the winter  will soon get its update, because I didnt.   My Echium russicum is ok it would be if its Russian, my sp. lusitanicum is ok, which is a surprise since it comes from Portugal. 

So , I really am one , a Fileygardener.............

South Riding

I tried not to watch South Riding. I sat at the other end of the sitting room and tried to look at Tweedeck, but before I knew it I had put  #southriding in a column to see if it was trending.  I have been on an emotional roller coaster ever since. Its not the book. Its a great book. Its not Winifred Holtby. Anyone who once lived with Vera Brittain  wrote great books.  I wonder if Shirley Williams ever did a trip to the real South Riding. Its not the not happy ever after end of the book, or the empathy with the schoolteacher thing, especially after last nights romp thro the snobs of Literature with Sebastian Faulks, and my wonderfully wrong Miss Brodie, who I could so easily have been. 

It was the place

• Oh !the road on Sunk Island, that tree lined,ditch lined road to the prospect of mud
• Oh! the talk of 1953 High Tide
• Oh ! the landscape of dead trees from the salt bath
• Oh ! Skeffling
• Oh ! Hilston and Withernsea
• Oh! Connor and Grahams
• Oh ! Mulberry Tree

and all the more poignant because I always always remember my childhood haven in Holderness when the snowdrops are out. 

I know that as my sisters read this post they will too remember fondly maybe, a beautiful Georgian house, once the vicarage of Skeffling,  we visited often . It was the home of Whitfield and Margaret Carter, friends of my parents. It was an outpost of all that was different, exciting and stimulating in the seemingly dullest of landscapes that I now love, and in a tightly controlled 50's childhood where conformity and towing the line defined  and provoked the wild child in me wanting to get out. 

Everything about Skeffling was about Possibility after escape. I write this as the house here is silent, the road outside as quiet as  that road to the Humber from Skeffling- That road past the sloes, and bullrushes to just a bank looking out to the Humber , and the prospect of mud and clay. 

I am thinking of all the forays around those coastal half villages , where every visit before the  scramble down the boulder clay cliffs  would be pre-ambled by a discussion of how much of the car park had fallen into the sea since last time.

The Old Vicarage was full  of glorious objects fashioned by  Michael , the son of the house, from the Skeffling Clays, and his alarming paintings all like my own of his , with its sticker mark from an exhibition in the 1950s. The kitchen was where I learned things so removed from the 50s austerity and bland recipes of home, for Aunty Margaret brought French Canadian flair to Holderness . I learned to grind coffee into the waiting wooden drawer  in a little hand  grinder. I smelled the bran mash machine where the chicken food was made, and  always hoped for waffles with maple syrup, or a walk to the Mulberry Tree.

Skeffling Clays

The real people who lived in my  Holderness have had a huge impact on my outlook and interest as an adult .

When I married, the first thing I did in my own garden was buy a packet of  Nasturtiums ,like those  that came up year after year in the garden at The Old Vicarage. I thought they were magical, the colours and the smell,and the way they grew over everything. I could not understand why everyone didnt grow them. And then the Elderflower  and Elderberry wine which I made every Spring and Autumn until a few years ago when I stopped drinking,  as a drink always made me want a cigarette, which I gave up in response to nagging and my own good sense (for once).

So , all those railway carriages , which as the Shacks in South Riding , are remembered  by me , as 'Holiday homes' of the 50s, or chicken Houses, lurking next to a hedge in the fields of Patrington and Easington,  Hilson and Hollym. 

Michael Carters 1950s painting of 'God knows What but I like it'

I am not going to re-read my battered copy of South Riding. I might just go to Rudston tomorrow and look at Winifred Holtbys grave, or re-read the wonderful Sunk Island of Hubert Nicholson. As soon as it gets a bit warmer, but is not a school holiday I'm off for a drive to the real Sunk Island again , with its Crown farms and Stone Creek, lunch at the Hilyard Arms in Patrington and home thro all those tiny coastal villages , Roos, Tunstall , Rollston Camp and maybe Hornsea  with Pevsner. I wonder if David Hockney fancies Holderness for a change, only 10 miles from Brid in another direction from His Bigger Puddles and Trees.

RIP Brian Jacques

Some things come to you later in life than was intended, but the timing is perfect. Such was the discovery of the Redwall novels by Brian Jacques for me, for I devoured them with a childish repacity when nearly a grandmother. Since The Long Patrol assaulted my senses , and tempted my palette  with Eulalia, hares and deeper than ever beetroot and turnip  and potato pie,I have devoured all the books as soon as they were published. My last purchase, The Sable Queen, was read and enjoyed just before Christmas. 

There is a recipe for all the novels.

• The Goodies-mice; hares, moles, shrews, otters, squirrels, and badgers , with  appearances from occasional large birds,
• and the Baddies; foxes, stoats, ferrets, weasels, wildcats, rats, snakes and toads. 
• Then there is the food, nutcream and bramble pasties, mushroom soup,salads, and the deeper than ever pies beloved of the moles.
• Then the cruelty of the enemies, the dungeons, the slavery
• Then the love and ultimate success of the heroes after trudging for days through swamps, forests, and mountains
• A feast
• Then the appearance in each novel of the GUOSIN Shrews with their 'Log a log ' leader
• Then the antics of the baby animals in the idyllic community of Redwall Abbey 
• A map
• Lots of poems
• A battle or two, with war cries and death of a hero or two
• A supernatural intervention from Martin the Warrior
• A lot of hilarious antics from hares who eat all the time

I wait for each ingredient in each book. Sometimes I am surprised by a twist, but never , never disappointed. I read one and keep on going. Usually after about four , I have had enough until my next taste.

So Brian Jacques REST IN PEACE You have given me some of the best reading I have ever done. I haven't read Doomwyte , but it is the only one .I will try tomorrow to order it.

A picture of Holy Tone

Tony Moralee in 1983 with his god-daughter , our Alice Rowling 

This post is an add- on to the blog of Gary Jenkins  Redhill thoughts. You need to read both his posts Ministry by Degrees and Holy Tone  to see a Godincidence.


Tony was a key player in the faith Journeys of Colin and I. He lived across the road from us in Wincanton Road, Southfields, and had worked for Rowlings the printers for many years, before becoming caretaker at a Local Primary school . He baptised Imogen or first daughter  in 1974, when a lay-reader, as we were in an interegnum at St Michaels Southfields. He stood God-father to Alice ,our second daughter and married Alice to Guy in 1998 at St Martins Dorking, where we worshipped as a family.


I will send Joan his widow the blogs, Paul Moralee their son has just celebrated his silver wedding, he was one of my cubs in 'The Gordons' pack 6th Wandworth (I think) in 1968-71, when I first lived in London, a raw northerner , teaching at Belleville Junior Girls School.Battersea. Back in Yorkshire for 20years, Colin and  remember fondly a

Godly man. 

For Mary , Miguel and Nancy

http://brucearchive.blogspot.com/


I am going to post pictures and docs here at the Bruce Archive blog for you in Future. Its not got much on it, but is better to put in one place, Shall I put the photos on Picasa or Flickr  -I have lots!! Will do when I can.


This is my working  record. It is not accurate.Just a Guideline.

For Mary

Death of Christian Sutherland Bruce 1820

Children  of William Bruce and Christian Sutherland m1793

                                                                        

I have lost the plot ---Thanks Joe at Cross references H/T

I found this via Google reader this morning as I was quickly scrolling through the usual daren't miss their blogs if I am keeping up with the world and news people in the minority world known as the C of E , and they know who they are.


My prayer partner Shiela and I got together this morning for our weekly time together. Rachel is in Madeira, so our trio is a duet. We prayed about Worship today, and I realised that I have let mine get cold as I network and blog, do this and do that.  So thanks Joe at his blog Cross References for pointing me back.






All the trying to keep up with the Cof E Jones's -Oh dear I have lost the plot- so am going back , turning round, repenting.

Twitter and the Bishop of Hull

I was pleased that our 'Envoy' (our Filey Parish magazine) editor M had asked me to give her half a page about Bishop Richard and Twitter. I did the picture above, sent it to her and went out to the Third Sunday Service , our  ecumenical Praise Service at the Salvation Army Hall. 

As I was sitting there Our God reigns, And can it be, Come on and celebrate etc I was really thinking about the picture I had hurriedly sent to M. So I said to spouse an the way home 'I bet there's a message on the answer machine when we get home , and M doesn't want the article she asked for.'  We got home and I was right. We both had not thought it through. No one uses Twitter in Filey Parish, only me and those at uni. Infact the Hull Daily Mail made much of Bishop Richard on Twitter. BUT he has not done any more than a few tweets, has not followed anyone much, and not even managed his avatar yet. It is still that egg thing.

Once again I have rushed on before Gods Plan I think.

Beverley Minster and Aged Parent

We have been planning today for ages. Aged Parent and I know every aisle, label, and variety of Aynsley Harriot Cup-o-soup in her Beverley Supermarket. Our regular trips to buy the stuffs of life have taken a new turn. We have been to church as well today .

My over 90  mother takes Communion every month. It is brought to the house where she has lived for 26 years by vicar of   St Marys. in whose Parish she resides. She shares this time  with other residents of the house. This is C of E protocol- not stepping across the boundaries . She cherishes those times. BUT..

She always used to go to her own church St Leonards at Molescroft , but a 9am service is just too early for her now. The Mother Church of Beverley Minster offers a said Midweek Communion on Thursdays at the much better time of 10am.

Although not prepared for the roadworks around the Minster we did manage a disabled space, and the flat walk to the disabled entrance.

It was the first time she has seen Jeremy Fletcher. She knew all about him of course because I had given her My Crockfords. I think she might have thought the minster  was going 'high' as he was dressed in  the white robe thing. She doesnt really do 'high', but it was very low key, despite celebrating facing east. The verger was right on the case and very discreetly asked if she wanted the sacramant  brought down to her. It was all so perfect-she could see everything, she knew every word of course 1662. She is hoping for CW next time. Yes there is definitely going to be next time. So many people came up to her after the service , remembering when she was a regular at the service that she was thrilled to bits. She didnt hear all the talk as she has forgotten her hearing aid. I had remembered mine so relayed it to her afterwards, and improved on it I thought. We didn't stay for coffee this time as we had to fit in the Surgery, the Building Society and Tescos before an afternoon party  at the Abbeyfield house.

I am so pleased. She had such a lovely time. Let us not stop meeting together-its all that Hebrews 10 again. 

We are planning a fortnightly visit . I cant wait -I love acknowledging and bewailing my manifold sins and wickednesses now I understand what they mean.

An answer to the Churchmouse

He is right to ask the following questions with regard to the King James Bible


'Mouse would just like to ask what messages we are trying to get across.

So far, the discussion has largely been about how important the King James Bible has been in it's impact on British life and culture.  There has been some talk about how beautiful the translation is.  And all that is true.  Yet is that all we are trying to say?'


The dialogue is only just starting, and more questions will emerge. Like everything in the Blogsphere there are times of # trending.


My answer to the Churchmouse is watch the spaces.

• Schools will use the opportunity to use the KJV in Literacy lessons. It will come in the planning as use and  comparison of archaic language   . The Message will take off, as educators will go first to Bible Gateway to save time, and stumble upon something new. 
• The atheist brigade will use the time to rant about 'eye for an eye', 'the Virgin Birth' etc,
• The Christians will answer them and some will rant 
• people will look and see if they can find their KJV s  at the back of bookcases. The Christians will read their favourite bits:Psalm 23,Corinthians 13 and Revelation 3v20 . Church goers will find their KJVs in the loft and do the same  but will go on with more bits
• those in the order of Melchizedek will use the opportunity to plug EDWJ and the like
• Charity shops will do Bible Displays in their windows
• Waterstones will try and shift some of the White KJVs they have had on the shelves for years for Infant Baptism presents
• The Exclusive Brethren (women in head scarves,standing  at the back) will remind people by shouting out ,at a street corner , but not making eye contact that the KJV is the ONLY one (But must have a black cover)
• The Gideons will be accepted in more schools to give out their red NIV testaments and Psalms to the School Leavers
• Those in other faith groups will agree that the language of the KJV is beautiful
• Christians will pray that  glory goes to God, that lives will be changed, that the ears of the spiritually deaf will be unstopped, and then will remember that the Word of God never returns Void

4 years ago when I was teaching a Yr 6 class week by week for RE  I was having a  terrible time with the appalling behaviour of the children. I would not teach over the shouting out, the rudery and the disruption. The syllabus was not relevant.The Children had no idea how to even open a Bible and find a Chapter and Verse. I would at least teach them that. For several weeks we played the sorts of games done 50 yrs ago in Bible classes. Things changed dramatically when the children realised that I was not expecting them to do the boring syllabus (fine for well behaved middle class children). As we were playing the ancient game 'Draw your swords' the mood of the class began to change.The bribery of the winning row getting  prize at the end of the lesson( a jelly bean), and the banal simplicity of the game won the day. The game was to be the first complete row to find a verse and all sit down with NO NOISE WHATSOEVER. 

Bibles under arms, I say 'Draw your swords for John 3v16'

There is a silent rush

A child finds it

they now have learned OT and NT ,and 4 gospels M,M, Land J

so they help each other silently , no pushing  , no chair scraping

The first row sits down and is checked.A child reads out the verse

Simple or what!

After some weeks , now good behaviour, lessons beginning to go well, the game always promised for the end of session , 36 children all on feet and listening quietly I called out 

Luke 6 v27

The most disruptive child in the class  read it out for his row

But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,

He then turned to me and said,

'Miss , did Jesus really say that, WOW'

How will they know , if no one ever tells them?

So , Churchmouse (whoever you are) -go with it , if one person turns to a Bible , whatever version , and turns to Christ, it will all have been worth  it.

Brian -I just love your video

I cannot get the tune out of my head now-it appeals to all my  musical taste-Jan Garbarak to Hildegaude of Bingen via Antony and the Johnsons

The signs of the times...

Once again the glory is going to someone else...........King James. Now I am as pleased as anyone that the BBC is broadcasting excerpts of The Bible today in the KJV. I am pleased that I keep catching snatches of those words  beautiful language, our Heritage, and old familiar words.  I love the KJV, but no longer read it other than as a nostalgic treat. I am sorry that whilst praising the wonderful permission to have in Churches  what is ours anyway by the grace of God ,the Bible in English, that William Tyndale is an unsung hero. So Thank you William Tyndale for having the courage to make the first accessible translation of the NT for those without a classical education in 1534, most of our forbears that is. Now I know that it had very limited availability, and once again this was rather more to do with his comments on  the marriage plans of Henry V111. 

So we had the King James Bible , based on Tyndales translations ordered to be read in the Churches

I am reminded to re- assess my Bible reading Habits. I  had the KJV read to me every week from age 3 to 21. Some of it is so beautiful I want to cry '

See as larger file

Phillipians 2 for example
But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:
 ⁸And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
 ⁹Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name:
 ¹⁰That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth'

I do thank God for it.

But accessible NO.


I do not think Mr and Mrs Filey, Master Filey and Miss Filey would understand it at all. I am glad that many translations these days are available in these days of option excess, along with varieties of Breakfast Cereals and other stuffs of life. One may choose the version to read that appeals to personal taste. I am praying that personal taste will be for the Bible, and that God will use all this publicity to his glory.

See as  larger file

I have dug out the Bruce family Bible, well read and thumbed by my ancestors in Edinburgh in the 1790s onward. Though foxed, and unwealdy, it nevertheless stands testimony to a time when some families were able to have the Bible in their own language. 

It also stood as the registration of births and deaths before the law of 1836 . Thank you my Grammar School in Hull. I have engrained in My brain all the acts of the 19th Century, and this is the first time in 50 years I have ever actually needed to recall one. All the boy children of William Bruce and Christian Sutherland are mentioned-but none of the girls!

See as larger file

And for you Brian after your Psalm 16 on the Filey Parish Blog, I have found you the metrical one from the back of my family Bible. Your translation from the Net Bible is not so very different  if one looks really really really hard, and dont confuse s with f or is it f with s.

Why did I use Signs of the times as a header ,well that phrase was coined by Tyndale along with lots more familiar friends.See Wikipedia.

To God be the glory Great things He hath done.

Bridteacher was always Fileygardener really

One of the first graphics I ever used in the cyberworld, Alices sketch of a Cardoon

I started my Bridteacher blog in 2006 as an outlet for my rants. This was before the days of built in stats , and the platform was not as easy as it is now. For one thing I didn't have broadband   or a digital camera. I had no idea how to insert images or even understand those magical 640x380 numbers. It has come full circle.  I dont bother always to scale down my huge files in Gimp, I fully understand what copyright and file sharing mean, and yet am best friends with Google images. I certainly never read the blogs of anyone else in those days. So Bridteacher it was .

I had dabbled with Frontpage in 2001, and what remains of my first efforts are still there to behold. Lycos has long gone . My first efforts would not pass the last module at Yorkshire Coast Colleges web-building course ; All that going right across the screen , and dubious links. Simon Rudiger my mentor on Filey Parish Blog had a real aversion to broken links. I think they show the human side. My first efforts were styled Fileygardener. I have decided to go back to that defining title. The bridteacher url will stay. I am doing this for me. You will find me if you want to truly look.

Who wants to be a millionaire

I haven't seen anything new yet. 

We are warm and cosy in our sitting room .  We are alone with Kiaora Cat and our television set.  Samson  is still sporting his festive red ribbon, and though not watching TV is listening to the Cole Porter songs with us, his back arched against the radiator.

 We have not had the car out for 5 days.I have used 5  drums of salt clearing a path to the dustbin. Scarborough Borough Council do not usually bother to grit our Filey roads and paths. This year has been an exception. A week ago a slight sling of grit on the footpaths was applied. 

We have registered -1 to -14 for a week. It has not been above.  I have dripped clothes dry on the shower rail, removing my Thermal long johns quickly when the a crunch on the ice outside the  back door announces callers.

The ground is definitely hard as iron so the carol words have been ringing true this year.I realise that most of the carols lyrics bear absolutely no  resemblance to real life conditions for most of my Christ masses, but this year never a truer word and all that...

Filey has been true to 'In the bleak midwinter', We have never sung it so many times. I looked thro all the lyrics on my Bethlehem  Carol Sheet and have been reviewing the words. I have been remembering 2 wonderful trips to Israel, and the heat of Jericho, Bethlehem and Jerusalem.  We decided that the Nativity on BBC 1 must have been filmed somewhere with a moorish background, as the windows were islamic looking. Canon Edward suggested this first.  He was right.  It was filmed in Morocco (BBC iplayer)

I am so used to singing all those familiar carol lyrics without thinking . I so agree with Ruth Gledhills comment last week in the Times

 'After half a century of sitting through church nativities, I am bored to tears with Mary and Joseph and plastic baby Jesus . My heart sinks at the thought of those eternal carols  yet again........It (the BBC nativity) turns out to be one of the best written, cinematically magical tragi-comic religious dramas ever broadcast on television.'

So whilst I sit here unable to get anywhere , with family plans on hold, watching evergreen wholesome films, my highlight of the season* so far has been the BBC offering. I will be happy to watch it every year.

*Not for purists , but Christmas for me starts with 9 lessons and Carols .

A nativity from children in a New Zealand church

Insomnia Blog 3

Once again.
I have prayed through an alphabet of names. I did Kate Middleton for K, could not do anything for U so did Ursula Andress. I hope she is alive, as I dont pray for dead people.
I have been downstairs and made Horlicks and eaten Cashew nuts which were to go with Christmas drinks.
I have perused a map Of Bradford Buses incase @nickbaines  wants to know anything , but realised he will have a limo and does not have a bus pass to get to Bombay Stores or Saltaire, my 2 favourite places around Bradford.

I have finished my James Patterson novel. It was awfully good. The truest words I have ever written.
I have looked at the Mac Box Set sent me as a gift to update this old thing, but think its beyond me at 2 in the morning, although Time Machine sounds so alluring.
I have my warmest gilet over my dressing gown.
Ill have a quick look at Facebook and see if @garryrutters awake. No , but my sister has put the date wrong on her wall post.
Shall I put the slow cooker on  and  do a stew. The thought of waking up , hopefully at 7ish to the smell of beef is more than I can bear.
I will look through my Redwall novels . No I want something funnier. Sweet Thursday or Just William then, or maybe Cold Comfort farm again. Ive just remembered A Marcus Didius Falco on the shelf, heavy to hold in bed, but funny from page 1 with a map.

Miniature marinated Figs-dynamite at dinner parties

Who could be without a jar of these delicacies? 

We have been pondering the jar. We have been enjoying the implications, intended or otherwise of the dynamite in the jar. 

Longtime Readers of Bridteacher will know that we do not give presents at Christmas , except to the school age children in the family. We do not give cards either except to friends far away. 

So  we have had so much enjoyment and hilarity opening the the unchristmas present from Rachel and Robert. A thank-you for the use of our beach hut .

We have enjoyed the unchristmas present so much I am sharing it with all my friends. Firstly R and R had no idea that Figs are a long standing joke  in our family. If we see them , green in the greengrocers, we always buy one for  Colin.  More than that, when he was told to eat  for health after his Heart Attack, and then Diabetes diagnosis, he cut out cakes and biscuits, puddings etc and stuck to Sister  Rose's diet sheet very carefully.  Apart from the fruit that is. He took it into his head to eat lots and lots of fruit. The sideboard would groan with it, fresh and dried. Our children would indulge him with medjool dates from Waitrose, and packs of figs. So much so that Sister Rose had to explain that there was too much sugar in his now healthy diet . So the figs are going to be a real feast for him. More than that , the size of them belies indulgence, unless he eats them all in a sitting.

R and R did not stop there in their inspired generosity. Every base has been covered . 

• Ginger sauce for me and great grandma
• Stilton and walnut biscuits beloved of Imogen
• A musical tin box filled with biscuits that the small boys will adore
• Mulled wine spices for Homegroup Candlemas Party
• Dave Walkers hilarious 'The exciting world of Churchgoing' for everyone ( NB most of my family read The Church Times)
• A box of after dinner Trivia Questions. (How could R and R know that my family are games nerds?)

The unchristmas present was accompanied by a Christmas Card of MY FAVOURITE SORT a Burne Jones pre-raphaelite Angel, and all this in a week when I don't know whether I'm coming or going. Who says God has not got a sense of humour. 

See you all at the Beach Hut  !

Changing the template

Filey Samson

I changed the Template on Samsons Blog about 3 months ago. The new template is almost the same as the old one,Black has muted down to Charcoal gray  but otherwise its much the same.  Ive been looking at my daily blog dose, and realised that I dont actually choose a blog to elevate to Google Reader Status by its 

design. I only go by the content. 

Google Reader

You get to spot the Blogger Template after a while  and that makes one feel comfortable . Not everyone can mess around with the html and make a work of art  from a design page. Works of art too might be fantastic for some people and not for others. Recently I have been bowled over by the beautiful photography on the Visual Theology blog.

The man is a brilliant practitioner , graphics, and word content.  I have been round galleries for 50 years looking at Photographs, from those of Julia Margaret Cameron to Judah Passow, and his touch me . I dont have to be trawling Time Out for exhibitions as long as someone blogrolls good visual blogs for me. 

Conversely I have followed the blog of a methodist local preacher in Harrogate for years. She has as far as I know, never made any blogrolls except for mine , but I love her day to day banality. She talks so very Dear Diary, and I love her very normality. She could be me in other words. She has not posted for ages. I hope her husband is not ill again. I care so much that I will probably have to ask my friend Alison at Kairos church  Harrogate to see if she can find out.

So the question I am asking today is this-Is a fantastic template important for my Blog?

This question has hidden questions

• Do I want to be blogrolled , and as popular as Rev Lesley , (who is now being overtaken by the Vernacular Curate)?
• Will any more people read my blog if the template is a design miracle?
• Are personal  blogs the future or will the Johnny Laird Daily be the new black?(Why is his copy of the Message not right way up on his profile of Twitter)
• Am I jealous of all of them?

The answers are Yes, No, Don't Know , and Yes.

The answer to todays big question , Is a fantastic template important for my blog, No.