Rain puddles and stormy days

2012-01-26T04:47:00.000Z

Sleepless in.... Somewhere.

This blog gives me pleasure. The blip of interest each day from the other side of the world gives me pleasure.

I can't sleep. In the general scheme of things, this doesn't particularly matter, I suspect. But sleep is lovely!

x

2011-10-10T23:36:00.002+01:00

Dear faithful American reader. I don't know who you are or why you check my blog so faithfully, but thank you. The little pulse of interest your visits represent is like a steady heartbeat.

x

2011-09-06T06:08:00.000+01:00

Hello

Hello, faithful daily reader in America.

x

2011-08-18T01:20:00.000+01:00

And then there was one. Again.

And that 'one' was me. Again. At the best of times I am - amongst other, better, more loveable things - stubborn, independent and furiously resentful of any attempt to control, manipulate or pin me down. This is not the best of times and I'd say my capacity to be a monumental pain in the arse has increased tenfold. At least. It's good, because it's made me into more of a fighter, but it makes it almost inevitable that I'll fight alone. I'm frequently insufferable.

The person who was looking after me so kindly didn't feel that the kindness was always mutual, I guess, and he was right. Every bit of life in me resents dependancy of any kind, and days when I feel that taking a back seat... well, they make me even worse. I'm not ready to be meek, mild and quietly brave.

I'm bloody-minded, passionate and independent, and anyone who really cares for me will value that and worry when it's not in evidence.

Every act of self-censorship is a small death in itself. But principles are lonely things to fight for.

2011-07-31T08:36:00.002+01:00

Nostalgia is exactly what it used to be

These days I write another blog, but its editing panel links me back to here. It's been a while since I visited, but browsing through old posts, chicks and chickens has just been a source of immense pleasure.

In the three years that have passed since I last wrote anything on here, life has been busy. I suppose, in the context of most of the posts on here, I should begin by saying that many of our chickens laid their last eggs, and that old age and foxes intervened a lot. There have been some sad farewells... Toffee (my beloved Millefleur) died in my arms after a long time of poorliness and lots of veterinary intervention. 2010 - one of the worst years I can remember for all sorts of reasons - ended with a snowy night driving at least one fox into a frenzy of hunger. S/he hammered through a thick wooden henhouse and took Buffy and Titch, their daughter and his other wife (having got a lot older, he was only up to a small harem by then). Very sad...

2010 began - literally, on New Year's Day - with the end of a seven year relationship with MrRainy. I find myself unable to write anything more on that subject, except to say that it was heartbreaking.
Adventures ensued, some of them fun, none of them heartwarming. Work was hard and demanding (but sometimes challenging in a good way too).
The tiredness that had started to dog me in 2008/09 got worse and turned into a succession of illnesses that I never quite shook off. In October 2010 I found myself suddenly in hospital and the following month I was told that I had a cancer that couldn't be cured and that would ultimately 'shorten my life'.

Nine months later and I'm still here, for now. Working hard at staying that way. Cared for by someone kind. Clearer about relationships that actually make a difference and keep you safe when you need them to. It's been hard, but I'm still here.

And we still have five chickens, in the biggest, heaviest, most fox-proof house and run you ever did see. But that's another story...

2008-02-14T23:34:00.004Z

Numbers

Well, I did say I'd write about numbers and then I just forgot all about it. The following is vaguely number-related:

Somewhere in the last couple of days, I've heard a discussion on the radio about a relatively new couple comparing 'numbers'. The man had revealed his number of sexual partners to be what he thought of as being quite high and his girlfriend had been so shocked, she wouldn't speak to him. Then the number was revealed, and I was fairly shocked that such a fuss was being made over what seemed to me to be such a small number.

And then I pondered on what exactly was being counted and it all seemed a bit sillier. Quality/Quantity? Length/stamina? Why is sex so frequently talked of as thought it was a sport? Exactly what can be measured about a genuinely sexual, sensual, loving experience between two consenting adults?

I'm not sure some people get it... if you see what I mean.

(some days I should just go for the early night and not burble!)

2007-10-08T06:15:00.000+01:00

Magic numbers

Some years ago, someone told me that the following was a well-established fact: that for every three years you'd been in a relationship, it would take you one to really move on from it. At the time I ranted like a loon, because it seemed very unfair that someone who had - as a strictly academic example, of course - been in a miserable relationship for nearly twenty years would have to wait another seven to escape completely from it.

But it's true. Dammit.

So I was thinking about numbers and trying to identify other life formulae that seem to work.

I'll get back to you on this one.

2007-09-19T13:19:00.000+01:00

Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow... (etc)

Ow.

What do you do when painkillers don't touch it and the ones that do turn you into a drivelling fool?

Moan about it, mainly.
It hurts.

What I need is a distraction. I wonder what George Clooney's up to today...

2007-08-18T07:29:00.000+01:00

Brahms and horrible list

According to a comprehensive list of posters, on a national talkboard and around the confines of single parenthood and a more-than-fulltime job, I am the 4th most prolific poster. What a shuddersome fact.

Sometimes you should stop talking about it and just do the thing that's on your mind. This is seriously on my mind!

2007-07-27T05:18:00.000+01:00

Magnificent Sevens

In amongst all the bah-humbugging about not being able to sleep last (this) night, I got to thinking about Stuff and came to the astounding (I am astounded, therefore it must be astounding) conclusion that my life has fallen into seven year eras. 'Seven year scratchings' sounds far too much like something you'd get from a very dodgy chip shop, so I resisted the urge to grab that for a title.

Anyway. By way of demonstration, here are my Magnificent Sevens. For the sake of proving myself right, I have to make the first a Magnificent Eight. (Please don't quibble about this - it just makes you look anally retentive).

0 - 8 - No idea. No memory of it and no one around who knows anything about it to tell me. So these can be The Bermuda Triangle Years.

8 - 15 - The Dickensian Years. Because they were bizarre and full of the strangest individuals imaginable.

15 - 22 - The Growing Up Years. They did what it says on the tin.

22 - 29 - The Traumatic Transition Years. Moving from one dysfunctional situation to the next, but no less interesting for that. I decided to make no references to naughtiness in the title. So maybe these should be called The Self-Deceiving Years.

29 - 36 - The Fertile Years. These were good times, and two fantastic and unbelievably wonderful children came out of them.

36 - 43 - The Endurance Test Years. And then some. No angstful handwringing for you to endure yourself, reader. Suffice it to say, they were bloody awful.

Now - Now I have a seven year opportunity ahead, it seems to me, which ends when I'm 50 and will want to regroup and make a new seven year itch plan.

So I have been thinking about what these seven years could be, and what I'd like to be able to call them when I get to the end of them. I don't know what I want the title to be, but I do know that I'd like it to be something about construction and contentment.

That is all. I love the number seven, by the way. Always have done.

2007-07-17T07:14:00.000+01:00

Missing Inaction

It occurred to me today that I'm getting a bit rubbish at doing nothing. I've got a fine opportunity to lounge about at length at the moment, and I just can't do it.

I need to practise. Here's my first attempt....

2007-07-15T13:36:00.000+01:00

Opportunities

Six weeks of open time are ahead of me. First of all, obviously,

HURRAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! for that fact.

More importantly - and this just hit me while I was in the shower (to which subject I shall return shortly) - that's not an opportunity to be lost.

It's 1.30 in the afternoon and I only just showered and dressed. This morning was spent mooching about, waiting for emails, posting on GUT, watching tv... it struck me as I indulged in some serious shower meditation that this morning was a big lost opportunity.

Opportunities should be a time of challenge, don't you think? They should be used to find out new things about yourself and to experience life fully - not briefly and only just enough to post about it from a computer. I love GU and lots of the people on it, but I'm not sure it's good for me.

I'm going to try out some stuff that's good for me. And weaning myself off this laptop a little has to be good for me.

2007-07-12T23:08:00.000+01:00

Merrydale Magic Birthday Chicken

Have I mentioned at all that it was my birthday? Really? Ah well...

Let me just mention instead one of the most beautiful birds around - the afore-mentioned Merrydale:

That is all.

(Apart from HURRAH!!!)

2007-05-11T19:22:00.000+01:00

Beautiful babies

2007-04-23T18:57:00.000+01:00

Blowdrying chickens

Today the girls have been out and about, mostly sheltering under the bigger trees and shrubs while the rain drizzled on. Except for the silkies, of course, for whom wet feathers are a real health risk. So I've just been sitting on the floor in the lounge, blow-drying them one by one until they were safe to go to bed. Two of them absolutely loved the pampering and the warmth of it. The third one honked like an offended goose throughout the whole experience. Made me laugh like a drain.

Meanwhile, back at the incubator, seven red pekin and eight lavender pekin eggs are cooking away. Very exciting! The reds are quite rare and due to hatch on the 3rd (ish) of May. The lavenders are fairly common but extraordinarily pretty and due about four days after that.

Fingers crossed...

Chickens are just so fan-bloody-tastic. They're straightforward and functional. No politics, no moods (apart from the cockerels, but isn't that always the way?), no paperwork, no birthday lists, no crap. Apart from all the crap, obviously.

I just bloody love them.
Getting chickens was one of the best things I ever ever ever did.
Ever.

2007-04-09T08:36:00.000+01:00

I've just spent several fruitful hours chuckling at a site from a link from a link...
Here's the site:

http://sashen.com/index.html

And here's something from it that made me laugh:

2007-04-09T07:48:00.000+01:00

I've seen my daughters doing this loads of times, but I'm not entirely sure I'm doing this right... Hope so, because this is stunning.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krKZIyime4k

Oh, arsebiscuits... you'll just have to click on the link until the girls get home!

2007-04-07T17:25:00.000+01:00

Spring walk

Well... we went for a walk and it's spring. And the sun was beautiful.

2007-04-07T13:13:00.000+01:00

GU Walk

Finally it struck me that all I was doing was talking about things that mattered to me, and that all that posting was taking time from actually doing them. This despite the fact that I rarely post there now - which maybe makes it very much easier to stop altogether.
A poster on GU once made a glorious exit after telling everyone that they were engaged in the worst form of procrastination imaginable, and to me that was an immediately recognisable truth. It's just taken me two years to follow that example.

I didn't want to leave in a blaze of glorylessness, so I just left. And I'm only putting this here in case anyone from there should wonder, worry or check. It's been a wonderful place to spend time, I've made some much-loved and valued friends. Once or twice it's been a life-saver. I wouldn't have missed it for anything. After a while, though, even the most admirable virtue becomes a vice. Other vices are more fun and you get to do them for real!

2007-04-01T18:34:00.000+01:00

Buffy's new babies!!

2007-04-01T18:31:00.000+01:00

By Request...

This morning my younger daughter and I decided that it was time to put Buffy into a quiet place to wait for her eggs to hatch. She's in with the father and his other four wives, which seemed like it might be a bit crowded and hazardous for newly-hatched chicks. So we made a special nesting box for her out of a massive banana cardboard box from the local supermarket and trotted out into the garden at half past seven this morning to do the broody business.

Stage 1 - Open the chicken house and allow all non-broody chickens and one psychopathic cockerel to leg it down to the end of the run. Block run so that they cannot return during subsequent stages.
This went well.

Stage 2 - Remove broody from nesting box while she is still in broody trance and clearly Not Bothered and place her in the cardboard box in a very cosy nest, ready for her eggs.
This also went well.

Stage 3 - Quickly move eggs from their current location and place them beneath Buffy, close up the box and take box and happy contents to a place of warm and quiet safety, there to await the hatching event in a haze of blissful and natural wondrousness.
This could have gone better.

As I picked up the first handful of eggs, the air was rent with screams from the raindrop, who alerted me to the fact that Buffy had abandoned her maternal trance and was now pelting down the garden in homicidal pursuit of one of the free-ranging chickens (who had clearly made the mistake of looking at her in a funny way). I replaced the eggs, ran down the garden and separated the two chickens (who were now locked in blood-thirsty embrace). As I turned to take Buffy back to her broody box, the air was rent once again by the truly scared and scary announcement from daughter that The Cockerel Had Escaped.
At this point the theme from Jaws began playing in my head as the definitively appropriate soundtrack to the whole event, given that Titch - although small and perfectly formed - has the beak of a horror movie baddie, a temperament to match and the ability to fly (which means he is the only one of the chickens Not Allowed In The Garden). He stood in splendid profile in the doorway of the run and then launched himself out into the forbidden territory of the garden. Daughter ran off screaming.
Buffy was placed very rapidly back in the broody box, so that I could pursue Titch down the garden, Chuckle Brothers stylee, trying to trap him under the top half of the broody box and shouting in a manner so hysterically uncontrolled that I am now embarrassed to recall it, "OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD!!!!"
At which point, my neighbour - a devout Jehovah's Witness - popped up on the other side of the fence and called (in a ludicrously jovial fashion) "Morning girls - how is everyone today?" I continued to pursue the cockerel, whilst suggesting to JW Neighbour that things could perhaps be going a little better. Just as Titch decided that he was starting to get a little pissed off with me and that it was time I had some of the skin stripped off my arm, my neighbour added the thoroughly redundant piece of information that there was a cat in the vicinity and I should really watch out. A cat being the least of my worries at this point, I launched myself at the cockerel in a last ditch, if-I-don't-catch-him-this-time-I'm-going-to-be-so-late-for-work-they'll-sack-me attempt to contain the situation, no longer caring about skin, arm or anything other than STOPPING THE MADNESS.
Having now, and totally unexpectedly, grabbed Titch around the back side, I held on for all I was worth, got up from my ground-writhing position and carried him back to the run, avoiding his frenzied and furious assaults on my hand by millimetres. I just managed to close the run in time to see Buffy jumping out of the box again and hurtling back off down the garden. Luckily, at this point the daughter in residence realised that it was safe to come out from behind the sofa, and after another five minutes we finally and successfully coordinated a pincer movement in retrieving the motherly role model from her Fuck The Lot Of You jamboree around the garden. Whereupon we managed to install her in the box with the eggs underneath her, the lid strapped down and the door to the room firmly closed in the space of three breathless and panicky minutes.
And then I went to work.

And I still love my chooks.

2007-03-16T16:30:00.000Z

Our new babies (not so new any more)!

2006-11-12T15:22:00.000Z

Bigfoot moves house

Yesterday, Bigfoot and his brother (who had no name) moved to their new home on a children's farm. Which caused a bit of a lump in the throat - he was a gorgeous boy with masses of character. However, it was clearly the right move when catching him to take him to his new home took such a long time - he was getting to be a bit of a handful!

So two little men arrived with me at the farm and made themselves at home very quickly, and one little girl took their place in the carrier and wended her merry way back with me. She's called Henny Penny, she's a miniature white bantam silkie (which I've always wanted) and she's very pretty indeed! She's also in need of a good de-lousing, but that's another story...

Photo to follow! (after the lice leave)

2006-10-19T18:34:00.000+01:00

Today's update on chick progress:

Bigfoot!

Pipsqueak!

(They are both gorgeous and fluffy)

2006-10-13T20:10:00.000+01:00

And the thing about my disappearance was that these have been hard times indeed. Horrid things happened, and then more horrid things happened. Not that I wish to turn into a moany old rainwoman, and this blog is browsed by raindrops sometimes anyway. So.

But here I am, pattyyummycake! Mwah!!

2006-10-13T20:06:00.000+01:00

Bigfoot's first quiff

Prompted by the fabulously yummy pattycake, I have galvanised myself and taken photos of my Young Man in his chick adolescence.

It would be fair to say that they're not the best photos ever, but then, he's not the easiest subject ever! And you definitely get the idea about his Elvis-type hair arrangements!

He's the sweetest little thing - very timid and not keen on the camera, as you can see on this roosting rooster pose:

2006-09-16T17:22:00.000+01:00

The Incredible Disappearing Blog

Now you see me...

2006-09-07T22:04:00.000+01:00

By popular request

One of my most favouritest poems. Ever.

First, I want to make you come in my hand
while I watch you and kiss you, and if you cry,
I'll drink your tears while, with my whole hand, I
hold your drenched loveliness contracting. And
after a breath, I want to make you full
again, and wet. I want to make you come
in my mouth like a storm. No tears now. The sum
of your parts is my whole most beautiful
chart of the constellations--your left breast
in my mouth again. You know you'll have to be
your age. As I lie beside you, cover me
like a gold cloud, hands everywhere, at last
inside me where I trust you, then your tongue
where I need you. I want you to make me come.

-Marilyn Hacker

2006-09-06T22:45:00.000+01:00

Bigfoot has landed!!

New baby chick has hatched today. It has the biggest feet EVER!!!!

As soon as I saw it, I fell madly in love with it, and when I picked it up, it snuggled up to me and didn't want to be put down again. How can you resist something like that?

You just bloody can't, that's how.

Here he is:

2006-08-13T20:37:00.000+01:00

Big Chill

It has been pointed out that this blog is a little behind-hand at the moment. Here's the reason why and the next entry: the Big Chill!

We had a damned fine time of it. Lots of sun and strange sun tan patterns as a result...

Some of the Things We Saw.

2006-08-01T18:52:00.000+01:00

Chickens past and present

The hot weather has been a disaster for us. Our first hatched chick, all grown up into a very sweet chicken called Fluff, died in the heat about a week ago. Tears and sad faces all round, but nothing compared to the sorrow that greeted the loss of Snowball a day later.

Snowball was a chicken of great gorgeousness who would sit on your knee and chat for ages, even watching your face to see if you'd say anything back to her odd little noises. She used to trot around the garden after me, and she was a devoted friend to the chicken who came with her when she joined us. I've no idea how old she was when we got her, but she had a happy year here. Losing her was terrible - like losing a cat or a dog that's been with your family for years.

So, those were chickens past.

Chicken now present:

Her name is now Cookie Monster, because she's a (rare) cuckoo silkie. Pleased to report that she's deranged even beyond the usual silkie frame of reference, and I've already had to remove her from buckets, thunderstorms and small spaces that obviously look good to a girl who's used to less interesting ones.

2006-07-19T19:41:00.000+01:00

Hot cat!!!

(the indisputable...)

2006-07-17T22:38:00.000+01:00

Marge Piercy

By request (although this is not the one that either of us was thinking of):

Colors Passing Through Us

Purple as tulips in May, mauve
into lush velvet, purple
as the stain blackberries leave
on the lips, on the hands,
the purple of ripe grapes
sunlit and warm as flesh.

Every day I will give you a color,
like a new flower in a bud vase
on your desk. Every day
I will paint you, as women
color each other with henna
on hands and on feet.

Red as henna, as cinnamon,
as coals after the fire is banked,
the cardinal in the feeder,
the roses tumbling on the arbor
their weight bending the wood
the red of the syrup I make from petals.

Orange as the perfumed fruit
hanging their globes on the glossy tree,
orange as pumpkins in the field,
orange as butterflyweed and the monarchs
who come to eat it, orange as my
cat running lithe through the high grass.

Yellow as a goat's wise and wicked eyes,
yellow as a hill of daffodils,
yellow as dandelions by the highway,
yellow as butter and egg yolks,
yellow as a school bus stopping you,
yellow as a slicker in a downpour.

Here is my bouquet, here is a sing
song of all the things you make
me think of, here is oblique
praise for the height and depth
of you and the width too.
Here is my box of new crayons at your feet.

Green as mint jelly, green
as a frog on a lily pad twanging,
the green of cos lettuce upright
about to bolt into opulent towers,
green as Grand Chartreuse in a clear
glass, green as wine bottles.

Blue as cornflowers, delphiniums,
bachelors' buttons. Blue as Roquefort,
blue as Saga. Blue as still water.
Blue as the eyes of a Siamese cat.
Blue as shadows on new snow, as a spring
azure sipping from a puddle on the blacktop.

Cobalt as the midnight sky
when day has gone without a trace
and we lie in each other's arms
eyes shut and fingers open
and all the colors of the world
pass through our bodies like strings of fire.

Marge Piercy

2006-07-15T19:25:00.000+01:00

Sparky the cockerel

Just like his dad, absolutely gorgeous and starting to crow! Aaaargh!!!

2006-07-07T20:02:00.000+01:00

Today is my birthday and I'm having a lovely day. Children, chickens, friends and a seriously gorgeous boyfriend to celebrate.

Best present not received yet - a bow (and some arrows), as I'm loving my new interest. Strange to be vegetarian and startlingly accurate in 'killing' pretend things out in the woods. If I'm ever really hungry, I'll be able to hunt down my own tofu.

2006-07-07T13:14:00.000+01:00

By popular demand...

More chick news. We have eleven chicks growing apace right now - five under their broodymum and six making their own way in the world, having finally left the womb-like environment of the heatlamped cage. All but two of them are girls! Including the three millefleurs (from my wishlist, so I'm very happy indeed).

Here they are, looking particularly sweet:

We'll keep all three of these, and now we know they're girls I guess we'll name them too. Probably after flowers, since their breed is called after a thousand flowers (referring to the pattern on their feathering).

Sadly, little Pugh died after a week - he was just too little to cope without his mum, especially after she'd damaged him so badly in her brood rationalising attack. The ones underneath her now are all dutch bantams. Yesterday morning I found one away from her, shivering and cold - the only solution being to take her into work with me. I was about to tuck her down my bra to keep her warm when she reminded me of her ability to produce large quantities of chick poo without warning. Suddenly I felt less breastfully nurturing. After a day in a shoebox getting lots of TLC, she was better enough to go back in with psychomum. Looking good again.

It's rather difficult to get pictures of Buffy with her brood yet - I'll try this weekend.

(How's that, Mercy?)

2006-06-17T06:54:00.000+01:00

Tough Love

Not long after the picture of the chicks was taken, the mum decided that she had too many and that some must be intruders. MrRainy rescued the first chick she decided to reject, and while he tended to the graze she'd left on the side of its head she nearly killed a second. And so it went on, although she only actually hurt those two.

Consequently, we now have seven little chicks under a heat lamp in our bathroom. One of these has been named Blind Pugh because of the damage she did to him. He's getting much better, but still looks like he's wearing a crash helmet (in fact, when MrRainy's not around to defend the chicklove of his life, we do call it CarCrash). He's got most of the use of one eye back and our fingers are all crossed about the other, but it seems like a rather optimistic finger-crossing.

Meanwhile, mummy chicken has a brood of five that she recognises as her own and they are all very happy together. One of the more shocking incidents in ChickenWorld for us, nevertheless.

2006-06-15T11:48:00.000+01:00

Rainbows

Worth waiting for.

2006-06-11T17:49:00.000+01:00

CHICKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Including: Pingu, Snot, Tiger, Lily and Flash. I think...

2006-06-04T16:34:00.000+01:00

I am a vole and I live in a hole...

It took us 30 minutes to catch this sweet little gentleman after blackcat brought him into the house.

They run very very very very fast.

2006-05-27T20:15:00.000+01:00

Sunset

2006-05-27T19:57:00.000+01:00

Amnesty International

A new campaign is highlighting the censorship of internet content in different parts of the world. Amnesty is asking people to show their awareness of this in different ways - every action taken adds to others and makes change more likely.

Click here, please.

2006-05-25T13:30:00.000+01:00

Graphics tablet thingy type whatsit

Prepare yourself for an influx of bizarre doodlings - I am in love with a small piece of plastic (for once, one without a motor), and cannot stop being artistic with it, daaaaahling.

I may have to embrace my inner muse a bit more before going too public, however...

It's not great, but it was fun to do!!

2006-05-22T20:34:00.000+01:00

The Littlest Chick

He (for he appears to be a he, of course) is just the most beautiful and tiniest thing ever. FACT.

His broody mum loves him so much, and is caring for him brilliantly, even while she sits on the eggs that she was supposed to be hatching all along. They're due in about another five days. It's like a bloody maternity ward here at the moment!!

(Did I mention the fact that Buffy is now sitting on thirteen eggs at the moment?)

Ahem!

2006-05-19T09:46:00.000+01:00

Chicken wish-list

Last night I was perusing the lists of available chickens and hatching eggs and started to realise that I was getting a little over-excited and that perhaps professional help might be appropriate. However, that's not as much fun as getting more chickens, so here's my wish list:

She's a millefleur. Which takes me forever to type correctly, but I WANT one.

One of these, but brown red and a girl (clearly - I'm a one cock kind of a girl) - unfortunately the only picture of what I actually want is restricted.

Check out this gorgeous gentleman!

He's the male of what I want, and he's lovely!!

I can't resist the pekin shape - maybe it's a case of pets and their owners...

This is a picture of the typical pekin female - she's gorgeous.

I always wanted a black one and now we have one, and she's full of character. Most of it psychopathically deranged, but I can live with that...

That's a wish list of precisely TWO. Hardly excessive... I'm almost a chicken puritan.

2006-05-19T09:16:00.000+01:00

The Nature of Blogs

I have been engaged in blog contemplation for the last couple of days. Having thought for a while that I would like to indulge in the activity, and then having taken the plunge, now I am aware of a tiny band of readers to whom I would like to send an affectionate

before informing you (in the nicest possible way, of course) that I'm going to ignore you, because I'm not convinced that blogging should be a self-conscious exercise.

2006-05-17T06:54:00.000+01:00

Morning

When I woke this morning it was 5am and the sun was shining. In a wild surge of enthusiasm, I jumped out of bed, threw on some clothes and set off on a walk to start the day.

The weather was beautiful and the countryside here is lovely - there was so much large-scale pleasure for the eyes, but what struck me were the tiny moments of beauty everywhere I looked. Snails scurrying slowly for shelter under the hedges as the sun came up, birds looking afronted that I'd invaded their time and space, even the small feathery tragedies of fox leftovers across the fields. It was beautiful. It all reminded me of Marge Piercy's poem "Private Bestiary" - lines about snails and dolphins and wild love-making... Maybe I'll edit that in here later.

A lovely start to a morning. Now, a couple of hours later, it's gloomy and cold. I think I might have just seized the day while it was there to be seized.

2006-05-16T18:41:00.000+01:00

I just moved an old bloody oven and dropped the bloody thing.
Just thought I'd share that.

2006-05-12T13:15:00.000+01:00

Brian Patten

I have to confess that I heart him a bit. Quite a big bit, actually.

Here are some of the reasons why.

Simple lyric

When I think of her sparkling face
And of her body that rocked this way and that,
When I think of her laughter,
Her jubilance that filled me,
It’s a wonder I’m not gone mad.

She is away and I cannot do what I want.
Other faces pale when I get close.
She is away and I cannot breathe her in.

The space her leaving has created
I have attempted to fill
With bodies that numbed upon touching,
Among them I expected her opposite,
And found only forgeries.

Her wholeness I know to be a fiction of my making,
Still I cannot dismiss the longing for her;
It is a craving for sensation new flesh
Cannot wholly calm or cancel,
It is perhaps for more than her.

At night above the parks the stars are swarming.
The streets are thick with nostalgia;
I move through senseless routine and insensitive chatter
As if her going did not matter.
She is away and I cannot breathe her in.
I am ill simply through wanting her.

Doubt shall not make an end of you

Doubt shall not make an end of you
nor closing eyes lose your shape
when the retina's light fades;
what dawns inside me will light you.
In our public lives we may confine ourselves to darkness,
our nowhere mouths explain away our dreams,
but alone we are incorruptible creatures,
our light sunk too deep to be of any social use
we wander free and perfect without moving
or love on hard carpets
where couples revolving round the room
end found at its centre.
Our love like a whale from its deepest ocean rises -
I offer this and a multitude of images
from party rooms to oceans,
the single star and all its reflections;
being completed we include all
and nothing wishes to escape us.
Beneath my hand your hardening breast agrees
to sing of its own nature,
then from a place without names our origin comes shivering.
Feel nothing separate then,
we have translated each other into light
and into love go streaming.

Brian Patten

The Bee's Last Journey

The Bee's Last Journey to the Rose
I came first through the warm grass
Humming with Spring,
And now swim through the evening's
Soft sunlight gone cold.
I'm old in this green ocean;
Going a final time to the rose.
North wind, until I reach it
Keep your icy breath away
That changes pollen into dust.
Let me be drunk on this scent a final time,
Then blow if you must.

Brian Patten

2006-05-07T13:14:00.000+01:00

Sort of happy birthday

Today would have been my mum's birthday. I think - but I'm not sure - that she would have been 78 today. As it was, she died when she was 56.

I don't have any pictures of her to post on here as part of a rather strange birthday card, but here are some pictures of some of her favourite things.

2006-05-05T08:02:00.000+01:00

Little men - in praise of

The man of the house - Titch! He's been in the house since 5.30 this morning, because the sun woke him up early. Usually he sleeps quite well and only starts to grumble as it comes up to 7am. This morning, however, he wanted company.

He sat in my lap for a while, enjoying the attention and the stroking, but then decided he wanted to make some NOISE!!!!!

Here's my little beast, pausing during an extended period of running up and down the piano, enjoying the ensuing noise and chaos:

2006-05-04T19:18:00.000+01:00

The horror!! The horror!!!!!!!!!!

Broodies. Hundreds of them!!
Oh, alright then... two.
Two.
TWO!!

Sweetie:

And Buffy:

Buffy only just got her strength back after a marathon hatching session last autumn, so this is something of a disaster. She is also sitting on nothing at the moment. Instinct is stronger than sense all the way down the line with chickens. Probably why I love them so much!

So in a couple of days I shall be popping three hatching miniature silkie eggs under each of my broodies, and in a few weeks time (fingers firmly crossed) we shall have a little sextet of baby mini-dinosaurs. Like this (my favourite chicken):

Just don't tell MrRainy...

2006-05-04T19:08:00.000+01:00

Hurrah!!!!

I braved the aggressive cockerel, the protective mother and the burgeoning broodies (two now! Bugger!!)

Here they are! You can see Lemony at the back - he's so lovely.

This is their broody mum with some of her six babies. She loves them madly. Emphasis on the madly.

This is my cockerel - Titch.

He objects even to the implied presence of other men in my life and crows like a loon whenever there's a hint of male company. He looks fierce, but he's actually only the size of a large pigeon. Actually, a medium-sized pigeon.

2006-05-04T18:34:00.000+01:00

Chicken Not Very Little

Today we named some of the chicks. We've got as far as Lemony Snickett, Delphi and Blossom. The rest are all cockerels and we'll have to pass them on once they start crowing - it feels like it might be easier to give up animals without names, after shedding tears in the past over well-loved little personalities leaving our happy, chicken-overrun home.

I'm going to try to add a picture here of the chicks when they first hatched - unblurred photographs now they can fly are something of a miracle.

Ooh! There it is (I'm such an obvious Blog-virgin!)

Watch this space - I may tackle the scary chicks, broodies and camera combination later this evening!