My Somerset Life

A diary by Brian Snellgrove

Ticket splitting and weeds

Bargain Fares?

We are contemplating a trip to London in November so yesterday I went to Bath  rail station to look at the cost of two tickets return and with a rail card  the price quoted was £92

Today I  visited a ticket splitting site and I got the same journey for two people for £60 total.  The idea should be self-explanatory but it means that you can combine two separate journeys into one, so long as the relevant train stops at a suitable station on the way.   To travel by National Express at this time of year would cost us £21 for two people return so there is a difference and I could certainly afford the train.  Another factor is time. One takes  one hour 25 minutes and the other three hours 30 minutes.

Weeds, weeds and more weeds.

This video caught my attention immediately because it shows that weeds have a function a bit like a roof on a house and the commentator very kindly gives us or shares with us the right attitude towards this genre.

About this site

I am considering the way I present information to you from other readers, to see if there’s anything I can do,  so today I talked with my web designer.  What I’m going to say now applies to all websites for all purposes so it is not particular to my diaries. First of all we have to consider what a person wants to gain from the site and they will only know when they start reading so we have to tempt them to read.

Secondly we have to consider the attention span of people. If we have a lot of topics demanding our attention and very little time, then I would not expect anyone to spend more than five seconds deciding if they wanted to read or continue reading.

Question –  what can a person gain from reading this website that they wouldn’t gain from reading another website. In the case of Russell Brand who has achieved notoriety recently it’s probably because it is Russell Brand and you either hates him or love him. He has stuck his neck out on many matters so people are probably polarized when they switch over to him.

However, I do not have such a profile for which I am grateful. People in my position have to make it quite clear quite soon what they have to offer and in my case it is a considerable body of local knowledge which may be valuable to not only those who live here in Somerset but those who are thinking of visiting or moving to this area.

I try not to be self-indulgent in my writing,  though I do report my feelings. I do not wish to bore anyone with repetition so we try to give something new each day and so far after about 1300 diary entries, we have for the most part avoided repetition. I like reading other people’s Diaries because I can see the world through their eyes if only momentarily and can get some sort of  insight into how other people might feel and react.

When we do a rewrite in about a month’s time you will see links to various cities such as Bath, Frome, Bristol, Wells, Glastonbury,  so those desiring to know what it is like from a visitor’s point of view will have plenty of material at their disposal

When Samuel Pepys wrote his diaries he may or may not have written for the benefit of posterity but I suspect he wrote because he enjoyed it.  Also, it is a work of art and you don’t paint a work of art because of the number of people that will see it, you painted because the ability to do so is embedded in your mind and your consciousnesses.

You can’t write over one million words as he did with quill pen and poor lighting without being totally dedicated. His works were hidden or stored in a library for 100 years before being made available.  They have become part of English Heritage.



My Somerset Life

A diary by Brian Snellgrove

What makes a county show worth going to? – Dorset County Show, Dorchester

Today Sunday was the day for visiting Dorset county show which is an event held once a year for two days over a weekend, near to Dorchester.

An unexpected Aladdin’s Cave

On the main road down for some reason I decided to turn off into a garden centre and an establishment that described itself as  a trading post.  It consisted of three elements, a coffee bar, and bric a bac  shop with an amazing history, and then finally a small garden centre.  The coffee bar was open from 10am to 4 p.m. Seven days a week. Congratulations whoever you are in running this social service. .  It was like being in an old fashioned store in the 1960’s or 70’s. Very sentimental. even emotionally moving I could say.

We arrived about ten forty five in the morning. The road that my GPS told me to go down was blocked because it had  been made into a one way road. We had to go through the town of Dorchester and basically followed the traffic. Signage was non-existent. I suppose they wanted to  save some money and not pay the AA to do what they’re best at which is signing events.  There are of course good at doing a lot of other things as well but this is one of them.

I don’t think you want to see many more pictures of prize winning vegetables though there will be some. Rather, I would rather reflect on what makes a show value for money and whether we considered the £23 per head we spent  on this show value for money. First, some images.

Some pictorial features of the show

cars as far as the eyes could see.

VERY large food and art judging tent

Talk about being over the top. These pieces were made of iron and were quite weighty if I were to play a game I would need some time to get used to the pieces so they don’t get in the way of my mental processes in actually playing the game

Looks like Marzipan

Some child has a wonderful imagination

We went into the craft tent and I found an exhibition of bowls carved out of various softwood and hardwood.  The owner of the stand had a South African accent. Whenever I hear about someone from South Africa I get sentimental as my time there was so good and we are talking about 20 years ago now. I tried to guess how long he had been away from South Africa based on his accent. I wrongly guessed five years. In fact he came in the year 2000 partly to escape from the declineing economic circumstances. He had spent nine years in Germany and then come to the UK so well done whoever you are for surviving.

I had a long chat with his wife who originated from Zimbabwe and we both agreed that this type of work would not sell so well in a place where people did not expect to spend £200 or £300 on what was ineffector work of art and I thought he should sell them in art galleries where the artistic quality would be more appreciated and valued accordingly.

This is a lot of fun. You can place your dogs – or children –  in this oversize chair and see how they react.  People were getting the idea and doing it without invitation.

If this does not tickle the eye then nothing will


This band was playing merry jazz music and were for some reason dressed in pink.

These delightful young ladies were singing songs from the 1950s and 1960s.  They had really good voices and sung together  in joyous harmony.  I could have listened to them for a long time  but was getting a little bit tired

I have never seen corn on the cob being judged before so this was definitely a first for me. I could not tell the difference between any of them but I’m sure the practice eye can spot many differences.

A very clever and eye-catching feature. Well done the designer and I hope you make a good living, people

To me this was my first time to get up close and  personal with such a vast machine. Evidently it is not the biggest and it’s function is too harvest grain.  I don’t know how they move it from one field to another but evidently this six meter wide cutter is transferred on a separate trailer. We thought that a group of farmers would have to buy it and share it but no, the sales rep told us that this would be for one farmer and that the price was £450,000

We asked about the three wheels instead of the normal big wheels and we will told that it was because of needing to adapt to various types of ground.  We left suitably impressed

So what makes value for money?

I should first of all describe what the Show contains.  There are two or three rings for entertainment and for horse jumping and so on. There are about 120 stalls devoted to selling be it food or items of interest or utility. There was a big section devoted to displaying farm machinery. All types of animals were on show and prizes were awarded for excellence as you would expect..

We stayed for three and a half hours. At the end of  that time I’d had enough. On my phone I have a blue tooth checker and in the crowds I had 415 phones within range,  all broadcasting and trying to reach the stations never mind the downloads so that makes me tired I’m afraid. I wish it were my imagination.

These are the main features of the show

1. facilities   there were many public toilets and many large green containers for throw-away rubbish 9/10

2. entertainment –  there was a drag race where vehicles had to be pulled along by sheer brute force, there were four very nice young ladies singing songs from the 50s and 60s,   I will give this 8/10

3. horse riding competition –  to a high standard and the commentator tried to explain the rules 8/10

4. animal judging –  we had goats, alpacas, sheep, pigs, you name it  all done to professional standard.  9/10

5. the presence of large farm vehicles, pictured below, with helpful staff to  explain how they worked  9/10

6. signage –  even though you can buy a program you still need signs pointing in the right direction because it is easy to get lost and disorientated in such a large show. There were few signs  4/10

7. food –  there needs to be enough for variety at a reasonable price to provide for people’s basic needs while they are in the show. Basically the sellers have a monopoly because there is no practical way of finding food in nearby Dorchester.  You cannot force people to come and supply for example health food but all in all their were enough firms  supplying food to get you through the day and it seemed to be of reasonable quality.

One of my special moans, we are offered steak roll or a  bap and although the meat is good the roll itself is of the cheapest quality and I wouldn’t give it to an animal. People do notice these things.  The test for me is if you drop a roll and it bounces, it doesn’t have much food value

8. A special mention for the food hall. There was not as great a variety as I have seen in the Bath and West Show, the Shepton Mallet show, or the Frome show but there was certainly sufficient.  What I liked was that there was plenty of room in the hall to move. They  did not focus on getting every last stall or stand-holder in.  They also put a few tables and chairs in one corner which I did appreciate. People can come over funny and suddenly get tired and need to sit down. It’s not a medical thing just a thing of age.   7/10

9. weather –  not much you can do about that but we had an ideal day with temperatures of 24 degrees centigrade, not very much wind, so all was good here. There should always be covered provision in case of inclement weather.   9/10

10. parking-  there was plenty of free parking in adjacent fields. I reckon there must have been about 1500 cars altogether and these were marshaled by presumably volunteers or locals press-ganged in (joke) to assist   10/10

11. Transport to the site – not much public transport but it is possible to walk fro, the centre of Dorchester  7/10

12. the condition of the ground.  Again, there’s not much that can be done about this once the site has been selected but it was friendly to disabled people 9/10

13. entrance conditions –   there were six people taking money by credit card at the entrance gate and although we arrived at peak time there was not much of a queue at all,  so we more or less went straight in. Just a quick flash of my credit card   9/10

14. plant and vegetable competitions –  in this case there were many entries and there was a high standard. I guess that with Dorchester adjacent there would be enough people with a certain minimum mental acuity to be able to make a contribution. 9/10

15. Availability of staff in case of need and for guidance –  there were round the show several large maps showing where features were.  There were helpers but the only criticism I have is the lack of uniform i.e instant recognizability   7/10

 16. Quality of stands –  one or two stood out as being a bit amateur-ish but most people know their business, have exhibited before, and are good at presenting themselves.  People do notice if for example the person who is on the stand is reading a book, looking bored, or fiddling on his mobile phone.  It is not an incentive to go and speak to such people  8/10

17. costs of food –  my bête noire is expensive coffee and we saw at a stall near the entrance latte being sold for £4.50 which I refused to pay as you will recall from previous exercises.  I found someone offering coffee for three pounds which I accepted.  Other people felt the same way so we had to wait a little while but when it came it was good.   I had previously bought a very good steak and cheese Cornish pastie type pie for five pounds and that put me right for most of the day

18. Quality of public address –  there is nothing worse than an overloud loud speaker which they did have  in the main ring during the drag racing type events and I had to cover my ears. But in the horse ring they had it exactly right because the lady announcer seem to be speaking normally into her microphone and everyone could hear it as clear as day  7/10 overall

19. sitting areas –  some of us like to sit down or even need to sit down.  There were sufficient chairs and  benches for this to be able to happen though you had to act quickly if you saw a spare place as there were many people came to sit down.  8/10

20. The event was ideal for families.  People with pushchairs and young lively children had no difficulty at all in going round and the really good weather did help a lot. 9/10

21. Quality of organization on the ground .    The better the organization, the less you notice it. You can tell the quality of management through the attitude of the people working there and there was a reasonable amount of team spirit but I have seen better so I wonder if everyone was gathered together beforehand in a pre-battle plan meeting so to speak. 7/10

Main takeaway, get the AA to sign post in the area.  I know they are expensive budget is worth it.  Also do some internal signs.  I know you think it’s stating the blindingly obvious but to the stranger it would make a big difference

 I did notice one thing and there is a certain prejudice of people from Dorset towards people of Somerset. I did get mocked in a friendly way so maybe it’s the same way that London people laugh at people from Essex or Norfolk. I’m sure this goes back a long way and it did no one any harm

Would I return next year? I think probably once every couple of years. There are only a few weekends per year when such events happen and these are weekends from May until mid September,  so you can be picky. 9/10

 

 



My Somerset Life

A diary by Brian Snellgrove

The Market Day that did not happen

A Carrot produces triplets

My goodness, I know that carrots come in  all shapes and sizes but this triplet home grown carrot was somewhat unusual and very aesthetically pleasing. This has nothing to do with  today’s events but I thought I’d mention it. If I had been more conscientious in the past I would have taken a photograph of every misshapen carrot I have ever grown and given it a name.

But then I have more important things to do with my time so that plan must go on to the great ‘to do’ list

To Shepton Mallet but diverted along the way

Midsomer Quilting is just outside Midsomer Norton and we have been there on and off for the last seven years.  We were driving to Shepton Mallet but I decided – so-called on impulse – to drop in and see how the owner, Chris, and his wife were doing.  There is something special about the atmosphere. It is always welcoming and community minded and inevitably I get offered a cup of coffee.

There were one or two people in the work room but two ladies who had visited if not the first time the second time.  They were given the treatment and Chris the owner  chatted as only he can with complete strangers but with one thing in common the love of Quilts and quilting.  We actually went into make sure that they were aware of the current Bath quilt exhibition  of works by Kaffe Fassett  who believe it or not is a male.  Yes they were aware of it but had not been so we encouraged the two ladies to go.


Francoise talking to the two lady visitors over a nice cup of coffee and some always available chocolate biscuits

A bargain at £3

This would be a positively dangerous place for anyone who loves quilting and any of its relations such as sewing, embroidery and so on. There are only one or two quilteries in UK of such a standard so if you are keen then it’s worth making the trip. Here is the website.

The owner discussed with me that he had one space for the next addition of his bulletin. I said that creativity is unlimited and you don’t have to look for it, it will look for you. We seem to be on the same page though we have not often discussed it.  I think it is an implied philosophy between us which is rather nice because you don’t have to spell everything out or explain everything.

The monthly market that was not

So we arrived, parked our car by Aldi as we normally do and went to see the High Street. The place was absolutely empty instead of The hussle and bustle of a fayre which I had expected.  There is a reason for everything including that which does not appear to have a reason. We inquired of a passing woman walking her dog and she also expected to find the  market. I guess that the Mendip Times  added the standard entry, which is on the last Sunday or every month and just put it in without checking whether the bank holiday would interfere.

Never mind we will make the best of it. It is nice in any event to get out and about. We went to the Polish shop in the Square and Francoise  bought some fish.  We made our way up the high street and on the way saw this sign which shows me beyond any shadow of doubt that I am way out of touch with what the young people are listening to in terms of music, or what they define as music. To me, music is melody and harmony but these adventures that the kids listen to is anything but.

Community Food Bank

On the way we spotted a community food bank. In it were about 6 large  bags of mixed lettuce and quite a number of bread rolls and baguettes. While we were looking at it, a woman looked over our shoulder. It was obviously not the first time she had been to this facility. She said ‘if you don’t take it, it would just be thrown away’ and looking at the sell by dates I could see what she meant.

We discussed not wasting food and she said when she was young, if she did not finish her meal her mother would keep it and she would have to eat it the next day. My own mother was the same, if I left food I was told about the starving Africans. This lesson has stuck with me all my life and I feel bad if I don’t finish food but I also feel bad when I see other people leaving food in restaurants. Why did they order it if they did not wish to eat it.

The woman was very chatty and said there were also food bank  outlets  in Glastonbury, which I have featured  in these diaries before, and also Frome.  I can only hope that they reach the population that they are designed for.  People should not feel ashamed about not being able to buy food; it is seldom their own fault as for example a partner who has lost their job, the rent has gone up, the gas and electricity have gone up and come the end of the month they simply don’t have the money to feed themselves.

Very few people we to be seen, but those that were there were enjoying themselves.

Ducks or were they seagulls having a wonderful time splashing around.

A walk in the Park, Collett Park, which was gifted to the town by John Kyte Collett in 1906.  It is an ideal and safe place for exhibitions and fayres, as well as every-day playing of games with children. There is a small chic cafe where you can get good quality coffee and snacks. We did our rounds. Well done local council for keeping its maintained

Sign in a shop window

I think in most cases doubt is about not trusting your own intuition. If you’ve got an idea then there was a reason for it so don’t push your idea aside because something tells you it is not achievable. This is a good example of a juncture where you could speak to friends, and I don’t mean acquaintances, I mean people who really care for you and have known you for some time.

If you try something and the results are not what you expect or you don’t get the leverage, then at the very least you will learn something – so what’s the problem? Are we frightened of being laughed at for a new venture that we try. If we are laughed at let’s look at the character and the courage of those who have done the laughing. What have they got to show for their lives? I think a fellow traveler would not laugh but encourage.

A trip round Aldi

There was an Aldi in Germany where you could only get admittance if you had a relevant identity chip. This was not popular with the locals.

This branch of Aldi is quite big, about twice the size of our Midsomer equivalent, Lidl.   One of these days I must cure myself of the habit of walking around the non-food aisles to see if there is anything of interest. Inevitably there is not as I suppose this exercise is rather sad really, have I got nothing better to do and try and spot a bargain and if I buy one will I really use it?

The truth is we’ve got too much stuff already most of which we do not use and as I have said before we really must get round to clearing everything out of our property to be left with what is needed and give the rest to others either through a garage sale or a charity shop

Most of the people in their shop were doing their weekly shop with or without crying children. I realised that Sunday morning is sometimes the only occasion people have to do something together so I must be tolerant and charitable. I must say that the prices for wine were very good indeed even cheaper than Lidl.

Back to the car and off to find paint

BSM is a home store on a big scale where pretty much everything for the home is sold. We wanted some paint for the garage door which means  a metal friendly paint. We could not find the color we like and  as for price we saw small pots, 500 milliliters for sale at £16. Not the sort of thing you buy casually.

It is 1230 so quite a lot of the day left. We decided to go home and make lunch. Not much on the menu event-wise for tomorrow, Monday Bank Holiday, except a boat race in round Wells castle. Can I take the crowds? At a pinch I suppose I could but do I want to?  There is lots to do at home.

BONUS BONUS  BONUS

If you enjoy ‘oddly satisfying videos try this one for size. It shows workers at a new level.   Sit back and enjoy.

—–VIDEO LIBRARY——

Making a profit from Illness | THE DIRTY WAR ON THE NHS | John Pilger Health System Documentary



My Somerset Life

A diary by Brian Snellgrove

Rain, rain and wind, more rain, some sun

 

Weather forecast at 8am this morning

So we have a so called summer weekend, the Harbourside Festival in Bristol which is a three-day event and lots going on locally including three types of event in Frome. We awoke this morning to a largely clear sky but above is the forecast for 1:00 p.m. This does not auger well for any sort of planning. There is a secret garden event in Frome but looking at the weather it will be better if we go tomorrow Sunday.

I watched the morning news and was reminded that the BBC sex up the weather by marking the European weather in red when in fact it is this type of temperature every year even 45 degrees. That is how the custom of siestas came to be. Amazing what a £62m donation to the BBC  from Bill Gates can achieve.

We were also told that the Just Stop Oil people had interfered with the First Night of the Proms and indeed intend to make this a memorable week this coming week for London. I honestly believe these people are being paid because every time they appear there are roundly condemned and people are starting to take matters into their own hands. May this continue and grow. It’s not as if there was a shred of scientific evidence for what they are claiming. We rely on fossil fuels for 85% of our energy so do we just stop that? Do they want us to go back to the Middle Ages?

I spoke to the coordinator of the meeting last night about the barbecue for Christian people, and I said that it was a jolly enough crowd but looking at the medium term how do we draw more people in? Maybe like a cell it has reached its natural size and would benefit from division into new groups perhaps. It’s a tricky one this if we are to avoid being  cliquey and exclusive though we may not intend it to be that way.

Over the decades I have observed groups and I noticed that there are very few groups that contain more than 25 members. They then split or tend to split into two which follows nature because that is what cell division is all about. We are part of nature after all and superimpose our own imaginings and desires at our peril. We even speak of ‘natural’ behaviour in other words behavior in accord with nature

Visit to Farrington Gurney – ‘Pollination Party’

Talk about sunny periods and showers! Bright sunshine one moment, pouring rain the next. It was supposed to be raining at one o’clock but as I write at 2:15 pm we have bright sunshine, a breeze, warm and muggy.

It was obvious that this event was sponsored. Admission is free, is a free, talks and seed bombs are free, plant free, drinks and snacks are free. In a word – free. First I was very struck by the enthusiasm of the large number of children who were in this small village hall (credit to the parents for bringing them along). Secondly I was struck by the huge number of plants and there must have been about a thousand, waiting to be given away which they were to be at three o’clock though we did not stay to see it.

The plant varieties forgiving away included flowering currents, Mexican Orange Blossom, common lilac, autumn sage, creeping blue blossom, Skimmias and finally heavenly bamboo

The first talk was by Ellie Jarvis, a PhD student at the University of Bath in her second year. She spoke enthusiastically about the importance of pollination and creatures who pollinate. You can look this up easily yourself but we have pollinators to thank for every third mouthful of food we eat. Not only do they pollinate our food crops, but they’re also vital for the survival of other plants that supports so much of our wildlife.

Anything can be used to plant seedlings including this boot. To the left is the lecturer preparing some ‘seed bombs’.

Three bumblebee species have become extinct in recent decades. The recent European Red List for Bees reports that almost one in ten species of wild bee face extinction, and over the past 50 years, half the bee, butterfly and moth species studied in the 2013 State of Nature Report have declined.

Ellie spoke with great enthusiasm and authority. She ended her 30-minute presentation by making seed bombs which are made out of water, earth and seeds which you make into a ball and throw around wherever you like in the countryside. I went up to her and congratulated her on her presentation and said that she should do more speaking. She had previously said that she had never given a talk to such a large number of people. She has nothing to worry about.

Every one could make a Bug Hotel supplied with free already cut to size wood, screws, cut bamboos sticks and pine cones – the activity was very popular with children and adults alike including myself. Everyone left with an example in their hands

This was followed by an equally enthusiastic talk by Cathy Edge from Somerset bees entitled ‘everything you never knew about bees’. I had no idea that a worker bee can be converted into way Queen Bee by changing their diet. What an amazingly ordered world they live in. She did go slightly over time, something that someone like myself would get annoyed at, but she was well received.  I treated myself with a pot of local honey (£6) to go into our family larder.

We left at this point did many others. The atmosphere was very jolly. Children were running around and making some noise during the presentations but it did not matter because the microphone volume took account of all the background noise.

On the way out we saw a glass case consisting of a knitted house, church plus knitted animals.

As for the weather, what can I say? Far from being continuous rain which is what we had been promised it really was a mixture of sunshine and being warm and muggy, and then torrential rain. However, the rain lasted for a few moments so no harm was done.

Although we could have continued our journeys we decided to spend the afternoon at home. Tomorrow Sunday we will visit some of the 23 Gardens which comprised the ‘Secret Garden’ visitations of Frome which is being held this weekend from Friday to Sunday.

To Tesco’s in our search for unhomogenised milk. I looked at the screamers on the National Papers.  Evidently we are all going to be burnt to death by temperatures which will reach 45 degrees as in Europe.  Whilst in the car park we saw a car with scriptural texts on the side. Well done them.

Altogether a very good day



My Somerset Life

A diary by Brian Snellgrove

Day 28,889 of my life + time for searching (for) our souls

I woke up fairly early, 06:15 actually, to the sound of rain. I made a coffee plus a toasted baguette with cheese and turned on GB news. I alternate with Talk TV. I enjoy the directness of David Bull and his no nonsense approach. Today’s topic is the shenanigans at the BBC. Have they not learnt from Jimmy Saville or Rolf Harris? Obviously not.

I am excited that the coming day is going to be a unique one in the history of my life. Nothing repeats because it cannot repeat because we have changed between the first experience, and an apparently but deceptively a previous identical experience. Everything moves on. It has been the case since the 28,889 days since I popped into this world. It will continue to be this way.

This morning I have come across a very interesting article “Seven Omens that herald the dark night of the soul?” I’m not urging anyone to read anything but if you have problems with up and downs in this transitory situation we call a human life then you might want to look at this link.

It is now 10 minutes past eight in the morning. From material received overnight I have enough to keep me going for most of the day. I’m going to watch a video on how to treat the eye with exercises sent to me via a friend thank you very much, the article on ‘the dark night of the soul’ mentioned here and I have a video to watch on the possible intersection of the human DNA by an evil reptilian influence. Is it myth? Is it fact? Is it a projection?

I also have to go off today to have my eye injection so that’s the day pretty much full. Thank goodness I don’t have a full-time job. Well, this IS a full-time job but one of my own choosing. So, it is not ‘work’ but manifestation.

Hedge trimming

Last evening I visited a hedge trimming job on Frome Road in Radstock. There are two types of hedge job, trimming and reshaping. The latter is required when a hedge has not been attended to for some time, as was the case in this instance. I’m probably going to charge between £80 and £100 and then they won’t need anything else done until October. Two or three cuts a year is enough for most domestic gardens.

Vestiphobia

I bet you didn’t know what that meant. It is about the fear of clothing. I have a mild form of this which manifests itself when I need to buy any new clothes for myself. I went along to Marks and Spencers in Bath, and visited the men’s department which is normally the second floor. The ground floor is perfumes and food, the first is ladies and the restaurant and the second floor is the men’s department.

I found the shorts section. I’m size 38 waist but found on trial it was a little bit loose so I used that as an excuse to escape from the store without buying anything. If my partner had been with me she would probably have persuaded me to buy something.

Off to the hospital. I arrived about one pm to go and have lunch in the staff canteen which is open to visitors, before my 2:30 appointment. I enclose image of my lunch. It is not gourmet food and mostly designed to be taken away by the staff in a plastic container  to eat in another place. However the food is good and I had some roast pork with all the trimmings, baked potato and lashings of gravy. They had run out of carrots.

How you can run out of frozen carrots I do not know. I had this followed by the most delicious bread and butter pudding with some custard. The whole lot came to £8.35. Staff get 40% off. Normally I would have had problems with the custard but because I had taken a pill for my Barrett’s in the morning it did not trouble me.

I wandered up and down the corridor and made some photographs from the art exhibition. The exhibition is ever changing and cheers me up.

Tomorrow I’m going to have a photo shoot to update my image which is about five years old now. By way of preparation I have been noticing examples of portraiture and images and I can now see so much that I do not like and is frankly meaningless. I do not like people who grin at the camera. That says nothing and does not ask a question.

Examples of horror images

Eye glass and mobile phone ads are the worst. Why is she closing her eyes? Is this a dental examination? Is there supposed to be joy here? You could have fooled me.

Oh my Lordy. Tension – fear – uncomfortableness – an enforced grin not a smile. And she is supposed to be a happy employee of the NHS

Another happy NHS employee. It looks like he has just stood on dog poo.

One on the right has a vacuous grin, the other is holding herself together for the shoot. Very much done in haste. Not much good if you cannot see the eye detail.

Why did anyone bother to even take the photo. Is she/he planning a bank robbery. Is the nurse uniform just a disguise?

 

 

 

 

Someone who has taken the trouble to actually think about whom they are photographing. Yousef Karsh

In to get my injection. I’m having new medicine which it is claimed shows improvement over the eyelea in 80% of the patients who use it. They are not doing my eye scans for three months. At the fourth appointment they will see how much improvement there has been. Today I was treated by a Philippine nurse or was it doctor called Rosslyn, a Catholic. I said that hers was a lovely name but she interpreted that as more pressure on her to live up to an image. I did not intend it that way.

She wants to go to Rosslyn in Southern Ireland. I said that she could quit easily go to southern Ireland from Belfast which of course is in Northern Ireland. She said this would violate the terms of her visa and she would be imprisoned.

To speak with my friend John on ZOOM. Alas my microphone failed for the ZOOM call so we had to resort to the telephone. I later found it was due to a calcified USB connection on my computer.  That will teach me to check equipment before each call and not take anything for granted. Things stop working suddenly.

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The reptilian agenda – how the world leaders may have been infiltrated by an evil alien blood line.
A very interesting informative video on ‘How to improve your eye health and offset vision loss.

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