Spring is Coming – Two More Jokes

Sign outside a garden nursery:

Spring is coming!

I’m so excited I could wet my plants!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One evening a father went to the parent/ teacher meeting at his son’s school.

“So how is my son doing in class?” the man asked his son’s teacher.

“Oh he’s doing really well and he has fitted in fantastically with all the other children; he is a delight to have in the class!” enthused the young teacher.

“That’s great news,” said the proud and happy father.

“But, as far as I can tell… he can’t read or write yet,” the teacher added.

 

(Thank you, Roly, for making us smile this Sunday morning.)

 

 

Down and Out in Paris and London

I was leaving my mum’s place, having just cut her hair, when I was struck by the words written on a piece of slate hanging from a shrub in her garden:

Think deeply,                                                                                                               Laugh loudly,                                                                                                          Be kind,                                                                                                                     And give freely

It made me think of my mother, how kind and thoughtful is, and how those words so aptly apply to the way she lives her life. Then I felt a pang of guilt over something that occurred last week when I was hurrying home one evening; an agitated woman of about forty stopped me and asked for eighty pence.

“Sorry, I haven’t got my purse on me,” I answered, believing it to be true at the time (and grateful to able to answer thus); but, in the time it takes to make two steps, I remembered that my purse was in my knapsack after all and I experienced the first tug of guilt.

“She probably wants it for drink or drugs,” I assuaged myself and carried on walking and thinking.

It had seemed to me that eighty pence was a carefully considered amount to ask for, obviously deemed to appear not too much – less than a pound, which sounds a pittance – and yet, almost a pound, which still has some value. The woman had turned away sharply at my response – any hint of good manners had gone and her eyes darted around for the next person to badger; I was nothing to her but a soft touch. Never-the-less, I regretted not going back with my purse.

Walking home from my mother’s house my thoughts moved on to the audio book “Down and Out in Paris and London” by George Orwell, to which I had been listening yesterday afternoon whilst I painted morning glory (the blue convolvulus that grows wild and profusely in my homeland of Australia). I cried and laughed (there is always wry humour to be found in dire circumstances) through the account of Orwell’s own experience of poverty.

Still deep in thought about toerags (the rags that hobos put between their toes to prevent them from rotting, apparently – didn’t know that until yesterday!) I reached the main road which runs past our terrace and which still has traffic lights holding up the traffic because of the new cycle-path being constructed. The oncoming cars were at a standstill while the left-hand lane was moving. Suddenly my reverie was rudely interrupted by a loud wolf whistle. Startled, I nearly jumped out of my skin and looked across the road – one of my handsome old admirers was driving by with his window down. I laughed, as did the truck driver stuck behind the red light, and the old couple in the car behind him. Just as I reached our gate another smiling face behind a steering wheel blew me kisses – Ashley Thorn (as Scarlet O’hara would have said in her Southern drawl, “Oh Ashley, Ashley, I love you!”) – one of the nicest men you could meet. With much merriment I returned his kisses with exaggerated gestures (I do love him… in the right way!) and the people in the two cars behind him laughed.

As I walked in through my studio entrance my mind went back to the lady who had asked for eighty pence and it dawned on me what to answer if anybody ever asks again for such a paltry amount…

“Is eighty pence enough?”

 

 

 

 

Anyone Want to Come for a Walk?

“Want to come for a walk with us to Cockwood?” I asked, looking first at my seven year old niece Charlotte (alias Sporty).

“No thank you Aunty Sally,” she said after a long and pensive pause.

Likewise John, sixteen, (had a feeling he would have “homework”!) and eleven year old Daniel (also known as Bubba) deliberated long and hard before screwing up their faces and making their excuses. At this juncture Lizzie and Martin came home with little Mary (Fairy), who had just won a silver medal at an athletics competition. She, too, had no yearning to walk with us the five or six miles to Cockwood and back.

“Benji would probably like to go,” said Liz, “he hasn’t been out all day – has he John?”

Chris bridled. As kind and sweet as my husband is, he has never shown any interest in young Benji who is hyperactive and a tad over-affectionate.

“I’d love to,” I smiled and excitable Benji plonked himself on my lap and gave me a kiss (I don’t mind his affections).

“Come on then, let’s go,” I enthused as I was eager to continue with our walk (we live nearly a mile from my niece).

“I’m sure he’ll be good with you,” Liz encouraged with a broad grin and Martin slipped me a bag of goodies for Benji (just in case).

Now I enjoy to stop and take photographs whenever I go out walking so guess who ended up looking after our hyperactive charge?

“You look quite at home with him,” I told Chris.

“Well I’m not really as heartless as you imagined – I grew up with dogs,” said Chris.

And Benji the Cockapoo (not cockatoo) behaved impec(k)ably – except for when he ran across the road to make friends with a horse!

The Sons of The Fathers – A Joke

The Sons of The Fathers (or Pride Goeth Before a Fall)

One hot summer afternoon two old work mates, who hadn’t seen each other for some years, chanced to meet in a pub in South Brisbane. Pretty soon the conversation got around to their families and, in particular, their sons, who were both around fourteen years old. One man’s face lit up as he began to talk of his pride and joy:

“To tell you the truth, mate, I’m so proud of our Rupert. Luckily, he inherited his brains from his mother and, thanks to all her efforts – ramming home the importance of a good education – Rupert has knuckled down and really got into a good work ethic. He doesn’t waste time watching television, or spend time on the computer – unless it’s something to do with homework – and he doesn’t even go out with girls. Rupert has a mobile phone but uses it sensibly and is always in touch if he’s going to be late home for dinner. He spends at least two hours every day on home work and another three hours reading science books… for his own pleasure! He says he wants to be an astrophysicist! And what about your son? What does he want to do?”

“Oh Carlos,” began the other man despondently. “Carlos thinks the world owes him a living. He has a mobile phone and uses it at every opportunity – even at the dinner table – but never answers when we call him. He stays up all night watching television, twanging his guitar or playing computer games – even when his girlfriend is staying over – and then he, or they, stay in bed till one o’clock in the afternoon. He’s always late for school – when he bothers to turn up – and doesn’t give a damn about education.”

“Crikey mate, aren’t you worried? Haven’t you asked what he intends to do for a living?”

“Oh, he says he wants to be a garbage man…”

“You’re kidding!”

“No, he thinks they only work on Thursdays!”

 

(From the Bird-man of Brisbane)

What, More dogs?

“I’m scared,” said Mum.

“It’s only a hill. How can you be scared?” I responded.

“It’s a very steep hill and I’m scared,” Mum insisted.

“Just think of it as the route to longevity,” I laughed, giving my mother a gentle push in the small of her back.

“Use it or lose it,” my sister Mary agreed (she was on the other side of Mum, holding her hand).

“No pain, no gain,” I chimed in.

“Is it ever going to end?” our mother rolled her eyes Heavenwards and made a sound like a cluck.

“It’s not far to the top and it’s worth the effort,” said Mary, “there’s a pretty little woodcutter’s cottage at the top and crocuses beyond that – you’ll love it!”

Earlier, the morning sunshine had beckoned us to go out for an excursion and we had decided to visit the village of Cockington – an oasis of countryside nestled between Torquay and Paignton – in the hope that the camellias, crocuses and snowdrops would be out. It’s so pretty there in the spring and summer.

“Look over there at the crocuses!” exclaimed Mary gleefully as she pointed at a few small clumps of yellow and purple in the distance.

“I can’t see them,” Mum shrugged and tutted.

“We’ve come a few weeks too early,” I admitted, “but the camellias should be lovely… hopefully!”

Some people with dogs and children passed by and Mary and I stopped for a bit of dog chat.

“You’re doing well,” said a lady, seeing that our mother had just walked up the steep hill.

Mum smiled – or was it a grimace?

“Good for longevity,” I said. (Mum was still catching her breath and clucking.)

At last we started the walk down to the lakes where the camellias, rhododendrons and azaleas grow in profusion… in early spring, not winter.

“Look,” said Mary, finding a camellia shrub with a few sparse white flowers.

“I can’t see!” Mum replied with a definite lack of enthusiasm.

Some more dogs appeared, and people with children; then more dog and children people. As we walked down the hill more and more people with dogs and children greeted us on their way back from the lakes, and Mary and I enthused greatly over the cuteness of the dogs.

“More dogs!” Mum said rather sarcastically as we passed under a bridge and saw three more groups of dog people walking towards us.

“It’s hard luck for Mum that her daughters have both become dog-people!” my sister grinned at me.

At the bottom of the hill we plumped for the middle, and slightly less muddy, path to the lakes.

“I suppose we’ll have to come back the way we came… up the hill,” Mum bemoaned.

“No, I think this track will take us down to the road at the bottom,” I said optimistically.

“Is that an azalea in that tree over there?” Mary pointed.

“Oh yes,” I agreed.

“I can’t see,” our mother pointed out yet again.

Towards the end of the muddy path Mary and I had a few moments of dismay as we discovered that our way was barred with a sign and tape (perhaps there had been a landslide); we could either have gone back up the hill (oh no!) or we could take the wooden steps leading up to the higher path that comes out by the road.

“Let’s take the steps,” I suggested.

Mary’s look told me that she would pull if I would assist from the bottom with a push. And so it was that Mum made it up the huge steps at the bottom of the path…

“These ones are better,” said Mary cheerily reaching half-way, “at least there is a handrail.”

“Bravo!” said a lady as Mum climbed onto the top path.

“Not bad for a ninety-three year old,” our mother managed a smile of satisfaction.

Then, owing to the tortuous one-way system, Mum walked with us all the way back along the road to the car park. Well, we do like to keep our mother going. After all, exercise is the key to longevity.

 

 

 

Humble Lantanas – A New Painting

Just to think that it was only three weeks ago when I was walking my mountain bike up a steep hill on my way back to Charis’s house (where I was house-sitting in Brisbane) and I came across these pretty lantanas! I remember it being so hot and I had to stop every so often to have a drink of water and regain my energy for the climb, ever upwards. You don’t notice how steep hills are until you have to walk them – do you? But if I hadn’t had to stop I wouldn’t have taken photographs of the lantanas at the roadside… And now that they are painted my sister Mary, too, will enjoy one of the memories of our childhood in the bush.

 

The Real Thing – Two Paintings

I may be sick (and how!) but I can’t bear to be idle all day, so I worked on a small painting for my lovely sister Mary, or Mayflower, as we call her. It’s another painting of lantanas, the weed-like flowers that grow in profusion in the bush or any rough land in our homeland of Australia. When we were kids we all used grab the heads of the lantanas in order to pull off the hundreds of tiny individual flowers and throw them, confetti-like, into the air over any unsuspecting boy and girl walking together.

“You’re getting married, you’re getting married” we would taunt.

It was all very embarrassing for the “couple” and there was every chance that you’d get chased and have the same thing done to you.

So I hope that Mary will like this little reminder of our childhood – she doesn’t yet know that I’ve painted it (and it didn’t take long). The other painting, the Coca-Cola girl, is a commission for Rosie (and she has had to wait ages!).

“Voulez Vous Coucher….” on Valentine’s Day?

Yes, I spent most of Valentine’s Day in bed – with my sore throat, of course, and aching head! Not the very best way to spend a romantic day. Even so, there were highlights – a poem and flowers – to lift the spirits in my lonely hours…

On special occasions Chris writes me a poem or an ode, even when he himself is suffering from a nasty co’d. (Rhyming, too, is catching!)

 

THE POSSUM AND THE PUSSYCAT PART 2

                                     (The St Valentine’s Day Poem 2016)

 

The Possum and the Pussycat had often been apart

He stayed at home, she went away, right from the very start

and every year when winter brought the wind and rain and sleet

the Pussycat was far away in Queensland’s baking heat

 

And though the Possum, as his name suggests, was not averse

to joining his sweet Pussycat in Aussie’s sunshine burst

more often he’d be found at home in England’s wintry grip

 although the cold half froze his brain and gave his fingers gyp

 

But both agreed poor Pussycat  should never have to face

the bleakness of a winter’s chill of this benighted place

So every year she packed her bags and hopped onto a plane

which whisked her off without delay to Brisbane once again

 

 And always she would plan to be returning on the wing

when winter’s icy grip had safely melted into Spring

But sadly, all the best laid plans, they say, can come to naught

when winter fails to go away, the mood can’t ‘alf be fraught!

 

And so it was the Pussycat returned to England’s shores

too early, when the icy winds still moaned under the doors

“What’s this?” she cried in horror, chilled, despite her furry coat

“It’s so damn cold I greatly fear I’ll catch a vile sore throat!”

 

The Possum tried to soothe her with some talk of going to Spain

to catch the winter sunshine and relieve the cold and pain

but Pussycat said “Possum dear, you’re shooting at the Moon

we’ll simply have to sit it out and hope that Spring comes soon”.

 

But sadly, bleak old February’s still a million miles from Spring

and in it’s cold interior there lurks a nasty sting

for who should be struck down with winter colds and horrid ‘flu’?

It was, my friends, The Possum and the Pussycat, that’s who!

 

“Oh, “doh!”, I have a ghastly “blogged-up dose”, the Possum cried

“That’s nothing” croaked the Pussycat, “My throat feels like it’s fried!”

So there they were, between them both, a sad and sorry sight

with only paracetamol to save them from their plight

 

And so the winter days rolled on with little cause for mirth

the hapless pair just sneezed and sniffed and groaned for all they’re worth

“Oh, Possum” croaked the Pussycat “I need a little cheer –

my mood is strictly gloomy and my spirit’s down, I fear “

 

The Possum had a think, and then his face broke in a smile

remembering a date that he’d forgotten for a while

for, coming up, there loomed a special day, a day apart

when lovers of the world would give their loved ones all their heart

 

And thus it was the Possum scribed this very special note

entitled “To my Sallipuss”, and this is what he wrote:

“My special Sally, you’re the best, and, if you’ve got the time,

please make my day, and say you’ll be

                                 MY DARLING VALENTINE!!! “

 

Valentine poetry (from wikipedia)

The earliest surviving valentine is a 15th-century rondeau written by Charles, Duke of Orléans to his wife, which commences.

Je suis desja d’amour tanné
Ma tres doulce Valentinée…

— Charles d’Orléans, Rondeau VI, lines 1–2[53]

At the time, the duke was being held in the Tower of London following his capture at the Battle of Agincourt, 1415.[54]

The earliest surviving valentines in English appear to be those in the Paston Letters, written in 1477 by Margery Brewes to her future husband John Paston “my right well-beloved Valentine”.[55]

Valentine’s Day is mentioned ruefully by Ophelia in Hamlet (1600–1601):

To-morrow is Saint Valentine’s day,
All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window,
To be your Valentine.
Then up he rose, and donn’d his clothes,
And dupp’d the chamber-door;
Let in the maid, that out a maid
Never departed more.

— William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act IV, Scene 5

John Donne used the legend of the marriage of the birds as the starting point for his epithalamion celebrating the marriage of Elizabeth, daughter of James I of England, andFrederick V, Elector Palatine, on Valentine’s Day:

Hayle Bishop Valentine whose day this is

All the Ayre is thy Diocese
And all the chirping Queristers
And other birds ar thy parishioners
Thou marryest every yeare
The Lyrick Lark, and the graue whispering Doue,
The Sparrow that neglects his life for loue,
The houshold bird with the redd stomacher
Thou makst the Blackbird speede as soone,
As doth the Goldfinch, or the Halcyon
The Husband Cock lookes out and soone is spedd
And meets his wife, which brings her feather-bed.
This day more cheerfully than ever shine

This day which might inflame thy selfe old Valentine.

— John Donne, Epithalamion Vpon Frederick Count Palatine and the Lady Elizabeth marryed on St. Valentines day

The verse Roses are red echoes conventions traceable as far back as Edmund Spenser‘s epic The Faerie Queene (1590):

She bath’d with roses red, and violets blew,
And all the sweetest flowres, that in the forrest grew.[56]

The modern cliché Valentine’s Day poem can be found in the collection of English nursery rhymes Gammer Gurton’s Garland (1784):

The rose is red, the violet’s blue,

The honey’s sweet, and so are you.
Thou art my love and I am thine;
I drew thee to my Valentine:
The lot was cast and then I drew,

And Fortune said it shou’d be you.[57][58]

Sins, Syns and White Knights

Is it a sin to swear? I’ve been wondering about this over the last couple of days, since I read a comment on Facebook about our prime minister, “David F…wit Cameron” (apparently). It’s not that I’m a particular supporter of David Cameron but I was rather shocked, not only by the expression (which conjures a strange and unpleasant mental image), or the lack of respect, but mainly because the author was a middle-aged Christian woman. Neither the expression nor the sentiment seemed to fit.

So I asked Google if it’s a sin to swear (it used to be when I went to Sunday school) and there are many forums discussing this point. Here is just one of the answers:

The quick answer is, yes, it is a sin to cuss or swear or curse. Ephesians 4:29 says, “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” That seems pretty clear! Also, 1 Peter 3:10 adds, “For whoever would love life and see good days must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from deceitful speech.” Not clear enough yet? James 3:9-12 says, “With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be. Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water.”

Of course, I have sinned in this respect but I’m repentant (I hate myself for being vile – Sunday school wasn’t completely wasted on me!). However, I’ve not “synned”, at least not too much, because I have lost one pound in weight since I joined Slimming World last week. Not much to crow about but I’m keeping at it and being good.

What of the “White Knights” in the title? Well those are the white blood cells I envisage as victors over the attacking cold germs in my attempts at positive thinking. As yet there is an impasse around the region of my throat – at present barely a word is audible from my lips… and certainly no expletives!

Walk Along our Sea Wall at Dawlish

In spite of the cold weather, also Chris’s cold and my sore throat, we try to get out for a walk whenever the sun shines. Amongst the photographs of our pretty coast in the winter sunshine is a shot of me looking like Lawrence of Arabia – that was taken after a downpour of icy-cold rain on one of our less successful walks when we had to turn back. Happily, the next day was stunningly beautiful (but not today!).