Stella McCartney Crystal Horse

Lori Lansens got me through most of Easter Sunday or her book " the Girls " did . The story of conjoined twins one of whom , a writer, wants to tell her story just as she discovers she has an aneurysm about at bursting point . Her sister isn't a writer and doesn't have the blood vessel problem but nontheless will also die a few minutes after her sister . She joins in the writing too . Between them they got me through whatever blood vessel issues it is I have , which I would prefer not to contemplate , though it did occur to me that I had thought this Easter weekend I would be ok having been laid up for a fair bit of last week already .

Good Friday though was ok and we took a picnic off to Bolam lakes and walked round the lake in a convoy of people and dogs , fully aware that the rain would start just as we unloaded the food in all its shared glory onto the picnic table . As indeed it did , and not just a drizzle either . Three of us sat it out to the bitter end , so that upon my return to the house I was forced to strip off and feed all my clothes into the washing machine and myself into the bath-tub . Even the dog was wet through .

And today , back on track , was crystal horse day .ChronicleLive - News - Today's Chronicle - The lights fantastic at Belsay Hall ( Clock that Geordie accent on YouTube ! )

Impossible to capture on film the exquisite Swarovski crystals suspended spectre like in the ruins of Belsay castle . Go and see it . Take a picnic . Or at the very least click to enlarge and make the best of my pictures . Stella McCartney Designed Chandelier Is Installed At Belsay Hall - Pictures -

Fluxus :The Found Object at Top of Stair

I try to avoid getting down to hard graft and the making of the simnel cake , not so much worn down by the shopping trip involved in sourcing the ingredients but more delighted that such a trip is still within my powers .

Yesterday , indeed , as all my engagements were put on hold , such a thing had not seemed possible and I had wondered , in so far as I wondered anything much , whether our proposed family outing and picnic on Good Friday would have to go ahead of necessity " sans cake " and maybe even without anything much in the baked -at- home -foods variety . Having suffered two days of driving headache I finally lost it and and started on a cocktail of pills yesterday which had me convinced by two pm that I was flying ( headache safely at bay or reduced to a tiny squeaky little thing in the background ) or at least about to begin flying very soon . Jane arrived to collect Elly and I was able to hold a largely coherent conversation over almost two hours with her ( with one or two slips which I think I got away with ) .

During the night I floated above myself watching as the dog tossed and turned and her stomach squeaked and wheezed and perspired ( something amiss there , perhaps she got in amongst the creme eggs ? ) and I dug my heels in this morning , sleeping past the alarm and past the first coffee bell at six forty five .

Thus it was that I finally emerged to the artwork displayed above .
I do not know what it means .

Oh the Joys of Ikea .....

As diversion from my recent existential questioning , intensified somewhat by a dodgy x ray result on the part of one of my closest friends and setting in train a series of emails on that above theme , the fiction of a trip to Ikea provides the perfect foil for the "what is the point of any of it " and " what are humans for anyway ? " and " why are we even thinking of saving the planet ? "

Ikea .... how I adore Ikea . Fully aware that this is not a popular sentiment , I get confused when people rant about the inconvenience of the missing screws , the backs of wardrobes that break when you lean on them with a screwdriver and the sheer impossibility of keeping one of their beautiful foliage plants alive beyond a week . Set against the joy of the full English breakfast ( six items for a mere 93 pence .... hold on , 93 , where did that figure emerge from , presumably used to be 99 but the recent change in the vat laws provided the reduction ) and delicious it was too , and though not for the faint hearted , ideal for those of the low carb persuasion . Had I not forgotten ( or lost in the depths of my bag ) my Family Ikea Loyalty card we could have had free coffee too rather than having to pay sixty odd pence a mug for that or whatever it was , sorry I forget , distracted as I was at the time at the excitement building up at the prospect of being one of those people with one of those wardrobes where everything glides about on runners and oh bliss , the jewellery and make up can be found in a drawer with dividers ( hundereds of little squares ) situated under the shelf under the hangers of neat creased suits and so forth .
For a minute or two as I polish off my eggs and bacon etc I am forgetting that I don't posses suits ( really ) , or jewellery ( much ) and ironing ... well .... I see D do it so I do understand about ironing and know what is involved in having such a well functioning wardrobe ( D has one ) .
My current arrangements run to a series of chest of drawers stuffed to the gills with largely crumpled and squashed items ( some rolled ) , mostly t shirts , sweaters and vests , vying for space with assorted household items largely unrelated to clothing but of the " where else would it go if not here ? Photographs , notes , tablets , dog items , stop . I cannot bear to continue . I was enjoying my dream of transformation and it is going to happen . There is going to be a transformation if it kills me . Otherwise what would be the point ?

As I sit here typing , my new wardrobe is upstairs in the early stages of construction .

In its various parts , and loaded onto the trolley , it narrowly missed castrating a pleasant young man whilst still in the warehouse . D lost control of things and the frame section poking awkwardly forwards veered between the legs of the man in front in the queue , standing backwards . He seemed resigned to his fate and admitted things were generally not going his way . Indeed he waved towards what looked like a king sized bed frame and told us he had already loaded and unloaded the frame from his ( small ) car , realising he had bought "the wrong one" . He had something of Brian the snail from The Magic Roundabout about him ( I liked Brian , he was one of my favourite characters , but I'm glad he wasn't building my wardrobe ) .

And then the worst bit ( or best , depending on your perspective ) , a massive attack of the giggles on my part whilst attempting to reverse the car into the loading bay . Memories of former occasions when I have failed to hit the spot always disable me at this juncture as no where else on the planet am I incapable of successful reversing . In our street I can reverse park on a sixpence ( should such a coin still exist ) but in Ikea car park , hey I always get it wrong ! I decided to forego the spot D is expecting me at and head for the one next door and then Whoosh out of the blue D runs at me like a rat out of a drainpipe shouting No , You can't park in that bay , that belongs to that woman ! ...... I am completely and overwhelmingly overcome with the giggles and although I try my hardest to behave I cannot stop . I am weak and unable to drive , unable to do anything except sit there shaking , there are tears coming down my face and I cannot drive into any parking bay for love nor money . Two children in the back seat of the car alongside catch sight of me and look at me in wonder and start to laugh themselves . It is a long time since I have laughed so long and hard at absolutely nothing ... and it gets me through the loading up of the various packages ( way too big for the space in the car ) . D glances at me occasionally , possibly wondering about the Mental Health laws .

At home , the Ikea leaflet accompanying the packages shows the wardrobe being constructed in its various stages by a large man with his shirt tails out , assisted by a smaller lady helper . He has the hammer and nails or screws and is clearly the worker . She stands helpfully by , occasionally holding up a piece of wood for him , always smiling .
I had better get up and there and see if I am required . Better stop tittering though .

What is the point of it ?

Although no longer raging about lemon curd , and whilst one does not wish to be perpetually ranting about something , the NHS takes the biscuit this morning . D attends for the second time in a month , hopeful that today the consultant will have received the x ray results from our local hospital required for a decision about the next step cardio vascuarly. ( which any doctor worth his salt and not overstretched into the bargain would have got hold of prior the consultation a month ago ) . In effect : Carbon copy of last month's consult . Registrar looks at patient. Opens file . Scan results still not there . Informs patient that they will now give up on waiting for scan results from local hospital and conduct their own scan . No mention of comment made last time that reason for not conducting scan that day was because of " slight risk to kidneys " .
Informs patient he will receive invite to attend for scan in four to six weeks . Goodbye . A simple phone call or e mail to "the patient" this morning could have saved him and the doctor the bother of the entire fiction of the consultation itself . What is the point of it ? I think that is my mood today ? What is the point of any of it ?

I wonder to myself whether in his place I would have grabbed the file and rung the local hospital myself and volunteered to drive over there myself to collect the scan results . These are admin support tasks and hardly rocket science .
As a general rule I am mild mannered , polite and careful not to offend those who are not responsible for the things which annoy me . But there is a place for speaking out and my medical notes have a sprinkling of comment ( mine ) and certainly on one occasion a letter of complaint ( mine ) concerning a very inappropriate remark made by a professor who should have known better and indeed had the good sense to send by return of post a fulsome apology .

I have since sometimes watched doctors as they quickly scan "the notes" glance at this correspondence and then look again at me and rub their chins thoughtfully . And , to be frank , I am glad that there is something causing some slight hesitation before their pronouncments , or I am ordered off for the latest round of brain scans , or bone scans or whatever it might be . And in my less bleak moments , I remember the kindness of individuals within the system , who have held my hand , and shown their true concern and fluffed up my pillows and come back to my hospital bed long after I thought they had gone home , to bring a pain killer or tell me about a phone call I had received or just to prop me up a bit better or , in one case , give me a tea towel I had requested to wrap round my eyes when the light was bothering me so much . No matter how bad the system is , there will always be the individuals within it . And maybe that's the point . Just today , for a few reasons , its hard to remember that all the time .

Oh , and in case anyone is interested . My wonderful daughter pointed out that I didn't "lose" the lemon curd . That when you have guests staying , you expect them to eat things like jam . That our Young Americans more than likely used it with their breakfast croissants . Mystery solved ! I've stopped looking in the bathroom cabinet ( both my sister and Bettejo suggested this was where it would be ... ) and I've put aside the short story detective idea ( Silliyak .. ) . To the next mystery ?

I am filled with rage at my missing lemon curd . It is all the fault of British Summertime ( if indeed this is the name of the clocks going forwards lark that upsets my body clock and has me sleeping in and losing my hour's reading time from 5 30 am till 6 30 which is mine, all mine ! ) Instead of waking as usual I am all out of synch and dreaming strange dreams and it is the alarm which wakes me at 6 45 .
I potter and stay in bed reading anyway till late as I have a day's leave , thus at nine am I am as I reach for my lemon curd I realise I have almond butter in my hand . Someone has moved my lemon curd and I move from slight irritation into rage . Pulling out the entire contents of the fridge I conclude that the lemon curd has either been binned by Someone in error ( not me ) or placed elsewhere in error ( possibly me ? ) where it will doubtless show up when safely out of date . I ring D at work to ask if he has any thoughts on the matter . Waiting in a local school to interview a headteacher , he sounds incredulous . Lemon Curd ? he says , and it is impossible for me to convey the tone of his voice , which is incredulous in most of his dealings with me even before I speak . Sometimes I think we are Opposites in every way . It doesn't matter , I say , dejected . And later , to myself in an undertone .... It will show up . I can eat my yoghurt with a smattering of linseeds and no lemon flavouring . It won't be the same but there you go . I was planning a day out but things came up . I am in martyrish mood and determined to enjoy it , every moment of it . I start to see the fun in being the martyr .
When he appears with a new jar for me I don't know whether to be suspicious or grateful .

Feckless?

Word of the Day for Friday March 27 2009
feckless / FEK-lis/, adjective
1. Ineffective; having no real worth or purpose.
2. Worthless; irresponsible; generally incompetent and ineffectual .

I subscribe to an online dictionary which as you see above delivers to my inbox a daily word with pronounciation guide and meaning . Usually these are words with which I am eminently familiar and I click on and click off without much thought . Occasionally the word is new and I look with interest but reflect that at my age I am unlikely to remember the meaning much beyond lunch .
Occasionally the word will hold a special poignancy or resonance .
Feckless for example . The name , if I remember rightly , given to one of the three cows in Stella Gibbons' wonderful novel Cold Comfort Farm . Feckless, Pointless and Some Other equally disarming name which might come back to me as I eat my fish and chips later . Or might need to wait till some kind reader reminds me .
Although feckless wasn't actually the word used by Miss Robson our hideous games teacher to fire at me when I couldn't find my place on the netball pitch after she had dished out the bibs with a mysterious GD ( goal defence ?)stamped on it , this was probably the word she was looking for . But although she doubtless ( Doubtless , was this the name of the third cow ? No I think not ) meant that I was pointless , the word she used was hopeless .... or useless , or maybe she said both . Either way , I still remember the feeling of utter humiliation . I think I'd like to have called her a cow . But cows are lovely gentle benign creatures and she was a bully of the first order . I would like to start a new paragraph here but hey ho .... Blogpost is agin me ..... perhaps my post is too long . My good friend Margaret Anne has three sons and her eldest , when just learning to speak , began to formulate ideas . " What are people for ? " he asked , and his mother was momentarily stumped . And probably not for the last time . After her simple description of what people are, he looked hard at her and said "No , but what are they for ?" It remains an excellent question . . My dad occasionally used to call me feckless , or more often "sackless" by which I think he meant largely the same thing . Roughly translated , I've asked you to do a simple task and there you are still sitting reading your novel .....There was a point to this whole post , which occurred to me last weekend and which spurred me to become involved with Human Writes . Of which more anon , when the para function returns ...... meanwhile I shall restore the guest room for the arrival of Auntie Laura tomorrow at the crack of dawn .

The Young Americans

Nat on pic 1 2nd from right in front row .

JR in pic 2

Nat and Craig Worsley ( from Asbro ) in Pic 3 . Mike 4th from left in back row. Pic 4

The Young Americans have been and gone ..... The Young Americans

We took delivery of our own two delightful boys JR and Mike last Monday evening , collecting them at the school and feeling like old hands having acted as host family two years ago and prepared in advance this year by stocking up ahead on food which was our main downfall last time . And , having suggested when the school rang to discuss " matching " issues such as pets and smoking , that they might wish to note that our attic rooms were of limited headroom and therefore guests of smaller stature may be more comfortable , we didn't keep our fingers crossed .

After all last time we stated we could only take a girl and were allocated two strapping lads . But no matter they were lovely lads ..... ( and Craig after all is almost famous now having been recently signed by Take That manager Nigel Martin-Smith Search for boyband member - Showbiz - News - Manchester Evening News...ASBRO: Cutting edge or cynical marketing exercise? Music guardian.co.uk see photo of him with Nat above .

So as we arrived at the school and glanced at the group of young people , I scarcely glanced at the smaller ones and yes, you guessed right , JR and Mike were perhaps two of the tallest guys in the group , and to Nat's absolute delight , certainly the "fittest" so we weren't about to complain .

The Young Americans is a not for profit organisation which brings the performing arts to schools around the world . Young people act as teachers and mentors to young people in schools over two or three days , working solidly to produce a show in which they all perform together for parents at a final performance ( ours was last night ) involving singing and dance . But the experience offers so much more . Pupils seem to increase dramatically in confidence via their involvement and are encouraged to think about life and the deeper emotional issues that affect us all . They speak about and express their emotions . For those of us who act as host families ( known as Homestay ) its also an opportunity for our kids to get closer to the Young Americans , to find out a bit more about their lives and to feel a bit more involved in the whole process . We learned this year about the aspirations of many of the Young Americans , to become performers ( like our Craig ! ) , to teach , and what better way to learn , or as a stepping stone into a wide range of other careers not immediately apparent but where broad horizons , travel and people skills are important .

We finally said goodbye this morning with a few tears ( on our part ) . I can't quite believe I won't hear " Hi Mom " and " Bye Mom " again from 20 year old boys twice my height .....

Good Luck in Japan Mike and Good Luck on Broadway JR .... that's where you're heading .....and as for Craig , and Asbro, well I don't think its the last we've heard of you either and it was great to see you again! Well done you!