Month: Jul 2024

#976 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn blogging, Serendipity1 Comment
More buttocks

The yard has started to produce a small handful of strawberries. Today’s haul gave us two bums.

This week has been all about gathering things, mostly lovely conversations with friends. And also some stray thoughts because my life is all about gathering virtually useless information.

Strawberries are not called strawberries because they are habitually grown on straw to protect from slugs. The name comes from the Anglo-Saxon language when they had a descriptive name of Stray Berries because they throw off runners to create new plants.

I also learnt a new acronym.          ‘ There we are then’ a really polite phrase that neatly responds to the news that someone has behaved in a particularly vile or unpleasant way.

Another offering from the yard for Friday is sharp evening shadows . White Agapanthas and my newly white painted wall.

Random thoughts for a Friday.

#975 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Bobbing1 Comment

The bobbers are late getting to our regular Wednesday evening swimming habit. Maybe only a few weeks late. Most years we tend to start in early June. The tide was set well for an 8pm dip. And with no forethought at all I had called the bob for the exact time the England football team were playing a televised semi-final match. A good result for England as they won and a very good result for the bobbers who got a whole glorious seascape to themselves. Moments like this are a real privilege, we could swim out a bit and catch the evening sun. Hugo and Lola could sniff the incoming tide and fish for seaweed without irritating anyone. They do not usually come to a bob. Bobbers who drove could use nearly empty roads . It was a win-win kind of evening. If there was a chink of gloom it is that the water has not really warmed up to normal July levels and there were less bobbers than normal,but everything else was perfect.

#974 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Life Admin, Serendipity1 Comment

When I found a tree with buttocks last week I used the image to share with a choir who had been singing about the Green Man. I quite enjoyed tinkering with the image at the time but had forgotten about it, a week or so has passed. But then Instagram gave me this little mind twister this morning.

This sort of madness makes me laugh. Just a little bit of a wry smile during such moments is such a private, magical, but life-enhancing thing. If tree bottoms were this morning’s ‘private smile’.Yesterday gave me one for different reasons.

Yesterday there were many early morning jobs to be done but the weather was not encouraging .

A free parking space in the city centre and a cup of tea in a local outdoor cafe were two reasons to celebrate early tasks achieved and success in all areas of the dog walking.

In two of the 4 grey seascapes above, there is actually a cruise ship anchored up in Plymouth Sound.

While I was enjoying my cup of tea and the concept of free parking at 8am. Passengers from the cruise ship were being landed out of sight but straight ahead of me.  Out of the mist rose lively, welcoming Military Band music. Honestly, what a lovely sound to perk up a grey early morning. Another private smile moment.

©Plymouth Waterfront Partnership

#973 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity, Yardening3 Comments

What strategies do you use to increase comfort in your daily life?

This is my strategy.

I have the ugliest pair of crocs to wear in our yard. They live by the French windows and never see action anywhere beyond the yard. They have a much more grippy sole than a regular croc and were only available in two colour ways. This camo green with electric blue was the most  acceptable of the two offerings. They need grip because in winter, parts of the yard can get slippy.

The outdoor mirror is also the only one in the house where it is easy to see how a whole outfit looks.

So the crocs get worn with all our best outfits. Small crocs are provided for small people.

There is a flaw in this strategy.

Sometimes small people or even larger people interrupt the flow of getting ready to go out. On occasions the crocs have made it beyond the front door to the outside world with posh/smart/lovely outfits because they were not taken off. A return home is essential on these occasions.

#972 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Events, Serendipity2 Comments

What are you most excited about for the future?

Writing a daily blog about the repetitions and mundanity of regular life has given me appreciation and fascination with how unplanned moments shape the activities and experiences of most days. Making every day an adventure of sorts. Future ponders that are formed by normal life are very exciting. What will I be thinking about next?

Yesterday we had a Naming Day to attend. So fancy clothes were required.

A small boy was welcomed into his community, with a service by a celebrant, surrounded by his family and friends. A bubble of Love.

We were in a small Devon village  where similar services along with marriages and funerals would have been celebrated in similar ways for centuries.

Food, drinks, lots of hugging and happiness. When the time came to leave we were stuck. Halted by a scene that would have been part of this small villages life for the same amount of centuries

The sheep gave me time to ponder on the importance of marking these life milestones with my friends and family. As many of us shrug off the rituals and commitments dictated by religion we don’t mark becoming a couple or the arrival of a child as much as our forbears did.  The last vestige is perhaps funerals but even those are going the ‘no-fuss’ way. But gathering together to eat and drink with our fellow humans, for a couple of hours to mark a significant event is such a lovely thing to do. We should do it more often perhaps, gathering is good for us. In reference to the first image. Are gatherings the building blocks of family, community and society?

Are we missing out in a non-celebratory world?

#971 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Anecdotes, SerendipityLeave a comment

It is not every day that a tree presents itself as a pair of handstanding buttocks.

Last weekend I was singing a song cycle celebrating The Green Man.

Yesterday I found him, butt naked, cavorting in a local park. A briefly sharp sunbeam  alerted me to his performative bottom. I’ve just digitally tweaked his butt to make him a little more obvious. ( Not a sentence I would normally share on the blog!)

Happy Sunday.

Then I flipped him over.

Green Man buttocks.

#970 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Colour, Serendipity, Stonehouse1 Comment

It took more than the usual one morning coffee to power me through a day after a night of staying up all night to watch democracy unfold. But at 9 in the morning I had not expected to fuel my day with a sugar rush provided by a free sample of soft scoop Ice Cream.

Pure white Ice Cream to calm a mind that had been watching the differing colours of political parties skid across the T.V screen  all night. I found all the AV special effects fairly baffling as the night wore on. But the, normally serious political journalists seemed to enjoy playing with computer generated building blocks. I’ve recreated my Ice Cream in the style of my overnight T.V politics experience. Baffling , I think you will agree.

In a last mention of the election some surprising news. Overnight Hugo and I had to swap sides.

Sofa slouching and varifocal glasses do not, a comfortable overnighter make. To avoid a nasty crick in my neck we swapped sides on the sofa every hour or so.

He was not always happy to swap.

#969 theoldmortuary

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Firestone Bay1 Comment

Sun rising on a different political landscape in the United Kingdom. Yesterday no political broadcasting was allowed until 10pm. Obviously broadcasters had to find a way to swerve those regulations #dogsatpollingstations  on X and Instagram featured pictures of dogs waiting patiently for their humans to make their votes . All news programmes featured images of pets patiently waiting. Hugo and Lola were happy to pose. Not least because under normal circumstances they are not permitted in this churchyard.

Hugo even kept me company in my overnight vigil to watch the rolling coverage of our election results.

We are both a little tattered round the edges this morning. I bet he wishes he loved coffee.

#968 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Stonehouse1 Comment

Up early this morning to vote, and hopefully change the political colour in this country. I am 66 years old. If this election goes the way it is predicted then for the first time in my voting life I will actually have voted for the party that goes on to form the government.  This is for geographical reasons, I have moved about a bit. I have often had to vote tactically and have on occasions voted for a successful  and effective local M.P. But it shows the weakness of our first past the post system that for nearly 50 years my votes have felt impotent and pointless beyond local results.

Being up with the lark was surprisingly social for me and the dogs.

But, being greeted, on the harbourside by this enthusiastic, swimming-sheepdog slightly dampened my early morning joie de vivre. In her defence she was spooked by a drone powered camera. Presumably getting picturesque shots for news bulletins.

I hope that is the only dampening of my political spirits that occurs over the next 24 hours.

#967 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, dog walks, Royal William Yard2 Comments
©ATM

During my morning dog walk I popped into an exhibition at Royal William Yard (RWY). It is Shark Month at Ocean Studios. There are loads of lovely Sharky images, but on a bright morning this one was the only one not glazed and not suffering from loads of reflections. The website of the artist is below.

https://atmstreetart.com/

In the cafe there was also a really cute collection of bits and pieces left at low tide near to RWY.

I particularly liked these little bits with text on.

As I regularly poke about at low tide I was quite jealous, I never find anything with words on. 

But then on my walk home I had a moment!

The tide had delivered me a cracked and grubby plectrum. With words on it.

A freebie advertising gears for Mountain bikes.

Here’s the moral dilemma of the day. Do I donate to the communal exhibition of tidal finds? Or does a grubby plectrum start my own collection of mudlarking treasures with text on.?

© ATM

Me and a shark with beady eyes. One more hazardous than the other.