Tag: Boats

#1228 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Hybrid PrintmakingLeave a comment

Whatever blog was going to flow today has been bounced by a fellow artist sending me this page from a local newspaper. Not exactly headline stuff but page 5 in a local newspaper is still page 5 in old media. For some reason the free newspaper rarely makes it through my letterbox. There was every chance I would miss my moment as yesterday’s news.

In other news we spent a pleasant hour crafting with our two year old grandaughter in the local museum and art gallery.

I did all the right things assembling materials and sharpening pencils but was not allowed near any of her creative space and could only use the glue stick under her supervision and tear paper to make a picture. Which she needed to finesse before it was done.

Thank goodness for Hybrid Printmaking, which allowed me to sail abstractly into the sunset.

#523 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn BreakfastLeave a comment

The secret of happiness? Embrace the boring, lay claim to the mundane and rejoice in repetition.

I am not someone who loves winter. The clothes are great but the weather that dictates the clothes and the short days wear me down. Mid January and February are the dullest. Simple things like left-over Christmas cake and some family birthdays pull me to mid- January but then I have a mental lethargy that requires buffing with little treats and activities to keep me twinkling until Spring reliably kicks in.

Writing this daily blog for a few years has taught me that within the mundane and the repetitive, there is nearly always a pearl of something that can be weaved into a story and once the story is created the day has a gem. Yesterday was a day of repetition but within the repetition there were pearls.

The day may also have had actual Pearls too. After very high tides, large Oysters were washed up onto the dogs favourite beach. It is a flight of imagination that pearls would ever be found in Tamar Valley Oysters. The secret to not being disappointed is to leave the Oyster alive and intact returning it and its potential, but unlikely, pearl to the sea. Treasure imagined but not realised.

Our morning was spent breakfasting with friends. We have done many breakfasts with these friends over many years. There is much that is repetitive, the usual suspect is always late and we do talk some mundane shit. We pretty much know each others views on things but there is no pressure to be anything other than ourselves and within that relaxed framework the subject of conversation could be anything.

Our great act of the day can be described as mundane, boring and repetitive. Watching the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race. A two horse (boat) race on the same course every year.

As a child I watched it in the bosom of my family, some of them genetically from the city of Cambridge. We watched it on the television about 5 miles west of Cambridge, everybody supporting the light blues of Cambridge. As soon as I could think I decided to support Oxford, it gave the family gathering a little grit, some pushback and singled me out as different.

As soon as I left home I reverted to Cambridge and have never wavered. T.V is my preferred method of watching. During the London years it was entirely possible to jump on a bus and watch the event live on the banks of the Thames but I realised then that my pattern was set in my formative years. For me this is an indoor event with cups of tea and chocolate digestive biscuits.

Just like daffodils this event is a proper marker of Spring. So significant in my mind as a marker of time passing, that when Covid restrictions cancelled the event I didn’t really feel that Spring had happened at all.

Boring, repetitive and mundane, the building blocks of normal life.

#223 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity, Van LifeLeave a comment

Yesterday was a fine example of planning v serendipity and also a lesson in observation. We had planned to meet some friends for an early morning dog walk and breakfast. We were very surprised when we arrived , the cafe, which we had never noticed before, was very close to the end of one of our regular dog walks.

The end of our walk is between the double lines, we walk until there is nowhere else to walk. Quite how we have missed the Waypoint Bar and Bistro is beyond me. If I have an excuse it is that there is always loads of things to look at.

The actual Waypoint, itself demands attention. Yesterday the breakfast demanded attention.

There was also a pretty, camp, figurehead to catch the eye.

And pretty yachts, prepping for the Round Britain and Ireland Yacht Race.

Round Britain and Ireland Yacht Race

No wonder the chatter around the other tables at breakfast were in so many different languages and so animated. When we left to do the gardening, , I almost wished I was going on an epic journey requiring skill and courage. Then I remembered I have neither of those attributes and that my potbound spider plants would not thank me for going off on an unplanned adventure. Later with the gardening achieved we waited to see if a cheeky offer on Ebay would be successful.

It was and the unplanned part of the day began. Our purchase required us to be in Bristol with the van early on Sunday morning. Supper and breakfast and a few clothes were popped in the van and we drove to a  farmers field between Bristol and Bath for the evening.

Once we left the traffic jams of the motorways we found a different sort of hold up.

Paella in the sunset was our reward for gardening and driving.

The evening dog walk brought one more surprise for the day.

Definately a day that taught us to be more observational.

#28 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn abstract photography, Tamar ValleyLeave a comment

Waking up on a clear November morning prompted me to share three boats from the Tuesday river trip. The acidic yellow of this one almost makes me want to blink against its brightness. A proper wake up and take notice colour.

Not that we needed anything to wake us up this morning, a pocket call from Hong Kong woke us for a brief conversation about trampolines and needing a wee with our granddaughter. Urgency, and necessity, made the call short and sweet and left us awake enough to enjoy a cup of tea and the sound of a winter dawn chorus. The call was a video call and another boat on the river fairly accurately depicts what our side of the call looked like.

Last night was firework night, when most of Britain ‘celebrates’ the attempt in 1605 to blow up the House of Lords as part of a plan by Catholics to overthrow Protestant James the First and replace him with a Catholic head of state. Normally I love fireworks but post supper ennui and a genuine wish to just quietly sit this one out, won over. The first year in a new house made us slightly hesitant to leave the dogs at home while we headed out to watch fireworks, not knowing how much flashing and banging was happening at home. The answer was loads of banging and no flashes, the dogs were untroubled by any of it. Leaving this calm blog untroubled by pictures of flashy pyrotechnics. Just calm boats snoozing in bright autumnal sunshine.

Pandemic Pondering #42

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Pandemic ponderingsLeave a comment

I’m not normally a lover of alliterative phrases linked to days of the week or names of the month, although I do quite like cleverer, less trite, alliteration. Today though #ThrowbackThursday, works for me, as the glasses featured are very retro.

Today the weather in Cornwall is strange. It’s been windy and stormy overnight and the heavy rain of the early morning, interspersed with bright glorious sunshine, was at one point replaced by icy hail. I realise that this scenario is just local to us and it set me thinking.

It is said about Covid- 19, Coronovirus that we are all in the same boat in the storm.

But we are not all in the same boat , we are not even all in the same storm.

We all share a storm in common, but we also all have our own storms and boats that determine how we cope with the shared storm.

In common with many, we are cooking a lot more, remembering dreams more vividly and are craving coffee and curiously bright colours.

Which brings me to the point of this pondering. I got caught in the Hail storm this morning whilst walking the dogs, it’s not what I expected in late April, but I also didn’t expect a sharp bright shaft of sunlight to give me such pleasure this morning.

We’ve been using some 1960’s or 70’s glasses to brighten up our water drinking during the lock-down. They were a gift from our friend Steph who gave them to us as a keepsake from her parents house.

They go in the dishwasher just like any other glasses. When I got in from the hailstone walk, sunlight was pouring through the window and then onto these freshly clean glasses. The Abstract patterns that illustrate this blog were created on the work surface for about five minutes between showers and absolutely illustrate why a slightly quixotic decision was a good one.

We are not all in the same boat

Or even the exact same storm

Surprising things will happen

Sometimes fresh out of the dishwasher.