Tag: dailyprompt

#654 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn blogging, Serendipity3 Comments

On what subject(s) are you an authority?

Today marks 7 years of owning theoldmortuary.design domain. Before that my blog was called the garden painter because that is what I was. A part-time artist who painted in the garden often with a ginger cat as muse.

My blogging in thegardenpainter days was sporadic and not hugely effective. I didn’t know why I was writing a blog but the concept fascinated me in an abstract and unfocussed sort of way. A house move and renovation/repurposing of an actual old mortuary gave me a new title but no greater insight or efficacy at blog writing.

By now I was writing and reviewing for an arts magazine, no closer to actually being an effective blogger. A much younger and replacement editor suggested that I was perhaps too old for a publication that had him as an editor. Exactly the inspiration I needed to create my own publication/blog more effectively. I found a blog writing course by the wonderful Gentle Author who writes a fabulous blog.

https://spitalfieldslife.com/

Between the beginners and the advanced course, Covid 19 stuck and I was caught writing a daily blog for considerably longer than was planned. At some point I did the advanced course. Pandemic Ponderings filled the space between the two courses. theoldmortuary ponders was devised on the last day of the advanced course. Not exactly a diary or journal but just a daily reflection of an ordinary persons life with all the mundane aspects, repetition, chores, dullness set against abstract thoughts inspired by words or pictures. I try to look for the positive or quirky and having that daily need to find something to write about actually makes me observant and better tuned in to each day.

So in answer to the above question.

I am somewhat of an authority on the blogs of my own creation. From pretty useless blogging to daily blogging on the mundane parts of life, via a daily personal record of an International Pandemic.

I can track the development stages that bring me to this point. A little late on a day when I have bobbed, entertained a grandchild, done some Social Media work and right now luxuriating in watching tennis on the TV. Later I will dog walk again, listen to some live music and then tomorrow will be another day. Who knows where that will take us…

What is an authority anyway?

HMS Kent sailing past as we bobbed this morning. Friends and family on the deck. Frigates passing us make the most wonderful artificial waves. A bobbing bonus with thanks to the British tax payers Defence budget.

#647 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Food ( but this is not a food blog), Serendipity3 Comments

What’s the most delicious thing you’ve ever eaten?

Hard on the heels of yesterday’s blog this was the prompt today.

3 years into my world of a changed and sometimes absent sense of taste and smell, delicious can mean a whole new world to my faulty olfactory system. Alongside my partial loss of day to day taste and smell. I am losing my memory or recollection of foods I have loved in the past but with that I have developed a liking for things I would have previously avoided. Blueberries are a case in point. I always found blueberries to be a fusty, stale tasting fruit, on the whole I avoided them. Then, in Thailand, I tried this beautiful lemon meringue pie, garnished with blueberries. Normally I would leave them to one side and gift them to whoever I was eating with but curiosity made me eat one. All the embellishments/ blueberries were gone before I even touched the lemon meringue pie. In that moment blueberries were the most delicious thing I had ever eaten. Blueberries in Thailand became my favourite thing.

Mangosteens too, although I had never had a previous opinion.

I wondered if growing in an entirely different climate had changed the flavour of blueberries, but it is me that has changed.

So the most delicious thing I will ever taste may be yet to come…

#645 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn blogging, Serendipity1 Comment

What’s the oldest thing you own that you still use daily?

The answer is, beyond myself, almost certainly my house.

Built in the late 1890’s. So firmly of the Victorian era but with many Georgian era neighbours.

This week marks 2 years since we moved into this house. It definitely takes a while to settle into new homes.

Things that seemed essential works when we moved in, have faded into insignificance. Other,more pressing, projects have risen to the to-do list.

The yard surprises us every day with its fecundity. We have had strawberries every day for about 6 weeks and the tomato crop are forming beautifully in the outdoor planters. Our gifted courgette/zucchini plant is beating its brothers and sisters who are still in their original home on a farm. Our courgette lives on the garage roof, we learned last year how spiky their stems can be against naked ankles in a yard with limited space.

I have to say that only owning the house for two years makes this answer feel a little like a cheat as it just involved exchanging money for something old that has been looked after by other people.

Old things I have had longer to be responsible for include a Sandalwood Chest of Chinese origin which was owned by family friends of my parents,and was in their possession as employees of the East India Company during the Indian Uprising. Last seen very recently on this blog while we watched Glastonbury on the TV this weekend.

The other daily use of an old thing is a bit tenuous but my Facebook profile picture features a fake fur tiger-print jacket that I wear in the depth of winter. But as this blog is posted daily on Facebook I can probably get away with this. The jacket was made about a decade before I was. So here are two other old things I use every day.

My Facebook profile and myself.

#634 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn abstract photography, art, Royal William Yard5 Comments

Describe one of your favorite moments.

The entrance gate to The Royal William Yard

A coincidence that this title should be the prompt for a blog today. I have many favourite moments, one of them happened just then when I reinstated the ‘U’ back into favourite, where it surely belongs to give the word its true flavour.

Favourite moments usually come thick and fast most days. The first mug of caffeinated tea, swiftly followed by the first caffeinated coffee start the favourite-moment ball rolling every morning.

Getting preconsidered tasks done ticks the box.

As does wrangling unplanned tasks into an already busy day

The writing or publishing of a blog, that zings, is favourite too. Insider fact. A blog that zings for me does not always zing for the stats. The curious world of algorithms at play, I assume.

The little sketch above was a favourite moment. Christmas stocks up my painting supplies,sometimes, with new things. Christmas 2022 brought alcohol inks, rubber shaper brushes and Yupo paper. I felt the urge to give them a go yesterday and sketched the gate that I walk through most days for our dog walks. The combination of three new things was a little trepidatious but went well for a first. A series of happy accidents and some angst created a recognisable image. It even looks safe enough to walk under.

Our early evening also featured a favourite thing. Bobbers together in Firestone Bay celebrating a significant birthday.

Favourite moments are everywhere.

#625 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn blogging, pondering, Serendipity2 Comments

Using a prompt today, not because I was lost for a subject to ponder, but more because there is always something to ponder.

Early morning pondering in the van, waiting for coffee. Two dogs on my lap.

What are you good at?

I’ve always been a ponderer and on the whole pondering is a private occupation, unless a daily blog is written. So with some self judgement I would say that I am a particularly avid and accomplished ponderer. Being good at something carries responsibilities, I have been accused of having too vivid an imagination or being lost in my own world. Well I adore vivid, that’s why some of my images are over-saturated and trust me,I have never been lost in my own world. I know exactly where I am.

So after all that self-justification here is todays ponder which is a little late and ludicrously vivid.

A chance encounter with a patient took us to Buckfast Abbey early this morning.

It was the most peaceful spot for an early morning dog walk with friends.

So peaceful that, beyond the vivid stained glass,I forgot to take photos.

The whole place is rather overwhelming and the Stained Glass is certainly a show stopper.

But coupled with an organ recital of some contemporary music the whole experience was quite other worldly.

Which I suppose is the point of an Abbey.

#549 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity1 Comment

Jot down the first thing that comes to your mind.

Goodness me that Prosecco hit the spot last night. It bubbled gently into the fissures, sulci and gyri of my brain and loosened up random thoughts that I felt obliged to share. Thank goodness it was a talking party and not a dancing one. Undoubtedly Prosseco would have given me the misguided belief that I was flexible.

On the way to the party we found a little moss heart. Tossed to the ground by birds impatient to get their nests built.

It is the time of year when something soft and yielding provokes a sinking feeling as we walk in our street. The instant reaction is that it is a poo left behind by an inattentive dog owner, or worse a fox. Such a sense of relief when it is just a bit of carelessly dropped moss. The little heart had three locations to pose in on our short walk.

Stark wooden boards.
Craggy church wall.

I would not have been so creative with a poo.

‘Jot down the first thing you think of’

It could have been worse.

#541theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn SerendipityLeave a comment

Describe something you learned in high school.

I am warming to these prompts for blogs from Jetpack. I pick up the ones I can best work with. Yesterday this delicious little picture fell at my feet and it would have been criminal not to use it in a blog.

I had to go to Sutton Harbour last night to pick up some printing from a company that I am new to using. They are incredibly efficient and helpful and had printed posters for a gardening event that I did some artwork for.

©theoldmortuary
Homepage
https://www.bretonsidecopy.com/

They were so efficient that I was left with an hour and a half of parking, to use on a sunny evening, in a harbour with blue skies, warm sun and tinkling rigging.

It was perfect serendipity to find this wonderful heart shaped mound of lichen next to a discarded party star in the tracks of a discarded rail track.

Which neatly brings me back to ‘ Describe something you learned in High School’

I was painfully reserved in secondary school. Margaret Tabor Secondary Modern did not get the lofty title of ‘High’ in its name until it became a comprehensive school and became, Tabor High.

I was painfully reserved at age 11, I know shy is not the correct word. Painfully reserved, exactly describes it. Separated from my best friend from Primary School, Manor Street. I floundered in a classroom full of people I didn’t know.

It is obvious to any reader that the names of my two schools are not part of an elite system. I had the free, state- provided, education in my local town.

Being cut adrift from my best friend at 11 made me regress into my natural social position of being on the outside looking in. I am naturally an observer and for the most part I spent the years between age 11 and 18 observing. Occasionally slipping on the mantle of a gregarious person but knowing in my heart that I was just pretending. I learned a massive amount at ‘High’ school but perhaps the most important thing was to be an observational person who can comfortably wear a cloak of gregariousness; while still having the ability to find the magic of a heart and a star in a post-industrial landscape.

Anatomy of a Serendipitous Observation captured on a smartphone whilst waiting for two dogs to eliminate.

Old railway track from the time when this area of the harbour was the Tin Wharf exporting tin from the Tamar Valley all over the world for centuries. Tamar Valley tin has been discovered all over Europe wherever the Romans went.

Broken glass from the party pub just behind this picture. Plymouth Barbican is the Plymouth night-time economy hub.

Lichen Heart , in the South West Lichen thrives in our climate. Before humans this part of England was covered by Atlantic Rainforest.

Confetti star , the Barbican is a magnet for Stag and Hen do adventures. Finding a star was truly serendipitous. Confetti can be pretty and joyful but it can also be earthily pagan.

Thanking the blogging Goddess for a happy Star yesterday.

#539 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, SerendipityLeave a comment

What’s the most fun way to exercise?

Exercising my colour eye is a pretty good way to spend a day. Currently my studio is in a proper pickle. All my own fault, but there are plans to restore order very soon. Not far from home nature is having its way with vandalism.A quick photo records Sunburst Lichen continuing to flourish on graffiti. While frantically finding work for an exhibition, old exercises have come to the surface.

The one below is a classic mini treated to some mindful colour mixing. I combined a limited colour palate with a stencil. Not remotely exhibition worthy but as an exercise very interesting.

And then another colour exercise. Wisteria at Pentillie Castle. This last one was also an exercise in utilising the unwanted water drops that landed on my paper from the resident labrador who decided to shake himself before admiring my colour sketching.

He was everywhere!

#531 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, Serendipity4 Comments

Strange isn’t it? That after my minor rant in blog # 428 two days ago, the title below was suggested as a blogging topic. https://theoldmortuary.design/2023/04/01/428theoldmortuary-ponders/

If you could have something named after you, what would it be?

The simple answer is that I have never given the matter much thought as an  individual. Another answer would be that if my surname were to be used there would be no point. There was a minor male saint of the same name who has a church named after him in Cornwall and Greece, and within that Cornish churchyard a rare daffodil has been given the same name.

Then there is an actual ancestor, male, who founded an American University and there are towns of the same name. The female diminutive form of my name, Ju, does not really work and I stopped using that name many years ago when working in a predominantly Jewish area. In the early days of my employment I was asked what I would like to be called, when I offered my abbreviated name I was told.

“If we shout that in a crowded room, everyone will come running”

So I adopted the male diminutive, Jules and we have come full circle. No point naming anything after me. A man got there before me.

I am also rather coy about signing my artwork. Coy is not a word I would use to describe a woman who over shares her mundane life in a daily blog. But I have the core of an introvert who wears the big flamboyant cloak of an extrovert. This week will be all about framing and yes, signing artwork. In teeny tiny writing that can barely be seen. I picked up this seasons basic prints yesterday and got a quote for some Giclee prints.

I made a start on framing and signing too.

There are two more paintings to be finished by the end of the month too.

Nearly There Trees with tiny autograph. ©theoldmortuary

So in answer to the question above, I need nothing named after me. One day I will slip the extroverts cloak and the introvert core will be no more, the autographs will fade and for a while, I will be a memory until those memories fade too and there will be anonymous space for others to fill in whichever way they choose.

#527 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Family3 Comments

When you were five, what did you want to be when you grew up?

This prompt from the host of my blog made me laugh this morning so it seemed foolish not to use it as my source material. Jetpack, my host, gives a daily prompt which I ignore for the most part.

At age five I was heartily sick of being asked what I wanted to be when I was a grown up so had formulated an answer that made adults slink away.

“A lady, how about you”

My mum always told me off for being rude but I was truly sick of being asked that question.

A better one was, “What sort of house would you like when you are grown up?”

The answer was always the same and could even be an adult dream fulfilment.

“I would like a house where every room has chocolate digestive biscuits available”

Neither of these were the answer that made me chuckle this morning.

In the 60’s and 70’s my mum ran several Contraception and Sexual Health Clinics. The talk in my house was often of a pragmatic sexual nature. Imagine my parents ran a hardware store and talked about nuts and bolts. That level of conversation.

Not surprisingly my mums colleagues did not have a lot of children so when they held a monthly planning meeting at our house, there was usually only one other girl, Briony, brought over to play while our mothers plotted to limit the worlds population, starting in rural Essex.

One particular summers day myself and Briony were having the best time dressing up as Hippies and planning our careers at age 8. I had at that point moved on from the thoughts of being ‘a lady ‘ .

We both almost certainly knew what might irritate our mothers. Briony’s family were Quakers and if anything the conversations in her home were even more liberal and free thinking than in mine.

Eventually our mothers clip clopped into the garden to see what we were up to. I say, clip clopped, because all of my mothers friends wore Dr Scholl wooden sandals.

Our mothers and their friends were eager to hear what two such vibrant and enegetic little hippies were planning to be.

The answer, when it came, was not what anyone expected.

” We are going to travel the world as sex addicts”

The wooden sandals were silenced.

https://www.scholl-shoes.com/en-gb?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=%5BGADS%5D_ECOM_Search_Brand_EN&utm_term=%5Bwooden%20scholls%5D&gclid=Cj0KCQjwiZqhBhCJARIsACHHEH-R8eg4hzWqbOzwMT7IPpKScWjMDVZJRh0Hnei9ViHN6IDMNkneZHUaAkVzEALw_wcB

While researching for this blog I went to the website for Scholl. I may well get a pair for old time sake and to commiserate with myself with never reaching my ambitious goal in life.