A friend came into the shop one day this week and asked me if I knew about depression. Do I! Yes I do. It's something I'm prone to. Looking back over this blog I've just noticed that my enthusiasm for it is fading away. I have zero energy for finding photos and no impulse to write screeds about my opinions. Maybe that's a good thing for the world, but I suspect not good for me - it's a state of mind not arrived at through tranquility but brought on by low-grade gloom. Anyway, I clicked on the next ten blogs and found them all to be filled by textile artists, design artists, quilters, etc. Many with very beautiful stuff. Maybe this is no place for words.
Or nobody has the patience to read words any more. The magazine mind that likes to flick picture pages has triumphed. The instant gratification society has taken over.
Which reminds me: One of the most depressing adverts I've seen in the papers recently was for a children's 'interactive' book which promised to 'make reading fun.' Reading IS FUN DAMMIT. IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE MADE FUN WITH A WHOLE LOT OF VISUAL GIMCRACKERY.
Maybe I do still have opinions!
Doesn't mean I'm not depressed.
Not sure what to do about the depression. Pulling up the socks has never worked for me. There may be a long intermission whilst I slide gently to the bottom of the sludge.
29 May 2010
22 May 2010
Overcast.
Warm sunny weather but the skies are overcast, it feels heavy and humid here. My letter box is about to be fitted with some sort of anti-arson device by the police. I leave the reader to fill in the story.
21 May 2010
Character and attitude.
The day of the true eccentric isn’t over. We have one in town called Margaret. Very small and rather bowed she trots up and down pushing an enormous square shopping trolley, dressed always colourfully in stripey tights, shawls, multiple scarves and recently an amazing hat. Rising about 18” from the top of her brow this hat is knitted (crocheted?) cotton in multicoloured circular stripes From a floppy brim it ascends to a peak exactly like a witches’ hat, except that no witch recorded ever chose such a gaudy piece of headgear. On the very tip bobs a bright pom pom.
She fights her trolley into the shop to buy Dandelion and Burdock drinks, Sesame Snaps, and Yogi Tea, and to have a bit of a blether. She brightens my day.
She fights her trolley into the shop to buy Dandelion and Burdock drinks, Sesame Snaps, and Yogi Tea, and to have a bit of a blether. She brightens my day.
New and true.
True - and now for the urban myth collection.
A Jack Russell ran down a rabbit hole, one of many in a field full of such holes. His owner waited but the dog failed to emerge. He was wearing a harness so the possibility was strong that he had got caught on a root underground. (Memo to J R owners: don’t put harnesses on them.) The fire brigade was called and many rabbits found their burrows extended by spades, but no J R was discovered.
Darkness fell and the fire brigade went home. The wife of one of the firemen (a volanteer) was so upset at the thought of the wee dog lying trapped underground she wandered the field calling and began praying, as one does, to a God she wasn’t sure she believed in. The next day the SSPCA came to look with no success and another night passed. The lady continued to walk the field and started to make bargains with the deity: ‘If this little dog can be rescued I won’t have any birthday presents or cards this year’ (her 50th birthday) ‘The money my friends might have spent on me I’ll ask them to donate to charity.’
On the second day since its disappearance the dog finally started to whine and the farmer who owned the field brought a digger. Happy ending. Dog extracted. (Of course it will be down the next hole at the first opportunity. J R’s never learn, I know, I had one. )
The fireman’s wife duly told all her friends of her bargain and she received no presents or cards - except one. This one had been bought three months earlier by a friend who saw it during a shopping expedition and told her husband she must buy it for A’s birthday. ‘Why?’ he asked. “Her birthday’s not for ages.’ ‘I don’t know.’ she replied, ‘I just must have this one.’
It was a very ugly card with a bad drawing of a Jack Russell, it’s mouth covered in chocolate, sitting by a plate on which lay a few crumbs of the stolen chocolate cake. The title on the back of the card was: ‘Evidence.’
A Jack Russell ran down a rabbit hole, one of many in a field full of such holes. His owner waited but the dog failed to emerge. He was wearing a harness so the possibility was strong that he had got caught on a root underground. (Memo to J R owners: don’t put harnesses on them.) The fire brigade was called and many rabbits found their burrows extended by spades, but no J R was discovered.
Darkness fell and the fire brigade went home. The wife of one of the firemen (a volanteer) was so upset at the thought of the wee dog lying trapped underground she wandered the field calling and began praying, as one does, to a God she wasn’t sure she believed in. The next day the SSPCA came to look with no success and another night passed. The lady continued to walk the field and started to make bargains with the deity: ‘If this little dog can be rescued I won’t have any birthday presents or cards this year’ (her 50th birthday) ‘The money my friends might have spent on me I’ll ask them to donate to charity.’
On the second day since its disappearance the dog finally started to whine and the farmer who owned the field brought a digger. Happy ending. Dog extracted. (Of course it will be down the next hole at the first opportunity. J R’s never learn, I know, I had one. )
The fireman’s wife duly told all her friends of her bargain and she received no presents or cards - except one. This one had been bought three months earlier by a friend who saw it during a shopping expedition and told her husband she must buy it for A’s birthday. ‘Why?’ he asked. “Her birthday’s not for ages.’ ‘I don’t know.’ she replied, ‘I just must have this one.’
It was a very ugly card with a bad drawing of a Jack Russell, it’s mouth covered in chocolate, sitting by a plate on which lay a few crumbs of the stolen chocolate cake. The title on the back of the card was: ‘Evidence.’
Genetics
The daily paper I read caries a column by the daughter of a college friend. In the attached photo the young woman stands with folded arms looking somewhere between defensive and truculent. When I look back through old photos I find one of her mum standing with arms folded, in much the same attitude, which amuses me, except that....
...... the last seven days have seen a renewal of our anxiety about my grandson whose father is playing very dirty again, dripping poison and horrifying threats into the poor child’s ear. There are many layers to this nightmare, but one is that the boy needs his father to be a good man because his father is a part of him. He walks like his dad and he stands like his dad. How do we convince him that he isn’t his dad - reassure him that he can choose his behaviour and lead a very different life?
The corpse in the cargo.
...... the last seven days have seen a renewal of our anxiety about my grandson whose father is playing very dirty again, dripping poison and horrifying threats into the poor child’s ear. There are many layers to this nightmare, but one is that the boy needs his father to be a good man because his father is a part of him. He walks like his dad and he stands like his dad. How do we convince him that he isn’t his dad - reassure him that he can choose his behaviour and lead a very different life?
The corpse in the cargo.
12 May 2010
Poor old Gordon. After his resignation speech I was waiting for one of the politicians, prompted by BBC commentators to say 'Nothing in his life became him like the leaving of it' but I had to wait for an Independent journalist to use the quote. I have to confess I've always liked the man; he has that grumpy Scots thing going on (as someone else said of him) and, unlike the showman Blair, every speech he made seemed as if it was coming from a real man, not an actor.
Well, well, now what have we? At least they can't do too much damage with no real majority. England can now take its place alongside Scotland, Wales, Norway and Germany who all have - what was the phrase we kept hearing? - stable, broadbased, principled, blah blah governments made up by coalitions and all seem to get by quite well (especially Norway and Germany!)
Between all this excitement (which was better than a rugby match) I went to the real Chinese acupuncturist up the road for a treatment yesterday. I haven't dared go to an acupuncturist since Belgium where there were a couple of good ones that I trusted. This lady is the real deal. She was also trained in western medicine in China which is somehow reassuring. There was nothing resembling western medicine in her treatment of me. She spent a long time looking at my aura which was rather unnerving. I braced myself for bad news - stormy coloured clouds, angry red hues, blobby bits of gunk... When the verdict came it was a surprise. She told me it is quite clear, not fuzzy and that she reads me as a decisive person who comes to decisions easily and makes things happen. Strangely, considering how little I've made happen lately, I think that is true. I'm always irritated by people who aren't decisive. The next revelation was even more startling - I didn't expect to be told I was a General in my last life! This time I want to experience the balance - from power to no power I suppose! She called it 'service' rather than no power. Maybe that's why I have such an aversion to the military.
Over the years of living in this area I have grown bored of 'past life' stuff and very skeptical, but coming from this lady I was prepared to accept that, if not the whole truth, this is an image of myself worth considering. Wanting to be feminine but being perceived as of lesser importance than my husband, not being appreciated or listened to seriously, these have been real experiences that have certainly brought on the asthma!
Possibly more weirdly she told me there is bad Feng Shui in this house because the toilet is against the kitchen. can't do much about that but she told me to get out more. Oh dear. I need to be more in the community she said. Again, oh dear.
Finally there was some very painful acupression around neck, shoulders and back then some excruciating work around my ears where she put those little seeds in place with a lot of gleeful: 'Does this hurt? Yes? Good.'
We shall see now if it works.
Well, well, now what have we? At least they can't do too much damage with no real majority. England can now take its place alongside Scotland, Wales, Norway and Germany who all have - what was the phrase we kept hearing? - stable, broadbased, principled, blah blah governments made up by coalitions and all seem to get by quite well (especially Norway and Germany!)
Between all this excitement (which was better than a rugby match) I went to the real Chinese acupuncturist up the road for a treatment yesterday. I haven't dared go to an acupuncturist since Belgium where there were a couple of good ones that I trusted. This lady is the real deal. She was also trained in western medicine in China which is somehow reassuring. There was nothing resembling western medicine in her treatment of me. She spent a long time looking at my aura which was rather unnerving. I braced myself for bad news - stormy coloured clouds, angry red hues, blobby bits of gunk... When the verdict came it was a surprise. She told me it is quite clear, not fuzzy and that she reads me as a decisive person who comes to decisions easily and makes things happen. Strangely, considering how little I've made happen lately, I think that is true. I'm always irritated by people who aren't decisive. The next revelation was even more startling - I didn't expect to be told I was a General in my last life! This time I want to experience the balance - from power to no power I suppose! She called it 'service' rather than no power. Maybe that's why I have such an aversion to the military.
Over the years of living in this area I have grown bored of 'past life' stuff and very skeptical, but coming from this lady I was prepared to accept that, if not the whole truth, this is an image of myself worth considering. Wanting to be feminine but being perceived as of lesser importance than my husband, not being appreciated or listened to seriously, these have been real experiences that have certainly brought on the asthma!
Possibly more weirdly she told me there is bad Feng Shui in this house because the toilet is against the kitchen. can't do much about that but she told me to get out more. Oh dear. I need to be more in the community she said. Again, oh dear.
Finally there was some very painful acupression around neck, shoulders and back then some excruciating work around my ears where she put those little seeds in place with a lot of gleeful: 'Does this hurt? Yes? Good.'
We shall see now if it works.
10 May 2010
Yesterday, unusualy for me, I went for a walk around the grounds of our local castle. I got lost - haven't done that for years - so walked further than I intended. Helpful hides are set around the lake for bird-watchers but also good for wheezy walkers. I spent a few minutes in each getting my breath sorted and seeing very little from the discreet slits. In fact, in the space of a few yards as I walked on, I saw a pair of blue tits, a bullfinch, a wagtail and a tree-creeper. I also heard a woodpecker but failed to spot him. The woodpeckers here are't like the smaller southern blue-green peckers; they're black and red and white. Very handsome, but I miss the little ones still.
I caught sight of two nesting swans but decided not to try to get closer - scary creatures when roused.
The duck island certainly wasn't subsidised by the tax paying public - or if it was it didn't cost much!
The copper beech trees are beginning to leaf up and I appreciated how well they tone with the soft almond pink the castle has been painted.
Twice a year a very fine local choir give a concert; the one before Christmas is inevitably Christmas pieces but for this season it has more freedom and this time performed the Haydn Te Deum, Schubert’s setting of ‘The Lord is my Shepherd’ and Cherubini's Requiem in C-minor (1816), commemorating the anniversary of the execution of King Louis XVI of France. It wasn’t clear if the requiem was a celebration of that event or in mourning for the monarch. I couldn’t read my programme notes because I forgot my glasses but on the whole, after checking out Wikki, it seems likely it had to be the former. Poor old Cherubini had friends in high places that he had to keep quiet about for a while after the Revolution.
So, for once, I left the cosy living room and TV and spent Saturday evening just a few steps across the road in the large church with fine acoustics listening to choral music. There was also the very enjoyable Handel Organ Concerto Op.7 No 4. (I managed to write down that detail after someone read the programme for me.) The organ is such an amazing instrument. It fills huge spaces yet can be frisky and flirtatious. That was perhaps the biggest treat of the evening though the choir was great, rather light on the tenor and basses - as usual far more women than men represented. There was an unorchestrated visual display too; during the Cherubini the setting sun shone piercingly red through one of the tall church windows for several minutes, It was so beautiful it nearly took my breath away.
Lately I’ve watched the BBC Young Musician of the Year contests and realised that there is a lot of wonderful music out there that I don’t know about and would like to hear more of. Music hasn’t been a feature of my life. Apart from Dylan, Cohen and Nick Drake, who touched me through their lyrics and their strange off-key growling or in Nick’s case haunting, voices I haven’t been a follower of popular music.
My father was Welsh, had the national talent for singing and also played the cornet well enough to be given all the solos and the Last Post on Remembrance Sunday. It was all ‘Praise the Lord’ stuff but I can’t hear a brass band to this day without crying a bit. None of his genes seem to have bothered with me, but g’son is good enough on his violin to play in the upper school orchestra although he’s still in the prep school.
After the concert a friend had invited me for cheese, wine and company. Two glasses of wine these days and I am tipsy so I got rather hot under the collar about the number of charity shops in town and found myself in conflict with a person for whom charity shops are the only ethical place to shop. Brrr!
The availability of cheap goods for those who genuinely can’t afford to clothe themselves from retailers is excellent. One, or even two charity shops in town would be very acceptable. What I can’t stand are the intelligent, educated, folk who could earn a reasonable wage who are living in poverty because they’ve chosen a certain way of life, deeming it to be more worthy. They then resent anyone who is making any profit at all and make a virtue of their own poverty, claiming the moral edge on the rest of the world because they are failing to make profit in their own field. The offender would probably also purport to be against supermarkets, but I’ve seen him often in Liddl. I wonder how he justifies that.
I also wonder what the charity shop habitués would do if all the distributors of new goods folded because nobody bought new any more? The prices of the remaining clothes items for instance, would go up immediately. People who rely on the CS’s for their wardrobe also rely on those who do buy new to keep the circulation going so they are literally living on the backs of those folk and there is a word for that sort of creature.
Which rant brings me back to Cherubini about whom a contemporary wrote: "some maintain his temper was very even, because he was always angry."
I’m not ALWAYS very angry!
So, for once, I left the cosy living room and TV and spent Saturday evening just a few steps across the road in the large church with fine acoustics listening to choral music. There was also the very enjoyable Handel Organ Concerto Op.7 No 4. (I managed to write down that detail after someone read the programme for me.) The organ is such an amazing instrument. It fills huge spaces yet can be frisky and flirtatious. That was perhaps the biggest treat of the evening though the choir was great, rather light on the tenor and basses - as usual far more women than men represented. There was an unorchestrated visual display too; during the Cherubini the setting sun shone piercingly red through one of the tall church windows for several minutes, It was so beautiful it nearly took my breath away.
Lately I’ve watched the BBC Young Musician of the Year contests and realised that there is a lot of wonderful music out there that I don’t know about and would like to hear more of. Music hasn’t been a feature of my life. Apart from Dylan, Cohen and Nick Drake, who touched me through their lyrics and their strange off-key growling or in Nick’s case haunting, voices I haven’t been a follower of popular music.
My father was Welsh, had the national talent for singing and also played the cornet well enough to be given all the solos and the Last Post on Remembrance Sunday. It was all ‘Praise the Lord’ stuff but I can’t hear a brass band to this day without crying a bit. None of his genes seem to have bothered with me, but g’son is good enough on his violin to play in the upper school orchestra although he’s still in the prep school.
After the concert a friend had invited me for cheese, wine and company. Two glasses of wine these days and I am tipsy so I got rather hot under the collar about the number of charity shops in town and found myself in conflict with a person for whom charity shops are the only ethical place to shop. Brrr!
The availability of cheap goods for those who genuinely can’t afford to clothe themselves from retailers is excellent. One, or even two charity shops in town would be very acceptable. What I can’t stand are the intelligent, educated, folk who could earn a reasonable wage who are living in poverty because they’ve chosen a certain way of life, deeming it to be more worthy. They then resent anyone who is making any profit at all and make a virtue of their own poverty, claiming the moral edge on the rest of the world because they are failing to make profit in their own field. The offender would probably also purport to be against supermarkets, but I’ve seen him often in Liddl. I wonder how he justifies that.
I also wonder what the charity shop habitués would do if all the distributors of new goods folded because nobody bought new any more? The prices of the remaining clothes items for instance, would go up immediately. People who rely on the CS’s for their wardrobe also rely on those who do buy new to keep the circulation going so they are literally living on the backs of those folk and there is a word for that sort of creature.
Which rant brings me back to Cherubini about whom a contemporary wrote: "some maintain his temper was very even, because he was always angry."
I’m not ALWAYS very angry!
8 May 2010
More random thoughts from the attic.
We live in interesting times. Finally folk are rumbling en masse to the understanding that 'Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely' - be it politicians or the Pope. The Tories could hardly expect to win when the Thatcher days are still fresh in the memory and Labour will have a hard time living down the oil slick that was Blair, warhawk extraordinaire. My newspaper tells me that a Tory seat Cameron is proud of for the 'good' changes a Tory council has made there now charges so highly for care and help at home that one blind woman at least has had to give up having it. The recreation ground that used to be a haven for the local footie teams now gives priority to - polo teams.
The first leader to suggest that a coalition government is what is needed in these times of financial crisis would get my vote now.
Amusing that of all the people interviewed for predictions on results (BBC) the astrologist came the closest - nearly spot on. She predicted a second election in September.
A customer accused me of being 'what's wrong with this country' (Scotland) because as an English incomer I would be bound to vote for 'those people down there.' Well, he's right of course, but the Lib. Dems did very well up here even if they didn't get this constituency which is an SNP stronghold and I'll never vote for anything with 'national' in its title (I don't like Alex Salmond either but the other reason sounds slightly more worthily idealistic.) The same customer went on to rubbish the Americans, the Jews, the 'blacks,' European immigrants and etc. etc. so I didn't feel I was in bad company. Being grouped with Americans might bother me but as they are in fact, all the other races he derides rolled into one it takes the sting out. I don't much like being lumped with the religious extremists, or the 'right to bear arms' numpties in the USA but don't have me down as a bigot Gordon please; I may be bigoted in some areas but not in all and after all some of my best friends are Am... oh wait, no they aren't... still they might be, and I really like Obama.
It amazes me how many Scots believe that their country could 'go it alone.' The UK itself is of little more consequence in world affairs than Belgium nowadays.
Oh for goodness sake, what a daft lot we humans are. Always at war with ourselves. The planet will shrug us off soon.
The first leader to suggest that a coalition government is what is needed in these times of financial crisis would get my vote now.
Amusing that of all the people interviewed for predictions on results (BBC) the astrologist came the closest - nearly spot on. She predicted a second election in September.
A customer accused me of being 'what's wrong with this country' (Scotland) because as an English incomer I would be bound to vote for 'those people down there.' Well, he's right of course, but the Lib. Dems did very well up here even if they didn't get this constituency which is an SNP stronghold and I'll never vote for anything with 'national' in its title (I don't like Alex Salmond either but the other reason sounds slightly more worthily idealistic.) The same customer went on to rubbish the Americans, the Jews, the 'blacks,' European immigrants and etc. etc. so I didn't feel I was in bad company. Being grouped with Americans might bother me but as they are in fact, all the other races he derides rolled into one it takes the sting out. I don't much like being lumped with the religious extremists, or the 'right to bear arms' numpties in the USA but don't have me down as a bigot Gordon please; I may be bigoted in some areas but not in all and after all some of my best friends are Am... oh wait, no they aren't... still they might be, and I really like Obama.
It amazes me how many Scots believe that their country could 'go it alone.' The UK itself is of little more consequence in world affairs than Belgium nowadays.
Oh for goodness sake, what a daft lot we humans are. Always at war with ourselves. The planet will shrug us off soon.
6 May 2010
Grey day.
Election Day at last - it will be a relief to get it out of the way. Not that there's been much effort to win votes in this area. A couple of incomprehensibly warbling loudspeakers drifting through the town and a few posters and that's it. I cast my vote weeks ago by post knowing I'd be too lazy to get to the polling station.
It won't make much difference who gets in but newspapers and TV will be able to concentrate on something else soon, I hope.
No wind of change here - no wind in fact. We seem to have missed the sunshine but missed the turbulence as well.
My family are all doing interesting things. Sophie-daughter has just finished an Iyengar Yoga intensive in some midlands town; Costa went off to Greece at the weekend, Vassiliki thankfully, for water sports activity, not Athens where the Greeks are dealing with the crisis in their usual emotions-first, logic-later manner; and Chloe-daughter went to a charity dinner-dance at which Sir Robin Knox-Johnston was very entertaining. Ex and wife are in Belgium (well, maybe that's not so thrilling...) I am, as usual, doing nothing of any interest - and wondering why! Only one person to blame for that sadly.
Am I the last person in the world to have heard that May 4th is Star Wars Day - May the Fourth be with you! Yes, I probably am...
The troubles in Greece suddenly reminded me of the time N & I drove into Athens when the country was almost at war with Turkey over Cyprus. We thought Stadiou was unusually deserted but were enjoying the lack of hassle (in those days Greeks drove on their horns and if you didn't hoot they didn't consider you worth avoiding.) Then to our surprise (but being British we didn't react much) burning newspapers started to fall from windows in the buildings either side of the street, evidently aimed at us. We made it the rest of the way to our hotel unmolested, passing tanks that were so small they looked like toys until they trained their guns on us. Later that day, as we ate ice-creams outside Flokka, lounging in their comfortably deep basket chairs, our peace and serenity was again disturbed by these pesky little tanks rushing past chucking tear gas bombs to left and right. They were aiming for groups, perceived or actual, of over three people for fear they were hatching dissident plots. We, along with the rest of the coffee-drinkers and ice-cream eaters, all Greeks (in those days the tourist trade hadn't really got going!) moved with great dignity inside the cafe. The waiters shut the doors and nobody took any more notice of the fuss outside.
The British Embassy advised us to go home but we didn't and had a very nice holiday driving around the Pelaponnesus.
It does me good to remember that I did once have a more edgy sort of life.
It won't make much difference who gets in but newspapers and TV will be able to concentrate on something else soon, I hope.
No wind of change here - no wind in fact. We seem to have missed the sunshine but missed the turbulence as well.
My family are all doing interesting things. Sophie-daughter has just finished an Iyengar Yoga intensive in some midlands town; Costa went off to Greece at the weekend, Vassiliki thankfully, for water sports activity, not Athens where the Greeks are dealing with the crisis in their usual emotions-first, logic-later manner; and Chloe-daughter went to a charity dinner-dance at which Sir Robin Knox-Johnston was very entertaining. Ex and wife are in Belgium (well, maybe that's not so thrilling...) I am, as usual, doing nothing of any interest - and wondering why! Only one person to blame for that sadly.
Am I the last person in the world to have heard that May 4th is Star Wars Day - May the Fourth be with you! Yes, I probably am...
The troubles in Greece suddenly reminded me of the time N & I drove into Athens when the country was almost at war with Turkey over Cyprus. We thought Stadiou was unusually deserted but were enjoying the lack of hassle (in those days Greeks drove on their horns and if you didn't hoot they didn't consider you worth avoiding.) Then to our surprise (but being British we didn't react much) burning newspapers started to fall from windows in the buildings either side of the street, evidently aimed at us. We made it the rest of the way to our hotel unmolested, passing tanks that were so small they looked like toys until they trained their guns on us. Later that day, as we ate ice-creams outside Flokka, lounging in their comfortably deep basket chairs, our peace and serenity was again disturbed by these pesky little tanks rushing past chucking tear gas bombs to left and right. They were aiming for groups, perceived or actual, of over three people for fear they were hatching dissident plots. We, along with the rest of the coffee-drinkers and ice-cream eaters, all Greeks (in those days the tourist trade hadn't really got going!) moved with great dignity inside the cafe. The waiters shut the doors and nobody took any more notice of the fuss outside.
The British Embassy advised us to go home but we didn't and had a very nice holiday driving around the Pelaponnesus.
It does me good to remember that I did once have a more edgy sort of life.
4 May 2010
The town.
Not much going on here. There should have been a photo opportunity at the weekend when the town had its 'Theme Day' and heavy old traction engine rumbled through the High Street puffing white smoke - and a filthy black cloud every so often like a random f*rt. Unfortunately, since new highways laws decree that roads can't be closed to trafic more than once a year (or some such lmitation) this event has moved from being in the street where it brought more trade to local shops, into the nearbye park where it brings trade only to the motorised hot-dog and ice cream stalls and the 'showies,' the little fair that arrives for the occasion. Yet another low blow to the High Street. Not because of that but because I was too lazy to walk the distance, I got no photos. I do like traction engines. Sandy and I sat through Fred Dibner replays one Saturday night long ago admiring his renovations as they chuffed majestically through town traffic; also the big old factory engines in their sheds - something quite exciting about them.
We have a sixth charity shop opening - did I already say that? Probably. No matter. I hear that two other charities are eyeing up empty stores, of which there suddenly seem to be a plethora. A chap who sets up web sites for towns came by to ask where the bookshop had gone. He likes secondhand book shops and was hoping we would become a book town. It could have happened if we had received an EU grant, but Wigtown got that ages ago so, the rents being what they are - exorbitant - no-one is going to risk opening a secondhand bookshop in this climate. The web-site chappie says his mother and her friends make special trips to the town to trawl for bargains therefore he has come to the conclusion that he has to feature us as the 'Charity Shop Town' of the North.
I give up. The moaning is over. It's getting boring. I set about trawling myself yesterday, starting with the Red Cross shop, my favourite, and felt the old stirrings of excitement as, invited to go behind the scenes, I found a couple of hardbacks that might tempt quite well on Amazon. I also found two skirts for my daughter and sent her in to look through the shorts. She came back with an armful.
I also heard about incipient internecine warfare between CS's as one tries to head-hunt volanteers from another. This can only get worse!!
Sudden enjoyable shiver of schadenfreude!
We have a sixth charity shop opening - did I already say that? Probably. No matter. I hear that two other charities are eyeing up empty stores, of which there suddenly seem to be a plethora. A chap who sets up web sites for towns came by to ask where the bookshop had gone. He likes secondhand book shops and was hoping we would become a book town. It could have happened if we had received an EU grant, but Wigtown got that ages ago so, the rents being what they are - exorbitant - no-one is going to risk opening a secondhand bookshop in this climate. The web-site chappie says his mother and her friends make special trips to the town to trawl for bargains therefore he has come to the conclusion that he has to feature us as the 'Charity Shop Town' of the North.
I give up. The moaning is over. It's getting boring. I set about trawling myself yesterday, starting with the Red Cross shop, my favourite, and felt the old stirrings of excitement as, invited to go behind the scenes, I found a couple of hardbacks that might tempt quite well on Amazon. I also found two skirts for my daughter and sent her in to look through the shorts. She came back with an armful.
I also heard about incipient internecine warfare between CS's as one tries to head-hunt volanteers from another. This can only get worse!!
Sudden enjoyable shiver of schadenfreude!
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