wendy house

A gift of croci sent from a flower provider with a message indicating they are ‘commemorating’ my birthday.  It’s jolly nice recieving some flowers with a message of hope. Though at the risk of splitting gray hairs I’d rather celebrate, than commemorate, my birthdays passed

the sound of the subway phone

John Foxx sang underpass

Spoilt for choice in a local antiques shop

Picking a plain wrought iron poker for the to-be-installed over-hyphenated wood-burning stove

Breathing-in was required to walk between the goodies.  The tiny antiques shop brimmed with lovely practical gadgets. It was like walking through a museum store room. There were leather straps for sharpening razors, there were copper kettles and iron flat irons. I was lucky to get out of the shop having bought only a poker

My self-control can be utterly astounding

Paul from warm interiors popped round to look at the Wendy House’s wooden roof beams.  When the fireplace is opened-up to install the woodburning stove Paul will be making a fireplace opening lintel from oak to match the roof beams. The lintel will have bolts and hooks like the original (circa 1845) beams.  Excitement levels are on their way up in the Wendy House.

The urban dictionary attributes my singleness to my name:
1) Intellectually attractive woman.
2) Physically attractive woman.
3) Emotonally attractive woman.
4) Attractivve in all 3 major ways, yet not you are condemned to be ‘just friends’

Person A: Oh man, she’s perfect!
Person B: Oh yeah? So are you guys dating ow what?
Person A: Nah man, she’s a total Wendy….ya know?
Person B: suxx0rz 2 b u l4m3r!!!11

Would ‘Person A’ please un-anonymise themselves…

Pippa: I’ve pdf’d my desktop

IT Wiz: Yep,  I’ve never seen anyting like it, I’ll have to take your computer away,  after I”ve looked-at Wendy’s computer

wendy:  LOOK! my computer is a large shiny black thinkpad thingy see

IT Wiz: that’s not the type of look-at I meant

wendy: what does pdf’d your desktop mean?

IT Wiz: clicking on any executible opens as a pdf

wendy: Pippa, you genious! how’d you do that?

Pippa:  I think I put my elbow on the keyboard when I was making a phone call

wendy: I’d quite like to pdf a few people’s desktops, can I borrow your elbow?

IT Wiz:  WENDY. Calm down

chatty person: I’m waiting to start talk therapy. I’m not sure if they’ll want to talk with me

wendy: [silence]

It’s beautiful

This weekend my gimlet helped me get dozens of flush screws in the woodshed

What was once a flat pack is now a full 3 dimenisonal experience with an asphalt roof.  No avatar necessary,  just a black and decker power drill, tape measure, tacks, hammer and the essential gimet

Recovering from an intensive weekend de-savaging the wendy house garden:  

• woodshed shopping
• leaf brushing
• weed plucking
• bush pruning
• snowdrop shoot admiring

Savage garden sang I want you

wendy: Northumberland Avenue please

Taxi driver: how far up Norvie do you want to go?

wendy: what do you mean by ‘up Norvie’?

Taxi driver: that’s what we call Northumberland Avenue

wendy: near the Angling store,  who are ‘we’?

Taxi driver: taxi drivers

Fiddling. 

With the wendy house blog and fireplace.

Updating my banner with a stylized picture of a gravestone that sits under a Cedar tree in the Cemetry junction graveyard. 

A speedy idealised self-portrait on a post-it note without the aid of a mirror has become gravatar.  The hair looks like it has a little more volume than in real life.  I may fiddle with impovised product for volume to capture that ‘80 big hair thing in real life. 

Some things move on and others move around and some things get sketched on post-it notes then blogged.  Tis the way of things.

brrrrrrriiiiiiiinnng brrrrrrriiiiiiiinnng

wendy house:  Hello!

BT operative (BT-OH!):  Hello,  is Mr or Mrs House available

wendy house: my parents don’t live here

BT-OH!: Do you pay the bills?

wendy: Are you selling me something?

BT-OH: this phone number is a BT phone number and we have a special offer on Broadband

Phone sales people often want to talk to my mother, dad or to-be-arranged-husband.  It will be sad when my reply is ‘my parents are dead’ until then it’s mildly comical.

Ashley F Harrold and guest Lesley Saunders reading at Reading’s poetry cafe. 

In May one of my most-favourite poets, if I am allowed more than one favourite, Brian Patten, will be the guest.   That’s as exciting as the delivery of dry chopped wood to a house heated by a wood-burner during a cold-snap when the current supply of wood has run-out.

There appears to be an ongoing controversey about the labelling and meaning of the sections. These sections, bits, stages, modes, are referred to as ‘halves’ by the young bearded Mr. Harrold.  This controversey is revisited at the begining of each cafe meeting to ensure the audience is not suprised by the unexpected onset of an interval or ‘half’.

Many locals take part in open Mic’ sections.  That’s not open micky-taking it’s open-microphone in trendy shorthand.  I’m beginning to recognise some of the open mic regulars,  especially those who’s work I like. 

In 2004 Ashley said:

“Most of the open mic poets we have are pretty good, I think they must put something in the water in Reading as we always have a decent quality, compared with other open mics elsewhere in the country, which is heartening and inexplicable.”

Absolutely

Today we listen to internationally* celebrated behaviour therapist Dr. Amelia Prank-Hirst present the key canons of her best selling clinical text book on effective handling techniques for your pet human male – ‘he’s just a man’ 

This lecture was performed for a small group of international psychiatrists and legal specialists in the back garden of Doctor Prank-hirst’s modest wooden wendy house on the outskirts of downtown Stockholm.  The meeting is more commonly known as the ‘Stockholm stand summit’ (SSS).

From this lecture we learn that men

• are irrational (hard to understand).  We are advised not to waste time trying to make sense of the complete gobbledegook that pet males are prone to spew.
• have trouble standing up and require physical props.  Pet owners have tried many kinds of physical props but the most effective prop is the pet owner themselves.  I was particularly impressed by Dr. Prank-Hirst’s commitment to re-inforcing her hairstyle to add the versatility of extra height to her male-support function.
• should not be aquired for christmas or any other gift-giving ceremony unless you are confident that the recipient has sufficiently strong back-bone and arm-muscles to deal with the male’s unability to stand alone.  Several nations at the SSS are considering introducing a pet-ownership licence schemes to ensure owners have the strength to manage a pet man. 
• need a nocturnal external heating system.  Several heating systems have been proposed.  Currently the wood-burning stove is recommended as an excellent souce of renewarble energy.  Possession of a heating system is likely to be a requirement for people taking-on pet males in the legislation being developed at the Stockholm summit.
• require love.  There has been some debate around the nature of love that is required by male pets,  with specialists proposing that food, alcohol, TV remote control constitues the necessary basics and the provision there-of could be described as ‘love’.

I’m sure we’ve all seen the results of these simple behavioural support guidelines not being followed by owners of males – gangs of men wandering the streets at night,  shivering,  falling over, hanging around in fast-food joints and pubs.  

Tammy Wynette sang stand by your man

* In the style of Scarlet’s advertisement reviews.  Scarlet has not condoned any of the views expressed in this post

Cas:  hello Dr. Wendy

Wendy: Wow, I’m impressed that you remembered me and that I’m a Dr!

Cas explained the differences between multifuel and wood burning stoves as she pulled together a costing for converting my fireplace (gas fire). 

Paul:  you’ve over-estimated the cost of the chimney liner, knock 20 feet of the height, Wendy lives in the cottage

 Wendy: you even remember where I live!

Paul: and we put the fireplace in there about 7 years ago for the last owner.  We’ve done most of the fireplaces round here, we’ve been here for 20 years.

Cas handed me lots of manufacturers brochures to help me choose a stove and I bounced out into the wet snowless winter weather.

person 1: what was I going to do?

person 2: sort the tuesday issue

People don’t worry

Tuesday will be sorted, before it arrives,  it will not be an issue any longer, we’re on top of it here at the wendy house

Last night I decided to go into work today. 

A week after Thomas got snowed into the drive,  finally I planned on taking him out for a spin and some slip sliding…

This morning 3 inches of new snow fall, still coming, quickly scuppered that rash little plan.

affecting all of the UK

 Normally the weather only affects a bit of the UK while the rest of the UK remains weatherless. 

Weatherlessness?  No wind, no fog, no rain, no thunderstorms, no snow, no blue skies… …a silent, still, greyness lingering oppressively

There is a national shortage of kitty litter. 

The National press are conspiring to supress this story. Some regional press are sneaking out reports. The Burton press managed this excerpt:

Tesco, on St Peter’s Bridge, sold out of cat litter on Thursday as customers grabbed supplies to use as a handy and effective substitute for gritting salt. Sales have rocketed by 70 per cent in a week.

The East anglia times noted panic purchase of pussy essentials

Customers at Tesco stores in Kesgrave and Martlesham are reporting a shortage of eggs, bread and milk, while there was also word of rapidly emptying shelves at Sainsbury’s in Warren Heath.  Anti-freeze products, boots and thermal underwear have also proved popular, alongside a surprise best-seller – cat litter.

Local councils are running out of grit for the roads so private citizens are stepping-up to fill the void left by the hording and abusing of the litter of the cat.  This reduces supplies for normal cat toilet abilities.  There could be unanticipated consequences.

Your eyewitness, on the spot, roving reporter [ME!] is out and about interviewing the kitties that matter, those suffering from this very shortage.

In this revealing interview footage we listen to

• a vey frustrated, unlittered cat
• icicles melting
• the police sirens as they chase people deliberately over-purchasing kitty litter for elicit purposes

Matrix has difficulty walking on the snow and fails to find an acceptable toilet.   Her experience is similar to that of many of the UKs mainly outdoor kitties. 

What will happen next? 

How can I improvise when my stocks run out and my indoor kitties refuse to conduct their ablutions in the snow. OH!

For your own safety, please avoid walking under the permanently affixed luminance apparatus on the Wendy House frontage

Sorry for the inconvenience

This message is bought to you courtesy of wendy, the fluffballs, January snow…

…the cup of T

and the number 3

A trickle of water from the cold water tap. 

Less that a trickle from the hot water tap, 

Not enough flow to ignite the combi-bolier heating.  Brrrr… 

I made a cup of tea,  inspecting all visible pipes in the house and the stop-cock that supplies water to the house. 

All were well.

Thames Water website show a daily list of major water mains leaks and areas they affect.  There is a leak nearby, but it shouldn’t be affecting my home.  There is a note that they are having difficulty getting to burst water mains and that the phones are very busy.  I should be patient. 

I coat, boot and glove-up.  Then carry my spade through the ice and snow covered garden.

The garden water tap is frozen. I can’t turn it. No sign of a leak.  I get to the roadside and dig out my water valve and check the meter.  It’s not ticking over.  No water coming onto my property.  Phew, no leak on my property means I dont have to call out a plumber on my expense.  Inconvenience rather than inconvenience and financial burden.  Phew.

The neighbors have no water at all.  I offer them use of my trickle to fill their kettle for tea.  We watch as a child hikes by with 4 large bottles of water.  A man walks by and asks if we have water,  we tell him no and he is pleased.  He’s just visited his lonely frightened mother, he goes back to reasure her that its the water mains. 

Plenty of white snow around for creating untreated water. I’m not going to die of thirst in the near future or run out of Tea 

I wonder if snow is full of chemicals or fresh enough to drink as it once was. Luckily I haven’t had to find out – yet.

The trickle from my tap filled some bottles for tea and the bath to flush the toilet.

Here in the UK we have roads who’s whole purpose is to provide relief,  relief Roads. 

The pleasingly named Rose Kiln Lane is a Berkshire relief road.  Roads that provide relief.  A ver pleasing idea. 

Having a stressful day at work? Then visit Rose Kiln Lane to find relief.

Judging by this web camera picture very few people have been using Rose Kiln Lane for relief  during this cold snap.  No yellow snow, cars, or people to be seen. 

My fluffballs are indoor kitties with their own kitty-litter box. 

Many british cats are outdoor-indoor cats with their own ‘cat-flap’ in the household door, window or wall. 

How does such deep and freezing snow affect outdoor cats?  How do they get through a cat-flap that is below snow level?  Even if their human digs out the snow by the flap where do they make the cat pathway go?  Cats like to bury their doings, how do they do this when the earth and snow is frozen? 

I’m concerned for the many cats that do their doings outside.  It’s not made national news yet but given cat ownership in this country it is a pending disaster.  Worse, on a personal level I’m running low on my supply of kitty-litter.  

 What to do with indoor kitties that need doings doing and no litter for doing it in?

(obligatory local snow scene picture)

Perhaps I was a bit premature with the melting snow post.

Thomas has been buried alive.

I’ve cunningly avoided yet another Gym subscription nightmare by resorting to digging out the Wendy House garden path.

After 24 hours of snow, 30cm in my back garden, the local shops are suffering from depleted stocks.   People who when stranded at home must have a steady supply of toast, ideally spread with marmite, are buying thier bread. No new deliveries.  You do the maths…

Toastie!

Will I have to compromise the purity of my toast by taking my marmite on toasted teacakes? Tonight I’m planning to pop around my perky, yet elderly, neighbour’s house to…

…share some seasonal bubbly – more toastie!

…and snow stories in front of a glowing fireplace – even more toastie! 

then I’ll take their food order round to the corner shop where I’ll

battle for some buns.

The snow is disappearing to the sound of modern English’s optimistic little ditty.  This song came to my attention on a compilation audio tape cassette that Bambi used as part of his courting ritual. 

Modern English sang I melt with you

They said:

46 yr, self-employed, parent:    where did you get that top?     
19 yr, university student, child: Primark   

They meant

parent: are you spending your scarce supply of money on clothes that you don’t need?  You have plenty of clothes.  You are so bad at managing your finances you really should not spend money on how you look.  When you started the course 2 months ago you had a full student loan and money from us for your rent and text books.  Now you have nothing in your bank account, are in debt to your new college friends and to top it all you don’t have any text books at all.  For heavens sake, you are not stupid, pull yourself together, get your priorities right and start studying.

child: Just leave me alone. I have enough to worry about without you being on my back aswell,  there’s nothing good in my life,  I’m crap at college, I’m fat, I can’t cook, I’m being bullied and just for a moment I felt good, in a new top that didn’t cost much but for a moment it made me feel special, worthwhile.  Then you have to go and spoil that fragile moment by telling me that I can’t manage my money well.  Thanks.  Even my parents make me feel like shit.

My parents, brothers and nieces all turned up at the Theatre Royal Bath production of sleeping beauty.  3 generations laughing together at topical bad jokes involving duck houses, MP’s expenses and discrimination against ginger people. 

I was a little confused by the principle boy being an actual boy.  No girls dressing-up as boys in this production.  The songs were excellent and included perky famous dittys like ’Could it be magic’.  Lots of children dancing around, some slapstick and shouting and chanting.  Much fun for everyone. 

Family pantomime outings are THE BESTEST!

by Magnus Mills

Highly recommended for people who love watching the social dynamics of the British workforce.  This book was a Birthday pressie! 

4 smiles: Ratings explained

What is the book about? 

A story of gradual social change within a nationalised industry featuring, tea, cakes, chat, meetings and canteens.  We watch the gradual decline of a national treasure – the scheme for full employment – through the eyes of an unnamed employee.  Reminiscent of the decline of the national mining industry,  national car industry,  and the NHS. 

The reader gradually learns how the scheme works through the daily experiences of one employees.  We meet his colleagues, supervisers, and learn about what employees should do and what they acutally do.  The manner of storytelling reminded me of Kafka’s ‘The Trial’, as the protagonist appears to accept and observe all that goes on around him.  The short sentences, descriptive focus, economy with works, make the book very easy to read.  I wish I could write that beautifully.

Unlike the majority of modern novels this one focuses solely on work contexts.   The action, and sometimes inaction, all happens on work time, in work venues.  There is only one female character named and present in this workplace.  The scheme is currently, predominantly, a boys world of work.

Is the book boring?

Unlike Kafka, the story is full of situational humour that Mills gradually reveals like clues in a detective novel.  Other reviewers describe the humour as ‘Deadpan humour’.  For me the funniest part is what the scheme for full employment does,  how it delivers value above and beyond full employment.  Many of the reviews I read actually gave this away rather than allowing the reader to discover it within the book.  I am glad that I didn’t read any reviews before reading the book.

List-i-ness abounds.

Highlights of 09:

• wendy house garden pruned, blooming and growing
• Thomas joining planet wendy
• friends and neighbours (weddings, games nights, enouragement and support)
• visiting Cairo, a Sheepwash thatched cottage, Cornwall,  Canterbury, Hampton Court, Avebury, Chepstow castle and Penshurst place
• enjoying wonderful live performances by David Byrne, John Hegley and local bands at Reading Arts Centre tribute nights
• reading some outstanding books
• committing at least 6hrs per week voluntary contributions to a health related non-profit organisation, and enjopying it!

Lowlights of 09:

• Just a bit Brrrrrr in the house on cold days
• Some of my guests have to sit on stools at parties…
• Someone broke into the Wendy House!
• Matrix starting to get extreme old-cat wobbliness
• Sampo’s new nickname is ‘the pumpkin’
• Never got around to blogging on the books I’d read

New year resolutions for 2010:

• replace the wendy house front room gas fire with a wood (pellet) burning stove that will reduce my carbon footprint and increase the wendy house warmth and energy efficiency
• buy a Lloyd Loom sofa
• arrange a diet for Sampo
• do more health related non-profit work

These are possibilities rather than commitments…

• replace wendy house original 1840’s slate roof with felt-lined, insulated slate roof
• tile the kitchen and refit the kitchen worksurfaces
• design a garden mosaic based on the tree of life
• enroll as a student on a counselling course

Christmas bought a Magnolia Stellata.  It is 1ft tall.  If left unpruned it will grow 5ft in 10 years and mature to a hieght of about 10ft

It is a SHRUB*!

(*or a tree)

The Wendy House garden has attracted many shrubs since last autumn when the low maintenance patio was broken into by a range of muddy borders. 

The Wendy House garden has become one large SHRUBBERY.  This gardening direction will please the knights

King Arthur meets the knights who say Ni

Bernard Hieatt  founded the Reading motorcycle club and was a Brooklands Motorcycle champion and Aviator who died age 21 in 1930.  This memorial  to Bernard and his brother Stanley is in the Cemetry junction graveyard