Digging up the past

First thing this morning I get a request for urgent prayer for Louie dog currently seeing the vet. He'd eaten Nurofen. Louie not the vet that is.

An hour of induced vomiting later, and by mid-afternoon he's full of beans but he has to stay in doggie hospital overnight. I'd like to say, "That will teach him," but it won't.

I'm still snuffly so after recording my book launch I spent a couple of hours watching The Pilgrimage on BBC iplayer. A group of celebrities of different or no faith follow a recognised pilgrim path. The ones I'm watching are taking St Columba's trail. It's interesting seeing people react and relate to others when spending weeks in close proximity. I think things are about to kick off in the next episode.

I wouldn't have thought a novel about an archaeological dig would be my cup of tea but it was fascinating and at times exciting. Would they discover treasure? Had the tomb already been raided? Would everything be washed away before they can preserve it? 

There were lots of relationship issues as well, of course, the wealthy old widow of the manor and her surprisingly young son, the local experts versus the Top Dogs, the young bride of an elderly professor and a visiting cameraman. 

The book is based on the real dig that took place in Suffolk just as the second world war was about to begin. A huge burial ship was uncovered at the 'most famous archaeological dig in Britain in modern times,' and treasures uncovered that caused archaeologists to reconsider their description of the period as the Dark Ages.

There's a film made in 2021 by the same name.

Health report

1. My eye is much better. Still a bit sore and red but not as painful as it was yesterday. 

2. I messaged the doctor about my hearing report as instructed, including photos of the letter and results, and she phoned me back. "I don't know what it means," she said. Not particularly reassuring but she's referring me to the NHS audiology department. So that will probably mean at least a year's wait. If she works out how to do it. She said she didn't know that either.

3. My cold and sore throat are worse, making me feel very sorry for myself. 

In this sorry state, I've done some promotional stuff for my book launch this week. I think I probably won't do a Live launch but pre-record it. But I may change my mind when I feel less bleurgh and more yay!

Getting its revenge

Back out in the garden I was trying to pull up a root when a branch flew up and whacked me in the eye.

It feels much worse than it looks. That was over an hour and a half ago and it's still painful. Painful when it's open and painful when it's closed. NHS advice is to run water on it for twenty minutes.

How are you supposed to run water over an eye? I bathed my eye using a measuring cup in the absence of an eye bath.  It's still blurry too so if it's like this tomorrow I will have to go to A&E, again according to the NHS website.

Let's hope it's better by then. I'm already a bit snuffly and you know how quick I am to wallow in my own misery. 

* * * * *

Last night I started reading The Twits to the grandchildren in Italy. I'd searched in the library for a copy but I should have looked at home first. I found most of the old Dahls from my children's days.

Take 6 litres of seaweed

Happy National Laverbread Day!

Sadly I have to tell you that, even though I'm Welsh, I don't like laverbread. I know it's rich in iron and iodine and very good for me but I still don't like it, sorry.

For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about let me explain. Laverbread is made from seaweed. In Chinese restaurants you can get crispy fried seaweed, and that's quite palatable. Welsh laverbread is something entirely different. It's a thick paste, sometimes spread on bread, sometimes tossed in oatmeal and fried with bacon and cockles. Or just heated and dolloped on a plate with cockles.

You can buy it in Swansea market in little tubs.

Or if you're far from home and missing it you can order it in tins.

In 2017 Welsh laverbread was awarded a special designation under European law, like champagne, although I don't know whether that's still valid now we're no longer in the EU. (Boo hiss.) The north Gower coast is home to a number of cockle-picking and laver-gathering families, and their products are renowned. 

If you fancy making your own you first need to gather the seaweed. This is porphyra umbilicalis in situ.

Mo Wilde has a recipe for laverbread on her website. You need 6 litres of laver seaweed, which you wash well under running water to rid it of any sand. Place it in a slow cooker, add 150 ml of apple cider vinegar or lemon juice, and cook on high for 8 hours. You can add seasonings to taste: salt and pepper, chilli, soy sauce, whatever takes your fancy.

Nicely mulched

What do you do when you're a tad stressed? Go and dig the garden in the rain, that's what.

It's my favourite part of gardening, hard physical work. Most unlike me! But it's satisfying. I wanted to see what the soil was like at the back of the garden where we had trees cut down and where I intend to plant rambling roses. I wondered how it would be after forty or so years of big conifers living there. 

Pretty good as it turns out. Nicely mulched by the leaves and twigs. And here's my prize trophy.

Yes, I dug up a tree root! Well, I was impressed. I had more trouble with the honeysuckle that took over and refused to flower. There's still a lot of that to shift.

The plan is for Husband to fill in the cracks in the wall to strengthen it then to get someone to put fencing on top (and other bits I'm planning) before I plant my roses. I'd love to see them in this year and starting to ramble but the weather's not being very helpful.

And here's some of the rubbish that Husband has been keeping for years - just in case - but now I'm taking charge so watch out.

Natural born panicker

I went back for an intensive hearing test this morning. You have to sit in a little box and press a button when you hear a sound. Sounds simple but not if you're a natural panicker.

"Why is there such a long gap between beeps? Is he not pressing buttons or am I missing loads of them? Why is he staring at the screen so intently? Is there something terrible wrong? Why is he leaving me in here when I haven't heard . . . ooh, was that a beep? Or was it my imagination? That light switch looks like a face. No, concentrate, close your eyes. No, stay awake."

It turns out volume wise my hearing is okay but I miss certain letters of higher frequency making my brain struggle to work out what the word should be. My hearing has deteriorated a little since the last check two years ago and I would probably benefit from hearing aids. But I'm still in the mild hearing loss band.

However, it seems I hear better through the back of my head than I do through my left ear. So I have to see the GP who will probably have to refer me to the Ear, Nose and Throat department. Something is stopping the sound getting into my head, maybe fluid in the ear or something.  Signs of it were showing at my last test but now it's gone over the edge of the 'should be referred' line. So it's not a dramatic sudden change. And I don't have to worry. 

But of course I panicked and went to Mumbles and bought a large bar of chocolate.

But on the good news front, the biopsy from Husband's ear shows no further cancer cells. Yay.

* * * * *

As I've said many times I grew up in the heart of the village of Mumbles, living in Albert House with my mum, my grandparents, and my great-gran.

My grandparents and my first dog, Soames.

Many years after we sold it the house was still in reasonable condition.

Then the old lady who was living there died.

Her son intended to do it up but time dragged on and the house looked worse and worse. Then just before lockdown work began on it, and then stopped. And then started again last autumn. And then stopped.

This is my childhood home now.

People who knew my family stop me and tell me how it breaks their hearts to see it so. It breaks mine too.

From slimy to sexy

As I feared my tulips were battered by the storm but they survived, just about. Except this one that broke off when I was trying to tie them up.

Two views of the same bed. Bluebells, tulips, ranunculus and wallflower, with roses and peonies shooting behind. They look prettier in real life.

I was clearing out some of the chopped-down rubbish by the back wall and came across this.

It gave me a fright until I realised it was a dog toy.

* * * * *

Last night I went to 3 Talks at Red Cafe. (Three speakers, each talking for ten minutes on a subject of their choice.)The first woman spoke about old film star, Ronald Colman, and why he never became as famous as Cary Grant. I'm not sure what the answer was as she rushed through it at such a pace it was impossible to keep up. Definitely one of those times when less is more. Or better at least.

Next up was a musician singing his own compositions, and finally, and best, was a man talking about seaslugs!

From Slimy to Sexy, the Salacious Story of Seaslugs. He accompanied his talk with images of seaslugs he'd found around the Gower coast and in Swansea Bay, and they were amazing! Wonderful colours and shapes. Did you know that if seaslugs come into contact with a venomous creature they can absorb the venom into their feathery tentacles and then use it on something else! How amazing is that?

At the end of the evening the compere mentioned they're looking for more speakers. If you recall I did a talk there about Zac's last autumn. I began thinking about whether I could do some sort of book promotion, but that didn't seem quite appropriate, so I had a think what else I could talk about and came up with a very short list.

Grammar. One questioner asked if there were less seaslugs because of global warming. All I heard was  my brain saying 'fewer, fewer.' Then there's 'should of'. I could do a whole rant on 'should of'. 

Breasts. (It's a predominantly female audience.) If you've read my first novel, This Time Next Year, you'll know there's a bra-fitting scene in it. That was based on true life so I thought I could adapt and make more of that, plus talk about the indignities of mammograms, and the 70s when men talked to my chest. And the pros and cons of big boobs. And plug my books. But am I brave enough?

I love Langland

I posted a couple of old family photos on a local Facebook page yesterday.

I seem to have mastered the reluctant photographee pose!

What amazes me is that I thought I was fat - and look how slim I am! So much time wasted hating my body and yet I still do it.

The Facebook page is called I love Langland and is aimed at people like me who grew up spending all their spare hours on the beach. That's Langland you can see in the first photo, with its iconic and much-sought-after beach huts. At that time there were cloth huts on the beach as well as wooden huts just behind the promenade. These days it's just the wooden huts, which are council-owned and applicants for the summer season go into a lottery to get a hut for one of two three-month periods. Fairly optimistic view of summer in Wales but at least with a hut you can sit in its shelter and have a nice cup of tea.

We frequented Little Langland, now known as Rotherslade. In those photos the tide is out but when it comes in Rotherslade becomes a separate beach. The trendy people went to Langland itself. I was never part of an in-crowd so sunbathed on Little Langland envious of those with more confidence, better looks, better bodies (!) than me.

Rotherslade with Langland in the distance

The big rock you see on the right of the beach is called Donkey Rock now but was previously known as Storr's Rock, and featured in a number of paintings by the Impressionist artist, Alfred Sisley. The one below was painted in 1897, when Rotherslade was known as Lady's Cove.

Multi-banking

As you drive into Swansea from the east you can't help but notice the enormous Amazon warehouse on the outskirts of the city. It is HUGE.

It doesn't have the best reputation when it comes to how it treats its workers so perhaps helping the local community is one way of trying to improve its name. In 2022 the first Multibank was set up in Scotland in an initiative from Amazon and Gordon Brown, ex-PM. (I think. Yes, I'm sure he was PM.)

The third UK Multibank has now been set up in Swansea. Surplus essential goods are donated by Amazon to Cwtch Mawr (Welsh meaning big hug), a community hub run by Faith in Families. Each week an inventory is sent out to local charities who can then request items on the list for people in need.

Zac's has just signed up and today I went to collect our first items. One woman asked us last week for a kettle so I ordered one, plus several pairs of men's trainers sizes 8-10, because we never have enough, and black bags and kitchen cloths for Zac's. All new!

I do love getting things for free!

Sexy tea?

Over on Debra's blog she has lots of funnies about coffee. I commented that I feel the same about tea. The trouble is that tea isn't as sexy as coffee. (Everything is considered sexy or not these days I find regardless of whether it has any actual sexual connotation.)

So I thought I'd have a google and see what I could find.

Aah, that's nice.

True.

Cwtchy.

Then these are the 'sexiest' I could find.

The best tea is.

True.

What the thinking people drink!

Could you beat in an elephant in a fight?

When I arrived at Zac's last night Craig asked me if I'd remembered. I told him I had. Then he wanted to know if we were having cake before or after bible study. I said after, as we always do. He nodded, took his cup of coffee and sat down.

About five minutes into study he got up, put on his coat, and left.

Which was a shame because my sponge was the best one I've made for ages.

When I had to get rid of my old broken food processor I feared that it was taking with it my ability to make light sponges. My new food mixer certainly didn't do it as well, and my recent birthday cakes, made with my new food processor, had been okay but not, I felt, up to my high standard. 

Last night it got there!

Craig comes for lunch on Thursdays and Fridays so I've saved him the piece of cake with his name on it - not that he deserves it! But grace is getting what we don't deserve.

It was a really good bible study too, led by Sean, about maturing in faith, building on foundations, and graduating from milk to solid foods. Inspiring, especially as I need to mature to deal with 'the thorn in my side' as mentioned in previous posts about Zac's.

And I had a bit of an epiphany about love. If it's possible to have a bit of an epiphany.*

I came across this chart from 2021 on Twitter. 

I'm guessing the Americans are planning on using guns. (Just noticed it specifies unarmed.)

* An epiphany is defined as a sudden and striking realisation, so that probably rules out 'a bit of an epiphany.' Like unique, something can't be quite unique. It's either unique or not.