INVASION of the Teenage Campers!!

Just when I think I've survived the Easter holidays intact, and all that's left to do is to play the organ on Sunday morning before returning to school and starting a new term...an INVASION arrives...
Nine teenagers, friends of Youngest, all set to camp in the garden...night frost, hailstones, rain and wind notwithstanding!

Mad! I tell you! Mad altogether!

They pitched tents (four in total), collected their own kindling from along the bottom lane, had a chat and fed carrots to Mary Horse, chopped logs, lit the fire AND kept it going despite the wind, cooked out (baked beans and skewers- chicken and vegetable) (having prepared the vegetable skewers first at the kitchen table, and wasn't that a laugh!), went for a torch hike, froze, talked for IrelandEnglandScotlandandWales, did some stargazing (someone brought a telescope), retired inside to watch a video and warm up, retired to their tents, and were up at dawn for another hike before landing in the kitchen like a bunch of zombies to cook a massive breakfast which went on for nearly four hours!

I have to admit I get such a kick out of them all, from their attitudes to tent pitching (lying on the grass watching everyone else and offering advice) to trying to keep the fire alight (have you anything else ready to burn?), as well as the snippets of conversations overheard!
...and another thing? Under the direction of Youngest they left the place as neat as a group of teenagers could! Mattresses and bedding all returned upstars, kitchen and garden clean and tidy. MEGA-impressed!

Gotta love teenagers...sometimes!!

And now we are down to the last day before school and the dreaded WSE. Aaaargh!
Oh well, this too will pass...

A Grand Life Sez They!

A fortnight back I thought I was having a regular trip to the doc and it turned into fullscale Heckety warfare. 'Just think of it as an MOT,' said the nurse; well cars have feelings too, thought I....but she was only doing her job, and being really nice too, so I managed to catch that one behind my teeth before it popped out.

For all the poking and prodding and having pins and needles and winkle pickers and button hooks jabbed at me, all they managed to come up with was that I've anaemia.Whoop-di-doo! Watch out for your gates folks, I'll be gnawing my way along the neighbours' railings presently...or I would if we had any...neighbours, that is!

Somebody hasn't been eating their greens, sez you! Well if you came in from work every day as tired and cold as I, and collapsed onto the sofa while you ate they quickest, easiest thing you could find...a banana usually, then crawled into bed, you wouldn't be eating your greens either. Greens take energy to prepare. Youngest cooks for herself and the Hub, which is very long-suffering of her, but I since can't eat pasta, bread, rice, or anything out of a bottle, tin, packet, or whatever, I'm not able to share their meals. (allergies)

Its a bummer. And now I'm really sick, serves me right, though it seems to be settling into the usual bout of sinusitis. Blaaahhhh. Which is where the Experimental Year's experiments would come in if I had the energy...

As long as you've your health, they say. Mental or physical, sez I, and they don't know what to answer to that.

Sure aren't ye the young healthy one? they say, and never known a sick day in yer life! Well, you be making the most of yer youth, sez they, for it won't last.

Sure it won't, mine departed when I was about twenty four and I'm sick searching for it ever since.

Its a grand life when ye have it, sez they.

Sure it is...Let's swap!

The Ash Grove? or Global Warning?

Down yonder green valley, where streamlets meander
Where twilight is fading, I pensively roam

This is actually Hazelwood, and the Ash in the song is referring to trees rather than a volcano, but hey! its a nice photo!

Apparently Irish airspace is still closed, and the ash cloud is heading west with the possibility of being in American airspace by this evening. Its like something from a science fiction novel or film, isn't it?
Dad was in town shopping this morning and got extra groceries for us as Mom is anxious that by the time I remember to do the shopping the shelves may be empty. Already in Kenya many agricultural workers have been laid off and the produce left to rot since it cannot be flown out to Europe.

A volcano spews ash in Iceland and on the other side of the world, in a different hemisphere workers lose their jobs! What sort of behemoth have we made for ourselves? There's been plenty said about Global Warming, Peak Oil, World Poverty, Terrorism, and a lot else over recent years- but did anyone consider the possibility of a Natural Incident?

But if you think about it, or, if we are prepared to think about it, this could be the very wake-up call we need to seriously mend our ways. After Krakatoa erupted there was no spring or summer so crops failed, and a lot of people died from respiratory complications. Wouldn't it be truly ironic if there was to be widespread hunger in Europe because so many people depend upon their food to be grown in Africa (and elsewhere)? Whereas in Africa the food is useless because it cannot be got out of the field and into the Market?

Up until two years ago the Hub's Dad managed farms in East Africa for the Tesco chain. We bought Kenyan green beans in Sligo, north west Ireland, knowing that M had grown them in Nanyuki, Kenya, since he was the supplier to Tesco. How absolutely RIDICULOUS is that? Think of the miles and damage it took to get them to our table?

So perhaps having all the cargo planes grounded and people stranded all over the world is just a gentle reminder to us all, all over the world, that we are living unsustainable lifestyles and that we need to cop on to ourselves. We sit and gaze at a grassy garden and go hungry for veg and fruit- how daft!

No one of us is going to solve the World's problems, its way too late for that, but sure as we do nothing, nothing will be done. Think about it, folks?

Saturday Tea OR Feeding Time at the Zoo?

And then they all dolled up and went out for the night!Curfew for BBugs lot is 1am...Sos' lot intend to multiply and return by taxi-train 'whenever'!

The clocks go forward an hour tonight- I'm playing for Morning Service at 10.30am...and...

Lunch party tomorrow...