A general round-up
Bishop Tony came to take communion this morning, which was rather nice. Afterwards, we had refreshments - I took some GF chipolatas and volunteer vicar* brought some GF macaroons, which was nice of her. I was chatting with Tony as we drank tea, then we both put our cups down so he could sit with the kids and I and another mum took photos. When we went back to the tea, I picked the wrong one. Bishop Tony doesn't take sugar. He was very gracious about my error!
*When vicar Peter retired we got a lovely woman, Christine, who used to be a shepherd. Tony told her off once, while she was still in Halifax, for arriving late for a service. She'd been out lambing, and did the service in her surplice, with her muddy trousers still tucked into her wellies. She pointed out that she was late because she was looking after the other flock. When she came to us, we also had two retired female vicars in the congregation, plus Sandy, who'd had a congregation elsewhere but her husband's job moved him here and she came too, losing her parish. So she volunteered with us. Christine has now retired, and has yet to be replaced, but Sandy continues to help out.
Oh, another Tony/Christine/sheep story: a few years ago, a villager wrote to Christine in high dudgeon that sheep kept roaming the churchyard, eating the grass and pooing everywhere. She responded that in the countryside this is the kind of thing that you have to get used to. Also the sheep keep the grass down. The villager was not impressed with this response and wrote to Bishop Tony. His reply was that if the villager could a) find a way to keep sheep out of the churchyard and b) help to keep the churchyard tidy and the grass cut, everyone would be happy, but in the meantime, the sheep were part of the natural order of things. Villager wasn't heard from again.
YoungBloke is out playing with Charlotte and Imogen - they came to ask if he could play out just as he was finishing his homework, so that was good timing. C is in Y4, not sure about Imogen, and Ben (Y6, C's brother) has appeared too.
I was sitting thinking how nice it is that the kids weren't bothered about the age differences, or gender (unlike in the school playground, I suspect). Last seen, YB was in skateboarding gloves, tied up in a skipping rope to be either a horse or a dog.
Mum has decided not to come for dinner tonight because she's got a cold. It's the first time she's not come since moving here over a year ago. I'm going to get her portion ready and send OB along the road with it while I finish everything for us.
Over Christmas Smogg had a lot of sneezing episodes, and threw up a few times too. A trip to the vet before Christmas resulted in the usual antibiotic and anti-inflammatory injection but the sneezing continued. A week or so ago OB took the cat for a follow-up visit and returned with the advice to raise the food bowl in case the sneezing was mechanical, and nasal drops. The raised food bowl sort of worked, except, of course, that Smogg tends to take food out of the bowl, drop it on the floor and eat from there. The nasal drops? Can you imagine?
Actually, Smogg is so laid back that they were pretty easy. He would go to sleep on his chair, one of us would lift his head back and drip the drops onto his nostrils. He would give a little snort and shake his head, then go back to sleep. We did that for a week and the sneezing seems to have stopped. Hurrah.
*When vicar Peter retired we got a lovely woman, Christine, who used to be a shepherd. Tony told her off once, while she was still in Halifax, for arriving late for a service. She'd been out lambing, and did the service in her surplice, with her muddy trousers still tucked into her wellies. She pointed out that she was late because she was looking after the other flock. When she came to us, we also had two retired female vicars in the congregation, plus Sandy, who'd had a congregation elsewhere but her husband's job moved him here and she came too, losing her parish. So she volunteered with us. Christine has now retired, and has yet to be replaced, but Sandy continues to help out.
Oh, another Tony/Christine/sheep story: a few years ago, a villager wrote to Christine in high dudgeon that sheep kept roaming the churchyard, eating the grass and pooing everywhere. She responded that in the countryside this is the kind of thing that you have to get used to. Also the sheep keep the grass down. The villager was not impressed with this response and wrote to Bishop Tony. His reply was that if the villager could a) find a way to keep sheep out of the churchyard and b) help to keep the churchyard tidy and the grass cut, everyone would be happy, but in the meantime, the sheep were part of the natural order of things. Villager wasn't heard from again.
YoungBloke is out playing with Charlotte and Imogen - they came to ask if he could play out just as he was finishing his homework, so that was good timing. C is in Y4, not sure about Imogen, and Ben (Y6, C's brother) has appeared too.
I was sitting thinking how nice it is that the kids weren't bothered about the age differences, or gender (unlike in the school playground, I suspect). Last seen, YB was in skateboarding gloves, tied up in a skipping rope to be either a horse or a dog.
Mum has decided not to come for dinner tonight because she's got a cold. It's the first time she's not come since moving here over a year ago. I'm going to get her portion ready and send OB along the road with it while I finish everything for us.
Over Christmas Smogg had a lot of sneezing episodes, and threw up a few times too. A trip to the vet before Christmas resulted in the usual antibiotic and anti-inflammatory injection but the sneezing continued. A week or so ago OB took the cat for a follow-up visit and returned with the advice to raise the food bowl in case the sneezing was mechanical, and nasal drops. The raised food bowl sort of worked, except, of course, that Smogg tends to take food out of the bowl, drop it on the floor and eat from there. The nasal drops? Can you imagine?
Actually, Smogg is so laid back that they were pretty easy. He would go to sleep on his chair, one of us would lift his head back and drip the drops onto his nostrils. He would give a little snort and shake his head, then go back to sleep. We did that for a week and the sneezing seems to have stopped. Hurrah.