Rush cutting Morning...
So here is the blog post for the rushcutting - since this day, we have dressed the cart and had the festival - I'm a bit behind in my posts at the moment. :D I've also been behind in my journal entries (my hand written diary of my exploits). In 1996, I had a small day-to-day X-Files diary that I had with me, wrote bits of where I went in it, but I never kept a journal or 'travel log' of my trip back then, to get the exquisite details of every waking minute and feeling. I only had photos and a scrap book or two to keep my memories. And in 1999 when I came here, I had a tichy diary then too, and did not record anything down, not that much happened in 1999 on my trip here - something about visiting France to buy alcohol for a day (Callais), going to Alton Towers, and watching a solar eclipse - those were the highlights of 3 months in UK in 1999. So in 2006 I opted to keep as many memories as possible, by keeping a journal - And back then I came back with 1 and a half journals written in. That was 3 and half months.
I just finished writting in my hand written journal that I brought with me from Officeworks back in Australia. Now I need to find another journal here in UK (should be easy enough) to keep up with it. I ended the last journal while I was half way through my Cleckheaton entry. So now I am keeping up with diary entries on my laptop instead. The thought of hand writting it into a journal bugs me a bit, and anyone else would say - 'is there any point in handwritting it into a journal when you already have typed it, and could just print it up?' I like having hand written things though - its the Luddite in me - who likes to hand write a story before you type it up. Neil Gaiman still likes to hand write his books before typing. With Eloise, I've only hand written notes and sections of a chapter that I took down in notes too. The novel itself is being typed. Besides, if my laptop crashes (gods forbid) and I lose those journal entires, then I will have nothing to show for it. Every now and then, after writing an extensive amount of Eloise, I email it to myself, so its in email and can be accessed anywhere. Smart move to me! So far I emailed Eloise to myself at close to 34,000 words. Thus none is lost in case of USB and Laptop crash....
Titchy Blog: Sat 14th July 2012
Bastille Day! And in support of our French cousins we went rush cutting! OK -we were rush cutting anyway, then I noticed it was Bastille Day. If only Cromwell hadn’t been such a twat we might have had a proper revolution. Fancy banning singing and dancing! It’s not even as though we were around then to put him off.
Anyway, having found our way to Lancashire (or... as my little sons pronounce it - Wancashire (out of the mouths of babes etc)) - (can you do double brackets, or is that just in maths?), we disembarked along the side of the Rochdale Canal. We were: Jeanette, Angie, Mark, Terry, Helen, Paul, Tania,Pip, and Keith, complete with tools. Even the women. Having plunged, suitably bewellied, into the reed bed, we received instructions from Jeanette on how to do it. Then she showed us how to cut and prepare the reeds. I’m not telling you, next thing is you’ll all be doing it and there’ll be none left to take to church. If they wanted it. Which they don’t. Apparently they consider reed cutting to put on the church floor as a pagan activity, whereas Christmas and Easter (couldn’t even be arsed to change the name) aren’t.
After a couple of hours during which Keith complained of reeds up the arse (he was wearing shorts) and trying to avoid Mark’s builder’s bum, we had cut enough and carried them up to the canal. See photo. It was there I noticed that there was a Yorks/ Lancs boundary sign. I can’t understand that, facing north east (yes, I am the sort of sad bastard who carries a compass) Yorkshire was on the left and Lancashire on the right. I can only assume the Ordnance Survey have been printing the bloody maps upside down. You just can’t trust anybody, can you?
Jeanette took her leave, and we decided to go for some refreshment to Todmorden. Parking in Morrison’s carpark, and heading into town, we noticed their sign exhorting us to “come again!”. Didn’t have the heart to tell them we hadn’t been in the first place. Finding a café, we altered the seating arrangements suitably, i.e. with all their chairs round one table, and discussion took place about who could do what when etc. There were lots of veggie things on the menu, but luckily, some food too. The same old argument ensued about why we’ve got canine teeth etc, and could I remember bringing down a mammoth with my teeth. I pointed out I was not that old. Mammoths were extinct months before I was born. It is interesting to imagine, however, how our mammalian forebears (no - you’re wrong - Goldilocks was only three bears) which were the size of tree shrews, could bring down a T Rex. They must have had effing ENORMOUS teeth. But enough of this zoological meandering. Tania and I had something made of chips, gravy, and melted cheese.(No - we had one each - I wouldn’t go head to head with Tania off the same plate. She’s Australian. They eat kangaroos and ostriches. I like a girl who can shift her food. (No offence). Pip (nice to see his legs working again - the working is nice; the legs I’d rather not discuss) ordered a fish finger butty. The rest of them had various sorts of garden rubbish. The food arrived after quite a long period. Except for Pip’s. Either:
a) They’d forgotten him
b) They were having difficulty catching the fish to cut its fingers off
c) They thought the sight of him eating would put us off our food
d) None of these
Eventually it turned up when we’d all finished.
So off we went back to the cars, when we saw that Angie, in revenge, (by accident, she says)
had stolen her knife and fork. She IS a Thieving Magpie!
What I love about these posts is that he mentions me in each one for some reason or other. Perhaps he likes to brag that there is an Australian in our Morris side. Who knows, but none of us mind the things he says about us - to my knowledge, no one has ever complained about anything he has written about us. Love it! And it provides me with memories and someone elses point of view for me to keep - which is why I am keeping record of all Terry's posts on this LJ.
Some photos of Rush cutting....
Here, Keith was poking me in the neck and head with a rush. Annoying!
