Fruity Frangipane

We decided to not go camping this weekend because of bank holiday..So instead we went cycling and looking for Blackberries.We found most of them in a hedgerow just out of town ,down a little lane that reminds me a bit of Cornwall.
We had enough for some pie and cycled home, I called in to town for ingredients..
I have been buying Frangipane recently, pre made from Waitrose. So I knew how nice it could be but even though I am sounding a little vainglorious. My atempt was pretty special...
Quartered Conference pears glazed with a little butter and some Caster sugar. Some very dark French Chocolate crumbled benevolently amidst some hand picked lane ripened Warwickshire Blackberries...
A dollop of Creme fresh, everybodys happy

Happy Factory Fodder

Work is going well at the mo...We have our jolly moments and sometimes we even have raucous laughter. We get on with our jobs though and all in all things are enjoyable as well as productive..
Today I was fantasising about training as a Sushi chef and then opening up a lunch spot near the factory. There is little alternative to a rather bland canteen in the whole area...Sushi/ salad bar bit of a funky atmos, charging six quid a shout...Make a fortune I reckon...

Not whinging about da weather

So we have had a bit of rain...The grass in our back garden is well verdant.It wasn't raining tonight so I gave it a bit of a chop. Next doors cat had left his mark in there so that ended up sprayed all over the place...Still I do like cats so it serves me right to have liquidised cat muck all over my naked fetlocks...
As a contractor working at the car factory I'm not allowed to park near work and have to yomp in from a visitors car park a few fields away...I always give the Rozzer on the gate a cheery Good morning just to demonstrate how unbothered I am about getting soaked every day...
This week I have been fantasising about buying a Scythe and sculpting peoples lawns quietly, leaving some long tufty bits in for the Harvest mice to nest...

Friday nights on the settee

So we are settled back in England...I have got my head around my car factory job, had a heavy cold but soldiered on stoically...The weather was predicted to be poor so we stayed at home this weekend..I cooked some fish for tea then we settled down to watch the Telly...We were drinking Cider from Waitrose and watching,, Gardeners world first. I had forgotten how professional the Beeb were.The presenters are unpretentious, I think that there is an element of anarchism and an unspoken regard for liberty amongst gardeners...
Then we watched The Tudors...Raunchy rock n roll history, again with amazing quality and an eye for detail...The costumes are unbelievably beautiful...A bit of Q.I. then off to bed..
Good old BBC two...

moving back to England/ staying positive

I spent most of today inside a car factory and it was very tough...The place is infused with an air of hopeless lethargy.The permanent staff appear to be desperately unhappy and if I was not feeling so sorry for myself I might feel sorry for them as well...
But tomorrow I am going to be ultra chipper and make them have it.
Then at the weekend we are going to go swimming in a very wet river...
On Sunday we went to an old Friends house who has recently returned from Spain...Her and her fella made us Tapas and we had a little wine...It was very nice too...

Natural Mystic

These last few days I have been camping in Southern England... I have swam in lots of rivers, like the Frome and the Hampshire Avon.Wiltshire and Somerset where particularly enjoyable.There was a lovely swimming hole next to a weir on the footpath towards Batcombe, with a rope swing into the deep below a weir...
On the way to meet up with some pals in Hampshire, we stopped at Stonehenge...I really felt a presence there, but was offended by the way that is presented...Many people were taking cheesy pictures of each other so that they can prove to their Friends that they have, you know, done Stonehenge...It is obviously being exploited a a cash cow and they have some plans to spruce it up for the Olympics...
I strongly feel that it should be a sacred place of pilgrimage. The roads should be diverted or buried, and people should approach on foot..From at least five miles away barefoot across a silent grassy heath..

Scary Ocean

On a few occasions last week I walked along the Cornish coast path and then down a rocky headland to fish of a very deep ledge. Just standing there flicking my lure into the sea was very therapeutic...It was also a little unnerving. The thought that a freak wave might just lick me into the water was always at the back of my mind...
The god Pan was banished into the wilderness by Zeus...Whenever we are in the wild and we feel the onset of Panic.... That is Pan tinkering with our reason...