A Cherry on The Top....or not!

After a morning in the pub knitting and nattering with Friends and neighbours what could be nicer than visiting the farmers market outside and coming home with Pigeon and Pea Pie and a Lemony cup cake from the gorgeous A Cherry on The Top stall?

well, a coffee, a knitting magazine, a WIP and a comfy armchair to finish it off- Ahhhh, Sundays!

What Manner of Men...

After visiting my 95 year old Grandmother at the weekend I have been trying to find a poem for her - She is a huge poetry lover, and has been all her life - she can quote poems learned at primary school better than she remembers the families names!

About 30 years or more ago, she heard a poem read out on the radio, and in that one reading memorised about 4 lines from it, but never knew the author or the name of the poem - and has no concept of the Internet.

It has taken some finding - and in the end I found only 1 link to it, and can still not find any information out about the poet - if I have the correct name!

so in the spirit of sharing, not only on my blog, but in case anyone else should ever look up the poem here is it...

WHAT MANNER OF MEN

The Devil at the table prepared to dine,
Said, where is Death,he is past his time,
He knows our rule that we dine at Ten,
As he merely went to make Cowards of men

Then a stir was heard outside the gate,
Soon Death limped in to his Hall of State,
With broken scythe, his beard awry,
And terror that had shone from fear limned eye,

And the Devil roared with all his might,
What happened thou art in such a plight?
Hard felt the weight of some heavy hand,
That thou in such mortal terror stand.

Thy orders, said Death, were but show my face,
And they'd blanch, these men of inferior race,
But they hurled me forth, with my neck nigh out,
To the Devil with Death, I heard them shout.

So what manner of Mortal can these be,
Said the Devil to make such sport of thee,
As the old man tenderly smoothed his hide,
They're the men of 'Arnhem' sire he cried.

But you'll make them fear us, the Devil roared,
Ere again you sit and sup at board,
Then I sup no more, old Death replied,
For as I left them, they laughed and died.

Harvey Haywood

The second Poem here was recited during an after dinner speech given by Critstiaan Barnard (who performed the first heart transplant) when he was touring New Zealand in the 60's. My Mum who lived there back then, cut the poem out of the news paper the day after the speech, and posted it back to my Grandma in Warrington - they had believed it was anonymous, but a far quicker search turned up the poem and the author...

A Bag of Tools

Isn't it strange how princes and kings,

and clowns that caper in sawdust rings,

and common people,

like you and me,are builders for eternity?
Each is given a list of rules;

a shapeless mass; a bag of tools.

And each must fashion, ere life is flown,

A stumbling block, or a Stepping-Stone.

J L Sharpe

fascinating phalanges...

Sometimes my brain makes connections I had never thought about before, and then I can't remember why the connection was made!

Recently it put a connection together that perplexes me -namely my inability to do certain tasks WITHOUT looking at my fingers.

I know it probably down to practice in some cases - Piano and guitar have never been mastered because I have to stop every time I change a chord to make sure my fingers are in the right place. Hand sewing and knitting - I have to watch every stitch or I do make mistakes, and therefore find it hard to sit and watch TV while doing either of these - I need to listen to the radio more - I even have to watch my fingers while typing, something I spend hours doing everyday at work and at home, there is nothing more annoying than typing away for 5 minutes only to look at the screen and there is nothing there!

I recently went to the local 'Bowland Guild of spinners, weavers and Dyers' meeting and was talking to a lovely lady, we were both knitting, me - only when I could look at my hands, but this lady never looked at her knitting once - in fact, I watched her knitting more than she did with a kind of slack jawed amazement!
It's a good job I don't have to look at them while changing gear in the car!

So - to finish the first of my Easter bunnies, I sat in bed until lunch time on Sunday and watched as my hands did the work, with no distractions!

Mr Fig (or Mr Juicy as he prefers) keeps mocking me for making 'cosies', a hat is a head cosy, a scarf is a neck cosy, I have made cup cosies and phone cosies - well, you get the idea - so I had to grab a photo of natures very own wall cosy while we were in the Trough of Bowland last weekend!

The sun has been shining today, here are some of Mr Figs Chili crop from last autumn that have been drying in the window all winter, and below some gorgeous candy coloured roses Mr Fig treated me to as a 'not valentines flowers' gift
He's the real sweetie!