Simple sums

So I'm in the local Coop getting some cheese for Min to take some pills. The lads in front of me at the till were messing about and the final lad had to find 4 pence for his mate. He was fiddling about in his purse for what seemed like an age. I could see that he had a 2 pence piece but still he messed about.
Unable to contain myself any longer I said jokingly to him, "come on, its only 4 pence you have to count."
When my turn came to pay the male shopkeeper said, "I've been doing this job for over three years and you'd be surprised at the number of kids that can't count. A lot just put a handful of coins on the counter and expect me to sort it out."

Scary if true.

Keelham Farm Shop

So we're in Keelham Farm Shop (highly recommended) and Jan wants a rib of beef. I asked the butcher how long the beef is hung because I like it at around 30 days.
"Sir," he said, "the shop tag line is, all our beef is well hung, just like our butchers."
We couldn't say anything for laughing.

Stranger than fiction

Who said Ripon is dull and boring. Well not today anyway.
We parked in Booth's car park and I noticed a car with its engine running and headlights on but nobody around. I even looked into the car in case someone was ill inside. Nothing.
Assuming the driver was nearby but I just couldn't see him or her (I was sure it was a her because of the sunglasses on the dash) we walked into town.
We returned 40 minutes later to find the same car with its engine still running. We popped into Booths and reported it to the duty manager who retrieved the keys and spoke to the police.
After we had finished shopping we returned to our car and Jan spoke to a traffic warden who was about to issue a ticket.
Lo and behold the woman whose car it was and who had left the car for about an hour and a half returned to her car and was advised of what a prat she had been.
You couldn't really make it up.

Facebook

This article made me laugh.

Anyway I've decided to send them this photo of me.

Oh no

How depressing is this? It means twice as much rubbish.

Filthy dreams

You'd have thought that at our age we would no longer have filthy dreams. A rather shamefaced Jan admitted to me this morning that Jeremy Corbyn made a brief appearance in one of her dreams last night.

How disgusting is that!

Multi names

I'm not sure why or how but have you ever noticed how many triple barrelled names people now use. Names like John Smith Brown. Not a hyphenated surname but an additional family name stuck in either the middle or the end.
And to prove my point I noticed this:

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/nov/02/keeping-up-with-smith-joneses-no-longer-posh-double-barrelled-surname

Strange

Have you ever noticed that when people demonstrate in foreign lands they quite often show posters in English. Looking at the poster above you would have to say that Catalonia might not be Spain but it sure as hell isn't England or any other English speaking nation either.

United Nations

I have a poor opinion of the United Nations but have always had a sneaky regard for the humanitarian work they do. Until now!

#Metoo

There are so many women coming out of the woodwork complaining about Harvey Weinstein that I'm starting to wonder if I've ever met him.
Taking it one step further I could set up a website where, with a couple of clicks, you could easily check. A bit like PPI.
#Metoo.

Frustrations

They're out to get me. This morning whilst trying to find a parking place, which is always difficult on market days, the number of inconsiderate drivers reached a new level.
At the risk of sounding sexist the gender of the drivers was about 90% w...n. There were a huge number of cars circling the car park but the number of times I saw someone return to their car, switch the engine on, and either get on the phone or drink a coffee was frankly a little excessive. They can see lots of cars trying to park but they obviously couldn't give a shit.
Added to that whilst sitting in a cafe waiting for Jan I sat next to two w...n who shouted their conversation interrupting my (and everyone else in the vicinity) ability to sit quietly and read a newspaper.
Why don't folk stop to consider how their behaviour affects others?  

Stanforth Butchers

Talking about a Yorkshire speciality we popped over to Skipton the other day and bought pork pies at Stanforth's. I'm not really a pork pie aficionado but these are very, very good. Some time back I asked a friend if he wanted me to bring him anything as I was visiting and he mentioned these pork pies.

Frankly I was a little surprised but eager to understand why he'd asked me to bring them we bought a couple to eat before we arrived at his house and boy were they good. Hot from the oven and gravy that had to be mopped up with tissues as it dribbled down our chins.

The same place was showcased on a programme of a father and son cycling through the Yorkshire dales just the other day.

Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band

Jan got this one right. We went to Ripon Cathedral the other night to listen to the B & R Brass Band. It was quite an eye opener with soloists from around the world and an Australian conductor.
I suspect that the days of miners joining and playing in the band are long gone. It is rated as the second best brass band in the world so membership has taken on a special meaning.
The cathedral acoustics were excellent for this type of music and we both really enjoyed it. Jan gets to keep the job for a little longer.

The start of the end

Conscious of the ageing process I try to keep an eye on any strange behaviour that would indicate that I've started 'the end process.'

Well yesterday was a good indication. We had just driven back from Manchester and decided to stop off in Harrogate to fill up with cheap diesel.

Cheap diesel, that's a laugh! No sooner had I replaced the holster in the pump when I realised that I'd just filled up with unleaded. What an idiotic thing to do.

Full of genuine contrition I told the cashier who tried to cheer me up by saying that there are lots of idiots in the world and that it happens quite regularly.

I called the AA who came to the rescue after I'd given them £200 over the phone and fairly quickly and easily drained the tank and got me going again. At least I knew not to start the car after realising my mistake to avoid taking the wrong fuel into more inaccessible parts of the engine (he said in mitigation.)

Galaxy Note 8

Being a bit of a techie and carrying a three years old Note 4 I visited Samsung in Leeds a few weeks back to look at the new Note 8. Wow it's a beautiful phone and even better in the flesh than I thought it would be.

Well it arrived on Friday and I have been spending  many a happy hour getting to know it and dribbling down my chin. Sad.

Detroit

We went to see Detroit the other night. A film recommended by our entertainment secretary.

All I can say is that if you want to be metaphorically beaten up in a cinema then this is the film for you. Gritty realism is what it is, dealing with events in riot torn Detroit in the sixties. We both liked the Hurt Locker which was directed by Katherine Bigelow so had high hopes for this one.

I might be getting old and feeble but I found this a bit unsettling.

Style gone mad

The more I see them the more I think 'why?'

I can just about appreciate a small tear in a jean to make it look worn, no matter how artificial but the other day I saw a young woman wearing a pair of jeans with tears right down the whole of the front. It looked so ludicrous I couldn't help but ask her why she hadn't just bought a pair of shorts.

Thank goodness she saw the funny side.

Florida

Why the hell would anyone want to live in Florida? From my limited experience the weather is fairly shit, you have to put up with tornadoes and the like and there's an outside chance an alligator will get you and your house might be destroyed. So not much happening really. It makes Ripon sound like paradise!

As they evacuate the state the thought occurred to me 'where the hell do they all go'? Presumably to hotels or relatives out of state. To some hillbilly, gun toting, two headed lunatic in a neighbouring state.
Thanks but no thanks.

SKOSH

My son and family are visiting and he decided to take us to eat at Skosh in York one evening.
What a good choice. It was reviewed recently by Jay Rayner and I have to agree with what he wrote. Well at least all the bits I understood!

It must be sensible

Following a recent health check I was encouraged to drink more (water not wine) to improve my kidney function. Always willing to accept sensible advice I am complying. BUT it now means that that I get up at least once in the middle of the night for a piss. I think I'll just have to get back to a sensible routine.

Insomnia

Insomnia is awful. But on the plus side only three more sleeps til christmas.

Great politeness

We popped out for a curry the other night and grabbed the last two seats in the restaurant. They had a huge party of young folk, say 17 ish, who were making a lot of noise. The thought of the curry dispelled any thoughts of leaving so we settled down to stuff our faces. The noise didn't get any better as the evening progressed.
Anyway the party started to break up and one young chap came over, I think we were the only other table left, and really nicely apologised for all the noise they made and hoped it didn't spoil our meal. How nice was that.
He didn't bite on my suggestion that all would be forgiven if he paid for our meal!

Phew what a scorcher

Just back from a weeks trip to France. Jan headed to Spain for a week to stay with her kids and their families and I headed to France. Combas 30260 to be precise to see my old mucker Bryan and his wife Gill.
B&G had their own family staying so kindly offered me the use of their friends unattended house for the week. I hope you are keeping up?
The weather was to put it mildly bloody hot. It was 35C+ most days which I find too hot and very uncomfortable. It's a waste of heat. But, thank god, my room had air-con which made sleeping a lot easier. I fail to see why anyone would like that level of heat but they do.

Baby Driver

Jan has the enviable title of Entertainment Secretary. She pretty much decides what we watch on television and what films we see. A short while ago she told me that she wanted to see the film Baby Driver, that it was a comedy and that she'd read good things about it. Lets just say that with another recommendation like that, she's going to lose her honorary position.
If you want to see a 'shoot em up' film with massive car chases and not much else then I highly recommend this film.
Also if anyone is interested in the position of Entertainment Secretary let me know because there may be a position coming up soon.

Mob rule

Is it me or as a nation are we getting out of control and just a little bit too emotive? I'm thinking of recent evidence of mob anger and also mob grief. I can't help but feel that the mob anger is stirred up by a left leaning mob and mob grief by people with nothing better to do. People who seem to want to 'belong' and feel that showing mob grief is the way to go. Competitive emoting.

WTF

We've spent the last few days clearing the shed. When we moved here six years ago we filled the shed in the garden with lots of ''stuff', to the extent that we couldn't even get in through the door. Basically we haven't touched anything in the shed for six years.
Now by any stretch of the imagination if you haven't touched something for six years there has to be an argument that you don't really need it.
In order to get a grip, everything came out of the shed and onto the lawn and was sorted into 'keep', 'bin' and 'donate' piles.
In a bit of a rush to put back the 'keep' pile we got back to the situation that we can't get into the shed again.
How did that happen?

Caccio e Pepe

I'd been good for a few days so Jan rewarded me with one of my favourite pastas. It is so simple to make and is outstandingly delicious.
There's a recipe here.

City Varieties

We went to the theatre the other night to see Roesencrantz and Guildenstern at the City Varieties. In order to make more of the trip to Leeds we set off early and looked around the centre and its shops. Wow it's not the Leeds I knew as a youngster. The number and range of 'posh' shops is quite amazing. And they all seem to be thriving.
When I were a lad City Varieties was a strip joint, the sort of place we all giggled about but never went to. How times have changed.

A Michelin Star

After a bit of trial and error I have established a bird feeding station that gets emptied very quickly. Our visitors include tits (blue, great, long tail) nut hatches, sparrows and robins. Nothing too exotic but all bloody well fed.

The constant food is peanuts and then additionally varied with either sunflower seeds or sunflower hearts, fat balls and all replenished regularly. We even get the odd field mouse that must performs acrobatics to get in.

It's a definite Michelin Star.

The Yorkshire Party

Proud as I am to live in Yorkshire I find it hard to support the candidate for The Yorkshire Party. His leaflet popped through the letterbox today and informed me that the party is being represented by a 19 years old apprentice. The leaflet read more like a local election candidate's aspirations. You never know maybe one day! Good luck to him.

PS He got 1539 votes. He must have a big family!

Well I never

It's been a few weeks now and the hearing aids have settled down or, more to the point, I have. The amount of additional sound I hear is quite pronounced especially paper rustling which is annoying or bird singing which is very welcome most of the time. We have woods near us and most afternoons I walk with Jan as we take Min for a walk. The amount of bird song is quite amazing and quite loud. It makes me realise just how much I have been missing.

Tour de Yorkshire

As the name suggests it's a cycle race around Yorkshire and it happened to pass through Ripon this year.
There were lots of road signs warning of road closures and disruption. However the more of these signs I read the more irritated I became (nothing new there then). Why the hell do they mix French and English in what is strictly an English event? What's wrong with The Tour of Yorkshire why have any French words?

Aldi

God I hate Aldi. Well, not quite true, because everything we buy from them we like. It's just that I popped out to the garden centre to buy a garden fork because I wanted to fork the lawn (yes I spelt that right.)
We visited Aldi a few days later and there was an identical fork at half the price. Bugger.

By Royal Appointment

It was Jan that noticed it. She saw a news piece about Prince Philip and said, 'he's got the same hearing aid as you.'
I knew it, I have a royal connection.
Or, to put it another way, I have the body of a 96 years old.

Local elections

It makes me really angry when I see large containers of voting slips poured onto a counting table. Handling the simple process of counting votes should be handled by computer.
Every voter should be issued with a 'voting card' and make their choice that way. There must be some self interest in play here to make the event so labour intensive and cumbersome.
Someone needs to get a grip.

It's a miracle

I've just had my hearing aids fitted.That's right two. Grief you can hear stuff you never knew existed. The sound of the keys clacking as I type this is quite loud and annoying. As the nice lady put some instructions in an envelope before I left the hospital I could hear the rustle of the paper as the envelope closed. Who knew that it rustled? Sound is definitely magnified in quite an alarming way. I can hear stupid stuff that I'm sure you are not meant to hear. The down side is that I can no longer claim not to hear any of Jan's many instructions. Damn.

I asked if I could get an aid like the one above but they gave me a very discreet over the ear type. Picture available upon request.

A short trip south

I'm too old for all this. Jan needed to be in Windsor on Saturday for someone's surprise birthday party and instead of her going down by train I drove her down on Saturday and went to visit my son and family in Eastbourne for one night.
The small hiccup to a longer stay was that we had to be back to attend a funeral on Monday morning so we had to drive back on Sunday.
Still, my son arranged for my old tennis partner to come for dinner on Saturday night so we had a fun, very boozy late night dinner (with four hours sleep just what you need before a six hour drive home.) 

My friend Ivan was laid to rest in a moving ceremony on Monday. I do miss him.

Pizza Rustica

Not a pizza in the traditional sense. This is a pie, filled a little like our huntsman type pies, but with Italian stuff (stuff being the technical description of produce.) Jan made one the other day because it's a traditional Easter dish and my mother tried it on Sunday. It received tremendous praise 'justa lika mamma useda to make.'

Personally I can take it or leave it and I'll try it again tonight no doubt. Jan made it with a layered filling but there are other versions.

Here's a recipe. 

Happy Halal Easter

I love chocolate. I particularly like Guylian Chocolate Seashells which makes buying chocolate for me quite easy.

Searching the sweety aisles on Friday, because I was told to go and buy myself an egg (isn't that kind), I spied some Guylian Easter eggs. Heaven.

But there was a little doubt in my mind. I'd read earlier in the week that you could now but an halal egg made by Guylian. In my greed I ignored this fact until I got home and checked the packaging. Sure enough there it was, a little halal symbol hidden down at the bottom.

I am now going to celebrate an halal Easter - how weird is that? 

Ivan

On Tuesday last we went to visit Ivan who was obviously very ill. He died on Friday.

In memory of a very funny, kind and clever man who always made me contemplate life.

I think about him constantly. RIP.

Resurrection

Why do people put stuff they are trying to forget about but not throw away into their knicker drawer? I was rooting around the other day looking for something and came across my old Nokia 3210 phone. A fairly similar looking model to the one about to be re-released. Then spying a small box I took a look inside and found a couple of old watches one of which I still quite like.

Both the phone and a watch have now been 'resurrected.' The phone for about £5 and the watch for £10. God knows I don't need either but it was quite a satisfying experience getting them both looking smart and working again. 

Steam cleaned

I had never been to a Turkish bath before and that changed on Wednesday last. Harrogate baths are in the magnificent Victorian building on Parliament Street. Jan was having yet more 'beauty' treatment in another part of the building so I whiled away the waiting time getting very hot and sweaty.

Grief now I know what it's like to steam a vegetable (yes Craig I know I'm a vegetable). OK you start with the steam room which is scalding hot. I only managed 10 minutes because I started to worry that my watch might cook, then after a shower you spend the next half hour in three different rooms of escalating heat. The last one so hot it was difficult to walk on the floor. After yet another shower you can cool down in yet another room (bypassing the freezing cold plunge pool which was definitely not for me.)

It was an interesting experience and one I'll definitely do again.

A tale of two cities

With visitors over the weekend we had two quite different meals out. One was outstanding and one disappointing.

The first was at The Star Inn at Harome. At any level it was difficult to criticise the food or service, it was outstanding. A top class meal in a thatched cottage, who would have thought it?

The second I won't name because Jan wrote directly to them and complained. A few days later a nice chap phoned and made all the right noises and said he would send us a voucher for £50 by way of recompense. See how easily we can be bribed.

We're still not sure how he got our phone number.

Weatherspoons

I have never knowingly been in a Weatherspoons pub before but have now visited what must be the grandest of all.
Jan was visiting Harrogate Turkish Baths for whatever women do in these places and I was scheduled to meet her. By mistake I entered the very grand place next door. Instead of going into the baths I walked into the most elegant pub you have ever seen. Take a look at their pictures.

Carlin Peas - update

After a bit of cajoling from me we eventually had the Carlin Peas. I was intrigued because never having heard of them before and with a very unappetising appearance (the peas not me) Jan cooked them and you know what they tasted like peas. I could have done without the addition of malt vinegar when serving them but they were actually quite nice.

IWD

Today is International Women's Day. I'm not sure why international women need a 'day' but there you go.
Is there such a thing as International Men's Day I hear you ask? Do you care?

PS. The answer is November 19th. See you did care!

Not another headache!

The question is do you still take the time off if you know that there are headaches in the family?

Paddy Wood

I was reminded by Jan this morning that I didn't write much last week. I presume she just wants to know what's going on!
Anyway, as the title doesn't really suggest I've been helping a chap, who lives nearby, to lay a more robust path through his bit of private woods. We use these very pretty woods from time to time and, after rain, some of the paths get very muddy and are difficult to walk on.
I responded to a plea for help that was posted at the entrance to the woods. It's very hard physical work removing stones from the adjacent river and after an hour or so on Monday mornings I'm wacked.
Still, Jan gives me a pat on the head which is all a man could ask for.
The top picture attempts to show a before and after shot of the path with Jan lurking in the distant background. The bottom picture attempts to show a finished section with snowdrops at the side.
David Bailey I am not.

Pardon

I suppose it had to happen sometime.
We were sitting watching television and Jan said, 'I hope that's not our car.'
'Sorry,' I said, 'what are you talking about?'
It wasn't until I walked outside that I could hear a house alarm nearby wailing its head off.
That and a bit of tinnitus in my left ear made me visit the doctor. He arranged a hearing test which has confirmed a hearing loss in both ears and the need for hearing aids.
The only upside to this is that I can now legitimately tell Jan that I didn't hear one of her many instructions. Pardon?

Lewis and Cooper

I needed to make a trip to Northallerton to get my eyes checked at Friarage Hospital. A small but cosy hospital we really like. 
However no trip to Northallerton can be complete without a visit to Lewis and Cooper. An unusual shop with just a hint of Fortnum and Mason. Full of goodies that are difficult to find elsewhere. Neither Ripon nor Harrogate have anything similar. Probably the nearest would be Harvey Nicks in Leeds but the selection wouldn't be anywhere near as big or as good. For me this is heaven.
Anyway we were in the shop on Wednesday and we both learnt something. Did you know that Sunday 2nd April is Carlin Pea Day? On the shelf next to this notice were unappetising looking bags of what looked like dried brown peas. Neither of us had ever heard of them and there appears to be quite a history. Something new to try.