snowdrops – Page 6 – derrickjknight

A Battle-Scarred Red Admiral

Had I had no success with the computer problems that beset me this morning, you would not be reading this post, and I may have gone off my rocker. Yesterday afternoon I found I could not, it seemed, access the internet on my Windows 8 laptop. After much grappling, I realised that the internet pages, through Google Chrome, were automatically minimised and could not be enlarged, having been hidden in the bar at the bottom of the screen. The Hewlett Packard phone help service was only available during the normal working week. On line support was not much use to me in the circumstances.

I usually rise rather early and spend an hour or so on the laptop. This was not possible today. Fortunately my head was clearer than it has been for two or three weeks. I was happily getting on with my iMac, when I received an alert advising me to replace the batteries in my wireless keyboard. I did so. It would not then connect to the computer. I kept swapping batteries around, to no avail.

It was good that Jackie got up early so we could have coffee together, because I couldn’t phone any help desks until 8 a.m. My first call was to Apple Care. They needed the serial number of my machine, which is accessed via ‘About this Mac’ on the screen. I couldn’t access this because I couldn’t type the password. I was getting a wee bit frazzled by then. A young woman called Sam managed, without the relevant number, to talk me through getting my keyboard and computer conversing with each other. This involved using the technique advocated by ‘The IT Crowd’, which is ‘turning it off and turning it on again’. Apparently I had been sending my Mac to sleep, rather that properly switching it off.

This didn’t take too long, and gave me confidence to telephone Hewlett Packard. A patient and helpful young man, eventually taking over my screen, spent an hour sorting out that issue. He thought ‘a bit of malware had got in there’. Never mind, we both learned something. I now know what a taff bar is, even if I can’t spell it; and my advisor knows what colons and semi-colons are. I can confidently state that a taff bar is not a watering hole for Welshmen, and perhaps my helper now knows that a semi-colon is not found in the human body.

The rest of the morning was sunny and mild. I took a wander around the garden to investigate what has been happening there whilst I have been holed up inside.

The whole plot was now carpeted with snowdrops that had just been poking through the soil three weeks ago.

A very large variety of hellebores hang their heads everywhere.

All the camellias, including some darker varieties than earlier were now sporting blooms.

Winter flowering plants such as cyclamens, pansies, and violas have thrived.

Ever since the first autumn fall, loosened leaves have fluttered in the wind, often initially taken for butterflies. Imagine my surprise when one careened past me and, settling on a gravel path, proved itself to be a very battle-scarred Red Admiral. The wings of this creature looked as if they had fed caterpillars once the nasturtiums had perished in the few days of frost.

So surprised was I that I looked up its life-span on Wikipedia, where I learned that it is possible for these members of the Lepidoptera to survive in the South of England during the period we have recently experienced.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s super sausage casserole (recipe), piquant cauliflower cheese (recipe), mashed potato, carrots and leaks. Sticky toffee pudding and custard was to follow. I finished the chianti and Jackie drank more of the zinfandel.

The Cot In The Kitchen

This morning I took a gentle amble down to Roger’s footpath and back. We now have a plentiful crop of snowdrops, more of which adorn the bank in front of the car park of The Royal Oak, in the garden of which,

by fashioning a target, Nick and his friend had put a broken and discarded road sign to good use.

Jackie’s chest infection lingers on, so, unfortunately we had to cancel our trip to watch the Bournemouth Lions Panto, starring our friend Barrie Haynes. I hope it went well.

After a laundry session I rescanned some early colour slides from 1964. In ‘Two Rooms’, I described how Vivien and I had begun our married life in my parents’ house in Wimbledon. There it was that the first of my late wives brought home our son in April that year.

Like many another young couple, our accommodation consisted of one bed-sitting room and a kitchen.

By November Michael slept in a cot in the kitchen. After he’d finished playing, that is.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s exquisite chicken jalfrezi and nutritious onion rice. She drank sparkling water and I drank Marques de Carano gran reserva 2008.

Not Exactly A Chair

Over coffee, Jackie and I began the day discussing the detail of the Churchill queue photographs posted yesterday. Even I, who had been there in January 1965, was surprised at what can be revealed by clicking on the images to enlarge them. This prompted me to add a postscript that you may find as fascinating as we found the exercise. Little did I know, when I pressed that shutter, that it would one day be possible to send those pictures and comments on them, for immediate consumption, across the world at the touch of another button.

Afterwards, I extended my gentle amble to the entrance to Roger’s fields. Primulas are now blooming on the verges of Downton Lane, and, on this more overcast day, yesterday’s vibrant tree bark colours have made way for gentle sage greens and silvery greys.

First chatting to Carl in the pub car park, I engaged in a longer conversation with Paul, a very friendly builder living at number 25, who was clipping his hedge. He noticed me photographing a pine branch that had been ripped off and thrown across the other side of the road. He told me it was very unusual for these limbs to be torn from the trees, and that even now it would be very difficult to break off the cones.

After lunch, as today would have been Jackie’s mother’s birthday, we drove to Everton Nurseries where we bought primulas and snowdrops which Jackie planted by her Mum’s plot in Walkford Woodland Burial Ground. Only natural woodland flowers are to be set there. Although the primulas are cultivated, they will, if they survive, soon revert.

We then moved on to Molly’s Den in search of a chair, and instead came away with a rather attractive bevelled mirror which we think is probably contemporary with our house.

A rack of pork ribs in barbecue sauce provided our evening sustenance. This was accompanied by Jackie’s savoury rice, this time including and enough finely diced vegetables as to suggest it was an exquisite biriani, and crisp red cabbage stir fry. Jackie drank Peroni, whilst I chose Lidl’s 2012 Bordeaux Superieur.

Sea Flowers

This morning I made a start on reading ‘Madame Bovary’.

Later, in a successful bid to avoid the rain, I walked down to The Splash and back via the church footpath. The sunshine and showers nature of the day and the speed of the wind produced ever-changing skies, bright blue clouding over in white and grey, and vice versa, with the sun regularly emerging and lending everything still bearing raindrops a brilliant sparkle.
John was busy clearing the elder, that I had thought was a buddleia when I noticed it on 28th January.

Wherever you venture into the forest at the moment, you are likely to come across scatterings of what look to me like crab apples, like those on the bank of the stream flowing under Running Hill. Now I think about it, they are almost always near streams. I can only imagine someone is feeding the ponies in this manner when they pause their cropping to slake their thirst.
One stream the banks of which are not so bestrewn is that which runs beneath the concrete bridge of The Splash ford. There, the water flows fast enough for a build-up of spume that echoes the lichen on the surrounding trees.

Snowdrops have pierced the sward of All Saints Churchyard, and another riven yew rent in two has somehow spared the gravestones between which part of it has fallen.

In fact the rain held off for the rest of the day and Jackie drove us out to Hengistbury Head, making this a two walk day for me. I walked along the beach, up Warren Hill and back along the cliff top to the car park cafe where Jackie sat with her puzzles, cake, and coffee.

This was the roughest sea and fiercest wind I have yet experienced on the Dorset coast. Most exhilarating. Occasionally the incoming surges from the ocean clutched at my feet.

On the shingled edge of the beach I watched the frequent waves rolling towards the breakwaters and turning to cream as they careered up the sand and flung what my Japanese friend Rie Sug tells me her compatriots call sea flowers against the rocks, sending them furling and unfurling along the beach. Our word spume, for this foam, is rather less attractive than the oriental one. This version made the same phenomenon seen at The Splash this morning skimpy by comparison. Rather like comparing the power of a full symphonic orchestra with a piece of gentle chamber music.
The wintry sun that had seemed quite powerful on the occasions it peeped out this morning, when compared with the other elements in play in this wilder environment, seemed rather weak.
Walking along the cliff top I was intrigued by a woman’s voice berating what I assumed to be a recalcitrant child. Peering down I saw that the miscreants were a pair of red dogs. They seemed to have got the message and were allowed to romp ahead.
After I joined Jackie she drove us along the coast road to Boscombe. We had a brief sojourn in a car park at Southbourne, where beach huts clung to the side of the cliff, as we watched the sun doing its best.
We turned round at Bournemouth and headed for home where we enjoyed another very tasty dinner. This consisted of roasted chicken thighs marinaded in lemon juice, coriander, parsley, and a chilli; accompanied by roasted red and orange peppers, onions and baby tomatoes; cauliflower cheese; mashed potato and swede; and broccoli. Jackie drank Hoegaarden whist I drank Lidl’s Bordeaux Superieur, so the drinks choice was back to normal.

Why?

Photograph number 43 in the ‘through the ages’ series was probably taken by Vivien and printed by her brother Bernard in 1962. Bernard always used a square format. Here, I sit on a cast iron and wooden-slatted bench in the garden of 18 Bernard Gardens to which we had moved as a family a couple of years before, alongside my brother Joseph.
In a fascinating coincidence, my parents and I each produced five children with eighteen years between them. Unlike my Dad, I needed three wives to achieve the round handful.
Dad was a man, of his time, who would never borrow money for any purchase. When, in the late sixties, the large Victorian house began to suffer from subsistence damage, the quotation for repairs was £400. My father could not be persuaded to borrow that sum on mortgage, so it was sold and the remaining members of the family moved to Morden.
This morning I received a phone call from Sam and Malachi in Perth, Western Australia, and had long conversations with each of them. My grandson chuckled away when I asked him: ‘Why?’. He has, so far, despite distinct O’Neill genetic traits, retained his English accent. The attached photograph is taken from Holly’s Facebook page of 26th December last year.
Snowdrops have arrived in our garden. I spotted some as I began my walk of the Football Green/Shave Wood loop this afternoon. They were not far from the sawn-off cherry tree stump, which is all that remains of the casualty that was taped off in December.
A trail of white plumage, reminiscent of Hansel’s breadcrumbs, on Running Hill led to the remains of a large, now unidentifiable, white bird.
At the bottom of the hill, the gentleman who lives at Orchard Cottage opened his gate and crossed to give a pony on the green a tasty morsel. He had to be quick to return to his garden. The dark brown creature and its white companion, having had their interest aroused, wanted more and were intent upon laying siege. That is one of the hazards of that particular kindness to animals.

Further on down into Minstead, alongside the pedestrian safety path that runs by the most dangerous stretch of road, the smoke rising from a bonfire in an adjacent field blended with the subtle greys of the clouds above.
On Lyndurst Road, just before the junction with Football Green, a number of fairly large trees have fallen recently. Huge tyre tracks provided evidence that some rather heavy machinery had been used to clear them from the road.
Foraging ponies are looking a great deal more healthy than they did this time last year, when they were so cold and wet and their ribs were beginning to protrude.

As I turned the corner at Shave Wood, the skies, having been somewhat obscured by the trees, came back into view. How they had altered since I first saw the bonfire blend. Big skies are a feature of the countryside, and I find their constant changes of hue and formation fascinating. At that moment the artist had laid gentle brush strokes of yellow and indigo over the bright blue base wash.

Visible from high up on the hill approaching London Minstead, Minstead Lodge, like the Gothic pile it is, stood out against the rainbow trout tints in the sky. From Bull Lane I could look down on the still burning bonfire I had seen from the other side of the valley. The cloudscape painter had changed his or her palette yet again, as the setting sun slowly turned the gold to pink.
A BT Openreach technician high on a ladder clamped to a telegraph pole opposite the Minstead Lodge drive in Seamans Lane was applying some kind of testing device. He agreed that he was quite busy at the moment.
Further on I met Oliver. Not my grandson. A greyhound. His owner’s mother informed me that he had not been fast enough to pass muster as a racing animal, so was in fact a rescue dog. He seemed friendly enough, and ignored the baying of neighbouring hounds who had picked up either his or my scent.
For dinner this evening, Jackie produced roast belly of pork with sage and onion stuffing, roast potatoes, and vegetables. This is a most underrated cut of meat, that, when of Lidl quality cooked long and slow, offers a most flavoursome meal. Creme brûlée was to follow. I drank more of the Bergerac.

Access Denied

Jackie needed to have yet another headlight replaced this morning. She drove us to Wells Garage in Ringwood where she left the car, she went into the town, and I walked to Rockford End and back.

Hurst Road lies very near the garage. It is a cul-de-sac with a footpath leading off it. I followed this until it joined the Avon Valley Path; crossed the road at Rockford and walked up a minor road to Rockford End, whence I retraced my steps. The sun emerged from grey clouds in time for my return.

The footpaths ran through and around a series of lakes, the main ones being those of Blashford. Access to these expanses of water was very restricted. They were fenced in with wire mesh, cable, or barbed wire. Consequently there were only a few vantage points from which to enjoy the views. Warning notices proclaimed Deep Water, Private Property, a fishing club, and Spinnaker Sailing Club. Followers of the Avon Valley Path were restricted to narrow strips, now largely dried out, criss-crossed with tree roots of varying thicknesses.

At the Hurst Road end, a couple of scattered piles of plumage testified to an overnight reduction in Ringwood’s avian population, and to satisfied predators’ stomachs. This footway, in part, ran alongside a still swollen stream of clear running water heard trickling around the tree roots and over gravel stones. A couple of constructed bridges were supplemented by those formed by fallen trees.

George Hall’s big day, helping to celebrate Queen Elizabeth’s 40th anniversary twenty one years ago, seems almost forgotten. Snowdrops in bloom, and daffodils in bud, pierced the rough hedgerows.

Through the various barriers, I couldn’t see much of the waterfowl I could hear waking up to spring. Of the sounds I recognised, geese were trumpeting and coots piping. The former, in twos and threes occasionally flapped, honking, overhead.

The most open stretch of water, not available to the public, was the domain of Spinnaker Sailing Club, the New Forest’s private provision. Beyond this, a private fishing club had warning notices fixed, it seemed, to every other tree. Here, the footpath narrowed considerably.

On reaching the road at Rockford, I struggled to pick up the Avon Valley Path, walked around a bit, and being unable to find it, took the minor road up to Rockford End. This proved fortuitous, for the wooded slopes and farmland provided beautiful views, especially as the sun had then made it through the blanket of cloud.

I hadn’t got far up this road before a weathered footpath sign indicated a way through a field of dried mud. This was just beyond a still waterlogged stretch containing a knackered old bull. On my approach, he staggered arthritically from the mudbath he had been enjoying, turned to observe me, then sidled off. Even I didn’t consider him much of a threat. Nevertheless, the walker’s way was barred by a gate. Actually five barred. The field was filled with cattle. I continued on up the road to Rockford End. Spinnaker Sailing Club’s expanse of water shone in the distance, and nearer farm buildings soaked up the sun.

The car repaired, we set off back to Minstead. Jackie took a road she hadn’t tried before, and we were soon lost. But, we are retired, we had all day, and the sun was shining. So what did it matter? We drove up and down beautiful forest landscapes and envied characterful, idyllically placed, houses until we came to a spot I recognised. It was the road I had so recently walked across at Rockford. I proudly told my driver where she was headed, and where she would end up if she went in the opposite direction. ‘So it said’, said she, referring to the signpost we had just passed and I, for once, hadn’t needed. Here was I, attempting to show off my newly acquired knowledge, and that was all the thanks I got.

Jackie made up for this by demonstrating that last night’s meal could be just as good revamped. Especially when accompanied by Lussac Saint Emilion 2010. Or even her Hoegaarden.

Finally, episode 7 got us up to date with ‘Call the Midwife’.

P’tang Yang Kipperbang

For some time now Jackie has been collecting toys, books, and dressing up material for visits from grandchildren. She has now taken this a stage further. Buying such as Disney Princess dresses in various stages of use and abuse from her favourite charity shops, she has washed, ironed, mended, and added flouncy petticoats and sequins to the originals. Now they are nine. They are too good to dump in the dressing up box, and must be hung up.

This morning I walked the two fords ampersand, amending its shape by walking up the footpath past All Saints churchyard. The track alternated between a quagmire and a clear gravel river bed. The last time I took this path the two horses in the adjacent field were grazing in a blizzard.

There was such an array of spring bulbs emerging in the graveyard that I was almost afraid to walk in it. Careful as I was, it was almost impossible not to tread on any. Snowdrops and crocuses were in bloom, while daffodils were coming into their own. They provided a thick pile carpet of a white, golden yellow, and purple abstract design on an emerald ground. Treetrunks and gravestones were festooned with these harbingers of spring.

After a light lunch Jackie drove us to Mat and Tess’s in Upper Dicker where we, together with Becky, Flo and Ian, joined our son and daughter-in-law for a belated Christmas celebration. Tess had been ill at the end of December. We exchanged presents and pulled Flo’s crackers. Matthew couldn’t resist tossing a packet of Jacob’s Cream Crackers onto the table to save me going to the other room for the party type. As always we enjoyed good family time with a deal of hilarity. Tess, a superb cook, produced an excellent tagine and couscous meal. Somehow the meat dish was always full. Her homemade Christmas cake, still moist, was to follow. Whilst I had been in France there was a repeat showing of P’tang Yang Kipperbang on Channel 4. This was a wonderful film about adolescent yearning set against a cricket commentary from the legendary John Arlott, originally shown on that channel’s second night in 1982. Whenever it is repeated it is a must for family viewing because Mat and Becky, along with many of their classmates, were extras in the film. We were entertained by renditions of their respective performances. Mat in particular came in for a certain amount of parody. It seems that he took his acting role seriously, but that wasn’t wholly appreciated at the time.

An interesting issue of historical accuracy was raised during the filming. The production was set in that post-war period before there were any black and Asian children in Wimbledon. Those young people were therefore unable to appear in the film. Given that those who did appear in the film were given a fee, £5 per scene, I do hope those who were excluded were similarly compensated.