Reality Check at the Reality Check-out..........

Jackie was hard at work editing in London on Saturday, so I mustered the entire crew (me) and spent the day washing, sweeping, cleaning, getting in coal, wood and water, doing the re-cycling, the gash, the ash-can and the compost bin.

All in all, a day of such proper 21st Century Man right-on-ness that the smug-o-meter was right up in the red 'danger-do-not-exceed' level of the dial.

Then I went to Tresco.

Ah, the joys of The Scilly Isles Supermarket.

I even had a list:

Clumping cat litter.............. shelf empty

Sparkling water.................. ditto

China's favourite kitten biccies..likewise

red finger chillies...............sod all available in the Milton branch

I actually felt really annoyed.

For about three minutes.

Then a thought percolated through my brain... (like making good coffee, it takes some time, and can go very wrong if rushed....)

I had instead filled my trolley with all manner of good (and, need I add, substantially reduced) provender, including a whole free range chicken......

My Dad ate his first steak in Tokyo in the early 1950's when he was in the navy.

He was born in 1928.......

We so soon forget how lucky we are. We live in times of the most astonishing plenty.

My getting annoyed at the absence of a few comestibles actually rather shamed me, when I consider the privations my parents' generation endured before, during and after The Second World War.......

I popped back the following day and purchased all the missing items on my list.

And not a queue nor a spiv in sight.

Hmmmmmmmmm.

We are flushed. With success...

I have just succeeded in first blocking and then unblocking our loo.

It was hardly disgusting at all.

I just felt the world should know.....

Birthday Treat.......

It was my birthday on January 4th.

January 4th is pretty poor, timing wise, if you wish to celebrate a birthday with a big party, lots of cake, presents and the joy of staying up late.

Everyone's just done all of that ad nauseam.......

Yes, January 4th seems, almost traditionally, the day when we turn our backs on celebration and look forward to the New Year's crop of Inland Revenue Income Tax Returns, credit card and Tax Bills, overdrafts and bank loans.

In short, it's a sod of a day to have a birthday.

I celebrated this year by pulling a ten and a half hour shift in the Hole Making Shop.

Whoop-de-do........

But they did let me off twenty minutes early, so I picked Jackie up from Cambridge station, we phoned-in an order at the Chinese Take-Away in the village, took it back to Pippin and consumed it by the fire with a cheeky red I'd bought, heavily discounted, at Tresco (The Scilly Isles supermarket........)

So far, so mellow.

(After all, now I'm in my 49th year, you can't expect too much in the way of the sort of heads-down-no-nonsense-mindless-boogie behaviour of my (not necessarily birthday) parties of yore that have now passed into legend.....)

I had just started to seriously nod-out in front of the wood-burner, when my sainted wife announced she was unhappy with the state of Pippin's mooring lines and was off to check them.

Did I mention the gale that was blowing outside?

To give you an idea of it's ferocity, our wind turbine charge-indicator normally shows around 3 amps in a stiff breeze. It topped out at 19 amps, switched itself off, then proceeded to make some 'ooh lawd, I've just buggered me bearings' growling-type noises.

All night long.......

But I digress......

I wasn't about to let Jackie prance about on the foredeck alone and unobserved in the teeth of such a gale. So I very sportingly agreed to join her.

We'd just got another line ashore to relieve the strain on our bow mooring post ( a lusty 4" job, but not concreted in, so it was wobbling like a loosening tooth with Pippin's 26 tonnes on the draw-string.........

Then I looked upstream.....

Rob and Julie's "Friendly Fox" had pulled her stern pin and was at right angles to the bank...........

I could go on about the frantic phone calls, frantic bashing on the roof of the boat, the neighbours who came to help, the sleeping tablets, the rain and the wind,( oh, the wind!), but suffice to say, The Fox was eventually safely moored-up with extra pins and double preventer backstays. We then trotted round our wind-blown mooring with torches, pins and sledgehammers in hand making sure everyone else was safe.

Time to bed?

Ten past midnight.

It's good to know I can still show myself a good time.......

Happy Birthday!!!!

A question posed........

This question came to me in the long dark watches of last night. (I woke up at three and had the very Dickens of a job getting back to sleep...)

What is the correct anatomical term for the funny-bone?

You know, the one in the elbow that tingles like billy-oh if inadvertantly bashed, leaving you uncertain whether to laugh or wince.....?

I only ask because, if the sense of smell resides in the nose, sight in the eyes, hearing in the ears and touch in the tips of your fingers, then the funny-bone is, obviously, where the sense of humour resides.

I also ask because James told me another Higgs Boson joke. (He and Amy dropped by for some supper the other night on the way back to Lucky Duck from Christmas visiting).

' " Two pints of lager and a packet of pork scratchings, please."

A Higgs boson particle walks into a bar.'

Hmmmmmm.............Perhaps you had to be there, really....

But then again, always handy to know in case you bump into any particle physicists at tonight's celebrations.

I'll bet they'll nearly have an accident.......

Christmas Crackers.....

Don't worry, this is not a post concerning any problems I may have had obtaining my medication over the holidays, and the likely up-shot thereof......

No, it's just a feeble excuse to pass on a couple of Christmas-cracker style jokes, to whit:

'The Archbishop sees a Higgs boson particle zooming down the nave of Canterbury Cathedral.

"Oi!!", says the Archbish, "You can't come in here!"

"But Rowan", says the particle, "Without me, you can't have Mass......."

Boom-tish.

Following the recent announcement of the bankruptcy and forthcoming closure of Blacks, camping, hiking and outdoor pursuits specialists, the following slogan appeared in the window of one of their branches:

"Now is the winter of our discount tents........."

While I cannot make any claim of authorship, (or, indeed, exhibit any willingness to share the blame......),I thought my readers might enjoy them.

And on that note, may I wish all three of you a Very Happy New Year!!!

Wibblings...

'To wibble' is a verb aboard the good ship Pippin.

It's a regular verb, so (apart from the now rarely used 'thou wibble-eth'), it has common currency both in this blog and aboard the boat and in the life which it purports to be about.

To wibble is to talk nonsense, either as a result of over-tiredness, over-indulgence in [fill in alcoholic beverage of choice here], or just for the joy of trying to catch hold of the smoke of passing whimsy and share it with others.

I wibble a lot.

You may have noticed this..........

Wibbling is soft. It should never offend, for it is playful.

It's heart is good.

So of what should I wibble this night?

Of a kitten-cat called China who flows from my hands like an upturned pail of water?

Of the wind turbine and it's song of many keys this breezy night?

Or the gurgle and slap of the wind-wrought white-caps against Pippin's flanks?

The white fragments of the waning moon on the river's face?

The ticking of the woodburner as the embers glow......

It is a most beautiful evening here.

I hope the verbal scribble has helped me share it with you......

A glimpse of The Snark!!!

A quick post, this, just before I dash off for a late shift at The Hole Making Shop.

I've just heard on the wireless that scientists at The Large Hadron Collider may have had a glimpse of Mr Higg's Remarkably Elusive Boson! (See previous posts).

Now, I don't like doing biblical quotes: you can so easily come across as having your head stuck so far up your own fundamentalism as to not see Christmas coming with all the fairy lights on.......

But the report did bring to mind the bit about 'that which we see through a glass darkly.....'

Such are glimpses of God.

And so, it would seem, are those of The God Particle.......