Backwards In High Heels

Black & Yellow Hawk Down

First I offer you a huge pallet fire and now a helicopter crash in my own back garden! This is indeed a blog of action.

I went out to water our garden this morning (sorry southern readers, didn’t mean to make you jealous but we haven’t got a hosepipe ban….mmmm, look at my rubber tubing spouting…)

I looked across, sans glasses so everything was in a beautiful mist like when Miss Ellie used to appear on Dallas, and could see something yellow resting on my greenhouse tent. ‘Mmm’ I thought, not able to make out the form, ‘I wonder if I left a pair of secateurs there?’

Over I went and found…a black and yellow remote control helicopter in a rather bent fashion. I don’t think this is its first crash landing though due to copious amounts of duct tape already present. There is no sign of a miniature pilot – perhaps he bailed out.

I’ve put a note up in the local shop so hopefully someone will claim what has once been their pride and joy I’m sure.

This isn’t the first time I have found something foreign in our garden despite the fact we live in a cul-de-sac and have a totally enclosed back garden. In fact we are very lucky garden wise. As we are on a corner our back garden is about three times bigger than others in the area. It is enclosed by a medieval hawthorn tree boundary, private and safe for the cats.

Despite having a closed in garden I have in the past gone out to find a rottweiler sat in the middle of the lawn (he could have just walked into other peoples gardens but decided to clear a 3foot gate to visit us. He was as soft as muck, thankfully!), someone’s pet rabbit (who terrorised our cats) and a cat with a tag which said in Spanish it had full rabies protection. Most animals around here seem to think we are some sort of drop in centre.

There does seem to be a wind tunnel effect down the driveaway and things, such as autumn leaves, get blown down into our garden and collect in little piles. In the past I have found amongst the wind presents an in-date lottery ticket (not a winner) and a five pound note.

Who said gardening wasn’t rewarding?

I Give Myself Up For Medical Research

(Before I start – my Il Divo review is up at BBC Derby if you want to pop over)

Seven days of wheat filled eating left before the final blood test and then the removal of all things gluten.

Gran (gawd bless her) went straight to the bookshop and has sent me 4 gluten free recipe books. So I am slowly reading up and planning ahead for a life without gluten.

I feel as if my life has been secretly infiltrated by the hell demon of the kitchen Gillian McKeith. Alternatives to wheat read like a pet food shop list. Millet? Millet! Get me a mirror and a bell why not.

But I am hardly going to starve, it is simply a matter of being inventive and imaginative though one very serious wheat free no-no has come to light.

Cake.

Madeira cake, fruit cake, Jonathan Cake.

Mmmm, Jonathan Cake. If I licked him would I bloat (after being arrested and having an injunction served on me)?

I think in the interest of gluten intolerance research I should be allowed to lick Jonathan Cake just so we can all be sure.

And in the interest of scientific integrity I will of course need to lick a control, Daniel Craig, but there again he could set of a slight reaction because he starred in Layer Cake (this must be what they mean about gluten hiding in things you wouldn't imagine).

So perhaps a further control should be introduced, Ewan McGregor.

I am willing to make this sacrifice and risk my own health in the name of medical research.

Tech Tags: coeliac, gluten+intolerance, wheat+intolerance, Jonathan+Cake, Daniel+Craig, Ewan+McGregor

Too Darn Hot...

Right I am bored of the hot weather now, turn down the bloody thermostat weather gods!

It has confirmed if, sorry when, I win the lottery I am not moving my lock, stock and barrel fat cats to a hot country. I can’t do sunbathing any more either, boredom and rigor mortis sets in after five minutes and I only go a darker shade of white anyhow.

I like winter, I like the cold, I like huge jumpers that cover my lumps and bumps. I have reverse SAD!

And it is true we are weather obsessed in the UK. We have so many Old Wive’s Tales and sayings about such things.

Swallows high, staying dry. Swallows low, wet will blow.

Red Sky in the morning, Shepherd’s warning.

Red sky at night, Pallet Yard’s alight.

Back to our big fire…there is a rumour it may have been arson. I wondered if it was a confused terrorist thinking he was targeting Palletstine.