There's this photo challenge running around to post one black & white picture a day, depicting your life, with no people and no explanations. I got tagged by a friend but, I'd already read the superbly subversive attitude to the challenge taken by Ally Bean and thus inspired, I decided to accept the challenge but... Continue Reading →

... was my father's birthday. This year we are marking it without him. We'll be taking some of those Chinese lanterns up onto a nearby hill, lighting them, before sending them up into the night sky with our love and final goodbyes. My father was a great raconteur. Any time we had a gathering, he'd... Continue Reading →

As part of my current training programme, I've been working with the power of our 5 senses - those of sight, sound, feeling, smell and taste. If asked, I'd probably say that my least developed sense is that of smell. So I was surprised to experience a powerful smell trigger whilst in a shop selling... Continue Reading →

I stole this idea from Em @ Pretty Lil Book Blog - for which my thanks - but I've also talked about it at my book club, so I decided to try and get it down on paper, especially as personal taste is really hard to quantify. I'm a fairly hard nut to crack in... Continue Reading →

Even in a period when my reading time is having to be strictly rationed (I'm doing an accelerated training course), I simply have to read. I know you'll understand that my fellow readers ... Now I'm normally a lover of big chunky books (I may have written about that before) but, under the circumstances, I've... Continue Reading →

Remember Paris? Remember Nice? Remember writing how those violent events made you feel? Remember being rebuked for those feelings, more specifically for not sharing similar thoughts and emotions about events in other parts of the world? Yup, me too ... But what about Las Vegas? What about this horrendous event which happened in the USA?... Continue Reading →

... cancer. When you've had cancer and been one of the fortunate ones, there's a feeling that you must make a difference, with how you make that difference being the only question. Like many of us, I flounder about in a variety of ways, but one of those ways is writing about it. And I... Continue Reading →

This week is Banned Books week. I've always - somewhat naively no doubt - believed the books were predominantly banned for A Good Reason.  But, having taken a look at some of the books banned, all I can surmise is that my idea of A Good Reason and that of the various authorities who've been... Continue Reading →

... by which I mean Christmas, of course. Except that it also seems to be a rude word when heard any earlier than November. But being an organised sort, I've started to browse a bit. I've been looking for inspired stocking fillers for Himself, who's incredibly difficult to shop for ... worse than any man... Continue Reading →

Summer outings = military shows, at least they do with Himself ... Oh, we do fit in the odd trip to the seaside and up into the downs overlooking the coast but I'll not bore you with pictures of sandcastles and scenery. I'll jump straight in with a military show, but this one had a... Continue Reading →