Sunday 18 August 2013

grass foals and new shoes



The clouds have been gathering for some time now so the farmer's been quick to cut down and bale up. I only took this photo a couple of days ago and already the bales have gone, the stubble ploughed up and stinking fertiliser sprayed over everything. The beginning of a new start and for the horses, Harry and Trude a new set of shoes.


oh I was rather hoping for some Jimmy Choos
 The farrier - after remarking that Trude looked as if she was expecting a grass foal - announced that actually her feet weren't the best and she needed to be fed gelatine for a year. This, as all guitarists know is really good for strengthening nails and in her case hooves. Just give her a cube of jelly a day he said.
So I nipped down to the shop and bought strawberry flavoured jelly in bulk -  but would she eat it? It was a bit like giving a cat a toffee. She struggled for a while then spat it out and Harry hoovered it up. Not the plan. Harry's feet are so good they grow in front of your eyes. So now I'm left with loads of jelly in the cupboard.  I can feel some trifles coming up.
Trude expecting her foal made of grass


I've bought some hay in preparation for the winter which I've piled up in the shed. I see that the cats have discovered it as an extra special place to sleep. I think they look as if they're stacked up on the shelves of the village shop waiting to be purchased alongside with the Garibaldi biscuits, Gypsy Creams and oh - strawberry jelly.






Things are making a last concerted effort to flower before being struck down by cold weather. My pelargoniums are putting up a good show. I'm waiting on the dahlias which are yet to do something. Probably as a result of all those earwigs.





Exam results in this week. I'm so glad I don't have to take any more exams. In my day they sent them through the post so you could go and cry on your own somewhere - now you all hugger mugger up at school and compare genius's. How devastating it is to hear someone go "Oh no - Only Ten A stars and a B!"

My late friend and fellow poet Clare Marlow(1944 -2002} wrote this great poem about school.


The Truth About a Vacuum.




In the fourth form, our three hobbies,
giggling, laughing, shrieking,
spilled from bedroom to playground to class
where teachers in sports jackets
corralled us in double-periods
and O-levelled our hysteria.

One day, after break,
Mr Benson (Physics)
briefly engaged our unicellular brains.
"Nature abhors a vacuum." he wrote largely,
which explains the piston, the siphon,
and possibly the universe.

It has been disappointedly so.
The energetic adolescent reservoir
mercifully ran dry,
and nature's abhorrence filled the vacuum
with calm and useful wisdom?
Sadly, no. With profitless worry and indecision
that moves neither siphon nor piston.

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