Sailing by at night

Since my retirement from teaching, I generally sleep fairly well, but last night was one of those 'nuits blanches' when I was still awake to hear one of my favourite pieces of music, Sailing By, written in the 1950s by Ronald Binge. It was chosen as a prelude to the Radio 4 shipping forecast just before 1a.m. apparently because it is a piece that can be started or stopped at any point, which is useful as it can be fitted in to allow the length of time necessary for the subsequent forecast. (Hope I'm making sense to you here, I'm getting a bit confused!) So when the lads out at sea hear this music, they are all set to listen to the forecast.
It also reminds me of my three year old self when part of my daily routine was to sit down at 1.45pm for 'Listen with Mother' which was then followed by the shipping forecast. Those strange names , Dogger, German Byte, Fisher, Forties, Bailey, Rockall, Shannon are still familiar to me and I am not much wiser about them now than I was then, although I have now found this interesting site which gives a very clear explanation of the shipping forecast. I had no idea, for instance, that each bulletin consists of 350 words. Now that makes me wonder why 'Sailing By' needs to be of variable length. Maybe I can think about that if I am awake and listening to it again tonight.

Rheilffordd Blaenau Ffestiniog

As we in north Wales had a fine, sunny day yesterday (Did I mention that in an earlier post?), Keith and I set forth on our wanderings which took us, by a convoluted route, to Tanygrisiau where we happened to see two of the narrow guage steam engines. This railway's original purpose was to transport slate from local quarries but, with the decline of the slate industry, it closed in 1946. Enthusiasts, however, stepped in and reopened the line in 1954 and it is now a leading example of railway preservation.
We also drove through Beddgelert, which I love visiting when the rhodedendrons are in bloom. This is the home of the grave of the famous dog Gelert, who, legend has it, was left by his master, Prince Llywelin, to guard his baby son. On his return, the prince discovered, to his horror, that the child was nowhere to be seen and the hound was covered in blood. With a cry of rage, he drew his sword and killed him. Only on further investigation, did he discover the baby safe underneath the overturned cradle and the body of a wolf, which had been killed by Gelert to save the baby. In reparation, Prince Llywelin buried Gelert by the river and erected a memorial to him.
Rumour has it that this story is complete fiction and was thought up by a local publican to attract more visitors to the village, but if it is true, you can bet your life that never again did Llywelin jump in with his size sixes before first checking the facts!

Ring the changes!

As we up at this end of the country are about to have a 'nice day' weatherwise, Keith and I may well be toddling forth to search for yet more wonderful eating places in north Wales, but meanwhile, let me spread the word.
For those of you who are currently prostrate in admiration before my new template and no doubt wondering aloud at my incredible talent vis a vis the old html etc, (like good old Yorkshire Pudding, for instance), I have a confession to make. Not that I'm going to admit to being thick rather than talented - oh no - rather that I owe it all to someone else's incredible talent (which could mean that rather than being talented, I am just your average, bog standard anorak, I suppose.)
Step forward Amanda, she of Bloggerbuster fame.
Get yourself over to her amazing site right now, click on 'Download templates' and Bob's your uncle. She has also written very detailed and easy to follow tutorials on how to transfer your widgets to a new template and other such delights. For those of you 'dahn sarth' wondering what to do on a wet and miserable bank holiday (Am I overdoing the crowing just a bit?), there are delights on this site to keep you busy for hours.
If you asked Keith, he might mention moments of extreme frustration and inordinate swearing while I was doing mine. It goes without saying that this would be gross exaggeration and character assassination, of course.

Back home

When I set off from Bristol this morning, the weather, in true bank holiday style was wet, wet and more wet, which got a bit boring after a while so, a few miles from Spaghetti Junction, I was interested to see a sign on the overhead gantry proclaiming to all and sundry that it would be wise to slow down as there were 'animals at large.'
"Aha!" I thought, "This should brighten up a dull journey," and I began to wonder what sort of animals I was about to see. Giraffes? Elephants? The odd rhinoceros? Well, I have been reading 'The Life of Pi' recently, hence the fact that my thoughts turned immediately to zoo animals rather than farm or domestic ones.
Disappointment! Apart from a Canada goose legging it smartly along the hard shoulder, nothing else was in sight. How typical - arriving when the show's over!
Mind you, later on, I did see a whole lot of lemmings hurtling back home from the car boot sale at Chirk but it was a poor substitute, especially as the resulting queue on my route was so long I felt I was losing the will to live.
Still, I arrived home safe and sound, just in time for Formula 1 on telly! So glad I didn't miss that.....(not!)

Anyone for a wedding?

Walking along the High Street and what should we see but this.

Message for E.D. Grandad says that, when the time comes, he will treat you to a car like this.

Nice to be missed

Phone calls from Keith when I'm away go something like this:
"I got up this morning and sat here for an hour waiting for my cup of tea, before I remembered that you weren't here."
"I've just looked in the fridge and all that's in there is a big echo."
In case anyone gets the wrong idea, he is only joking, but it is quite nice to be missed...

I'm not here, I'm there

Today I'm not here - I'm there instead, which means, I'm not at home, I'm on a short visit to see Dad in Bristol. E.D. recently bought a wireless router for Dad so that he can use his laptop in the living room rather than having to be in the back room on the desktop all the time or have wires all over the floor. She bought it ... and left it here for me to sort out, which I am trying to do - honest!
The problem is that it's a wireless router, not a wireless modem router, which would have made things easier. Keith decided to sort it out remotely and we spent a couple of happy hours trying to set that up, but it was refusing to co-operate, so we have retired defeated for today.
Oh well, tomorrow is another day...