Incredible Orchids

To brighten Danni's room following her surgery, I bought her some blue orchids.  I've always loved these magnificent flowers, particularly the ones of unusual colors, but these blue ones are just too incredible...

A talent for humor

I couldn't help myself, I just had to post this, a recent posting by my daughter Nicolette, who's humor never fails to amuse and impress me.  Check out her very entertaining blog  www.nicolettemorgan.blogspot.com

Ode to the guy downstairs

Ah, the drunken babbling of the guy downstairs....
your voice is like a rubber mallet gently pounding away at my frontal lobe.
your knowledge of early 90's alternative rock music is unrivaled and very impressive to the ladies.
your persistence in the use of the word "dude", despite it being 2011, implies a "devil may care" attitude and a refusal to follow the rules.
you talk with ease on subjects about which you know nothing, never letting a lack of understanding or intellectual inadequacy stop you from making your point.
from the floor above, I hear you addressing the street below,
when you speak, I feel the need to clear my throat, but I don't, incase you should hear me and possibly try to use that gravel filled loud speaker in the front of your face to acknowledge my existence.
if I had to live with a voice like yours, I would probably be drunk too.

Reasons To Kill !

Back in June this year, while in Bocas, I wrote  "Life and Death in the Bay" a pretty typical post from me where I stood on my proverbial soap box and shouted my condemnation of the cruelty in killing the lionfish for sport.  Of course I hadn't waited to discover the actual reasons for the killings, so outraged was I at this new sport, I must add here that I'm not condemning fishing, but the act of killing for fun and then throwing away the creature, it's a waste of a life.
Then yesterday, in England of all places, I discovered that the lionfish which are currently breeding at a rapid rate in the Caribbean, are being hunted and killed because they are devastating the local fish stocks.
Lionfish are not indigenous to the Caribbean, but are flourishing and breeding there in rapid numbers after being released from fish tanks.
The impact the lionfish are having on the fishing community has caused the fishermen to take drastic measures to try and get rid of them.  Personally I think it would be better to try and catch them and put them back in the Pacific, where they originated from, but I realize this is impractical, so at this time killing them seems to be the only option.
The fishermen in Honduras have come up with an ingenious way of attempting to cope with the problem, they claim to have trained sharks to hunt the lionfish.  I don't know if like the way this is done, but needless to say desperate measures are required;  divers wound the lionfish, and this attracts the sharks.  I suppose if sharks eventually start hunting the lionfish naturally, then it would just be nature taking its course.
But I can't help feeling sorry for these poor creatures, even if they are toxic.

Photograph by Antonio Busiello

A grey reef shark chomping down on a spiky, toxic lionfish.

What Alcohol?

So, I'm 4 days now into my self inflicted detox program, which basically means I've decided to give the old liver a rest and not have any alcohol for the next month.  Who would have thought me the tea-totaler, what are the odds?
For those of you that know me, you'll know what a hardship detox could be for me, I do love my red wine, and the odd glass of champagne, but I thought that while I'm enjoying my unstressful environment off Daisy, it would provide a perfect opportunity to do something positive for my body. So I'm going for it.

I honestly thought I would struggle without my daily glass (or 4 of wine), but I can truthfully say I haven't missed it at all, I'm actually quite proud of myself.

Living aboard Daisy for the last 4 years, I've hit the bottle whenever the going got rough, and that was quite often,  sailors are well known for their constant, copious, consumption of liquor, usually Rum, which I simply can't stomach.  OH and smoking, all sailors smoke, well I'm a hopeless sailor and don't conform on any level to the norm.  I hate rum and I don't smoke.  I like red wine, and champagne, OH and of course Margaritas, yummy yes please lots and lots of Margaritas.  But for the time being (hopefully a month)  I'm off all the good (or bad, depending upon how you look at it) stuff.

My other blog "Daisy's Galley" is suffering too from my current "let's be sensible" frame of mind, because I've stopped baking all the scrummy goodies I've been over indulging in of late.  I just can't get excited about low calorie, low carb food.
 I really should have been French, the French are skinny no matter what they eat, but mostly I should have been french because I love butter, lots and lots of butter.  Butter makes everything better, OH and cream, don't forget cream, particularly English clotted cream, which is quite simply the most decadent food ever.

My last post on "Daisy's Galley" was "Devon scones" with clotted cream and strawberry jam,

which were just the most mouth watering, heavenly, sweet, artery clogging, deliciousness ever.  Following my over indulgence with the scones, I did suffer a little with guilt, there are after all about 1000 calories in a teaspoon of clotted cream, so I probably had a weeks allowance of calories in one glorious mouth full.  I could hear my daughter Daniela's voice scolding me "MUM what are you doing?"

So anyway, for the time being at least, no more scones and clotted cream for me, and no alcohol either.

Lemur tears

Mum and I were watching a lovely wildlife program this afternoon, about a family of Ring tailed Lemur in Madagascar. Fascinating filming and photography, it really makes me want to go there and see them, I'm wondering whether Bob will be there during his circumnavigation in 2012.   Lemurs are another endangered species, and I would love the opportunity to see them in their natural environment, while they still have one.  All their forests in Madagascar are fast being destroyed, torn down to create more and more farmland and grazing for cattle.

It was a lovely program and Mum and I were really getting into it, the film crew had given all the lemur's in the troop names, and one of the females had given birth to twins, which is unusual for this breed.  The twins were very small and it was a difficult task for the Mother to cope with them.
The program followed the twins progress for a few months, until one day the little male Lemur fell while playing in the trees, and landed on a log at the foot of the tree.  I watched the distraught Mother struggling unsuccessfully to pick up the injured baby and get it back up into the trees to safety. The struggle was heart wrenching and I was in floods of tears as she eventually climbed back up the tree alone to sit and call to her dead baby.
I love nature programs, but I inevitably end up in tears.

Copy and paste this link to see these incredible creatures in action

http://www.itvwild.com/search/Ring%20tailed%20Lemur

Accident Black Spot

My Mum's little house is on the corner of a busy street, right next to a set of traffic lights, which has a ridiculously dangerous signal system that allows people to turn right across the flowing traffic.  In the short time I've  been here visiting Mum, there have probably been more than a dozen accidents, usually nothing more than a 'fender bender' but the accidents are constant, we hear the bumps and scrapes, and the police sirens every day.   Yesterday Mum and I stayed home for the day to look after my niece Poppy who was feeling under the weather.  We were all in the sitting room when we heard a loud crash, not the normal bump,  a crash and glass breaking followed by ear piercing screams.  I yelled at Mum to dial 999  as I ran outside (barefoot) and jumped over the garden wall, it was chaos, a land rover had driven head on into a little vehicle that was full of people, the father, husband, wife, two daughters a 6 week old baby and a dog. Both air bags had gone off and the people were struggling to get out of the vehicle, women were screaming, and smoke was pouring out from inside the car, the rear door opened and a dog and a little girl leaped into the street followed by a woman who immediately ran over to the Land Rover and started punching and swearing at the driver.  I ran over to the little girl who was screaming and crying hysterically and grabbed both her and the little dog and got them off the street away from the car, both men managed to get out followed by a young girl with a tiny baby, I got the two girls the baby and the dog into Mum's house away from the chaos in the road, the little girl was shaking and crying and holding her shoulder, but the older girl the baby and the little dog seemed fine.  Poppy took charge of the little girl, and I went back outside to see if I could do anything to help, but also the let them know where I had taken the children and the dog, the hysterical Mother was being dragged away from the Land Rover driver by some local work men, both the husband and the Father appeared to be in shock, I could already hear the sirens in the distance, and no one seemed to have any serious injuries, so I told the Father where his children were and went back inside to check on them.
The rest of the afternoon was spent with a house full of paramedics and police, poor Mum had to retire to the bedroom for the afternoon, because there was no room in her sitting-room.  Eventually everyone was taken off to Bristol hospital and Mum, Poppy and I were left to take care of the dog, a sweet little Westie, called Molly.
The car was towed to the side of the road, and the police gave me the keys so I could get all the belongings out, and wait for the hauling company to come and collect it.

Although Mum, Poppy and I were very happy to help this traumatic situation, it makes me wonder how many more accidents will occur before the authorities do something about the stupid traffic lights.

There were 2 other accidents that afternoon nothing serious thankfully.   Mum's neighbor told us that only a fatality will get the council's attention, as they don't regard it as an accident black spot.  The fact that someone will have to die before the council sits up and takes notice is ludicrous, in the mean time I'm putting together a first aid kit for Mum for future use...  I think it may be needed.

Days Gone By

Every summer when I come back to England I'm always blessed with beautiful weather.  I spend most of my time here (when not in the kitchen) driving around the gorgeous West Country with my Mum.  Our drives are often trips down memory lane, and this visit proved to be no different.  

Last week we drove to Bath, one of the West Country's most beautiful and historic city's.  We parked outside the city and took the "park and ride" bus right into the city center, it was so easy, with none of the usual stresses of hunting for a parking space, and then running back every hour to feed the meter, hoping you're not spotted by the meter maids, and therefor collecting a fine.

The most adorable little candy store

We slowly ambled around the center sightseeing, and stopped outside The Corridor, where I had my very first job at 16 as a hairdresser, the salon was right above the entrance to the corridor, and it's still a salon today.

In the square outside the cathedral a busker was sat playing a violin as well as a number of strange musical instruments all at the same time.

Mum took me to the historic and very elaborate Pump Rooms for lunch, where we sat at a white linen covered table, under the largest crystal chandelier I think I've ever seen, and a pianist played Chopin so beautifully on a grand piano as we ate our lunch, and sipped minted Pimms from tall crystal glasses.

I love the eclectic collection of shops in Bath, you can find everything here from genuine antiques to garden plants; the fashions are both hippy, eccentric and fun, as well as sombre and elegant.  I saw these hand made shoes in one of the boutique stores that I just had to photograph.

On our drive home we passed through the village with my first school, we stopped to look at the church where Mum was married, and a mile up the street was the cottage where I was born, still called Merton Cottage.  I stopped to take a photograph, and the lady of the house came out to ask me if I was an estate agent, as she had recently listed the property.  When I told her I was born in the cottage she came over to talk to Mum,  she told us that she had lived in the cottage for 20 years, and was able to give Mum news of some of her old neighbors.  It's 50 years since I've lived there, and it felt strange standing outside after all this time.

Merton Cottage

Just up the road was what used to be the Post Office, (it's now a house) that had been in my family for a hundred years, my Dad was the last in our family line to run the business, he took over from my granddad and ran the business for a few years.

The short time between selling Merton cottage, and moving into the grand Georgian estate Mum and Dad inherited, we had lived above the Post office.

Moving from a tiny 3 bed cottage, and then a tiny 3 bed apartment above a shop, into a 45 room mansion had been a huge lifestyle change for all of us.

Oldland Hall
As it was when it was my home

Mum and I didn't drive past the house this time, it's since been sold and all the grounds divided up for large housing developments.   The house itself has been divided into flats, and the barn and stables are converted into houses,  my Grandpa's kitchen garden houses an entire housing estate.  I can't bear to look at it,  I like to keep my memories of that special home and time in tact.

My life has moved me all over the place, from one country to the next, to now living on a boat in the Caribbean,  traveling as much as I do it seems I lead the life of a gypsy, I dream of being able to put down roots again somewhere, one day, hopefully in the not too distant future, the trip down memory lane last week was filled with emotion of the days gone by...