Potpourri

My old A level Art teacher at Beverley Grammar School was Mr Doyle.  When it came to art, he taught me to avoid the trap of  being too easily satisfied - to push myself harder and thereby improve my creative offerings. In that spirit, I had another go at my cartoon of Liz Truss, now crowned as this country's latest prime minister:-

And I am sure that if I  attempted further versions I could make it better still but I am quite sick of Liz Truss already. Drawing her is rather depressing.

Before he departed, Johnson delivered a typically bullish, unapologetic speech from Downing Street. He likened leadership to a relay race, claiming that for him the rules of the race had been changed halfway through it. That was another lie. He broke the rules. His opinion of himself is so inflated that it is surprising he hasn't floated away like a huge pig-coloured hot air balloon.

Yesterday, I managed to get a three mile walk in amongst the abandoned stone quarries  and the woods above Padley Gorge north of Grindleford. Countless stone blocks for the construction of the Derwent dams came from here and there were train tracks and engine houses etcetera - all removed, ruinous or returning to Nature.

In earlier times, thousands of millstones were crafted in the area until the bottom fell out of the market just as World War One happened. I spotted these eye-catching old millstones now clothed in moss:-


And here's another picture I took - not a Mayan temple but the ruins of an old engine house that was used to lower massive stone blocks down the hillside to the railway track at the bottom before being transported up the valley of The River Derwent:-



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Ladies Who Lunch

 


I met my friend Colin in Chester and we watched the cormorants on the Dee for an age, before the clouds blew over from Wales. 
We had lunch in the popular Marmalade Cafe and chatted like the two old queens we are.


Chester is only 30 minutes away from Trelawnyd driving slow, so it’s lovely to know I’ve got a city on my doorstep. 
Roger has got over his nerves with most things unknown now, but was scared by a thunderstorm last night so hid away with Mary at his side in his crate until things quietened down.





from Going Gently https://ift.tt/UfrDELo

Friends like you

 Reality

The backwoods of Carolina

Looking out the frame

Of dew and green

Knowing life is sweet 

Because of another’s sacrifice

And yet my mind

Woke up in Positano

Dreaming of limoncello 

And ocean breezes 

Wherever I am

La Dolce Vita reigns

Because God is within me

And I’m surrounded

By friends like you



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