Birds, Baubles and Maturity

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Last night we took the entry forms to the village show. Julia duly handed them in, chatted to the organiser and handed over the 75p in entry fees. It is a vey modest village show. I did think of entering some chutney and some produce, but, as usual, didn’t get round to it. In any case, as our vegetable plot consists of a few pots and troughs, I don’t think we will threaten the traditional winners from the Allotments.

Bird studies for the acrylic section at the show

However, I feel our efforts to fit in would be better if directed to other areas, as the art and photography sections are dominated by a select few.  They are, without doubt, deserving winners, but you can’t help thinking that village shows, like e everything else these days, are not places for fun, amateurs and creations that speak of enthusiasm rather than technique.

On the other hand, thinking about the upcoming show a few months ago did give me inspiration for a haiku and, according to an email that arrived last night, this landed me a rare thing (in my world at least) – a spot in Frogpond, the journal of the Haiku Society of America. I find it so hard to get in that I am on the point of giving up. However, when the editor tells you that there were 3,000 submissions and an acceptance rate of 7% it all seems worthwhile.

To counterbalance that I’ve had my fastest ever rejection. The three haibun I submitted to a magazine this morning were back with me by the afternoon. It seems that they have had a lot of submissions already (it’s the second day of the submission window so that’s a worry if the competition is that strong) and they are returning mine because they don’t fit the “dominant styles and themes” of the issue. They are, however, “high-quality, publishable haibun” and the editor goes on to suggest that they might suggest someone else. They actually gave me the name of an editor and a magazine, but he already has his own selection from me, also sent this morning.

Christmas baubles- made with turned wood but then augmented by acrylic paint marbling – they will eventually have loops through the top

It’s an old antique market trick. Someone offers you a load of tat and you tell them it’s not your sort of stuff, but that X down the row loves that sort of thing.

I’m not that bothered, I’m used to rejection, but I am bothered by the manner of the rejection and am afraid that a new or sensitive writer might be put off for life by that sort of disregard for the effort they put in, and we need new poets.

The title? Well I had a three word alliterative title lined up, the third “B” describing the wording of the rejection, but I decided to be mature and not use it.

Dull Diary Day

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This morning I rose before I wanted to, made the normal breakfast and got dressed. I noted that there was a little more traffic on the road than usual but lighter than a normal school day – school is due back today, so the lack of traffic must be down to me being earlier than usual. That’s something to note for future use.

Painted Lady on the front brickwork

There was a Painted Lady sunning itself on the front of the bungalow when I got home. I took a couple of shots with my phone but the shadow of my sticks, held under my arm as I struggled with the phone, scared it away. It seems wrong to refer to a butterfly called a Painted Lady as “it” but half the Painted Ladies that I see must be male and it seems even worse to call them all “she”.

I still don’t know how to download photos from the phone, so I used a simple and direct method, as seen in the second photo.

Me and technology are not friends, so I transferred the photo by photographing it

We have had a surplus of tomatoes this year, even on our few plants. Julia made tomato sauce yesterday and it will be going into ratatouille, pasta bake and curry this week. Now the weather is cooling, I feel more like cooking.

Today’s emails brought a copy of an on-line haiku magazine. This was a surprise, as I had not had a rejection from them. Sometimes it happens.  Things must inevitably slip through the net when dealing with hundreds of emails. Paper is so much simpler to keep track of, but I try to be paperless and often lose track. However, it’s better for the planet and, to be honest, more convenient for me. I rarely submit if people want paper submissions.

Painted Lady on Red Campion

Anyway, I had been needing some haiku to round off my submissions for this month and this gives me ten to use. I just had a look at them and, despite none being accepted this time, feel they are in with a chance if given a second chance. There is always a little sunshine if you look.

A Press, some Pens and the Post that Never Was

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I just spent an hour writing a post that discussed ways of making water company executives take notice that we are serious about stopping water leaks in our mains and sewage in our waterways. It stopped slightly short of an unhinged rant, but when I started looking for illustrations of Victorian cholera outbreaks and hanging, drawing and quartering, I realised that it might not have stopped short enough.

 

So I started again. It’s lunchtime on Monday and Julia is just back from an extra stint at the tearoom. That’s probably a good time to have a break and restart today’s post. Today is a Bank Holiday in the UK. It means some people have time off work. Some don’t, as they have to provide services for those who do. And retired people like me don’t really notice the difference.

This morning, after the recent rain, I noticed our back lawn is beginning to green up. It’s hardly the miracle of the karoo, but it is nice to see.

Wooden Pens

This afternoon, after cheese and tomato sandwiches (the tomato crop has been bountiful this year, though cosmetically challenged) we assembled a press that Julia has bought for putting her turned wood pens and keyrings together.  All we needed to do was put the handle to the press and bolt it on. There were no instructions on how to do it and eventually I used the handle to persuade the mechanism to unfold and all became clear.

Taking inspiration from Billy Mann we are now looking at producing pendants from wood. It’s still August and she is already producing things for Christmas. Whatever happened to sitting back and watching the world pass by?

I would say “another wooden pen, but it isn’t, it’s one of the previous pair, but on its own

What’s in a Name?

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First I wrote about politics, then I wrote about politics again. However, it soon becomes clear when I write about politics, that I am just adding to an enormous pile of words on the Internet. If you were to sift the entire pile you would be hard pressed to find any wisdom. So I performed a self-edit – twice. This is my gift to you – two blogs about politics which you don’t need to read. Instead I had a fun ten minutes renaming things by writing on a map of the world.  I don’t have any crayons, so I can’t give it the authentic Trump look, but it was fun for a while.

Cormorant at Arnot Hill

The “British Ocean” now stretches from Ireland to the USA and the “British Holiday Sea” has taken the place of the Mediterranean. I toyed with the idea of renaming the eastern states of the USA from New England down to Georgia as “We Used to Own This” but seeing the mess they’ve made of it in just 250 years I’m not sure we want to admit any responsibility.

Anyway, with New England, New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, the Carolinas, the Virginias and Georgia, the British element is pretty well established – the names Delaware, Maine and Pennsylvania also have links to the UK. Even if you disbelieve the explanation given in the article, Maine in France was under British rule in the time of Henry II and Richard the Lionheart so there’s another link.

Cormorant at Budby Flash

It’s a wonder that Trump hasn’t tried to rename all these old colonial names, after all, he did rename Denali as soon as he got into power again.

Of course, this is all history rather than politics, so I don’t mind writing it.

Talking of history, of course, it’s very tempting to write about the Guano Islands Act of 1856, a law allowing citizens of the USA to claim previously unclaimed island which had guano deposits on them. I came across it while researching guano, a product that has been protected by various laws since Inca times. It’s a very interesting subject, honestly.

Cormorants at Clumber

However, the Act is very tempting as the basis of a comment that US Foreign Policy and mounds of fishy-smelling bird droppings have been linked for nearly 200 years – because that might be political, and I don’t do politics.

Time, I think, to make some phone calls. But first – pictures of cormorants – they are noted for their guano production.

Cormorant

Starts with Education, Ends with Unicorns

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Julia is safely delivered to the woodturning class, where she is mass-producing pens for (a) Christmas presents and (b) the Christmas Fair at the Cathedral, where the woodturning group raises money for funds each year.

It was an easy trip as the schools are not yet back. I think this will end next week. Instead of setting off at 8.00 and being back before 8.30, I will be stuck in a half hour jam as the queue for the school works its way back to gridlock two junctions. At non-school times the section in question is a quiet tree-lined road of a semi-rural nature.

Yes, it’s a Narwhal. Be patient.

In my day, as I increasingly say, we had school buses and walked. A mere handful were brought by car and a few cycled. These days a few still walk but a huge number are brought by car, delivered like some precious package with neither legs nor the time to walk. This is partly also, I expect, due to the rushed nature of the parents’ life. There are very few buses to be seen and I don’t think I’ve seen a kid on a bike.

There are five school buildings along that part of the road and I have been taught in every one of them. We arrived in Peterborough in 1966. I went to the infant school, which is still standing. I then moved along to the newly built junior school, where I was amongst the first pupils to move in. After that, and having passed my 11+ I moved on to the Grammar School. A year later, I was introduced to the chaotic nature of what passes as education policy in the UK. We turned Comprehensive. This meant merging with the Secondary Modern school next door. They also built a new block in between the two schools, which included a Language Laboratory. This was as high as tech got in those days – locked in a cell and taught by a tape recorder. Later, we would have six BBC Acorn computers, though these were reserved for people doing Higher mathematics and the rest of us were locked out. This is probably why I never took to computers.

My sister, three years younger than me, did have some lessons about computing – the dizzy pace of change.

A Narwhal horn, or is it? It’s actually a long tooth, or possibly from a Unicorn

Although it was supposed to be the answer to all our problems, treating all kids the same, it didn’t quite work out like that. Basically, we kept doing Latin and the pupils who had been at the Secondary Modern, kept doing metalwork. After merging fully, my sister’s year did metalwork and Latin wasn’t offered.

This is not necessarily a bad thing, but neither was it a great advance in education.

In Lincolnshire, meanwhile, just twenty miles away, they still have Grammar Schools to this day.

On my more radical days I would drag the pupils of Eton and Harrow et cetera (see – that Latin was handy)  out of their classrooms and line them up in front of firing squads against their ancient walls. On my more moderate days I would just like to see all kids given a top class education so they can all do well and the country can benefit.

I’ll file that wish on my list next to “world peace” and “unicorns“.

Well, with all the science that we have, if we can make non-allergenic dogs we can surely graft a narwhal onto a horse.

Yes, a Unicorn. One day we could see Unicorns once again prancing in the fields. It would certainly liven up the game of Polo.

Unpacking a Crowded Head

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At the end of the day I go to bed with far too much stuff in my head. Yes, it would have been much more elegant to use the word “thoughts” but it wouldn’t be as accurate. Much of the contents of my head are half-formed, or amorphous wafts of something, or simply daydreams. Recently, for instance, I have been instrumental in sorting out English cricket, regaining the Ashes and have refused both a  knighthood and the hand of a minor royal in marriage. Even if they were prepared to pass an Act of Parliament to allow me to be married to two people at the same time, I’m not prepared for a life of conversation relating to horses and undetectable poisons. I will say no more about the latter subject, but it would solve a few problems they are currently experiencing.

They aren’t really the sort of family I’d want to be linked to.

As I say “thoughts” would be an exaggeration.

Pendle Hill with a scattering of trees – when we lived with my Auntie Lizzie while we were between houses I used to wake up to that view every morning, only closer. It’s not often that sunny if I’m honest

I had an email today telling me about the progress of the reforestation of the Ribble Valley. That’s where my parents grew up, and are now buried, where I spent some portions of my youth, and where the bones of the Wilsons, and associated families, clutter many country churchyards. I’m quite keen on planting new trees and decided, after paying for some in various places, that I would concentrate on the Ribble Valley Trust.

I had another, earlier in the week telling me that my car’s MOT is due. They will doubtless find something wrong with it. Every year there seem to be more rigorous restrictions and more ways to fail. Normally I take it in my stride but as I use it very little and have had two big bills in the last two years I’m beginning to dread it.

Ribble valley with trees and a distant view of what may be Pendle Hill but might not be. They all look the same to me at a distance.

Hawaii, as a state of the USA is, I note from a history site that sends me reminders, is younger than I am. That’s strange – I’m sure it used to be a fully functioning independent state. Oh yes, that’s right, it did, but the USA decided that it would be better if it was occupied by the USA for defensive purposes. I’m sure that’s ringing a bell somewhere . . .

And finally, I’ve just skimmed an article about gene-splicing dogs to stop them triggering allergies in their owners. Amazing. We could get round the problem by not having dogs if we have allergies. But we decide to use science to alter dogs. We could probably use the science to help children, no, we’re going to use it to make dust-free dogs. I could go on the cover the unspeakable cruelty of breeding dogs that can’t breathe etc, but I might have to also unleash a broadside at the despicable members of the RSPCA and Kennel Club who allowed, or even encouraged it. And allowed dogs to be mutilated to meet breed standards.

You see, I used to be in the poultry industry, and we were often criticised by people like the RSPCA for “cruelty” even though we were just trying to feed people. But at the same time they were happy to see dog breeders breed all sorts of problems into dogs in the name of fashion.

Over the years bulldogs have been bred with so many faults that they can’t breathe properly, can’t breed without assistance and have a much reduced life expectancy.

Actually, when I said “finally” just above, I meant penultimately” as I’m now going on to complain about salmonella. The egg laying industry was unjustly slandered by Edwina Curry MP in the 1990s (though I’ve heard her repeat it since) who claimed egg layers were infected with salmonella. She was wrong. As an industry the egg laying side kept their stock clear of salmonella by good management, good hygiene, and testing breeding stock.

The salmonella problems that occurred at the time were all traced back to poor practices in the catering industry, and in one case, to foreign eggs. We have an outbreak now, and it also seems to trace back to the catering industry and imported eggs.

My advice is to only buy eggs that have been cooked properly (I never did like runny eggs), support British farmers and never eat in a place that doesn’t display a green food hygiene rating sticker with 4 or 5 stars. It’s very easy to get and keep a 5 Star rating, I did when we did the cafe on the farm. If a place doesn’t display its rating you can be sure it is low. The food inspector I used to work with had an app on his phone – he would eat at a place with a 4 star hygiene rating if there were no 5s around, but would never go three star.

Now that I’m on two drugs that suppress my immune system I’m quite keen on food hygiene.

Olympic Breakfast – I prefer my yolks hard but am happy not to make a fuss and will eat them as they come.

American readers, meanwhile, are suffering the same way. In the USA they treat eggs differently to us – instead of producing them cleanly, they rely on washing them after laying (thus removing their natural protection) and have to keep them in fridges when they distribute and use them. Ours are able to go on shelves in the shops and don’t need to go in the fridge at home despite what people say on the internet. Yes, it helps maintain quality a little longer, but maybe you should buy fewer or use them faster. Both systems, generally, produce a good, wholesome food, they just have different ideas about how to do it.

Anyway, in the USA they have just recalled 1.6 million dozen eggs (that’s over 19.2 million eggs) due to salmonella infection. That’s on top of the big food poisoning problem with 13,000 people falling ill after eating lettuce.  It’s not the farmers taht are the main problem, it’s governments that don’t have robust systems in place to check things. It’s nice to have an industry free of regulation, but people need a big Government stick to make them do the right thing.

I’m hoping that the current Government might do something involving threats to make our water companies clean up their acts. There is no excuse for the way they treat our waterways or waste water from leaky pipes.

Less visually appealing than the one above, this is how I do it

 

The Cheaper Man

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Robert Bridges – a pointless Pointless answer. Nice beard, shame about the poetry.

I spent a strange night, in which I participated in an Australian reality TV show (which proved very disappointing and badly organised). I then went home, where I appeared to live in a version of our current bungalow, but in a network of cupboards instead of rooms, hiding from visitors. I do try to hide from visitors as much as possible, as I’m not very sociable and most of them want money, but I don’t live in cupboards. The walls in modern houses are not wide enough to accommodate passageways and cupboards anyway, so it was a very impractical dream.

This week I have had two acceptances and a strange refusal. The two acceptances were from editors who sometimes reject my work, so that was good. The rejection was from a members’ anthology, which traditionally accepts something from every member. This was, I admit, a bit of a surprise.

Looking at the numbers for this year I will end up with about the same number of acceptances as last year and about twice as many rejections. It’s all part of my process of pushing boundaries and toughening up in my responses to rejection.

Philip Larkin – Looks like Eric Morecambe, had a few faults, turned down the chance to be Poet Laureate

I’m also trying to stop rattling on about rejections and such stuff as it’s of limited interest to most people. However, my poetry-based general knowledge did get me a couple of pointless answers on Pointless recently. It was about Poets Laureate. I got two pointless answers. My third answer (Day-Lewis) didn’t count because they wanted ones who had been in office ten years or more and he dies after just four years. The father and son team who answered, didn’t get any. Amongst others, they selected Philip Larkin (who turned the offer down) and Simon Armitage. These days they are only nominated for 10 years so Armitage, who is still in post, failed on the 10 year point. I can’t remember who else they nominated, it may have been Hughes, but he scored points and you need to be pointless to win the money.

Simon Armitage – seems a decent bloke but clearly disconnects when sitting in a barber’s chair

I tell you this because the son had been accepted by Oxford University. I love being able to answer questions that defeat Oxbridge students. They are generally better than me on subjects like Chinese cities, quantum physics and classical music but I love to find chinks in their armour. I am a natural descendent of the archers of Agincourt, bringing down the flower of French chivalry on a muddy field before seeing them off with with a precisely placed dagger.

For a poetic version try Kipling’s Arithmetic on the Frontier. I have added the link so you don’t need to search through a load of clutter about handbags. Handbags. What is the world coming to?

No proposition Euclid wrote
No formulae the text-books know,
Will turn the bullet from your coat,
Or ward the tulwar’s downward blow.
Strike hard who cares—shoot straight who can—
The odds are on the cheaper man.

Kipling – first British Nobel Prize winner (1907), turned down a knighthood and the offer to be Poet Laureate. Not always politically correct but wrote some great poetry, even if it hasn’t all aged gracefully.

 

The Girl With the Monet Fixation

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It rained several times last night. It was only gentle rain, but after weeks of nothing, it was probably just as well to start gently. Ten minutes later, it is done. I would have liked more, but at least it is a start.

The photo above is our two rusty steel hares – Julia bought it last year and I see from WP that I mentioned it exactly a year ago. The somewhat abstract photo used above (she took it on her camera then cropped it) is a picture of a sunbeam that lit them up during last week’s eclipse.

The next picture is The Girl With the Monet Fixation. I am trying to persuade her to get a Monet tattoo as it would make a good title for a poem.

The picture from the immersive Monet Exhibition/Experience she went to with my sister (who took the photograph).

The second time it rained, the drops were heavier but only lasted for about a minute.

I’m not sure what happened while I was sleeping, but there was a slightly fresher feeling in the air and some evidence of water on the floor. There were damp seams to part of the brick paving ans water shone on a couple of drain covers on the other side of the road. Unfortunately, as the heat builds up (it isn’t even 8.45 yet!) it is becoming humid.

It was another easy journey to wood turning today because the kids are still off school. Give it a couple of weeks and I won’t even be home by this time.

 

Some Thoughts on Poetry and Editors

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I’m still working on the Gladstone story, just not very fast. However, I am writing plenty of poetry. If I were a scientist I would probably put forward the theory that freeing myself from the shackles of WP and numismatic writing, has made me feel more relaxed and has released my ability to write poetry.

However, other variables include lower temperatures, better sleep and reading a book on how to write better poetry. And coincidence. I have always written in a way I could compare to peaks and troughs. However, it used to take me longer to descend from a peak and the troughs just represented a lower level of output. Now I seem to drop off the peaks much more quickly and the troughs are deeper, and are often accompanied by a period of struggle to write.

A lot of the problem, I think, goes back a few years to the times when I had some serious infections. Each one stopped me writing for a week or so, then slowed me down, sometimes for months. Before the infections I used to submit my work on the first day a submission window opened. I like to have things ready. As I slowed down I slipped back until I was struggling to have enough poetry to submit. I often had to resort to submitting things written on the day of submission, and sending submissions to the USA after my midnight, because the time difference worked in my favour.  Sometimes, of course, I came unstuck.

And before you ask, yes, various people declare that you should leave poetry in a drawer for a month, or even a year, before sending it to an editor. I agree. It’s always better when you give yourself time, as early drafts can contain clunkiness, and even downright gibberish.  However, I can confirm that it’s possible to write a poem, send it off the same day and still have it accepted. It’s not a good working practice, but if that’s the only choice you have, you have to work with it.

I also believe that getting in first gives you an advantage. If you write well, someone has to write even better to displace you in the selection process. If two poems are submitted on the same subject, the first one is in a better position for selection. It’s not scientific, and it may not accurately reflect the actual way that editors select, but I always think any possible advantage is worth having.

I’m currently in a position to make five submissions now, instead of waiting until the end of the month. I will do that in the next couple of days and start work on next month’s submissions. Next month is a strenuous month and it will be good to approach it well prepared. I often say that of course, but this time I really feel I can mange it.

Another benefit, (and one I am sure about) is that if you submit early you can get early rejections, and they can be recycled. It’s possible, doing that, to submit the same piece twice in the same submission period. Very efficient and when, as sometimes happens, it is accepted second time around, a useful reminder that all editors have different opinions.

 

A “disingenuous grifter”

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Owl Sculpture – Harlow Carr

I started writing a post about the Gladstone family yesterday, but as usual I became bogged down with diversions, wikiperigrinations (yes, I just made it up, though it wasn’t difficult)) and trying to trace a lost reference. It’s in my head but I can’t retrace it on the internet – I should have made a note at the time. It will involve upper class privilege, grave robbing and the end of Empire. Hopefully, I will have it done in the next couple of days and keep it down to 500 words. That of course, is the problem, it takes a lot longer to write 500 words on the subject than it does to ramble on for 2,000.

This reminded me of Mr Gladstone and the “tax on knowledge“. Gladstone, who passed a number of measures to help the working man, believed that an educated working class was better able to vote and to help themselves without government intervention.

How very different to events in the USA where Mr Trump is involved in a battle to steal truth and keep voters in ignorance.

We have the same here. We have just had a by-election where Nigel Farage, a political charlatan of the highest order, faced off against a comedian dressed as a waste bin. Farage claims the victory, which is true, because in the absence of any other major party he polled the most votes. He uses this to back his claim that voters support him as the anti-establishment candidate who really doesn’t deserve to be investigated for trousering £5 million donated by a crypto-currency billionaire who lives in Thailand.

However, a lot of people, over 9,000 voted for Count Binface. He’s a joke candidate, but a substantial number of people preferred him to the snake oil salesman.

It’s not really a resounding slap down for Farage, but, of course, the enquiry will go ahead again. It makes you wonder if the election stunt was to allow things to be tidied up behind the scenes.

This week’s political question is which word from “crypto-currency”, “billionaire” and “Thailand” is the most helpful one in establishing the confidence of you as a voter.

And just for the record, Nigel Farage, the anti-establishment candidate was educated at a top private school, worked as a commodities broker in the City and had a bank account at Coutt’s bank. These are not generally regarded as marks of a man who is not part of the Establishment, though many, including a member of the Coutt’s Board, consider Farage to be a “disingenuous grifter”. That’s pretty strong for a banker.

And just to show that I’m not biased, here are some poll results quoted on his (lengthy) Wiki page –

“YouGov found that overall, 73% believe he is “very” or “fairly sleazy”, the highest figure among party leaders (51% for Keir Starmer, 42% for Zack Polanski, 36% for Andy Burnham and 34% for Kemi Badenoch). Even among recent Reform UK voters, 40% believed that Farage was sleazy.”

Sorry about the politics, it just happened . . .

Owl carving – Sherwood Forest

I added the owls to inject a bit of wisdom into the post.