It is rather a long time since I last blogged, but, up until yesterday, there really was nothing worth writing about, just the usual work and day to day stuff.

However yesterday, was my Saturday off, so went up to Birmingham to go and see mum. After having visited Birmingham every other Saturday off, I had become a little bored with it, and so decided to go and visit elsewhere. Yesterday was the turn of Coventry. Poor old Coventry is not the most pleasant of cities, although if you leave the main center of the town, there are some lovely Medieval areas left to explore, and of course there are the two cathedrals, which were the main reason for our visit. 

On Friday night when I was mooching around on the net for inspiration of where to visit, I found out about a rail ticket that I had not previously known about, that allowed me to have unlimited travel in an area from Crewe to Stoke in the north, west to Shrewsbury, Gobowen and Hereford in the west, and Northampton, Lichfield and Stratford in the east and South, all for only £3.40 more than my regular return ticket, which seemed like stunning value, so of course, I bought one.

In the end, we only went to Coventry, as we took so long there, but still it was a saving.  I had been to the  new cathedral previously, and have gone from hating the sight of it when I first saw it years ago, to actually thinking of it as really lovely and incredibly impressive this time, it is definitely a building that grows on you, given the chance, but on first impressions I think you either love it or don't.   When you first go in, it does look incredible grey and industrial, but that is before you see the incredible stained glass windows and the tapestry. As you walk along the cathedral to the top, the windows are revealed one by on, until looking back you see every one glowing thee full height of the cathedral building.

When we arrived there was a choir practicing, with the organ accompanying them, so were treated to  some wonderful music, and standing dead center between the two halves of the organ when it was in full belt, was rather amazing, a group of German tourists were stood there some with their mouths open at how amazing it sounded, and with the choir singing center ahead of us, truly spectacular.

Before we went into the new cathedral , we had had a wander round the old one. Even though most of the body of the building was missing,, parts of the walls too and the roof completely and utterly absent, it still felt very much like a cathedral, and would be a lovely place for a service on a hot summers (dry) day. When we came to leaving the cathedral, we happened to have a look outside, and the rain was hammering down. Again. I was lucky in that I remembered to put my waterproof jacket in my bag that morning, and so we ventured out into it, it got so heavy at one point that there was a mist almost 2 or 3 feet high from the rain hitting the ground. We got about 20 yards, then decided that being out in the rain was not so wise, and dived into the cathedral shop, as had quite a few others. Had a bit of a look round, then mum decided we should go to the Transport museum, also in the city center. Quite a fascinating place, with vehicles from Victorian times to the present day, including a rather gorgeous brand new Jaguar. The Thrust SSC, holder of the world land speed record, breaking the sound barrier and reaching a speed of 763mph. Unfortunately as we had arrived at the museum only and hour before they were due to close, they had closed off some of the areas of the museum, including the one with the Thrust. Bit of a bugger really, but as it cost nothing to get in, will visit again soon.

On to Sunday, and church this morning, quite enjoyable. As the vicar is away at a New Wine thing this week, along with about 40 of the congregation, we had a lady from the Cathedral doing the service. She explained about the precautions to do with swine flu, and said as such, there would be no wine whatsoever, not even for dipping the bread in, slightly ott really. She then said we were to refrain from shaking hands at the peace, just nod at each other, this didn't go down to well.  She explained that the Bishop had sent them memo's with the guidelines on,  at that point a woman stood up, and said, in a rather consternated voice "I think you will find it was actually the Archbishop" , then promptly sat down again. Left the poor vicar slightly taken aback a bit, and then  she explained to everyone that the Archbishop had indeed originally set out what should be done, but that the Bishop of Hereford had been the one who had it said to her. Not quite sure what the woman thought she was achieving, in standing up and saying that, but she said it in such a way that it was almost as if she was implying the vicar was lying. When the vicar had explained, a good many people looked at the woman as if to say "Thats you told then". Quite amusing really. 

In the afternoon, we went over to the west of Hereford to a place called Kinnersley Castle, for a book launch of Phil Rickman's new book Merrily's Border, all about the place mentioned in his novels, with photographs and a bit of history to go with them. A very atmospheric old house, but nice and homely. There was a couple of tables there with various books, one with all Phil Rickmans novels for sale, including the ones he wrote under the name Will Kingdom, and on the other were books from his current books publisher Logaston Press. There were so many people there, wandering all over the house and gardens. Wine was there as were nibbles. When we arrived people were sat all over the place, up the stairs on sofas, lovely and relaxed there, not at all like any other book launch I remember. Phil Rickman himself was playing in the band on guitar, sounded pretty good too. A bit folky sounding for my taste, but still good. Well I made my purchase and MLO and I went off for a bit of a mooch around, the came in and went in the one room where he had encamped, to get my book signed. An hour or so later, we decided to go. Just as we were leaving we passed a car where, because of the wet the man had got himself into a pretty impressive rut, and who then decided the best way to get out of it would be to rev as hard as he could. Not the cleverest of plans. So MLO and I decided we had better help them. We got behind the car, and we said that if we rocked the car it should come free quite easily, so we rocked, and rocked a bit more, and rocked it forward far enough that Mr driver finally found some grip and got free. In return MLO and I got extremely muddy feet. Fun though.
We got home, and before we had had time to turn around, we had to get back off for evening church. We had a different vicar again, who did things a bit differently to the regular vicar, but everyone has a different way.
Anyway, that is me up to date, at last. Not sure what I will be doing tomorrow, so not sure if I will blog yet or not, will see how it goes. TTFN etc.

Sunday is all but over now.

Started the day at work, as usual it was exceptionally quiet, actually more so than usual, have just realised that a couple of the Sunday regulars failed to turn up. Wonder what happened to them?

The weather this morning was positively dreadful, the wettest kind of rain imaginable, horrible mizzly stuff. Yuk. But as the day wore on , the weather improved until this afternoon and it was doing a passable impression of a summers day.  Couldn't go to the town church's morning service due to work, but we did go to the evening service at the country church, got there a little earlier than we usually do, but oddly enough, so it seemed had everyone else. Must have been something in the air I think. Anyway the service started at the usual time, we were all stood up at the beginning, singing our hearts out to the first hymn, then  the door started rattling, thought at first it may have been the wind, but it did it again. Where we sit in church is right by the entrance, so that when anyone walks in they are literally greeted by us (MLO and I) smiling at them. A moment later and the door opens a few inches, then stops,   intriguing. A few more moments later and a head appears, shortly followed by the rest of a body. K who hands out the hymn books leapt to his feet to hand one out, along with the service booklet. The lady looked around and sat opposite us. Most people turned to see who had interrupted, then got on with singing and K went back to his seat. A minute or so later, and the door started rattling again. This time it opened up and revealed another person wanting to come in. Up K leapt again, to hand out the required bits. The gentleman looked a bit perplexed then went and sat down next to the woman who had previously come in late.

As the service went on, they appeared to be a little uncomfortable, and spent a lot of time discussing something between themselves. When ever we needed to stand, either for hymns or the reading,  this entailed a huge amount of face pulling and discussion. When we got to the peace, they did what we used to do and stayed put in their seats. Roll on towards the end of the service and just as we got to the last hymn, they abruptly stood up, but their books on the table and walked out. Smiled at them as they left, but just got frowned at. Not sure what we had done wrong, or what they had a problem with. Wonder if they will be back next week? Just cant work out why they felt it necessary to leave when it would have all been over  in ten minutes anyway. Never mind. Nowt so queer as folk. 

An enjoyable sermon this week, considerably more light hearted than last Sundays, which was pretty deep. All about us becoming reconciled in Christ, that by fully giving ourselves to Him.  By recognising all our faults and admitting them , and being fully aware of ourselves helps us on our way to achieving that. Quite interesting as I had previously done the little exercise the vicar had given me to do with that, but had also just started to read "The interior Castle" by St Teresa of Avila, and had read a fair bit at work this morning. The main gist of the book, from what I have so far gathered, is that in order to know God and Jesus fully, we must fully know and understand ourselves, to look right inside ourselves, and when we have done that, and in the process of doing so , we can know Him more fully, as she believed that God resides in our souls, and only through a thorough understanding of our soul can we ever hope to have a true knowledge of God. Obviously she went into a lot more detail than that, wrote a whole book on the subject, but I think that is the main gist of it. I thoroughly recommend reading it, as what I have read of it so far, is an engrossing and very enjoyable read indeed. The version I am reading was translated by Mirabai Starr, but as this is the only version I have read, I have no idea whether it is better or worse than any other.  

Quite a while ago, I joined facebook, just for the heck of it, and joined a Phil Rickman group on there, really just expecting it to be the kind of group where an occasional member pops up and posts a message, asking whether there are any other members out there. I was pleasantly surprised when I started to get occasional messages from the group. The most recent I was quite excited about. He is bringing out a new book, "Merrily's Border"  containing photographs of various locations that he writes about in his books, along with a bit of information about the places, he will be launching the book in August at Kinnersley Castle in Herefordshire, a place I have always wanted to visit as it looks so spooky from the road going by. There will be music, performed by Hazey Jane II perhaps even with Lol Robinson making an appearance, and a great excuse to eat drink and be merry. I will be going with MLO as it is only about 15 miles away from here. What amazed me was the number of fans he has from all around the world, although to be fair, I shouldn't be that surprised, as he does write ruddy good books. I still think of him as very much a local writer, being able to picture each place he mentions and knowing some of them extremely well. 

Heck, it is late again, I really must get to bed, have been listening to Aled Jones again, and his voice always makes me sleepy. So off to bed it is for me. So nighty night.

My second attempt at a post here. Last night the one Had written managed to vanish itself somewhere. Hadn't even saved it, very odd, but never mind, I will try again.
Yesterday in the morning I went with MLO around a few of his farms, all in the Orcop and Garway area of Herefordshire. An extremely beautiful area of the country. Mind you, having said that , all of Herefordshire is beautiful. Driving round with him yesterday made me realise how lucky we are to live in such a lovely place. Fertile green fields, rolling hills, woodland, a salmon river, beautiful orchards, even moorland in parts of the county. We even have a mountain. Herefordshire is one of the largest counties in England, but also one of the least populated, which means there is plenty of peace and quiet.
Anyway back to the farms, MLO works for National Milk Records, a farmer owned company whose job it is to record all the dairy animals details onto a database, and to sample the milk from each animal once a month whilst in milk. Then test it for all sorts of things, such as fat content, protein content, as well as testing for the first signs of certain notifiable diseases. It is essential for farmers to know exactly what fat and protein percentage each animal is giving, as for each liter of milk that is produced, the farmer has to buy, or lease a quota from the government, to entitle him to produce and sell the milk.
Each quota bought or leased comes with a specific fat and protein percentage. If the farmer under or over produces protein, or fat and even liters he can then be fined quite severely by the government. So the recording enables him to alter feeding programmes accordingly to reduce or increase protein, fat or liters. Also, when it comes to selling, the farmer has a contract with whoever buys it from him, to produce a certain fat and protein content, they will reject an entire load of milk if it doesn't conform, which can mean a loss of hundreds of pounds per load (before costs, not profit)! So MLO is the chap who turns up at 4:30 am (or even earlier), and takes milk samples from every animal. He then puts the information onto computer, along with all other details such as when the animal is served (mated) who did the deed, calvings, deaths, when an animal is dried off (withdrawn from milking to rest) and a 1001 other bits of information that make that dairy animals in this country the most traceable, and with the most information held per head anywhere in the world.
One of the places we had to go to was just on the edge of Garway village. A village that has an incredibly interesting history, very wellknown now thanks to the Da Vinci Code, Bonekickers, and hundreds more conspiracy theories. Phil Rickman a local author also writes about the place, but not so many conspiracies there thankfully.
Today. Tuesday, I am not feeling great, an egg salad disagreed with me last night, so had to take the day off work, as I feel pretty rotten. The other girl who works there, on my day off wasn't too impressed being woken up at seven this morning, I apologised, but she didn't seem to accept it. So I spent most of the morning in bed, as I was awake most of the night until about four-ish.

At least the sun has come out now, and is actually really warm now. MLO said I had missed an enormous thunderstorm this morning, so for me to have slept through that I must have been utterly pooped.

Anyway, that's enough for now. Will maybe post again later if the mood takes me, or if anything so incredible happens that I cant keep it to myself. TTFN.

Well, nothing much happened to day at work, very very quiet indeed. Plenty of time to think thing over in my head though.
Am watching Chelsea play Liverpool on the telly, cheesed off at the fact that Chelsea are currently winning. Booo. Liverpool Liverpool Liverpool.......come on you reds...
I doubt that will work though somehow..
Decided to be frugal tonight and had some baked beans in a bowl for tea, actually mainly due to the fact that I was just too bone idle to do anything any more complicated than that.
Decided that I would have light reading day today, nothing too educational, so have been reading one of my favourite authors the wonderful Phil Rickman, The fabric of sin. I borrowed it from our local library, I already have all his books, but most of them are signed, and still all stiff and new, and I hate it when books dont look all new, so borrowing from the library is perfect.
I advise anyone to give his books a go, they aren't exactly literary masterpieces, but are very enjoyable nonetheless. Plus an added bonus, is living in Herefordshire, almost all the places are known to me which is pretty darn cool, knowing that someone thinks so much of this county that he writes about it in his books. The later ones of his are about a priest Merrily Watkins, who takes over a church in Ledwarine, and all the strange things that happen to her and her daughter Jane. Meets a messed up musician, who has split up with his wife, falls in love with him, etc etc, ooh almost forgot, she is a bit of a modern day exorcist, or more correctly a deliverance consultant, so that takes her to some interesting places. His earlier books like The Man in the Moss, are equally good, but more standalone than a series as such.
Chelsea have just scored two more.. insert suitable expletive here..
Bummer.
Have a day off again tomorrow, so all being well, will be in the garden again (if the rain holds off that is). Anyway ttfn, cant think of anything more to say right now..