A-Z Challenge Day 20 - Transmission, Technology and Time

Technology is both a boon and a bugbear in my opinion. This is by way of warning you that the remainder of my A-Z is likely to be sporadic, brief and sadly lacking in images and formatting. (Oh what a shame!) My poor, ailing laptop has been sent off to the laptop hospital; return unlikely to be until after the end of the challenge. There may be Breaks in Transmission.



On the other hand- this could add a new and original flavour to my posts (or my piste- thank you auto Speller!) as I'm driven to find topics that fit in with my capabilities re the device I'm using in the meantime (or Mrstime).

Time will tell.

A-Z Challenge Day 19-Sustainability

noun

1.

the ability to be sustained, supported, upheld, or confirmed.

2.

Environmental Science. the quality of not being harmful to the environment or depleting natural resources, and thereby supporting long-term ecological balance:

The committee is developing sustainability standards for products that use energy.

S is for Sustainability. Sustainability is very much part of the ethos of Greenbelt,  the festival of  arts, music and social justice, that takes place each August Bank Holiday weekend in the grounds of Boughton House near Kettering, Northants, in the UK. So it's a good time to point you towards their latest blog entry, with its details of their Green Cup recycling scheme. Rather than end the festival with tons of used plastic glasses and cups thrown into landfill, festival-goers are being encouraged to pay a £1 deposit on their own cup at the start of the weekend, which they can keep and reuse. They then have the choice to either return it and have their deposit refunded, or keep it as a souvenir. 

I'll be interested to see how it works out.

A-Z Challenge Day 18 - Rambling

On to day 18,  brought to you by the Letter R, which gives me a perfect excuse to go rambling on about nothing in particular. Our Greenpatch rambling has taken a back seat these last few years. My intention was to link back to accounts of some of the more epic journeys we've made in our time, however, my labeling system obviously isn't up to scratch; searches for 'rambling,' and 'backpacking,' didn't yield anything, and walking references seem largely to be dealing with walking of a more spiritual variety - labyrinths and the like. Worth a peep though. The photo is from those taken during our Durham-Oban/Iona walking pilgrimage in 2011.

Then again, today's letter gives me yet another reason, given yesterday's news, to point towards another great sketch from the late Victoria Wood - Val De Ree. Camping...rambling...they're both linked, aren't they and it never fails to make me smile.

A-Z Challenge Day 17 - Queen

On day 17 of last year's challenge I posted about (amongst others), 'Queen,' of the Freddie Mercury variety. This year? Well, as it's Her Majesty the Queen's 90th birthday tomorrow, it's only fair that one Elizabeth II has her turn. I can't say I'm exactly a fervent monarchist, neither am I a republican, certainly not!  Also, I seem to have missed out on many of the 'milestone,' celebrations these past few years; partly from oversight, partly from lack of enthusiasm. Though I have dim memories of the Silver Jubilee celebrations in 1977: (my mother made me a sundress bedecked with tiny, discreet, red, white and blue patterns) and I can remember standing up on Cathedral hill looking out over the countryside to see the lighting of our town's beacon. ( In the event, rumour has it that there was a breakdown in communications and that our one was ignited before the one in Windsor! I never found out the truth in that one.) No street parties- at least not in our neighbourhood. Cynical teenager that I was, I reckoned it was because people were too stuck-up thereabouts.

So, celebrations will be muted chez Maison Greenpatch. Though I have come up with a germ of an idea. Inspired by a suggestion on the BBC website, I've come up with a scheme for creating my own modest tribute: Last year we finally finished doing up the back garden decking (once Mstr GP's old skateboard ramp). It needs some flowers to jazz it up; what could be better than a host of red, white and blue flowers. Plug plants are the answer, apparently, and according to Good old Auntie Beeb, if I plant them now, there should be a magnificent display come June, just in time for Her Majesty's official celebrations. Watch this space.

Before I sign off, I can't post without giving a mention to another news item that was trending just as I got home this afternoon and which pushed HM's headlines right down the front page - the sad news of the death of Queen of comedy - Victoria Wood, at the far too early  age of 62. I remember posting a link here a few years back to her wonderful Menopause and Health Food Shops monologue. As a young married, I giggled at her 'Family Planning Sketch,' her 'Bunbury Homes,' (too much like our housekeeping - or lack of it), the 'Continuity Announcer,' later - Acorn Antiques. Thanks to her - I still have problems keeping a straight face in Italian Restaurants, and who could every forget the 'Ballad of Barry and Freda!' Plus many more. Christmas before last, saw the TV adaptation of her wonderful musical 'That Day We Sang.' The secret of her success, I'm sure, was her incredible gift of observation: of  the minutiae  and daftness of everyday life , whatever one's age - from the angst of  lumpy adolescence through mid-life crisis to the loneliness of old age, and her ability  to laugh at (yes, and reflect) about it all. Many's the time, I watched something of hers and felt cheered by the realisation  that a feeling or and experience, or just an annoying little habit that  I'd thought was 'just me,' was in fact, something that so many of us share.  R.I.P, Victoria.

A-Z Challenge Day 16 - Prayer

Due to time constraints and the vagaries of the 'O' that got away from Monday's post - a certain new Operating System, I'm cheating today and pointing readers to a pot-pourri of my past ramblings on prayer. I hope you enjoy them. Actually, some of the credit must go to Dormouse for her encouraging comment on yesterday's post. It inspired me to look back into the Greenpatch archives and I was quite cheered up by what I found. Slow is good. It gives me time to notice those little gleams of light, of God's presence in the everyday that I'd otherwise be in too much of a hurry to notice. Have a good day, all of you.

A-Z Challenge Day 15- Orange is the colour

Of pumpkin lanterns

 Of Tiger Cat

Of a North Wales sunset

What else?

 - Of lurid, flower-bedecked 1970's wallpaper
 - Of black-eyed Susans
- Of grated carrot
- marmalade in a dish

Any others for the list?

 

A-Z Challenge Day 14 - Nativity

Nativity, St Beunos, January 2015

I've mentioned our weird and wonderful  Creche figures many times on the blog. So for a change, here's a glimpse of a more classical Nativity scene. This was an unexpected surprise and joy for me, for all kinds of reasons; not least because that somehow, I'd completely lost track of time and hadn't fully realised that we were in Epiphany. Sadly, Mr GP's mother had died the previous autumn. I'd been due to go away , but of course, cancelled. To my joy, there was a place left in a retreat in the New Year, so off I went.

Somehow, maybe partly due to the place where I was spiritually and emotionally , maybe because of  the different season; that time apart took on a special, never -to- be forgotten quality. On autumn retreats, I'm accustomed to spend time peering anxiously into the empty tomb. (the '30 Dayers' are often into the Third Week of the Spiritual Exercises about then). For me,  the familiar Nativity figures took on a new significance, speaking into my struggles and longings in a new way. The year just finished hadn't been easy and, however hard I tried to leave my 'baggage' behind at home, some of it was bound to come into the retreat time. During that eight days away, I  learned  a lot about waiting, and self-acceptance. In many ways I identified with the woman lurking about on the outskirts of the scene;  like me, looking and longing  ...for what? Who was she? I never worked that one out. Yet there was something that impelled me to be with her, to be her and to travel alongside her as she made her journey to the centre of the scene. (in reality, she didn't, but in my prayer and imagination,  she - and I - were drawn further and further towards the Christ child). 

I can still remember panicking one day when I thought that the latter had vanished, only to realise that he was there, on the ground hidden under the straw. I still, too, remember the sense of joy when I later discovered him in Mary's arms. A miracle? It seemed that way to me at first, although to find out that in fact my retreat guide had been responsible didn't diminish the sense of wonder and awe. Well, God does need a helping hand sometimes!