Self indulgence. Now and Then: Memoirs of a Sort.

 THERE'S ALWAYS A FIRST. In 66 years so much seems to have happened.  Some really really good memories of fun, learning, adventure and excitement.  Some memories are at the opposite end of the scale.  What ever happens, good or bad, fun or sad, there is always the first.  It's all normal for all of us. My therapists, Lamborghini and Lambrusco continue to provide me with good advice, good chat and help in learning to understand a new perspective.  Never before have I got so much pleasure from animals, let alone sheeps and chickens and ducks and spitting alpacas.         Don't you steal my egg, you've already taken 45. My not so old Mum died about 26 years ago, not long after my Dad had retired.  They moved from Reading to the big family house, decent garden and a 30 tree productive orchard in Cumbria.  My Dad had to live the rest of his retirement by himself.  I'm sure he got used to it, but he did say to me once "I feel as...

SUCK-CESS-FUL DESPITE BEING A CRAP JOB in the BARBERS CHAIR.  HAPPY CHRISTMAS and HAVE a FUN 2023 In about 1978 I stayed at Dubbs hut, above the Honister slate works.  I was there with about eight 14 - 15 year old school children.  We walked in from Honister, stayed 2 nights and then walked out to Langdale.  On the middle day we walked off up to, I can't quite remember, either Pillar or Great Gable.  Where ever we went makes no difference to the story.  In a little slate, cold and dark out building was the bog, toilet, dunny, tandas; call it what you want.  It housed a squattable sized tin can with a handle and an inch of blue Elsan at the bottom.  Not wanting the pristine surroundings to look like either our deck after the ducks have walked across it, or the infamously named 'Andrex trail' from Annapurna base camp, we asked that anyone who needed to squat should go in there.  At an alarming speed it got fuller and fuller.  No one was pr...