A Long Lost Twin Brother?

Blackthorn blossom.

We are at peak blackthorn blossom time here in Roscommon. The hedges are white with the froth on the still-leafless branches. We are amazed every year by how few actual sloes can be had from these bushes always loaded with flowers. Some of that is down to the 'haircut' given by the contractor hedge trimmers as soon as they are allowed (September) but the local bushes do not seem to produce many fruit even on the field sides of the hedge.

Blackthorn

Meanwhile, by happy coincidence, I have found a friend who was born on exactly the same day as me, almost 60 years ago. Friends of the blog will recall that a couple of our archers have produced a lovely baby girl, now 8 months old, for whom Liz once knitted a hat in the colours of an archery target. Well, a group of us were chatting at one of the shoot coffee-breaks a couple of weeks back and one friend started quizzing me about a significant birthday which I had let slip might be fast approaching. Eventually I admitted that it MIGHT be this Friday, April 14th, where-upon the baby girl's Mother (Yulia) pricked up her ears and looked at me in amazement. She asked how old would I be at this birthday and it turns out that baby (Feliz)'s Dad (name Colly) is also born that day and will be the same age. We are therefore some flavour of 'twins', all be it him born in Dublin and me in Hastings. Small world. Happy Birthday for Friday, Col' !

The ceiling goes up first holding up the insulating wadding

Huge progress in the Kitchen project. K-Dub contacted me last Friday asking if we could have a crack at it on Saturday and get all the "slabbing" done. Slab is the word used to describe the modern 'dry lining' plasterboard which is bonded to a sheet of dense (and fire-proof) insulating foam of various thicknesses. We use 30 mm on the ceilings and 70 mm thick on the walls. We also used a bit of foam-less old style 'plasterboard' where we needed to marry in to the existing 'old kitchen' ceiling.

Slabbing in progress

Our ceiling also had armfuls of fluffy wadding wedged up between the rafters just because K-Dub had a load left over from his own house. We can all remember handling this material when doing the parent's loft in Hastings, when the wadding was itchy fibre-glass and you had to work with sleeves rolled down and without wiping your hands anywhere sensitive (eyes, neck etc) or you would suffer terrible itching for days. The 2017 version of this stuff is much more forgiving - soft and barely itchy at all.

View from 'old' to new through the new arch. 

The task also involved framing up the arch through from new to old kitchen so that we could slab round all these corners but this was money for old rope for K-Dub, a Master Carpenter. It took him about half an hour while I pretty much followed him round picking up discarded off cuts of slab and sweeping up shavings and debris.

...and we're done. Slabbed out and awaiting
the plasterer(s)

I was also chief gloop-mixer. The wall slabs are glued to the uneven wall by mixing a bonding agent to what you chefs will know as the "soft peak" stage. This thick gloop is trowelled onto the wall every couple of feet (horizontally and vertically) in big dollops which stick out from the wall a good 3 inches. That way the slab is sure to touch the 'peaks' before it hits a sticking-out chunk of the stone work.

A slab profiled to butt up to the exposed-stone
wall

Another interesting feature of this task which may be worth sharing is the way K-Dub copes with a flat-sided slab butting up against a very uneven, stone and cement wall. It was fascinating to watch - you butt the slab up against the wall and then wiggle a pencil down the wall to create a template line parallel to the bumps and dips in the stone. The bumps and dips in your line are always just enough to cope with the 'deepest' bump/dip. The spare outside the line is then nibbled out with an ordinary wood-saw and Bingo! When you offer up the wobbly edged slab it should now touch the wall most of the way down. The plasterer does the rest, neatly filling in the small gap without messily splashing plaster on your nice clean stone-work.

Probably best not to ask.

That's the theory anyway. The "plasterer" here, though, looked like being K-Dub and I for a while, neither of whom can plaster, at least not in any free-flowing way that a pro would recognise. K-Dub has, in fact, done it on his own house, with plenty of this fancy edge-against-stone but he will freely admit that it was more of a 'tape and joint' style job (The American Way) using pre-mixed formula and around 6 cycles of slap it on, let it dry, sand-paper off the excess and repeat. We could do it but neither of us was looking forward to all that sanding and the Lady of the House would definitely not have wanted all that plaster dust drifting through her kitchen for however many weeks it would have taken.

Had to smile at this after our dog-prints in the new concrete
picture. This is a discarded Roman tile unearthed in Leicester.
2000 years on and dogs are still messing with we builder's heads!

By (another) happy coincidence I still have on my phone the number of one of the Mayo brothers who did our whole house back in 2011 and who subsequently became a great friend, sheep-mentor, breeder and supplier of store lambs for several seasons. A quick text to him confirmed that he was still in the plastering game, had lost my number but often thought of us and would be more than happy to come round in the week to look at the job and give us a price. More on this soon. If it works, it will save us lots of time and dusty mess.

Finally, every time I come into this blog-site to write a post one screen shows me how many views my most recent epics have had... how many people have clicked in to read them. Now, I gave up any dreams to have as many readers as JK Rowling ten years ago and have been happy to chug along with my 30-40 readers whom I know are mainly family and friends. My recent post about Senator Frank Feighan and the artist fella, Brian John Spencer amazed and delighted me by breaking this mould with a score of 210+ views - a record, I think, for the blog. I put this down to FF and BJS 'tweeting' links to it and my mention of it in the interview he had me do with him on 'Audio-boom'. Looking around I have had a couple more with good scores ("Stirring it" on 13th Jan had over the hundred and "Legal Beagles" had 136), but my norm is still between 28 and 80 so you won't find me on the Booker shortlists any time soon. Thank you for reading these who ever you are.

Tiddly-Om-Pom-Pom

Rocking the hi-viz coat and wellies in this
rendering by our artist fella, Brian John
Spencer

With our series of inbound visits last week barely seen off the premises (see previous post) I needed to get packing for my out-bound mission, off to the UK to see family in Hastings and old mates in our former stomping ground of Faversham in Kent. Family these days is my big-bro, Tom and 'me dear aul' Mum, 'Pud Lady' in these pages. Mum is about to go, like me, through a 'significant' number Birthday - she is soon 90 as I am soon 60 so I wanted to spend a bit of quality time with her this time instead of my all too frequent "flying visit" style trips.

Shiny Vauxhall Astra hire car, only days old, outside Mum's.

The mission was to take the normal shape - an Aer Lingus flight, Knock to Gatwick, and then hire of a car in UK for the running about. The first part of that was easy, the 2nd nearly came unstuck and turned into an hour and a half in car hire hell at the airport, and got me indoors at just after midnight.

Primroses and magnolia in Mum's front
garden

It was partly my fault and partly that of the Aer Lingus website where I booked my flights (and car) on line. I saw no-where who the car hire firm actually was (Hertz? EuropeCar? Avis?) but that's not been a problem - you just wander round the big foyer and try your name and booking reference at each till you strike gold. Aer Lingus have also moved their flight from mid afternoon to 8pm-ish too, but I didn't think that would be an issue either. Anyone hearing warning bells yet? What I'd actually written down was Aer Lingus's ref number for my car.

Battle Abbey. Mum in wheel chair centre bottom of pic.

We touched down at 9 pm and I walked to the car-rental 'room' and started my hunt, frustrated at each by having to stand in a short queue before I could even ask my question but also running out of desks to ask at. Finally, I was advised to go try the 'Inter-Rent' porta-cabin out in the dark where the 'indoor' desks said the guy had been evicted from North Terminal by building works but hurry as he didn't normally work late and might be closing.

Mum has map and is ready to explore
Battle Abbey and Senlac Hill

Off I went, increasingly fed up, to find one man soldiering through a queue of 8 customers at the end of a 13 hour shift. I suspected that if I queued for the 45 mins I might still be blown off with a "not our reference number" line. No such problem. The guy (Alex was his name) was as helpful, friendly and professional at my end of the queue as he had been at the 'beginning' - a true hero. Above and beyond. He had my name on his list, sorted me out a Vauxhall Astra and sent me on my way at 10:30 pm. Aer Lingus and Inter-Rent get my vote. You can keep your Hertz, Avis and EuropeCar. I got indoors by just after midnight to find Mum and Tom waiting up for me - Thank You very much, both.

At the Queen's Head, Icklesham, near Rye (Sussex), left to
right, myself, Mum and Tom

To cut a long story short, I had a lovely time both at Hastings and in Faversham and very pleasant company with friends, family and former neighbours all delighted to see me and me to see them. My time in Hastings was blessed by 2 superb, warm, sunny, blue sky days, so we took the hire car and Mum's wheel chair and went on a series of little scenic tours, interspersed with meals, coffee breaks and the inevitable games of Scrabble.

Fish and Chips. You can always rely on the Queen's Head
for a decent portion. Top left of the picture is an equally
generous crab salad. 

On Saturday, we drove all round the lanes 'behind' Hastings looking at the spring flowers - carpets of Lady's Smock, primroses, wood anenomes, celandines etc and the chance of an early orchid. We drove down to Hastings sea-front along by Marine Parade and pushed the wheel chair all along to the newly restored and re-opened pier, out to its very end (it is all nice and flat for this pusher's 'maiden voyage'). We headed out to the family's favourite pub/eaterie, The Queen's Head in Icklesham (near Rye in Sussex) where I managed a fish and chips 'fix'. We bimbled out to the famous Great Dixter garden (Northiam) where there was advertised a "Plant Fair" for Mum to buy a specific Clematis she wanted ('tangutica').

Mum surveys Senlac Hill from the top. I reckon if those Normans
had had to push their Mums up in wheel chairs then they would
not have won the Battle.

On the Sunday we headed out to Battle Abbey and Senlac Hill, the site of the famous 1066 Battle of Hastings, where the pushchair crew had to step up a gear. This battle, as any school boy knows, involved the Normans (and William the Conqueror) charging up Senlac Hill to knock the pesky Saxons (King Harold's mob) off the top. The Abbey was build on top of the hill (afterwards, obviously!) to commemorate the victory and the bits open to the public include the hill. Even the wheel-chair friendly walk route which is lightly gravelled just to slow you down a bit, includes some of the top-slopes of the hill inside the 'skirts' of the abbey, so there was some good heavy-breath slog up the slopes even though Mum is not 'heavy' to any degree. You put any 'little aul' lady' in a good wheel chair and try it, be my guest.

Oh we do like to walk along the prom, prom, prom? Hastings
sea-front and Pier shrouded in sea mist.

On the final morning (Monday), Mum and Tom had a funeral to attend, so I nipped back to the sea front to get some pictures, having deliberately not taken the camera on our walk, my 'maiden voyage' as wheel chair pusher. Sadly there was a thick sea-mist and although it always looked like it was just about to burn off, there were to be no sunny pictures that morning. The sun did not break through till I was heading off after lunch, bound for Romney Marshes and Faversham.

Tom, Mum and myself. 

In Faversham I was to meet our good friend John W, former husband of Diane (Diamond on here) and their disreputable looking Patterdale Terrier cross Ragworth. The plan was to spend the evening with John (we had a lovely stroll round the Front Brents area and north side of the Creek), have a bite to eat and then I'd stay the night in his spare room. On the Tuesday morning I could then work my way round as many former neighbours and friends as I could net before I had to head back to Gatwick in the afternoon for my flight home. Thanks you to all of you who I did meet and who I missed - better luck next time maybe.

Plenty of sailing barges still in the creek despite 'bogey-man'
developer, Michael White allegedly killing all the ship-wrightery

I got to meet and have a nice chat with a friend who I only really know since leaving Faversham (chatting on Facebook etc), Griselda C-M and her husband, staunch supporters and 'activists' of the Creek Preservation campaign. I met film maker Mike M who I know from Cambria days (he made the "Red Sails" film). I had nice chats with neighbours from both sides of our 'old' house in Whitstable Road (Jackie and then Betty and Jim). I met another good friend (Dave) in town as I was wandering about and I also got a good look round the Standard Quay and Iron Wharf areas of the Creek (the south side).

Every town should have a Pirate Ship.

A footnote to that last sentence should probably include mention of the latest "attraction", a rather mad Pirate Ship. This rather disreputable looking piece of fakery (a load of wooden 'topsides' added to an old wooden hull and flying the requisite 'Jolly Roger') turned up in Faversham a few months back, mooring up for a rest en route to Spain, crewed by half a dozen lads from (John tells me) ages about 30 to 50. They didn't manage to stay long as they didn't fancy paying the mooring fees (Why should we? We're Pirates!) charged by Faversham's 'bogey-man' waterfront developer, so he had them 'evicted' using a local tug-firm. These boys rather robustly (I was told) untied them from the quay and towed them down to moor them outside the sewage works outflow where they remain to this day. They have to get aboard and disembark by scrambling across a dodgy grass bank and some mud and then teetering up a long, springy plank in best pirate tradition.

The Creek's main developer finally gets
permission to convert the first of these
 lovely wooden weather-boarded grain
warehouses into a restaurant and wine bar. 

That's about it. I grabbed a spot of lunch with John and then headed for Gatwick, there to hand my car back in with none of the Friday night dramas. I flew home painlessly to be met at the airport by the Lady of the House and got a noisy welcome from dogs and livestock. And so to bed in MY OWN BED (well, my half of 'our bed'). No matter how lovely it is to go travelling, there is something special about finally getting home and being able to sleep on that old familiar mattress.

Thank you to all involved in this break. If I have forgotten to name you specifically, then I apologise for that.

Welcome Strangers

The dogs make their mark on the new concrete. These paw
marks look 'proud' rather than indented but that is just
because the light is coming from behind me. 

It may well be the Irish DNA in the Lady of the House, but there's nothing Liz likes more than 'hosting'. Hospitality - all that palaver of welcoming guests, organising their visits, getting rooms ready, ship-shape and comfortable and then, of course, all the menu planning and extra food prep and cooking. Of course the visit itself with the chance to make new friends and improve old friendships, chat, socialise. It matters not whether the guests are friends or family, long-lost cousins or just dinner-guests. Just this week we have diversified that even further to include complete strangers. Maybe not strictly 'complete' - we could learn a bit about both on line prior to their arriving.

The Pieris out front puts out its bright
salmon pink first new leaves.

First this week, though a delightful and enjoyable visit from the Bro-in-Law, 'Sparks' (old friend of the blog) who came down on his 52nd birthday, the Tuesday, with his partner Kim. They came to enjoy a special meal cooked by Liz (our own chicken) and Sparks, Kim and I nailed a good few glasses of wine (though it was a 'school night' for Liz). We chatted late into the night, enjoyed a good night's sleep and shared a lovely goose-egg breakfast. But they are"just family" now, so great to have them, but no longer front page news. That slot falls to this week's OTHER guests, the "exciting" visit to which I alluded in the last post, a renowned artist and a Senator, no less!

Brian gets the Senator down on white card.

The artist is Brian John Spencer from (his words) affluent South Belfast. He's 29, enthusiastic and ambitious to make a name as an artist having decided on a serious change of direction having studied Law and French through Uni. He is very knowledge-able and keen on the interesting history and politics of the North and particularly (lately) the various solutions now being discussed to the issue of Brexit.

Brian puts some colour in Tom's cheeks.

He conceived a project to visit every county in the Island ("Ireland in 32") to stay with different people from all walks of life, do some 'art' and discuss politics, history and local stuff with any 'Great and Good' he could net on his way round. His main thing is political cartoon drawings but also 'Vanity Fair' style line and colour-wash drawings of people - wedding guests and so on. Of course he has a Facebook account (one for him and one for the project), Twitter and website(s) where you can look him up. I will include some links at the bottom of this post.

Brian John Spencer and Senator Frank Feighan enjoy Liz's
roast lamb and champ.

We first heard of this and Brian when Liz saw a Tweet (a Twitter post) listing all the county stops and their dates with a request for help finding him a night's accommodation in each one. That sounded like fun for us so we immediately snapped up the Roscommon one (originally 29th/30th March) and we were hosting our first ever professional artist! He'd be roughly half way through his mission by the time he got here - he finishes in Dublin on Easter Sunday.

Senator Frank Feighan poses for his
cartoon sketch by Brian

All good so far. Brian started his tour and we followed his progress over the first days on Twitter and Facebook but then it got even better and more unlikely. Our local Senator, Frank Feighan who we would not have known from Adam, is currently challenging the Senate with a suggestion that Ireland and Northern Ireland both join the "Commonwealth of Nations" as a trading block to stay in contact with the UK post Brexit. Brian was fascinated by this "Wild West / West-Brit" suggestion (his words again) which would be almost treasonable in various parts of the North, so he contacted Frank and invited him to come here for supper too. Now we were hosting our first artist and our first politician and we were all starting to feel a bit over-whelmed. In for a penny though, Liz decided to call in very knowledge-able and respected 'Village Elder', Tom C who is also Producer of the imminent village play. Then there were 3. There was then a little mix up on dates where 'we' had to swap with Co. Longford but it all went as planned on the new date 30/31 March, last night.

Left to right, Tom C, Frank Feighan, my self and Brian Spencer

I must confess to a bit of nervousness as we had no real idea what either guest would be like, whether they'd relax and enjoy our company, whether we'd be able to contribute to the discussions (well, that was me - Liz is so good on politics and history she'd easily hold her own and could go off and worry about the food and the hosting being acceptable to these 'VIP' types). Frank particularly, might have had 'issues' with we 'voters' as all we knew of him was that in a political mess-up 5 years ago, the general election was won in Roscommon by main party Fine Gael on a promise not to close the Roscommon hospital A+E unit. As soon as they were in the did a U-turn and closed it. There was outrage and almost rioting locally and Fine Gael are still living it down. Our man, a TD (=MP) at the time, was right in the thick of it, obliged to break his promise to the voters by voting WITH the party to close it, so he shipped 4 years of vilification in the local press, death threats, hate mail and not a prayer of getting re-elected as TD. 4 years later he is back in business having been appointed to the Senate by a grateful 'Premier' (An Taoiseach), Enda Kenny. I hope I have this correct - serious apologies all round and I will retract any 'Fake News' and edit this post if not.

Peach blossom starting in the tunnel.

Well, you will be delighted (as we were) that we had no need to worry. All present were lovely, personable, happy and relaxed, thoroughly enjoyed our place and our food, shared a few gentle drinks ( I even got some Shepherd Neame beer into these Irish types!). Liz had done a menu where every course had a little bit of this small holding in it - starter was trad nettle soup (our nettle tips), mains were roast lamb and then champ with our kale in it and 'pud' was a rhubarb Pavlova. Gorgeous. The talk and discussion was broad ranging and fascinating - FF turned out to have been a main mover in the old Anglo Irish agreement discussions way back, but then Chairman of the Good Friday Agreement discussions. He and Brian shared many friends and acquaintances. Brian has also got that 'Small holding in the future' in his dreams so he was delighted to come and stay on one and see how it all worked. A roaring success all round.

I'll leave it at that, I think, but just give you some links to bits and pieces mentioned

FF is on https://www.finegael.ie/our-people/senators/frank-feighan/

BJS is on Facebook as "Brian John Spencer: writer and artist" and the Project is on as "Ireland in 32 Days" where you will soon be able to see and hear "our bits" (we did interviews as well as having ourselves drawn plus Brian is off today to capture some Roscommon landscapes, I think in Boyle before he goes off to find his host for tonight in Co. Meath)

On Twitter he is @BrianJohnSpencer here there is already some stuff up

His website is http://www.brianjohnspencer.com/

Good Luck now