Ugh!
Gotta bug!
Feeling ill and tired.
Didn’t sleep
Stayed awake
My throat sore
When I swallowed.
Feeling hot
Headache too
I don’t know
What I’ve acquired!
Better be well
I two days time
When singing
I will be
With a choir!
Sore throat
Visiting Stoke on Trent
Thinking of potbanks and the Dorothy Clive garden.
There’s lots to visit like the local potteries, Gladstone in Longton, Middleport in Middleport, Emma Bridgewater pottery near Hanley, Stafford pottery in Burslem. Moreland pottery near Cobridge.
Then there are parks and gardens like Trentham Gardens and monkey park, Biddulph Grange, park hall nature reserve between Bentillee and Weston Coyney, and there is Westport lake.
Then railway days out at the Foxfeild light railway and the Churnet valley railway at Cheddleton. There is also a flint mill there which has a working water wheel and Etruria Industrial museum where they are having the canal festival on 1st and 2nd June. Oh and the potteries museum and art gallery. Spode visitors centre in Stoke. Lots more to see and do. Just investigate. Plus outside the city there are places like Rode Hall, Biddulph Grange, Little Moreton Hall, Mow Cop. Not forgetting Ford Green Hall at Sneyd Green I think…
Tall dark STRANGER!
I was just walking to the post box when I noticed someone in a dark hoodie and trousers walking behind me. I’d decided to post a letter and I’d left my bag at home as I’d decided not to take any money. But I did have my phone in one pocket and was carrying an umbrella in the other hand.
As I walked I noticed he was keeping up with me because I walk slowly so I expected him to walk past. But no he was close to my left shoulder, I put my hand in my pocket because the phone was protruding slightly. I stopped to look in a shop window across the road so I turned to look at him. He dawdled past me but I noticed he turned and looked back. I started to walk slowly again and watched him. Every few yards he looked back. So I kept stopping and looking in windows. Finally I got to the post box. He was about fifty yards ahead of me and once again looking back. I waited until he ambled off again. Then I turned around and headed home. As I got to side streets I walked up them and then back down. I only noticed him looking back again once.
I felt anxious about this and it made me quite nervous. The man’s appearance and his activity was strange. Was I right to avoid him?
Him
Every day I think about him, and frequently apologise to him for not looking after him better. I know I have lots of friends and I try to keep active, but the tears come and I think of what I would be saying to him, or where we could go. The bubble of trouble and fun that was him has gone. All I have is memories.
Esther Chiltons weekly prompt “books”
Books. I have so many, I counted them once and when I got to 1000 I gave up.
Many were my hubbys, trains, planes and bicycles, autobiographies, war and history. Stories about Rommel or Rome. My books are science fiction or fact, mysteries, art and illustration. We shared a love of JRR Tolkien and Ursula K Le’Guin and other writers such as Terry Pratchett. All our books are intermingled, it’s hard to see where ones obsession ends and the other starts.
Books are a library, some I’ve read over and over again, sometimes overnight, finishing the last page as the sun rises. Others I’ve savoured over months. Some bored me, but I still wanted to finish them.
But now? Can I let some go, like puppies to a new home? I might never read them. If anyone knows of a book charity for schools let me know?
I’m glad Esther posted this prompt, it’s made me think about things.
Glass paperweights
Do you have any collections?
It started small, two paperweights in blue and red with gold and silver leaf surrounded by clear glass globes. I loved the way the centres were embedded and I’ve always thought they look like small planets.
The skill and attention of the glass blowers that made them sparked an interest that has stayed with me, so every so often I will treat myself to a new one.
They have to be sturdy because the windowledge they are on to catch the light is also my cats favourite sun trap, so they have been knocked off onto the floor a few times “thud”, but no breakages luckily.
Also luckily they have not acted as lenses and heated up or set fire to anything! Always check it’s safe to place them. I wouldn’t put them where they can act as magnifying glasses to focus bright sunlight. My window is shaded by trees.
I have other collections but this could get quite boring!
Pneumonia
A drawing I did when I was in hospital 6 years ago with pneumonia. Even when I’m not well I still want to do art. I was in for a few days. When the antibiotics kicked in I started to feel better and got very bored, so I asked my hubby (bless him) to bring me a sketch pad and some pencils. It helped that I was in a side room and I had a view out across the valley with hospital buildings, houses and trees. I was a bit annoyed with the thick window frames that blocked a lot of the view but I guess they need to be sturdy. I hope I don’t have to go through that again, but if I do I will be asking for art materials!
Bizarre?
No it’s a friends knee!
My friend was wearing a pair of trousers with abstract cats on it. At one stage the folds in the cloth made it look like a giant, one eyed alien cat was staring at me.
I can imagine a world with different coloured beasts, each of them monocular or cyclopean. Perhaps they have no need for binocular vision, especially if the planet is always foggy so you never get to see great distances. Or an ocean world with dim views of reefs full of eel like creatures? Colours would be similar to the way octopuses or squids change when attacked or showing emotions.
Whatever you want to think, but I do like the bizarreness of this photo.
Art
What is the legacy you want to leave behind?
I draw, paint, create digital images, do set decoration. I am an artist and always will be.
My legacy is a house full and more of this stuff. Where will it go when I die? Will it be welcomed by my relatives or just seen as clutter? Should I will it to them or give some away to my local art gallery? Does it have any intrinsic value.
My art is in my memories, but some pieces are lost. Either mentally or physically. Sometimes I’m surprised when I see work from several years ago that I don’t even remember doing or having the ability to do it. My manual dexterity and sight have started to deteriorate. May I continue to create till I finally lay down my paintbrushes!
Cactus abstract
I was feeling spiky
A bit annoyed today
Something like a cactus
On a hot summers day.
Then I thought of flowers
The way they emerge
Sometimes out of nowhere
When the cactus has a surge
Of growth when it’s ready
To make a new plant
It made me feel happier
My mood more valiant.
Mallaband-Brown 