Sailing

How wonderful it would have been to go on the Moody Blues Cruise, or On the Blue Cruise as it was more recently known. A flight to USA then a few days sailing to wherever in the company of the Moody Blues and various rock bands. The entertainment, non-stop and first class. The expense, well, one lottery jackpot win could have got me there, and home again. There’s another problem. Me and sailing don’t go together well. Not at all, really, but, if money was no concern, I might have risked it. Too late to find out. I’m saddened by the passing of my favourite, John Lodge, but very happy to have met him on a couple of occasions and enjoyed many concerts. Only one MB member left.

In his retirement, my father took up boating and spend endless hours, days, seemingly forever, on the Lancaster Canal in his cabin cruiser, sailing up and down. His first boat was to see if he liked it. He soon upgraded to something bigger and nicer, even though it needed constant care. He was involved with the boat club, became Commodore then later, President. The boat was moored at Forton, when it wasn’t in dry dock for repair, and occasionally I would visit. Sitting aboard was lovely, until another boat sailed past. Immediately, I would feel queasy. It wasn’t too bad if we were moving, but apart from attending a couple of dinner dances with the boat club, I didn’t grow to love his hobby. It was good for him, even when he became the subject of some gentle ribbing for being very sea-sick sailing from Fleetwood to the Isle of Man, and back.

My desire to visit the Outer Hebrides out-weighed any sailing worries and I booked ferry routes with short crossings. It worked very well. We had CalMac ‘island hopper’ tickets with the intention of seeing as much as possible. The longest crossing was Stornoway to Ullapool coming home. It was so good, it filled me with confidence to return the following year to see Barra and Vatersay, which we had to miss out. The ferry from Oban to Barra was over five hours. Four of those hours was enough to put me off all planned sailing trips round the small islands and I dreaded the journey back. We reached Vatersay driving on a causeway and keeping mindful of the times of the tide. It was worth it.

This summer, we sailed to Guernsey. A brave decision on my part, which I regretted shortly into the ferry journey. Those wrist bands did nothing for me. We needed our own car, not just to explore the island, but to continue our holiday along the south coast when we came back to the mainland.

I loved sailing the River Thames on a sight-seeing pleasure boat in London. I enjoyed the same thing in Shrewsbury, too, so not all is negative.

On our trips to the Ayrshire coast, we go to look at Ailsa Craig, an island that has fascinated me for years. It’s where the microgranite for curling stones is quarried from. I wonder if I could cope with a boat trip, just to sail round and back? I’ll see what next summer brings.

Meanwhile, next Tuesday, New Brighton beckons. Justin Hayward in concert. A first for me. The last member of the Moody Blues. It will be moving.

My Haiku style poem,

Calm swell of the sea,
It’s such a gentle motion,
Roll from side to side.

Soothing? Not for me,
It’s torturous endurance
With nowhere to hide.

Too late to lie down.
These wristbands are not working
Are we nearly there?

It feels so awful,
I’m not doing this again.
(Until the next time.)

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Here Comes the Weekend

 As a child I remember looking forwards to the weekends, but thinking back now, they weren’t the best times. Age eleven, I was miserable in my secondary school and Friday teatimes were wonderful. No school for two whole days. Saturday morning and I would will my parents to forget about my piano lesson. If it wasn’t mentioned, it didn’t exist. It didn’t work. The fated hour would be nearly upon me and I would be transported by my dad’s car to the home of the horrible man, subject of nightmares. I would sit rigid and hit the keys hard in a display of my anger. I hated every moment and each week I promised myself I would speak out and it would be my last. I never did. Sundays were bath, hair wash, Sunday School then the rest of the day would be family time. We would either be visiting or having visitors. It was always good and remained so until after tea. That was when the worry started. The sinking feeling of dreading school tomorrow, remembering the piece of unfinished homework, the maths I hadn't understood, the poem I forgot to learn by heart, the items for cookery I didn't ask for. I don't know why I looked forward to weekends at all.

In adult life, weekends offered a mix of welcome rest time after a hard week at work and being out and about socialising. A day out or sometimes a whole weekend away would be a good way to relax and enjoy something or somewhere different.

Becoming parents changed the way we planned weekends. Activities for the children were a priority even if it was just a play on the park and an ice cream. Junior football became my pet hate. I love the game, I always have, but some awful parents I encountered made my blood boil. It would upset me to witness five and six year old little lads having fun running with the ball, being seriously shouted at because they haven’t yet developed the skills some parents expected them to be born with. I would dread the times I had to take our little lad on my own. I would stand watching, keeping to myself.

Since retirement, the days are much the same and weekends disappear almost completely. We know it is Saturday when there’s a home match on and we’re in our places at Bloomfield Road. My husband is once again on the touchline at grassroots level, taking our football playing middle grandson to his matches. We’re starting to plan a few short breaks away with our caravan, but we tend to go midweek when places are quieter, so I suppose that becomes a kind of ‘weekend’ for us.

I remember Mackintosh’s Weekend, a boxed collection of mixed chocolates and posh sweets. They would be my mum’s and rarely shared. It’s the first thing I thought of when I saw the theme for this blog, so I had to mention it.

No poem today. Instead I share an excerpt of lyrics from ‘Here Comes the Weekend’, a Moody Blues song written by John Lodge,

Somewhere in the night
There’s a heart that beats so fast
I can feel the heat
Of the fire in your eyes,
Burning like a naked flame,
Waiting for the ice to break,
Counting down the days,
Waiting for the weekend.
Lonely is the night.
Silence is a friend to walk with,
With no one else to talk to.
Somewhere in the heat
There’s a heart that beats so fast
I can hear your voice,
Talk to me tonight.

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Recipe Poetry - If I Knew You Were Coming I'd Have Baked A Cake

For the past week, I’ve had Blue Mink’s ‘Melting Pot’ going round in my head. It was a good song back in the day, carrying a message in a poetic recipe form. Unfortunately, the lyrics, seemingly harmless in 1969, are inappropriate for our enlightened PC modern times. I decided not to include them here, but they are easy enough to find on Google.

Instead, I share with you my wonderful birthday cake recipe, made the same way for years and years of family members birthdays, even my own. My sister has made me a cake a couple of times. She’s got a birthday this week, one of those with a ‘0’ on the end and she looks so much younger.

Hands washed, pinny on, oven on 180c, and off we go.

Ingredients:  3 eggs, or 2 eggs and a splash of milk; whipping cream, strawberries and chocolate flake to decorate; 6ozs of self-raising flour, 6ozs of caster sugar, 6ozs of margarine.

Give yourself at least an hour,
Gently sift the finest flour.
Caster sugar is the best
Weighed properly, not just guessed..
Use three fresh eggs, nice free-range
Or two with milk for a change.
Margarine, the best is Stork,
Mashed and softened with a fork.
Beat all in the Kenwood, fast,
‘Til a smooth and shiny cast.
Transfer the mix to cake tins
And bake for twenty-five mins.
Whilst they cool, whip up some cream
And prepare the décor theme.
Strawberry halves, chocolate flake,
For this special birthday cake.

Trust me, it is delicious!

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Summer - Making Memories

It is here, at last, the moment we’ve been waiting for. Proper sultry, summer weather of hot sun and blue skies from dawn until dusk, which is around nine-thirty, and I would like to say it goes on day after day. It won’t. I think this is two days of heatwave, then rain, possibly storm, and cooler temperatures. My house is currently thirty-four degrees and I feel sticky and uncomfortable.  The heatwave may not be completely responsible.  After two and a half years of sticking to guidelines and looking out for myself and family, Covid has got me. I tested positive at the weekend after feeling unwell for a couple of days. There are no signs of recovery yet. When it cools down, I’ll rest in the garden, admiring the fruits of my labours, especially the planter I’ve called Tangerine and White.

The summers of our youth were everlasting and full of ice cream, the park, the beach and sometimes a holiday. Our holidays tended to be spent with family, when my dad could escape from running the pub for more than two days together. It was always good to spent time with our cousins. They are in the USA now, but they lived in London and the south of England when we were all children. My sister and I loved their big garden offering lots of room to play, even space for badminton.

For years home was a pub on South Promenade. We had the beach on our doorstep. Day after day we were there, not a care in the world and not a thought for how lucky we were. Someone would be with us until I, being the eldest, was considered old enough to take us across four lanes of traffic and the tramlines. My sister would choose an ice lolly or ice cream. I loved a portion of shrimps in a tiny paper bag. I can still taste how delicious they were. Better than anything sweet.

When our children were young, summer holidays meant the long road trip to Pembrokeshire and a couple of weeks staying in a static caravan. It was owned by family members who didn’t use it during the busy months of July and August, but were very happy for us and others to enjoy it. We were so privileged. We had holidays that wouldn’t have happened if not for the generosity of our extended family. Our children, and us have great memories of those wonderful times.

Making memories is what we’ll be doing in a few weeks when we take our grown up children and all our grandchildren to have a blast at Butlin’s. It’s our treat as grandparents and a one-off. It will be fun for all of us, of course, but it is centred on giving the grandchildren a fabulous time. My grandparents used to take me to Butlin’s when I was small, before I had a sister. Now I’m the nanna. It’s my turn.

Allow me the indulgence of my favourite of Shakespeare’s sonnets,

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

William Shakespeare 1564-1616

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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