When left to my own devices I got a bit carried away and stripped the wallpaper off the walls too

Unfortunately I don’t have a picture of the Welsh Dresser to hand, it used to be where the boxes are in the first photo.  You will just have to imagine that

CHEERS!! I raise my glass to you.  Thank you for sharing life’s journey with me, I hope that any troubles from 2011 will fade into distant memory and I wish you, your family and friends a happy, healthy and peaceful 2012.

xxx

I invite you to join me at Vision and Verb, where I talk about champagne and raise my glass to you in a ‘New Year’s Eve’ toast.

I invite you to join me at Vision and Verb, where I talk about the ‘Tree of Light‘ giving hope and purpose at Christmas time to those who are feeling the loss of a loved one.

Whilst going about my daily business at work I was drawn to look at the dictionary that is stood up next to my in/out/pending trays.  I immediately forgot about it.

When it was lunch time I rustled in my bag and got my lunch time eats out and placed them on the table.  As I did this there was loud banging sort of noise.  It made me turn my head and made a colleague on the next bank of desks to me jump.  The dictionary had fallen on the floor.  I joked we had an office ghost playing around and we had a little chuckle together.  I picked it up and put it back on my desk and we both immediately forgot about it.

During the day I had been trying to phone a colleague, but all I got was an answering machine, I didn’t want to leave a message because the subject needed a conversation.  When I made my first call to that colleague after the lunch time incident there was no dial tone when I picked up my phone receiver!  As I pressed the catch on the phone to try and reset or see if there was a problem, there was a loud bang.  The dictionary had fallen on the floor again!!

That dictionary has been placed like that on my previous desk for 10 months (without incident) and also for the 4 weeks I have been in my current job (without incident).

It reminded me of this:

Speaking of ghosts reminds me of a strange incident at work today.  Both my colleague and I heard the noise of footfall and were aware of a presence behind us.  When we looked there was no-one there…

The dictionary is now placed firmly on it’s side!!

Whilst wandering round the National Railway Museum my Mum reminisced about what train travel used to be like before commerce took over. Back in those days it was all about looking after the customer and making them comfortable so they enjoyed their journey. This was before the days of getting a person from A to B at the cheapest cost and before company profits were more important than customer comfort and safety.

Sadly modern lifestyles and expectations have hastened this change which I believe to be a backward step…

Now going back to the reminisces. My grandfather worked as a guardsman on the railways (on this line). I have fond memories of being able to greet him on my local station for a brief hug before the train had to carry on its journey.

It seems that ‘that time of year‘ has come around all too soon.  Where did the year go?

I had always planned to visit The Festive Gift Fair again this year, the tickets from a colleague were a bonus surprise   I took the opportunity to visit with my Mum.

Once again the trains there and back were painless, but the show seemed to be a bit more commercialised and many of the stalls sold the same sort of things, most notably scarves, jewellery and charities etc

The stalls that used to house unique and individual crafts and craftsmanship seem to have vanished in favour of more standard items.

Maybe I need to search them out on line…

PS:  At this time of year I have  many fond memories of my Dad

Over at Vision and Verb I invite you to sit and rest a while with me.

After a weekend of  “Error establishing a database connection” my blog for now seems to be behaving itself and the engineers are looking into why the problem keeps recurring.  So what have I been doing whilst I have been away?  Taking advantage of the lovely sunny weather of course

On Saturday I had lunch, sitting in the shade watching the world go by at Attingham Park.  I then made the short journey to Wroxeter Roman City.  I particularly wanted to see the Roman Town House.  This was built for Chanel 4’s “Rome wasn’t built in a day”.  A team of 6 builders had the task of building the town house using traditional building methods.

The builders were aided in their quest by a manual on Roman building written by engineer Vitruvius 2000 years ago, and supervised by Professor Dai Morgan Evans, the project’s planner. The builders had just six months to master the skills and complete the town house.

The sun was so hot (85F) I took a bit of time out to sit in the shade with a cooling drink.  I was chilling out reading the guidebook only to be interupted by a couple joining me at the picnic table without so  much as a word of hello!  They immediately started bickering and I thought it was boyfriend and girlfriend until I looked up and realised it was mother and son…  Eventually they left and peace returned.

Afterwards I decided to make the short walk to St Andrew’s church in the nearby village.  It has an interesting history and it is a long time since I visited.  At one stage I was in danger of getting knocked over by an oncoming vehicle whose driver only slowed the vehicle down and came to a halt when the driver of another vehicle coming in the other direction slammed his brakes on and pulled to one side.  The first driver clearly hadn’t noticed me until then!  I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and retreated back to the ruins.  I will visit the church another day by car.

On Sunday the weather was still nice but not quite so hot, which was the perfect excuse for another little excursion.  This time to Stokesay Castle via Much Wenlock for lunch.  At Stokesay it was lovely to sit drinking tea outside enjoying the countryside and watching the birds picking up crumbs from underneath the tables.

The photos however will have to wait until I have finished showing my Malham excursion.

Earlier this year, a good friend of mine set up his own dojo to share the knowledge that he has gained studying and practising martial arts. Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending his first seminar at his own dojo and watching him teach his students, some of whom are teachers in their own right.

This was the first of a series of seminars that will take the students through a level of progression that was taught to him by the Shihan (master teachers) in Japan. The teachings aim to provide life skills by explaining the importance of balance and self-discipline.

Onmyō is the older Japanese character reading of inyō, more commonly referred to in the West by the Chinese expression “yin-yang”. Meaning ‘shade’ and ‘light’, the concept of Onmyō expands to include female-male, positive-negative, inner-outer and life-death. In fact, it encompasses all of the opposites that are both hidden and seen in the universe and it is cyclical in nature. At a deeper level, it embodies harmony. Essentially, it is to reveal the hidden and to ‘see’ the obvious with fresh eyes and new understanding that we patiently persevere in our training.