Due to unforseen problems caused by public access to this page, it is my displeasure to announce that I will no longer be blogging here. I have set up a brand new blog that can only be viewed by approved guests, in other words you will have to email me if you want to read it!...all ip's will be logged!
vixtravels2@hotmail.com
My new blog will also be closer to a diary, that this one has been, and will be much more personell. Proxy servers will NOT be able to gain access......sorry!!
Its been fun folks, but all good things must come to an end. I apologies to my genuine friends for the inconvienience!

*transmission ends*.............*blog terminated*...................

Pudding hasn't been well following our day out in Birmingham.....
He started nibbling at his back leg and he has obviously got something in there, but I have looked carefully and I can't find anything. He has licked it so badly though he has made a bald patch on one of his toes though, so Derek and I have been bathing it with salty water and disinfectant, and wrapping his leg in socks so he can't nibble it! Yesterday evening we considered taking him to the vets, but decided to give it one more day to see how it goes...fortunatly this morning he seems much more perkier, and in a better mood and he has just shared breakfast with me...he is now sat in the window waiting for "Nanny!"........
Last night on the phone mum asked if she could use the spa today as he back has been bad. I said ofcourse!! But the house is a tip at the moment so I had better get some housework done before she arrives at 12pm!! My spa is great for all kinds of aches and pains (including Derek!!) but this is the first time mum has actually asked to use it, so I think she must be bad. However, mum is a notorious hypercondriact and infact she is fitter than me!! But my spa does need a bit of work this morning before mum uses it at lunchtime. Last night, just before I got out of the spa I noticed some foaming and this usually indicates my water is not right, so I will have to do a water ph test and see what the problem is. Also I must top up the chlorine level and give it a run through, and all this while keeping an eye on my Pud to make sure he dosn't nibble that sock off!! All in all this will be a busy morning, but hopefully will be worth it. Our lunch is poached cod with chive mash and to cheer her up a bit more I have her favorite comiedian, Dave Allen on DVD!! Crikey!! I must sort some fresh towels also.........*zips off to do work*

Over the weekend we went to the British Briard Club fun day, at Bickenhill near Birmingham!!

We arrived shortly after 4pm and it was raining so we had to wait in the car for the rain to stop before we could set the tent up, in the far corner of the field which was "Briard Central!" There was loads of gorgeous champion Briards, mostly twice the size of Sirius, and as soon as we set to work putting up our medium sized tent, a delightful lady came over to invited us to do some fun agillity!! Fortunatly I had managed to explain to some via a forum that Sirius is a cross breed and not a proper Briard, but there were still many questions to be answered as to what he is crossed with!! We still don't know, but most were saying some kind of spaniel, then another lady came over quiet in awe at my Pud and she was a breeder who said he was possibly a very rare breed of European sheep-dog! Many said "does he heard?" Oh yes!! I had said as Sirius does indeed hurd me and Derek together and its worse if Mum is about...if Derek and I are not together he sulks and sits grumbling too himself...Anyway here is a short video I took on my pod of my baby's attempt at the fun agillity!! Sorry for the quality! It was raining and Derek got in the way too!!



After this we carried on organising the tent and our stuff and later we were invited to a quiz, and the evening had a delightful "doggie rave" air!! I nearly fell off my chair in shock though when one lady announced over a megga-phone that the winner of the fun agillity for the non Briard was........SIRIUS!!! Derek and my pud went to collect his prize which was a an excellent "dog walkers companion" featuring water carrier, travel bowl, treats pouch and play bone all in one delightful package!! I had not expected that!! There were other non Briard dogs at the event who were much better behaved that my hell-raiser pudding!! Anyway we joined in the quiz but it was getting late and pudding was restless so I took him back to our tent, and left Derek drinking with his new quiz team mates. When Derek didn't come back for half an hour, Sirius was certainly getting irritated, but much to my relife he appeared shortly after slightly tiddled!! We soon settled down into a comfy and very cosey nights sleep!!
The next day at the event was strictly "Briard champions only" and a proper dog show, where a lot more people appeared and indeed more dogs. We took a short drive for breakfast and then came back to see the rest of the show!! The Briards were truly magnificent!! But as it was hot, Sirius was becoming restless again, and I think he was getting quite spooked as he had never seen so many people and dogs before!!! Indeed when we got back and got to bed last night, he was certainly not himself and kept us awake for a while panting and grumbling. I think he was just a bit overwhelmed by it all, and if we go to another doggie day out I feel he would be better off at a smaller event. It was, however, a superb day and will be long remembered!!

What would I put in "Room 101"?....mmmmm.....thinks........

4x4's and people carriers

my mother's hypocondria!

intolerant anti-smokers!

over-sized baby buggies!

crap daytime TV!

reality TV shows!

someone's got talent, shows!

charity adverts!

Trendy over-priced sports drinks!

The England football team!

Katie Price!

..........ok....really do need some retail therapy now!!! *blinks*

Just looking back over my blog and I have only just realised I have made much of the hard work involved in having a spa....and absolutly nothing about how nice it is!!
As we come to the time of the year when the darker nights are coming in, I have been adding lights and candles to my spa's gazebo and the ambience the lights create is stunning!! I got some Chinese lantern type "string" lights from ebay that are solar powered and they are delightful, along with a small camping lamp and tea candles set in free standing lanterns....even on a trip to TK Maxx recently I found a gorgeous, Veniceian Jester mask, very ornate and beautifully decorated, and I have set that in the gazebo with a light behind it to shine through the eyes!!! (I always like the macarbe!) Also privacy is paramount with my camping curtians covering the windows of the gazebo...
Now because of my very "time aware" dog, my evening spa has turned into something of a routine, as Sirius gets more and more restless as 9pm approaches!! Even from 8pm he will sit under my chair in he living room, and if I dont show signes of making ready he will begin grumbling and pawing, untill I move...so it goes as follows:

4pm....switch on spa to begin heating for the evening! The lid holds a lot of the heat in but I need the extra time to get it up to 39 degrees!!

8pm....water garden if we have had no rain. I have two massive tomato plants and some 6 foot high sunflowers as well as others!

8:30pm....change into swimwear and gown, fill Sirius water bowl, and bring treats into the gazebo

8:45pm.....prepare supper, open port, and prepare mp3 with waterproof headphones!!

9pm......Sink into hot steamy bubbles, give Sirius his snacks and chill out listening to fav tunez!!

Very regimented isen't it? muhahahahahaha!!! ...and needless to say I will be late tonight as I am writing this!!....But its not the same every night and some nights I dont have a spa at all. Perhaps the weather is too cold or I have just done a water change when it will need a full 10 hours to re-heat!! or even if I can't be bothered at all or Derek will use it, or both of us! but Sirius will still want his snacks!! But saying that though, Sirius seems to like the spa as when I get in he likes to lay next to it and watch the garden!!
Ok...gotta go.....his lordship, Sirius is waiting!! :)

Derek, changes his mind like a big daft woman, yet again!! *rolls eyes*

When I was a travel agency manager he would have driven me loopy, changing his mind!!!
Yesterday I had got our motorhome holiday "almost" in-the-bag!! as I had got a final quote, and info on insurance, as well as other bits and pieces sorted, and I was ready, phone in one hand and credit card in the other....then I phoned Derek.......
It was clear to me from his voice that he was having a bad day, so I just said "do I go with this or what?" but to my horror he said no!!! and that he wanted to talk about it tonight!! Good grief!! Anyway the "talk" about it tonight, did not happen...I gave him his tea, and then he skulked upstairs for the rest of the evening, on his computer! By now I had quite given up, and Sirius was reminding me that it was nearly "spa treat" time, so I took his mind off it with a game of ball in the garden!! AT about 8.50pm me and Sirius came in and I got ready for the evening bubble session, when Derek suddenly appeared!
"I found this cottage on the Dogs Trust website, and its £200 cheaper than doing a motorhome!" he exclaimed!!
and then he told me he had sent me a link!! I went into it and the darn thing just gave me an error message, and by this time I had a sulky dog giving me evils as if to say "get in the spa now!! I want my treats!" at this point I gave up and I shouted upstairs to Derek that I would look tomorrow.
Now Derk and I have done a Welsh cottage before, years ago in November time. Although the place was very quaint, the only source of heat was a "real" fire. Now as I had not got a clue how to start a real fire, it took me about an hour to get it going properly and even then it kept going out, and belched thick, acrid smoke into the small living room...and it was freezing cold!! Well, as I don't want a repeat of this unpleasent expierence I am non to keen about doing a "cheepy" Welsh cottage again!! If we did, I would take a convector heater, and my portable dvd player!! and I wont be too happy about it ! Also we have done a fair too many cottage holidays, and I want to explore different avenues of holidaying with a dog, like the boating trip we did, so the motorhome seemed like a good solution. Derek's argument is the cost of diesel and the fact that the van only does about 25 miles to the gallon, max! But what does he expect? Its not a tiny runarround, car. Its a bloody great 4 ton van!!!!
As for tonight, I have been promised the said "talk" about it again, but like last night, it wont happen, after nearly 20 years together I know him too well!! and he will just come in, have his tea, and vanish into his office!!!
I think I have resigned myself to the cottage holiday!!
As for today, well I have a ton of house work to do, as well as searching out new tracks for my ipod, and cleaning the spa area!!
Ho Hum!!!!

Just yesterday, Derek admitted he had been looking at boating holidays in France, which suprized me some-what as he has not mentioned boating since our Norfolk boards trip. As it is, it was me who was planning a trip on the North Norfolk broads in a bigger boat...I hadn't even considered Europe!!....

Derek has never traveled in Europe before, so this came as something of a shock.....Normally he isent interested in anywhere unless it involves a considerable amount of stress, endurance or wild adventure, but obviously our global jaunts have ceased now we have Sirius to consider...Derek was only put him in kennels "over my dead body!" as I will never leave him....
Way back when I was 14, I got my first trip abroad by pure accident!! It a long story but basically mum and dad had a row about Mothers day and they didn't speek to each other for weeks after. Thier favorite restraunt was near Northwich and called the "RhienGold!" and as dad dropped me off at school one morning he told me he was going to take my mum there to make it up!! Anyway mum actually though he said "book for the Rhienland!!" and not book the Rhiengold, so before dad knew anything about it mum had booked the 3 of us on a week long coach holiday!!! I found it really exciting, and I enjoyed every second of it because Germany is so very beautiful...on a side note this trip triggered my smoking as dad bought 200 JPS (the same brand I smoke today!) and shortly after we got home I discovered his "stash" behind the fire canopy, and decided to try one in the bathroom...Needless to say it was love at first puff!! Anyway it had been a coach tour and we took in other European countires going out and coming home, and not all were as pretty as Germany, and one of them was France which I didn't rate much compared to Germany!! So yesterday, when he told me he had been checking boats in France, I just said "Germany is much nicer, and the food in gorgeous!"...to my shock he said he had checked that too, but both had proved to be far to expensive at around £2,000 per week!!! Crikey!! I could book us the Carribean for that, I thought!!
Now sometime soon we are to attend a Doggie fun day and we are able to camp, but Derek is very reluctant about camping for some reason. Which is a shame as I was going to suggest camping in the Isle of Mann, another place I visited with my parents as a child, and Derek has not been too!! I have been looking at dog friendly guest houses on the Isle of Mann but nothing is certain yet, and the choice is quite limited. Also I still quite like the idea of boating, but I only wish Derek was able to steer one, as the prospect of another week stuck at the helm is not as appealing as it was once!! Well there are plenty of places to go boating in Britain, it dosn't have to be the Norfolk Broads!! Another thing I have considered is a dog friendly static caravan or perhaps going back to his aunties caravan in Ireland!!...there are many options to consider, but one thing is certain, it wont be soon.....Unfortunatly...

This blog is going to be a very serious warning about the new craze sweeping the internet!!

I-Doser!!!!!!! NEVER LISTEN TO THIS!!!!!!!!

For those of you who have not head of this, iDoser is a neural stimulation system, using pulses of sound at different frequencies through left and right headphones, to mimic the effect of drugs. Its legal, its free, as its on both limewire and youtube but most of all it messes with the brainwaves and indeed the brain, something which we don't compleatly understand the workings of!! and its here and sweeping the internet like the virus it is!!
Several days ago I read this blog on the Telegraph website...but I dident take it seriously enough, until I investigated...and listened to it!!


http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tomchivers/100044998/the-digital-drug-terror-that-is-sweeping-the-nation-possibly/

you will have to copy/paste, if you want to read!

I had read all kinds of things about this "legal high" and I naturally thought "year, right!" and dismissed it until I reminded myself that at the moment I am indeed using Solfeggio 528 Hz sound for relaxation and peacefullness...Next I thought, Vicky, don't be a hypocrite and try it for yourself so I did....

This video is of someone doing I-doser, and its not pretty!!
PLEASE DO NOT WATCH IF YOUR EASILY FREAKED!!



Bravely I clicked a link to a youtube video!! *not the one above* But one which contained the real sounds of one of the idoser...Its not music! its just an alternating beep, but my God, the effect on me was immediate!!!
...and I was not even wearing headphones!! (I aint that brave)
Instantly these frequency's hit my ears I felt as if I was going to fit!!! and it got worse by the micro second...horrified, I tried to move my finger over the mouse pad to stop the video, but to my horror, my finger would not move, so I had to use a heck of a lot of will power to move my finger to the back button!...When I managed to stop it, I was shaking, sweaty and very dizzy and still feel a bit dizzy now, an hour or so later!!!
Anyway, having the expierence of listening to it, if albeit for only a few seconds I would concluded that this might be the most dangerous thing to hit the internet!! I am not trying to scare anyone here, but I think we should all be aware of this horror and how kids are activly using this to mess about with their brainwaves!! Brainwaves are not there to be messed about with, and I have a feeling, if they are messed about with the consequences could be permenant brain damage........I know that a lot of my friends have teenage kids and I want them to be aware of this happening!!

DO NOT LISTEN TO I-DOSER!!!!!!..........unless you WANT to be sectioned!!

....and did you have your ears on!! (CB slang for on-air!)

As some of you know, my dad was a lorry driver and as a kid I was totally obsessed with "going down the road" with him!! So much so it effected my education, and frequently got my mum into trouble with which ever school I was at, at the time! (I went to 4 different schools) But oh it was fun...I had, had a bit of sulky week though, when sometime in 1981 my dad refused point blank to take me with him anymore, as he was getting snide, micky taking remarks about me from other lorry drivers. They were mostly related to the fact I looked much older than I was and already had a huge chest. They used to joke "Oh your awright for tonight then!!"...to which my dad would reply, very red faced, "Actually that's my 14 year old daughter!!" so for a while I was grounded from Dad's truck trips, and I was not happy about it!!
It had been a dark October evening when dad got home in his oil stained overalls one eveing, at about 7pm.
He had brought something with him, heavy, weighed down in a scruffy carrier bag! He just grinned at me, and told me to wait as he set (whatever it was) up on the kitchen table!!
It was a large black and chrome C.B. RADIO!!!
Mum and I looked on in awe, and for a moment I was so excited I could have popped!!!
Dad explained he had bought it off a fellow lorry driver for £15 as the driver in question had got a newer model. Mum had briefly remarked that £15 was worth a weeks shopping to which dad replied, it was for me, to cheer me up a bit!! Cheer me up? I was delighted!! But my delight suddenly gave way to the fear that I would have to use the thing too, and the push down microphone really did scare me at first. However, after just a week of having my new C.B. in my bedroom I was going at it like an old Ham!!! My ariel was a "Cherry Halfbreed" and only about 3 foot tall, attached to an old busquit tin covered in tinfoil. It got me as near as my mates in the next street, which was not satisfactory for my 14 years old self and I began to research getting one of the best aireals available, a 18 foot D.I. Thunder pole!!! After a bit of creeping from me, my dad got me one and this massive pole graced the back of our house (much higher than the tv areal ) until we moved in 1984....The C.B my dad had got me was a CBMaster 20-80 AM, which was actually an 80 channel *illegal* radio, but I didn't care as I was having the time of my life with it, and now with my huge areal I could DX over to the States too!! (dx-ing is a term used by ham radio people to *bounce* their signal around the globe when weather conditions are right) I even had California once!!! and I also kept a small notebook of all the "copies" I had, had...my *Handle* was Cherry Brandy, which at the time was my mums favorite tipple!! Also it didn't take long to meet my first on-air boyfriend, a chap from Padgate calling himself Peanut (real name Paul Humphries) he was several years older than me and it only lasted a couple of months until I found out he was seeing another C.Ber and I finished with him. Then I met someone else on air who I had vaguley known from school...His handle was Fire-Dragon and his name was Ian Struthers and we were together for several years after this, but that eventually ended too!! C.B was fun though as I made a lot of friends, and in a way it was so much more personal that the internet, but only in some respects!! Eventually the govenment clamped down on C.B'S like my poor AM radio and dad got me an FM C.B but that didn't seem to be as much fun, maybe because it was legal!! Lots of C.Bers like myself were put off and by 1985 the British public had fallen out of love with the C.B radio and the airwaves went silent!!
It was such a shame....and I would love to C.B again!!

10-4 for a copy good buddy?

How sick is this?
A well known collumist for the Sun and the News of the world uses the horrific story of Raoul Moat and the sick facebook page "RIP Raoul Moat you Legend"...TO DEMONIZE SMOKERS!!!!!!!!!!!

I quote:

*****SHE stood there, fag in hand, blowing smoke, declaring how incredibly funny it was that Raoul Moat had managed to hide from the police for a whole week.*****

Carole Malone is taking about Siobhan O'Dowd who began the sick facebook page "RIP Raoul Maot you Legend"
What Miss Malone fails to adress is the fact that Siobhan O'Dowd is a very stupid, brainless chav, not worth commenting on in the first place!!!
Its thanks to collumists like her and the media in general that made that sick facebook page so popular in the first place!! Good grief, is there no common sense in the world?
Now normally I read the Telegraph because its interesting and focuses on world events much more than other papers and infact reading this paper became a habit while traveling as you are given it free on most long haul flights...but occasionally I will decend to the tabloids and when I do it always annoys me in some way or another. Such as the News of the world, today on its paper website has no less than 4 stories on Jordan (Katie Price) alone!!! I really don't give a F*** what this waste of human existance is doing in her love life or elsewere! She is just a freaking Barbie doll!!! Surely there is more news worthy stuff out there...and then I get around to Carole Malones page and nearly fell off my chair when I read the first sentance of her "story". What the hell was she thinking? I will tell you what she was thinking..."Ohh having a jolly good whine about a sick face book page will make me look good in the public eye, and while we are at it, I shall demonize smokers so that everyone believe its only smokers who have the intelligence level of Siobhan O'Dowd...I'm sorry but Carol Malone has just proved she has the same intelligence level as the sick mare who started the facebook page in the first place!!! I know I have moaned about the anti smoking brigade more than once, but this sinks to a new, more sinister level, and I find it more than a bit creepy. Its thanks to people in the media, like her, that law abiding smokers like myself face abuse from strangers in the street, because all smokers are obviously stupid, inconsiderate chavs who blow deadly smoke into everyones faces!! Carole Malone needs to wake up and live in the real world, a world where todays smokers (like myself) try their very best to not let their enjoyment of tobacco infringe on any non smokers beautifully clean air!!This collumist actually thinks its trendy to demonize smokers, when we are just human beings like the rest of mankind, but we happen to enjoy tobacco!! What happened to tolerence!!? I would say to Miss Malone, why not turn your talents (if she has any) to more comment worthy articals instead of just writing what you think the sheeple will enjoy? Why not write on the Burkah debate, or how the coalition govenment is going to claw back the massive debt that Labour left us with? Yes there is indeed much more to the world than some thick woman who starts a stupid facebook page!! I mean its not as if the page is still on line! It was taken off on a few days ago! so why is it comment worthy? Collumists like her need to buck up their ideas and do some research into subjects before they start using horror stories to yet again demonize smokers! The media made this page as popular as it was, and even I who use facebook most days, did not know of its existance untill it popped up on the national news!! So I did indeed look at the page in disbelife!!.....and its crackpot author just "happens" to smoke!! WOW!! that must be comment worthy, Miss Malone!! I have skipped your page often, but I will be totally ignoring it in future!
As a side note I have left a comment on her page, which is heavily moderated by the way.....let me guess...my comment wont be published!!

*makes pot of tea.......lights up!*

Yes, you read the title correctly...the planets are "singing" to us!

Yesterday I had my interest re-fired in the pineal gland, sometimes referred to the "third eye" because it contains the same properties that are found in the human eye and it is light sensitive! I say re-fired because I first heard of this on my travels in India, Nepal and Tibet as far back as 1995!...The pineal gland is a tiny (about the size of a pea) gland in the geometric center of your brain that is mostly active in childhood and adolescents and even used in puberty (my puberty was very early starting at 10, and traumatic) By adulthood it lies mostly dormant and calcified, unless awakened. During my travels I was amazingly privledged to be invited into temples and monestaries and crossing my legs and contemplating the sounds I was hearing, I felt my spirit greatly uplifted and quite renewed!! For this reason Derek frequently *lost* me when I was on a "monestary hunt" I didn't really know it at the time but these *pure* chanting sounds were directly effecting my pineal gland!!
So whats this blog all about?...I hear you asking!
The pineal gland can be awoken by listening to certain sounds such as the "love" frequency 528, and by meditating on these sounds and using our dormant pineal we can become more self aware as well as spiritually aware! Descertes reffered to the pineal as the "seat of the soul" and the eye of the soul! and why not?...afterall this gland is centered at our deepest, most primal part of our brains!! ...When I was about 5, I actually believed I was the only, if albeit small person, in the world who could "see" as only I could see through my eyes and not through the eyes of others! Wacky, I know, but I was a wacky child as well as an adult, although I dont believe this anymore. But could this thought have been prompted by my "then awake" pineal gland? Who knows! Now as someone who has been through and indeed suffered from depression, I would find it very beneficial to re- awaken my pineal through meditation, and this is where the planets come in...The planets realy do sing to us through electromagnetic frequencies just as the monks sung when I was uplifted in the monestaries!! I will begin with Jupiter, our largest sibling and protector!! I say protector as Jupiter acts as a giant cosmic Dyson cleaner, because of its massive gravity, which sucks up comets and meteors in huge numbers! Without Jupiter our planet would have been destroyed a millenia ago! Jupiter really is our baby-sitter and after the Sun this is the next celestial body we should be greatfull for our existance!! Now Jupiters song is indeed at the magic 528 frequency!!! God's frequency, some call it!! and I shall be researching into this for many years to come, as its a "knock yer socks off" awesome study!!
Below is the song of Jupiter!!
Try and listen to this with head phones while meditating!!



Next is Saturn, our other giant protector!!!



and Uranus!! which incidently is the same colour (pale green) as that which pertaines to the 528 frequency!!



Wouldn't it be wonderfull if we could all take some time out from this mad crazy world, to contemplate and mediate on the songs of our planets, and re- awaken our pineal gland to find spiritual peacefulness and the deep joy in our souls!!

Believe me.....that joy really does exist!!.... We, as the human race, have just forgoten how to re-discover it!! :)

A very big pet hate of mine!!

This week is the 25th anniversary of live aid and I hopped over to youtube to watch some live aid footage to remind me of the time many years ago that I watched this event in a Warrington town centre pub, with a very good friend of mine!! Jane and I were both 18 and mildly drunk on halfs of cider and black, but had an excellent day out!! (yes...at 18, I was a lightweight!!) I vividly remember Quo doing "Rocking all over the world" so I tapped this into youtube search for a bit of nostalgia!...and indeed did other searches for bands that took part. Now attached to my laptop is a small but rather powerful, ipod docking port which doubles as computer speakers for me. Several vid's almost blasted my speakers to bits and yet other ones I could hardly hear!! For a time I thought I was either going deaf or there was something up with the docking port! NO....its simply annoying youtube sound levels. and its make even worse wearing headphones. With all the techy stuff we have today, surely youtube could have a standard sound level adjustment??
The same thing happens on TV!!
Who on earth has not noticed that adverts are so much louder than the programmes?
Gold and Watch channels are the worst culprits of this, I think!
Now think about it for a second....we, as the human race have advanced to put man on the moon, fly 8 times the speed of sound, connect live, instantly with others around the world and launch probes to other worlds and yet we must suffer from overly loud adverts as apparently there is no technology in existance to adjust sound levels on tv and computers without actually, physically turning the volume up and down..?? Ok, perhaps I am just too lazy to use the volume controle, but you would think with all the advancement we have today, such a thing would exist!! or perhaps I am just getting old and grouchy (lol) and a wee bit deaf after all my time dancing next to 10 zillion megga watt speakers in Mr Smiths club for many years!! or listening to my Sony walkman casette at full volume!! No, its just annoying geeks who can't be bothered with such a thing as standard sound level adjustment software!! If anyone has ever heard that such a thing exists, please email me!! I would pay good money for it!!

Last night in my drunken negotiation's with mum we agreed to meet today for shopping and lunch at Morrisons!

I had warned her about the heat, and standing around in bus stops but she assured me she would be ok, and she was desperate for cat food so I eventually agreed...Earlier this morning I phoned her and tried to put her off as the forecast was set for 31 degrees. It was all to no avail, she said she was going anyway, with out without me! So, at 11:30 I sauntered down to the bus stop for the short trip to the shop and lunch. Mum had been waiting at my stop when I got off, and instantly began wailing about the heat. I felt like saying I told you so but didn't, I just let her moan on. We shopped and I picked up a large plastic table mat which I wanted for the table in my spa so I wont get rings on it. Mum liked them too and she bought two of them, they are wipe clean and very handy....I was just about to find out just how handy they are.... Then we had lunch of fish and chips of which I had a pensioners portion (smaller) as I was not really hungry and we parted company at the traffic lights outside Morrisons car park! Mum didn't want to come back to my house today as it was indeed too hot (shock) and she wanted to get back for the cats, so we went for our seperate bus's. Now the wonderful smoking ban forbids smokers from smoking in bus stops so I stopped in the shade of a tree about 100 yards from the stop and lit up, and enjoyed my ciggie! Ahead of me at the said bus stop were several older people, and it looked pretty crowded, but I finished my ciggie and went to join them as the bus was due. I managed to squeeze my ever widening backside onto the end of the red bench next to a very frail old lady and a man and a woman in their 50's. It was indeed absolutly stiflingly hot as I waited and looked up the road for my non existent bus. Quite suddenly the frail figure next to me began to slide forward and in horror I realised she was fainting!!! The couple in their 50's were her daughter and son in law and began to help her. Without thinking I gently but firmly got hold of her arm to steady her, and suggested to the couple that they should take her jumper off as her face was bright red and she was obviously boiling hot! The th'ree of us eased her out of her blue cardigan as my mind was buzzing with things I could do to help this poor lady!...suddenly I got it!! Out of my bag I got the plastic place mat and began to fan her vigorously with it.
"Oh that's wonderfull!!!" the man had exclaimed "Thank you so much!!"
The lady began to come round, with the wafts from my place mat, and the glazed "not with it" look gave way to a more focused gaze and a delighted smile form her! As We waited and I wafted, I spoke with her daughter and son in law. It turned out this lady was 88 and had suffered two bad heart attacks last year!!! ...why on earth would they bring their frail elderly mum out in 31 degrees heat? this really had really got me baffled!!! The elderly, like babies also, do not have the same heat regulations systems that we have as adults!
By the time the bus arrived (which was late) she had come too sufficiently to stand with aid from her daughter and we helped her on the bus. They could not stop thanking me, but it wasn't thanks I wanted, I was just helping, and I hoped they realised that taking out their mum in heatwave weather is not a good thing, in fact its down right dangerous!!!
I hope there was a lesson learned today...as I wont be around next time!

Just watching the local news and got the shock of my life when a piece came up featuring a pub I was landlady at back in 1992!!

Back then it was called "The Rifle Butt" but during these politically correct times it is now called the Hart of Duston!!!

The current landlady called Lorraine Wager was on the news telling it like it is about the smoking ban, and how its affected her trade! She looks like a lovely lady and I wish her all the best in her excellent business, and hope that this ban might be lifted!! Its just a shame that this pathetic smoking ban is closing tens of pubs by the day, and when Derek and I are out for a drive we often pass closed, boarded up and sometimes vandalised pubs, which is indeed a very sad sight. It saddens me too that this was my chosen trade in life!! (thank goodness I got out) and I trained heavy and very hard for it, sometimes working almost 70 hours a week!! While I was at the Rifle Butt, my wages budget did not allow for a cleaner 4 days a week so I was up at 7am every morning cleaning, regardless of what time the regulars would let me lock up, which was normally about 2am!! Its not an easy life and I dread to think what its like now!! I admire Lorraine for her candidness in speaking out and I applaude her, loudly!!
The Rifle Butt was the first large pub I had run on my own!!
I think I mentioned somewhere else in my blog that I was there with a chap called Peter McKenna and every morning he would leave me too it at 7am only to return about 1am!! He got sacked because he was never there and I had to carry the ship on my own so to speak!! After Peter went I went with another lady to manage two other pubs in Northampton, before going on my travels....but my time at the Rifle Butt was a miserable and lonely one!! When I moved in there was no carpet up stairs, and it was draughty and damp!! It was an absolute tip upstairs, and down stairs in the two bar's it was not faring much better. I can remember on my first day, thinking "What the heck have I let myself in for?" and my question to myself was indeed justified. The lounge side was almost reasonable at this time ('92) but the bar side was a right "hole"...I could say Peter and I, but I wont as he was never there so I will just refere to me as singular....I had been promised a full referbishment but this never happend. In fact it only happened when I was off traveling in Asia almost two years later. I am happy to say the pub looks superb now!! Although I have not walked through those door since I left!
Good luck Lorraine!!!!!!!!
Your a star!! Keep up the good work!! x

Below is singer/songwriter Joe Jackson speaking on the "Forest!" smokers rights website!!

Guest post by JOE JACKSON

Ten reasons why the smoking ban stinks:

(1) It disregards property rights. The air in a pub ‘belongs’ neither to smokers nor nonsmokers, and certainly not to politicians, but to the publican, and it is the publican who should decide the smoking policy on his or her own premises.

(2) It sets a terrible precedent by blurring the boundary between public and private. A law court is a ‘public place’ – a nightclub is not, and neither politicians nor doctors have the right to legislate what people do in it. If we concede to them that right, they will inevitably extend it to our cars (as they are now trying to do) and then to our homes (which has already happened in parts of the US).

(3) It removes freedom of choice – not only the smoker’s freedom to enjoy a legal habit, but everyone’s freedom to work out their own compromises and solutions.

(4) It is anti-democratic. The government’s own Office for National Statistics found 68% opposed to a total ban, but like every other smoking ban in the world, it was imposed regardless. The only opinions which have been heard are those of medical authorities and lobby groups, and directly or indirectly, the pharmaceutical companies which fund them.

(5) It is socially divisive and encourages intolerance. Government is blatantly stigmatising a particular group, who must change their behaviour or be excluded from ‘correct’ society (a recent NHS campaign used the slogan ‘If you smoke, you stink’). Well-intentioned or not, antismoking authorities have created tremendous animosity between friends, neighbours and family members. They have also encouraged people to think that government can, or should, intervene to stop other people doing whatever they personally don’t approve of.

(6) It is hypocritical, since tobacco remains legal and the Treasury makes around £10 billion per year from taxing it. And, incidentally, there is a smoker-friendly bar in the House of Commons.

(7) Despite ever more frantic and contrived efforts to ‘prove’ otherwise, it is bad for business. Pubs and clubs are dying, and although the ban may not be the only factor, few people in the trade would deny that it’s a significant one.

(8) It is technologically backward, since it is not difficult, with decent modern air filtration, to make smoke virtually unnoticeable, and certainly harmless.

(9) It does not stop people smoking. Even if we find it appropriate in the first place to ban smoking in pubs in order to pressure people into quitting, it doesn’t work. In many countries smoking rates have risen since bans have been imposed.

(10) Finally, and most importantly, the government claims to be setting aside all these considerations in order to tackle a deadly health threat: 
‘secondhand smoke’. But there is no actual proof that even one person has died from this phantom menace. After 40 years of studies, antismokers can still only produce computer projections based on dubious statistics, and ‘relative risk ratios’ which sound scary but mean nothing in the real world. That’s why we see, for instance, posters telling us that tobacco smoke contains various nasty-sounding chemicals, without mentioning that they are present only at infinitesimal, harmless levels.

If we accept that such feeble evidence justifies a smoking ban, we are setting the level of acceptable risk so low as to justify banning just about everything else, too: cooking (which produces carcinogens), candles, incense, open fires, perfume, etc. Thousands of products, from household cleaners to cosmetics, contain higher levels of toxic chemicals than tobacco – and are still harmless.

Ultimately, the problem here goes way beyond ‘to smoke or not to smoke’. There is a worrying general trend towards more and more intrusive legislation, justified by more and more dishonest and misleading junk science and fearmongering. (Typical of this are recent claims that the continuation of a long-term decline in heart attacks is ‘caused by’ smoking bans, and the invention of a new threat, ‘thirdhand smoke,’ on the basis of no scientific evidence whatsoever).

What’s needed is not just the repeal of the smoking ban and other petty, oppressive laws, but a return to healthy scepticism, fairness, and common sense.

www.joejackson.com

I applaude you sir!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
love Vix x

This morning I realised I was about to run out of ciggies and as the local shop is miles away I decided to get the bus into town and get some at Sainsbury's...what I haden't realised was that today the gods were against me shopping!!
I have a terrible phobia of escalators which was brought on by that dumb escalator information film from the early 70's, so I got the lift up to the second level of the Grosvenor center via the New Look shop. My eye was caught by a huge display of bikini separetes and eagerly I stalked over to have a butchers, lead on by a huge pink sign announcing "20% OFF!!" ....Great!! I was thinking as I began to shuffle through the hangers to find styles I liked. As I ususally find, sizing is my problem, and most of the sizes were a tiny 8 and 10. However I am a 16 top and 14 bottom!! Everything was jumbled up and I would find a top in my size that I liked only to be dismayed when I found the matching bottoms were a size 10!! Time was getting on and my bus was due in a few moment so I hurridly decided to buy un-matched separets!! Afterall they are only for the spa. If I want to show off on a beach (not that I would) I would wear my Ed Hardy swimsuit. Anyway I came to the counter with 3 tops and two bottoms. To start with I nearly fainted at the price!! £58!!!!!! (what had happened to the 20% off) I asked the sales assistant if that was right and she said yes, pointing out that the sale things were not the designer items I had chosen!! "Well they were on the same rack!" I had exclaimed. Well I decided to keep my items but I was not happy about being charged the full price when a sign above the rack clearly said 20% OFF!!! I may not shop there again, methinks!!!
Later while hanging about in line for the bus, I had began to wish I had got a taxi back as the pungent smell of old people wafted in my direction!! I love old people as they have fascinating life stories to tell, but this bunch of four realy were NOT fragrent!! To top this the bus was late arriving, and then he parked in the wrong bay!!
On getting home I inspected my purchases and to my horror of horrors I found one of my black bikini bottoms was not a size 14..... it was a f**king SIZE 8!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.......Unbeknown to me, I had gone on the size it said on the plastic hanger and not thought to check the size in the garment itself!!! Crikey I have not been a size 8 since I was 25!!!! and would certainly not even get one bum cheek in the bloomin' things today!! Well I can't even be bothered taking them back, and besides, I am a dab hand with a sewing machine, so I will cut the tops of the legs and make ties for them.
In other news:
On Sunday me, Derek and Mum took a drive to our local garden centre and I was delighted to find two tea candle lantern holders on 4 foot poles, and these were in the sale!! They make a wonderful addition to my spa zone and look really pretty when lit!! I suppose they will look better when the nights get darker. Also I have decided to collect the Royal Dulton limited edition "Henry and six wives" set as an investment! My first piece which I sniped at 5 seconds is "Anne Boleyn" for a bargain price of £133!! (worth about £200 at auction) and she arrived today! I am delighted and the piece is exquisite! Now I have 6 pieces to go!! However, I am a wee bit worried about the cost as a Catherine of Aragon piece from the same set just sold for £350 on ebay!!!
Lastly, last night while I was listening to my ipod in the spa, I got an annoying voice on one track saying "this is an illegal download" over and over again, and I can't see how the heck I picked it up as I don't use illegal downloads! *scratches head* So I spent the morning, today, trying to trace this rouge file and I think I have now deleted the right one....as for tonight, well the usually bubble session and port at supper time!! :)

Another list!!

Just the current songs on my iPod in no order what so ever!! Some fairly new, some golden oldies to remind me I am 43 this year!! Ugh!!!
Not all the tracks I have will be listed here....just the ones I love the most!! ;)

Armin van Bruuen - Burned with Desire (Chillout mix)

A guy called Gerrald - Voodoo Ray

David Guetta - Delirious!

j-Lib - The Red (Instrumental)

SoHo - Hippy chick

Benny Benassi - Starship!

Dont stop beliving - Journey

Freemasons - Uninvited!

KLF - Last train to Transcentral

Marylin Manson - Beautiful People

Bronski Beat - Hit that perfect beat!

DJ Tiesto feat Tegan and Sara - Feel it in my bones

Scouting for Girls - This aint a love song

Seleena Gomez - Comes naturally

Sisters of Mercy - Temple of Love

Bow wow wow - I want candy

Agnes - Release me

Space Cowboy - Falling Down

David Guetta - Love takes over

KoXo - Step by step

Cicaine - Hiding all the stars

DJ Rui Da Silva feat Tietso - Touch me

N-joi - Anthem

Moby - Disco Lies

Prascilla Reena - Dollhouse!

Ce Ce Penistone - We got a love thang!

Bellamy Brothers - Its the reason

49ers - Come on and touch me

Jeff Lynne - Sooner or later

Kelis - Fireworks (4th July!)

Freemasons - Love on my mind

The Beloved - Kind of love that takes me higher!

Fleetwood mac - Abatros!

Def Lapperd - Animal

Mika - Love Today


Just a small selection of old and new that I like...may post some more soon, but I change the track listing so often its difficult to keep up with myself!! But at the moment I have an odd liking for DJ Tietso!! and the Freemasons (not just because I am one!) as well as other DJ type dance music! Trying to re-live my mis-spent yooff!! hehehehehe............

Some friends of mine, on a spa forum have expressed an interest in getting a hot tub following my expierence of getting one!!
Now its really lovely to lay back in hot bubbles in your garden of an evening, with a glass* of wine....BUT and its a big but, please consider these several points before you spend your hard earned cash on one!!

1: Where will you put your tub?...The best place for any hot tub is in the garden preferably on a good, solid concreate patio area (where I have mine) What must be considered here is the full weight of the hot tub which can be extreamley heavy. I have heard horror stories about people installing a 10k jacuzzi in their bathroom only to have the floor cave in under the weight. You must remember that your tub will weigh about 5 times the amount of your bath or more!! Folks who do install them in bathrooms, will almost certainly have to spend a small fortune on having the floor reinforced with steel!!!

2: Do you have time to maintain your tub once it up and running?...Hot tubs can be VERY time consuming as regards to hygiene and heath and safety!! Bugs like "legionaires" just love to party in your tub!!! Think about it!! Warm and wet is the perfect enviroment for them, so you have to wage a veritble war on the little buggers, so your tub dose not become a cess pit of disease!!
Daily: wipe tub and cover with a clean cloth, use an aquarium brush to clean the tub inside. Run the filter for half an hour to filter out residue. Clean filter in fresh water!! Test the PH of the water with a test strip and if the ph is to high or two low, adjust acordingly with chemicals! Add chlorine or bromine, if the level is too low! (DO NOT USE CHLORINE OR BROMINE TOGETHER)
Every week, clean the filter and every month change the filter compleatley for a new one. Change the water every 3-4 weeks and leave in about 2 inches of original water so you do not have to "shock" your tub with too much chlorine (when you first fill your tub you must shock it with a huge amount of chlorine, to kick start the cleaning process. You only need to do this once though!

3: Costs?....ok so you have laid out thousands for your posh tub...but wait....Have you considered the running costs?
I have only had mine for 3 months and already I have managed to double my electricty bill!!! I have had to cut down to using it once a day, and only turn it on at 4pm to begin heating for the evening! Hut tubs EAT electricty, if your not careful!!! Another consideration is the chemicals you have to buy for your tub and water maintinience. These include: pH plus, pH minus, chlorine (hot tubs EAT chlorine!) and De-foamer. You also must buy water test strips for testing, and learn how to read them properly! Reading test strips incorrectly, and you could turn your tub into an acid bath!!! Another consideration is your water bill! Hot tubs generally hold on average 1,000 to 2,000 ltrs or more and this ammount of water can cost a fortune if you change it too often. With careful water maintaining and a good, regular cleaning routine, and your water can be pristine and crystal clear every time you use it! I change my water about every three weeks, and am happy to say my tub water is perfect!!

4: Safe bathing?....so you have your water to perfection with a good hygiene routine, and you have your first "bubble session" ahhhh luveeeryly!!
Please note!!
Hot tubs can cause DISEASE!!!
Some of the little beasties are "hot tub lung" and "Foliculitus"
Grousome picture below is Foliculitus caused by a badly maintained hot tub/jacuzzi!!


photo from skincare13.wordpress.com

This disease is caused by bugs crawling into the base of you hair folicals and infecting them!!
NOT NICE!!! but the result if you don't clean and maintain your tub properly!!

Needless to say I did about 6 months research into them before buying mine. I figured that if I did something wrong or didn't understand something properly it could cost me a fortune!!! But as I find, there is more to damage to your health than your tub!!

Notes on safe bathing!
*NEVER take anything glass into the tub!!...if this shatters or breaks, shards can get sucked into the filtration system and cause irreparable damage!! use only plastic cups and things suitable for the spa!
NEVER let children under 12 in a tub, unsupervised!!
When at all possible bathe nude!!...I say this because bugs and germs can build up on swimwear and even freshly washed costumes can still have traces of washing powder on them which can effect the water quality, badly!!
NEVER wear make up, skin cream, perfume or any other beauty product when using the tub!! This too can upset the water ballance, and the overall cleanliness of the tub.
NEVER drink to access or take drugs while using the tub!!! Hot bubbly water makes you very sleepy!!! its VERY dangerous!!!
NEVER have anything electrical near the spa such as radios, tv, mp3 etc: Use waterproof electricals ONLY from a reputable supplier!!
NEVER overload your tub with people!! Think of all the unseen germs on everyones bodies and it will take you ages to clean!! Plus this will put extra strain on your spa's pump and it may burn out giving you a heafty cost for repairs. If a tub's instructions say "max 6 persons"...make it max 5, and so on!
NEVER have your tub too hot!! Your spa should have a digital temprechure display and thermostat (mine has). If not, you must use a thermometer and make sure the spa is between 35 - 42 degrees...anything hotter could burn you or you could pass out!! Be Aware!!

Saying all this though, having a tub can benifit your health greatly, if you have blood circulation problams. Hydro thearpy is fantastic and you really feel invigorated when you get out....But for such pleasure, it goes hand in hand that some very hard work must be done too!
However, if all this sounds too much perhaps consider a whirlpool bath? Much smaller and cheeper cousin of the spa with no chemicals and you change the water every time!!

I hope this info has been usefull to potential tub-uzzi-spa owners :) x

Yes!! another list!!

I do rather a lot of the worst this and that, but this morning I have decided to do the best current ads on telly!!
Since Christmas rubbish selections, there have been some good ones, I think!

1: Five alive dancing Dodo!!

2: Diet coke "Maniac" dancing puppets!!

3: O2 rubber duck pool party!

4: Anchor butter Cows in Factory making butter!

5: Specsavers shearing sheep dog!!

6: Avon youth Emulsion!

7: Cows undercover Milka ad!

8: Cravendale time travellers!

9: Yaun Sheet!!!

10: Neurofun funny little monsters!!

Here he is!!! *grinns*



Its a new "Phenix" 6 inch (150mm) Newtonian, reflecting telescope with a focal length of 750 mm which is going to be perfect for my deep space observations, and even Derek is interested in this from a photographic point of view as photography is his main hobby!!
My passion for astronomy began as a child when my dad took me out into the garden at night when I was 4 or 5 years old, with his binoculars to look for the infamous Comet Kohoutek!! From that moment on I was obsessed and saved up for my first telescope when I was 10. This was a tiny 2.5 inch reflector but it was better than binoculars and I got amazing views of the moon and planets, as well as fuzzy looking galaxies in Orion's belt! My bedroom had been packed with astronomy books during this time, and I spent many nights observing and keeping notes in a note book. As I grew up and other elements of my life took hold, I kind of left my love for astronomy on the door-step of my childhood home. Now it appears that I am going to have to dust off those old cob-webbed memories of how to observe, and start a fresh in this exciting hobby!! As a Fellow Craft freemason its my duty to study the 7 arts and sciences of which astronomy is one....When it arrived yesterday the massive box weighed an absolute ton, this is by no means a small telescope and even the scope counter weight weighs in the region of 30lbs!!! It took me about 30 mins to assemble which was fairly easy as it was just like my smaller version only on a much larger scale!! and I didn't miss Coronation Street!, but its taking up a massive space in my dining room!! Any way, I can't wait to try it, but this is realy the wrong time of year to observe. Winter is far better with darker and clearer nights and Derek even suggested we take nightly drives into the country to observe, where there is no light polution. This might be a bit difficult because of the size of the thing. Even taking it off the huge tripod it would only just fit in the boot!!

In other news!!
Because of the gorgeous warm weather at the moment the spa isen't taking as long to heat up in the evenings so now I only put the heater on at 4pm for my night-time bubble session. Last night it was a baking 41 degrees!!! Almost TOO hot!!
Recently I bought a couple of spa acessories: The first being a folding, hanging camping shelves for hanging my flip flops up in...Sirius has a very puppyish habbit of running off with my flip flops when I am in the spa, so this idea is to stop him. Its also a good place to keep my glasses and other bits. Secondly I bought a cast iron book holder so I can read my books while bubbling away in the tub. At the moment I am reading Alison Weir's "Six Wives" AGAIN!! But I really do need to finish Phillipa Gregory's superb "White Queen" also. Oh and I got some tent curtains for the gazebo so its totally private for nude bathing! This is more healthy for the water as it keeps it cleaner!
Ok, need to hop off now and brush up on my astronomy!!
:) x

Sorry but this is a rant one!!

Several years ago Derek and I found the time to take a 2 day trip to this awesome 5,000 year old monument on Salisbury plain!! It had been a superb but cold and windy day, and as visitors we could only follow the path of the visitors trail which is at quite a distance from the monument itself. It was a day to be long remembered and we took many photos!
Today on the BBC news there was a report from Stonehenge, about the summer solstice event and as the camera man panned away from the reporter to view the site it was indeed a dreadfull sight!!! Tons of rubbish had been left behind by the revelers making this monument look like some kind of landfill!!!
Its an absolute disgrace that English Heritage allows these folks "inside" Stonehenge (where as ordinary visitors must stay on the visitors trail) let alone, use the place as a rubbish tip!!! If any of these so called druids really cared about Stonehenge, they would respect it and take their rubbish with them. They clearly don't care about this wonderful place!! But I suspect that the "real" druids do care about Stonehenge! Its the bad apples at the bottom of the barrel ie: hippys, drop outs, low lifes and no-lifes that have caused this filthy rubbish...English Heritage really need to pull their socks up on this one, and allow only genuine druids into the monument itself, and keep the weirdo's and their rubbish at a distance. This is a neolithic, bronze age monument that should be highly respected, and indeed revered! This is also an ancient burial ground of our English ancestors!! How would the average person feel if someone tipped a load of rubbish on a grave of their family members?? Sorry but its practically the same thing!!! Think of this another way. If this had been an ancient monument or building in, say, Indoniesia, India or Thailand you would be arrested from dropping a ciggie butt let alone tons of litter!! People in these countries respect their ancestors, highly, as well as the things they built, and as such this would never happen...but in England, soft handed folks like English heritage just let these oddballs disrespect our ancient heritage and turn the place into a virtual landfill, while they quietly move in afterwards and perform a clean up. I wonder how many drug needles the cleaners of this site find?
Something MUST be done about this disgusting, filthy behaviour!!! These folks insult our history and piss on the very graves of our ancient ancestors!!!...they should be, at worst deeply ashamed, at best arrested, and given community service picking up litter, to teach them a lesson!!
Sorry...very angry about this...

*makes tea to chill out*

For once I am going to divert my blog from the usual, science, nature, history or moaning and write about last nights awful England Algeria match at the world cup footy game!!...The lazy, almost drugged up performance of the England players is certainly blog-worthy!!

Yesterday, I had a more or less lazy day, cooked a light lunch for mum and me, but I was preparing for last nights game...as in not watching it!!
Mum left about 4.30pm and I flicked the spa on to warm for 9pm, washed up, and got Dereks tea ready! By 7pm I trekked upstairs to watch Eastenders and the superb Queen Victoria documentary, flopped lazily on the bed with Sirius. Sirius appears to be sick and tired of the football too, as he stayed upstairs with me for most of the night, bringing me his favorite toys and laying on his back for tummy tickles. By 8pm I was hearing very loud *F* expleatives from hubby down stairs, so bad I had to go down to him to see what was wrong. At first I thought our telly had broke!!...Derek was sat in my reclining chair, onto his his second can of bitter, and his face was like thunder!! As I watched the game I realised why...Very lazy players (England) trotting after the Algerians, seemingly not giving a monkeys about where the ball was, let alone getting it into the net. Dereks language was not pretty and he was clearly not enjoying this. For a time I left him too it, and went to check on the temp of my spa, which was a disapointing 35 degrees. It was a cool evening and the spa was strugling to reach a nice hotness, so I put a blanket over the lid as this helps with heating. Eventually Sirius followed me back upstairs but I had been thinking about that awfull game, and curiosity got the better of me and I turned the upstairs tv onto ITV to watch and see if the second half had got any better!!....Errr NO!!! To be honest , here I have seen sunday park 5 a side games played better than England last night. I could hardly believe what I was seeing, let alone contemplating how much the superstar player earn in comparision to the Algerians. Perhaps it was the weight of their pay packets slowing them down, I was thinking! Or perhaps it was the fact that the WAGS had flown out to join them that they had been distracted. However, this was not a team game! This was simply a farce!! England fans were understandably angry as most had forked out an absolute fortune for air tickets and acomodation, as well as the cost of tickets to the game itself. If it was me, I would have felt cheated!
At 10 past 9 I eventually gave up on this pathetic attempt at football, and trotted off downstairs for my spa. It had only reached 37 degrees at this point and not my prefered 39, but I still had 15 minuites bubbling away, sending clouds of steam puffing out of my gazebo! Sirius sat next to the spa looking out at the birds in the garden. At least the hoover type noise my spa makes drowned out Derek and his effing and blinding. I am not a fan of football, but I could hardly blame him...England had indeed played half heartedly, at best!
The England team don't deserve to wear their 3 lions shirts, or their mind boggling pay checks...they have let their fans down too!!
Do they realy deserve even a chance at the world cup? I think not!!

BTW!
Can't wait for the Dr Who finale tonight!! ;)...and I can watch this down stairs too! ;) x

Ok, so we have all heard the waffle about 2012 and the end of the world, but have we ever really, deeply thought about what "might" happen?

Our nearest star, the sun, is asleep at the moment, but just a couple of weeks ago it gave out a loud snore which sent a barrage of solar wind in our direction!! Fortunatly nothing untoward happened and we have been used to these solar hiccups for as long as man has been on earth. But we only need to look at our sister planet, venus, to see what could happen to our home if we had no electro magnetic shield to protect us. Venus is a burning, greenhouse, fireball with a atmosphere that is 90 times more dense than our own! The suns deadly rays constantly fry the surface of venus and because of the dense atmosphere the rays are trapped, hence the greenhouse effect to its extream!! We are protected by our electro magnetic shield, which is generated by the iron core of the earth, but reading various reports and trying my best not to look at the scare-mongering stuff, our shield appears to be shifting and weakening. Now this is worrying as our sun is about to "wake up" from its 11 year slumber, and this time NASA has predicted it is going to wake up VERY p***ed off!!!!...and the worst solar storms for centuries are set to hit our home planet, due to our sun having a major hissy fit!!
Now the thing is, these storms have been hitting us every 11 years since time began, but consider this? Only now do we have super fast communications and technology, power systems, and ultimatly electricity, that will all be susceptible to the sun's waking rage! Consider world wide power outages, and the effects on the economies on this planet? We are in a bad enough state as it is, without our sun making it worse for us. But because of NASA and it recent announcment, things are set to get a lot worse! I remember back in 2003 when we had the last solar storms and there was major blackouts across Canada! It was also a nightmare to watch TV as I remember sky went down, and even when it was working the tv would flicker and cough, and be almost impossible to watch. Derek had asked what had been wrong with the tv. Solar flares, I explained. To my amazement my university educated beloved replied "Dont be daft!!! That can't be effecting our TV!!" ...but I am sorry to say, I was right. In 2012-13 we might be worrying about a bit more than flickering TV pictures! Major power outages could be possible as our sun throws out highly charged bursts of solar flares in our direction. These big flares (they have a fancy name that I can't remember just now) are magnetic and this is what could effect earths electricty supply, by actually melting transformers! Not nice!! Its possible that we could be without electricity for days, but is all this just scare-mongering. To be honest I think some of it is and some of it isent, but the problem comes when sorting fact from fiction, when there are so many differences of opinion by scientists. Personally I believe NASA! in the fact that there storms are due to be the worst for 50 years or more.
So should we worry?
Not really....whatever will be, will be, as the saying goes, and I don't believe we have the power to change the fate of our planet!
I am waiting for the delivery of a new 6 inch reflecting telescope, and I will be looking at the sun's active sun spots, and maybe even posting findings I make on here (if any!) Sun spot activity is a sign that the sun is about to go into a very active phase, so at the very least this might be helpfull in predicting when solar flares are likely to happen. As a side note NEVER look directly at the sun!!!! To view the sun with a telescope you must use white card to reflect the image! I have been doing this since I was a teenager with my old 3 inch telescope, so am well practiced in doing this! and even the image reflected on the card will be bright enough to hurt your eyes so I wear sun glasses to view the card....
Anyway...I hope this has been food for thought!
What will I do to prepare for 2012?
hehehehehehe....going to stock up on tons of candles, methinks! ;)

My nerves were building from last Friday!
Friday night I could hardly sleep!
Saturday afternoon I caught my taxi to my lodge!!

At about tea time I was passed to my fellow craft, the second degree of Freemasonry!!

The ceremony was amazing!
There was non of the teasing I expected from my fellow bretherin, except a joking remark about goats, of which my brother got a very knowing look from me and a grin! I had heard this one before! There are no goats in masonic ceremony!! Its quite laughable really, but this roumer came from non masons trying to make sense of the G.A.O.T.U which actually means "The Great Architect of The Universe"....still I was nervous though. Who wouldn't be? But I entered my lodge with an open heart and mind and when the time came I was asked to leave and prepare by my Right Worshipful Master, and at this point I exited the lodge and changed into the same kind of thing I wore for my initiation. Pyjama like top and pants with velcro fastening, so I could show the various bits of flesh required for the ceremony, like my knee, chest ect. I had to change the top twice though as it was too small, and at this point I was hurrying as I didn't want to keep the bretherin waiting.
What followed was a little like my initiation, but the lodge seemed to be buzzing with spirituality as I took my vows and pledged myself to seek knowledge trough the arts and sciences. When the time came I was clothed in my new apron, now with two blue rosettes to the left and right corner, and as we closed and left the lodge I was congratulated with many kisses and hugs from my fellow brothers!! It was wonderful and I felt like I was on some kind of high, and this feeling continued right into Sunday as I tried my best to let the expiernce sink in!! The only thing that blighted my day was the sodding world cup!! Derek had said he could only pick me up at 7pm, just as our festive board was starting, so I had to leave! Making a short speech of thanks and apologiesing for the fact I had to leave, I made my way out to Derek waiting in the car!! It was heartbreaking to leave but it was either that or I would have to pay £20 for a taxi home!!
Derek and I had made a pact over the world cup!
He would only watch the England matches down stairs and the rest he would watch upstairs, and I am happy with that. But Saturday evening was the England match, and I endured most of it because my hot tub was heating up, and it only reached 38 degrees at 9pm only 20 mins before the match was due to finish. Eventually I switched on the bubble button, before I sank into bubbly hot steamy water, up to my ears, and happily contemplated my "passing". I stayed in the tub for half an hour, sipping port and lemon! Sirius came out to see me, and sat on the grass bit in the gazebo almost as if he was guarding me, or making sure I was ok. Sirius had obviously been upset that he had not seen me all day, as when he did see me he was all over me, licking, whimpering in pleasure with a madly wagging tail. I had missed him too!!
Later I had climbed the stairs, marginally sloshed, and went to bed leaving Derek to his footy, which he watched well into the night....Sunday was very quiet! We had an early morning drive and then lunch and Derek retired to the bedroom to watch 3 footy matches and formula 1. He came down to walk Sirius in the early evening, and the went back to watch more footy highlights. Personally I hate the world cup and football in general...but I am not complaining as Saturday was my day!!! Its just a shame Derek was not there to witness it!!
Later on Sunday I was told by a fellow brother via a masonic forum:
"You were awesome!...by the way you conducted yourself today, you will make an excellent ritualist in due course!! Congrats!"
This comment left me with a huge grin on my face and a heart bursting with joy!! :)

Lists!! I adore lists, and I have probabally even done this one before, but hey, the old age is setting in and I get forgetful...well thats my excuse anyway!!!
Before I start I have omitted to add some of my favorite music from the world of opera and rock-opera, and even my adored "Jeff Waynes War of the Worlds!" Instead I decided to concentrait this list mainly to single tracks or the old 45 rpm singles. Some of them have a very personal significence, some have a meaning attached for me, and others I just love...please pardon the eclectic taste listed below, but if it has a good beat, a good base line and awesome harmonics...well I love it! This is an "all time" list so some tracks are from the early 70's, also I have not included my current favorite track which is...my current favorite track is the Red by Jaylib...you may recognise this from the socialite rubber ducks O2 advert!



Trixivilles all time TOP 100!!! (in reverse order)

100: Thunder in the mountains - Toyah

99: Swords of a thousand men - tenpole Tudor

98: Child in time - Deep Purple

97: keep on loving you - Reo Speedwagon

96: Automatic lover - D Dee Jackson

95: Waterloo - Abba

94: My sweet Lord - George Harrison

93: Land of make belive - Bucks Fizz

92: Cheery Pie - Warrent

91: More than a feeling -

90: Step on - Happy Mondays

89: All together now - The Farm

88: State of Independence - Donna Summer

87: Alright - Pet Shop Boys

86: Prince Charming - Adam and the Antz

85: Metal Guru - T Rex

84: The Whistler - Jethro Tull

83: Big Wheels - ELO

82: Sex Machine - Carter USM

81 Ebaneza Goode - The Shamen

80: Ride a white swan - T REX

79: Fashion - David Bowie

78: Next is the E - Moby

77: Eve of the War - Ben Lierbrand

76: There's more to love - The Communards

75: Mr Blue Sky - ELO

74: Radio Ga Ga - Queen

73: Close to the edit - Art of noise

72: Blue Jeans - Neil Diamond

71: Bad - Micheal Jackson

70: Jurrassic Park - Weird Al Yankovic

69: Confusion - ELO

68: I wanna be free - Toyah

67: Wandering star - Topol (first song I ever remember hearing as a baby!)

66: The tide is high - Blondie

65: Star - Kiki Dee

64: Sit Down - James

63: Ride on time - Black box

62: 21st century man - ELO

61: Another one rides the bus - Weird Al Yankovic

60: I want to break free - Queen

59: Rockin all over the world - Status Quo

58: Road to nowhere - Talking heads

57: Mamma used to say - Juinor

56: Eldorado - ELO

55: 7 Tears - Goombay dance band

54: In the air tonight - Phil Collins

53: Hammer to fall - Queen

52: Mirror man - Human League

51: Syncronicity - The Police

50: Riders in the sky - The Shaddows

49: Sooner or later - Jeff Lynne

48: Never can say goodbye - The Comunards

47: Another brick - Pink Floyd

46: Belive me now - ELO

45: Dr in the Tardis - KLF

44: Big Time - Peter Gabriel

43: Give you devotion - Nomads

42: Photograph - Def Leppard

41: Your Should be dancing - The Bee Gees

40: Fascination - Human Legue

39: Two Hearts - Phil Collins

38: Dont you want - Felix

37: Waves - Blancmange

36: Stargazer - Rainbow

35: Sacrifice - Elton John

34: Native Love - Divine

33: Smoke on the water - Deep Purple

32: I travel - Simple Minds

31: All night long - Rainbow

30: Naked in the rain - Blue Pearl

29: Reputation - Brian Spence

28: Could you be loved - Bob Marley

27: Things can only get better - D-ream

26: Renaissence - M-people

25: History - Micheal Jackson

24: Face of the waters - Moby

23: Pride - U2

22: Comment te duie adure - The Communards

21: Beautiful People - Marlyn Manson

20: Cracklin' Rosie - Niel Diamond

19: In the shadows - Rasmus

18: Redemption Song - Bob Marley

17: I surrender - Rainbow

16: Shine a little love - ELO

15: Tear us apart again - Joy Division

14: Living on the ceiling - Blancmange

13: Take me away - Time Frequency

12: Any road - George Harrison

11:Be with you - Attomic Kitten

10 Video - Jeff Lynne

9: Not gonna get us - Tatu

8: Off-shore - Ciccaine

7: Crazy - Seal

6: Can I play with madness - Iron Maiden

5: Anthem - Moby

4: Inner Smile - Texas

3: The Mummer Dance - Loreena McKennit

2: Twilight - ELO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


1...................Is below!!!




Moby and "Hymn!!! this is my dream!!" *taps feet happily*

This is my JOINT number one........WITH!!



Club Country by the associates!!

May god rest Billy McKenzie x

testing.........................................................testing..................................................

"Trekking form Jiri??"
The old boy tutted and walked off down the Ghats at Varanasi, mumbling "Too many steps!"

Now it doesn't take much to confuse me but, I was confused at this point as we picked our way to the beautiful Ganesh temple. I was confused because Derek had assured me that the route we were taking was the "old" trekking route and therefore much better than flying into Namsche Bazarre as most trekkers do from Kathmandu. Namsche Bazarre is at a height of about 11,000 feet and trekkers would aclimetize there before going on to Gorok Shep and base camp. Jiri, where we started, was much lower so Derek told me, we would get aclimetized better.
Like a berk...I believed him!!
The bus ride to the small Nepalese town of Jiri was almost 12 hours from our last stop for supplies. These were emergency supplies of chocolate and tinned ham and other packets of trekkers dried food a bit like pot noodles, which when added with boiling water would give you a supposed meal!! I say supposed because they were god-awfull, and indeed made the traditional pot noodle seem like a sunday roast in comparison!! Now at this stage I had never done any "serious" trekking in my life....Derek and I had done "training" treks in Derbyshire and Yorkshire before undertaking this expedition and infact when I had first tried on my fully loaded backpack back home at my pub, I almost toppled over backwards!! I was much more used to hiking and therefore having only a 20 litre day pack. My backpack (the one I am wearing to the right in my banner) was a whacking, great 65 litres and weighed about 20lbs!! just under a quarter of my total body weight at that time. During the trek I was to off-load some of the contence of my pack to Derek as it was just too knackering to lug about..Now let me explain about the trails from Jiri. They are indeed stone steps!! Very steep stone steps, and they are not level or safe and often slippery with mud, slush and snow! By as soon as day too on the trek I was begining to wonder just what I had left myself in for!...Also because our route was transveresing the Himalaya. In other words every day was "climb, decend, climb, decend" and it was totally exhausting! I had read some sound advice about trekking in Nepal about a year before we left and it said "when you look, stop and look. When you trek, Trek! This proved to be true, several times over when I lost my footing. We were in February and a good time to watch the beautiful rhodendrons out in bloom. Derek is a big chap and his legs are far longer than mine so he was leaping about like a mountain goat. I, however, would be transfixed by the awesome scenery, while trying to keep up with him, with my rock scrabbling, slipping and sliding everywhere! It was awful!! and we provided much entertainment for the locals!!
The night before the snow storm...we were lost!!
Derek had, had the map and I the compass but his map reading skills are not the best. We spent the day climbing to a snowy ridge called Lamjhura pass at 10,000 feet and appeared to be going around in circles as when we stopped at some villages for tea, I would ask my usual "Yo ghar unkho nhame keho?" translated means "what is the name of this village?" at 3 seperat villages I had got the same reply "GOYEM!" This was amazingly confusing but we concluded we were, indeed, on the right track and there must be a lower Goyem, middle Goyem and and upper Goyem...all of which were not on our map. Many villages wern't on the map either, but I had read to expect this, so we carried on to the upper of the three, where we were to make camp for the night. There were a couple of bhatti's (tiny cafe's) and a small school. It was a pleasent enough place and I was very relived to be stopping for the night, as our cold fingers worked on erecting our small, mountain tent. With the tent up and sorted we made our way to a bhatti for supper, much rakshi drinking and my journal writing. I remember I had been quite tipsy, when I was accosted by the village school teacher who appeared to be equally drunk. (drinking in Nepal is a national obsession!) with sign language and my crap Nepalese I gathered she wanted to take me to meet her school children!! This was to be the most delightful part of the evening! She led me to her small wooden walled school and quite suddenly I felt like some kind of movie star as I was greeted by 40 or so squeeling, excited kids aged about 7!! I was invited to sit cross legged in front of the school room and groups of children thrust their school books under my nose for me to write some "Engerishhh" in them!! The teacher was delighted!! and with our session ended she took me back to the bhatti and even bought me a "special" Yak butter raksi!! By now I was quite drunk! and our supper of Dhal Baht Takari (a kind of lentil stew and rice) had arrived...To wards the end of our supper, our landlord came rushing over with a red face and very flustered.....
"Snow storm come, Snow storm come!!" he yelled!!
We looked at each other and hastily finished our supper and thanked the landlord as we hurridley left!
The landlord was not joking either!!
When we got out side there was a really nasty blizzard that had suddenly blown up, and we could hardly see our way back to the tent! In the mountains this often happens! It can be quite warm and sunny one second and the next you get a blizzard!!
Somehow we got back to our tent and bungled our selves up for the night. I remember I squeezed myself into my mountain sleeping bag and was even wearing 4 pairs of socks!! But I was still frozen as the blizzard slammed into our tent. Derek had a small bottle of rum and a small flask of boiling water borrowed from the bhatti, and this warmed us as we drifted to sleep, somehow!
"SCHEEEKET!"
This odd sound woke me in the middle of the night, and to my relife the wind seemed to have calmed!!
"SCHEEKET!"
The sound came again, and my newly woke brain began to process this new noise!
It was coming from the tents outer cover, and sounded like razor sharp claws, were scraping down the cover of the tent!!!
The noise came again and much closer to my ear this time. I shook Derek awake and in a paniced voice, stage whispered!
" There is a f*****g YETI out side the tent!!!"
Derek fround at me and was just about to say "don't be bloody stupid" when the noise came again!! He paused and looked to the area of the tent from where the sound had come...slowly and quietly he moved to unzip the tent and have a peak outside!
"be carefull, I hissed!!"
The next thing I heard was his giggling!
"Wha.....!"
"Your yeti is just lumps of snow falling off the outside of the tent!" he said, cheerfully!!
....its amazing what altitude sickness can do to the mind!!

Ok that's all for today folks...but there is more to come!! "oh noooooooooo!" I hear you moan!! "not more travel waffle!" hehehehe, yeah sorry!!
I will wright part two of this very soon!
*lights ciggie and makes tea*

This is me at Goyen...

At about 6:30am (local time) an Air India 737-400 crashed, over-shooting the runway at Mangalore in south India!!

Woke to this heart breaking news this morning!

As many of you know by now I have a special love for India and have visited this awesome country about 12 times now...but this horrible news this morning reminded me of the nerve racking landing at Kerela airport just south of Mangalore. As travel expert Simon Calder put it "This was a table top airport" meaning the runway has steep drops either side. In my opinion these runways are simply too short!!! While coming into land at Kerela we began an unusually steep decent and we were flying aboard the same type of aircraft Boeing 737-400. This steep drop was horrible and felt like we were just "falling" out of the sky, rather than the gentle "step" drop you normally get. Both Derek and I had looked at each other nervously and then around the cabin at our fellow passengers (mostly Indian) who appeared to be calm and relaxed...watching local reaction when your traveling is a good indication as to "whats normal"...such as on a mad Indoniesian bus ride. If the locals are relaxed, then this ride is normal!!! In the cabin all was normal, so we supposed this steep drop was normal to, but it was making me feel sick!! To this date I have only ever had air-sickness once, and I have forgotten how many times I have actually flew!! So my sickly feeling was unusual to me! When we landed the force of full reverse thrust slammed us in our seats and just a few seconds later we were at a standstill on the runway!!! Hence it is in my opinion that these runways are simply too short!!! However flying in India is excellently safe, more so than most asian countries!!
Here is an oddity though!
I have never felt safe on either a 737 or an Airbus!!!....and I have no idea why! The only thing I can think of is the amount of really bad clear air turbulence I have felt aboard these jets. One classic example was flying home from Goa...as we bounced about on board the seat belt sign "bonged" as Vicky, here was tucking into a rather gorgeous bottle of coconut liquor, getting rather tiddled in the process. Anyway I didn't need to put my seat belt on as I was already wearing it, as I do on all flights!! Pilots MUST keep their seat belts on at all times so my principle is "if its good enough for the pilots, is good enough for me" ...now, mildly drunk I, inevitably needed the toilet so I un-clipped my seat belt and made my way wobbly up the aisle while clinging on for dear life!!!
"Make it stop!!! Make it stop!!!" a terrified screach came from my right and a woman I had been chatting to while we were in the que for boarding, suddely grabbed my trousers and very nearly tripped me over!! She was in a state of compleat hysterics!!! Crying and squeeling and I was indeed surprized that a flight attendent hadent come over to calm her. Anyway, busting for a wee I took her hand and said gently...
"Its just nasty air. Its called clear air turbulance, so there are air pockets we bounce about on" I smiled at her!!
"Whats clear air turbulance?" she cried "Why is this happening to us??" She was still holding my hand in a death grip!
"Just let me go to the toilet and I will come back very soon!" I told her...she carried on crying and gripping my hand which I gently let go of. Like Arni in Terminator, I told her "I'll be back"
I got to the aircraft loo and wee'd for Britain!!
When I got back she was still crying and mumbling but on seeing me she smiled and reached out for me. I took her hand and knelt down in the aisle next to her seat and calmly explained what this turbulence was. She seemed to calm a little and then she said "Why are you so calm?" I told her I was a bit tiddled, and offered her some of my coconut liquor which she accepted gladly...I half expected a flight attendant to come over and get me back to the safety of my seat, but this never happened. Also I realised I was risking my life being in the cabin with no seat belt on in severe turbulence. People have been killed by clear air turbulence by not wearing their seat belts, as if the aircraft drops suddenly you can smash your head on the roof of the cabin. I was not really thinking about this though. I simply wanted to calm and reassure this poor woman. After about half an hour the turbulence leveled off and the seat belt sign bonged off with sighs of relife around the cabin. By now I was quite angry that a flight attendant had not come over to calm this panicing passenger, and indeed get me back to my seat!! No they were all safely buckled in with their belts!! They must have realised I was doing a good job and did not need to interfere! But its not my job to calm fellow passengers! Cabin crew are trained for it!!!
Anyway this is why I am non too keen to fly on the 737!!
My favorite aircraft is the classic 747-400, where I have always felt very "at home" simply because this jet can climb above most bad turbulence, giving the passengers a very smooth ride!

This crash needs to be investigated VERY carefully!! and evaluations need to be done on the length of this ultra short runways in south India!! 737's are big jets and it appears to me that the captain of this aircraft sadly just ran out of runway...I await the investigations!

My heart goes out to the friends and family's of the poor souls that perished, today. May God rest them all! x

.........its difficult to think what to write at this point!
Except this day, 474 years ago a Queen of England was murdered!
Indeed the first Queen of England to be executed!!

Queen Anne had been so very brave!
On her final day she had her favorite ladies about her and her final Mass had been an emotional one. She also swore her innocence of all her supposed crimes on the Body of Christ!!
Then she bravely waited....and waited...Her jailer Sir William Kingston had been trying desperatly to get a definate hour for the execution, but it had been proved to be difficult as the infamous Hangman of Calais had been delayed on the road to London. Kingston noted that Anne appeared to take "much joy" in death, and she was calm and indeed jolly. This is where the famous comment about the "little neck" came from! Kingston had told Anne that there had been a further delay and Anne has said she was sad it was delayed and "hoped to be dead by noon and past my pain!" Gently, Sir William told her there would be no pain as the swords man of France was an expert, and the blow would be so subtle and swift. To this Anne had laughed and circled her long, delicate fingers around her own neck and said "...and I have a little neck!"
Finally, at 9am she was lead into the the early summer sunshine...and thus unto her death.
Anne had chosen her out-fit carefully! a grey damask over kirtle, and red kirtle. Red was the colour of English religious marters and Anne knew this. This same red colour was chosen by Mary Queen of Scots for her execution 50 years later...Anne also wore her famous silky Raven black hair tied up under a simple cotton coif on her head. She mounted the steps calmly and with much grace, where her weeping ladies removed her ermine fur wrap, and she turned to the crowd and gave her final adress!

"Good Christian people, I am come hither to die, for according to the law, and by the law I am judged to die, and therefore I will speak nothing against it. I am come hither to accuse no man, nor to speak anything of that, whereof I am accused and condemned to die, but I pray God save the king and send him long to reign over you, for a gentler nor a more merciful prince was there never: and to me he was ever a good, a gentle and sovereign lord. And if any person will meddle of my cause, I require them to judge the best. And thus I take my leave of the world and of you all, and I heartily desire you all to pray for me. O Lord have mercy on me, to God I commend my soul!"

Her executioner was very taken aback by her "smiling countenence" and he became shaky and weepy as Anne gently forgave him, and gave him his purse of monies for his work that would be shortly carried out. His sword had been hidden under some straw on the scaffold, so Anne could not see it and thus have no fear of where it was coming from. Kneeling upright (as was the custom of French executions) She clasped her hands tight in prayer and whispered the words...

"To Jesu Christ I commend my soul!!" over and over...

"Boy!!!! my sword!!" the executioner said loudly. This was a ruse created so that Anne would have no idea when the final blow would come. There was no "boy". The executioner quietly slid his sword form its hiding place under the straw, and with one swift, expertly placed swing...it was over!

*Notes*
I have no idea where my obsession for Tudor history comes from, but I have had it since I was a child. I had been about 3 when my dad told me of "Good king Hal" throwing chicken bones over his shoulder and it went from there....and belive me!! its is an OBSESSION!! Derek has even mentioned I should apply to Oxford to study for a degree, and I may well do this as it might be the only cure for my addiction to this time in English history! I am planning a book that will prove the innocence of Anne Boleyn, but this will involve years of research and study of carefully structured debates of noted historians, both alive and dead. My aim???...well its a long shot....but I would like to join the campaign to get Anne Boleyn pardoned and re-buried with her daughter, Elizabeth the 1st, in Westminster Abbey. Why??........Good Queen Anne was innocent!! Its as simple as that!!

Inspired reading:
The life and death of Anne Boleyn - Eric Ives
A new life of Englands tragic Queen - Joanne Denny
Henry VIII's obsession: Anne Boleyn - Elizabeth Norton
Anne Boleyn - Nora Lofts

*lost in thoughtful remembrance*

This for me is true for two reasons!
Firstly and personally it was the day I foolishly married a womaniser (1986) whom I divorced two years later on the grounds of his gross adultery!!
450 years earlier it saw the bloody murder of 5 innocent men!!!



Kathrine of Aragon had died early in 1536 and with this even Henry and Anne "celebrated!" this event by wearing yellow silk and dancing...they also had another reason to celebrate...Queen Anne was pregnant again and Henry was eagerly awaiting the birth of the long waited for son. At this stage though their marriage had become strained as Anne had learned of Henry's womanising (I can well sympathise here) and indeed his eye had already been caught by the supposedly pious and devote Jane Seymore, who was everything Anne wasn't! Quiet, submissive, and not much intelligence, of plain appearence and certainly nothing special. Anne herself was indeed feeling threatened by her and was becoming increasingly adgitated. This came to a head when the Queen discovered Jane and Henry in a passionate kiss and this subsequently caused her to misscarrie the much desired son...However the still born boy was so badly deformed it would not have lived, and the Kings suspections were aroused. How could he, the King, possibly have fathered a deformed child??? He was the King and thus, perfect!!! Such vanities gave way to the supposed whisper of witchcraft and so began Thomas Cromwells plot to not only depose Anne but to have her murdered!!
Initially, Cromwell had been a firm supporter and friend of Anne, but due to their differences in foriegn policy and Thomas crawling after the King like a pet puppy, he turned on Anne when Henry had screached "Get rid of her!!" at him in a horrible rage after the sill born child!! It is constantly said that Anne had misscaried of her saviour and the wheels for her downfall were set in motion!! Thomas Cromwell then used Annes own flirty personility against her and five innocent men, favorites of Anne's, were draged into the frame. Sir Henry Norris, Sir William Brereton, Sir Francis Weston, her own brother Viscount Rochford (George Boleyn) and her favorite musician Mark Smeaton. Most of Cromwell plotting centered on court gossip, sniggers and overheard bits of conversation. Like when Anne accused Henry Norris herself of visiting her when he was supposed to be visiting one of her ladies in waiting. Gossip carefully and clumsily super-glued together to form a case against the Queen!!
In the final week of April the first to be arrested was the musician, who was tortured by having his eyeballs squashed with a knotted rope, and then most probabally racked too, where his limbs would have been ripped out of his sockets causing excrusiating pain and ripped the words "I confess to adultery with the Queen!" from his lips...The next arrests came at the May day festivities. The last to be arrested was the Queens own brother George on the accusation of incest!! Anne and George were indeed close but not THAT close!! it has even been suggested by some historians and indeed the Tudors mini series, that George was gay, but there is nothing historical to prove this as he is presented as somthing of a womaniser, but its very possible he could have been bi-sexual. His relationship with his wife Jane, was simply awfull, and it was supposidly her that planted the incest thing in Cromwells mind when the ladies of the chamber were questioned. But none of the dates and places in all the accusations could be proved as the Queens whereabouts did not correspond to them.....
On the 17th of May 1536 all five accused but innocent men submitted their necks to the executioners block...even Mark Smeaton who was a commoner was beheaded. Commeners were hung instead.
Poor, hansome, intelligent, talented men died for no other real reason than politics and Henry's lust for another woman!

It was Thomas Wyatt who wrote the poem "These bloody days have broken my heart" ...Wyatt was also arrested but later released without charge!

Just got back from our usual Sunday morning expedition to Morrisons where I picked up a promising little gem on blu-ray for £8.99!! I say promising as I have just had a brief look at IMDB where this movie has quite promising reviews!! Its called "Splinter" and is directed by Toby Wilkins who I remember did the Grude 3, but I was non too keen on that, still I wont hold that against the guy as the story appears to have a very interesting plot! Its something along the lines of a Dr Who story I wanted to write a couple of years ago but never got round to it....anyway. I am going to give this a whizz tonight at nine by the usual candle light (I cant watch horror unless my candles are lit!!) and I will write a review on the next blog!!

Ok!!..."Amy's Choice" Dr Who......???......errrr.....
To quote my Facebook post "WTF was all that about?"
IMHO this has to be one of the worst who stories since the diabolic "Love and monsters" and that realy is saying somthing! But this is just my opinion! I read what others thought of it on GB and other Who sites and weirdly loads of folks actually like this compleat drivel!....loads of unexplained falling asleep and waking up and not knowing whats going on. Also a pregnant companion is somehow just "wrong" and I almost felt a little embarraced watching it! Enter a potentially interesting character of the Dreamlord (the Valeyard in another incarnation I think) but then the plot zings off all over the place and even inculdes violence on OAP's!!! ...again, just "wrong" and over all, this story just dident work for mel, infact half way through I was back on the internet playing Bejewelled!! Derek watched it and he thought it was a load of rubbish too. He finished watching it, shrugged his shoulders and took Sirius for a walk. "Who" REALY needs something VERY special from the pen of Moffatt to take it out of its current dire mess!! Much more of this rubbish and I will give up watching nuWho forever!! Which is a shame realy as I realy like Matt Smiths Doctor, as he as so much substance in his acting!!
PLEASE! can someone write some realy decent Who stories!!!

*sighs*
Back soon with my review of "Splinter" ;) x

You know I often blog about the weird and wonderful but this one has me stumped....maybe because I actually like the weird and wonderful, or maybe I am just intriegued by the "weirdness" of people, but here goes........

At my last Lodge meeting, myself and a fellow brother (Lady) were chatting as we often do about the paranormal. She is a Wiccan, I am not, but I do have a very deep interest in the wiccan and pagan religions!....For my part, I consider myself to be a moderate christian, but my interest in all things paranormal and indeed, hard fact science has often left me questioning myself. Like a pure and simple hard science "fact" is that human eyes and ears can only see and hear a tiny window in electro-magnetic spectrum, so basically we can't see and hear almost 95% of things going on around us!! and that is without going into the world of ghosts and aliens. Its just a fact! a bit like a dog whistle....dogs can hear it because they have a wider range of hearing, we as humans cannot....ok, dont know where I am coming from??? Neither do I most of the time. But my point is what we hear and see around us is NOT the full picture!!!
A few weeks ago I got some magazines for mum and one "spirit" magazine for myself, and right on the back page was the "Noises from Hell" story. I read it with interest, and did a little research on the internet, and discovered this story was actually an urban hoax...This was the story I releated to my brother at the Lodge, and she said she had never heard of it. It concernes a deep drilling expedition in Siberia which began in the early 70's and by the early 90's they had drilled as far as 10 miles deep. As the story goes, the drill bit started spinning very fast, as they had hit a pocket in the earths crust, and suddenly the heat was registering up to 2,000 degrees!!! They lowered specially cooled microphones into the 10 mile deep hole, to listen to the sizemic movements in the earths crust, and what they *supposed* to have heard was a very creepy noise of human voices, screaming!!!!

Here is a clip of the sounds which lasts just 19 seconds, before the microphone melted in the heat....it is CREEPY!!!



Hope that dident spook you to much!!
Now I have listened to this several times, trying to figure, with an open ear and heart, and it just sounds like the noise in a night club with the music turned off...I remember years ago at Mr Smiths night club! I would stay untill the end and when the music was off and the bouncers moved in, the noise was very close to this. But curiosity made me dig a little deeper, and sound scientists in Singapore have ripped this recording to bits and can come up with no explanation as to what it is, other than that is is human voices and it is genuine!! Next I moved onto the debunking theories....internet folks just love to "debunk" things, in other words, prove something is a hoax. Anyway most of the debunkers say its simply a christian group that came up with this idea to make people belive in Heaven and Hell, and christianity, out of fear!!! But my question here is WHY??? Its such a strange and weird story...did a christian just jump out of bed one morning and say "Hey!!! were going to make a tape of people screaming from under the earth, to make people belive in Hell!!!"....mmmm....to me that dosen't make much sense, and as I dug a little more I found people of other religions debating if this was genuine or not! Hindu, Muslim and Jewish forums mostly, have all, to some degree discussed this story. But to me (a bit like Dr Who) I would like to know if there is a scientific explanation for these sounds? Like I said in my openeing paragraph, we as humans can only see and hear a tiny degree of the spectrum. So considering the medium change of the earth (as sounds are different underwater) the earth would change the frequency of sound waves. Like centuries ago when approaching armies could be heard by "putting your ear to the ground"...Its food for thought, I think. But I am very interested to know where these sounds originated from! As the story of the drilling in Sibiera concludes, hardened scientists refused to work on the site after this episode, and today it is closely guarded by the Russian military!

Right....now I have creeped the pants off you!!....

Some updates!!!
I am so sick and tired of the cold weather I have been poking around the met office site looking for a good weather day...and its TODAY!!! well for here it is anyway! So I have fired the spa up and its currently at 29 degrees. By 1pm it should be up to a gorgeous 38 degrees, and then I shall bask!!
Yesterday I gave it, its first proper clean! as in filter, tub, lid, drained and replaced about 50 litres of water, tested and sorted...it took me most of the morning, but its sparkling now!! In the evenings I have taken to the tub nude, as I think this will help it keep clean as there is no build of muck I might have on a swimming costume...and my gazebo does keep it very private! ;)

...eagerly awaiting tonights "Who", and see you soon!!
Vix x