Saturday, 13 June 2009
Waffles is/are the answer
I've just realised what was going on in my sub-conscience. I had mentioned the Waffle Trophy, and Belgium is famous for chocolates, beer - and waffles!
We didn't go to Belgium this year
Quite why Belgium should have come into my mind is a mystery. But then, She Who Must Be Obeyed would probably say that my mind is a complete mystery to anyone, especially me.
The last couple of years, the Lions International Relations Committee (four of us who like a day out) have visited Belgium just before Charter Night to buy Belgian chocolates to use as raffle prizes. Why Belgium should produce such great chocolates I can't imagine. I always think of it as a grotty little country.
Granted, there are some very attractive parts. I'm told that Ghent is, but whenever I have tried to visit the town it has been raining cats and dogs (or perhaps I should say chats et chiens). Bruges (or Brugge) is very attractive, at least in the centre. So is Ypres (or Ieper). Notice that there are two spellings for the name of every city, town or village. That's because this tiny country actually has two languages: French and Flemish (or Walloon). Most of the inhabitants speak both, and also German and English. Even a waitress where we had coffee admitted to speaking five languages.
I don't think much of Brussels. I've been there twice. The first time was about 45 years ago when the coach we were travelling on back from Austria stopped there for a while, then a few years ago the OB decided she would like a day trip while we were staying at Lille. The Grand Place in Brussels is beautiful, but that's about it. The great majority of tourists also visit the Mannekin Pis, a fountain of a little boy passing water (you can guess where from, but I will post a picture all the same).
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What very few tourists ever see is another fountain in a narrow dead-end alley off an almost equally narrow old street. This fountain is the feminists answer to the Mannekin Pis is Jeanneke Pis...
The last couple of years, the Lions International Relations Committee (four of us who like a day out) have visited Belgium just before Charter Night to buy Belgian chocolates to use as raffle prizes. Why Belgium should produce such great chocolates I can't imagine. I always think of it as a grotty little country.
Granted, there are some very attractive parts. I'm told that Ghent is, but whenever I have tried to visit the town it has been raining cats and dogs (or perhaps I should say chats et chiens). Bruges (or Brugge) is very attractive, at least in the centre. So is Ypres (or Ieper). Notice that there are two spellings for the name of every city, town or village. That's because this tiny country actually has two languages: French and Flemish (or Walloon). Most of the inhabitants speak both, and also German and English. Even a waitress where we had coffee admitted to speaking five languages.
I don't think much of Brussels. I've been there twice. The first time was about 45 years ago when the coach we were travelling on back from Austria stopped there for a while, then a few years ago the OB decided she would like a day trip while we were staying at Lille. The Grand Place in Brussels is beautiful, but that's about it. The great majority of tourists also visit the Mannekin Pis, a fountain of a little boy passing water (you can guess where from, but I will post a picture all the same).
.jpg)
What very few tourists ever see is another fountain in a narrow dead-end alley off an almost equally narrow old street. This fountain is the feminists answer to the Mannekin Pis is Jeanneke Pis...
Friday, 12 June 2009
Beware the Waffle Trophy!
I'm almost certainly heading for a fall of monumental proportions. If I am, it will be because I have been getting ahead of myself. Not only is the July issue of Jungle Jottings just about finished (it only needs notes from the business meeting next Wednesday), but I have actually started on the August issue! What's more, I have so many things buzzing around in my head that I want to get down on paper - or up on screen - ready for blogs.
This blogging business seems to be acting on me like a drug: unlike Skip (who posts nothing unless he has something to say, or so he claims) if I don't post something every day I think the world will come to an end. Of course, it's not really as bad as that, but it is just as well that other members of Brighton Lions Club don't know of the existence of the Brighton Pensioner and Pebbles. I would almost certainly end up with the Waffle Trophy. This is a trophy presented each year to the Lion who has, in the opinion of the Waffle Trophy committee (the holder from the previous year) provided "a plethora of platitudinous phrases calculated to please". The problem is that most of the other members don't know what a platitudinous phrase is, let alone a plethora. They probably think it's connected with that strange Australian creature. Whatever they think, the trophy tends to be presented to someone who has spent a lot of time on his feet at meetings, whether or not what he said has been calculated to please.
This blogging business seems to be acting on me like a drug: unlike Skip (who posts nothing unless he has something to say, or so he claims) if I don't post something every day I think the world will come to an end. Of course, it's not really as bad as that, but it is just as well that other members of Brighton Lions Club don't know of the existence of the Brighton Pensioner and Pebbles. I would almost certainly end up with the Waffle Trophy. This is a trophy presented each year to the Lion who has, in the opinion of the Waffle Trophy committee (the holder from the previous year) provided "a plethora of platitudinous phrases calculated to please". The problem is that most of the other members don't know what a platitudinous phrase is, let alone a plethora. They probably think it's connected with that strange Australian creature. Whatever they think, the trophy tends to be presented to someone who has spent a lot of time on his feet at meetings, whether or not what he said has been calculated to please.
Thursday, 11 June 2009
"Next July we collide with Mars"
If my memory serves me correctly, that is a line from a song in the film High Society. But now it seems that Earth and Mars could collide, bringing about the end of the world. But it won't happen just yet - not for about three billion years. (I assume those are British/European billions as the report came from Paris. Americans will have to wait a bit longer as their billion is bigger than ours!)
Wednesday, 10 June 2009
Sports again
Sport dominated my day yesterday. Not active participation on my part, but as part of Life with the Lions. The club has decided to award a bursary of £1,000 a year up till 2012 to help pay the training expenses of a potential member of the Great Britain squad at the Paralympics. Liam is 25, has cerebral palsy, and is already a member of the British boccia team, with which he has competed in Europe, Canada and Brazil. Three of us joined him at one of his training sessions to present the first year's bursary.
(The guy in the suit is the south-east region chairman of Sports Aid.)
Then a meeting in the evening with representatives of a local football club, Patcham United, to discuss the possibility of the Lions entering their under 14 team in the MD competition.
And to add a bit of extra spice to the day, I had two rather surprising emails (which I will have to deal with this morning). First, a reporter from the Eldersburg Advocate wants to interview me by email about our club's twinning arrangement with Freedom District Lions and our joint service project; then, somebody studying for an MA in anthropology is researching the now-defunct Brighton Lions Carnival and wants information.
I'd better get on with answering them.
(The guy in the suit is the south-east region chairman of Sports Aid.)
Then a meeting in the evening with representatives of a local football club, Patcham United, to discuss the possibility of the Lions entering their under 14 team in the MD competition.
And to add a bit of extra spice to the day, I had two rather surprising emails (which I will have to deal with this morning). First, a reporter from the Eldersburg Advocate wants to interview me by email about our club's twinning arrangement with Freedom District Lions and our joint service project; then, somebody studying for an MA in anthropology is researching the now-defunct Brighton Lions Carnival and wants information.
I'd better get on with answering them.
Tuesday, 9 June 2009
Thank goodness that's over
Until next year, anyway.
We have an extension built onto the back of the dining room. This is laughingly called the conservatory, but it is really a glorified glory hole with a freezer, tumble drier, wet weather gear, muddy boots and, on occasion, a wet and/or muddy dog. To allow as much light as possible into the dining room, the roof of this extension is made of corrugated plastic and once a year I have to get rid of the moss and generally clean up the roof. This involves climbing onto the flat roof of the kitchen extension (which is, fortunately, solid), pull up a ladder and a crawling board, and lay these over the plastic roof. I then have to crawl over the ladder to clean the roof, hoping that the plastic doesn't give way beneath me.
It's not a job I enjoy, but yesterday afternoon I screwed my courage to the sticking point and got it done.
We have an extension built onto the back of the dining room. This is laughingly called the conservatory, but it is really a glorified glory hole with a freezer, tumble drier, wet weather gear, muddy boots and, on occasion, a wet and/or muddy dog. To allow as much light as possible into the dining room, the roof of this extension is made of corrugated plastic and once a year I have to get rid of the moss and generally clean up the roof. This involves climbing onto the flat roof of the kitchen extension (which is, fortunately, solid), pull up a ladder and a crawling board, and lay these over the plastic roof. I then have to crawl over the ladder to clean the roof, hoping that the plastic doesn't give way beneath me.
It's not a job I enjoy, but yesterday afternoon I screwed my courage to the sticking point and got it done.
Monday, 8 June 2009
I'm better now
At least, I think I am. I certainly hope so. I seemed to lose my marbles yesterday and now Sharon thinks I'm completely loopy, having counted five people in a photo as six. What's more, even after she drew my attention to my mistake, I still insisted I was right! I do hope it's not the onset of some dreadful condition that afflicts old people.
And I still haven't remembered the word I was trying to think of, oh, months ago. It's the word that means using two words with the same meaning, like 'patently obvious'. No doubt it will come to me some time.
And I still haven't remembered the word I was trying to think of, oh, months ago. It's the word that means using two words with the same meaning, like 'patently obvious'. No doubt it will come to me some time.
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