How soft does the sun shine upon us in radiant warmth when clouds are on the horizon? Too often I deem that clouds appear whenever the sun had placed a favoured countenance toward us. Yet it boots nothing to complain for the world owes us nothing but the chance to make a difference. Sowing I may reap and building I may gain shelter and by toil for others do I prosper. Yet soon I shall toil no more and in setting to seed will reap all that I have sowed and the sweetness of its taste shall be magnificent.

The night evaporates into a new daylight arc
While the east wind sighs through the orchards
To cool the world and bring a scent of ripeness
The cows low tenderly, arise from nights slumber
Upon softly trodden wet grass into a dewy morning
While the sun rises higher and the cockerel crows
Review all that you have seen and make a choice
Choose a better way; choose what the heart whispers
Then see the sun break over the distant hills and know
When the dusk comes you were here for a little while

Save a space for me Amy on your celestial journey. You the joy of so many hearts and a light in this world of only 27 year’s brightness. Yet in this short life how many people did you sway? One day I should like to talk with you and let you know how much I enjoyed all the depth and pure musicality of your work. I know some of it was dark and baleful, but so often life is and like a mirror to your soul you sang your torturous journey to us all.

Vicariously peering into your world, we watched your story unfold. Perform for us we demanded and like a pack of wolves the media came to devour your talent for us because we have so little ourselves. You see now that everything is a choice but the hardest choices always come when we are alone. I see only starlight on a canvas of blackness but you saw endless possibilities and sang of them to us. Be at peace special one.

   

Soft yellow tinges leaf margins and slowly it replaces the high greens as the summer heat settles fair across slowing days. Yet despite the seasons drift to night what a magnificent cessation we see to the explosion of growth that leads our heart into autumn. Days are filled with gold and the nights are awash in the honeyed scent of wild honeysuckle.

We may stroll under mighty trees treading soft across mossy ground and never know that close by a doe leads her fawn through nature’s canvas of night shadows lit by only shafts of moonlight. Or choose to be guided by starlight again into the childhood elven realms where imagination once held sway. 

Yet what would I wish? To never be cold again, to nurture and encourage natures unbridled growth. To take pleasure only in how incredible and beautiful the world around me is in the summer. To sit and wait and see my little world complete a cycle of seasons around me…that is my wish.

 
Obituary: Amy Winehouse

 Amy Winehouse 27 has been found dead in London, she won comparison with some of the great female singers such as Sarah Vaughan and Nina Simone. Amy Jade Winehouse was born on 14 September 1983 in Southgate, north London.

Her taxi driver father, Mitchell, was a jazz enthusiast and often sang songs to his daughter as she grew up. She trained at the Susi Earnshaw Theatre School from the age of eight and, by the time she was 10, had formed a rap group with one of her best friends. Winehouse later attended the prestigious Sylvia Young Theatre School. She began writing music at the age of 14 and a former boyfriend sent a tape of her singing with a jazz band to an A&R man.

It led to a contract with the Island/Universal record label and a publishing deal with EMI. Her debut album Frank, released in 2003, was described by The Times newspaper as "earthy, warm, lived-in and astonishingly versatile". She co-wrote all but two of the songs and won praise for what one reviewer described as "the cool, critical gaze" in the lyrics. Frank was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize for album of the year in 2004, and Winehouse won the Ivor Novello song writing award for best contemporary song with Stronger than Me.

It was the critical praise that followed the release of her follow-up album Back to Black in October 2006 that propelled her to international stardom. Rehab, the first track released from, reached number seven in the UK singles chart. The song, about her refusal to attend an alcohol rehabilitation centre, generated huge publicity, with Winehouse frequently being photographed drinking on stage and in pubs. In February 2007, she scooped the title for best British female at the Brit Awards and, four months later, she picked up song of the year at the Mojo Awards. Winehouse was again nominated for the Mercury Prize and went on to be named artist of the year at the MTV Europe Music Awards in November.

Too precious and honestly loyal for this earthly world were you.
A body too small, to hold all the talents, that ever shone through.
You have left us your evergreen and timeless soulful music,
But in doing so it left nothing for you to soothe all the pain
Be at peace and search the stars and always feel our love
Goodnight, God bless Amy – we’ve all gone ‘Back to Black’.

It’s been almost non stop rain since the weekend till now (wed) with dark, tumulus clouds bringing the touch of a chill November to July. Already 1 month from the summer solstice and nights creep ever closer into the day. Now the descent to winter has begun I always think how did it happen so fast? There is no more time in summer; a day is still 24 hours regardless of the season. But still, we think we can achieve so much more in the natural longer days of summer. A life seems to expand in the light. It is the great joy of living close to the poles. How wonderful would it be to be able to switch hemispheres every 6 months at the equinoxes? What a dream so right now I’ll settle for the completion of the kitchen…it does never seem to get any closer.

All we talk of at work is the factory shutting next year (or sooner.) Its to be expected of course but a bit wearing after a while. The funniest thing is the differing reactions amongst everyone. For some employees its sadness or bitterness and for some other employees elation. The HR manager summed it up as disbelief, denial, anger and then acceptance. I guess we are all at different stages of the process. For me, I think I am termed an institutionalised employee having never having had another job nor been to an interview etc. so time to join the real world from next year. Bit scary really! I really have to touch the void out there after clinging on with my fingertips to my comfort zone for so long. But you know I think the current economic climate out there is pretty inhospitable.

Someone summed up the current economic woe rather like a game of cards (Old Maid) whereby the last one holding any cards loses everything. Here are my pointers to a recession

1.Home Prices Keep Falling. Only ‘buy to let’ landlords are making money on all the misery. But they are only succeeding in rising the rents which the impacts on welfare payments and probably worst of all destroying neighbourhoods by allowing in unsuitable or uncaring tenants.
2. Small Businesses Can't Get Credit. Homebuyers can’t get credit. Nobody else wants it.
3. Unemployment has and will get worse (despite the hype most of the jobs created are worthless to the nations GDP)
4. Consumers Are Losing Faith and not buying due to uncertainty as petrol, utility and food prices continue to rise.
5. More People are on a pyramid selling scheme, sorry I mean Welfare Benefit. Soon it wont be sustainable…we are probably nearly at that point now.

6. The black market is increasing selling goods that are too highly taxed by the government
7. Cash businesses now dominate among the small businesses. It is now the business model of choice.

The Bottom Line

Somebody pass me a guide to surviving in a third world economy please. 

Soon the opera lady will sing as bankers jump

We will descend into a moneyless anarchy

While the world will hold its breath and hope

That mans capitalist evolution may be halted

For after all the money within it is an illusion

Underpinned by exploitation of intangible desires

Was it just a dream Asthralain wondered as the morning sun filtered through the closed wooden shutters and fell upon her face; soft and gold. In her gentle return to the waking world from sleep she was a carefree child again, running swift through the meadows of Redallion. Her heart sighed at the memory for how long had it been since her feet trod its upland soft velvet grass and her gaze followed the contours of the snow kissed peaks circled by eagles. In her mind she could smell Axfilago the indigo and crimson wildflowers clinging to the bare limestone rocks as she followed the blue butterflies. Happier days when the sun shined warmer and the days were longer than she could explore before it was again bedtime.

The water rolls and flows under the bridge to the sea

Through hill, dale and past many along ancient tree
Pure and clear, it rushes to the sea, swift as the wind

Washing away the guiles of all those who have sinned

It takes our hopes and its worth, decides the fate of earth

Chinese farmer Wang Dalin will certainly 'bee' happy after winning this incredible competition. The 42-year-old beekeeper was competing in a daring 'bee bearding' contest in Shaoyang, Hunan Province of China, against 20-year-old farmer Lv Kongjiang. The pair competed by standing on a scale wearing only a pair of shorts. They then used queen bees to attract other bees onto their bodies

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2015729/Chinese-contestants-cover-insects-bee-bearding-competition.html#ixzz1SOIdcNsd

Well here we are so soon midway in July. The weather has been a mixture of warm sunny weather and rain. I think probably better than last year but I am not so sure. The potatoes have been raised and buried again, (down my throat) and delicious they were too. The mangetout and the asparagus is growing well as are the horseradish (now reaching monstrous proportions in the green house) and the grapes also are beginning to enlarge. still only the size of a large pea but lots of time left to get bigger. They weren’t good last year having very tough skins and no sweetness but then again the north of England isn’t renown for its winemaking industry. The only disappointment has been the apples because despite the huge magnitude of blossom in May there are only a few apples left on the trees.

I can’t say much as it has practically rained nonstop all today. I took the dog out and we watched the waterfall in the park...which was impressive. Then I listed my old valve amps on eBay so I wonder what they will bring. Check em out here...

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=230648475333&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

Kitchen renovation is ongoing but slow. Hopefully it will be done in another week. I'll do some before and after pics when it's finished.

The water rolls and flows under the bridge to the sea
Through hill and dale and past many long ancient tree
Pure and clear it rushes to the sea swift as the wind
Washing away the guilt of all those who have sinned
It takes our filth and its worth decides the fate of earth

She stirred at last from sleep and rose to part the shutters to gaze upon the distant hills. A chill was in the air and the memory of Redallion faded swift under the now weakening sunrise of the autumn. Yet it had not been just a pleasant reverie for knowledge long buried in childhood innocence arose now in her thoughts and had a different meaning.

The half light of the elves is upon us. Strands of moonlight and wonder, wrapped in the lore of the Earth. Starlight brought to day to cool the heat of summer. In all the long history of the world nothing has dimmed its joy. For in such light the very first songs were sung. They sang of dawn birthed into day by the stars underneath tall snow clad mountains and clear streams swelled by the gentle rain falling upon soft grass.

No news is good news was raised the cries
Now the box is open; Pandora deeply sighs
All grubby news gathering done and spent
Too late, too late the countries patience is rent

How do we stand up when it all falls down?
Streets, communities, villages and town
The tide has turned and taken us out to sea
I look to land but see only shadows of me

We gave it all away to such eager hands
Covetously desiring to reshape the lands
A war is lost without an opening round
Too late, too late was our awakening found?

A silver moon ring on a night sky in June
Slivers of hope come on a dream too soon
The words of our secret hearts ring out clear
I am always so glad you are always so near

Tap, tap, tap said the Wapping spider as she span her silken web
Who will be caught today? Soldier, child, politician, or celebs
Luckily for her victims they lay in state within her threads?
For tragedy cannot even counter her incestuous, moneyed bed

What if there have been trillions of big bangs? Why assume there has only ever been the one. Birth and growth in infinite number before entropy claims it all back again. Order to chaos is after all a universal law, and in this there is hope that chance and probability will one day bring us all back here again to the very same place in a slightly different way. Perhaps it already has and that is why the call of the universe cries so loudly in our collective consciousness.

The arrow of time is; uncertain
In the hands of existence; is frail
The 70 years I will live are passing
But the memories may always remain
Until I return to claim them,
My sweet, bitter moments of life
Shaped around my endless infinity
When worlds are again born anew
The arrow of time is; uncertain
Unless it always points to you

Went to visit Gawthorpe Hall (nr Burnley in a small town called Padiham) on Saturday. Compact but so impressive – read some of the details from Wikipedia.

Padiham has seen much better days. Must have been a great Lancashire town once but now seems grubby and ill kept. Half of the shops on the high street are empty and some of the other half look like they need closing down by environmental health. The only places that seem to thrive are hairdressers and take away food.

Gawthorpe Hall

Although the house is more compact than power houses such as Chatsworth House or Tatton Park, it is described by the National Trust as an Elizabethan gem in the heart of industrial Lancashire. Nicholas Cooper describes it as an early example of a plan in which the main stair is immediately accessible from the main entrance, a feature that later became standard. The house is in a state of complete repair and its history stretches back to 1600, when rebuilding around the pele tower, already a Shuttleworth property, was begun by Lawrence Shuttleworth.[2] Gawthorpe Hall was owned by the Kay-Shuttleworth family until 1970.

In 1604, Richard Stone from Carr House in the Bank Hall estate Bretherton, imported Irish panel boards and timber for the Shuttleworth family, who were building Gawthorpe Hall at the time, storing the 1,000 pieces in Hoole's tithe barn until they were needed as the building was constructed.
Gawthorpe began as a pele tower, a strong square structure built in the fourteenth century as a defence against the invading Scots. The Elizabethan lodge was dovetailed around the pele. The house was redesigned in 1850 by Sir Charles Barry, who honed his skills at Gawthorpe before going on to design the Houses of Parliament. The hall also figures in the history of English literature because Charlotte Bronte (1816–1855) was a family friend of the Shuttleworths and spent some time at Gawthorpe.

The mottoes of the Kay-Shuttleworth family, Iusticia et Prudentia (Justice and Practical Judgement – Shuttleworth) and Kynd Kynn Knawne Kepe (Keep your own kin-kind – Kay) may be seen displayed in various areas of the house, including above the front door and around the tower at the top of the building. The initials KS for Kay-Shuttleworth also occur frequently throughout the hall, and may be seen on the front door, on one of the ceilings, and in other places within the house.

The hall is full of antique artefacts on display in the many rooms preserved and cared for by the curators who attend each room to provide tourists with a commentary of what they are seeing. A tea room within the grounds offers refreshments. Local football team Burnley train on two football pitches built on the grounds near the entrance.

Pity the house was closed at 9am when we arrived. The moral of this story is check the opening times.

Borne aloft as carried on a long feared dream; now are the machinations come at last to fruition and laid bare before us. All this has happened before and now as the hand of destiny hovers to midnight so the clear divisions that beset all we strive to become; crystallise. We the clockwork organic machinery of a now dying world of commerce are at last to be set free only for it all to come to nothing but what has been allowed for us. The hands that control the fate of the world are few, but alas, they are too mighty to conquer in one lifetime.

We have lived and been reborn so many times but each step in renaissance has taken us back to the same place in existence. We are pawns in a cosmic chess match that has been played maliciously over aeons. Yet we will not bend or yield to the basest humanity driven avarice. For we realise that you invisibles who drive the world cannot understand all that came as gifts to us when the world was first birthed in cosmic forges and stardust formed, breathed and became life. It is our life not yours and we will decide how to live it

Here my luck has run out and after my 35 years the mill is closing...3 generations of Davies totalling over 100 years...sad really, but inevitable and the company is trying to do the right thing by us.

Key Historical Dates
  

June 1977 - Leave school Friday start work Monday at Hollins Mill
June 2011 - Hollins Mill begins 90 days of consultation with workforce
Oct 2012 - Hollins Mill forecast to close

See here

http://www.stregis.co.uk/products/4/3/1

Duz tha speak Yarkshire

A Yorkshire man takes his cat to the vet.
Yorkshireman: "Ayup, lad, I need to talk to thee about me cat."
Vet: "Is it a tom?"
Yorkshireman: "Nay, I've browt it with us."

A Yorkshireman's dog dies and as it was a favourite pet he
decides to have a gold statue made by a jeweller to remember the dog by.
Yorkshireman: "Can tha mek us a gold statue of yon dog?"
Jeweller: "Do you want it 18 carat?"
Yorkshireman: "No I want it chewin' a bone yer daft bugger!"

A Yorkshireman's wife dies and the widower decides that her headstone should have the words "She were thine" engraved on it. He calls the stone mason, who assures him that the headstone
will be ready a few days after the funeral.True to his word the stone mason calls the widower to say that the headstone is ready and would he like to come and have a look.
When the widower gets there he takes one look at the stone to see that it's been engraved "She were thin".
He explodes: "'ells bells man, you've left the blood y "e" out, you've left the blood y "e" out!"
The stone mason apologises profusely and assures the poor widower that it will be rectified the following morning.
Next day comes and the widower returns to the stone mason:"There you go sir, I've put the "e" on the stone for you".
The widower looks at the stone and then reads out aloud:
"E, she were thin".

Bloke from Barnsley with piles asks chemist
"Nah then lad, does tha sell arse cream?"
Chemist replies "Aye, Magnum or Cornetto?"

Portugal – The Algarve – Cabanas - The weather is hot and sunny nearly all the time with just the odd cloudy spell thrown in to cool you down. The flat is situated just outside Cabanas and is one of hundreds on a large complex. The complex appears to be one of the construction projects that were coming to fruition when the recession hit as probably 66% remain unsold. As June is ‘out of season’ the occupiers of most of the other 33% are nowhere to be seen. The result is what appears to be a set for ‘life after people.’ This has its advantages but at times it is a little eerie. So in order have been to

Sat - Cabanas – Small pretty harbour on a bay so to get to the beach you need to take a ‘water taxi’ got bitten by mosquitoes tonight. Typical they head straight to me. Think they are going to be itchy.

Sun – Pool day. Wow other people and from Oldham too. Nice couple with a baby on the way very soon and staying in his father’s apartment. Got the impression despite it all that they wished they had not bought the apartment now as the prices had since fallen by 25% but it's a lovely spot and you cant put a price on all those holidays. Had to go to the chemist for some cream for the bites which have come up swollen and red.

Mon Tavira – Large town reached by train (10min) with a beach again only reachable by a water taxi. I bought a mobile internet stick for 29.99 which i thought had 10 days use on but it turns out there was only 1 hour. So need to go back at some point. Well Vodafone need I say any more.

Tue - Monte Gordo – A large town with high rise hotels which is unusual here. Planning laws must restrict the height of new developments to preserve the atmosphere of the place. This does however have a promenade and a beach.
Wed - Seville – Obviously in Andalucía, Spain. Took a day trip on a coach (2hrs) on Wednesday. Nice city with a huge gothic cathedral and lots of winding streets. Very hot place though and I was glad to get back on the coach again after a few hours. What was amazing was driving past acres of orange groves laid out in long straight lines and full of ripe Seville bitter oranges.
Walked into Cabanas after the coach dropped us off and saw 2 snakes in the stream by the path. Managed to get a photo of 1 of them.

Thur - back to Monte Gordo for some sunbathing. Unfortunately it didn’t work out as the beach was freezing. Then to Tavira for a 10 euro top up on the internet stick. Money has all but run out and there are still 3 days left to go so we are going to need some cheap entertainment till we leave.

Fri – Up early and at last the internet is working again. Although to be honest most of the time you look at crap to pass the time. Wonder how the dog is getting along at my brothers. Well will know Monday. I hope he is behaving himself and not being too much of a nuisance...he’s very boisterous. Spent the day on the beach and had pasta with a vegetable tomato sauce for dinner which Jennifer made...very nice.

Sat – Spent the day on Cabanas beach again – very hot. Really too hot for me even tough I brown off quite easily. I think my ideal temperature is about 22-24 degrees. Got a Frango (chicken) for dinner and had a full roast dinner as best we could – especially given the limited cooking facilities.

Sun – Last day today...nice here but I want to be home now among all the familiar things and see little dog. Not looking forward to work again though. I haven’t missed that one little bit. Think we are going to the local town of Tavira for lunch and then home to pack. It’s a hot day and a mosquito manages to bite my ear and make it swell up.

Mon – Ah and so back into Britain and the cool, cloudy weather. The first thing I notice is all the posters in the airport that tell me what I cannot do here. That sounds about right and head for home past the sniffer dog at customs. But I’m brown as a walnut, just as wrinkled and itchy...must have been a good holiday!

Pictures to follow

Dirt cant hurt me

Grapes too far north

Mutant Horseradish

Perhaps there is a part of HE 1523-0901 in the stardust that makes up us all. We are after all just a collection of molecules of encapsulated time that presses on through the relativity that is the cosmos. We are each for a better word soldiers of time living and dying for mother universe. It is probably a war without end, so there will be no armistice, no surrender, and no dawn after a bloody night. The peace is always to be lost and as conflict rises we sail through our second in time knowing we make up the spatial day..

After the Big Bang, the Universe consisted of mostly hydrogen, some helium and a little lithium, so the first stars to form would have contained only these elements. It was the first generation of stars that converted these lighter elements into heavier ones like carbon, phosphorous, iron and lead - collectively known to astronomers as metals. When those stars exploded they "polluted" the cosmos with these heavier elements, which themselves went into a later generation of stars - like our Sun. The existence of stars with zero or very low metal content has been predicted for decades, but none has ever been found, leading some to suspect they never existed - until the discovery of HE0107-5240. The star was spotted in the outer reaches of our galaxy by Norbert Christlieb, at the University of Hamburg in Germany, and colleagues. It lies in the direction of the southern constellation Phoenix, at a distance of about 36,000 light-years. The star has just 1/200,000th of the metal content of our Sun. Recent cosmological studies show that the Big Bang occurred 13.7 billion years ago. The metal-poor star HE 1523 formed in our Milky Way galaxy soon afterward (cosmologically speaking: 13.2 billion years ago)
How old are the oldest stars" astronomers recently measured the age of a star located in our Galaxy. The star, a real fossil, is found to be 13.2 billion years old, not very far from the 13.7 billion years age of the Universe. The star, HE 1523-0901, was clearly born at the dawn of time.

Amazing photos from http://www.eso.org/public/