Maddie Grigg

Here’s to blue sky thinking

We arrived in France on Thursday, just as the weather changed.

By Good Friday, in the south west of the country, the sun was out, the sky was blue and we were thanked for bringing the weather with us.

As if.

Just like the UK, it has been a cold and wet winter here in France. So to see – and feel – that shining orb looking down warmly – well, it’s been a welcome visitor with a smiley face and absolutely no baggage.

Today, our part of Dorset is similarly clad in warmth. Spirits soar and everything in the garden is lovely, if you forget world events and personal traumas and focus instead on the trees ditching their winter wardrobe and grabbing their spring and summer clothes from nature’s rail.

Lush Places gets back to normal tomorrow, with temperatures plummeting and roadworks all over the place as super-superfast broadband is installed by a roving crew, leading to faster internet speeds and frazzled drivers.

Here, we’re set fair until Sunday when temperatures, too, will plummet along with (if there was any justice in the world) fuel prices. But we all know justice is in short supply these days so I’m not going down that particular route for fearing of reaching a dead end or one great big pothole.

Gather ye rosebuds while you may and make hay while the sun shines and all that.

Be kind, hope for the best but expect the worst and you will never be disappointed.

Speak soon.

Maddie x

Happy Easter

May the Easter bunny bring you all the chocolate eggs you can eat in one sitting.

No, but seriously, following the austerity of today, Good Friday, when we’re all feeling a bit sad because it was the day Jesus was crucified, it’s the day when we can now officially eat Hot Cross Buns, even though they’ve been on sale in Morrisons for months.

Sunday is the day of the resurrection. So Easter Day is a day of rebirth, when eggs become symbols for new life and we can gorge on chocolate now that the period of fasting is over.

It’s a celebration day for families to get together and enjoy Easter egg hunts and shared food and rejoicing.

If you’re religious – and even if you’re not – you can go to a church service for one of the most important days of the Christian calendar.

We’ll be in France and I’m not even sure our closed village church will be open.

And family will be back home, so we’ll be making the most of it by celebrating Easter Sunday with friends instead.

Happy Easter to you all, and here’s to new life.

April Fools’ Day

https://www.flickr.com/photos/vatobob/2136501005/

It’s that jolly japes day when you can never be quite sure if what you’ve seen or heard is actually true.

April Fools’ Day was the date you’d love with a passion as a child because it meant you could play tricks on your parents or siblings with impunity, at least until noon.

After midday, the joke would be on you.

Over the years, there have been some classic and cracking April Fools Day jokes, such as the Panorama spaghetti harvest of 1957 and the San Serriffe fictional island nation invented in 1977 by The Guardian newspaper.

Done well, April Fools’ Day jokes were superb, pulling in the gullible with no harm done because the jokes weren’t mean.

This was back in the day when we took what we now call ‘fake news’ in good spirit, especially when it was funny.

We could all do with a laugh in dark times but, these days, ‘fake news’ is everywhere. It’s made cynics of us all. And it’s mean spirited.

‘Fake news’ has also become a popular retort when someone who should know better wants to shut down a valid story.

When an April Fools’ joke is done on social media, it invariably backfires and leads to a string of puzzled, worried, baffled comments by people who’ve forgotten what day it is.

Is it an age thing or are April Fools’ jokes wearing a bit thin?

Springing forward

There was a real feeling of spring in the air last weekend.

Bees were buzzing, birds sang their little hearts out and everything in the garden looked really lovely. Even the Spanish bluebells were giving it their all, their last hurrah and not realising I was about to dig out the interloping blighters.

In the house, the rays lit up the the dust on the inside of the windows and drew attention to cobwebs hanging from the ceiling. But, to be honest, no-one cared.

It’s amazing what a few days of sunshine can do to uplift the soul, especially at the weekend when more people can enjoy it. Children were playing, building dens, families were out en masse, with big smiles on their faces.

This week, the weather’s been a mixed bag but it’s looking a bit better next week.

Which is great news, because the clocks go forward an hour on Sunday, giving us another hour of daylight in the evening.

No more huddling round the fire and binge watching Landman. It’s time for country walks with the dogs, going down to the beach at West Bay and just enjoying being outside without the heavens opening and grey skies threatening to dampen our spirits.

So remember when you go to bed on Saturday night to put your clock forward an hour.

Can’t wait!

Have a great weekend.

Love, Maddie x

Lady Day

It’s Lady Day today and also my brother’s birthday.

Happy birthday, bro!

As the child of tenant farmers, it was always a date ingrained in my head. It’s the date when rent was due, the date when farm tenancies were renewed or smallholdings changed hands.

In the agricultural year, it’s a quarter day, the others being Midsummer Day on 24 June (the Feast of the Nativity of John the Baptist), Michaelmas (the Feast of St Michael and All Angels) on 29 September, and Christmas Day on 25 December.

Says Wikipedia: Quarter days are four dates in each year when rents were due, servants hired, and school terms started. They correspond to religious festivals and are linked to the Celtic and solar calendars.

Lady Day marks the date when the Virgin Mary received a surprise visit from the Angel Gabriel to tell her she was going to have a baby. Not just any old baby, but Jesus Christ.

It must have been a big shock: one, to be told she was pregnant when she’d never even been near a man and, two, that the dad was God.

As well as being an important date in the Christian calendar, Lady Day still holds significance, not just for farmers but those of us who are taxpayers.

Says Wikipedia: The British (personal) tax year still ends on ‘Old’ Lady Day (5 April under the ‘new style’ (Gregorian) calendar, which in the 18th century corresponded to 25 March under the ‘old style’ Julian calendar: the Calendar (New Style) Act 1750 advanced the calendar by eleven days. 5 April is still the end of the British tax year for personal taxation.

Here in Lush Places, the date just happens to coincide with Ladies’ Night at the community pub, where, for £15, you can book in for a midweek treat of a glass of wine and smoked salmon & rocket linguine or goats cheese & beetroot salad.

If the boys’ night out last week is anything to go by, when two women were persuaded to stay and eat their meal rather than taking it home because they didn’t want to impose on the men’s fun, there could be some chaps along too.

So have a lovely Lady Day and here’s to a great birthday for my big brother.