Keeping Busy In My Old Age ...

No , I haven't slipped down the back of the sofa or gone off on a round the world trip ... 

I've just been pursuing a certain Pokemon character . I've got the whole thing down to a T .

Pick the toy shop with the most plastic clutter in the window . Fight your way though a sea of pink sparkly things and fluffy things . Interrupt one of the employees who is rushing out of the stock room with a trolley piled high with shiny boxes .

The best informed member of staff usually looks too young to work anywhere . You might in fact remember him from his pre-school meltdown days , in which case don't remind him that he was frightened of the swing or forget to admire his almost-moustache . Don't try to impress him with your computer skills ; let him find the right Pokemon pages.

If  they haven't got what you want , don't despair . Have a coffee and look in another shop or two .

 By day three , get on a train and widen the search.  Eventually, like me,  you'll find something roughly right and the manager will throw in a free pack of Pokemon cards, delighted with the prospect of getting rid of you .

On the way back to the station, remember that Birthday Boy and all his/our relatives will need Christmas presents next month .

Bits and Pieces

Aldi have always sold roasted almonds . I was just rather surprised last week to find that the ones they now stock are adorable . It says so on the packet .

I'm temporarily immortal , having just had the 'flu vaccination .Can't help feeling that if I'm going to do anything remotely risky , this might be the moment .

Though when we tried some Tai Chi this week at the gym , it was swiftly demonstrated that I'm not going to be part of any band of Superior Pensioners weaving graceful patterns in the local park's dawn light . Not having any coordination at all , I kept on getting teetery and tied in knots . All attempts to remain serious , graceful and balanced reduced me to giggling hiccups , so I had to retire to the treadmill instead .  There's something very sobering about the treadmill ...
The Class Swot persevered and , taking to it like a duck to water , asked for more next week . Meanwhile I seemed  to be rediscovering my teenage silly-arse self .

The sun shone for an hour this afternoon and I took the chance to have a coffee on the balcony . Sudden commotion as two little boys cycled past , bells ringing and bellowing "Alarm !", "Alarm! " . Had I not just poured out the coffee , I might have joined them ... it looked much more fun than dusting . 

 

Is everybody else's deep freeze full of pumpkin soup too ?

Miaow !

The new ... in theory , temporary ... municipal library which rejoices in the name "Pop-Up Library" ( such a dispiriting name ) is full of bewildered Leeuwarders , cardboard boxes , new machines , an assortment of old armchairs and new Ikea dining tables , a windup gramaphone and the roaring of mechanical dinosaurs in the lobby .
And , depending on the time of day , Dutch lessons for bewildered foreigners , spontaneous Bible lessons by a young man in a wooly hat ,  unofficial lessons/workshops on how to use the new machines for the older staff by the very youngest stagaire  and weird clanking of hot water pipes .
 No , it's not the most peaceful of places any more . 

Until I sat down at one of the tables this afternoon to hunt for my library card and found a cat .

 I think all libraries should have a cat and I hope he comes to the old jail/new library , sometime in the Spring . 

Maternal Solicitude ...

When the children 'phone , you naturally want to hear all their news , so you ask about what's been going on . How are their children , partners , partners' parents , work , their friends , the cats , the garden  ? ...  yes , being related to me must be like being picked up by the KGB .

It's an empty nest thing , I suppose . For some reason it took me ages to get used to not knowing what they were wearing that day , once they'd left .
A fully furnished picture of their home life makes them seem nearer .

And now Younger Daughter has introduced a further character ... After years of showing no interest in gardening or of growing anything at all , she now has a plant .
So now , of course , every week I'm also asking after Mint . Together we glowed as she reported that it had two new "branches" ( she's still not mastered the jargon but it's just a question of time ) ...

Now , as long as I don't start saying , "And how's Minty this week ? "...

Local Gentry

It's museum time again . The new season's exhibitions are beginning and the one I went to yesterday was  simply titled  , "Rich In Groningen" .

 It was a collection of locally held treasures  , some  from attics , some from country churches and a lot from the museum's vaults .
 Lots of crests , uncomfortable furniture

family portraits by the barrow load , silver goblets , gorgeous wall paper copied from odd scraps of the eighteenth century originals in the city archives , even the odd angel .

Since the city , in an attempt to avoid corruption , had a complicated system involving having four mayors , electing two at a time every two years there were lots of portraits of tubby chaps in black and splendid lace jabots ... and a definite family look to them .
In fact , there was a certain family look to most of the portraits and the same names pop up again and again .

But the occasional parvenue pushed forward and , since anyone could , would design himself a crest .

The Reverend Rudolphus Kuen and his wife Elizabeth had a particularly nice one .

I left , designing mine as I went . Aubergine with a bay leaf wreath and soup ladle rampant ?

Operation Stonebreak

Sorry , it sounds less clunky in Dutch ,"Operation Steenbreek "... or maybe it doesn't , but anyway , whatever you call it ,  it's in full flood .

It's a nationwide scheme to make towns and cities in Holland greener . Leeuwarden did a survey and discovered that up to 77% of the gardens in some neighbourhoods were totally covered in stone slabs , with a resulting decline in wildlife . Hedgehogs , bees and butterflies are becoming scarcer ...

So this weekend , all you have to do is dig up one of the flag stones in your yard and take it along to these young people and they'll swap it for a fruit bush  .

All of which sounds admirable ...  but I live in a flat  .  Neighbour and I pondered how to hack a chunk off our respective balconies and totter down the road with them but couldn't quite see ourselves managing it .

It'd probably be simpler to buy a couple of bushes at the local nursery ... I wonder if we asked at the town hall , they'd even give us a grant ? Two Euros fifty each ?

You Know It's Bad When ...

You know it's bad when you get a birthday card like this from one daughter , the second gives you a calendar from the year you were born that she'd found at an antique fair , and the third just gives you a giant pot of miracle-promising body lotion .