Invisible Illnesses

People are often kind enough to ask how I am.  The answer is usually ‘OK’ or ‘Fine’.  That is for the simple reason that if I’m not OK I am unlikely to be communicating in any form. On average I have one or two ‘Good’ Days each week, a couple of Bad Days and the rest are Liveable With….    Good, of course, is a relative term.  

I met some old friends recently and was delighted to do so – on two counts.  Firstly because I wanted to see them.  Secondly because it was one of those days when I was well enough to keep my appointment with them.  I was picked up by She-who-used to-organise-me and her partner.  They enquired how I was and vice versa – we all said ‘Fine’ with a laugh that indicated we all knew how each other really was but were happy not to go into it.  ‘Fine’ covers a multitude of aches, pains and problems.   I had some idea of her partner’s health issues and they know mine so we didn’t need to go into detail or justify how we were well enough that day to go visiting.

When we got to our destination a couple of folk who hadn’t seen me for years commented how well I was looking.  What do you do when someone says that? I was very tempted to go into details as to all the things that were wrong with me and how I was only there because it was a ‘Good’ day.  However I refrained. I just smiled and thanked them.  It's what you do...

May 9th

This has to be one of my favourite days of the year.  It's my younger daughter's birthday and the garden is really springing into life as are all the hedgerows.   

And I love the idea of it being  Lost Sock Memorial Day.

It is also the day that the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Fairies was founded.    

 
I know those two because of Messymimi’s super blog.  Despite its title the publisher of this book  (at the request of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Fairies) notes that no fairies were injured or killed in the manufacturing process...   Lady Cottington's Pressed Fairy Book  by Terry Jones, Brian Froud - A fairy book that is the diary kept by Lady Cottington. Instead of pressing flowers in it, she pressed fairies. Handwritten and handsomely bound, this fairy book is as surprising as it is pleasing. 

So true!

Happy 175th Anniversary

 Especially for those who still post letters and cards-

6th May 1840 - a day that changed the world with the introduction of The Penny Black – the world's first pre-paid uniform rate postage stamp.

News Flash

The Biscuit Tin

For almost a century Huntley & Palmers biscuit tins have been seen on the tea tables of well-to-do Brits.  They came in many styles and with many different designs on them.

What few of those biscuit-eating folk realized is that some of the tins contained a surprise... not in the biscuits themselves, but in the illustration on the outside of the tin. Around 1970 a rogue employee, got his own back for his imminent redundancy by hiding sexually explicit scenes in the illustrations. 

This tin shows two dogs having sex in the flowerbed.  Reuters rather pruriently prudishly blurred the cover of the tin in the picture accompanying their article, so you can't see the dogs, but luckily an auctioneer’s has a picture of the tin, in which you can just see the dogs. They're in the flowerbed on the right-hand side.   

There is also a pot of jam with ‘shit’ on the label and two naked lovers in a flowerbed.  Production went on for a number of years before these things were spotted and the picture changed.  Nowadays the few surviving examples of the tin can fetch up to £5,000 at auction.

Have you paid your TV Licence?

St Walpurga the Licenceless

When I moved into a flat in the 1980s I didn't have a television.  A few Sundays I would walk round to Mum and Dad's in the evening and watch the Grand Prix highlights but other than that I didn't miss a TV.  However, the TV licensing people would not believe I didn't have a TV and kept sending me notices threatening to prosecute me if I didn't buy my licence.  I even had someone call at the door but I refused him admission on principle.  That, of course made them more suspicious.  After all, no one could live without a TV, could they?  In the end they gave up when I threatened to take them to court for harassment.

In 2009 the German authorities went through a similar palaver.  They sent St Walpurga a demand for immediate payment of a television licence.  Father Karl Terhorst of the Roman Catholic church of St Walpurga in Ramsdorf was obliged to write and explain that St Walpurga had died in in 779 and, so far as he knew, had never had a television!