Monday, August 03, 2009
Oops !
Forgot to mention that if you click on any of the photos of the Church, you will be able to see larger and higher quality photos :-)
An Historic Church Part 3
In the South Porch, all these can be found :-)
The grave stone of a Norman knight, now vertical.
A very nice wooden statue of Our Lady of Walsingham in the niche above the South Door, where once upon a time a wood mounted copy of an icon of the Forerunner stood.
The original stone Piscina. or Holy Water stoup, which is still used for its intended purpose.
The grave stone of a Norman knight, now vertical.
A very nice wooden statue of Our Lady of Walsingham in the niche above the South Door, where once upon a time a wood mounted copy of an icon of the Forerunner stood.
The original stone Piscina. or Holy Water stoup, which is still used for its intended purpose.
An Historic Church Part 2
Part of the Reredos, the original solid stone altar mensa, which survived the Reformation, and one of the Aumbry niches which has been converted to be a Tabernacle for the Reserved Sacrament with an icon door and a vigil light above.
More wall paintings.
A very fine example of Burne-Jones' magnificent stained glass windows, depicting St Peter, Christ "The King of Kings" and St John.
An Historic Church Part 1
I thought you might like to see some photos of a beautiful 11th century Church in Wales (Anglican/Episcopalian) church only five minutes walk away from my home :-)
Tudor wall-painting, only recently discovered beneath many layers of paint and plaster.
A modern original icon of the Forerunner, to whom the Church is dedicated.
The hammerbeam roof, complete with bosses, is particularly fine :-)
Tudor wall-painting, only recently discovered beneath many layers of paint and plaster.
A modern original icon of the Forerunner, to whom the Church is dedicated.
The hammerbeam roof, complete with bosses, is particularly fine :-)
Sunday, August 02, 2009
Quality Of Life
I was delighted to hear, when I phoned my mum last night, that my brother had had a really good day after he had not been so well on Friday when we saw him.
Yesterday, he had permission from his doctors to leave the ward for one hour, by wheelchair, to visit the coffee shop and small shopping complex downstairs in the hospital foyer. So he was taken down by my Mum and her friend, and they had a lovely hour, browsing the shops and my brother had *two* cups of cappuccino, which he throughly enjoyed.
As his feeding tube fell out on Wednesday, he is no longer having the high calorie tube feeds, and as a result he has been feeling hungry, and to enjoy eating normal food again, although in fairly small quantities.
He has been eating sausages, pate, toast, puddings, ice cream, soup and fish. This has got to be far more fun than having the special tube feed, which smells vile, going straight into his duodenum and makes him feel really sick. It was undoubtedly effective, but not nice..........
Mum said he was a constant beam of joy for the whole hour, though he was really tired by the end and glad to get back into bed.
We hope he will be allowed out for an hour each day, so he can see something other than the same four walls of the ward each day, and feel that he has some control over his life.
He really loved being able to go the shop and browse the selection of sweets and be able to choose what candy *he* wanted to buy, for the first time in twenty long weeks :-)
And this morning, my brother phoned me at 8am and asked where DH had put my brother's memory card for the laptop when DH fixed it for him. We were able to tell him, and he was delighted - he had woken up this morning feeling well enough to use his laptop, and needed something that was on the card.
I am just amazed that he was well enough to be able to use his mobile phone to phone me, as he hasn't been able to do that for twenty weeks, either......it is good to hear him sound so happy.
Yesterday, he had permission from his doctors to leave the ward for one hour, by wheelchair, to visit the coffee shop and small shopping complex downstairs in the hospital foyer. So he was taken down by my Mum and her friend, and they had a lovely hour, browsing the shops and my brother had *two* cups of cappuccino, which he throughly enjoyed.
As his feeding tube fell out on Wednesday, he is no longer having the high calorie tube feeds, and as a result he has been feeling hungry, and to enjoy eating normal food again, although in fairly small quantities.
He has been eating sausages, pate, toast, puddings, ice cream, soup and fish. This has got to be far more fun than having the special tube feed, which smells vile, going straight into his duodenum and makes him feel really sick. It was undoubtedly effective, but not nice..........
Mum said he was a constant beam of joy for the whole hour, though he was really tired by the end and glad to get back into bed.
We hope he will be allowed out for an hour each day, so he can see something other than the same four walls of the ward each day, and feel that he has some control over his life.
He really loved being able to go the shop and browse the selection of sweets and be able to choose what candy *he* wanted to buy, for the first time in twenty long weeks :-)
And this morning, my brother phoned me at 8am and asked where DH had put my brother's memory card for the laptop when DH fixed it for him. We were able to tell him, and he was delighted - he had woken up this morning feeling well enough to use his laptop, and needed something that was on the card.
I am just amazed that he was well enough to be able to use his mobile phone to phone me, as he hasn't been able to do that for twenty weeks, either......it is good to hear him sound so happy.
Computers ? Huh !
Yesterday, the family's main computer, downstairs in the study, decided to go belly-up.
When started, it rapidly displayed an interesting variant of the Windows "blue screen of death", stating that a System_5 intitialisation failure had occurred.
It did this repeatedly, but DH the computer hero managed to access it in Safe Mode and salvage all our crucial files (ie family photos) onto a flash drive and then did some strange and mysterious things which meant that after several hours hard work, the computer is now fine again.
Our precious family and holiday photos have now been archived onto an external hard drive, the other computer *and* the flash drive, so all I have to do now is REMEMBER to put all the new photos I upload into the new file labelled "to be backed up" and not just dump them in any old folder as I have been doing :-(
Back-ups will now be done fortnightly, and scheduled. I own to being very remiss about this in the past, solely due to my laziness......mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa !
When started, it rapidly displayed an interesting variant of the Windows "blue screen of death", stating that a System_5 intitialisation failure had occurred.
It did this repeatedly, but DH the computer hero managed to access it in Safe Mode and salvage all our crucial files (ie family photos) onto a flash drive and then did some strange and mysterious things which meant that after several hours hard work, the computer is now fine again.
Our precious family and holiday photos have now been archived onto an external hard drive, the other computer *and* the flash drive, so all I have to do now is REMEMBER to put all the new photos I upload into the new file labelled "to be backed up" and not just dump them in any old folder as I have been doing :-(
Back-ups will now be done fortnightly, and scheduled. I own to being very remiss about this in the past, solely due to my laziness......mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa !
Tuesday's Doh !
DD2 and her lovely boyfriend came down to spend the day.
As she is now working away across the border in England, it was such a treat to have her come home to see us :-)
After a while, I thought I could hear a drip drip drip. Further investigation revealed a quite steady small flow of water through the ceiling of the dining room, about three feet away from the icon corner. We checked all the upstairs taps, all off. No sign of water leaking from the pipes in the batthroom or the toilet. No one had used the shower that morning, so it was a complete mystery where the water came from.
I phoned the mother of DD3's school friend, whose husband is our plumber, and was advised to turn off the water at the mains and drain the cold water, so I did, after filling the kettle to the brim so that I would not be tea-less for hours :-)
It didn't make much difference, so towels were laid down to absorb the water and our plumber friend arrived quickly. Floorboards were lifted, pipes were checked. It was all very thorough.
Guess what the problem was ?
A small gap in the seal around the top of the bath, which was allowing water to seep down behind the tiles when the shower was used. The water then tracked down to the floor joist,which had absorbed so much water it was like a sponge, then when saturated, was itself dripping and that water was tracking down through the ceiling into the dining room.
Luckily the ceiling there is wood-panelled, so it hides a multitude of sins :-)
Floorboards were left up for a few days to allow the wood to dry up, then all is fine again.
But as we had our friendly plumber there, DH phoned and asked him to have a look at our toilet flush, which has been very temperamental for several weeks, and for him to replace it. This has now beeen done, and we now have a very whizzy push-button flush, which is simple, extremely quick and effective, and environmentally friendly as it uses much less water.
So what could have been a domestic fittings disaster ended up a rather good day, and of course I had the delight of my precious daughter's company :-)
As she is now working away across the border in England, it was such a treat to have her come home to see us :-)
After a while, I thought I could hear a drip drip drip. Further investigation revealed a quite steady small flow of water through the ceiling of the dining room, about three feet away from the icon corner. We checked all the upstairs taps, all off. No sign of water leaking from the pipes in the batthroom or the toilet. No one had used the shower that morning, so it was a complete mystery where the water came from.
I phoned the mother of DD3's school friend, whose husband is our plumber, and was advised to turn off the water at the mains and drain the cold water, so I did, after filling the kettle to the brim so that I would not be tea-less for hours :-)
It didn't make much difference, so towels were laid down to absorb the water and our plumber friend arrived quickly. Floorboards were lifted, pipes were checked. It was all very thorough.
Guess what the problem was ?
A small gap in the seal around the top of the bath, which was allowing water to seep down behind the tiles when the shower was used. The water then tracked down to the floor joist,which had absorbed so much water it was like a sponge, then when saturated, was itself dripping and that water was tracking down through the ceiling into the dining room.
Luckily the ceiling there is wood-panelled, so it hides a multitude of sins :-)
Floorboards were left up for a few days to allow the wood to dry up, then all is fine again.
But as we had our friendly plumber there, DH phoned and asked him to have a look at our toilet flush, which has been very temperamental for several weeks, and for him to replace it. This has now beeen done, and we now have a very whizzy push-button flush, which is simple, extremely quick and effective, and environmentally friendly as it uses much less water.
So what could have been a domestic fittings disaster ended up a rather good day, and of course I had the delight of my precious daughter's company :-)
Doh !
I just realised that there are lots of things I fogot to blog about last week :-)
Monday morning, DH called me in a slight panic.
From the upstairs study window, he saw an elderly lady had fallen and hurt herself on the opposite side of the road. A lady cyclist had stopped to render aid, and by the time I got out, an ambulance had already been summoned.
A kind motorist also stopped and had helped her to sit up, and covered her with his jacket. I took tissues and wet wipes so we could clean up some of the blood and see how badly she had cut her head. She was lucid, though badly shaken, and her elderly husband was very shaken too.
She had a nasty cut to her head, which had bled a lot initially but quickly stopped, and some nasty grazes to her cheek and chin. I was glad an ambulance was on its way as her eye was starting to swell shut and I was worried that she may have fractured her cheek bone/eye orbit, which is horrifyingly easily done in an elderly person who falls.
We stayed with her till she was safely aboard the ambulance, and her husband had notified other family members of what had happened and he went in the ambulance with her.
I do so hope she is okay, as I worried about her a great deal. I am glad I was able to render a little assistance.
Monday morning, DH called me in a slight panic.
From the upstairs study window, he saw an elderly lady had fallen and hurt herself on the opposite side of the road. A lady cyclist had stopped to render aid, and by the time I got out, an ambulance had already been summoned.
A kind motorist also stopped and had helped her to sit up, and covered her with his jacket. I took tissues and wet wipes so we could clean up some of the blood and see how badly she had cut her head. She was lucid, though badly shaken, and her elderly husband was very shaken too.
She had a nasty cut to her head, which had bled a lot initially but quickly stopped, and some nasty grazes to her cheek and chin. I was glad an ambulance was on its way as her eye was starting to swell shut and I was worried that she may have fractured her cheek bone/eye orbit, which is horrifyingly easily done in an elderly person who falls.
We stayed with her till she was safely aboard the ambulance, and her husband had notified other family members of what had happened and he went in the ambulance with her.
I do so hope she is okay, as I worried about her a great deal. I am glad I was able to render a little assistance.
Saturday, August 01, 2009
Orthodox Antactica
Did you know there are two Orthodox chapels in Antarctica ?
Trinity Chapel is served by some of the monks from the Trinity Lavra of St Sergius, just outside Moscow. The chapel is lovely, fully appointed and has celebrated baptisms and a wedding !
Lots more info and pictures here.
The other little chapel of St John of Rila is mentioned here.....
Enjoy !
Trinity Chapel is served by some of the monks from the Trinity Lavra of St Sergius, just outside Moscow. The chapel is lovely, fully appointed and has celebrated baptisms and a wedding !
Lots more info and pictures here.
The other little chapel of St John of Rila is mentioned here.....
Enjoy !
Blessed Dormition Fast
To those of us on the New calendar, a blessed Dormition Fast.
Tonight I chanted the whole Small Supplicatory Canon to the Mother of God, and received great comfort by doing so. I will endeavour to recite at least one Ode a day during the Fast.
(We are not having services in Church at the moment due to Father's bereavement and his committment to minister as Chaplain at a Church camp.)
Thank you, dear Meg, for reminding me to speak to our Holy Theotokos ......funny how even the most sensible and obvious actions can be completely forgotten when one is under stress !
I was able to take the mad dog out for a half hour walk today, and was even able to break into a gentle jog for about 50 yards before my tummy start to protest a little, whereupon I immediately went back to walking. I have actually lost half a stone since my surgery, but am now totally unfit..... but all things in due course.
No point in trying to rush and end up with more problems......
Tonight I chanted the whole Small Supplicatory Canon to the Mother of God, and received great comfort by doing so. I will endeavour to recite at least one Ode a day during the Fast.
(We are not having services in Church at the moment due to Father's bereavement and his committment to minister as Chaplain at a Church camp.)
Thank you, dear Meg, for reminding me to speak to our Holy Theotokos ......funny how even the most sensible and obvious actions can be completely forgotten when one is under stress !
I was able to take the mad dog out for a half hour walk today, and was even able to break into a gentle jog for about 50 yards before my tummy start to protest a little, whereupon I immediately went back to walking. I have actually lost half a stone since my surgery, but am now totally unfit..... but all things in due course.
No point in trying to rush and end up with more problems......
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