Rhyme Time (#NaPoMo)

April is National Poetry Month, across the cyber world people attempt to grapple and wrangle with their language to conjure something of power, of poignancy, or amusement. Poetry is one of those forms that has many variations, from the syllable structure of hiaku, tanka and fib, the free form structure (isn’t that a contradiction terms, an oxymoron), limerick, sonnet, the list goes on.

Many moons ago in the blogging days of the defunct bcuk.com a group of us would game play with words, write short stories, poems, enjoy the weekly Friday fives, Wednesday wordle and alike. A few of us are in a private Facebook group and have been enticed (read cajoled) into taking part in the write a poem everyday.

Now I am no bard, I struggle enough just writing a blog. My levels of imagination swing between non-existent to fleeting sparks. Yet somehow I seem to have ended up joining in and I might admit begrudgingly that one or two of my attempts ain’t too too bad. I shall now proceed to bore you all with a few, please feel free to vacate now if you wish.

Let’s start with a light limerick

There once was a man from Nantucket 
Who was troubled by the hole in his bucket
Eliza suggested
Henry then tested
Until they conceded to chuck it

A haiku follows a syllable pattern of 5-7-5.

Procrastination 
Is my new occupation
Until tomorrow 

A fib poem follows the syllable pattern 1-1-2-3-5-8, and I was attempting one when the death of HRH The Prince Phillip, Duke of Edinburgh was announced

Gone
Dead
Grieving
Such a brain
Such a character
None like him will be seen again

The acrostic style is where the first letter of each line spells something out

Nonchalant 
Openly inquisitive
Through my window creeps
Mannered and quiet
Yet expecting
Chair, blanket or lap
And caresses on head and chin
This cat of not mine

There there is the more traditional comfortable style

Fight The Rhyme, is the new rallying call
We'll storm the libraries, we'll march to Whitehall.
April has been high jacked, It's becoming quite the strain
More addictive than hippie crack, the effort quite the drain.
It's sneaky and enticing, You're teased with a simple ploy
Just a few to start with, to release those endorphins of joy.
A little harmless game, it's fun, a poem a day
Before you know it you're caught, and with headaches you pay.
I am here to make a stand, to stop this engulfing all of us
If you need help, reach out, to Poets Anonymous.

Websites like thesaurus.com, rhymezone.com and syllablecounter.net have seen their hit rate sky rocket into the stratosphere.

Right then, off to wrestle with tomorrow’s attempt.

 

Being Cuckoo-d by a Cat

There was a hilarious tweet recently that started me on a trip along that leafy memory lane. Someone posted “Our neighbour just put their house up for sale, couldn’t resist a snoop on Zoopla ………. that’s our bloody cat!” There quite unashamedly stretched across the purple bedspread was a very contented fluffy ginger cat. The comments had for more amusement as people across the globe were sharing ‘tails’ of having visitors. So if you’re in need of calm amusement, pop over to Twitter and search #NotMyCat.

Here’s my story.

Back in 2017 I kept my green recycling wheelie bin at the back door so I could easily lift the lid and deposit my green credentials. When Big Sis and I were cleaning house ready for BFF’s visit, Big Sis grabbed the recycling with all intent but as she entered the kitchen said “Can’t put the recycling out, there’s a cat on the bin”.

Now ‘cat’ was no stranger, he was often seen prowling around the gardens, giving cars meticulous inspections and had played with a leaf atop my sisters estate car. He had decided this was his manor and he was security. Postie became a friend to go to for a quick head scratch, bin men were glared at from a distance, window cleaner and gardeners were avoided, a suitable snooze spot in the sun found. He often featured in estate agent exterior photos.

If my front door was wide open he would cautiously approach but not venture over the threshold. His neck would stretch further and further with curiosity but his back paws remained firmly on the door step. Until one day during BFF’s visit the ultimate, irresistible inducement to be courageous was offered – sandwich ham. My fate was sealed.

After BFF had left for home, Big Sis and I were sitting in my lounge when a faint sound could be heard, just slightly, we looked at each other and chuckled. She got up and opened the front door and in sauntered Mickey, on patrol but fussing.

On BFF’s next visit (can you sense a theme here) the bedroom window was opened for air and in the wee hours a voice remarked “Oh it’s you” as a lump walked up BFF and snuggled down for a snooze. A visit to the High Street pet shop resulted in a couple of cat toys and some nip. Somehow while grocery shopping some Dreamies or Felix treat bags sort of accidentally fell in, followed by a box of pouches (well he is a large lad). He confidently strides through an open door or window, has head scritches, chin tickles, back strokes, decides whether he is going to sleep on the wooden chair, desk chair, armchair, sofa or me. Gives me the “Do you mind!” expression if I move a muscle, lightly perpetrates my thigh with his generous acupuncture treatments.

With CoVid delaying BFF’s first visit last year she was concerned that Mooch might have forgotten her (ha! As if). She arrived mid afternoon, front window was opened slightly for air and suddenly this white blob attempted to jump in the narrow gap because he had heard her voice. You could see the joy in his face at having her back again. I’ve told him, June, just 66 days, she’ll be back.

Fur forward four years and “Mickey” (because his black ears reminded me of Mickey Mouse, should have called him Oliver) still sits on the bin, sunning himself, supervising any kitchen goings on, also gently rests front paw on the door handle as a subtle hint.

A carer had a sporty car with a straight exhaust and he’d inspect the car every time, warm his paws on the bonnet, or glare at her when she came in and disturbed his snooze. He is currently working his charm on my other carers. Just last week while I was parked on the porcelain throne Carer was in the kitchen preparing my dinner when she declared “I can’t stand it”. She strode to my lounge and returned to the kitchen and I heard “Here, stop starring at me”, treats were popped on the bin to appease her guilt.

This very morning as I was wriggling into position on my bed, Carer opened the kitchen door and declared “Ohhhh, hello beautiful, do you want in?”….. I think I need to check my care plan, I don’t think it says ‘Look after cat first’.

But, well, he is handsome and charming and……..

 

CoVidVersary

How are we? Things pootling along okay? I am sort of slightly unanchored, with the days getting longer I cannot feel what time of day it is, I have no idea what day of the week it is and I am not altogether sure which month it is, especially in relation to things/events I need to remember. It’s all gone a bit groundhog. Even my three day week method has collapsed as I think it’s today when it’s actually tomorrow.

We are approaching the anniversary of the first lockdown here in the U.K. Oddly for me it wasn’t that much of a change, I can’t leave the house and there’s nowhere I want/need to go to anyway. Once I grasped the book-early book-often with the groceries, that sorted that.

Where it all impacted me was people visiting me. A work colleague (hello Joss) would visit and we’d chatter, laugh, rant, ponder and generally muse over the oddities of life and I have really missed those hours of escape. BFF had to reorganise her visits, although we were able to get together but were isolating except for food. Neph would bring my bread, ably assisted by mini-me and we’d have a brief catch-up. Then there was my bi-monthly pedicure, I really miss that. A hour of scrubbing, pampering and natter which resulted in tidy toes, shiny nails and a general happy inner well being. Plus Neph’s better half would come to harvest my hair and we could catch up on happenings at the same time.

Generally it feels like we have forgotten the seriousness and ominousness of how things were back early last year. It’s amazing the power of the unknown has, where as now, it feels like the atmosphere is a mix of weariness at the restrictions and lack of faith/trust in the information.

As we begin the steady slow progress of coming out of lockdown, I do wonder how the general populous will behave. Will it be the manic, crazy, rush akin to the Harrods January sales of old or will it be the tentative, cautious, creeping animal rehomed after rescue.

 

Spring Like A March Hare

I say spring, more like enthusiastically lurch……. well I say enthusiastically but it’s more like begrudgingly shuffle…….. hmm begrudgingly that’s on point and shuffle, hmm yeah, kind of outch, dawdle, mosey.

Whether it is the decline of my physical abilities, the endless endurance of the shielding lockdown, the cold fingers of winter or a mix of it all, I cannot seem to shake off the shackles of winter oppression and awaken, find the joy in things, the pleasures in purpose, everything feels exhaustingly ::sigh:: As I said to BFF I cannot be bothered to be bothered.

There are the tentative hints of improvement. Doesn’t it make the day seem nicer when there is sunshine? It has an extra energy, almost an optimism. So in that fashion one might dare to tackle a bit of a to-do list.

• Add crochet border to red cat blanket
• Start the Alan Davies book
• Check domain registry dates
• Go through iTunes genre
• File images accumilated

A chunk of that involves my desk, which is dependent on who my carers are and the times they are due here. Plus the sitting position isn’t the most comfortable.

The ‘remote’ app on the iPad that controls iTunes on my Mac is working really well, but as I scroll about trying to decide what I feel like listening to I find I tend to choose a genre and let the device shuffle. When I am at the desk I usually select an album or artist to listen to. As I think I have mentioned before my choice can be influenced by what I am doing, classical while html coding, rock/metal while photo editing, Rhythm/blues while dealing with accounts and numbers, etc. The automated comes-when-you-upload info of a cd can be a little odd, there are a few tweaks I would like to make and there are those with no genre tagged at all. Hardly a vital necessary task but it fills the time, like finding album covers and adding those.

My original iPad (gen1) has been struggling to deal with life for a while. When I purchased my new one I repurposed the old one to the bedroom for iPlayer, radio, audiobook usage, but many of the apps need an operating system it cannot cope with so I was using the browser, but even that struggled. Anywho, I took the decision to buy a refurbished one from MusicMagPie, it came today and so far so good. I’ve spent a couple of hours setting up and logging in, tweaking to my preferences, selecting display images etc.

Must think of more to blog about so it’s not eons again before I text lyrical.

 

The Cecil Hotel, LA

Recently I binged the Netflix documentary series Crime Scene The Vanishing At The Cecil Hotel, it was an interesting watch, if you’re into real life oddness.

It centres around the Cecil Hotel in downtown Los Angeles, a 700-room hotel opened in the mid-1920’s just before the Great Depression, along with several grand hotels in the area it enjoyed a period of opulent prosperity and was aimed at the middle class traveller and business men. After World War II the area, also known as Skid Row, fell further into transience as fortunes changed, the stark increase in sex workers, drug dealing and users, along with those unable to afford rents and the increasing protocol to herd the homeless into a manageable area of the ever expanding City, increased criminal activity.

Curiously ever since the Hotel first opened it has been linked to suicides, mysteries and murders. The first documented suicide was January 22, 1927, when Percy Ormond Cook shot himself in the head while inside his hotel room after failing to reconcile with his wife and child. In 1967 “Pigeon Goldie” Osgood long-term resident, a retired telemarketer was found dead in her room, she had been raped, stabbed, beaten and her room ransacked. Her murder remains unsolved. The Press often linked the hotel to numerous serial killers. Frequently residents had died from drug overdoses or long term substance and/or alcohol abuse. There is even a Wikipedia page detailing some of them.

The documentary beds itself around the disappearance in February 2013 of young Canadian student Elisa Lam. She was an avid blogger and frequently documented her travels, fashion, life thoughts online garnering many regular followers. When away from home she called home everyday, after her parents hadn’t heard from her they called the LAPD and news started circulating about a missing person. As the Police struggled to piece together Elisa’s movements they released the elevator CCTV footage, it went viral and set in motion an interesting series of events.

An army of ‘web-sleuths’ scrutinised in meticulous details, frame by frame, the cctv sparking the beginnings of numerous conspiracy theories, many still perpetuate. Things like, why’s the time stamp jumping, the door isn’t closing, whose that shadow. Suddenly people across the globe were gathering in FaceBook groups to discuss minute anomalies, some visiting the hotel to re-enact and trace where she had been. What I found very telling as the documentary continued was how this congregation of unqualified amateurs ardently believed they could succeed where the professionals could not and that they believed every morsel of conjecture and hypothesis from a straightforward mugging gone wrong to the CIA using vanishing vaporise lasers. But there was more to come.

SPOILER ALERT :: if you don’t want to know the outcome I’d suggest ceasing here …. thank you for reading ….

……

….. Okay dear reader, I hope you’re not eating or drinking while you read on.

…….

About two to three weeks after Elisa’s vanishing a few hotel guests and residents started to complain that the water had an odd odour and taste and the water then started to change colour to a sludgy brown. A maintenance worker was sent to inspect the four roof top water tanks. Sadly one of them contained the floating bloating remains of a young girl, later identified as the missing traveller.

Now the merry band of web sleuths really had something to get overly involved with. From behind their screens and keyboards they pieced together bits of facts with leaps of notions, ignored some elements and fantasised others, to quite catastrophic levels.

Attention turned to how did Elisa get onto the roof. The access door was locked and alarmed, this meant that the hotel management had to be involved, a member of night staff had to have killed her. The design of the building meant that there was a metal fire escape on the outside, a series of stairs and platforms covering all fifteen floors, including the roof, accessed from a hallway window that was not alarmed, locked or monitored in anyway. Debris on the roof showed that it was frequently used by people to smoke, drink, take drugs, have parties etc.

The nature of her discovery caused a media frenzy as a police chief was leaving the hotel trying to get through the jostling crowd of reporters he was asked a question which he hastily replied “When Officers approached the water tank the hatch was closed”. The web brigade pounced on this to mean that she must have been dumped because no-one could close the hatch from the inside, so it must be murder. The officer was correct in his statement, because when the maintenance worker noticed the hatch was open and that’s when he discovered the grizzly contents and had closed the hatch from habit as he called for help.

Searches across the internet brought up ‘evidence’ of a Mexican death metal singer called Morbid, due to his chilling lyrics, which included a reference to a girl drowning and his dark videos addressing death (one was filmed at The Cecil), along with having stayed there, meant he must have lured her to the rooftop and killed her. He was hounded, trolled, and harassed over a period of months, received death threats and villanised as a murderer by the Court of Online Public Opinion. It caused him to suffer a breakdown and such depression that he attempted suicide. The ‘evidence’ grasped by the onliners was years old and at the time of Elisa vanishing Morbid was in Mexico but even still today eight years later he still get mail labelling him a murderer.

One aspect of Elisa’s life was, to some degree, suppressed until late on in the investigations and not readily available, she had been diagnosed as bi-polar and had a history of intentionally not taking the prescribed medication, which had caused her to experience strong psychotic episodes, along with hallucinations in the past. Armed with this knowledge, along with the Coroner’s report showing toxicology levels and there being no evidence of any assault or violence on her body, it was concluded that her death was accidental.

At the end, I felt sad that this young life had ended, that so many innocent people had been branded and abused because of tenuous links but mostly I was concerned, almost worried, about the mob mentality and power of online collectiveness. This ferocious hungry entity eagerly hurrying for instant information, affirmation and inconsequential action feels a little bit like Pandora’s box.

 

Shouting At Burglars

During the course of conversation I recalled an anecdote which had my carer laughing. Hopefully it will bring a chuckle to your chops too.

When I was about thirteen or fourteen there was an incident. When I lived with my parents we were in a very rural village, lots of woodland and open marshland. In the early hours of a morning my Dad was woken by a sound, thud-thud-thud, reasonably rhythmic in nature. He asked my mum who sleepily thought it was the pile drivers across the marshes, but not that early in the day, unsettled he got up to investigate. I had a pet rabbit Rv who as soon as he heard people movement would thump his back legs against the back of his hutch wanting out into the enclosed courtyard. Rv’s hutch was against the wall of the garage, beside the window of the workshop area and opposite the kitchen window and door, Dad thought it was Rv getting his Thumper action on. So he unlocked the kitchen door and shouted across the courtyard to Rv “Shut up, you noisy bugger!” As he crossed the hallway he noticed that the garage side door was ajar, which was extremely unusual, it was then a penny dropped. Dad went back upstairs to get dressed and when he went to the garage there every yard or so was a hessian sack each with the contents of our big chest freezer, the rhythmic thud being the closing of the heavy freezer lid (it didn’t stay up). As shocking and upsetting as the event was at the time, we couldn’t help but wonder what said burglar thought was going on when he heard a deep voice declaring “Shut up, you noisy bugger!”.

Fast forward about seven years, I was home alone, Mum and Dad were away visiting old friends. At the same time the flat roof of the garage was being replaced. By the end of day one the roof had been stripped back to its rafters and the new boards just laid on top. As I was about to get ready for bed I opened the front door to call the cat in “Kevin! Kee-viiin, move your backside“, as I stopped to see if the ginger and white blob was approaching I heard distinct foot steps on wood echo through the garage. Yikes!! I locked myself in and immediately rang the police. The culprit was caught trying to break in elsewhere. Yet again I can only imagine the shock the fellow must have felt as all of a sudden someone is bellowing a name, telling him to move his backside.

Hee hee…

 

Now listen here 2021!

How has it been for you so far?? Really! Well I say…..

Me? Well let’s see, it’s frigging freezing and I’ve that niggling nasal drip making the throat feel suspect, is it a head cold wanting to brew or just changing temperatures doing their thing or something far more suspicious. After a zoomy chat with a hospital consultant, letters are being sent as no one from my GP Surgery has contacted me about the requested pneumonia vaccination and to remind them I’m highly vulnerable and need a home visit for any jabs. Grocery delivery slots are getting snapped as quick as they are released, good job I’m still eligible for the eight hour priority slots. Several of the carers with the agency I use and likely ones I see have tested positive for CoVid and today my front door has decided no one shall pass.

It decided to be sticky of a morning and we put it down to the colder than a witches tit night temperatures, as it wasn’t a problem during the rest of the day. This morning my beefy stout carer semi hurled herself at it so I messaged my awesome superhero Neph thinking it might just need some WD40 and a stern talking to. Neph rocks up in a shortsleeved tee shirt (I’m sure he’s part polar bear) and when I suggested he lock the door and feel how it’s sticking, did so and it stucked stuck.

Not very does often he get a perplexed expression on his face but as he fedangled the lock, huffed the handle mechanism, brute yanked the door, perplexion indeed crossed his face. “hmm, I don’t think it’s the mushroom, more like the bolt not lifting in the spag at the middle”. Well I think that’s what he said, it all sounded a bit wigwam for a ducks bridle to me.

Now I’m not saying that Facebook can predict the future but across the past few weeks there was been an ad appearing for “Panes In The Glass” a local small business advertising window repairs, hinge greasing, lock maintenance etc, I read their reviews and recognised the van so they’ve been to my area before. It’s getting late on a Saturday afternoon so thought, mentally prepare to leave a message which I did and within two minutes he called back and after spouting forth about spags and mushrooms he thought “it might be the gearbox” (don’t you just love the variety of technical language). After a discussion about what is likely involved and how things will go, weather permitting and if Murphy can keep his law to himself, on Monday a very nice man is going to try and fix it.

Now let’s hope the carers due across the next couple of days get the message to use the back door. 🤞

We haven’t even reached double digit January yet and already 2021 is being a 🤬. Although I did managed to get a surprise treat to BFF, some strictly not birthday flowers some just because flowers (it’s her birthday in a couple of days and she told me to only send a card). And a special kitty cat in Switzerland sent me some new year wishes 😸.

Sure hope I get a fantastic prize after passing all these tests.

 

Same Old New

As much as there is nothing about this year that many of us would want to hang on to, again I feel a tug as I do every New Year’s Eve. There are those who talk of new beginnings, fresh motivation and forward ideas but for me it feels like the things I enjoyed, that I used to do, the people I was connected to, are further in the past. Somehow that seems sad.

Once upon a few decades ago we would all gather at my parents house, have a meal, probably another box of crackers, maybe play a board game (well Big Sis and I would with audience participation) and then an evening of tv, chatter, and a feeling of everyone waiting for the clock to chime so we could all go to bed. Most likely because we were tired of all the preceding festivities.

When things changed after mum died, New Year’s Eve was likely the one night I’d be in bed early with a book and only knew the time by the ships horns and cacophony of fireworks.

There were of course a couple of exceptions, midnight 1st January 2000 I was drinking champagne and dancing on the deck of a tall ship, watching fireworks, being deafened by horns, kissing strangers, moored in Tenerife between cruise ships showing them how mighty we were (some of their passengers didn’t look like they were having a ball) – sailory types know how to par-ty 😉.

There was the year a gang of us on a message board saw the various New Years in as the time crossed the globe. Apart from the in joke of “F5 Renee!” once midnight had passed in the U.K., I could say to my American pals “You guys are sooo last year”, well it tickled me.

As I sit here in my hovel, musing and pondering, I do wonder

• Where will I be this time next year?
• How will I be this time next year?
• Who will no longer be with us?

Still, wherever you are, I honestly hope we are heading toward better things and I wish you all well 🥂

 

As ancient as…

You that feeling when……. you are watching a black & white movie (Carry On Regardless, 1961) and your carer arrives asks what you’re watching and questions “So when did colour tv start?”

I explained that there were colour films shown in cinemas before there was colour tv because colour over black & white was hideously expensive to make. I thought that colour tv was introduced around the late 1960’s (turns out it was a Wimbledon final 1967 on BBC2) before becoming mainstream in early 1970’s.

This branched on to the fact there were (and still are) tv licenses for either a colour tv or a black & white one, this notion seemed quite startling, along with that many homes did not have a colour TV set until the mid/end of the 1970’s.

When I went on to remark that I remember as a child being told to change the channel because there were no remotes, and there were only three channels broadcasting at set times of the day (kids tv about 3pm til shutdown 11pm), and that at close down the BBC would play the National Anthem – well my carer’s jaw dropped to the floor.

When I said channel 4 didn’t start until 1982 and Sky started 1989 she remarked that she found it hard to believe these things happened not that long before she was born (1998).

Talk about feeling ancient!!

 

Small Change, Profound Difference

It is not often I extoll the virtues of technology and it’s even more rare for such to bring a tear to the eye. Let me explain.

Across the decades I have amassed a significant music collection on my Mac, a mixture of uploaded cd’s, downloaded purchases from Amazon/iTunes and independent offerings. If I was to press play and let it run on unabashed it would take a month to get through. When I was spending every morning at my desk I could merrily listen to my tunes, mixing Mozart with Madness, a touch of Mancini mingled with Marmalade, Zakk moshing with ZZ Top, as I whittled some html coding, wrangled a bit of number crunching, wrestled with photo editing and such like. It was entertaining and uplifting, seeing as my brain seems to be mostly filled with lyrics and set to Kareoke mode.

With the loss of my mobility I became separated from this mentally motivating activity and I have so missed it, time spent at my desk has become seriously dwindled. I had considered streaming services but felt resentful at having to pay money to hear music I have already spent monies upon.

I had procrastinated about searching for an answer, I had dawdled over posting on the MacForum for a suggestion. I had hoped Siri could help but my Mac is too old. I started seeing adverts for the new HomePod mini and the sown seed slowly germinated, maybe one of these could access and play my music. It spurred me on to ask on the forum if this could work with my particular kit, I hit publish and waited for a potentially helpful reply.

To my delight and surprise a helpful bod answered my post and introduced me to the app “iTunes Remote” as a potential solution. Google and I spent an evening reading and researching, could this be the answer? Could it really be that straightforward? Well, dear reader, in short, yes!

So yesterday after carer had positioned me at my desk I set to. Slightly pessimistic because things that class themselves as quick or easy rarely are. I followed the instructions with a tingle of anticipatory expectation.

• App Store, download free app iTunes Remote to iPad
• Open app, select manual set up (4-digit code appears)
• Open music app on Mac
• From Devices list select iPad
• Enter iPads 4-digit code
• Done, sorted, connected.

It really was that easy!!!

Okay so far so good…..but…….. now to test the theory. From the iPad app I selected a track and hit play and music sprung forth from my Mac ✅ …… I adjusted the volume, skipped forward and backward. Alright…..but…… I put my Mac to sleep, counted to twenty, opened the app and selected a track and again the swinging piano vibes exuded from my dozing Mac ✅✅. Right then, the big test, shut down and restart both the Mac and the iPad, open app and select a tune, without hesitation the dulcet tones of the lyrical warbler wafted across the room ✅✅✅. Another test, this morning I opened the app and selected a play list annddd it’s playing ✅✅✅✅.

I am reconnected to my music, my smile could not be wider, I’m busting my (sat down) moves, twerking so much I’m gonna give my buttocks whiplash, I have gone from famine to feast ….. so much choice, it’s almost overwhelming. Brain is fizzing as it sings along to tracks it hasn’t heard for years.