Archive
My Wales Holiday Part 2 – Bodnant Garden
Welcome back to my little Wales mini-break! In the first part I visited Dolwyddelan Castle. That was actually an unscheduled stop – I saw a sign marked “Castle”, hit the brakes and swung into the car park (rather too fast considering the cattle grid just inside the entrance).
I then continued northwards to my planned destination – a National Trust property called Bodnant Garden. A bit pricey, but since I’m a National Trust member, I got in for free!
It was a lovely day and the place was packed – I was in the overflow overflow car park I think.
I had trouble picking just a few pictures, so there are quite a few here!
Two Days in Wales
I don’t usually prattle on about my largely uninteresting life, but since I just had a holiday (my first in five years!) in Wales I thought I’d share some pictures.
Well, I say a holiday. Two full days is more of a mini-break, I guess, but I lost two days on the road (it’s a six and a half hour drive).
Here’s where I went:
Map courtesy of Google Maps
The area to the north of the arrow is Snowdonia – mountains, forests and whatnot.
The trip up was fine apart from some panic around Birmingham. So many motorways branching off. Why is it that when you’re desperately looking for a turn off, all the road signs are obscured by lorries? Still, I didn’t get lost even once, and when you’re on your own with no navigator, and especially if you’re me, that’s quite a feat!
After arriving in a lovely little Bar/Grill/Restaurant/Hotel (six rooms!) I booked a table for dinner. Quality food! Grilled brie in breadcrumbs for starter followed by a massive home-made burger with onion rings, a mushroom so big it should have had some sort of faerie creature sitting on it and home-made chips (with the skins on!). For my US friends, that’s chips as in “French fries”, or is it “Freedom fries”? In the UK, the term “French fries” is reserved for those rubbish chips you get in fast-food places like MacDonald’s.
So, enough rambling, on with the pictures! I don’t want this post to get too long, so today I’ll show you some pictures I took at Dolwyddelan Castle.
Set on a hilltop (as many good/effective castles are!) it commands a dominant position over the surrounding countryside.
It was manned by Welsh soldiers – at that time Wales consisted of several kingdoms and there was also the threat of Norman/Anglo-Saxon invasion from England.
After visiting the castle, I continued to Bodnant Gardens, a National Trust property to the north. I’ll post some of those pictures later!
Back on the Grid
I’m back everyone! What’s that you say? You didn’t notice I was gone?
Hmmph.
I was only away for a few days to be fair, and since I only post a couple of times a week there’s been very little difference post-wise from the draliman stables.
I do want to apologise to the people I follow. My philosophy is “If you post it, I shall read” but I only had my phone with me and I didn’t really keep up with reading all your lovely blogs – the screen is a little small :-(.
I’ve been on a little holiday in North Wales, near a town called Dolgellau. I’ll pop some photos into a couple of posts in the coming days – here’s one I took during a forest walk at Coed y Brenin.
A waterfall in Coed y Brenin forest park, Wales
For those of you who know me a little bit, you’ll appreciate that this was quite a big step for me. I haven’t been on a holiday for five years, and I’m so driven by routine it’s sometimes difficult to leave the flat, let alone drive all the way to Wales on my own (350 miles). I’m always convinced that if I do something out of my ordinary routine something bad will happen. There’s probably some psychological condition for that – “mild routine-itis” I expect it is.
Anyway I had a lovely time :-). Nothing terrible happened (except to my bank balance and waist line). Maybe next year I’ll have another holiday, who knows?
An Ever-Changing Blog
At the beginning of the week the lovely Khana over at Khana’s Web nominated me for the Versatile Blogger’s award!
First of all, I’d like to apologise to her for taking so long to write this post. In my defence, after sitting at a computer at work for 10 hours a day I find it quite hard to fire up the old laptop when I get home.
This particular award comes at quite an apt time, actually. I was already planning to write about how my blog has changed in nature from my original idea. But first…
Versatility is my middle name (not really)
When I first started this blog, it was going to be posts about things that happened in my life that made me think about things. Unfortunately, not a lot of things happen in my life and therefore I was running seriously short of things to write about.
So I added some poetry. Well, I say poetry. Most of it’s quite naive – I still haven’t quite gotten out of the schoolchild “it’s all got to rhyme” mentality. I’m not sure why I’m writing it at all – I hated poetry at school. Keats can take his “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness” and stick it where the sun don’t shine. It’s a perfectly good poem, but I have an aversion to anything I was forced to read and endlessly analyse at school. I enjoy a lot of the poetry I find on various blogs, but I choose to read that.
I actually hate nearly everything they forced me to read at school, the only exceptions being two of the books for my German literature exam – Die Physiker (Dürrenmatt) and Biedermann und die Brandstifter (Frisch). These are plays and therefore almost all dialogue. The third book was all flowery prose. I don’t want to read 300 pages of flowery prose in English. Why would I want to read it in German?
But I digress.
I began responding to some of the Daily Prompts – a great way to pick up ideas and see what other people make of them. I expanded my repertoire to fiction (I’d forgotten after all these years how much fun it is) and I’ve even added original “artwork” in the form of DraliDoodlesTM :-).
So I guess I have become”versatile”, and am happy to accept the award! Here are the rules:
- Post the above logo [done that]
- Accept the nomination and link back to the blog that nominated you [done that as well]
- Share seven things about yourself [coming up]
- Nominate blogs and inform them of the nomination [hmm]
So seven things all about me. This is, presumably, seven more things that I didn’t mention in my last award acceptance. That last award post pretty much used up everything interesting about me.
But wait – it doesn’t say seven interesting things, does it?
- I’m in my early forties (yoinks!)
- I’ve been at the same job for nearly 10 years – my longest-lasting job ever!
- I get up really early and go to bed quite early too
- In two days I’m embarking on my first holiday in five years. I’m going to Wales for three days. I’m anticipating high winds and heavy rain.
- I’m pessimistic by nature
- I enjoy books about sci-fi and vampires and magic and stuff
- I think it’s a really interesting fact about me that I can’t dredge up even seven interesting facts about me
I’m going to have to break with tradition here. I’m really no good at nominating people, so I’m going to follow the cop out various others have taken, and just say that if you feel your blog is sufficiently versatile, grab the award and follow the rules! Like I didn’t.
Here’s a picture of me receiving my award. Warning – this picture contains flash photography!
“I Accept” by DraliDoodles (TM)
An Award for Me!
Yay! Lovely fellow blogger Nanuschka has included little old me in her award nominations!
(Pause for claps and cheers and whatnot.)
It actually appears to be a 3 for the price of 1 deal. How about that? It’s like buses. You wait for years and then three come along at once.
Make way for the logos:
Smashing. I hope it’s OK to stick them all together in one image like that. I don’t know how to make images sit next to one another.
So without further ado, I’d like to thank my parents, my family, my best friend’s cousin’s dog… actually, I’d like to thank all the people on WordPress who have been kind enough to read my humble postings and especially those who comment and click the “like” button. It’s a bit sad I know, but I’ve taken to keeping my email open at work so I can see if anyone “likes” me!
Here are the rules as posted for this multiple award:
- Display the Award Certificate on your website. Done.
- Announce your win with a post and link to whoever presented you with the award. Done.
- Present 15 awards to deserving bloggers. Well, this is 3 in 1 and it says “15 awards”, not “awards to 15 bloggers”, so…
- Drop them a comment to tip them off after you have linked them in the post. Will do.
- Post 7 interesting things about yourself. Uh-oh.
So, 7 interesting things about me. Seven. Seven whole interesting things. Blimey.
- I’ve lived and worked in Germany and Ireland (and the UK as well obviously).
- I can speak semi-reasonable German but I can’t speak any Irish.
- I can’t speak any Cornish either despite being Cornish myself.
- The most frightening and proudest day of my life was the day of my PhD viva (I “passed subject to minor corrections” :-)).
- I’m not married and I don’t have kids. Otherwise I’m sure number 4 would be different :-(.
- The name “draliman” is made up of my title, the short form of my first name and “man”. Because I am one.
- I spent many years of my life attempting to drink myself to death. I haven’t touched alcohol since February 2003. Yay me!
And now for the moment you’ve been waiting for – my nominations! As previously noted, this is 3 in 1 and I need to present 15 awards, so that’s 5 people, right? Ooh, I’m such a little cheater.
I know some of you guys aren’t ones for awards, so this is more of a thank-you list of people who have particularly shaped and aided my blogging, and whose blogs I really enjoy and have followed for some time.
I shall now repair to a mirror to bask in my own award-filled glory ;-).
I Found My Childhood Friend!
A little while ago I wrote all about my childhood friend, in a response to a Daily Prompt. The problem was, I couldn’t find the little fella!
I asked my parents about him when I went round for lunch today. They said I must have him as they don’t (uh-oh). I did get some more history, though. He was bought by my Gran for my Mum when she went into hospital to have her appendix out. I guess having your appendix out when my Mum was young must have been extremely scary, all leeches and sacrifices and stuff (sorry Mum :-)).
No, it was only 56 years ago. He was bought in Oban, on the west coast of Scotland (“in a little shop on the sea front”, my Mum tells me).
And here he is!
Cuddly Bear – my childhood friend
I popped a pen into the picture to give an idea of scale. As you can see, he’s been through a lot but now he has taken his rightful place on the bookcase with the rest of the gang. He’s meeting some of them for the first time!
I do hope they all get along.
Small Change
Things change. People, places, things. That’s life. No change means stagnation.
Stagnation? Bring it on. I hate change. Change is for other people. I’ll happily stagnate, thank you very much.
Small Change. Lunch is on me!
Last week brought me change in abundance. Nothing major, just small changes, but lots all at once.
These are all things which wouldn’t even be an issue for 99.9% of the population. They’d look at me as if I were mad.
I was already in a bad head space. A website we’ve been working on for months was about to go live and I was in a right state.
In my mind, I make a small error in the code. Everything goes wrong. The world ends.
(Please note – I don’t program nuclear missile systems. Therefore the world is not actually in any danger.)
Here’s the “small change” part. Along with this going on:
- The road near my house is under repair. Bits keep getting closed. I need this road to get to work, otherwise I’d need to change my route.
- The supermarket where I do my weekly shop has been refitted. The parking system has changed and everything inside has moved around.
- The petrol station where I fill up my car every fortnight has closed for a refit for up to 28 weeks. I will need to get my petrol elsewhere.
- And the icing on the cake – the barber I have been visiting since I was but a little lad is closing! Nooooooo.
Too much change in such a short time. So what happened?
- The website’s fine.
- The road works have yet to deny me access to work.
- I found everything in the supermarket without any trouble.
- I bought petrol at the garage around the corner.
- My hairdresser is moving 5 doors down and has given me her card so I can book my next appointment.
So, no need to panic, then. I knew there never really was, but my stupid brain keeps going off on one. It’s not under my control in these situations. It won’t listen to reason.
Does anyone have the number of a really good psychiatrist?
Too much time
I’ve been shamed. I’ve been guiltified. One of my fellow bloggers has asked why there are so few posts waiting in her reader. Where has everyone gone?
I’m one of the non-posting culprits. Okay, I’m notorious for having a post-spurt and then going ominously quiet, which is what has just happened. So this is basically a post to tell you all where I’ve been the last couple of weeks.
Nowhere! That’s where I’ve been. In fact I’ve haven’t even been at work since Tuesday, and therein lies the problem (well, part of it anyway). Too much time on my hands.
Strangely, the more time I have, the less I seem to do. I decide not to do anything “right now” because I’ve got so much time, I can easily do it later. And then I don’t.
I’m great if I’ve hardly got any time at all. I can bang stuff out just like that. It’s not just writing posts either. If, say, the bathroom floor needs a clean and I have twenty minutes free, I’ll rush right in there and do it. If, however, I have a couple of hours free I’ll do it “later”.
Of course, when it comes to posting, there’s the whole “inspiration” thing as well. Sometimes I’ll get all inspired by the Daily Prompt, sometimes I just think that I have nothing to say on the subject. I probably could if I tried but I don’t take the time to think. I’m either working, or watching TV or reading. I rarely sit down and just think. I’ve found a couple of old photos and I’m hoping to get some poetry inspiration from them, though poetry’s not really my thing. Let’s see how that goes.
How about you? Do you see loads of free time and get loads done, or are you better when time is short?
Letting it Happen
Today I shall attempt the impossible! Two prompts, one post! To quote BBC’s Red Dwarf (from the episode “Holoship”):
RIMMER: I shall undertake both tasks simultaneously if it’s all the same to you.
PLATINI: Mr. Rimmer, that is impossible.
RIMMER: Nevertheless, I shall attempt it.
Prompts for the Promptless by Rarasaur: “Wu wei, or non-doing, is a Taoist practice involving letting one’s action follow the simple and spontaneous course of nature rather than interfering with the harmonious working of universal law by imposing arbitrary and artificial forms. In other words, it is the action of non-action.”
Daily Prompt: Comfort Zone – “What are you more comfortable with — routine and planning, or laissez-faire spontaneity?”
A panda, whose name may or may not be Wu Wei. We’ll probably never know. (Picture JP Fischer, Wiki Creative Commons.)
So let’s just forget for a moment that “Wu Wei” is an excellent name for a panda. Let’s look at “spontaneity” first.
I’m about as spontaneous as a brick. Not one of those bricks which suddenly and without warning spontaneously decides to become part of a house. No, this brick just sits there letting life happen around it. It’s a Wu Wei brick, you might say.
Most of the time I’m a bit like the Wu Wei brick. I let things happen around me and just go with the flow. The world revolves around me and I sit happily in my little bubble.
Of course, I live in the real world. I work, I go shopping and so on. That part of my life is ruled by routine. Everything happens on a certain day at a certain time, even, to a certain extent, what I eat and when. That sounds really boring but it works for me. It keeps my anxiety level down. If I have to do something which breaks my routine, I try to forget about it until it’s time to actually do it. That way I don’t obsess about it.
“Safe in my Bubble”, part of the DraliDoodles(TM) collection
This sounds like I always have everything planned out. As far as my routine goes, that’s true. However, I never plan every detail of everything, because then it’s too easy for something to go wrong, and that would be “bad”. I’ve booked three days in North Wales in June, my first holiday for five years. I have a room booked and I have a route planned to get there, but once I’m there I’ll just let the mood take me. If I planned everything, I’d panic if something happened to change my plans.
So, to summarise I’m a semi-Wu Wei routine-driven partial-planner.
Wu Wei-hey!
For all you art fans out there, I’ve talked to the DraliDoodles team and they’ve given me some details! They tell me that “Safe in my Bubble” was rendered using a black ball-point ink-distribution unit on a canvas of dried compressed pulped wood. It was digitised using “a cheapo Canon scanner what we got off Amazon”.
Magical Mystery Tour
I’m well known around these parts for my ability to get lost at the drop of a hat. So when I decided that it was high time I took my Dad’s old CRT computer monitor to the local waste recycling centre (a ten minute drive), things didn’t go exactly as planned.
If you’ll indulge me, I’ve decided to explain my journey(s) in the style of “Woodland Walks in a National Park”.
Cornwall’s “Happy Trails” Wilderness Adventures
Welcome to Cornwall’s Happy Trails Wilderness AdventuresTM!
The Red Trail
A short trail for the beginner. Strike out towards your destination, but be sure to ignore all road signs and turn right early, because you know better. You will find yourself on a tiny winding road which leads to a tiny village. As the road gets smaller, realise that you’ve gone the wrong way – find someone’s driveway and use it to hang a cheeky U-turn. There’s no-one else here but village dwellers who all know each other – try to look as if you belong, and keep your windows wound up and your doors locked.
The Green Trail
Not for the faint-hearted, ensure you have plenty of petrol before setting out. Turn right when you see the sign post to your destination. When you reach the next town you need to turn left at the cross-roads, but unbeknownst to you there are two cross-roads. Turn left at the first, because there’s a little red van in front of you which looks like it’s going to the tip. Follow him slavishly down a small winding road, but don’t follow when he unexpectedly turns left – this is his house. Continue on and make some random turns in a futile attempt to circle back round to the tip. Continue on for several miles until you realise you’re almost in Truro. Since you’re here, why not visit our beautiful cathedral, our museum, or enjoy a Cornish Cream Tea in one of our picturesque coffee shops? Make your way back to the main road and continue back to where you started.
The Blue Trail
Continue as you did on the Green Trail, this time make a left at the second cross-roads (it’s clearly signposted) and continue to the tip. It’s not hard. Be sure to stop at the burger van at the industrial estate 50 yards from your destination to ask the way. Try not to show your embarrassment. On your way back, why not completely miss the huge, clearly signposted left turn back home and continue on? This will add a good 2 miles of tiny winding roads to your Cornwall’s Happy Trails Wilderness AdventuresTM experience.
Maybe I should use a sat-nav?
Click for a random post!
Woohoo!
I totally didn't win!
Share Your World
Friday Fictioneers
draliman on life 