duck in a dress: April 2014

Wednesday, 30 April 2014

April Happiness

Five things which have made me smile this month...

1. This sign. Found in the Students Union at Bath Uni.

Silly sign in the Students Union at Bath Uni

2. A fab perk of the job - a drinks reception here!

3. Seeing lots of these guys all around campus.

4. An lovely anniversary meal at a little cafe called Tiffanys in Llandudno.

5. This picture. I wanted a photo of the flowers we had in our holiday cottage and Andrew decided to snap me instead. It's a bit of a silly picture but I really quite like it!

What little things have made you happy this month?

The Midweek Hop - Bird is the Word

Three music videos on a theme...

(inspired by Desmond Carrington's 'The Music Goes Round')

This weeks theme is...Bird is the Word

Inspired by well, birds!
Chris Evans played track number 3 yesterday morning on Radio 2 and we thought nope, we haven't had bird-themed songs yet :-)

1. Bird Dog by The Everly Brothers

'Bird Dog' entered the chart on 12th September 1958 reaching Number 2.

2. Birdie Songs by The Tweets

'Birdie Song' entered the chart on 12th September 1981 reaching Number 2.

3. Surfin' Bird by The Trashmen

'Surfin' Bird' entered the US Billboard Hot 100 chart on 13th November 1963 reaching Number 4.

Happy listening!
(and I challenge you not to have "bird, bird, bird, b-bird's the word" in your head all day...) :-)

Tuesday, 29 April 2014

Blog Every Day in May (aka I must be mad...)

Anyone remember last year I took part in Rosalilium's Blog Every Day in May challenge?

(you know the one which started off with my dad having a stroke on day 1?)

And then again, I forgot what hard work it was and signed up to Blog Every Day in November?

(the one where the first two weeks was Carnival season?)

Well, guess what, Blog Every Day must be a little bit like childbirth because yup, I've signed on the dotted line to do it all over again - and this time, the first day of the challenge kicks off with me being in hospital for my IVF egg collection operation.

So yep, join me for a month of madness, late night blog posts and articles tenously-related to what the actual topic is about.

I know Michelle from Life Outside London and the lovely lady behind Not So Simples (really sorry, I'm not sure what your name is!) have both signed up. And Angela - you know you want to...!

Pop over to Rosalilium's site to sign up - there's a form to fill in and a downloadable Google calendar of suggested topics - see you on May 1st!

Monday, 28 April 2014

This Weekend at the Duckpond

We have mostly been...

Bird-watching - these two lovebirds perched on the garden wall at the back of our house. It was pretty clear what Mr Pigeon was after - Mrs Pigeon didn't seem too impressed though!

Baking - some cheese and onion bread in the breadmaker. We ate it for Sunday brunch, freshly cooked with caramelised onions, tomatoes and sausages.

Home-cooked bread with caramelised onion, tomato and sausages

Bashing - down the wall in the front garden; the widening-the-driveway saga continues each day...

Binning - a large amount of paperwork; several years worth of bank statements and associated financial bumpf went into the shredder and lots of other (non-personal) bits and pieces went into the recycling. It's astounding how much paper you seem to accumulate over the years!

What did you get up to at the weekend?

Thursday, 24 April 2014

52 Lists - Things I'm Grateful For

The week's prompt is all about things you're grateful for. I think there's so many things we should be more appreciative of; things which most of us just assume we have. Far too many things in this life are what's known as an 'unexamined privilege' and we should all be truly grateful for what we've got.

(If you fancy a fairly easy academic-type read, this fabulous article by Scrodinger's Catbox looks at all the privileges we take for granted - it is slightly biased towards the 'fertility privilege' but is still a very funny and accurate read nonetheless.)

Finding Andrew (or rather, finding someone who actually wants to share the madcap adventures I like to attempt - see above)
Living in a time of relative peace (compared to the last two World Wars)
Having all my limbs, mind and mental capacities (although some would say that's questionable...)
The miracles of modern science and medicine
Having a roof over my head and food on my plate
Being able to read and write and having had a free (to the age of 18) education
A wonderful free National Health Service
A society which doesn't thrown people like my brother (or anyone else with a disability) into an asylum

What things are you grateful for?

This post is part of Ema's (Made in Hunters) 52 Lists Project

For a full list of all the other lovely bloggy people taking part, visit Scarlett's site (WorkRestPlayLove) for a nosy!

Wednesday, 23 April 2014

The Midweek Hop - Being English

Three music videos on a theme...

(inspired by Desmond Carrington's 'The Music Goes Round')

This weeks theme is...Being English

Inspired by St George's Day

1. An English Country Garden by The Muppets

'English Country Garden' was popularised by Jimmie Rogers in 1962 reaching Number 5 but this version of the tune by Rowlf and Fozzie from 1977 is much better!

2. Britannia Rag by Winifred Atwell

'Britannia Rag' entered the chart on 9th January 1953 reaching Number 5.

3. The Village Green Preservation Society by The Kinks

'The Village Green Preservation Society' is from the album 'The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society' and was released as a single in America in 1968.

Happy listening!

Tuesday, 22 April 2014

A Photo Every Hour - Saturday 19th April

April's Photo an Hour Challenge was set by Jane (from Is That You Darling) on Saturday 19th - a good day to choose because of the Easter holidays!

My Easter Saturday panned out a bit like this...

8am - as always at the moment, my day starts early with IVF drugs and injections.

9am - Breakfast was on the way, we had Chicken and Cheese Quesadillas!

10am - About to head out for a bit of sightseeing and the view from our cottage window had not a cloud in the sky.

11am - I actually missed the 11am shot and ended up taking this at 11.30ish, mainly because I was too busy trying on and buying dresses from a charity shop for £2.50 each!

12pm - After buying up several things, we walked back to the car through the churchyard of St Cybi's Church in Holyhead.

1pm - Then we stopped off at Asda on the way out of town as I needed to buy a card for our wedding anniversary on the Monday.

2pm - We ended up in Rhosneigr where we stopped for a delicious ice cream which we ate on the beach.

3pm - We headed up towards South Stack in Anglesey but it was absolutely packed with everyone else doing the same thing so instead we thought we'd go back and have some tea and cake in our cottage.

4pm - I unpacked some of the morning's purchases...

5pm - My brother and dad popped round to our cottage to collect us on the way to the holiday park swimming pool.

6pm - We were actually in the pool at 6pm (which I couldn't really photograph) but when we got back at 6.30pm I remembered I hadn't yet unpacked this little tulip basket I picked up earlier that day.

7pm - Dinner tonight was BBC Good Food's Sticky Apple, Sausages and Bacon.

8pm - Dinner is served!

9pm - I know, I'm very sad. I thought the holiday would be a good chance to catch up with some coursework reading for my degree.

10pm - Treated myself to a bedtime snack of Harry Hopalot before listening to my IVF relaxation CD and falling asleep!

Hop on over to Jane's blog to see when May's Photo an Hour challenge will be - it's always great fun!

This (Long) Weekend at the Duckpond

We have mostly been...

Holidaying - with the other half, the parents and brother and one small bear in Angelsey in North Wales.

Wasn't it a lovely sunny bank holiday weekend?

We spent the time mooching round charity shops, beaches, countryside and car boot sales.

Stumbling - upon some Arcopal Scania dishes to add to my collection (£3.99 for a set of 5!)

Eating - lots of food; not Easter eggs but quite a few cakes and ice creams were had.

Visiting - the famous Cob Records store in Porthmadog in celebration of Record Store Day on 19th April. It's a bit of an institution across the world; it first opened in 1967 and my mum and dad used to visit it in the late 60s and 70s. They stock pretty much anything and everything - CDs, vinyl, DVDs and even videos and cassette tapes. We were quite restrained this year and only bought two CDs (Betcha Bottom Doller by The Puppini Sisters and Seasons of my Soul by Rumer) but we have been known to come out with several bags of stuff in the past.

Celebrating - our 7th wedding anniversary on 21st April. The 7th one is copper so we took a walk round Angelsey's Parys Mountain - also know as Copperopolis or Copper Kingdom. It's an impressive site; to begin with it looks just like any other quarry hole in the ground - and then you remember it was all dug by hand back in 18th and 19th centuries!