In Passing By Brian Harris (1967)

To be born in Wales,
Not with a silver spoon in your mouth,
But, with music in your blood
And with poetry in your soul,
Is a privilege indeed. 

Your inheritance is a land of Legend,
Of love and contrast.
A land of beauty so bright it burns the eyes.
Of ugliness that scars the Spirit
As the Earth. 

Wales is an old land with wounds
That weep in hills.
They wept before in the bodies of men
And in the hearts of women
And time will never heal them. 

The stigmata of sorrow, 
Of pain and poverty,
Of lonely crucifixion in the dark,
Remain our lives to feed. 

This Land of our Fathers was built on coal.
Its rivers of mingled blood and sweat
Have forever darkened it,
Relieved only by death. 

We are a sad people.
Our sadness being wrapped in harps and music
And praise to God,
For the lovely, yearning light
That feeds the Spirit as well as the eyes. 

Apogee and Perigee moons

A perigee moon - when it's closer to the earth. Large and round and glowing bright. 

An apogee moon - when it is furthest away from the earth. 

Apogee and perigee 

Close or far away

Bright or dull

Round or crescent

Half or full

High and preposterous and separate—   

Lozenge of love! Medallion of art!

O wolves of memory! Immensements! No,

One shivers slightly, looking up there.

The hardness and the brightness and the plain   

Far-reaching singleness of that wide stare

Is a reminder of the strength and pain   

Of being young; that it can’t come again,   

But is for others undiminished somewhere. (excerpt from Philip Larkin's Sad Steps)

I love the moon.

I love the words Apogee and Perigee in equal measures

A Monday afternoon's musings on non-specific things while eating a chocolate brownie

After feeling particularly cheesed off, I eventually took off for a walk in the hope that some fresh air and different surroundings might help to shake off my low mood.

My brain feels like it's flatlined, I feel strangely irritated and easily roused into a bad temper. I'm tearful, fed up and I don't think I can simply put that down to Friday's general election results. It's just a temporary, passing mood, one that will go as quickly as it came.

I'm now sitting at a table in Blue Skies, waiting for a large coffee and a gluten free chocolate brownie. I have no particular allergy to gluten, but always err on the side of caution seen as my stomach is so sensitive these days. I have a large cookie in a brown paper bag - a purchase to take me over the £5 limit and avoid the 45p surcharge. 

It's bright and airy in here and the sound of voices, mostly children and young women, serve as a calming influence to my agitated state. They're probably students, out on a break from the drudgery of lectures. When I'm like this, it's good to sit on the sidelines, not quite part of anything and yet strangely still part of the milieu. I'm sat smack bang in the middle of the room, on a four seater rustic wooden table. Some children have come in and sat in front of me with, I'm guessing, their grandmother.

The boy is now swinging on his chair. I can remember doing that at school. We were absolutely forbidden from doing it, but I did it anyway. I think someone must have fallen off the back of a chair once and gone flying. The thing to do was to push your chair back while you were sitting on it, and push it back so you were balanced on the 2 back legs. A precarious balancing act that could end in disaster.

Those long, hot summer days when the future was so far away you could only imagine it into something exaggerated and fantastic, and create possible scenarios that you knew could never really happen.

But there we are...fast forward to today and here we are, musing on the past, the present and everything else in between.

Today has been an escape, a short one which I'm hoping will help to give my brain enough time to recuperate from my irritated mood. A trip out which might inspire me to come up with new ideas or refresh already existing ones. 

We can live in hope.

And anyway, it was an excellent excuse to eat a chocolate brownie.......and a moment like that is never wasted.

I think Winnnie the Pooh makes a valid point when he says that sometimes listening, doing nothing and not bothering can have its own value. And I always agree with whatever Pooh says.

Part I: A woman gradually and inexplicably becomes a computer geek.....the beginning

I spent the last hour of my working day messing around with my desktop, a refurbished PC with Windows 7. I already have a laptop with Windows 8.1 and after endless crashes and bug fixes, plus the age of my laptop, I bought a new one. Thing is I really thought that Windows 7 would be the answer to all my prayers, because apparently everyone is sick of Windows 8 and can't wait for Windows 10, me included, that's if they haven't already downgraded to 7.

Roll on Windows 10.

Actually, you can't downgrade to Windows 7, hence the new PC. I bought a refurbished PC because I can't afford a brand spanking new one, and I also really like the idea of buying a basic desktop and customizing it myself. Adding things and taking things away. I must admit I'm really starting to enjoy this.

I had problems with Google Chrome and I couldn't upgrade, I ended up with some mishmash of Bing and internet explorer that basically couldn't even play the odd video without crashing, and for some inexplicable reason wouldn't even let me open up FB. I've now spent the best part of an hour tinkering around with it and I've done the following:-

• Upgraded Google Chrome (thank god, couldn't even open my Google + account)
• Uploaded Windows 8.1 upgrade assistant to see if I can upgrade on here, (having Win 7 not a good idea - you can never go back) 
• I can't upgrade on Windows 8.1 on here unless I pay £99 even though I have it already on my laptop - so poo to that
• I downloaded Microsoft Silverlight (at one point stone age Microsoft Security Essentials wouldn't let me download anything).

I then spent an hour hunched over Netflix watching episode 4 of DareDevil, with no interruptions, no crashes. Bliss 

I'm having a few ups and downs with this pc at the moment, these are the ones I've sorted:-

• Google Chrome wouldn't upgrade and this morning wouldn't even load (sorted)
• System Restore wouldn't' work so I could restore Microsoft Security Essentials back to full working capacity, because it was telling me that the virus software part of it was out of date. 

System Restore wasn't working, then I got it to work, then it wasn't working again this morning. Anyway, I don't need it right now anyway, and if I do, then I'll do whatever it was I did last time to get it to work again (whatever that was). 

Microsoft Security Essentials is as up to date as it'll ever be and most importantly now, it's working.

As we speak I'm working on the latest Google Chrome and that means I can perhaps successfully download stuff I need in the future e.g. I prefer AVG to M.Security Essentials. 

Anyway, I think I deserve a drink and something to eat now. I really feel that I could really get into this.....big time. 

I've already learned how to remove and install a hard drive. I can upgrade stuff, and basically I'm getting hold of the basics I need to progress. 

Gamer Girl by Mashi by SRSobotka ...

My ambition -

To turn my computer into one mother-of all-computers with a massive screen and a powerful hard drive. 

I'd love to learn gaming and start designing, but that is WAY into the future right now.

I have 300GB of space and 4GB of RAM. It's a start. 

A personalised, fully customized PC that's got me stamped all over it, and full of tricks and games (some I even created myself). It's something to aim for and it's an ambition.

Apart from another ambition which is to study art history with the OU, and I've already registered for that, just need to find £850. 

Oh, and go caving or mountain climbing before I'm REALLY old.

Thing is, as sad as it sounds, I could quite happily stay on my computer all day and all night, when it's doing exactly what I want. Sad but true.

When I'm not obsessing about my computer, I work as a freelance copywriter, so do feel free to get in touch if you'd like me to write for you. 

pandora.77@hotmail.co.uk  

www.taith.net 

Rest, relax and breathe

It's that time of year where you go through what you hope will be quiet period, to be shortly followed by another rush. It'll be similar to the rush that's gone before, where you're wishing things would slow down a bit. Then the slow bit arrives and you're suddenly asking yourself when it'll get busy again because you're bored. You know what it's like. You can never really appreciate where you are on the hamster wheel, you have to be constantly thinking where else you should be.

And no matter how much you try and kid yourself with self-employment, everyone's on a hamster wheel - only difference is you get to choose how fast or slow you go round.

But for tomorrow at least, it's going to be different, it's going to be restful, a time to collect my thoughts, a spot of marketing, tidying up and  some appreciation of being in the moment, rather than focussing on what will happen tomorrow.

There'll be a review of the first 4 months of the year and the tidying up of loose ends, invoice checking and counting of figures. An assessment and review of the general picture of things. A setting of scenes, a focus on details.

And after that...

I have promised myself during this quiet period that I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts. I'm not going to be rushing to the next job, I will endeavour to savour the moment, meditate, do some yoga.........

Oh puleeeese...

That really isn't going to happen is it? I'll last until Wednesday and then I'll start pounding the walls screaming, and then as I get stuck in again with another round of work and clients, I'll be complaining about how I never get a holiday. 

I detest yoga and meditation leads to boredom followed by sleep. Give me a set of weights and a pair of running shoes any day. Running is my meditation. 

We can't change what we are...but we can try to work with what we've got.

Far from the madding crowd...

You know that feeling when you're all out of inspiration and energy and all you really want is to disappear for a while, to a place where no one can find you ? You feel the solution is a break, a week away. A place somewhere in the sun where you can recharge your batteries and indulge yourself in some serious relaxation. Admire the view and adjust your mind, your imagination and your eyes, to a different skyline and a more interesting landscape.

Thing is, I already live in a place like that. I have the sea, sun, sand, boats, mountains and lush grassland at my disposal. And when you live somewhere like that – where do you go on holiday? 

A different landscape

I get up from my desk and I go on a “jolly,” there’s always new places to explore, new restaurants to eat, and, a few little shops tucked away that I haven't seen before.

I only have to travel, say 20 miles further  up the coast, and although none of it’s new, I often see it with different eyes. It's like looking at a detailed painting, there's always something I missed the first time round, always something new and different, something worthy of further exploration.

I spend so much time in ‘my office,’ that leaving the house is rare, there's always so much to do. So if I feel it's getting too much, then the sea, mountains, and picture postcard scenery of another town or village a few miles up the road is the answer.

I'm lucky to live where I do, there's always somewhere I can sit undisturbed. Somewhere I can sit and ask myself what the hell am I doing, and allow my question to be answered. 

I was in many forms
before I became free..."

Battle of the Trees.  Taliesin 

Take me somewhere different

My solution this time was to travel a few miles up the coast and stay with friends opposite a public footpath leading to a mountain complete with ruined  castle. Then in the local village, cross the road and sit and enjoy the view of the Conwy Estuary with a liberal selection of boats sitting nicely on mirror clear water. From there I sat and threw a few pebbles and watched them skim the water, then watch the speed boats and small yachts go by.

Opposite there were a few shops and restaurants, some more expensive than others, one offering a select gaming menu, situated in a 3 to 4 story white washed house, then one or two small tea rooms serving cakes and tea in perfectly painted china. That day we settled on a small restaurant “The Olive Grove”  serving simple vegetarian and meat dishes with local and organic produce. They served  tea in perfectly painted china too - sweet little ivy strands winding themselves round the cup and saucer, the gold rim preventing the ivy from escaping on to the rustic  wooden table.

The Vardre

Later in the afternoon a leisurely stroll up Deganwy mountain to the ruins of an old castle with lush green, craggy mountain tops and the sea visible in the distance, a firm grey smoky line, a reminder of my childhood past. The sea was always quietly staring back at me as I tried to fathom it out. I could never work out its secrets.

A different mindset

I am satiated now, and  throw in long leisurely chats, glasses of chilled rosé and a few home cooked meals that I didn't have to make myself and I am refreshed and reborn, recovered enough to face another day.

If you're not local, I highly recommend the area for refreshing your mind and body, there are some beautiful places to see here in North Wales  rugged areas of exploration that, although you know that someone's been there before, always makes you feel like you're visiting it for the first time.

"Conjure up majestic trees
in great numbers
and resist the mob".

Battle of the Trees Taliesin

Never allow yourself to feel we're just too far away, we're just north of your border, close to the sea, craggy mountains waiting to envelope you, and dotted here and there, a few goats, sheep and the odd farmhouse. But you don't have to be alone, there are seaside towns and Victorian boarding houses with the sweetest tea rooms you're likely to come across. 

Plan your escape now.