Listen carefully and follow the instructions....

       
Hello and thank you for calling the State Mental Health Hotline. Please select from the following options menu:

If you are obsessive-compulsive, press 1 repeatedly.

If you are co-dependent, please ask someone to press 2 for you.

If you have multiple personalities, press 3, 4, 5 and 6.

If you are paranoid, we know who you are and what you want, stay on the line so we can trace your call.

If you are delusional, press 7 and your call will be forwarded to the Mother Ship.

If you are schizophrenic, listen carefully and a little voice will tell you which number to press.

If you are manic-depressive, it doesn't matter which number you press, nothing will make you happy anyway.

If you are dyslexic, press 9696969696969696.

If you are bipolar, please leave a message after the beep or before the beep or after the beep . Please wait for the beep.

If you have short-term memory loss, press 9. If you have short-term memory loss, press 9. If you have short-term memory loss, press 9.
If you have low self-esteem, please hang up our operators are too busy to talk with you.

If you are menopausal, put the gun down, hang up, turn on the fan, lie down and cry. You won't be crazy forever .

If you are blonde, don't press any buttons, you'll just mess it up.

Succinctly Yours - A Microfiction Meme #56

Grandma at Grandma's Goulash provides a picture and a word prompt for this Microfiction Meme and the rules are use the photo as inspiration for a story of 140 characters OR 140 words.

Want more challenge? Use the word of the week in your story. This part is optional.

This week's word is INCANDESCENT here's the picture and my offering, using the picture and word of the week  in 140 characters, including spaces and punctuation.

Fred and Kermit Frog had always had a competitive relationship, 

so Freddie put on his best incandescent suit for the latest family reunion.

Finally.....

Our brilliant son has just got his exam results for the MLP. 

Besides his First Class Hons in Law he has now achieved 6 A's and a Distinction in his final exam. 

He is now Daniel Naylor LLB (Hons), Master in Law & Practice (Distinction). 

Come September he will start a two year training contract with a firm of solicitors, after which he will be a fully qualified solicitor himself.

Congratulations Dan you deserve it after four years of hard work. 

He couldn't have done it without his partner, Fiona, who has worked so hard to keep everything together whilst he has been studying, so we give huge thanks to her.

 

Succinctly Yours - A Microfictiin Meme #55

Grandma at Grandma's Goulash provides a picture and a word prompt for this Microfiction Meme and the rules are use the photo as inspiration for a story of 140 characters OR 140 words.

Want more challenge? Use the word of the week in your story. This part is optional.

This week's word is METAMORPHOSIS here's the picture and my offering, using the picture and word of the week  in 140 characters, including spaces and punctuation.

Felix had been looking forward to having another cat to play with.

He just hoped the metamorphosis of the creature wouldn't take too long.

A rather special anniversary....

On 6th June (just gone) it was 40 years since MWM and I met (again).

 I say again because we actually met first in 1963 and were together for about 6 months then drifted apart. 

It was 8 long years before that wonderful night when we met again and we've been together ever since.

December 7th will be our 38th Wedding Anniversary.

Long Live Love!

Succinctly Yours - A Microfiction Meme #54

Grandma at Grandma's Goulash provides a picture and a word prompt for this Microfiction Meme and the rules are use the photo as inspiration for a story of 140 characters OR 140 words.

Want more challenge? Use the word of the week in your story. This part is optional.

This week's word is APPRECIATE here's the picture and my offering, using the picture and word of the week  in 140 characters, including spaces and punctuation.

Beatrice didn't appreciate why it this ride was called Tornado 
until it finished and she got off,

she felt as though she'd just survived one.

Torquay - Part 1...

Our latest trip (a couple of weeks ago) was to Torquay in Devon.   I have never visited Torquay but have been to Newquay in Cornwall when I was a teenager so I thought it was time to visit a place I have often wanted to see.

We travelled by coach and the journey took about seven hours but we had a couple of comfort stops and stopped an hour for lunch at a garden centre in Gloucester.   We arrived at the hotel with enough time to unpack and have a short rest before getting ready for dinner.

Our first full day in Torquay was a busy one as we boarded our coach to take us to Totnes,  Totnes has a long recorded history, dating back to AD 907 when its first castle was built; it was already an important market town by the 12th century. Indications of its former wealth and importance are given by the number of merchants' houses built in the 16th and 17th centuries.  Totnes is a quaint little town, they had an Elizabethan market and we spent about two hours exploring and taking photos, some of which I've shared with you in the slide show below. 

Soon it was time to make our way to the river to board our boat for a 90 minute cruise on the River Dart to Dartmouth.

It was a cool day but it was bright and wasn't raining so views of the riverbanks were good and stunning.

 One of the historical sights we saw on the cruise was Britannia Royal Naval College (BRNC), which is the initial officer training establishment of the Royal Navy, located on a hill overlooking Dartmouth.   While Royal Naval officer training has taken place in the town since 1863, the buildings which are seen today were only finished in 1905, and previous students lived in two wooden hulks moored in the River Dart. Since 1998, BRNC has been the sole centre for Royal Naval officer training.

 We passed the little village of Stoke Gabriel situated on a creek of the River Dart. The village is a popular tourist destination in the South Hams and is famous for its mill pond and crab fishing (known colloquially as crabbing).

 Another place of interest on the River Dart is Greenway, the holiday home of the famous author Agatha Christie and her family.   You can read about it here.

Eventually we docked in Dartmouth, where we had an hour to have a look around and get some lunch.  We chose a lovely little pub called The Crab and Bucket where we had delicious fresh crab sandwiches and a pint of a local ale called Devon Dumpling.

 We then had a walk around the town

 

 before climing aboard the foot ferry for the short journey over the river to Kingswear, where we boarded the steam train for the journey to Paignton, where our coach was waiting to transport us back to Torquay in time for dinner at the hotel.

We had a great day and saw a lot, hope you enjoyed it too.

I hope you'll join me next time for Torquay - Part 2.

Succinctly Yours - A Mictrofiction Meme #53

Grandma at Grandma's Goulash provides a picture and a word prompt for this Microfiction Meme and the rules are use the photo as inspiration for a story of 140 characters OR 140 words.

Want more challenge? Use the word of the week in your story. This part is optional.

This week's word is CONQUER here's the picture and my offering, using the picture and word of the week  in 140 characters, including spaces and punctuation.

Three men in a boat, will they conquer their fear of water and sharks?

"Come in boat number 9, your time is up!" called the boat hire man.

Update.....

I found the perfect frame for my Inchies and MWM mounted them for me. 

They are now residing on my bedroom wall.

A gift......

Morning AJ, a fellow blogger,  takes part in a weekly creativity challenge called Every Inchie Monday,  where she and others create one square inch of art, with anything they have to hand, using the Inchie Word Of The Week.    I do so admire her, creating a piece of art only an inch square is no mean feat, do go over and have a look at her work here it's amazing.

Recently she was having a giveaway and asked what people would like.  I said I would love one of her Inchie pieces and guess what?   She has very kindly made not ONE but THREE pieces especially for me!

Here they are

I

If you click on the picture above it should enlarge it so you can see just how intricate the inchies are.  They're absolutely beautiful and I shall be looking for a suitable small frame to display them.

Thankyou so much AJ I shall treasure them.

Severn Valley Part 3......

Our last day of this trip consisted of a visit to R.A.F. Cosford.  RAF Cosford is home to a variety of units, the principal ones being: the HQ Defence College of Aeronautical Engineering; the No 1 School of Technical Training; the No 1 Radio School; the Defence School of Photography; the RAF School of PT; and the University of Birmingham Air Squadron and they have a superb collection of over 70 aircraft displayed in three wartime hangars around the airfield.

We took lots of photos here which I've put into a slide show.

From Cosford we continued our journey to Ironbridge Gorge. Originally called the Severn Gorge, the gorge now takes its name from its famous Iron Bridge, the first iron bridge of its kind in the world, and a momument to the industry that began there.

The bridge was built in 1779 to link the industrial town of Broseley with the smaller mining town of Madeley and the growing industrial centre of Coalbrookdale.  There are two reasons the site was so useful to the early industrialists.  The raw materials, coal, iron ore, limestone and clay, for the manufacture of iron, tiles and procelain are exposed or easily mined in the gorge and the deep and wide river allowed easy transport of the products to the sea.

Our next stop was Blists Hill.   Blists Hill is an authentic reconstructed Victorian working town, complete with shops, a bank and a public house. Nestling at the bottom of the town, overlooking the Green and its traditional fun fair, the Forest Glen Refreshment Pavilion is an exquisite Victorian Tea Room.  Blists Hill is staffed by knowledgeable demonstrators who are delighted to explain the role their exhibit played in a Victorian community.   One of the first  buildings you come across at Blists Hill is the Bank where you can change your modern money for Victorian token coins to spend in the shops.  As you leave you can exchange any remaining coins at the Bank or keep them as souvenirs. Some aspects of the town are original to the site, such as the Blast Furnaces and the Brick and Tile Works, other buildings have been relocated brick by  brick mainly from the locality or have been newly built using detailed research and carefully sourced materials.  

We had a delicious meal in the licenced tea room before exploring the quaint surroundings.

 

All too soon our visit was over and it was time to make our way back to the car park to join our coach for the journey back to the hotel for dinner.    The following morning we started the journey home after a thoroughly enjoyable trip.

I hope you enjoyed our Severn Valley trip as much as we did.

Succinctly Yours - A Microfiction Meme #52

Grandma at Grandma's Goulash provides a picture and a word prompt for this Microfiction Meme and the rules are use the photo as inspiration for a story of 140 characters OR 140 words.

Want more challenge? Use the word of the week in your story. This part is optional.

This week's word is PRIVILEGE here's the picture and my offering, using the picture and word of the week  in 140 characters, including spaces and punctuation.

The residents of the nursing home were privileged, so visitors were led to believe, but then no-one knows what goes on behind closed doors.