The weather finally cleared about a half hour before start time, just the time that Cat went AWOL. She was chased by a small dog and then a massive, beautiful white German shepherd that saw her as a grey running shape, , more or less, home and was gathered up and brought in for affection. Only one puncture wound to my chest to show for the whole dramatic debacle. By Cat, of course.

Somehow, Beloved was persuaded to leave Cat to recover and 2pm saw us off and out.

Village fetes are the same anywhere and everywhere; it’s only the scale and enthusiasm that changes. Well, this one was pretty good! The goal on the green had a “professional” keeper for kids to try their penalties, there were creepy crawlies, (plastic) duck races, hot dogs at a respecatable £2.50 (75p of which was carbon on mine), tea and cake in the village hall, Pimms, plants, cakes (naturally, by Fete Law, all the best had gone just before opening, just as the weather improved; God nodding to the correctness of Little England doing it’s odd things correctly)…and a dog show.

It appears that everyone in the Cotswolds has a dog. And everywhere has a dog show. With the same dogs in each class, pretty much. Confusing to me, but seemed enjoyable to the kids.

There was also a scouse Punch and Judy with all the violence taken out, making the old, corny jokes somehow lifeless and almost reprehensible in their evil disdain for just how much kids would like the violence. I know there are whole treatise on Punch and Judy and I know there are worthwile comments. But the same argument spoiled Tom and Jerry, you fools. Still, at least I wasn’t scared of Mr Punch, which is a nice change. Unlike the tarantula (which may or may not have been scared of Mr Punch, but I meant the other option in the ambiguous phrase).

And finally, as a rarity, the pub was open all day. So a pint of cider for the first time. And a San Miguel for the Beloved. And then a couple more. We may nap. Oh, wait, she is…

 Anyway, Cat seems fine. Which is the important thing. :0)

[Photographs by iPhone; blog done in a hurry; apologies for crapness]

Our gut feeling was to go with Wheatley Estates, as David is good and trustworthy but our hefty research has us disagreeing with him on price; we were right about that, getting a good price for the place. However, this was to do with the happenstance of purchasers, a lovely couple who appeared at the right time and were prepared to wait from 2 weeks after marketing the house until just a couple of weeks ago. I mention this to underline as warning that there was very little help from Chancellors. Chancellors are cack.

Of course, they listed the house on the website but it lacked any “full description” and had various details wrong that took three attempts to correct. Further down the line, we were finding out about all relevant details and hold-ups by calling either solicitor or the estate agent of the house we were buying, as he seemed to know a lot more, even about our  purchasers, bizzarely. When questioned on some of this, the Chancellors bloke got a bit shirty, only for the details he denied to be confirmed in e-mails hours later. We had to check with them that they were aware of completion date and had keys for our purchasers; our purchasers (whom, they had told us, were delaying on ending a rental contract) turned up on the morning we moved, since they had been told we had long-since moved out and were keen to move in, rent having been terminated two months before. Grrr.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

First thing was to find a house. Our initial are for looking was the Peak District. We checked Bradwell, Castleton, Hathersage, Bakewell, Youlgreave and various other places. Unfortunately, not only was it expensive, but everything we found failed a key criterion – especially the must-not-be-near-a-main-road one. Or there would be 6 bedrooms for up-and-coming families but nadgers all garden. Or, at a particular house in Grindleford, my knees were issuing feared warnings at the violent slope of the garden and hills about.

Lovely surroundings but, after some exhaustive searching, both virtual and real, it was time to look elsewhere.

Also, by this time, it looked like I was going to have more chance of getting a job in the Oxfordshire are than Peak District. So we turned to the Cotswolds, as a southern, middle-class, mini version of the Peaks. Stow-on-the-Wold, Moreton-in-Marsh, Long Hanborough, Kingham, Churhcill, Chadlington, Charlbury and more. And after yet more searches, visits, rationalising, compromising, cursing and hoping, we found the place. Maybe not the perfect place, but all the efforts to then, and any amount of Kirstie and Phil, had taught us that “perfect” is ephemera: grasping at mirages.

And so we made an offer and, long story short, it was finally accepted and the solicitor travails began.

Now I’m not a solicitor, and I’m happy for them that they all take two weeks off over the Christmas period, but I remain astonished how long it can take to do expensive searches. Especially when some of the detail was taking me 5 or 6 minutes to Google on local government websites. Still, where the LAW is involved, I guess they have to use special phrases for searches that inhibit clarity – “can the search engine, herafter known as ‘Google’, indicate the legal instance when the land effected change from agricultural to residential with regard to its status ” instead of “when was it built?”.

Meanwhile, I’d found a job actually in the Cotswolds, as a Supply Systems Analyst for Daylesford Organic (don’t ask; I’m not sure what it means, and I’m doing it – but it’s hard, fun, educational and a big change from butterflies!). And this meant I was living away from the Beloved for most of the week. Sloth of movement on house was starting to hurt and fatigue.

But other than time taken, which I assume is normal, Withy King were fine;  there were some complicated details about covenants that slowed things up. And the vendors, initially suggesting they were happy to move out and rent, were actually part of a small chain that was the main factor holding things up. And time passed and Easter approached  and I was tired of living in Chipping Norton and cycling 12 miles a day and the proposed exchange date looked unlikely.

Until it wasn’t.

Sudddenly, it was all hands to the pumps and engines on full. Exchange happened against all odds on the Monday. Finances were juggled, went missing for a few hours, then turned up with the solicitor. The Beloved was a rock, sorting all the details out whilst I was miles away at work – potential house movers got tested and chosen;  BT was forewarned; Sky were booked in; banks were told.

One week later, the good folk at House 2 Home Removals were battling through the bitter cold to box up our lives and transfer us to Cotswoldia. Beloved and I, slowly, having back-spasmed, followed them around rooms doing the cleaning as our purchasers waited to get inside, checking on Cat, as she was locked away to ease her nerves. And at 2pm, we were off.  Completion on purchase still hadn’t happened (sale had) but I had been assured it should in the next hour so, and that was an hour ago, so we handed over keys and said goodbye to Wheatley: you’ve been splendid and good to us, and I shall miss you! [I almost got a bit teary when saying goodbye to the butcher on the Saturday before, never mind the Railway]

Then stress. No completion. We are getting closer to Moreton-in-the-Marsh but no keys would be available without completion. On the upside, Cat was being very calm in the car with our last few, key belongings (laptop, PC and, most importantly, kettle, mugs, milk, teabags and biscuits). Two phones on my lap, ringing estate agents (Harrison and Hardie; the good one) and solicitor.

No go. Question: if the estate agent makes a payment at noon and it takes three hours to be received, what exactly is the value of the CHAPS payment charge? Especially when purchase and sale were meant to be simultaneous.

And then both phones went off about half a mile from the keys. It was done. Hurrah! Now just get unpacked and see if we still like the place we haven’t been to for three months…

By 7pm, we were unloaded. Miraculously, phone worked and router was connecting to broadband without doing anything other than plugging it in. Previous occupants had left us no bloody oil, so that was high on the agenda to get sorted. But, we had food I’d prepared earlier, Cat was acclimatising, TV had a good Freeview signal and there was wine open.

Probably about time, we thought, to tell people we’ve moved…(and sorry for keeping you all ill-informed; there really has been little time to pause and relax)

Settling in begins. Ooo, wood-burning stove! We’re going to need logs. And I’m going to have to remember how to make fire.

Still lots to do, if I turn round, of course…

But Cat is starting to feel more at home!

And finally, because it’s quite nearby:

Adlestrop

-Edward Thomas

The tragedy of the lovely evocation of times past and nostalgic longing is that this happened in June 1914. Thomas was dead 3 years later.

Which was an unnecessarily bleak note to end this on. So I’ll just add: the pub is nice and serves Carlsberg Export on draught!

I should really have been filling out job applications this morning, but got carried away with fixing this issue having acccidentally come across a site that was clearly doing almst exactly what I wanted. A bit of searching after that led me to Oliver Brechét’s page, which contained the CSS, JQuery and brief explanation of how to apply the “widget”.

Although there is a WordPress version, these widget’s tend to knacker any preferred settings that I’ve already written in to the underlying PHP, so I added this by linking in the PHP itself, rather than using the WP widget.

I don’t quite follow 100% of the JQuery script (another item on my to do list!) but could garner enough of what was going on in it to rewrite it to fit my own, rather more sparse, needs. This also meant that a lot of the included CSS was unnecessary so could just be copied in to my main CSS sheet and adjusted for appearance (no header, no separator lines, no borders and no background). I imagine this is against Twitter’s new usage requirements and that I will thus soon be excommunicated…

Main change was to the fetchTweetsData function, edited down as follows, preceding lines to the first, italicised one unchanged:

obj.finalText = $([linkURLs(obj.writeTweet, obj.entities)]).linkUser().linkHash()[0];
obj.header = '';
obj.avatar = '<div class="tweet"><div class="avatar"><a '+rel()+' '+target()+' href="'+obj.userUrl+'"></a></div>';
obj.textTweet = '<div class="mt_text">'+obj.finalText;
obj.footer = '<div class="time">'+obj.tweetTime+'</div></div><div style="clear:both;"></div></div>';
return obj;

Consequently, the only CSS used was:

.tweets {
 max-width:245px;
 max-height:150px;
 font:13px/17px "Tahoma",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;
 color:#CCC;
 background-color:transparent;
 margin:auto;
}

.tweets a {
 color:#d08702;
 text-decoration:none;
}

.tweets a:hover {
 color: #f7d274;
}

.tweets .tweet {
 padding-bottom: 15px;
 text-align: left;
}

.tweets .tweet .time {
 float:right;
 color:#999;
 font-size:11px;
 padding-left: 10px;
}

.tweets .tweet .avatar {
 display:block;
 float:left;
 background-image: url(images/tweet.png);
 height: 15px;
 width: 21px;
 background-repeat: no-repeat;
 background-position: top;
}
.tweets .tweet .avatar a {
 display:block;
 height: 15px;
 width: 21px;
}

.mt_text {
 padding-left:25px;
}

Excellent work, Mr Brechét, and thanks!

[Original code that inspired this and has slightly different, or broader, functionality, is here]

Week of Release: 7/11/12

Dial H #6 (DC COMICS) – 4.0/5

Splendid offbeat tale examining the unPC possibilities of dialled heroes. Doctor Cloaca? Shudder! It’s no surpise by now that Nelson is becoming almost addicted to the heroing and I suspect the lack of smoking may reference that – something for future tales? The downside of the dial is touched on again, at a more personal level, and a new story is set up. It’s a pity that this series will surely be cancelled soon!

Earth 2 #6 (DC COMICS) – 2.5/5

Finally, the rot saga wraps up and Green Lantern shows himself to be more arrogant than I’d expected. There’s not a great deal of value here but the promise remains, now that arc is done. An awful lot depends on the next couple of issues for me…

Manhattan Projects #7 (IMAGE) – 3.5/5

This is a bit of an oddity for this series being more political than outlandish mad science. It seems to have set the Project up against governments which will either play out or might suggest that this has become a limited series. Difficult to tell. Laika’s contribution was no surprise but no less fun for that. Good to hear Hickman’s enthusiasm for this series on the back page and I hope it gets on track soon. There’s nothing quite as nuts out there.

Hypernaturals #5 (DC COMICS) – 3.5/5

Thinkwell gets more definition as Braniac 5, the Clones are fleshed out nicely, the expected villain really isn’t and the Fatal Five arrive. Sort of. Ad for “AI Law” is particularly fun. This is turning in to a very good series and sharper art would kick it up a notch.

Action Comics #14 (DC COMICS) – 3.5/5

Well, that’s gravity and electromagnetism unified, then. It’s odd that the moment focusses on the feat of resisting electricity rather than solving that! It’s quite fun, for all that, with a nice use of a fork for explanation and the (not unexpected) reveal of just who the angelic host really is. Except that it’s an imp – though this one seems rather more like the murderous version from Moore’s “…Man of Tomorrow” tale. Nice backup tale, too, if a bit telegraphed.

Week of Release: 14/11/12

Week of Release: 3/10/12

Boys #71 (D. E./DYNAMITE ENTERTAINMENT) – 4.0/5

As we approach the end, Butcher shows his ability to manipulate has no limits and Jessica Bradley gets royally shafted resulting in a bleakly satisfying hair removal moment. It’s mostly a talky issue with liberal swearing and smatter of violence. All done bar the bolted door, fittingly ending on something of a sad whimper.

Non Humans #1 (IMAGE) – 4.5/5

Image continues to impress! A futuristic police story in a world where toys come to life due to a disease enhanced by imagination. Consequently, kids have imagination damped by drugs and there’s no internet or TV – that’s a neat trick to make something futuristic and yet still a more noir-style thriller. Excellent first issue and Whilce Portacio’s art a perfect fit.

Earth 2 #5 (DC COMICS) – 2.0/5

I still don’t really know why I’m getting this but it is slowly improving. I think I just dislike the rot in this – there is no reason for this to be Solomon Grundy, either, who is a wasted antagonist and lacking any interest. And yet…there is some possibility here, some promise from Flash in particular. The world council, as a direct result of Apokolips invasion, has promise – or may be painting Earth 2 into a bad corner, making it too dissimilar to the world we know. A few more issues, against better judgement!

Dial H #5 (DC COMICS) – 3.5/5

Cock-a-hoop saves the day! The balance between lunacy and bizarre drama is a marvel in this comic. It’s a slight dip after the last issue one-off, I think, but the arc comes to a close in a just-about-understandable way, hinting at more to come and showing just how powerful the dial could be.

Action Comics #13 (DC COMICS) – 4.5/5

A Hallowe’en tale of sorts, with more history of Krypton, the Phantom Zone and Krypto (I’m a sucker for Krypto! Even if he has changed breed). Travel Foreman’s art is a vast improvement for me, though I fear the ongoing 5th dimension stuff as I’ve never like Mr Mxytwat. Heartbreaking backup, for any dog lover or softie, by Sholly Fisch.

Week of Release: 10/10/12

•  Gingerbread
• 1 Punnet raspberries
• Sugar (about 40g plus little extra)
• Good vanilla ice cream (Fedrici panna cotta is very good)
• Double cream (80 ml)
• Willie’s Cacao (60g), grated
• 2 Knobs of butter

Put the raspberries into a small pan and add teaspoon of sugar (more if you have a sweet tooth!). Gently warm the raspberries, shaking the pan every now and then for about 10 minutes until pulped – work through a sieve with the back of a spoon, collecting the juice in a ramekin and remembering to scrape the pulp from the underside of the sieve. Clingfilm the ramekin and fridge.

Next, make a ‘truffle log’ of chocolate ganache: heat cream and sugar in a small pan, removing from the heat when nearly boiling. Add the chocolate and a knob of butter and stir until mixed (note: Willie’s Cacao is very bitter as it’s 100%, so the amount of sugar required is according to personal taste – I prefer it quite bitter against the sharp raspberries). If the mixture is a little too warm, it may split: just add a little more cream (cold) and whisk the mixture hard. It will recover – but your arm will need a rest!

The  ganache needs to set; you can pack it in clingfilm by sitting a layer of clingfilm in a double thickness of tin foil, to support the film, pouring the chocolate sauce in, wrapping over the clingfilm and then the foil. It can get a bit messy – but these are good-to-lick messy fingers. Transfer to fridge – check every 5 or 10 minutes as it will harden quickly. When still a little give, you can roll the whole thing on a hard surface to improve the shape.

This can be done 2-3 days in advance, if wished, keeping the prepared ingredients cold.

When ready to serve, boil a kettle and pour hot water into a mug – keep to one side. Put a knob of butter in a frying pan and sprinkle over a loose handful of sugar. Cut four slices of the gingerbread, not end pieces, and, when the butter mixture is bubbling, place them in the pan, freshly cut side down.

Meanwhile, on a plate, spread out a healthy teaspoon of the raspberry purée; cut three 3mm thick disks per person from the truffle log and place on the raspberry. Turn the gingerbread over to cook the other side (the pieces want about a minute or so per side, just to soak up the butter mixture, warm them through and give a slightly crisped edge). Dip a scoop or spoon in the hot water and dollop out one scoop per person of good vanilla ice-cream onto the plate, rinsing the utensil each time quickly in the hot water to help get the ice cream out – and give a nice sheen!

Place the gingerbread on the plate and serve immediately.

(Apologies for the terrible picture!)

The boy seemed uncomfortable around her, his knotted, unkempt hair bobbing about as he lolled from side to side, shuffling his feet to keep to the shorter girl’s slow, steady pace, eyes to the floor even as hers bore fiercely forwards.

She wore a patterned dress, blue flowers on a cream background, with a sash across her narrow middle; a lilac ribbon tied her straw-coloured hair back, accentuating her gaunt face and sharp nose. The boy reflected less spring, dark blue jeans, a size too large and held up by a thick piece of hawser; the bottom of his t-shirt sat, gathered on the rope and the faded Chewbacca face above snarled through the creases.

The old gentleman sat on the dry stone wall, a sheepdog panting at his feet, a weathered cane in his right hand as the left hand tickled under the happy dog’s ear. He wore pin-striped trousers, a tight crease ironed down the front, a loose-fitting white shirt, it’s casual lack of collar a contrast to the austere trousers, and a heavy woollen coat kept the cool morning air at bay.

“Hello, Daniel, is this Lily?” he asked gently, smiling. His voice was deep and calming but the smile had an edge to it, wrinkling his long, tombstone face, except around the eyes, where no crow’s feet tread.

The boy scuffed his battered walking boots against the floor, not lifting his eyes and jabbing his hands into his pockets. The girl put her hands on her skinny hips and looked at the gentlemen, levelly. “I’m Lily,” she said, “Daniel didn’t want me to come, so he’s in a mood”.

She poked her tongue out at him silently but Daniel didn’t notice, never lifting his face.

The gentleman turned his gaze to Lily, his head moving slowly as if his eyes were fixed in position, his smile unchanged.

“Well,” he said, with an easy tone, tilting his head to one side, his hand leaving the sheepdog to cup his square chin as he leaned slightly forwards. He tapped the cane once on a smooth grey stone, dislodged from the wall.

“And why would that be?”

That’s probably why I enjoyed BBC2’s the Adventure Game – it was quite a fun celebrity puzzle game but, also, the characters, planet and the currency were all anagrams or partial constructs of “dragon”. A good word and the “cleverness” of spotting anagrams – because everybody likes to feel a bit clever, right? I mean, that’s why we like quizzes. Only Connect is far more entertaining than University Challenge precisely because it is more vague, allowing for odd, intelligent and pattern-matching connections in the brain rather than degree level art history (or 12 year old science).

Anyway, dragons. The main problem, if such it is, I have is their representation in fantasy literature: they are almost always the villains or are just dumb monsters guarding treasure (the Hobbit, anyone?). From the first moment I saw a picture of one, and I have no idea when or what that would be, they were smart, wise and ostensibly the good guys. In my mind. They might be mischievous or guileful; tricky and sometimes untrustworthy but never actually villains. That just seemed wrong to me because they were clearly better than humans – humans always make the best villains in anything other than horror (where monsters are a must) because we understand that. People suck.

In the Lord of the Rings, orcs or trolls may be foot soldiers but the villains are really Saruman and Sauron – humans, effectively, if not technically. In Alien, the xenomorph is the monster but the real villain is the corporation – a very human concept. Dragons are just too sexy for that kind of treatment – which is probably why I like “How to Train Your Dragon” so much, even if the hero dragon of the piece looks too fish-faced (and even in this, the most impressively dragon-like dragon is a baddie).

When I was a kid, I read a book called Dragonworld, partially because of the outstanding illustrations. In this, if I remember correctly, whilst the hero was a hobbit, in essence (Amsel?) the trick was to make the “bad” dragons a separate species – firedrakes. Dragons themselves weren’t so bad – though they were fearsome. Again, if memory serves, the main difference with firedrakes and dragons was that firedrakes had two legs and dragons, also larger, had four as well as being smarter and less bellicose. Even so, the firedrakes were drawn so well I had a bit of an issue with them being villainous… Even Harry Potter disappoints – the films beautifully render the dragons, as seems so easy now (e.g. the somewhat unusual use in “Reign of Fire”), but they remain dumb animals on film and in print.

When I started playing Dungeons and Dragons, the same problem persisted: not only were dragons far too powerful for my D&D Basic, 2^nd level character to take on, so I was unlikely to meat one without instant death by one of any number of breath weapons, but they were pretty much always just treasure hoarders and evil, to boot, even if the Monster Manual indicates a full range of alignments.

In the last campaign I ran, I perverted the very idea I loved. It ran something along the lines of there being key, “Prime” versions of various magical creatures and, specifically, three dragons. The players were going to find out a lot more about these, one of them having some blood relation, but whilst the online game lasted a long, long time, it never got to a point where they fully found out about them. The key element, their secret antagonist, was a dragon that had been bitten by the Prime werewolf and had become something altogether evil and transformed (I know, I know – but it’s D&D, OK!). This was The Mogradjinn, a word I liked so much that it became my online ID – primarily because “Andy” is usually taken (“dragon” probably is, too, but I’m not cool enough to try for that one, anyway), so it’s just easier to have something…odd.

Ursula le Guin’s Earthsea dragons are maybe the closest to my mind’s eye version, being smart and powerful, somewhat benevolent, if unconcerned with men. Thought they are still treasure hunters. But for any version like that, there are countless other mindless beasts.

And that, in the end, is the reason why I like dragons: they remain mysterious, like the concept of magic itself, and also just acompelling word; however they are presented by others as dumb or vain or evil – and I don’t pretend to have read everything dragonesque – there’s a version of them that remains mine. Unspoken, ill-defined, like a dream that waits, dragons are childhood, waiting in the wings. With wings.

(Harpy from here ; BG from here)