'THE WHISTLER' by JOHN GRISHAM. Published 2016.

Eeh, she likes a good thriller and always enjoys Grisham's books. They're 'serious' reading, not light-weight trash you rip through in a few hours. With filthy weather and absolutely NO inclination to do any chores today, she and I have lolled about all day long, her reading this book and me playing 'The Fool'.

We have eaten delicious food and snacked on her latest passion.. rice cakes with black sesame seeds! Crisp and crunchy, just up our street. Together with lots of clementines, almonds and walnuts, isn't it wonderful that, apart from being extra tasty, all of them are also good for you!

I have bounced about and eaten absolutely everything that has been offered to me. But it's getting late and I am, perish the thought, ready to go to bed, that shows you how much I have been bouncing about, does it not!

Early start tomorrow, she has to be at Chelsea Manor Street by 11.20 tomorrow morning, in her gym clothes for her induction to the machines and to sign up for classes etc. She'll have to see if she can find a one piece swimsuit, she thinks she must have one somewhere, she knows where her bekinis are and oh boy, is she glad she didn't get rid of them when she was fat!

So.. off you go and find Mr. Grisham's new book. Corrupt judge, Casino owned by a Florida Native America tribe.. murder.. FBI investigation.. all good stuff! Save it for a cold rainy day or a long-haul flight, you won't regret it.. this copy is from the library and it will go back tomorrow so someone else can borrow it.

Ah, the joy of reading a tale well told.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 26th, 2017.

BELINDA BAUER HAS WRITTEN SEVERAL CLEVER CRIMINAL THRILLERS & 'DORIS' HAD AN EVIL BROTHER!

Horrid Doris, otherwise known as our most recent storm, caused a tragic death and mayhem all over the UK this last week. When she blew off to be beastly to Eastern Europe, we had a few hours of bright blue sky, it was chilly-billy but bright as old Mr. Sun turned his torch on for a few hours.

On Friday she had to go and find some things in Hammersmith, so having taken a big pile of books back to the library and chosen two by Belinda Bauer, an author she has never read before, she left the library and walked around the corner into Chelsea Manor Street 'to see a man about a dog'.

Having met the man and seen what he had to offer, she thanked him, they arranged a date and time, she then crossed The King's Road and caught a 211 bus on Sydney Street, opened one of the books called  'The Shut Eye', published in 2015 and the bus trundled off all the way over to Hammersmith.

Leggings, leotard, sweat shirt, t.shirt, socks and shoes.. yes, you've got it.. gym clothes! She has her induction on Monday with Keith, the gym manager whom she went to see on Friday. Talk about a nice space!

Studio 2, where the Pilates and Yoga classes are held and the equipment studio are both huge rooms with a ceiling mostly made out of panels of glass, yes, a glass ceiling! Natural light was flooding into these two areas, much nicer than exercising in an area only lit by artifical light. Keith explained that both rooms had originally, a long time ago, been swimming pools and that the glass ceilings were opened in the summer to allow proper 'fresh' air in.

The huge pool will shortly be closing for a total refurbishment but that's ok, she's not so interested in the swimming pool bit as much as the classes and using the equipment. And so close! Yippee,library and gym in the same building, just different entrances and, as she is ancient, the monthly fee is amazingly good value but still gives her access to all the facilities.

She reckons that by using the gym three days a week, Monday, Wednesday and Friday and going some other days to the allotment that she'll get her strength back up, I, of course, cannot go to the gym but I'll go to the allotments when the weather is better..

After shopping for food yesterday afternoon, she walked the length of the North End Road market hoping to see a friend and eureeka, all of a sudden, there she was!

Our very dearest Karen. The person who recommended her dentist to mum and who, for many years, ran one of the best stalls on the street. She's been away helping her son in Crewkerne, Somerset (where Constance had lived) and only came back on Friday.

Such squeaks of happiness as they saw each other.. "what you doing." they asked each other and it transpired that yesterday was Karen's last day because she's gone back to nursing and is starting at Charing Cross Hospital on Monday.

Telephone numbers were exchanged and then she asked after me.. naturally.. mum told her about my 'mohair vest', that made Karen coke with laughter! "Oh, I must go back and catch up on the blog, it's been at least nine months since we last chatted, Jasmine's baby (Karen's grand-daughter) is now ten months old and they've got a cute flat in Hammersmith." They hugged and gave each other a kiss.

"Grr, I thought Doris had blown off, what's with this evil wind and rain, she must have had a sneaky brother coming along behind her", she thought to herself, for the weather was deteriorating by the minute, with a bitter wind and icy rain falling as she walked up to the Broadway to catch a bus. Grrr.. Chelsea were playing at home! Buses on diversion, she should have caught the 74 on Lillie Road but then she'd have missed seeing Karen.

Thank goodness for the book in her basket and the kilo mesh bag of Shetland Mussels from her fishmonger!

We had them for supper last night when she finally got home. She did them in a very simple way, she took a BIG pan with a close fitting lid, put in about an inch of water and added : lots of fresh black pepper, a bay leaf, a celery stalk, a clove of crushed garlic and some sea salt.

Turned the heat to high, put on the lid and when the water had boiled for about a minute and was beginning to smell delicious, she put the cleaned mussels in, the lid back on, turned down the heat a bit and gave the pan a good shake every few seconds so that all the mussels were hit by the steam. They only took about four minutes, she then turned them into a huge bowl.

I am now crazy-daisy about mussels! Surprised? So was I, she offered me one and as it smelt truly delicious I took a little bite and was instantly hooked! There was only one in the whole kilo bag that was dead. A kilo of Shetland Mussels picked the day before, February 24th, and the cost? £4.00! We have some marinating in a vinagrette sauce which we will have sometime today, what a lovely treat.

Especially as the weather is so grim and the temperature has plummeted again. So much so that she's put the heat pad back into the bed to warm it up. But it's still Winter and we know only too well how bitterly cold and frosty March and April can be. And let's not forget this astonishing fact, that out on the allotments, our last Frost Date is June 9th!

Chirp.. I wonder what's she's got for our lunch? Now that is a happy thought as is the ray of sunlight that I spy with my little eye!


GeeGee Parrot.
February 26th, 2017.

SPINY-APPLES & CLEMENTEENIES..

Are on the barrows in the street markets! Oh, yippee, I do love them. You would know them by their proper names which are Pineapples & Clementines but I think my names are better. For pineapples bear no resemblance to any sort of pine or apple.. do they? But they're very spiny! And those pretty clementines are very teeny, are they not?

Do you know the difference between mardarins and clementines? Mandarines have lots of pips, clementines don't and are sweeter. Don't ever say I don't give you any bits of vital information.

A quids worth of clementeenies came rolling home with her yesterday.. 20 of them! Slurpy things, I eat my segments quite slowly compared to her and we have two of three at night between us, it's Winter, we've got to keep our vitamin c level up!

And two very ripe spiny-apples came trundling home as well as six juicy fat lemons, two kilos of chickpeas and a large pot of tahini. Thank goodness for our wonderful street market.. The North End Road.

And our local library! Do you use yours? If not, why not? Our research library is directly above the lending library and is magnificent! And they have computers and printers and newspapers, they are brilliant place to educate your children and yourself.

She going on a jaunt this afternoon, to Walthamstow Central! I don't know who she is seeing but one of her 'girls' used to live out in that neck of the woods, I wonder if it is her?

Anyway, I have had a snacket of hummus and steamed broccoli stem, so delicious, and I am going to doze whilst she's out, it's a slightly muggy day but the www.. wicked west wind.. is blowing so it's a hat day. She's leaving WW behind, despite the fact that Walthamstow is famous for having the longest street market in England but we need nothing. She's taking some fruit, a bottle of water and a book for the journey.

PipPip folks.. Chirp.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 22nd, 2017.

WHAT DO YOUR FAMILY CALL YOU?

Well, I ain't got a big family, there's her and me and BUB up on the Isle of Man, that's three of us in total. It doesn't mean I lack for attention or love but she does call me the strangest names.

As you all know, my name is GeeGee, the Gee being prounced like in gee whizz, not like Gi as in GiGi the film with Leslie Caron and I am a (Congolese) African Grey Parrot. My body is pale grey, my wings are dark grey, I have a silvery face, a black beak and a scarlet tail.

And you all know that I spend a lot of time perched on top of her head, it keeps her head warm and I don't have to wonder where she is or what she's up to.

In the morning, I have a dish of a boiled egg with steamed carrot and broccoli, that sets me up for the day and gets my blood sugar going, so I start to chat, toot and to imitate other animals, I do a very good duck as in 'quack quack', an amazing kitten in the smallest 'miaow' you've ever heard and a rather manic dachshund and I whistle and make weird noises, so I am called 'The Tooty-Frooter'.

As the day progresses, my intake of food.. aka yumyum.. usually sparks my vocabulary to increase and I dig out my repertoire of songs and tunes, I can't honestly say that I know all the words but I can remember snatches of them and they certainly cause her to smile and to join me in singing the correct lyrics!

One of my passions is hummus, it is one of hers too and we eat home made hummus, NOT the shop bought kind. It is SO easy to make, you soak dried chickpeas over night, boil them gently in water together with a clove of garlic and a bayleaf for about 60 - 75 mins, but you don't want them too soft.

Drain but reserve the cooking water. In a food processor, you whizz some of the cooking water, 2 cloves of taw garlic and black pepper, very well stirred tahini paste, fresh lemon juice. Put this into a bowl, put in your chickpeas with some of the reserved cooking water and make them soft but not TOO soft, then add the tahini liquid and adjust to taste.

We do not add salt to ours, she makes a big pot of this which lives in the coldest part of chilly-white larder. She plops two tablespooonfuls of this into a bowl for me to eat during the day, we then have another bowl which she eats with carrots and celery at night.

I eat fresh vegetables, steamed vegetables and bird seed throughout the day, it is a healthy diet with fresh water that has some avian vitamin drops in it. I take a lot of exercise unless she's gone for the whole day (a rare occurence), in which case, I find a comfy spot usually on a book shelf and snooze facing the SAD lamp that she leaves on for me in the daytime during the winter months.

At the end of the day comes the dreaded sentence "Hey, GeeGee, it's bedtime" and I am off like a rocket, flying to the highest, most inaccessible place in our bedroom and then I climb even higher up onto the pole which is fixed between two piles of old lampshade frames.

I know, of course, that I have to go to bed and once, to her absolute astonishment, I actually put myself to bed! Then there starts the battle of wills but she hasn't reached her great age without learning a trick or two.. and I, stupid bird that I am, fall for it every night!

It ends with me stepping down onto her hand and her covering my head with tiny kisses and saying "You're such a silly Red Bum".. 'Red Bum', I ask you, what type of a name is that for a mother to call her only daughter.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 21st, 2017.

IT'S A MAN THING.

They had lots to talk about these two old dears, well, Debbie isn't as old as mum but everyone's truly ancient compared to me, for as you know, I am not yet even a teenager!

Anyway, having greeted mum with a hug and a kiss, Debbie shot off to the CoffeeShot van and returned with delicious coffees and two very scrummy cherry and dark chocolate, non wheat, vegan brownies. Oh slurp!

Much laughter and talk went on and then, somehow, the subject came up on the difference between men and women. Debbie grinned and said "There's one thing that men do that women don't, do you know what it is?" My mum thought about what it could possibly be and then said "no, tell me".

"They put the hot tea cosy on their heads when they take it off the teapot", well, the squeals could have been heard down on Parson's Green they both laughed so much! "Have you ever put a hot tea cosy on your head" asked Debbie.. "No", said my mum.. to which Debbie replied "you see, it's a man thing".

Mum thought about our tea cosy, it is a huge, life sized grey chicken and realised that it would keep her head warm in winter whilst she was reading in bed but that I would certainly have a great deal to say about such an interloper taking over my favourite perch.

Moving onto today, we were promised a HOT day! Huh, well, it was sunny alright but there were lots of clouds in the sky when she went out at 11.00am, she's back now, the sun has disappeared and it's as dull as ditch water out there. There's a very 'brisk', (read cold) westerly wind blowing and she's glad that she went to the library early and that she has no reason to have to go out again.

Tomorrow she has to take herself off to see the gym manager with reference to starting her exercise, then she'll go, if she can remember where she put the keys to the gate and to Little Shed, to the allotment to start the fruit tree pruning, that is if it ain't blowing a gale or freezing cold. For it isn't much fun travelling for an hour only to be rained upon or to be frozen solid!

But before that, she has two letters to write and to make a new batch of tooth powder. So that's what's a'going on around here, we are gainfully employed, me keeping her head warm and her tapping my blog out on iPad for you.. chirp.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 20th, 2017.

POTATO STARCH & TAPIOCA. OH, SO NO MORE DIM SUM DUMPLINGS FOR HER.

Good evening to you all. I have a very despondent mum under my toes. (I'm standing on her head). The reason being is that a Chinese friend of hers has told her what they use to make the covering of Dim Sum Dumplings out of and the title of the post tells you what those ingredients are.

BooHoo.. potato starch would and does make her hand sore within fifteen minutes.. quelle bummer and other such 'choice' expressions, that's really mean and sneaky, why don't they make them out of Rice Flour? So there will be no more plans to trot off for dim sum on her way to or from the British Library, that's for sure.

It was an exceedingly dull, cloudy and chilly day here in deepest Knightsbridge, so she girded her loins and trotted off to see Debbie Goaty Mum whom she knew would be at Parson's Green Farmer's Market between 9.00am - 2.00pm.

They sat and chatted about the disgusting things that non-organic arable farmers do to their crops, not just here in the UK but around the world, like spraying Glyphosate onto their wheat harvest to kill it before they harvest it, it kills the wheat and dries it out so that it is easier to harvest.. words failed her!

No wonder more and more people are having 'problems' with wheat! Glyphosate is a toxic herbicide used to kill weeds.

It is supposed to be warm and sunny tomorrow, I am not going to the allotments, we have decided because she will be there for some time, there are several apple and pear trees that need to have their hard pruning done and I would just be put into the big cage - which I don't like, I have no idea why I don't like it but I don't, I squeal piteously if she goes out of sight and carry on like a two year old.

So I am better off left at home and she can get on and do the work without having to worry about her delinquent avian daughter!

The world's news is pretty gruesome.. it seems that nothing good or pleasant of any significance has happened anywhere, or if it has, the media reckon that 'bad' news is more important.. ugh.

She's off to make a mug of hot ginger root 'tea' and I'm off to eat copious amounts of that hummus that she made yesterday. We wish you all a happy and healthy week wherever you may be.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 19th, 2017.

READING LETTERS..

She went looking for some paperwork which, sadly, has been disposed of but she did find papers which caused her to sit for a while, they were letters written to and letters received from four dear friends.

How does she have the letters that she wrote to friends? Simples.. these letters are so old that they date to when she and a lot of her friends had fax machines and she wishes people still had them, for it is much quicker to write a letter and fax it than having to wake your computer up, type the email and then send it.

So she sat and read letters from Moley.. dating from November 1994. From Edgar, his are hand written and were sent by mail, the first is dated 1991, faxed letters to and from Carolyn in NYC date from the early 1990's and from George to her also in the early '90s.

These friends wrote long letters.. not just a scribbled note, no, they were friends who communicated in the truest sense of the word and she was suddenly struck by the fact that none of her friends write letters these days. Bill wrote but only on postcards, he was idle and preferred the telephone, so there is nothing of his to read.

They've all gone. Edgar died October 30th, 1997. Bill died October 30th, 2003. George died in 2010 she doesn't know the date and Moley died October 30th, 2012. (I know, very creepy, three beloveds all dying on the same day!)

These four friends were all slightly larger than life, so there letters were FULL of information, news and of what was happening to mutual friends and 'stuff'.. she sat on the bed quietly when she had put the file away in the cupboard and mourned them, she mourned the loss of them in her life and the life that she had those twenty odd years ago. She misses them all greatly.

She knows she is not so gregarious as she used to be but she mourns her health, for even if her Gastro team gave her written clearance and permission to fly any long distance, the thought of what agony her knees would be in if she had to sit in an airline seat, is enough to make her not even think of flying to NYC, let alone a thirteen hour flight to California.

Oi vey..

So she gave herself a little mental shake, ran a deep hot bath with deliciously smelly bath oils and soaked in it for the longest while, then washed her hair, blew it dry, put a load of washing on, made a huge pot of hummus with chickpeas that she had soaked over night and that had simmered gently for an hour and a half, steamed a large pan of beets, carrots, broccoli and kale and we retired to bed to have an early supper.

Slurp.. I have never had warm hummus before! How delicious it was, she told me not to expect it every day.. how sad, I thought to myself, for it was particularly slurpicious.

They, the weather forecasters say we are in for a hot week! Huh! I'll believe when I see or feel it! She has work to do at the allotment, for February and March are the time that you prune apple and pear trees and she needs to do a lot of that out there. So, if it is hot then she'll take me and we will go early in the morning for the whole day, if it is not, I'll be a 'grass daughter' and be home alone whilst she goes for about three or four hours.

We will see what the week brings, tomorrow she is off to a Farmer's Market and to the library to change books.. she read 'The Girl on a Train yesterday' but wasn't overly impressed. Tonight she has a thriller 'No Safe House' by Linwood Barclay to read. He writes well and you don't see the end coming.

But she has to do the washing up and hang the washing up to dry up before we can settle down with this book.. so pip pip. Enjoy your evening.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 18th, 2017.

AN ANGEL & HER VIOLA.

When we read this story, we were struck dumb! Or rather, I was struck dumb for it was me making the racket, I had a tumtum full of yumyum and was tooting and carrying on alarmingly, as is my want when I am happy.

I have no idea where she read about Venai Jelks. She walked into the Fireside Convalescent Home in Santa Monica carrying her viola and asked the manager if she could play for the patients. "She was adorable, she would come in after school and play for us and it was magical" said one if the residents of the home.

For two years this charming person came to lighten and brighten their days.. until one day, she didn't come. She had not been feeling well and she died the next day but during those two years, what a gift she gave to those people.

Venai was thirteen when she walked into Fireside and fifteen when she died.. truly a gift from God.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 15th, 2017.

HER 'DADDY' DIED TODAY..

She called him Daddy or Poppa, she wouldn't have dreamt of calling her father by his christian name even when she was a grown up. So St. Valentine's Day is 'pretty strange' around here. If you think about it, there aren't many dates that are BIG around the world, are there?

Easter falls on a different date each year, so does Thanksgiving, countries Saint's day are always on a certain day, St. Patrick's being on March 17th. St. George is our patron Saint here in England and it is on April 23rd, so too, of course, are Christmas and Valentine's day that are always on the same day.

She is now five years older than he was when he died.. oi vey.

She was up with those mad wild birdies today and left the house to go to see her GP about the x-ray results. "Hmmmm, well both of them have taken a battering poor things, haven't they? I am sending you off for physio and because I don't want you gardening which is how you get your exercise, I am also sending you off to the gym for both yoga and pilates and I want you in the pool as well, how do you feel about that?"

"Dumbstruck" she replied.. "is this to do with the polio" and her lovely GP explained how the polio virus never actually leaves the body, it goes and hides somewhere, usually in the spinal column but it can also hide elsewhere in the body and sometimes in organs as well".

Then she went way back in time and looked at the medical notes of November 1st, 1956 and she said "you were confirmed as having it on November 1st, 1956, do you remember anything about it?"

She sat and went back in time and replied "yes, I do, I woke up early feeling sick and hot with a tingly sensation in one arm, I didn't get dressed and go downstairs for breakfast and that was what alarmed my mother, for I loved school and was always dressed and ready for breakfast, she came up to find me, asked me what was wrong and when I said how I felt, she knew it was for real, she went to telephone our local GP, whose response was "Don't let her get out of bed or move a muscle, we have three confirmed polio victims at her school and I've got four other mothers saying the same as you, I will see you later" so I stayed in bed, not allowed to go to the loo or walk about".

Doctor Lucy shook her head and said "Thank God for a really switched on doctor, do you remember anything else?"

Mum smiled and said " Quite a lot, I got it in the middle of the Hungarian Uprising which started in the latter part of October and which lasted for just over two weeks, mummy used to listen to the world service on the BBC. She was desperately worried about friends of hers in Prague and another thing was food!"

"She made food into funny things for me, she would use small baking trays, the mince was ploughed earth, the hedges were made out of masked up greens and mashed potato was wheat or corn, she'd bake them in the oven and tell me to eat a bit of this or that, as I was tired and didn't want to eat much.. oh, and that's when I became scared of snakes!"

"Smakes! How did you get scared of snakes in bed?" said her GP, "well, a friend of my father's knew that he had been offered a job in South Africa and sent him a bundle of Life magazines from Cape Town, my father tossed two of them onto my bed and one of them fell open at the centre page which showed a terrifying photograph of a full sized Cape Cobra, with his hood up and spitting -  they spit their venom in defence, I screamed, threw the magazine off the bed and have been scared of snakes from that day, despite the fact I saw snakes in Malaya as a little child and they never bothered me."

They smiled at each other., then she waited for this kind woman to print out some papers and was told to email the gym in a few days time to make an appointment to go to see the manager and get slotted in to pilates, yoga classes and pool exercise classes. Then she and WW went off to catch a 14 to go to Fulham in order to plunder the street market for fruit and vegetables.

Yumyum! Eight persimmon for a pound, all the bowls are a pound, so she picked up seven lemons, five avocados, lots of carrots and beetroots, three big heads of broccoli, a huge bunch of dark kale, twelve sweet and juicy clementines and fifteen dark purply-red plums which were also a pound.

A kilo of dried chickpeas, a new tub of tahini paste and two packets of barberries also plopped into WW, together with a new tin opener, she was distinctly offended when hers died last week.. aren't they, like bottle openers, supposed to live forever? Why, it was only 42 years old for goodness sake!

And then she came home again, home again, jiggedy jig! Only, after having given me a mini snacket, for her to disappear again with WW and her library books plus things that she had collected to give to New Horizons, the lovely place on Cadogan Street on the Guiness Trust Estate that is run by a team of volunteers but was set up and is managed by Age UK.

And came home with lots more books.. how she loves the written word, certainly it was something that she reallyreally appreciated all those years ago when she was confined to bed and not allowed to put a toe to the floor.. oh, thank goodness for that clever GP and for her mother not pooh-poohing how she felt.

So she can't tap dance or run down stairs and has no reflexes in either of her knee which are both decidedly dodgy and creak more than a little bit but she reckons that she got away VERY lightly.

It is time to rattle those pots and pans.. we're having steamed kale and carrots with garlic and ginger sauce for supper, slurp, but I do hope she remembers that I'm crazy-daisy about kale stalks and doesn't plan on eating them herself..

GeeGee Parrot.
February 14th, 2017.

"MIAOW.. HISS.. SPIT.." SHE SAID AS SHE OPENED THE DOOR & THE BEAUTIFUL STORE ON VIA CONDOTTI.

She may not be a cat but she certainly does hate driving sleet trying its' hardest to become snow and that was what greeted her as she left the house yesterday at 11.00am to go to Romford for her 1.45pm session with Valerie.

Why was she leaving so early, you may well ask! It was because they're doing track repairs to the East Anglian line at weekends for several months and she had to go to Stratford, change on to the overland system to get the Newbury Park and then bus it on from there into Romford.

She had allowed herself the extra time as the weather forecast was a bit grim, with snow and ice forecasted and it was a good thing she did as she only made to the salon with five minutes to spare.

Oh, what cosy bliss it was to lie on that heated treatment bed! Yubba-Dubba.. to be toasty warm and cosy. For the journey had been 'pretty grim' with a lot of steps which old creaky crunchy knee didn't like climbing very much at all.

A few drops of diluted oil of ginger were sprinkled on the offending naughty knee, then Valerie set to doing her uncrunching bit on her feet.. "hmmm, your adrenals are down and I'm picking up a lot of stress, what's going on here?"

Then up she came to naughty left knee.. "it's two ligaments that are causing all the trouble, they've tightened and shortened and are pulling the knee cap out of place which is why you have the two bursa and the cyst at the back". And she proceeded to set to and work on them.

"Turn over please, I've got to get at the back of your knee". Dear Readers, my mum is brave but even she uttered a sound and squeaked when the knee cap tweaked back into place by the ligament being released. But the worst was when she had the support moved away and her knee was straightened.. "miaow hiss spit", wasn't in it!

But it was all worth it, for on the repeat of the journey but backwards.. stay awake at the back there.. not once did her knee say anything, it was a bit stiff sitting on the bus as there wasn't any leg room but no pain, however she had been told by Valerie to take the left-over oils that she had used and to use them every morning and night until they were finished and to continue drinking ginger tea, both powdered ginger and grated fresh ginger root.

The weather was even worse coming home, by this time it really was snowing and bitterly cold. She was SO glad she had worn her much longer jacket, 'Old Rabbit' is warm as toast but he isn't as long as her beautiful parka that she bought from the very fancy store on Via Condotti, Rome in December 2005.

How can she actually remember when and where she buys things? I hear you asking yourself. Well, that's simple, she hasn't actually bought herself a huge amount of beautiful clothes that she still has, she had a lot of glorious clothes made for her by her fabulous dress maker Ros sobsob.. but bought, not many.

It was December, she was staying with Zaira, who is my greatest fan, in Rome and her old Max Mara coat had died, it was a beautiful mock leather raincoat with a puffa lining that she had bought second hand from Gracie's (most amazing resale shop in the whole wide world, we kid you not) in Aspen, Colorado when she had stayed with Hanne at Glenwood Springs. It had a hood and was just the best coat ever but having used shoulder bags, she had worn away the mock leather and it had started to shed.. boohoo.

So Zaira said " Well, the best parkas come from Max Mara, let's start there", so off they walked to the Via Condotti. And sure enough, there was a wonderful brown gabardine parka, just the right length, with a hood, both the hood and the body were lined in Loro Piano tweed and there was a rim of brown fox around the hood, and it had a double zip (so clever) and a belt. What was there not to like? The price! GULP.

She was served by a charming bi-lingual assistant and she said to her "I adore it but I wasn't figuring on spending as much as this", the woman smiled and said "Yes, it's true, our things are expensive, however, this parka will never go out of style, the fabrics are superb and you can wear it in rain or snow and you will never get wet or feel the cold, have a think about it, it's new stock and you won't forget my name, what month are we in, December, what happens in December? Christmas.. and my name is Noelle".".

Zaira and she walked out of the shop, for the next couple of days she looked at other jackets, none of which were a patch on the lovely Max Mara one and so two days before she was due to leave, she said to Zaira, "That's the one, Noelle was right, it fits me well, it's perfect in every way and I'll have it for years, if not forever", Zaira laughed and said " let's go".

She walked into the store and whom should she see facing her! No Reddies for guessing. Noelle, whose face broke into a big grin and she said "Brava.. you're taking it, I am glad".. and eleven years and a few months later.. so is she. For this beautifully made coat is still immaculate, it has stood up to all manner of filthy weather and never let her down, it keeps her dry and warm without being heavy.

Yes, indeed Noelle. It's worth every euro she paid for it all those years ago and it certainly kept her warm yesterday, even though it was cold enough to make a cat cuss.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 12th, 2017.

FIVE FLAKES OF SNOW..

Not enough to call a flurry, drifted into her face as she left the library, icy cold little flakes.. brr.. it has been chilly-billy here today. I was busy keeping warm as witch.. aka mama.. hasn't turned the boiler up and the meagre feathers I've got on my chest look like a peculiar mohair vest.

Silly me, I really shouldn't have taken out those lovely new feathers, should I? But it stressed me out greatly having her in bed with that virus and Beaky plucked them out. Stupid Beaky, no wonder she's so rude about him sometimes!

She pulled the door curtain across the front door and both the blind and the curtains are drawn in our bedroom to keep Mister Icy Cold away.

But we keep warm.. Ginger is her warming drink of choice, into a thick mug go half a teaspoonful of powdered ginger and a chunk of the fresh root grated very finely, then boiling hot water is poured in and a saucer put onto the top to allow the mix to brew. For one, it is a marvellous anti-inflammatory for her knees and secondly, it is mighty warming!

Then I sit on her head, it keeps my toetoes warm and her head hot.. it's a great deal!

She's off to Romford tomorrow for a session with Valerie, it was Emma's fortieth birthday last Friday and there is a prettily wrapped present is sitting just infront of the door, so it cannot be left behind by mistake.

She was given a beautiful gift yesterday, a glorious orange cashmere shawl.. ohhh. the colour is truly breathtaking! And a tub of crisp banana slices and something she's never seen before.. dried bananas! They're individually wrapped in a big box and are veryvery scrummydumptious. So a big "thank you" goes to Tereza for these lovely gifts.

Something strange happened today, she took a book back to the library because she simply couldn't read it! This has only happened to her about five times ever in total and as she's the person who'll read the back of a Cornflakes packet, you have to know that this means the book was, well, it was dire!

First up, the type set was wrong, it was badly printed and in a most peculiarly weird page size, it reminded her of an old fashioned, cheaply produced history text book. The writing was as dry as an old bone.. which was a pity as the subject, Romania in the last years of the 1990's - 1998 to be precise - was a fascinating time, that dreadful man, Nicolae Ceausescu and his equally evil wife Elena, had been dead for ten years and the country was taking its' first steps towards freedom from communism.

Worst still is the fact that she knows the author, ah well, her borrowing the book has earned him 7p! But she won't be dropping him a note about how much she enjoyed it, for it was dreary beyond belief.

Unlike the short story by Joanne Harris.. 'Faith and Hope Fly South'. It is a charming tale, short but extraordinarily powerful, at the end, you 'see' the room.. I urge you to get it and read it and I defy you not to touched by it.

Bed time for us dollies.. she's going to use the heat pad tonight for a bit, it's getting colder and we are envious of Karen being in the warm sunshine on the Mexican seaside, she's having a break from the wicked cold in Minnesota, how wise! Have a happy time Karen.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 10th, 2017.

HER BEAUTIFUL BROGUES, THEY'RE 50 YEARS OLD!

What is the oldest piece of clothing you possess that you still wear?

She's got lots of clothes that are over twenty years old, still fashionable and in great condition, her Donnybrook Duffle coat being one of them. She took it with her on the mammoth trip that Edgar and she went on in 1994 and she'd already had it for a couple of years by then.

A Yves Saint Laurent jacket dates to 1972, she remembers this as it was given to her by a dear friend who died later that year. A glorious Loewe black antelope skin dinner suit also dates to that year, it was the first thing that Bill ever gave her, they were in Seville. It's a bit battered and bruised but now she's much slimmer, she has worn the jacket a couple of times.

And being slimmer has meant that one of her most favourite gifts from Bill can be worn again.

In February 1973, forty four years ago this very month, she was visiting him in Washington DC for the weekend of President Richard Nixon's re-election. Bill, being Bill, had been invited to every 'gig' in town and had her put her name down to be included on his invitation or ticket . But alas and alack, had not told her exactly how very 'fancy' this weekend was going to be!

But armed with Bill's American Express card and two of his store cards clutched rather nervously in her paw, she was whisked off by his charming secretary to get 'kitted' out for the festivities and.. the cold! The dresses have long gone but the warm jacket survives, it was bought at a 'Young Gentleman's Outfitters' the name of which she cannot remember, it is a khaki parka with a hood and it's lined in Rabbit.

For years she hasn't been able to wear this cosy thing but out of sentimentality there was 'no way' that it was going anywhere! So it remained in a trunk in a cotton cloth bag with cedar wood chips and lavender that she replaced every year. The trunks, I regret to tell you, are still causing chaos in the sitting room but she had a thought or two about her weight loss and 'Old Rabbit', as she calls this parka and pulled the bag out last week.

She gave the jacket a good shake and tried it on.. EUREEKA! It fitted! And over a sweater too, not a very thick sweater but with its' furry lining you don't need to be wearing one. 'Old Rabbit' is such a cosy thing, she'd forgotten how snug a fur-lined hood is, her ears are warm with the hood which doesn't squash her hair like a hat, although there have been a day or two when she's worn one of Pat's hats underneath the fur lined hood and she'll be doing that today. For it is mighty chilly-billy here this morning!

But it is a pair of shoes that she bought fifty years ago this month that are her oldest item of clothing. They're a pair of 'Swan' brogues by Crockett and Jones, made in Northampton, England. They have metal studs in their leather soles and in them, are a pair of wooden shoe trees.

She remembers exactly where she bought them - 'Riceman's of Canterbury' where she worked on Saturdays and in the holiday. The store was taken over by Fenwicks and demolished in the 80's.

And, what she paid for them as she had saved and saved up for them, it was the huge sum of £7.10 shillings.. there used to be twenty shillings to a pound £, so ten shillings in old money was 1/2 a £.. the only reason her parents agreed to her spending this huge sum of money was A. her feet had stopped growing and B. they knew she'd take care of them and that she'd have them forever! The style is still made.. but they now cost over £400.00!

What a good thing she IS her father's daughter and always polished her shoes!

Oh, lookielookie.. it's time for YumYum.. off we go.. but I'll be back to tell you all about the short story by Joanne Harris which touched her so deeply! PipPip.. "come here little eggy-peggy, Beaky wants to gobble you all'up".

GeeGee Parrot.
February 8th, 2017.
PostScript: Known in our household as : Peter Jenner's, David Mac's & her niece Zoe's birthday.

"Go to x-ray immediately" said her GP.

So off she went.. the thing at the back of her knee, which she now knows to be a Baker's Cyst has grown and is inflamed, so too are her bursitis.. her Supra patellar bursa and Infra patellar bursa. Two bursa equals bursitis. How veryvery boring, but, at least now she is able to sleep with her newly found knowledge of pain management!

Ginger powder, who knew, did you? She doesn't like taking pain killers and will only take them if absolutely necessary and then, only the weakest dosage possible. So when she read that powdered ginger* will cope with pain as well as a 400mg pill of Ibuprofen without any of the side effects (and you cannot overdose on it).. well, she was a very happy camper!

Turning over in bed, when your kneecap is behaving badly, is an extraordinarily complicated and painful manoeuvre but having found that powdered ginger does the trick, she has slept the sleep of angels for the past couple of nights by drinking a large teaspoonful of powdered ginger stirred into warm water just before she goes to sleep.

However, she was in pain when she woke this morning and looked at her knee, even from above it looked decidely dodgy, luckily she had an appointment booked with her GP about something completely different and told her doctor this when she went in.

"Ok, well let's look at these naughty knees, goodness me, I see what you mean, the left one is looking very swollen and I am not surprised you find it painful and.. you have a Baker's Cyst at the back as well.. ok, off you go, let's have them both xray'ed and see what they are up to, I also want you to have an ultrasound on that left knee but that won't be through for a couple of weeks at least".

"I know about the Polio when you were young, has anyone done x-rays of them before, because you are now of an age when things might start to happen, so this is another reason why we should have a look and see what is going on in there".

"No gardening.. I don't want you traipsing about on uneven ground and wrenching that knee and use escalators whenever possible.. use this anti-flamatory gel three times a day that I am giving you a prescription for but don't take Ibuprofen, yes, absolutely you can use ginger as pain relief, it will get you through the night and is much kinder on the body".

With that, she thanked her doctor, made a follow-up appointment for next week to review the xrays, left the surgery and caught a bus to Chelsea and Westminster hospital to have them x-rayed.

She had a book with her but didn't have to wait for very long before they called her in but she had enough time to read two short stories out of Joanne Harris's collection of short stories called 'A Cat, a Hat and a Piece of String. One of which is what the next post will be about.

She came home in time for lunch, that was a nice surprise, raw vegetables with some wonderfully ripe fruit.. slurp.. who doesn't like a fat and juicy mango?

GeeGee Parrot.
February 7th, 2017.
PostScript: *Dr. Michael Greger's book called 'How Not to Die'.

LAST BUS TO COFFEEVILLE. Author J. PAUL HENDERSON. Published 2014.

'Che was captured by Special Forces in South-Eastern Bolivia and executed the next day, shot nine times by a single soldier, his handless body flown to Vallegrande for display purposes and his amputated hands hands sent to Buenos Aires for identification purposes'. Ugh.. grim.

And what do you know about the story of 'The Blue Eyed Six' from Lebanon County, Pennsylvania in 1879? It's one hell of a tale, that's for sure.

Or do you know anything about the Battle of Blair Mountain, of 1921 and the march in August of that year by 13,000 miners on Logan County in West Virginia, which was about the right to unionise. Federal troops were called in to disperse the miners.

This last of the stories is not happy probably not taught to a lot of American school children as 'being of little importance' but it IS of great importance and if you're American and don't know of what I write, I suggest you read up on this subject, which is your country's history of less than 100 years ago.

The author, J. Paul Henderson, has taken History with a Capital H and cleverly woven it throughout this book, one of her librarian friends recommended to her yesterday as a 'good read' and she is not disappointed. It is a story, told over a lifetime, of life that has humour and sadness mixed together in equal quantities, buy or borrow this book from your local library

It is dreary in deepest Knightsbridge, cold and wet underfoot. What better place is there to be than snug at home with a good book? There's a pot on the stove of poultry bones making bone broth and brightly and deeply coloured fruit and vegetables, the results of her raid upon the market, are on the work surface in YumYum HQ.

On top of the bookshelf there's a stash of delicious nuts which we will have at 'tea time' and walk-in store cupboard has given up a monumental treat, a tin of vacuum packed chestnuts! Oh, they're so veryvery scrummydumptious, which is why they are now in a pot in chilly white larder and not sitting here with us, for Beaky and Mouth would gobble them up in a few munches and then, boohoo, there would be none for after supper!

Lunch, for her, was a huge bowl of bone broth together with some poultry meat (chicken & turkey), carrots, onions and parsnips. I had steamed broccoli stalks and hummus, we had one chestnut each and there is a bag of tootie-frootie easy-peel mandarins lying (unprotected) beside her. Don't worry folks, they're safe, they maybe easy for her to peel but I haven't figured out how to do that yet.

And.. oh boy, lookielookie.. a really ripe persimmon has just rolled out from underneath a book! The variety in the market at the moment are sublime. They're.. Big.. Fat.. Orange and extra Sweet.. with a thin skin and are selling for six or seven to the £1.00! Slurpy. Very slurpicious indeed but the one we had last night was most extraordinary.

Read on and be amazed as we were..

It is upon the fingers of one hand that she can count how many seeds she has found in these fruits and she has been eating them ever since the early '70s when she came across them in the market in Malaga. They go by multiple names, you may know them as Sharon Fruit, Kakis or Persimmons. There are several very different varieties but a ripe one, of any variety, is truly delicious.

Anyway, last night's treat was wonderful.. but what was this? She had cut the top off to give to me and there, nestling in the fruit were five seeds, each the size of a small and flat almond, we were mightily astonished, to say the least!

She is now off to make us a mug of LapySang, this tea goes remarkably well with a slice or two of tasty persimmon. Then she'll settle down to continue reading this most excellent of novels but before she can pick up the book, she must pick up the telephone and call our dearest friend Mister Tom in NYC.. but we do send chirps to you all.

GeeGee Parrot.
February 5th, 2017.

BREAKING NEWS IN PARIS & WHAT'S OUT OF FAVOUR. BECAUSE THEY HAVE NO FLAVOUR!

It is bright and sunny! What more could a bird ask for? Apart from what I have, which is a bellyfull of egg, turmeric and ginger root and broccoli stalk plus multiple slurps of hot LapySang.. ahhh.

Now, down to serious business.. the second part of today's post refers to what fruit or vegetable, come on you lot, no slacking.. guess? You can't? Well, it's those pesky tomatoes that she loves but cannot eat.

Grown in giant poly-tunnels with hydroponic systems and never allowed to see the light of day, why, they're exactly like battery hens as far as we are concerned. Perfectly formed but with no smell or taste. Why anyone would want to buy them, even ones that are sold at Farmer's Markets here in London at this time of year, is beyond her, I don't go to Farmer's Markets so it is certainly beyond me!

But, this year, she's is going to grow them again. Not, I might add for home consumption but as gifts to give to friends. Who doesn't like those big solid beef steak tomatoes called Zebra or the heritage ones which are almost black, or, perhaps what used to be her favourite, the yellow cherry tomatoes.

OR.. Plum tomatoes with which to make a proper sauce with garlic and oregano or basil? SLURP.

Storm 'Doris' has landed and is busy causing chaos in the West Country. She is the 'bit' of weather that is affecting Spain and France with snow and heavy rains, help help.. you're only allowed to buy three iceberg lettuce at some supermarkets! Hate Icebergs.. they have to be the most tasteless lettuces ever grown.

What is also causing chaos but not here but in Paris is the 'incident' which started at the Carousel shopping centre at the Louvre Museum in Paris earlier this morning, a man with a knife and carrying two backpacks tried to attack a soldier with a knife and got shot in his leg for his attempt.

Who knows what the backpacks contained but I doubt that it was his pyjamas and wash kit, that's for sure. The city of Paris is having a grim morning, there has been a severe gas explosion which ripped apart an apartment building in the Noisy-Le Grande area and a man was seriously injured after a gas canister exploded in his home in the Seine-Seine-Denis area causing terrible damage.

But we have things to do, like shake a leg and get dressed, her, not me. I am already dressed but not in my usual silky suit. No, because of my revolting habit of nibbling, my silky suit now looks more like a mohair one.

Yes, folks, I am in disgrace but that does not stop her thinking that I am the veryvery best parrot in the world and loving me as only a mum can love her child.. I say child as there's only one of me. Thank goodness, she is quite dotty enough, can you imagine what she'd be like if she had TWO of us!

And on that staggering thought.. I say "Adieu.." come along and sing with me for you certainly must know the words by now.. "farewell, auf wiedersein, goodbye".

GeeGee Parrot.
February 3rd, 2017.

A TURMERIC ROOT LOOKS LIKE A CROSS BETWEEN GINGER ROOT & A JERUSALEM ARTICHOKE

Their flesh is orange like a Sweet Potato and is good for you. She has for several months sprinkled a very small amount, like less than half a teaspoonful of this spice, on to rice and sweet potatoes, not knowing that the strange roots she has seen for many years in her favourite Asian supermarket are the fresh turmeric root.

But now she knows what they are, they will always be in YumYum HQ, she slices it very finely with that wickedly sharp mandolin into her lunch time bowl of raw vegetable. All things red.. beetroots, red onions, red cabbage are mixed with raw ginger, garlic, celery, carrots, pumpkin seeds, dressed with black pepper, some grey sea salt and the juice of half a lemon and a dollop of linseed oil.

When using the powder or the raw root of turmeric, always add fresh black pepper, it boosts the level of curcumin in your blood stream! This also applies to when you make Turmeric tea.

And it tastes much nicer than the powdered spice. But the powder and the fresh root have different health giving properties.. so read on and if you don't already include this day-glo spice in your cooking, then do so immediately, if not sooner, as Constance used to say.

Unless you suffer from Gallstones! One of the properties of as little as a quarter of a teaspoonful of powdered turmeric is to increase the action of the gallbladder, by contracting and squeezing out half of its' contents.

I quote from Dr. Michael Greger' latest book 'How Not to Die'.. "Cooked turmeric appears to offer better DNA protection whilst raw turmeric may have greater anti-inflammatory effects".

Ginger root, do you use it? Like turmeric, it comes in the powdered form as well as in the fresh root, she keeps some of her ginger roots in a flower pot with some 'poor' soil, they grow thin, tightly rolled fresh leaves which she snips off and uses raw.. they taste delicious!

And did you know that it's an ace in the treatment of migraines without any evil side effects, likewise with the treatment of pain and we quote again his book - on page  361 - in the drug trial between one-eighth of a teaspoonful of powdered Ginger against 400mg of Ibuprofen, the ginger worked as just as effectively!

In fact, most spices are good for you and not just for improving the taste of our food. The spiky Clove is the most antioxidant packed spice and, of course, herbs are up there with spices in being good for you. Garlic, Oregano, Peppermint, Marjoram being just a few of them.

But beware.. both cinnamon and nutmeg can cause hives! As she well knows! And yes, you can have too much of a good thing when it comes to nutmeg and cinnamon, of which there is two varieties: Cinnamon from SriLanka and Cassia Cinnamon from China.

There have been extensive tests done on Cassia Cinnamon recently because of a compound called Coumarin. Whereas it used to be considered a safe and effective treatment for type 2 Diabetes, the recent tests are showing that the results of tests are showing coumarin to be toxic to the liver in high doses.

She thoroughly recommends anyone who has an interest in maintaining good health to read this book. You don't have to take everything on-board but why not tweak your 'diet' ie food intake a little if it is going to benefit you?

Chirps to you all.. we're having supper early as she's got to go all the way over to Hackney to collect another pair of reading glasses. Then she'll call in on a friend on her way home. We have IshPol and Herrings for our supper tonight, I call that worthy of a slurp and a chirp or two, don't you?

GeeGee Parrot.
February 2nd, 2017.
PostScript: HOW NOT TO DIE by Michael Greger MD, Published by Macmillan £14.99.