From football to matzo balls

STOP PRESS: 

Tuesday 3rd May - Leicester have won the League! We are the Champions. I may not be an avid football fan but I'm feeling pretty proud of Leicester this morning.

Football
What I know about football could be written on the side of a matzo ball (matzo balls are small dumplings for soup) but I have noticed that there's a lot of excitement around Leicester's King Power Stadium over the last few weeks. It would seem that at the beginning of this season Leicester were no hopers, and now they are almost winners of the League. I don't exactly know which League this refers to but I do know that a lot of people are very excited about it.

This Friday Leicester will be turning blue as a show of support. There will be blue banners, blue balloons, blue cakes in shops and blue jerseys everywhere. There will even be a blue strip tease posted up by Walkers Crisps. They will be removing packets of crisps from an apparently naked Gary Lineker in their Countdown to Kit Off.

As I understand it, this Sunday's game could be the clincher. Televisions will be tuned in to Sky Sport. The streets of Leicester will be silent. I may take advantage of the situation and go shopping.

Matzo
We are in the middle of the eight days of the Jewish Passover. I've blogged about the story that must be retold each year, the story of slaves escaping Egypt, of freedom and the ending of oppression here. Those first two nights, when we have the Seder meal and retell that story, are special. Not only do we get to share a meal with family and friends, we also share our well-rehearsed traditions and songs. It's the kind of communal activity that I love.

But what of the rest of the week? Eating matzo in place of bread is tough. Every year I'm reminded of how much wheat-based food I usually consume. As well as bread, there's pasta, pizza, scones, fruit loaf, the list appears to be endless. Just as too much matzo has its unpleasant effects on the body, so too must all that wheat. Maybe this year, after the Passover, I'll stick to my promise to myself and cut down on the wheat. It can only do me good.

Happy Passover. Happy football viewing and good luck to Leicester City.

A Magnificent Magnolia

A magnificent magnolia flower

A lovely gift from a lovely friend

Fresh white petals brightening up a dark corner

A sign that summer is not far away

A doggy dilemma and how first impressions can be misleading…

…especially if you’re a Staffordshire Bull Terrier.

Sunny was found tied to a fence in a car park, (How could anyone do that to any living thing?) and is now at an RSPCA Animal Centre waiting for a new home, one where he will be loved. There’s only one problem. When visitors walk by looking for their dream dog, Sunny enthusiastically tells them:

“I’d love to go for a walk and play on the grass.”

“Please, take me home with you.”

“My suitcase is packed and ready.”

Unfortunately the visitors don’t understand Dog-lish and to them his conversation sounds like a series of angry barks.

If only those visitors could take him for a walk and play with him on the grass, they would soon see that far from being an angry barking dog, he really is a little softie…

So you see how first impressions can be misleading.

(The above photograph was taken by Daughter who volunteers at the RSPCA.)

It’s not only dogs who have trouble with first impressions. We often make judgements on other people based on a brief introduction, even though we all know that being shy or nervous can affect the way a person is perceived. How do we overcome this problem? It is especially important when going for a job interview where it can affect someone’s future career. I don’t know the answer but I know that I have often assumed that someone is unfriendly until I get to know them and then I invariably realise how very wrong my first impressions were.

I am now wondering how I come across to people on a first introduction. (They possibly can’t see beyond the fact that I talk too much!)

Have you ever made a glaring mistake based on first impressions and how do you think you might be perceived on a first meeting?

If you’re interested in giving Sunny a loving home then here is another adorable photograph of him together with his contact details.
Sunny at the RSPCA's Southridge Animal Centre.

Treasured Items

I have paused in my research about my Grandma and her journey from Latvia to England in the early 1900s to consider some of the practical issues that, fortunately, have never, to date, affected my life. One issue that I have spent some time ruminating over is, how did my Grandma and her brothers and sisters decide what to leave behind them and, more importantly, what treasured items to take with them when they set out on this foreboding trip?

The only item that I remember the family referring to as 'Russian' was a huge feather quilt. This was when I was small girl, in the days before duvets, when people in England slept under sheets and blankets. Every winter that feather quilt was placed onto my bed, over the blankets but under the counterpane. I loved it. It was snuggly warm and made me feel secure under its weight. 

Though they were never referred to as 'from Latvia', there was always a pair of candle sticks and a small silver wine goblet (or bekher as it is referred to in Yiddish) on Grandma's sideboard. These were items used on a Friday evening to welcome in the Sabbath and I can only assume that they were part of the treasured belongings. The bekher has been so well polished over the years that the engravings can hardly be seen but they are of typical buildings from the shtetls (small Jewish Eastern European villages).

Grandma did not know what kind of journey she would have to endure and so would need to keep packing to a minimum but how does anyone decide what to take, what to leave behind? I appreciate that the family were very poor and so would have had few belongings, but there must have been small treasured items, something that Grandma maybe slipped into her pocket when no one else was looking, that made the journey with her.

So what would I take with me if, sadly, I had to make such a journey? Of course, life has changed dramatically in the last hundred or so years. I would grab my phone and Ipad even though I'd not expect there to be Internet access out at sea but what else would I pack? What would be that little item that I slipped into my pocket? A photograph of my family? A small teddy bear for comfort? A prayer book maybe, or a book of uplifting thoughts? What would you pack under such circumstances? And what would be that treasured item that you slipped into your pocket when no one else was looking?