Friends and The One Ring

Popped up to Birmingham to spend time with ephraim and november_girl, who had long ago recommended that we try the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter for rings. We came, we saw, we bought. My wedding ring is beautiful, more than that, it called out to me!

This never happens. While I love beautiful things, I am not the kind of person who loses sleep over not having stuff. A friend of mine told me she could think of nothing worse than wandering around a place full of gorgeous stuff she couldn't afford; that has never been my problem. I see a pretty thing,ooh and ahh over it, and leave it behind. It can't be a virtue cos it takes no effort, it's just not the way I attach, so to speak.

So when the ring called out to me, I just walked in and tried it on. Naturally it was the perfect fit. Because it is my ring. There are many like it but this one is mine...

Our hosts were magnificent as always, with excellent hospitality and time spent together. It was a grand, grand weekend, and did us both a world of good.

Work It Out

I have always been hypersensitive, one of those people who get told not to 'take on so,' when a child. Everything hurts. As an adult I learned not to allow it to hurt, that often anger or laughter or both are the ways to get around pain.  Also,perhaps  because everything has impact if I am not constantly armouring myself, I over-analyse issues until they are chewed to pieces. Yesterday, my very dear Sister-in-Law-to-be lost three lovely pet chickens, probably to a fox. Instantly people were commenting on the 'badness' of foxes.They forget that dogs, even nice dogs, can do exactly the same, including the coop frenzy in which a chicken massacre occurs.   But no-one talks about this. Why is it OK for a dog to do it, and terrible for a fox to do it? There is something extraordinary about people calling a fox stealing chickens 'cruel,'  when our abbattoirs are such places of nightmare even we can't bear them, and we generally eat the results of this horror in blissful oblivion.

Virtue doesn't seem to exist beyond justifying what we like as the way things should be. There is no equity in it, and what is even worse,no recognition of this view slant. What we do is right, not because of any inherent quality in the action itself, but because we are the ones doing it.   If we decided to start skewering eyeballs out of each others' living  heads, we would find a reason for this to be praiseworthy and appropriate. Goodness means Us-ness. It has no depth beyond our preference.

Any spirituality that doesn't go beyond this cosmic scale of self aggrandisement is vanity.

Not that my  Sister-In-Law-to-be came out with such nonsense. The lady is very kind indeed, nor was it the place to bang my drum too hard, because she has lost some dear friends. I would be furious with anyone,man,dog, cat, fox,who killed my chickens.

Filled with these distressing thoughts I went for my first proper work out.

The trainer nearly killed me. But the pads were great fun.

'Woah!' She said, as I thudded away at the white circles  on them, 'This woman's a maniac! Is this 'ow you gotcheroleman ta propose? Joo beat him up or summat?' She moved me on to the punchbag. I really enjoyed it.

But the core exercises were horrendous. Planks and squats make me feel about 104.

I'll be back tomorrow.