Canny lass

Now that sounds more likely Bayardm. Thanks.

I saw a lot of it in India! Lovely silk or marble screens that hide women from men in public Buildings but I can't see any Connection here.

Just had Another Think about 'cleaky mats'. Could wor Jackie be talking about 'clicky mats'? I remember two sorts of mat making in my home. Proggy mats, using small 'clippings' and a 'progger', and clicky mats using long strips of cloth and a special tool that knotted the strip to the backing - usually hessian.

Flaas - flaws maybe?

Not to be confused with tjebble! The kitchen table.

I don't know about the mining term Cyevule but when you write it down as kjebble (Which we pronounced as 'shebble') it means 'chat'. A canny kjebble, a canny crack they both meant a good chat. My mother could also use it to us kids when we were arguing - stop your kjebble/kjebbling this minute!

Strong Words are great Words - when they eminate from strong feelings!

I remember it Maggie. There was Always a 'ging -beer plant' standing on the floor in our pantry. Very hush hush! It smelled like rotten eggs but the end Product tasted very nice. It was a bit like a sour dough. it had to be fed and divided once a week but obviously there was no flour involved. It was fed with sugar and ground ginger and there must have been yeast involved in the first 'plant'. I've been trying to get a recipe for this for years so I hope somebody here can help.

We freeze mackeril! Whole, gutted, cavity filled with dill stalks. Dipped in iced water and frozen. Removed from freezer when frozen. Dipped in iced water again and refrozen. Remove and wrap in Heavy duty foil or polythene. Keep up to 3 months. It is, as you say, better fresh but this method gives a fair result. When I lived in London I was very fond of the east-ender's 'pie and mash with liquor'. The liquor was a luminous green fluid poured over the pie and turned out to be the water in which they cooked the eels -later to be jellied. I loved it , till I found out what it was! The polish vodka isn't a patch on the Scandinavian! One of the most interesting ways I've seen of serving potatoes!

Of course we don't make raw herring but we do make many home-made dishes using raw herring - in the same way that people don't make strawberries but do make home-made strawberry jam. The food in the Picture - Kalles Kaviar - is not cod roe. The Product contains about 40% fish roe, of which a small proportion comes from cod. The remaining 60% is mostly oil so I wouldn't try frying it. Youngsters here are the same as youngsters in any other developed country. Of course they like fast food. Problem is that it's hard to get your hands on fast food here because of the long distances to outlets. "Reindeer bland", "stock"?? I'm afraid you've lost me there!

Finlandia vodka! That must have been an all time first for a Finn! Everything- and I mean Everything - is home made here.

These herring are not like those in Holland. Pickling, from a Swedish Point of view, involves the use of only minute amounts of vinegar, The preservative effect comes from loads of sugar and salt. Vodka, plain or spiced, is a popular ingredient at Xmas and Easter. Then there are all sorts of Spices and sour Creams that add flavour.

Such sad news! We've had many a good laugh here thanks to Keith's sense of humour and his wonderful competitions. However, on a more serious note I have to thank Keith for sharing his interest in astronomy with us, and with such enthusiasm that even I can sometimes .find myself star gazing . A very sad loss indeed! Warm condolences to the family.

It really is good fun, Brian, and we get a bit of the Xmas food prepared. The following week we do something similar when we get together and pickle herring for Xmas. Thank goodness that it has to stand a week Before it's ready for eating. That way I get to avoid it! Sausages and raw herring - I bet your all just dying to try a Swedish Xmas dinner!

I make my own sausage. I started about 20 years ago. Sausage, Believe it or not, is an integral part of Christmas dinner in these part!. Every year on the second sunday in Advent the four generations in this family squeeze into my kitchen and make 15 metres of Xmas sausage. Not all at once mind you! Half of them make 600-800ginger biscuits while the other half make sausage. We make a day of it with games and competitions and round the whole thing off with a 'no talent' competition. Prizes for the person with the most 'no talent' and the team with best times for sausage making and most biscuits from a kilo of dough. Great fun. Then theres a simple/sample meal with the newly made sausage. I don't use anything wild in sausages either Vic but we do eat game. Elk and wild boar. These last few years I've stopped eating 'bambis'. They are so much more beatiful in the garden than on a dinner plate. Like your wife, I feed them at the kitchen door but only during the Winter. Rest of the year they eat my flowers from the garden. Getting soft in my old age!

Cow's tail as usual! Hope you had a good day Vic.

I remember Guinness being prescribed for "general debility" in some hospitals. In severe cases we could whisk an egg and blend it into the stout - revolting! I've Heard the term "invalid stout" used in the same context. It may have had something to do with those advertising Campaigns such as "Guinness is good for you". I remember that phrase was exchanged, at least in the nursing profession, for "There's a baby in every bottle" owing to the increasing birthrate during those years.

..... unless, unless, unless you've got dyslexia, ADHD (and a host of other alphabetical disorders) ..... unless, unless, unless you've not had a teacher or parent with good Communication/teaching skills Spelling and grammar are constantly changing, spelling more rapidly than grammar, and who's to say what 'sloppiness' is. Language is the tool of Communication and as long as the language used gets your message across the tool is doing its job. When that which is written, or spoken, becomes unintelligible due to deviation from the so-called norm then the tool is not working. That's been happening quite a lot lately.

Pilgrim, "is this a mass debate?" It's more like a sandpit debate (I use the last Word very loosely)! When will you guys learn that some things (and even people) are best ignored. I don't know how you can be bothered to encourage, let alone read it. Malcolm, as a linguist I'm all against language policing but in this case I take my hat off to you: Well said.

The joys of rural Life indeed! The Scandinaviens are ace when it comes to coping with such events. I was surprised on arriving here in the middle of a harsh Winter that the first thing my husband did was switch off the electricity and Telephone for 2 Days and he continued switching off the electricity and telephone for 2 Days every month until I learned to cope without it. I have to add that he worked out of the country 200 Days a year so it was a skill that was to come in very useful. Being without electricity and Telephone in the middle of the forest for up to a week is quite common but not a problem. I can recommend the exercise of doing without electricity for a week-end to everybody.

"he's a smart Young fella noo wi hi's adult plumage". Better get him locked up now HPW. The ladies will be after him!

Thumbs up from me as well HPW. Lovely stories and even lovelier Pictures. A tribute to what real love for animals can achieve.

Can't say that I remember the first one but I do remember the last one, smoked in the car park outside Bedlington Health centre. 30 minutes later i was sitting in the doctor's surgery being told I had cancer - at 38 years old! Obviously I was told to stop smoking. Threw the packet and remaining cigs in the docs wastepaper basket and haven't touched a cig, or even the packaging, since.

Smudgeinthebudge, what is "deed man's baccy"?

This is very late I know but I was out of the country and the Internet was not being kind to me. I hope you had a really nice birthday but did I read correctly - The Monkey? What happened to the Red Lion and table 26?