Look ! Over there !

All Hail, Great Pumpkin!

This is Halloween

He's coming tonight!

Just a reminder ....

... that the clocks go back an hour at 2.00 a.m. tonight (technically Sunday morning). Pity those working on night-shifts while most of us enjoy an extra hour in bed! Though they will get an extra hour's pay ....

... and nigher ....

The Feast draweth nigh ...

Back in the big city

I spent four days down in London last week, and took the opportunity to visit the Canaletto Exhibition that has just opened in the Sainsbury Wing of the National Gallery. He has always been one of my favourite artists and this Show, placing his pictures alongside his contemporaries who were also painting street and canal scenes in Venice shows that he was not the only exponent of this detailed art-form. All the pictures on show were superb, but for me Canaletto remains the best - his intricate recording of daily life in that city allows you to look at his pictures and each time see something different, whether it be a person in the foreground, or an open window way in the distance through which you can just glimpse someone standing.


This trip also gave me the chance to walk the streets again, from Kensington to Trafalgar Square, detouring via Picadilly Circus, and there I found that since I last stood under the Statue of Christian Charity (commonly known as "Eros") the road layout has been changed. No longer is the central attraction on an island which you have to risk life and limb to reach, but now sits in a pedestrianised precinct that takes up half of the circus. The space between the statue's steps and the theatre opposite is so narrow at one point that I cannot see how the traffic used to flow around, and it made me wonder if the whole edifice had been shifted slightly to one side, but a search on Google didn't bring up any record of such an alteration. Maybe my memories are at fault.

Answered prayer

The vicar asked if anyone in the congregation would like to express praise for answered prayer. Suzie Smith stood and walked to the podium. She said, “I have an answered prayer I'd like to share with everyone. Two months ago, my husband, Tom, had a terrible bicycle wreck and his scrotum was completely crushed. The pain was excruciating and the doctors didn't know if they could help him.” A muffled gasp went round the men in the congregation as they imagined the pain that poor Tom must have experienced. “Tom was unable to hold me or the children,” she went on, “and every move caused him terrible pain. We prayed as the doctors performed a delicate operation, and it turned out they were able to piece together the crushed remnants of Tom's scrotum, and wrap wire around it to hold it in place.” Again, the men in the congregation cringed and squirmed uncomfortably as they imagined the horrible surgery performed on Tom. “Now,” she announced in a quivering voice, “thank the Lord, Tom is out of the hospital and the doctors say that with time, his scrotum should recover completely.” All the men sighed with relief.

The vicar rose and tentatively asked if anyone else had something to say. A man stood up and walked slowly to the podium. He said, “I'm Tom Smith.” The entire congregation held its breath. “I just want to tell my wife that the word is sternum.”

Spotted these .....

... on a recent visit to the National Trust property Felbrigg Hall in north Norfolk.


I think we'll stick to beeswax in our churches ....
!

Hot stuff

Tonight was an Indian curry night in our Village Hall. Home-cooked curries and also some all the way from a Bangladeshi restaurant in Birmingham. Wonderful food and good company of all ages, and I washed down my two plates-full with almost a bottle of very fine red wine given to me by a German student who stayed with me for 10 days in the summer. A good evening, but I'm glad that I'm not on duty tomorrow.

The body of Christ ,,, *pharrrp*
The blood of Christ ... *pharrrrp*

etc ....

Oscar Wilde's birthday

Google Doodles are not the only way of celebrating this day ....

Here's some shots from Matthew Bourne's "Dorian Gray" dance that I saw in Norwich a couple of years ago.

Soul food

Yet another I can't put in the Benefice magazine

A man and a woman were sitting beside each other in the first class section of an aeroplane. The woman sneezed, took out a tissue, gently wiped her nose, then visibly shuddered for ten to fifteen seconds. The man went back to his reading.

A few minutes later, the woman sneezed again, took a tissue, wiped her nose, then shuddered violently once more. Assuming that the woman might have a cold, the man was still curious about the shuddering.

A few more minutes passed when the woman sneezed yet again. As before, she took a tissue, wiped her nose, her body shaking even more than before.

Unable to restrain his curiosity, the man turned to the woman and said, "I couldn't help but notice that you've sneezed three times, wiped your nose and then shuddered violently. Are you OK?"

"I am sorry if I disturbed you, I have a very rare medical condition; whenever I sneeze I have an orgasm."

The man, more than a bit embarrassed, was still curious. "I have never heard of that condition before" he said. "Are you taking anything for it?"

The woman nodded, "Pepper."
.

It's all been quiet here lately ....

... but that might change today with a visit of a friend from Theological College days.

(Somewhat older now than when this photo was taken in a deserted French church, as am I, though it's debatable whether increasing years brings increasing wisdom ....)

Suggestions as to what Jesus might be doing with his hand are welcomed .......
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