the high cost of divorce

Most of you will know about two prominent
divorce settlement cases that were considered
by the Law Lords last week. I find it fascinating
stuff ... the aggrieved husbands are having to
dig deeper into their pockets to stump up huge
amounts of dosh, subject of course to the outcome
of their appeal. You can read more about it here.

My heart bleeds for the poor blokes. :)

One of the husbands made an interesting point ...
if his wife had sustained severe brain injuries,
the maximum compensation she would have received
in the law courts, would have been £2 million
pounds. After 3 years of marriage, one of the
women was awarded a payout of £5 million.

The Law Lords have decreed that women in their
situation should receive compensation for giving
up their own careers, keeping home for him and
raising their children – compensation being a
new idea it seems. One counter-argument I heard
on the radio this week was, "Well, they did
choose to do so".

And then there’s a question of pre-nups. Would
you sign one, if you were about to marry someone
better off than yourself? Perhaps that someone
has got an ex-husband/wife or children, and
wishes to ring-fence some of the dosh for them?
I suppose signing a pre-nup is a reasonable
idea, even though it doesn’t carry a great deal
of legal weight in this country. But it’s not
very romantic is it?

“Now repeat after me ... with this pre-nup,
I thee wed.”

Why is it that some men can't pee straight?

Yes, I asked that question in Zoe's comments
box 1-2 days ago. Why do some men pee onto the
floor rather than into the urinal bowl, I
wonder? And if it's because they're hitting the
toilet bowl rim, then their pee will be splashing
all over their trouser legs.

There was one particularly bad place in
Nottingham, where there was no ventilation, and
where it was excessively hot. The floor felt
sticky to walk on, and the smell was bad too.
I say "was", because someone has been in recently,
cleaned it well and left the window open.
It's the Gents' loo on the second floor of the
Central Library.

So I return to my question, "Why is it that
some men can't pee straight?". Are they pissed
as newts (or "nished as pewts", as one of my
friends used to say), or they stoned on drugs,
or have they got exceptionally bad hand tremor,
so bad that they wiggle their willies all over
the place?

I'm a blogslut

Yes, I own up. I'm a blogslut. I like looking
at other folks' blogs... and I enjoy adding
comments on their blogs and vice versa. That's
what makes blogging more interesting than
writing a diary, n'est-ce pas?

Well I did a spot of blogslutting the other day,
and came across Greg's, who writes about life
in Australia. Last month he wrote a very funny
post: "I blog, therefore I am". (Hope you don't
mind my quoting this one, Greg).

Yes, in an odd way, I feel that to be very true.
Blogging is a kind of extension of my own
personality, and helps me reach out to contact
other people .... something that I enjoy doing.

Looking back at my childhood, I was very
introverted and shy ... basically socially inept.
As I've said before, I think, I still have
difficulty getting a conversation going with
complete strangers, but once I get going I can
chat on for ages. On the introversion-extroversion
scale, I now feel I'm midway. I could happily
spend all day on this computer, doing various
things, but after a while I feel like a change,
and feel an urge to get out and meet other people.

I'll stop there as midnight is approaching.
I'll post one of my rhododendron photos, which
I took last year at Lea Gardens in Derbyshire
(not far from Chatsworth).

Nottingham in the news again

Well, what do you know, Nottingham has been in
the news yesterday for its high level of criminal
activity. Well, surprise, surprise – we have to
live up to our reputation as the home town/county
for Robbin Hood and his Merry Men.

Hardly a day goes by when I don’t see shootings
in the main city streets - people staggering
out of the city bars riddled with bullet holes,
and dropping dead in the street. It’s like the
Wild West here. Gunfights galore, with frequent
re-enactments of the final showdown in “High Noon”.
I recommend to you the window seats in the glass-
fronted café at the Central Methodist Mission on
Parliament Street - an excellent viewing point.
Good trade as usual for the local undertakers and
the coffin makers … business is booming. And all
the prostitutes, pimps and drug dealers loitering
round the city streets, waiting for business, and
waving their ASBOs at passing police cars. Tony
Blair’s relaxation of the pub drinking hours hasn’t
helped matters, as drunkenness is markedly on the
increase. The city’s bad litter problem pales into
insignificance.

And what is the Sheriff of Nottingham doing about
it? The only time I saw him was about three years
ago, when he opened Nottingham’s Goose Fair (dressed
in ceremonial costume). What are we paying him for?
Why doesn’t he get his act together and dress up like
Wyatt Earp, and swagger down the streets fully armed,
along with his deputies?

Perhaps Nottingham should be renamed as Dodge City?
Bring back hanging, I say, or "off with the goolies"!

mini baby boom

Not a lot happening today, apart from the "D-Day
Landing"/implantation of the embryos into our
daughter, L.. As RN said in the other day's
comments box, there is a small baby boom
happening in our family (and extended family)
at the moment. So we are all feeling very
excited.
I've spent the past day or two working on another
website, which I'm re-creating. It's challenging
stuff and fun at the same time. I've had a lot of
fun tinkering with this one, and have learned a
little HTML along the way.
This morning I spotted these lovely flowers on
our dining room window-ledge, and photographed
them. They are a variety of Busy Lizzie, which
Mrs C has propagated and looked after in the past
year or two.

Family news and crime drama

Well, we didn't go to Leeds yesterday. Our
daughter S. sent us a text message at 7am to
say she was unwell, and to ask us to postpone
our visit. So we sat around in the morning
feeling disappointed and at a loose end, and
we filled the time with finishing off the Radio
Times Crossword with the help of "oneacross
dot com" - a very good website, but it has
some limitations. By the way, the answer to
the police TV series clue is "A Touch of Frost"
- quite easy, if you like watching crime drama
and David Jason, as we do. We had a couple of
coffees while I had a go ordering a few books
on amazon dot com, including three photography
books for me, and a novel, "The Kite Runner"
by Khaled Hosseini, for Mrs C. We find the
reviews on amazon very helpful.

Later on we called round to see our third
daughter R., who lives on the other side of
town (in Bramcote) with her husband K. R. is
having her 20 week pregancy scan next week, so
we're all getting excited about that.

Incidentally, our second daughter L. is going
for IVF blastocyst implantation tomorrow. Two
out of a batch of 14 embyos will be chosen and
the rest will be frozen - we all feel rather
strange about that - the thought of potential
human beings queing up for future implantation,
or ending up being discarded. We're going down
to London next weekend to stay with her while
her partner is away. Here's some info about IVF
... L. and her partner are paying a bit more to
have the embryos developed to the 5-day blastocyst
stage, for a better chance of implantation. The
wait for IVF treatment at her local London
hospital is 2.5 years - she's on the waiting list
for NHS treatment too.
In the evening we watched the end of an episode
of "The Inspector Lynley Mysteries" that we'd
recorded last week. A somewhat feeble plot, a
murder mystery set on the Cornish coast, and
poor production I thought, almost like "Acorn
Antiques", an old TV comedy series.

Much better last week was "See No Evil: the
Moors Murders" - a dramatic reconstruction of
the murderous activites of Ian Brady and his
partner Myra Hindley, set in the 1960s. The
drama was mainly seen from the viewpoint of
Myra's sister Maureen and her husband Dave Smith.
Excellent writing, acting and production. We
were left feeling shocked and sickened by
programme - I could hardly speak afterwards.
We've driven through the moorland where the
murder victims were buried - it's a very bleak
and desolate place.

I'll end on a more cheerful note - a photo of
our great-nephew, M, who is five weeks old.
By the way, my photo-editing software is
playing up. When you click on the photo on
this blog to enlarge it, do you see a pop-up
menu asking if you'd like to download the photo,
together with a warning about potential viruses?
This happened to me with the clematis photo but
not with the previous photos. Weird.
(Added later: I think the problem with the Inspector
Lynley TV episode was the poor and improbable script,
that the actors and the production team had to work
with).

a fun day today

I've got to get up in about 7 hours' time, to
pack up for our trip (car journey) to Leeds.
It's a short distance from here to get to the
motorway (M1), and then we just keep travelling
in more or less a straight line to Leeds. Our
daughter lives in the Horsforth area, which
is about 85 miles north of here.

I spent most of today socialising - coffee and
peppermint tea with my friend B. at Costas at
the bottom end of Friar Lane (my cappuccino
was very nice ... I like it without the
chocolate on top). This lunchtime one of our
nieces called round with her 5 week old baby
boy to see us (he looks really cute), and this
evening we had a couple of friends around for
wine, cheese and other nibbles.

We listened to a couple of CDs (compilations),
featuring an American jazz singer - Morgana
King, various Beatles CDs, and a wonderful
album called Bebel by Bebel Gilberto.

Lastly, here is a photo of a lovely clematis,
which is rambling over a garden wall not far
from our house.

more flowers

Here are photos of a type of gorse and some
rhododendrons that are out in bloom at the moment.
It's rhododendron and azalea time in the UK -
most of the large woodland parks and stately
homes have masses of them. If the weather's good
in Leeds this weekend, we'll head for Temple
Newsam Park for the flower display and a good
walk round.
Oh dear, I've just checked the weather forecast
for the weekend and it's going to be wet. Perhaps
we'll go to the cinema or to the shops/cafes in
Leeds. In the city centre we usually make a
beeline for the Pasta Romagna - excellent home-made
pasta and pizza, good coffee (though not quite
as good as Betty's) and opera-style singing
from the owner. You can imagine yourself in Italy
there.....which reminds me to mention a brilliant
Italian cafe in the middle of Covent Garden in
London ... always very popular, and a nice place
to sit down and relax.

“For money can’t buy me love”

I was sad to hear the news today that Sir Paul
and Heather McCartney are separating after being
married for four years. As you will have heard,
they are blaming the intense media intrusion on
their lives for the split-up. It must have been
sheer hell for them.

I recall reading about the trouble from the
press and photographers that Robbie Williams has
had, in Chris Heath’s biography of him. I won’t
go into any detail here in case I were to
infringe copyright, but it’s an interesting read.

I’ve been a fan of Sir Paul over the years (and
John Lennon even more so). I’ve been very
impressed with his musicianship and his song-
writing. I play electric guitar with a couple
of friends once a month, and we usually play
and sing a few Beatles songs every time.
We’re the Fab Three. I’ve got a couple of
Japanese Fender Strats and a Gordon Smith blues
guitar, BTW.

McCartney is staggeringly wealthy as you all
know, but I wonder how happy he is? Can money
buy you happiness and lasting love? Was he just
unlucky this time as regards the person he chose
to marry?

I’ll post a few photos of local gardens and
flowers over the next few days. Here’s a lovely
garden which is near to where I live, and which
stretches some distance down the hillside at the
back.

a busy day (well not really)

I took the car in for a minor service this
morning ... to a garage (Vic Herbert's) at the
top of the nearby hill, which is the highest
in Nottingham. I asked for the car battery and
the alternator to be checked over (and other
things), as I'm having to put the trickle
charger on overnight to make sure the car will
start up the following day.

We're using the car less and less these days,
only for an occasional big shopping trip,
visits to relatives, and for when we go on
holiday in the UK . Next weekend we're going
up to Leeds to stay with our fourth daughter
and her partner, and in three week's time we're
having a week's break in Cromer on the Norfolk
coast, travelling by car.

I had two lovely walks through leafy suburbia
to get from and to the garage, and I took a load
of photos on the second trip, in the hazy
sunshine. I'll put up some of my photos onto
this blog this coming week - I haven't had time
to look through them, as I've been busy doing
other things.

As Parkinson said, and I think it's very true,
"Work expands to fill the time available for
its completion". It's easy to find things to do
in retirement .... activities like blogging, for
example .... and it's even easier to postpone
other things that need doing. I'm an expert
in procrastination, a brilliant habit I picked
up from my dad. And if you wait long enough,
sometimes a problem will go away or it will get
sorted by someone else. :)

smoked salmon again

I thought I'd try out taking a photo of the
smoked salmon salad just before we sat down to
eat it the other day. I haven't had much success
with taking photos of my culinary efforts, but
this one turned out better than most - I took
it in rather subdued natural light. Our kitchen
window is north-facing, and it was cloudy
outside.
I put about 100g of smoked salmon on this for
the two of us (plus three eggs), which was ample.
The cats didn't get a look-in, as regards any
left-overs.

Football and our cats

I was in Tesco Metro yesterday lunchtime, which
was very busy around the tills, but almost
deserted like the Marie Celeste, in the wine
and beer section at the back of the shop. I said
to the sole shelf-stacker, "It's very peaceful
here, isn't it?" "Yes," she replied, "all the
men will be at home watching the Cup Final!"
With hindsight I think that was a sexist remark,
as a lot of women would have done the same.
I switched on the TV later in the afternoon, in
time to see the last 15 minutes of the second
half and the penalty shoot-out, plus lots of
action re-plays of the earlier goals. Fantastic
play.

I've enjoyed having the company of our two cats
while Mrs C's been away. They are very friendly,
but rather shy of strangers. I took a couple of
photos of them on the top floor of our house
(the warmest part of the house). The first one
is of Slayer, who was sitting in a fairly dark
corner - I was near the top of the stairs with
my camera at carpet-level. She had distanced
herself from the camera (I don't think she
likes the red focussing light). Her sister Miss
D is not so camera-shy, but by this time was
snoozing in her high-tech cat bed (obtained from
Lidl nearby). It's funny how cats love to sleep
in cardboard boxes, even squeezing themselves
into small ones, rather than kip on the carpet.

Do you like cats?

sex, wine and smoked salmon salad

I'm on my own this weekend, as Mrs C has gone
off to Coventry (University of Warwick) with
a couple of her friends. She attending a
conference all about the brain and sex - a very
interesting subject. As I've mentioned before,
I enjoy having sex more, if we're both emotionally
involved and excited. Gone are the days when I
enjoyed having a "quickie". I think either my
testosterone levels are dropping off, or I've
"matured" as time's gone by, in the sense that
I appreciate the quality of experience more
than the quantity.
It's a bit like drinking and appreciating better
quality wines ... in my younger days, I might
have drunk anything (apart from paint-stripper),
but now I'd be prefer drinking half to one glass
of a good quality Shiraz.
Returning to the sex theme, I find that alcohol
has a detrimental effect on my sexual performance
... even half a glass of wine can have a bad
effect, so I keep off the booze some nights!
It's a sign that I'm getting older.

How to spend the rest of today? Well, if I was
really "good", I would be getting out the paint
pots and brushes as our hallway badly need a
make-over. But I've got a few minor jobs to do
this morning - a quick walk into town to transfer
some money between accounts (Mrs C and I are
about to take out a mini-cost ISA with the Post
Office) and to get some mixed leaf lettuce from
Tesco for tomorrow evening's meal.

Mrs C has requested that I make up a smoked
salmon salad, which is one of our favourites
meals (and excellent party food too).... Jamie
Oliver did this on one of his TV programmes a
few years ago .....here's the recipe for you
(the quantities up to you)...

Boiled new potatoes ... halved/quartered (and
served slightly warm)
Lettuce ... any type you like.
Watercress & rocket optional
Half an avocado per person, cut into big chunks
(prepare this last minute and sprinkle a little
lemon juice on top to stop the avocado turning
black)
One and a half hard-boiled eggs per person...
rapidly cool the eggs after boiling them, in
cold running water, to stop the egg yolks
turning black at the edges (my mother's tip).
Any other salad stuff you like ... sliced vine
tomatoes, cucumber, red pepper, radish, spring
onion or chives, and any herby stuff you like
(eg a little parsley)
A salad dressing, eg the Pizza Express Dressing,
which is our favourite.
A good squeeze or two of lemon juice
Good quality smoked salmon, cut up into small pieces.

So all you do is layer up the salad and potato
in a large shallow serving dish, put the egg and
avocado on top, and then strips of smoked salmon,
a little bit of parsley, then a drizzle of the
dressing and the lemon juice.
Absolutely sensational.... MMmmm...MMmmmm.

All served up with a glass of chilled white wine ...
well, perhaps a quarter of a glass for me.... and
some honey-dew melon for afters.

Depth of field

I've spent some time today looking up articles
on the internet on photography - depth of field
in particular. I've noticed with my present
camera, the Canon 350DSLR, that I'm having more
problems getting the depth of field right in a
lot of my shots (compared with my previous one,
the Olympus C-5060).
I've been using the automatic exposure settings
on my camera so far, and have yet to try out
varying the aperture-priority mode settings ...
partly due to laziness on my part and partly
ignorance also. I've learned today that using
a smaller aperture (but higher f number) will
increase the depth of field, with generally
better results, though this is not always the
case.
What I need to do next is to buy a small
handbook on how to handle this camera (I've got
one in mind by Charlotte Lowrie). I will have
a look at Amazon straightaway after this.

In the past few days I've been taking lots more
photos... here are a couple of my better ones.
You will see that the forget-me-nots towards
the back on the left hand side are slightly out
of focus, owing to limited depth of field.
However, I'm pleased with how this photo turned
out. The yellow rambling rose belongs to our
neighbours, but it's cascading over into our
garden ... it's a huge splash of colour in the
corner of our garden.

lovely trees

I just love trees. I'm so pleased to be living
in an area where there are lots of them. And of
course, trees attract birds, and it's lovely to
hear the bird song.
The downside of living in an area like Mapperley
Park is having to sweep up lots of leaves in the
Autumn, and putting up with the grey squirrels.
The squirrels go for the bird food, and are fond
of digging up and eating bulbs you've just
planted out in the garden.
I went through a phase of trapping the buggers,
and then releasing them a few miles away in
parkland .... that is until I read on the
internet that they have a homing instinct like
pidgeons, and can find their way home within a
25 mile radius. So we don't put out much bird
food these days, and the squirrels are now less
of a nuisance.
Coming back to the subject of trees, I find
treeless landscapes and treeless suburbia dull
and depresssing. I quite like visiting moorland
however, but only for a short time ... I start
to feel isolated, and somewhat threatened by it,
especially in cold bleak weather. Once I've seen
an expanse of heather, some sheep and some sheep
droppings, I've had enough. I feel the same in
the vast treeless areas of fenland too.

It's been a lovely warm and sunny day today ...
just right for walking outside. Lots of flowers
and shrubs are out in bloom, with brilliant
colours and scents.... wonderful.
I'm putting on a couple of tree photos. The
cherry blossom is coming to the end now, but
this tree is still smothered in pinkish white
flowers. I took the second tree photo just
round the corner from where I live, earlier this
evening.

Victor Meldrew - may he rest in peace

The BBC have just started a re-run of the 1990s
TV sitcom, One Foot in the Grave. The main
characters were Victor Meldrew, a Mr Negative,
who was forcibly retired from work and who
moaned about everything in life, and his long
suffering wife, Margaret, who had to put up with
his rants.
I've watched a couple of the early episodes,
during which Victor complained about the litter
in his garden. "I counted two Twix wrappers in
our garden this morning," he complained to his
wife. "Where do they all come from? Planet Twix?"

I too complain from time to time about the amount
of rubbish people leave behind in our street...
empty MacDonald's cartons, cigarette packets,
crisp packets, beer cans, etc, etc.. Oh, and the
occasional used condom .... not very nice. Most
Friday mornings I spend about 20 minutes clearing
all the rubbish, just before the bin men come.
The neighbours cheer me on! "You've missed a bit
there!" said one of them, leaning out her car
window as she was driving by.

Fortunately we're not prone to doggy doos - in our
neighbourhood, the dog owners are good at clearing
the stuff up. In our last house (a Victorian
gatehouse in Nottingham, not far away from where
we are now), a passing car driver threw out poo
parcels in small poly bags. The poos were all
neatly wrapped in half sheets of tabloid newspaper,
but they were not so nice to clear up when another
car ran over them and squashed them flat. We
thought the poos were probably human in origin,
as they didn't smell like doggy doos (hope you're
not eating anything at the moment). A family friend
thought that the culprit might have been autistic,
to account for such behaviour. Fortunately for us
we haven't had any poo parcels our way.
If my daughter L. were to read this, she'd say,
"Get a life"!

A trip to the dentist

I was about to set off to see my dentist this
morning for my annual check-up, when the car
wouldn't start.... the battery was flat! I
phoned the receptionist straightaway to ask
if I would be seen if I turned up 15 minutes
late. "No way", was the reply - my dentist is
a strict time-keeper.
I got out my old bicycle, but the tyre pump
wouldn't work... it wasn't my day today. However
when I called a local taxi firm, the taxi came
fairly quickly and took me to the dentist's in
6 minutes, just in time. Needless to say I had
to wait 15 minutes to be seen, as the dentist
had taken in someone who'd arrived early. I'm
beginning to sound like Victor Meldrew!
Yesterday I noticed a tiny chip in my right
lower canine tooth (chipped when I chomped on
a boiled sweet rather stupidly). My dentist
confirmed the damage and said that a filling
very close by was crumbling, and that it should
be replaced. I paid £15.50 in advance for the
check-up, but was told that the bill would rise
to £42.40 for the additional work required.
These are the new NHS rates, but a lot cheaper
than private rates of course.
I decided to walk home (along Porchester Road,
Woodborough Road and down through Mapperley Park),
which took me 45 minutes .... a pleasant stroll.
The rain set in later in the day.

John Gibson sculpture

I look at Jean’s blog “This too” from week
to week, and was interested to see her photos
of a lovely sculpture called “Delicatesse” by
John Gibson. (See her post for Friday 28 April).
A couple of years ago I did a bit of research
on another Gibson sculpture called “Hylas
surprised by Nymphs”, which I found on a saleroom
website, along with its provenance.
For many years this sculpture was in the main
hallway of the Liverpool Institute School for
Girls, aka Blackburne House, which was attended
by my mum and her sister.
My mum was very fond of this sculpture. When
she was writing a biography of one of her
schoolteachers, she was given a photo of the
hallway by another old pupil, which she included
in the biography. The schoolteacher, Gladys
Imlach, led a totally secret life as described
by Anthony Sampson in “The Scholar Gypsy”.
So here is a copy of the old photo, dated
November 1922, (which I've touched up), followed
by my photo, taken on a boiling hot day last May.
The school used to be the home of a Liverpool
magnate (and Lord Mayor), John Blackburne, and
is now a FE college for women.

A few flowers

Well, I thought I'd put up a few more photos
from our Mallorca trip. The first two were
taken in Cala d'Or, and the last one is a
view of a garden, close to the cathedral in
Palma.
As regards the rambling succulent with mauve
flowers, I don't know what its name is ...
it looks like a Livingstone Daisy. If the
climate in the UK were to become more like a
Mediterranean one, as some people predict, then
I look forward to growing plants like this, and
seeing orange and lemon trees around too.
The other daisy like flowers are Osteospermums,
which grow here also.
It's been sunny and hot here in the East
Midlands, the last three days, with a gorgeous
slightly sweet smell of flowers in the air ...
the smell is probably from fields of oil seed
rape being grown a few miles away from here.

Visit to La Granja in Mallorca

On our way back to Palma, on our day trip to
the North West of Mallorca,Mrs C and I spent
a couple of hours looking round a large country
house called La Granja (which is near Esporlas).
A really beautiful house, set in lush green
surroundings - like a mini-version of Chatsworth.
There's some info about the history of the place
here.
When we arrived there was some traditional
dancing to live music, and there were several
people re-enacting various rural crafts. The
house had a lived-in feel to it...it didn't
feel like the average British stately home
(which often feel like mausoleums to me)...
and it was buzzing with visitors and staff.
So here a few more photos of the place for you.
In tomorrow's post, I'll attach a few flower
photos.

North-west Mallorca

Mrs C and I spent a day motoring around the
North-West of Majorca. It was a hot sunny day
(possibly around 24 deg C), with a little
cloud at times. We went via Palma to Valdemossa,
and then up the coast to Soller. Later in the
day, we went back down the coast to visit La
Granja (nr Esporalas).
We had hoped to visit Deia on the way (made
popular by Robert Graves and his friends), but
there was no car parking available (about a
dozen spaces for cars in all). Oh well, we'll
stop off next time we go to the island (at a
much earlier time of day).
Valdemossa was very pretty - one of the ten
must-see places on the island ... a beautiful
monastery with a large garden, and lots of
cafes for refreshments. I'm putting on a link
to Wikipedia, if you fancy checking out the
history of the place - this includes a cold
and wet 3 month stay that Chopin and his
partner George Sand had, when they overwintered
there in 1838. He had TB at the time, and his
piano never arrived.
The road to Soller from there was very scenic,
but not very nice to drive along (lots of
hairpin bends). Soller had lots of lovely trees,
cafes, some interesting architecture, and an old
electric tram system - the trams looked quaint.
I've put on this blog a few photos of the above,
and I'll put on some of La Granja tomorrow.


(the monastery tower)

Arta in Mallorca

We spent one hot and windy day driving North
to see Arta, a small town with a hilltop
fortress and chapels (with lovely views of
the countryside from the top), and then we
drove back along the coastal road, and saw
some holiday towns on the way (too much
modern development).
I didn't get any brilliant photos of Arta itself
(as the midday sun was too strong), but here a
few of the ones I took.... palm trees in the
centre, a shop sign (the shop sold Moorish
furniture and ornaments), and an arty shop
selling motifs to put up on your walls ....
that reminds me of the flying ducks that Jack
and Vera Duckworth used to have on their living
room wall (in Coro)... anyone remember those?

Coastal views of Mallorca

I've selected a few shots of the coastline,
the first one being a view of the small beach
at Cala d'Or which was fairly close to us.
The next two were taken at one of the main
beauty spots on the island, at a large house
called Son Marroig, formerly owned by an
archduke. I took one of the photos with my
camera pointing towards the sun (which
accounts for its poorer quality).