Its tough, it will get better and guess what its freezing brrrrr!

BB1984

Hmmmm I'm not sure what it was. My first thought was a sparrow hawk, but not sure. I don't think it was a kite, as it didn't have a forked tail. Could be a buzzard, but don't know.

Just listening to Radio 2 - said that Southern Trains are planning to stop services "early" tonight. No idea what constitutes "early", but they are recommending that if people haven't already started making their journeys, get a move on asap! I'm sure all you sensible OS-ers will be well on your way home from work by now though, if you made it in the first place!

Proper old style tea for me tonight.....faggots! Not homemade though, bought them at the market yesterday from my nice pork-man, Dave! (He's great, always gives me a discount in return for a bit of light flirting...! ) Having them with mashed potatoes, onion and red wine gravy, and green beans. And yes, I am drinking my way through the rest of the bottle of wine....! :rotfl:

Might make some mince pies tonight...can't decide if I can be bothered...I'll see if I can persuade DH to give me a hand.

I really want to start putting the decorations up! Will get the tree this weekend and cant WAIT! Might put a few of the other bits and bobs up tonight.

BB

mardatha

If it was bigger than the crows then it was a buzzard. They would be fighting over food . Buzzards are not very tough, they are a bti wimpy

Charis

kittie wrote: »

this is added to many cereals and is very addictive. It is also added to weight watchers stuff. Time to name and shame

it is a very nasty stuff and I am going to do more finding out about it


also called glucose-fructose syrup or isoglucose.

and Michelle Obama never gives any product containing it to her girls as it is thought to kick start obesity

A balanced view from someone with an MSc in Nutrition and Diet.

All sugars kick start obesity, when eaten to excess. Watch labels for anything ending in ...ose, glucose, fructose, dextrose etc.

shegar

mardatha wrote: »

If it was bigger than the crows then it was a buzzard. They would be fighting over food . Buzzards are not very tough, they are a bti wimpy

Points taken ,but ,sparrowhawks are bigger than crows also sparrowhawks breast is like a thrush colour breast .......and beings its so cold out, the 2 crows were telling and arguing with the sparrowhawk by bombarding it saying "this is our territory please go away"...........thus why they were fighting with it.....

ceridwen

jackieglasgow wrote: »

Someone on one of the other threads was talking about making sure their bird water never froze the other day Seasalt, and what they do, is put a tealight under the tin dish they use to keep the water above freezing, is there a chance you could do something like this for the animals? Probably a crazy suggestion but sometimes those are the best. I was thinking something like an old paint tin with a big candle in it, under the trough?

Ummm....personally...I think that would probably achieve the desired objective (ie keeping the birds water okay) - but....eerrr..<cough> I wouldnt want to take the risk of leaving an unattended lighted candle (even of the tealight variety)....

ceridwen

kittie wrote: »

I watched a prog that I recorded from BBC2 called the food that made millions. Well what an eye opener that was, how the big companies have made a fortune by weaning us all away from home made food to cereals ie the first convenience food. They make a profit of 2000% by messing with the cereal and by transforming it to something else, first getting rid of the nutritiously good parts. Then they get sprayed with vitamins to put something back. They got us all on board with all the free gifts they used to enclose ie the submarine, the disc on a string, the monkey that climbed the ladder. Oh I remember them allright and they were good playable toys and they were used to get us used to having boxed cereals every day

I was just so mad watching it and later on will make my own granola as I used to do. I am not buying cereals any more. They even jumped on the muesli bandwagon. Never mind all the salt and sugar they added to everything. It makes you think as most people were much slimmer before the secret sugars were added

I remember those readymade cereals as a child - and the toys (which I used to look out for....:cool:). I've rarely bought readymade cereals as an adult - the price is so offputting of the healthy variety I buy:eek:. I think the standard "junk food" ones that supermarkets sell are very dear for what they are (before you start counting in how unhealthy they are...).

I'll stick with my huge bags of porridge oats and making myself porridge from them - even though I buy organic ones:) - I think its good value to get such a large bag for about £2.50:D (think its 2.5kg offhand??)....

ceridwen

mardatha wrote: »

True Kittie , I gave up eating them years ago, we stick to porridge. Yet more snow overnight and this morning, really deep and nowhere to put it now. Farmer came down the street with his tractor, complete with two bales on it lol, cleared our cul de sac but dropped straw all over it
Wee orange cat really miserable sitting in his polystyrene box on his wee bit of carpet LOL with his tail all wet.
Our heroic postman got through today but the parcels I'm waiting for didnt come. So I wrapped some crissy pressies and ate some dolly mixtures and am not going out again cos my boots let in and I'm soaked and freezing lol.

There's a tip I read on waterproofing boots (and shoes) of spraying them with WD40 and rubbing that in....I've not tried it myself to know how effective it is...but might be worth trying...

ceridwen

kezlou wrote: »

Ventured into town today to pay council tax nearly cried as i handed a wad of notes over. But its done now, till next year at least. Also reapplied for housing benefit, may as well see if i can get out.

Been attempting some kind of budget for next and its very slow going. The amount of paperwork we have is immense.
The cats have been meowing at me, looking at the radiators then back at me. Hmm may be i should put the heating up to 20 instead of 16 degrees.

Maybe you might like to think of having your Council Tax come out on direct debit each month? Years back I swopped over to paying mine that way (at the thought of the large chunk of money having to be handed over at once....). Some time after that - I swopped the debits from the way the Council does them automatically (ie for 10 months of the year and leaving 2 months free) over to a debit every month. That way no one month has to bear too heavy a burden from the C.T. bill - and there is the added benefit of course that if my job went pear-shape and I ended up benefit again:( that I would instantly be able to cancel the direct debits (to allow for the fact that those on the dole don't pay C.T.) - rather than having to chase the Council to hand me back any money they owed me (for having paid in advance).

Re the cats - cats aren't stupid I do know. Some neighbours thought their cat had learnt how to operate the doorbell to get let back in again - till they realised that when the cat wanted to be let back in again it would look appealingly at passersby (ie me) until we rang the doorbell for it:rotfl:

mardatha

Sparrowhawks are the same size as a Kestrel pet. We kept and flew and bred hawks for 15 years, my son was a falconer

kidcat

I so want porridge now!! YOu have to stop doing this to me, I am now craving porridge :Dand:o:o:o:o:o have to be honest have never made it so have no idea where to start!

Off to look up some recipes.