We Peaceful People Have It Tough, These Days

Hi there, my peace-loving friends.
'Cause that's what we are, right? 

I cannot imagine anyone in his or her right mind, no really sensible intelligent well-thinking person, who wakes up in the morning and thinks "Right, who can I kill today? What kid can I tear limb from limb, what mother can I rape, what man can I behead, what village can I pillage, how much blood can I shed to fill up the emptiness of my heart?"

Yet I woke up this morning and the first thing I heard was talk of war, of terrorists, of bombs, of jet fighters and that all of this was the reality and justified and "the right thing to do".

Well.
Have a listen to the song in the link below. And then dig out your peace signs and your placards and plaster them all over the Internet!

What is it good for? Absolutely NOTHING!

10,040 Readers?! Wow-wee, So Nice to See You!

LWhen I started this blog on November 24th 2013 I didn't dare dream that so many people would bother to read my stuff!

I thought that if I could scrape or drag in a couple of readers a week, it would be lovely.
Not knowing that I would have hundreds a week, and sometimes more than 1,500 a month at any given time.

And the parts of the world that you live in amaze me as well. Hundreds of readers a week in Ukraine? I mean...sure, great, wonderful that you are reading my blog folks, especially in the event of politics going on (I try - and mostly succeed - to stay away from politics; I'm certain that you have noticed); keep it up by all means.

On the subject of statistics:
my American readers are the most numerous, 
closely followed by my own countrymen,
very closely followed by people from the Ukraine
and the rest is quite evenly divided between Australia, South-Africa, India, Germany, England
and the occasional reader in France, Poland, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Greece, Latvia, Russia, Ireland, Canada, Rumania, China, Thailand. 

Now wouldn't it be wonderful to have, say, Hawaii, or the Solomon Islands, or anywhere in Africa, or Surinam.

Anyway. For ALL of you, I have looked up one of the funniest little videos I could find. It is about cats... They are one of my pet interests, simply because I think they are so inscrutable and always doing their own thing. So if you hate cats, skip it.
(Although...you could try it anyway, perhaps you'll surprise yourself by laughing out loud)

Link: I dare you to watch this without at least smiling.

Well? Bet you smiled, or even laughed out loud!

Have a wonderful evening, until next time.

It's Official: Autumn Has Arrived in the Wetlands!

We have been enjoying a gone-away-and-then-back-Summer for the last fortnight, but now temperatures have plummeted. Nights and early mornings are misty, clouds hide the sun, leaves are falling, spiders are absolutely everywhere (and they are HUGE this year) coats have been recovered from closets and people start talking about turning up the heat.

So I thought I'd do an Autumn post. With lots of Autumny photos, to help you get in the right mood and prepare for this melancholy time of year.

Credit should and must be shown to the French FB site Photo'graffiti, where many of these photos were uploaded in the first place. But I have found some photos elsewhere on the www as well, and some of them are simply my own.

I don't know about you, but falling leaves make me somewhat sad. Even though I admire their lovely colours, and like their smell, the trees shedding can give me a big dose of melancholia.

Then again the hazelnut tree peppering my garden with nuts gives me a happy feeling. Must be the prehistoric gatherer gene still going strong inside of me...I simply love gathering nuts.

When my kids were little we used to collect leaves and chestnuts and put them in an Autumn display on the windowsill. All kinds of insects would come inside as well, and try to hide behind the curtains...These days we have put up an insect hotel outside (much more practical).

This last photograph is one by my son, Wibe Koopman. He took it in Denmark. I love it.

Stop Your Messing Around...?

Good morning to you (Yes, Ukraine, especially to you! 119 readers in a week? Wow!). Last night I went to a great Ska concert.

A Message to You, Rudy

Click on the link and enjoy the long-lost music of The Specials.
It is such a shame that this wonderful music genre has all but disappeared from our radios. But, thankfully, not from our collective memories!
My local theatre, TweeHondjes, had reserved their largest hall for a ska concert by the Dutch ska band Peen! and it was filled with two kinds of people: youngsters who have been turned on to Peen! and oldies like me who have lived through the Seventies and Eighties and who have fond memories of the brief Ska revival (after all, the original ska came from the fifties I believe).
And it was wonderful. I was dancing non-stop.

This Sunday morning my knees are protesting and my back hurts, but it was worth it.
For those of you who do not know much about Ska, let me educate you (a bit).
One of the best known artists is Desmond Decker.

Live BBC footage of The Israelites

And we Dutchmen got acquainted with Madness in the early Eighties and locked this bunch of English madmen into our hearts. Let me show you why. And do sing along, the lyrics are provided!

Boat on the River Nile

Digging for Gold? Gina the Tunneler.

We have had our dog for almost 10 years now. And she's sweet, absolutely. But she has this annoying habit: she digs up the flowerbeds.

Now obviously I know many (most?) dogs dig. They like to make themselves a cosy nest for sleeping in. And I remember our first Dalmatian dog digging holes underneath my Mum's beloved roses (alongside those dug by the chickens, by the way). 

But Gina doesn't dig her bed, she just...digs. Huge holes. And afterwards she comes in all muddy and flops down on the parquet all happy. And I go into the garden with dismay, and view yet another Hydrangea bush dug up, or my lovely Echinacea covered in earth.

She started in a small way, a couple of years ago, in the bed between the back and side garden, and we forgave her, for she had found the tunnel of a vole who obviously lived underneath that bed. We even praised her, I remember, clever girl, that will show that vole!

But then the small hole got bigger, and deeper, and we were certain that the vole had moved on ages before, and she dug up all my tulip bulbs in the process.

So we put up wire netting, to protect the bulbs and to stop her. She simply tore out the netting. Then we tried chaining her up when we weren't around to stop her. She howled. So now we try to keep an eye on her when she goes into the garden.

And as long as our eye is on her, she is innocence itself, simply snoozing in the sun or dozing in the shade, nowhere near a flowerbed, in fact.

And then, as soon as our attention lags, she is at it again. No way that she is digging for mice or voles (we hardly have any left anyway, with Viggo hunting them mercilessly) - and the holes get more numerous and bigger every time.

Viggo on Life (sort of)

Good morning to you, where ever you are!
Viggo has graciously consented to another interview.

Q: What prompted you to grant a third interview?

V: I want to set the record straight. After the second one I got a lot of flack about being arrogant and grumpy. I am not grumpy. In fact I am lovable, intelligent, funny, generous,  a good listener and...did I mention generous?

Q: Can you give an example of your generosity?

V: Of course I can! I bring my woman a nice juicy mouse, vole or mole at least once a week. I used to bring it right to her in bed, but for some reason she has made it plain that she wants them delivered elsewhere. Beats me. Anyway, I now leave them next to the back door, and she loves that. Every time I present one, usually with the head neatly severed, she shouts "Oh Viggo!". That says it all, doesn't it? She loves me.

Q: And you aren't tempted to eat them yourself?

V: Well...Yeah. Sometimes I cannot help myself. They smell so good, and I get these urges... But that's only sometimes, mind. Mostly I keep them for her. She deserves them, she's a good woman, really, she does her best. But yeah, I occasionally eat one. The thing is, I always regret it afterwards. The mouse hair doesn't agree with me, so I tend to barf a bit.

Q: Eeeeuw!

V: Don't be silly! It's  a fact of life that cats barf. I'm good at it, I do it discreetly in the garden, not everywhere in the living room like that tubby tabby that my woman keeps inviting into my home. Well, strictly speaking she's not a tabby of course, but in essence she is. Get it?

Q: What tubby tabby is that?

V: Oh, that's a sad case. She comes when her people go away on holiday. My woman has, in a moment of weakness, said that I will be hospitable. The tubby tabby comes from a shelter, like I do, but she has a screw loose. Even though she has been here numerous times, she always spends at least two days hiding behind the settee and she has this thing about staying in the cupboard under the stairs. I keep trying to get her to relax, you know, I even try to play with her to loosen her up a bit, but she just growls. Talk about grumpy, now there's a grumpy cat for you! And she hates my dog. Gina and I get along fine, Gina knows her place. But the tubby tabby is afraid of Gina. Quite comical, you should see her jump when Gina barks.

Q: How do you feel about the other cats coming into your garden?

V: Funny you should mention that. Tubby tabby is allowed into the garden, as long as she keeps her claws off the fish in the pond. They are mine, simple. And the frogs. They are mine as well. And come to think of it the rodents; mine! And tabby should stick to the paths, as the earth is mine as well. So...But the other cats should keep out of my garden. I'm quite strict about that!

Q: What do you do to keep them out of it then?

V: I have my methods. Me being black is an advantage. They tend to see me at the last possible moment, hehehe. Also I practice a very ancient defense technique, which originated in the East, called Cat Fu. I am not very heavy, but I'm fast as lightning. And it helps that I keep my claws sharp, obviously.

Q: Okay, well, thank you very much, I appreciate this.

V: No problem. Always happy to oblige. Now piss off, it is time for my snooze. You can put the extra bags of Purina in the back, my woman will take care of them, ta.

China? Ni hao! And France, bienvenue! Join me for Dinner?

Welcome, my Chinese and French friends!
So nice to see you!
I look at my statistics and see quite a lot of you are visiting, and it pleases me no end. Hope you are fine!
Today I have been cooking and cooking and cooking...

I have made 10 pots of grape jam (cannot bear to see my grape harvest go to waste on the vine) and I have baked a vegetable baklava.

This is only halfway through...Later on I have added green and black olives, and a mixture of feta cheese, 3 eggs and old Dutch Gouda cheese to this mixture of courgettes, peppers, onions and garlic and have seasoned it with Greek herbs.

And no, it isn't my own recipe, I'm not that good. It is from 24 Kitchen.

It is now in the oven, covered with filo pastry and sesame seeds.

And I cannot wait! My mouth is watering!

Good food is better than sex, in my opinion (well, I am 56...that explains a lot I suppose).

It's a good thing my family doesn't bother to read my blog :P

Anyway...

Food.

We were talking about food.

I have been raised by a woman who has almost starved between 1943 and 1945. That explains a lot as well...

Food was a major thing in our house. And it is important in mine. 

Done!

Have a lovely evening!