Lilian's Blog

4th January 2012

liliansloan — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 18:24:35 +0000

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all

Iits now the beginning of a New Year and time I did something about this Blog site. Over the next week or two I am going to totally update all the family information, art work and several other bits and pieces. If you have written to me in the last 6 months and I so far haven’t done anything about it be patient and I will get to you – particularly the genealogy stuff. I have been incredable busy and this site just got pushed to the bottom of the list.

9th July 2011

liliansloan — Sat, 09 Jul 2011 14:28:06 +0000

Fist of all just a word about names. In my last post I told you about the Gobby family – a family of little brown birds who visit my garden. If any of my readers have the name of Gobby please accept my apologies. In my part of the world gobby means always talking, often saying the wrong things. Sometimes we say that a person has a ‘big mouth’ meaning the same thing as gobby. Yakety yak means constant chatter like small children – noisy and talkative. Gutzy or gutsy means greedy, always eating.

Anyway, this family continues to grow and still provide much entertainment. They seem to fight a lot making up the ‘pecking order’ and who gets fed first.

Now I am being visited by what looks like someone’s pet rabbits. A neighbour tells me that they are probably living wild and have had babies! There is a lovely grey one and today I saw a black one. Don’t seem to be aware of my cat though several weeks ago she did bring in a very small rabbit – unusual for her. It wasn’t dead but whether it survived the fright or not I don’t know.

28th June 2011

liliansloan — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 19:19:24 +0000

Just outside my kitchen window I have placed several bird feeders and coconut feeders. They hang from a hedge which goes along the side of my garden. There are lots of different garden birds visit daily; sparrows, bluetits, great tits, robins, blackbirds and of course the Brown birds. I have great difficulty in identifying all the small brown birds some being female and some being both sexes of some species. Anyway I want to tell you about the Gobby family. There is Patience (the mother) Helper (the father ) and 2 chicks whom I have named Yackity-yak and Gutsy. They live in a nest under the coping stones of my neighbour’s house and I have watched the comings and goings all year.

I watched them make take their fist flight. There were 4 chicks at the time (I think they are still around but I can only identify the 2 I have named) and they were all poised on the roof of the building making a ferocious din. Patience perched on the right and Helpful on the left with the chicks in between. Mum and Dad were obviously trying to encourage them to launch of the roof but all they would do was hop up and down the edge of the roof. Finally Patience decided enough was enough and pinched each on the bum and pushed them off the roof. Success they were now in flight. They didn’t go far but landed on the hedge. Patience and Helpful joined them and led them to the feeders.

Since then I have watched Patience (which must be running out) feed these fat fluffy little creatures endlessly. Meanwhile they yahked and squawked constantly.

Yakety-yak was the worst and is still at it though I saw that he/she has finally got the hang of getting food from the coconut shell. Gutzy on the other hand has also learned to feed but is still chasing Patience around for a top up meal.

I have had so much fun watching this family and I am sure there will be more to come.

The tits and finches though are the bright cookies. They seem to learn faster than all the others – no messing with them when they decide to learn.

a family of pheasants who visit annually - but that's another story

23rd February

liliansloan — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 22:29:59 +0000

Well the saga in Fife continues. What I believe we are now seeing is the dismantle of local government. In the end it will be up to us to pay for all services we require. If you can’t afford it you can’t have it. The rich will prosper, pensions and benefits will be cut or be non-existent and we will have a return to the good old days of Victorian England. The landed gentry will have it all. Bring on the revolution!

22 nd February 2011

liliansloan — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 00:18:13 +0000

Fife Council does it again – total lack of understanding of their voters……I wouldn’t want to be either an SNP or Liberal candidate at the next election. As they say ‘ ther jaket’s on a slack nail’

I know some of you with relatives living in Alan McLure House were at the full Fife Council Emergency meeting today at 2pm. For those of you who weren’t able to attend … here goes……

The administration (SNP and Lib Dems) invoked a procedure that required two thirds of those present to vote to suspend Standing Order 51 (whatever that is). As we know the opposition cannot muster that number of votes when the SNP and LIB Dems vote together and the Conservatives abstain from voting. This is what happened. As the Standing Order had not been suspended, that was the Emergency Meeting of Fife Council finished, before it had even properly started. The SNP and Lib Dem Councillors then walked out of the council chamber to repeated loud shouts of “Shame, Shame” from the public galleries and the opposition Councillors.

Basically they dumped democracy and brought the credibility of our elected local authority into a state of farce. According to the Leader of the Opposition (Alex Rowley) he had asked on several occasions about the validity / legality of their motion and had not been informed by the Chief Executive of Fife Council (Ronnie Hinds) that there was a problem. Cllr Andrew Rodger (Independent) had also queried in advance that the motion was acceptable.

Needless to say everyone (apart from the SNP /Lib Dems who had scuttled back to their rooms) was horrified at what had just occurred in front of our eyes. It would appear that the SNP and Lib Dem councillors had planned in advance of the meeting to prevent any debate or discussion on the future of the Fife Council Care Homes after they had pushed through the closure decision on a 6 / 5 majority at the Social Work & Health Committee on 1st Feb.

I had originally thought that we should take a quiet and measured attitude to the actions of these councillors and what this means to our mothers / fathers / relatives in Council-run Care Home, but after the display of arrogance and duplicity I witnessed today, I am thinking that we now need to take a much more pro-active part in exposing this heartless, cruel policy of the current administration, bringing shame upon each individual councillor who voted to close Alan McLure House and the 9 other homes, and making sure they realise the consequences of their actions. This will not be forgotten when the Council elections take place in 2012.

There is a public meeting in the CISWO, North Street, Glenrothes on Thursday (24th February). I think it starts at 7pm. If I hear different I will let you know. If you can attend, please do so, it will hopefully lead to a more combined effort from all those involved, as I believe that it would be ineffective to have the relatives of each Care Home campaigning individually. The Trade Unions representing all the staff who are being made redundant are also involved.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, I had hoped that these SNP and Lib Dem councillors would have shown some compassion, paid attention to the 77% of people in the Council’s own consultation exercise who wanted Fife Council run homes to continue being available; and would have at least been prepared to debate their decision at the Emergency Council meeting this afternoon. At least I had hoped the Lib Dems would have stood up for their alleged democratic principles and reconsidered their position.

If you have an SNP or a Lib Dem Councillor elected in your Council Ward it might be worthwhile contacting them, but to be honest after watching their performance today, I do not see them straying from their obvious policy of destroying council services and leaving the private companies to make even more profits from our old people in Fife. Some councils in England are reducing Social Work Services to only those that are statutory (ie. have to be provided by law) and closing all other services, leaving the private sector to pick up the profitable bits. I did not think I would see the day that so called “Scottish Nationalists” and Lib. “Democrats” would be looking to right wing England for their policies for us here in Fife!

Sorry about the rant …………. and look out for the STV News ( they had a camera crew at Fife House).

view this link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6tABanzt3k

13 Feb 2011

liliansloan — Sun, 13 Feb 2011 20:20:08 +0000

Yesterday I went to Edinburgh for lunch and to meet up with my family of siblings, nieces and my daughter. We went to the ‘Turkish Kitchen in Rose Street (down the lane at the Charlotte Street end)

What a super lunch we had. I would recommend it to anyone. Lots of flavoursome food served by friendly staff. It is small and I would recommend booking but the atmosphere is cozy and enjoyable. Top Marks.

The Scotland Welsh Rugby match was on later in the day but Rose Street was full of full blooded Welsh singers. Edinburgh is transformed when the Welsh come up en masse.

8/2/2011

liliansloan — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 17:57:36 +0000

Watched the film Avatar last night. What an amazing piece of work. Although the story is a bit of Cowboys and Indians meets Fantasia with a touch of American gung-ho invasion tactics, thrown in….visually it was stunning. I would love to see it in 3D.

The imagination of the the scene creator has to be applauded.

4th February 2011

liliansloan — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 20:52:17 +0000

Now for some more rotten weather and along with it comes the cold! It never ceases to amaze me how much gunk the head can produce from a head cold….and cough – I thought my insides would be empty by the time I had finished. I haven’t slept properly in a week.

Enough of that though. I am desperate to get out into the garden and clean up the grot from the winter. The garden is looking really awful but the hopeful sign is that some of the bulbs are pushing through. Maybe Spring won’t be too far away.

24th January

liliansloan — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 22:47:36 +0000

Went to see ‘The King’s Speech’ today and enjoyed it very much. A film worth seeing about George VI’s stammer. Last night we watched ‘Amazing Grace’ the story of William Wilberforce and his fight for the abolishion of slavery in the British Empire. This too was a first class film.

20th January 2011

liliansloan — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 19:26:04 +0000

On a happier note from yesterday, Glenrothes Art club is advertising a number of Art and Craft Workshops. Details below:

We are also arranging a fundraising Lunch at the Rotunda Restaurant of the Adam Smith College, Stenton Campus.