I have a dream....

2008-Apr-29 - The mystery of the handbag

Her Majesty has always a meat hook in her handbag.
Queen Elizabeth of Great Britain celebrated her eighty-second birthday on 21st April. I shall never forget this, for my husband’s birthday was on the 23rd of April. And he too would have been 82.
Well, back to the Queen, she is a member of the most colourful royal family of Europe and apart from the Danish, the oldest family. The Danish Queen Margarethe and the British Queen are descendants of Vikings. William the Conqueror, the ancestor of Queen Elizabeth, was a Viking.
Queen Elizabeth is known to carry always a handbag. But something that not everybody knows, is that she uses the bag to communicate with her staff. They watch her bag carefully. If she places the bag on a table during a cosy tête-à-tête it means: Time to go!
Bag on the floor means: This guest is very boring!
What are the contents of these handbags? This question kept journalists busy for years. Anyway it is said that her handbag contains an S-shaped meat hook to hang her bag on. For the rest it contains articles of personal matter.
Queen Elizabeth cannot do without her handbags. Our Queen Beatrix cannot do without her hats. They are her trade mark. BTW tomorrow we celebrate her birthday. It's a national holiday and everybody is taking part in it.

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2008-Apr-10 - An interesting vehicle

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I passed by my old school, where I used to teach, when my children were young, and saw this bike. I thought it such a great idea for a family with little kids to use this in stead of taking the car. The owner calls it a long vehicle.

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2008-Mar-2 - Watch out for a Frenchman!!

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My grandson has got a new tricycle. This is better for him than a bicycle. He can keep his balance easily now and there are grownups who use tricycles for this reason. It stands to reason that he is pretty proud of it, so his father and I tried to take photos, which he likes in a way but he doesn't want to show this. My grandson is a little Frenchman, for he was born in France! So I can say:"Watch out for a Frenchman..."!

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2008-Feb-27 - Happy Memories.

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The parsonage in B., where my sister and her family lived for 27 years, is at least 150 years old. We spent many holidays there, during the time that my brother-in-law was a minister of the Reformed Church in this village. Two of their children were born here. My mother celebrated her eightieth birthday here and in the church opposite the house, two of her grandchildren sang and played for her. The house has 5 bedrooms and a bathroom on the first floor. Downstairs are two livingrooms, a study, an enormous kitchen and a sun room. My broter-in-law has been retired since 1994 now and he and my sister live in a far smaller house now. Their children have their own homes and come to stay every now and then.
I remember that my children loved to stay with their aunt and uncle when they were young. My sister has a lot of imagination. One day she told the children that there was an old treasure hidden in a hollow tree in the garden. It was all written on an old map of the garden, but they had to look for the map first. She then suggested that such old maps are sometimes hidden in old bibles like the one she had on the mantelpiece in the largest livingroom. Of course the children went looking for the map in the bible. And lo and behold there it was: an old dirty map of the garden with miraculously enough the same trees that must have been there 120 years ago. There was also the hollow tree and when they went climbing in it, they found a real treasure. ( My sister had bought some plastic necklaces and rings in the supermarket). The children had been busy all afternoon and they had enjoyed themselves immensely.Opposite this house, which is no longer a parsonage, is the church, built in the Middle Ages.

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2008-Feb-20 - When was the last time you surprised yourself?

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When did you surprise yourself?

Not so long ago. There was this lady who was always criticising me. She often came to visit me and we had a nice conversation for a while, then she got nasty. Once she stared hard at my left hand, her whole face got a disapproving look and out she blurred: "Good grief what have you got there on your hand?" I looked surprised at my hand and in particularly at my ring finger. I mumbled something like: "Oh that's a pewter ring from Norway".

She interrogated, for that was what it looked like, me further: "And do you really like it????"She gave me a look of reproof. I said:"Yes of course otherwise I wouldn't wear it, would I?!"" Well", she said," pewter ought to be polished until it looks like silver". Now I happen to watch "Antiques Roadshow" quite often and I heard once said by an expert that tinware must look like tinware and not like silver. But I didn't say it.

Another time she saw some Norwegian lessons on my table laying and again her face looked angry. She said on a disapproving tone with an angry look:"Why do you bother to learn Norwegean, you will never use it!!"

I said :"Well in fact I always use it when I am in Norway and people over there like it. She :"I hate that lanquage. Take French, that's a beautiful language. But Norwegian ...Ugh !!"She made a sound as if she wanted to throw up. Now I happen to know that she doesn't speak either language, but I said nothing.In the meantime I was sick and tired of this woman, who even didn't speak Dutch properly.
Then a short time afterwards I had a couple of people, whom I had taught English for a long time during the wintertime.She was one of the students. I made coffee and had a biscuit with it. She took one and immediately cried out:"Wil What the hell have you got here. It tastes of nothing!!!" Then I did something I never did before. I stood up, looked sternly at her and said:"That's very rude, it is not done, and if you don't like it leave it !"Lateron she phoned me and said that she didn't want to continue taking lessons from me, I said that it was okay and ended the relationship there and then.

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2008-Feb-4 - When the sun is sinking.....

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I love these sunsets. Every day another sunset, every day another poem. This is one by Alice Schenberger.

When the golden sun is sinking.
And your mind from care is free.
When of others you are thinking.
Will you sometimes think of me?

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2008-Jan-15 - Another sunset...another goodbye...

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Sunsets in our lives are like saying goodbye to friends who are leaving us for ever. Each of our sunsets is unavoidable. Let it therefore be a beautiful one! To be remembered with love.