0800hrs Christmas morning, got to bed a 0230 (Midnight Mass ran on a little late!), so not running on a full tank yet. Prepare the Christmas morning bacon sandwiches for the family.

0815hrs Through out, for my feathered friends, crusts, which someone will not eat, and the bacon rinds.

0817hrs Sat at the table, drinking my tea, watching the children start on the "Roses", took a glance to the window, to see the feast I had left for the birds slowly been tucked into. To my shock, one of the birds turned and stared at me, now I could have swarn that he said, "I hope these rinds are Kosher, I just wont believe you if you tell me it chicken"

What had I done? I had not remembered other members of the family, the ones outside the window, could some of them been celebrating Hanukkah? would some of them needed Halal bacon rinds? should I have disgussed it as something else? And I had not stopped to thing about the birds who could have been Eurosceptics and not agreed with Danish or Swedish Bacon? H E L P!

Turned around for another sip of tea, turned back, the birds had all gone, well thats another morning of worrying over and done with!

For my part - Christmas was a great day, until I realised why the tablet bottles say, don't drink alcohol, honestly I only had half a glass of blue nun (now she is not going to harm anyone) well combined with the cocktail of tablets I'm on, it proved a very interesting evening sat by the big white telephone.

Needles to say, I've learnt my lesson in time for the New Year and will be sticking to Ribeana!!!

Paul:p

I don’t know if any of you will have seen this list before, I seem to remember it doing the rounds at work a few years ago.

Dear All,

You might need an Egg Nog or Mulled Wine and mince pie with this letter!!

My hands are so shaky at the moment, that even my typing has slowed down, because I’m hitting all the wrong letters, but I’m sure my ex-teachers out there would say that my spelling was never all that great anyway, or my grandma. So please excuse me, if I don't manage to scrawl you a Christmas card this year, you would never be able to read it, let alone the postie deliver it!

So here is my Christmas Greeting to all my dear friends;

May the Spirit of Christmas shine upon you
May the Christ child’s birth fill you with glory, awe & wonder, once more
May all children, smile with happiness, may they come to know the true meaning of Christmas
May we all know the true sacrifice his birth was to mean for us.
May the light of his birth shine brighter and stronger throughout every corner of the world
May next year be kinder to you than the past year, with Peace and Happiness

So much has happened this year, that I don’t know where all the time has gone to, in and out of hospital, several times, numerous visit to out patient consultants. But eventually, we have a glimpse of light at the end of the tunnel, and I’m learning how to do things in a different way, adapting and accepting, or should that be the other way around.

I’m not the only one though, My Team - Mel and the children have been through a lot of changes this year as well, with me being at home, but without their Love & Support, I don’t know where I would have been. Thank you to my family near and far, including my adopted Sister!

This is beginning to sound like an Oscar award ceremony thank you speech, I have to thank everyone at St Mark’s, to Tim, the Prayer Circle, the Healing Team, everyone who has been so kind to me, if I started to write everyone’s name down, ’the ceremony would over run into the News at Ten’ Each and everyone one of you deserve an award for sticking with me, and I’m sure you know how grateful I am.

I’m so very grateful for the man who invented the world wide web, without this precious gift from him, I would not have been able to keep in such regular contact with everyone, and through my letters, feel a sense of purpose and satisfaction.

I can’t forget to thank the doctors at Bennfield Surgery, my consultant at Coventry, the professors in London, who have all had a go at prodding and poking me and not forgetting, what seems to be the hundreds of medical students who have taken histories and examined me as well, I hope they learnt something, I certainly did, one thought I was pregnant, whilst another thought I had the plague! I can't forget to mention the friends I have made at the discussion forum of (www.wemove.org), a great source of support and knowledge and also those friends I have made whilst I have been "blogging" (www.akerman.blog.co.uk) Well I had to get an advert in some where!

My Love and thanks to you all, Shalom & God Bless

Paul

P.S., Forgot the joke to end with -

There are so many to choose from so here are a couple or three;

Recipe For Christmas Joy

Ingredients

1/2 cup Hugs
4 tsp Kisses
2 cups Smiles
4 cups Love
1 cup Special Holiday Cheer
1/2 cup Peace on Earth
3 tsp Christmas Spirit
2 cups Goodwill Toward Man
1 Sprig of Mistletoe
1 medium-size bag of Christmas Snowflakes (the regular kind won't do!)

Method

Mix Hugs, Kisses, Smiles and Love until consistent.
Blend in Holiday Cheer, Peace on Earth, Christmas Spirit and the Good
Will toward Men. Use the mixture to fill a large, warm heart, where it
can be stored for a lifetime. (It never goes bad!)
Serve as desired under mistletoe, sprinkled liberally with special
Christmas Snowflakes.
It is especially good when accompanied by Christmas Carols and family
get-togethers.
Serve to one and all.

Thanks to Mary Campbell

The Price Of True Love

The price of giving all the items bestowed by the "true love" of the song
"The Twelve Days of Christmas" may be a little beyond most people's
budget. The following costs were calculated for 1998, based upon a
report issued in 1995 by PNC Bank Corp., assuming an annual rate of
inflation of 2.5 percent

1. Partridge in a pear tree $38
2. Turtle doves $54
3. French hens $16
4. Calling birds $302
5. Gold rings $485
6. Geese-a-laying $162
7. Swans-a-swimming $7,538
8. Maids-a-milking $37
9. Pipers piping $2,807
10. Ladies dancing $3,245
11. Lords-a-leaping $1,194
12. Drummers drumming $1,293

Total to give gifts once $17,170
Total to give as in song* $78,986

* Singing the song in its entirety results in 364 presents. The partridge
is given 12 times, two doves 11 times (22 total), etc., etc., etc...

Thanks to Mary Campbell

and lastly, Sorry, I could not resist this next one …..

Chrismukah

I received this bulletin today and thought I should pass it on in time to save everyone the embarrassment of making passé, partisan holiday plan faux pas.

RE: Chrismukah

Subject: UNEXPECTED MERGER

Continuing the current trend of large-scale mergers and acquisitions, it was announced today at a press conference that Christmas and Hanukkah will merge.

An industry source said that the deal had been in the works about 1300 years.

While details were not available at press time, it is believed that the over-head cost of having twelve days of Christmas and eight days of Hanukkah was becoming prohibitive for both sides. By combining forces, we're told, the world will be able to enjoy consistently high-quality service during the Fifteen Days of Chrismukah, as the new holiday is being called.

Massive layoffs are expected, with lords a-leaping and maids a-milking being the hardest hit.

As part of the conditions of the agreement, the letters on the dreydl, currently in Hebrew, will be replaced by Latin, thus becoming unintelligible to a wider audience.

Also, instead of translating to "A great miracle happened there," the message on the dreydl will be the more generic "Miraculous stuff happens."

In exchange, it is believed that Jews will be allowed to use Santa Claus and his vast merchandising resources for buying and delivering their gifts.

One of the sticking points holding up the agreement for at least three hundred years was the question of whether Jewish children could leave milk and cookies for Santa even after having eaten meat for dinner. A breakthrough came last year, when Oreos were finally declared to be Kosher. All sides appeared happy about this.

Fortunately for all concerned, he said, Kwanzaa will help to maintain the competitive balance. He then closed the press conference by leading all present in a rousing rendition of "Oy Vey, All Ye Faithful.

Thanks to Marc Whitney

What is Fumaric Acid? Does it give you wind?

2nd clue - good old Ronald Regan enjoyed 57 of these sweets

Well I’ve given up worrying about the birds dietary needs. The poor things seem to be grateful for whatever they can get. But it’s once you chuck out the stale bread and crumpets that their true characters come through;

The Sparrows are usually the first of the morning, sitting on the fence,hey who can blame them for that, checking out the lie of the land for cats etc., then they flutter down, take two pecks, and straight back up to the fence.

Next down are my least favourite of the garden bird, the pigeons, no I’m not being birdist, but lets face it, they are stupid. There were five of them around the bread yesterday morning, each one of them ‘firing’ their beaks into the bread, and as they withdrew their silly looking beaks, they sort of shake the bread and valuable morsels are fired all over the place - no table manners. Whilst the five pigeons seem to have a pecking order amongst themselves and there are the more dominant ones , down comes a little Sparrow and barges past all of them for one peck, and then off it fly’s again.

The Blackbird arrives later on in the day, they must be bad morning birds, anyway they land to see what’s left, their lovely black plumage, and beautiful yellow beaks, but you only see the Daddy blackbirds, to date I’ve not seen any Mummy blackbirds, probably because they are afraid of beaking the trades description act, by being brown instead of black!

Mr/Mrs/Ms Jenny Wren has been down a few times during the day, balancing on the fence, just like the Sparrow, and then down we go, but it spends more time at the bread. Perhaps if I put a better quality bread down they would stay longer? Or even my home made?

The Speckled brigade, the starlings, never used to like these birds either, but I suppose they have got a lot more going about them than the Pigeons. Is it me, or can you still tell the juveniles from their Ma’s and Pa’s, they still seem to follow the darker coloured birds, and on our small patio I’ve counted a dozen or more. I given them 10 out of 10 for table manners and the same for entertainment value.

No shows at the table, so far this year, is our national bird - the Robin, do they have to wait for a typical Christmas card scene with snow and red Holly berries, before they put in an appearance?

GOD KNOWS