What do you enjoy?

[floo]

deleted

[SusanDoris]

I enjoy going to the gym, swimming (for which I can go safely for one half-hour a week), tap dancing of course! and being able to walk. Talking books are not the same as reading of course, but the choice is better nowadays.

[Shaker]

Possibly books first and foremost - I've been a book fiend all my life so the personal library is fairly large by now. Absolutely love books and reading and everything about them - choosing, browsing, waiting for them to be delivered, unwrapping them, everything.

Music is equal to books or as near as makes no different. I have a huge collection of CDs of every conceivable genre of music which I still buy since a CD can give you all the benefits of a vinyl LP - album art, lyrics, extra information and so forth - without all the drawbacks of vinyl so well expressed by L.A. just this morning, which also puts it ahead of the rather drearily functional utility of a bald digital purchase.

I write music as well - not that any of it will ever be heard, but I don't do it for that but for the challenge of doing something difficult as well as I'm able.

I used to paint (oils) at one time but haven't for a while, predominantly landscapes, although I keep saying that I'll get back into it when I get around to it.

Nature - photographing or simply being in, growing up as I did and having spent almost all of my life in the countryside.

[Étienne d'Angleterre]

Fishing, not that I ever really catch anything. I just love being by the water with my rod in my hand.

Playing music, mostly piano. I think I am reasonable but my wife thinks I am a noise polluter.

Restoring old things. I have quite an extensive garage and love getting hold of something old and broken, most often bicycles, and making them work again.

[Shaker]

Fishing, not that I ever really catch anything. I just love being by the water with my rod in my hand.

That's not fishing, that's flashing.

[Brownie]

I like sleeping.

[Rhiannon]

That's not fishing, that's flashing.

 

[Rhiannon]

Nature and the countryside are the first thing on my list. Probably more than 'something I enjoy' as they are an intrinsic part of who I am. I didn't grow up in the countryside and can't really say where it comes from, but being outside in all weathers (apart from extreme heat) and experiencing and noticing what is around me matters a great deal.

Music - whether I want something loud to play in my car, something funky for my kitchen it something quiet to contemplate in the evening, it means a huge amount to me too. I don't really understand the technical aspect of it, but then I don't need to.

Books - because I love learning. I so wish I'd gone into an academic career - I would loved to have been a historian or possibly an archaeologist and spent my whole life learning. But nobody ever thought it was a suitable career for someone like me and it was never presented to me as an option. So instead - books. And lectures and things... Books also present me with a chance to savour something else I love - words, and how they can be used to paint pictures or add a richness of meaning it history. Even better is when words give you the personality of the writer and you find yourself in the company of someone you really like, someone who may not even be with us any more - last night I was reading Roger Deakin.

Books - fiction books to cart me off to another world. Somtimes nothing else will do other than a Victorian/Edwardian gothic ghost story or a well-written historical murder mystery.

Upcycling, crafts and interior design. I'm a bit of a magpie and love searching out vintage stuff to do up (I'm a big fan of Annie Sloan chalk paint) and have a big stash of vintage fabric, buttons and trimmings that I'm unlikely ever to get through. I upcycle lamps and make cushions and sew silk roses. Then I like to figure out how it comes together in a room, in a home. Love it.

And this place. Bonkers though it probably is, I enjoy being a part of R&E. I've learned tons here, honed my own thinking, and met some fab people. I'll always be grateful to Jak for it.

[Bubbles]

Fishing, not that I ever really catch anything. I just love being by the water with my rod in my hand.

Playing music, mostly piano. I think I am reasonable but my wife thinks I am a noise polluter.

Restoring old things. I have quite an extensive garage and love getting hold of something old and broken, most often bicycles, and making them work again.

What sort of fishing do you do?

Course
Fly
Sea ?

[Owlswing]

What sort of fishing do you do?

Course
Fly
Sea ?

Compliments?

JOKE! (Just in case anyone thinks otherwise!)

[Bubbles]

I used to go fly fishing and am thinking of retrieving my stuff from the shed, I enjoy mackrel fishing ( spinning from the shore)when they are in, but also do fish for other sea fish with a variety of different methods.

Also enjoy choosing heritage fruit trees to grow and am about to start an experimental growing of things in straw bales.
( am growing an orchard). ( but not on straw bales ) 

Also have deer and badgers in the orchard which I enjoy capturing on film ( nature cam).

I enjoy camping out with friends and cooking outside over a fire pit.

I enjoy going to various rallies and meeting people.

I also make jewellery of various sorts and used to make glass beads ( by melting glass) but had to give up due to lack of space.

I enjoy cooking, music, trying new things.

My orchard is probably my most enjoyable one, I love seeing the blossom and leaves coming on my trees in the spring and the wildlife
 

[Owlswing]

Reading - Science fiction, Sir Terry Pratchett (as if anyone here needs to be told that one!), humour of most sorts, early modern history, the history of witchcraft.

Music - Just about anything recorded or written pre-1975.

Collecting - stamps, British QEII mint - Yu-Gi-Oh cards - Monster High dolls - POP dolls - dolls of anime and manga characters.

[Owlswing]

My husband used to collect stamps and coins as a young chap, but lost interest years ago. Some of the items could be valuable. Unfortunately none of our kids or grandchildren have the slightest interest in coin/stamp collecting.

I once found a couple of old halfpennies in a field, from the reign of Queen Victoria when she was a young woman.

I don't suppose my stamp collection, being QEII, will have any real value until Charlie becomes King, if he ever does. God (the one of your choice) help us - Queen Camilla Park-and-Ride!

I still have my grandfather's collection of early Victorian pennies - what he used to call the Honolulu pennies. It wasn't until I was in the army that he considered me old enough to explain the connection between Victoria and Honolulu - the picture of Brittania of the reverse of later pennies had the trident resting on her knee, the earlier ones had it resting rather higher up her legs - on 'er lulu! 

[Bramble]

I used to go fly fishing and am thinking of retrieving my stuff from the shed

I was recently rummaging through my 96 year old mother's attic (I've had to ban her from going up there on her own!) and came across my fly fishing stuff, untouched since I was a teenager. The fly tying materials had mostly turned to dust and the beautiful split cane rods are now antique pieces, sadly long since superseded by soulless carbon fibre. It was a poignant moment and took me back to my four year old self, when I lived on the banks of the (Scottish) river Dee, and would hang over the banks and gaze at the long brown backs of salmon, swaying in the deep clear pools below. I've been bewitched by streams and rivers and their inhabitants ever since. Later, I learned to hunt for the bright small trout that eked a living in the fast mountain streams and would spot you a mile off if you didn't slither up to the water's edge on your belly like a snake. They fought like demons and tasted of the limpid peaty water. When we moved down to England I fished for the fatter but duller trout and grayling of the turbid lowland rivers, in the days when water voles were a common sight slicing a V shaped ripple through the water as they swam from bank to bank. It was fishing that introduced me to entomology, as I discovered the fascinating world of Ephemeroptera and how to imitate them in silk, fur and feather. I recall longing to tie a 'real' tups indispensable, which requires the hair from a ram's scrotum. Now since this isn't, as you might expect, a widely available product, I was obliged to approach the large ram that grazed in the field opposite our house, armed with a pair of scissors. There followed a lengthy stand off, during which the ram and I silently came to an arrangement that left us both with our dignity but me without the desired material for my fly. Ah, blue remembered hills!

[Bramble]

Almost certainly not. She suffers from dizziness but still insists on standing on chairs to change light bulbs, which is bad enough, but the ladder to the loft is really perilous!

[Bramble]

You have my sympathies. My mum only gave up driving 5 months ago (very reluctantly) after reversing at high speed into someone's garage as she left the local GP's surgery. She completely demolished the rear end of the car but mercifully the garage came off a lot better. As she was parked in a disabled space directly in front of the surgery I was just glad she hadn't put the car into a forward gear, otherwise she'd have one straight through a large window into the waiting room! Amazingly, the motor insurance company sent her a huge box of flowers.

Talking of the hazards of old people driving, I've just remembered a time, many years ago, when I didn't have much money and was living in a dilapidated cottage in the Yorkshire Dales miles from anywhere. I survived mainly on roadkill but occasionally hitch-hiked into Leyburn on market day when I got fed up with flattened rabbits and crows. One winter's day after severe flooding a crusty old farmer (straight out of a James Herriot novel) picked me up in a battered Land Rover. He drove leaning over the steering wheel, his face pressed up to the windscreen, and when I commented on the extensive flood waters, which were lapping the edge of the lane, he just grunted "What floods?" I was glad when we got to Leyburn in one piece!

[Étienne d'Angleterre]

That's not fishing, that's flashing.

It wasn't intentional.

We need a Sid James emoticon.

[Étienne d'Angleterre]

What sort of fishing do you do?

Course
Fly
Sea ?

Hi,


I am 90% Course and 5 % Fly.

Went out for the first time this year last Thursday and had quite a few Perch on the canal so was a good start to the year.

I will be fly fishing now though. Mostly trout on a local brook, but it is very difficult, it is so narrow and bendy that you can't get enough line out to make the rod load up properly. It is a lovely spring thing to do though. Like Rhiannon's experience you get to walk along the stream casting your fly and at the end you arrive at the local pub in the village for a pint brewed at the microbrewery a few miles down the road. Hard to beat that.

Throughout the summer months I am mostly in pursuit of Tench. I fish for them in local farm pits and whilst it is east to catch fish of 1-2 lbs, if you want bigger ones you have to crawl on your belly and drop the bait, silently, in front of the fish you are stalking, usually at around 4-5 am. I use a free-lined bait of bread paste on a centre pin real. Best yet is 5 lb 8 oz


Ambition for this year is to catch a surface feeding carp on a fly fished dog biscuit.

Good luck, and tight lines!

[Étienne d'Angleterre]

I was recently rummaging through my 96 year old mother's attic (I've had to ban her from going up there on her own!) and came across my fly fishing stuff, untouched since I was a teenager. The fly tying materials had mostly turned to dust and the beautiful split cane rods are now antique pieces, sadly long since superseded by soulless carbon fibre. It was a poignant moment and took me back to my four year old self, when I lived on the banks of the (Scottish) river Dee, and would hang over the banks and gaze at the long brown backs of salmon, swaying in the deep clear pools below. I've been bewitched by streams and rivers and their inhabitants ever since. Later, I learned to hunt for the bright small trout that eked a living in the fast mountain streams and would spot you a mile off if you didn't slither up to the water's edge on your belly like a snake. They fought like demons and tasted of the limpid peaty water. When we moved down to England I fished for the fatter but duller trout and grayling of the turbid lowland rivers, in the days when water voles were a common sight slicing a V shaped ripple through the water as they swam from bank to bank. It was fishing that introduced me to entomology, as I discovered the fascinating world of Ephemeroptera and how to imitate them in silk, fur and feather. I recall longing to tie a 'real' tups indispensable, which requires the hair from a ram's scrotum. Now since this isn't, as you might expect, a widely available product, I was obliged to approach the large ram that grazed in the field opposite our house, armed with a pair of scissors. There followed a lengthy stand off, during which the ram and I silently came to an arrangement that left us both with our dignity but me without the desired material for my fly. Ah, blue remembered hills!

Hi,

I also have a couple of split can rods that I have inherited c. 1930. I restored them, fitted new eyes and re-varnished.

I caught a 8 lb carp on one last season and whilst during the fight I was constantly in fear that it might disintegrate into matchwood it actually performed really well. I would say, get your old rods and give them a go. I would draw the line at scrotums though

[Owlswing]

I am relying on my children to tell me when they feel I should no longer be driving, if I haven't clocked the fact myself. As it is I can no longer drive at night as my night vision is too poor.

I thought that it was now possible to get spectacles with lenses that correct this problem.

[BeRational]

Badminton, cycling, 5 a side football, walks with my wife.

[Leonard James]

It doesn't work for me.

I have the same problem, but the oculist told me it was due to an incipient cataract, and I am waiting to have it treated.

Could yours be the same?

[Brownie]

Don't tell her that Len!  She'll be worrying herself silly.  In any case, an optician would pick up a cataract on a routine eye examination.  Night vision is poor for all sorts of reasons.

[Leonard James]

Don't tell her that Len!  She'll be worrying herself silly.  In any case, an optician would pick up a cataract on a routine eye examination.

That is precisely how mine was found. The optician said she couldn't improve on my glasses, but suggested a cataract investigation.

Night vision is poor for all sorts of reasons.

If any of the reasons are treatable, I would be glad to hear about them. I am not looking forward to a cataract operation, even though I am assured it is simple.

[horsethorn]

Well, I'm an on-and-off reader; I build up half a dozen or so books, and then spend my evenings reading for a while.

I'm still larping, and doing/coaching Tai Chi (just bought my first metal practice broadsword!).

We also enjoy dressing up for events - mostly steampunk, but we might do something a bit different for our visit to Whitby Gothfest next Saturday...

ht