Portrait of the blipper with ferret

Blipper Frank S took this shot of me in Stroud High Street. I've chosen this one rather than a more relaxed pose because it is more honest, and shows the ferret's face better.

FrankS, CleanSteve, and Frank's wife Ann and I had had coffee and conversation in Back Books cafe, which Frank has blipped here. (I seem to spend one third of my life there! Willingly, I might add.) Then we strolled down the High Street, where we met a man called Tony walking a ferret called Smokey on a leash. I asked if I could photograph it, but he insisted that I should hold it, saying "if it was a kitten, you would". He didn't add that ferrets are more wriggly than kittens, and do smell rather strongly of wee!

However, I passed the 'holding a ferret and a conversation at the same time' test as Jeff the poet, who also features in the backdrop of Frank's cafe blip, stopped to remark on how the Laurie Lee celebrations were possibly going on a bit too long. I have to admit that I, too, feel a year is a long time to celebrate anyone's birth, be it Laurie Lee, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, or even Shakespeare!

Frank and Ann went on their way to South Devon, and we promised to meet again. They do pass through regularly, and it was great to finally meet on the fifth attempt!
I went to the cinema because it's holiday time, and I am a free woman. Yay!

The film was called Boyhood, there were about six people in the auditorium, and it was groundbreaking. Filmed over 12 years in Texas in order to show the characters ageing in real time, it documented the fictitious life of a boy called Mason from the ages of six to eighteen. His parents are separated but he sees his dad sometimes; his mother moves State so she can retrain at college; she has a couple of disastrous relationships which impact badly on the children in that they move house or town frequently; Mason grows up to enjoy photography....

There is no car-crash moment, no one pivotal event; it's more of a detailed study of a child's growing up in the modern US of A; what it means to be a boy; how to make sense of a world in which nothing appears to make sense, apart from living in the moment. It hit me hard how much time we adults spend telling kids that they have to "be more responsible, more thoughtful; less selfish" while appearing to do the opposite ourselves! No wonder those remarks tend to slide like water off a duck's back!

I do recommend the film; also Black Books cafe if your journey ever takes you to Stroud, Glos, England. Ferrets remain more of an acquired taste - part of me is still wrongly convinced that they have very sharp teeth!