Several years ago, while undergoing radiotherapy, I was given what I once described as “information overload”.  However, over a few days, I read everything in the various documents and became interested in one particular phrase. “If you feel tired, the best thing is to get up and do something.”  This was the opposite of what…

We have recently had scaffolding up outside our house (again), as our chimneys needed repainting. When he climbed up the ladders to start the job, our decorator found a family of jackdaws nesting in one of the chimneys. Fortunately, this is a “redundant” chimney so there was no debris in our fireplace. The chimney was…

We have just spent a wonderful week in the North East on holiday with our eldest daughter and our grandson. I had two main objectives for the holiday: the first was putting the new mobility scooter through its paces and secondly, as my daughter puts it perfectly, making memories for our grandson. During the course…

My home town of Ballymena in Northern Ireland has been featuring on the main news over the last couple of days. Unfortunately, it is for all the wrong reasons. There has been rioting and destruction of property and quite a few policemen have been injured. It is being blamed on racial attacks. Many of the…

I recently found a Nigerian prayer which begins like this: “God in Heaven, You have helped my life to grow like a tree. Now something has happened. Satan, like a bird, has carried in one twig of his own choosing after another.  Before I knew it, he had built a dwelling place and was living…

Read Ezekiel 36:22-28 God did good things for Israel, not because Israel deserved their treatment but because God was demonstrating his own grace so that through, and in some ways in spite of the chosen people, others would see his goodness and marvel. On holiday recently on Shetland (you may suffer more references in weeks…

Today’s thought for the day is brought to us by Stephen Trew www.christian aid.co.uk Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.  Something to read On the banks, on both sides of the river, there will grow all kinds of trees for food. Their leaves will not wither nor their fruit fail, but they will bear fresh fruit every month,…

I like the story of the lady who, looking out of her kitchen window, told her husband that her neighbour’s washing wasn’t very clean.  A few days later, she repeated her comment and asked her husband if she should talk to her neighbour and recommend using a different washing agent. The husband wisely responded that perhaps she…

Last week I wrote about my trip to London for a fateful football game. Having been away just over 24 hours, I was dismayed to return home to find wood and dirt scattered all over the road. On closer inspection it became obvious that our “friendly” badger had made yet another appearance. The vegetable beds…

One thing you’ve probably discovered about me is that words and the origins of words fascinate me. In particular, I can use an everyday phrase or word and suddenly wonder about it. Take the other day, for example, I was putting a suitcase into my boot and it prompted a realisation that I had no…