I don't think I know the Croydon Singers: the Corydon, on the other hand .........

Don't forget the sublime Durufl? - if I'm honest I slightly prefer it to the Faure.
(Darn this thing that can't cope with e acute).

Hehe.

Which is available with the even more sublime "Quatre Motets sur des th?me gr?goriens", sung sublimely by the St. Jacobs Kammark?r on the thoroughly sublime BIS record label - BIS-CD-602.
Sublime.

Now that's what I call random.

And icanhascheezburger.com is a real web site - that is even more random

Just because someone makes a clerical error, I have to mop up the mess. I shouldn't have to give bad news to a young girl and her mum! I haven't been sent on the course and they don't pay me enough!

Yes. It was a truly random act - I walked past a Mcdonalds on the way home and thought I'd see if cats ate cheeseburgers like the site suggested. Mine doesn't.

My son (7) swam into the wall at his lesson today, he was going that fast (backstroke) that he has a huge egg on his forehead!! Normally they catch them, but he suprised them, he was going so much faster than normal. He's lived in the pool in the summer!

I'm a bad mother - I laughed when I saw him at home....but he was obviously OK by that point!

Take the pickles out first

Having seen how difficult it is to feed pills to cats, am going to get mine used to it by giving her vitamin pills stuffed in cat treats.. so far so good

Just been in Marks and Spencer's Food Hall and it was selling Pringles and Cadbury's chocolate!
When did this begin?
It is the thin end of the wedge.
The barbarians are at the gate.

How to give pills to your cat:

1. Pick up cat and cradle it in the crook of your left arm, as if holding a baby. Position right forefinger and thumb on either side of cat's mouth and gently apply pressure to cheeks while holding pill in right hand. As cat opens mouth, pop pill into mouth. Allow cat to close mouth and swallow.

2. Retrieve pill from floor and cat from behind sofa. Cradle cat in left arm and repeat process.

3. Retrieve cat from bedroom and throw soggy pill away.

4. Take new pill from foil wrap, cradle cat in left arm holding rear paws tightly with left hand. Force jaws open and push pill to back of mouth with right forefinger. Hold mouth shut for a count of ten.

5. Retrieve pill from goldfish bowl and cat from top of wardrobe. Call partner from garden.

6. Kneel on floor with cat wedged firmly between knees. Hold front and rear paws. Ignore low growls emitted by cat. Get partner to hold head firmly with one hand while forcing wooden ruler into mouth. Drop pill down ruler and rub cat's throat vigorously.

7. Retrieve cat from curtain rail, get another pill from foil wrap. Make note to buy new ruler and repair curtains. Carefully sweep shattered figurines and vases from hearth and set to one side for gluing later.

8. Wrap cat in large towel and get partner to lie on cat with head just visible from below armpit. Put pill in end of drinking straw, force mouth open with pencil and blow down drinking straw.

9. Check label to make sure pill not harmful to humans, drink one beer to take taste away. Apply band-aid to partner's forearm and immediately remove blood from carpet with cold water and soap.

10. Retrieve cat from neighbor's shed. Get another pill. Open another beer. Place cat in cupboard and close door onto neck to leave head showing. Force mouth open with dessert spoon. Flick pill down throat with elastic band.

11. Fetch screwdriver from garage and put cupboard door back on hinges. Drink beer. Fetch bottle of scotch. Pour shot and drink. Apply cold compress to cheek and check records for date of last tetanus shot. Apply whiskey compress to cheek to disinfect. Toss back another shot. Throw tee-shirt away and fetch new one from bedroom.

12. Call fire department to retrieve the friggin' cat from tree across the road. Apologize to neighbor who crashed into fence while swerving to avoid cat. Take last pill from foil wrap.

13. Tie front paws to rear paws with garden twine and bind tightly to leg of dining room table. Find heavy-duty pruning loves from shed. Push pill into mouth followed by large piece of fillet steak. Be rough about it. Hold head vertically and pour 2 pints of water down throat to wash pill down.

14. Consume remainder of scotch. Get partner to drive you to emergency room, sit quietly while doctor stitches fingers and forearm and removes pill remnants from right eye. Stop at furniture shop on way home to pick out new table.

15. Arrange for Humane Society to collect mutant cat. Call local pet shop to see if they have hamsters.

Our (elderly) puss has been on medication for just over a year now, and we have found cat treats are the only way to get the pills into her fairly reliably. The Webbox ones. All flavours work, except for one only recently found, which she doesn't like (I think it's turkey and lamb).

Marks & Spencer potted salmon - half a teaspoon of that and the pill (it was just a vitamin pill- coenzyme Q10, and before anyone reports me to the RSPCA, it is beneficial to cats) went down in one gulp. Even though it was rather big (~1cm oval). I think she's due a worming one soon too

edit: Hercules, yes seen that one before The last cat I had, I used to wrap her in a towel like a mummy, stuff the pill in, hold her mouth shut until it went down, and then let her go before she knew what hit her.

Hercules - LOL - our vet has that up on the wall in his waiting room!

Take the cat by surprise. The best way I have found is to wait until puss is fast asleep. Then open mouth and shove the pill in as far back as possible, close mouth and hold it for a second or two. Say soothing things like "As if I would - you must have dreamt it."
Possible results:
1) Cat goes back to sleep and you breathe a sigh of relief.
2) Cat foams at the mouth and you duck!

Our cats are not easily pilled but it usually is possible though mostly a two person job. One of mine is on vitamins at the moment but they are liquid and I put 5 drops in a small helping of cream. That is the only way she will eat them - putting them in her solid food doesn't work. Neither does the cream work if she has seen me put the drops - I get thet 'You are trying to poison me" look.

You would think they would be appreciative we're trying to help them by giving them medicine!

Fortunately mine is greedy and daft enough that she doesn't know, or doesn't care, that I've doctored the food...

Initially mine ate hers if hidden in a prawn - now she's wised up and spits the pill out. Over the summer she's become quite fussy about food and will only eat dry food, things she's caught for herself and cheese (she tries to trip me up so I drop bits if she sees me making a cheese sandwich)

I try to indulge her greed by giving her carefully controlled amounts of lots of different things, so she never has the opportunity to get too fussy.

That was the approach we were using....until she discovered mouse, vole, sparrow, blue ###..... at which point she put on 1kg and won't eat wet food anymore.

But as omnibus is already the Dative plural of omnis does it even make sense to have a plural of a plural

I can see her point really... if I discovered free range chicken after a lifetime of Tesco ready meals I'd never go back! Mine's too clueless to hunt, I think..

I don't think mine is too clueless..just too lazy! I sometime wonder if she can in fact run! Mice and birds are all safe as she wouldn't bother running after them!
The strangest thing is that she won't touch cat food apart from one brand. Also she won't eat unless she sees me eat and then wants to eat what I have on my plate. She will eat salad, tomatoes, chips, cheese.... . The only thing she won't have is skimmed milk. One day I decided to switch from full fat milk to skimmed milk and tried to give her some but she got upset with me and ignored me after that for 2 days!!

My cat has 25-30g of biscuits in the morning, and 70g of wet food in the evening.
Tomorrow it is the annual vet visit for health check and vaccinations. I will be told she is overweight. I will repeat the sentence above on how much food we give her, and explain that of an evening (especially a summer evening), she will go outside for an hour or two, and then come back indoors and sit in front of us while ostentatiously licking her lips...

Following on to my comment a few days ago about Radio 3 playing relatively unknown works and me thinking there was a reason they were unknown...

Just heard (on an iPlayer repeat) Paderewski's piano concerto, and it's one of the unknowns that I've never heard before and really like.

(just to set the record straight )

Oh, yes, I love that 'giving a cat a pill', Hercules - so true..

We used to crush Tiggy's kidney pill up and mash it into her wet food..NO WAY would we ever have got it down her neck whole!

Ours is not overweight but the vet has said not to let her get any bigger. Easier said than done - she has 2 meals of 25-30g of dry food a day. I've checked the neighbours and she's not nicking any other cats food but on Sat she caught 5 mice and those are just the ones I know about.

It's quite recent, I think. Between six months and a year perhaps?

Yes, the vet who first said she was a little on the large side then did go on to say "but it's a perennial problem - just how do you diet a cat?!" So at least they acknowledge it is very difficult, although you'd think with getting fatter she'd have more trouble catching things...

Switch to Waitrose this instant.

No. It's longer than that. I was still writing up my PhD when it changed, and I submitted that nearly 2 years ago.

November 2009 apparently!
I am not a frequent M & S food shopper - usually only if I want a 'nice' convenience ready to cook - or their superb tinned curry - but I'm surprised I never noticed before today.
It just doesn't seem right.

I suppose they have to compete for survival against Tesco.

That sounds about right, because I submitted my PhD in December 2009 and it had changed that term.

Well doesn't time fly!

I loved the giving pills to cats guide It brings back some very fond memories. My cat was fiendishly clever. She would only ever take them if they were wrapped up in prawns, smoked salmon or roast chicken just out of the oven and then insisted on having the crispy skin. Otherwise, pill would be spat back in my face.

She also made trips to the vet an Olympic sport. She had a heart murmur so would purr as loudly as she could so the vet couldn't hear her heartbeat. She only stopped when a prawn made its way into her mouth and then would insist on screaming all the way home because she knew I would stop off at the shop to buy her roast chicken to shut her up.

Dogs are so much simpler - I tell her it's sausage and job done.

Had a flu jab today and have been told not to do any exercise for the next couple of days. Of course, I have taken that as carte blanche to gorge myself on cake this weekend

I'm still following the 'making chocolate totally puts you off eating it' diet...

Enjoy!

No-one's ever said that to me when I have my flu-jab - obviously they take one look at me and realise that I wasn't planning to anyway.

Why don't my ears hear the same as those of my teachers?

Because rachi has special clarinet-blemish-seeking ears

Actually the problem is the opposite.....
I have a tendency to be thinking how awful something was only to be told that it was fine.... on both instruments.

I really don't mind problems being picked up but I'm told that I'm not so good at taking praise.
I do find it difficult to accept praise when I'm not awfully happy with how I think I've played. That's when it's hard to remember that my teachers know what they are doing and that they don't do inventions....

Clarinet ears can deal with the opposite too...

Some days never really get going.

Autumn - my favourite season.


But here the trees are nearly bare already and I've missed my opportunity for photos of the glorious colours

I have a lot of days like that...

W

It's my favourite season too but here is arrving very late. My liquid amber tree is only yellow and by now it is usually deep red.

Blue Square North football league. Leaders : Hyde. 2nd place : Stalybridge.

They'll be dancing on the streets of Tameside...

Yes I keep an eye on Vauxhall Motors in this league, they are the second most senior team from the Wirral after Tranmere.
But Caldy Rugby (my son played up to Colts level for them) are top of National League 2 North.

The Radio 3 playlist has the following odd entry

"3:36 AM Thuille, Ludwig (1861-1907) Sextet for piano and wind quintet in B flat major (Op.6) (in four movements) Jae-Eun Ku (female) (piano), Tae-Won Kim (male) (flute), Hyong-Sup Kim (male) (oboe), Hyon-Kon Kim (male) (clarinet), Sang-Won Yoon (male) (bassoon), Kawng-Ku Lee (male) (horn)"

why do they feel the need to list the gender of the players? How strange...

I have realised I can browse the forum while "working" - stuffing envelopes. The theory section was useful as I pondered different time signatures and their beats whilst stuffing! We have classic fm on in the office which is pleasant as the trees outside blow in the autumn breeze. Just trying to think positively ....!