Wimbledon

Hi bloggers hope you’ve had a good week. Well Wimbledon started yesterday, predictably it rained. Here’s hoping the sun shines or at least the rain stops. Wimbledon is the oldest of the grand slam tournaments. In 1877 the men’s singles started, with women’s and mixed doubles events starting in 1884.
Apparently tennis is a British invention by Walter Clapton Wingfield, the game was originally called “sphsiristke”, a Greek word meaning art of playing ball.
Winners of Wimbledon don’t keep the trophy, Martina Navratilova holds the most titles she has nine. Federer holds seven titles, maybe he will make it eight this year. He is considered by many to be one of the best players in the world.
Dress code is very strict at Wimbledon players must wear white, however gradually players are wearing other colours. The tournament is the only grand slam played on grass, the grass is carefully nurtured all year and it has to be mowed to the height of 8 centimetres.
I read that more than 54,000 balls are used and 25,000 kgs of strawberries and 7,000 litres of cream are consumed. Goodness only knows how many bottles of champagne are consumed. However I did find out that strawberries have many benefits. Eating eight strawberries have more vitamin C than an orange and contain flavonoids that reduce cholesterol. So may the best players win. So that’s a little bit of Wimbledon history.
Bloggers have a good week over and out London.

Dog and Spiders

Hi bloggers hope you are all well. Here in London we’re back to torrential rain, at least no watering the plants, but it’s actually really chilly time to get the jumpers out again.
There is a saying that you can’t teach old dogs new tricks, this has been found to be false.
Peg an elderly sheepdog was given to an RSPCA animal sanctuary in Norfolk, as she had become deaf and could no longer respond to the voice commands, which told her how to round up the sheep.
Peg was well loved at the animal sanctuary and as they knew how much she loved to work they embarked on a program of retraining. They taught Peg to respond to hand signals rather than voice ones. It was a lengthy training and other sheep dogs were used to help her. Peg is now able to run around doing the job she loves.
In Victoria Australia an amazing event has occurred. Whole areas of land, animals and buildings were covered in cobwebs. This was caused by the fact that after days of flooding the land had become waterlogged and the sheetweb spiders had made the webs to escape the water and their death.
The sheet web spiders are nocturnal creatures that live on the ground. To escape to higher territories the spiders joined together to make a huge web. The webs attach themselves to each other thus for great swathes of silk. This is also known as the gossamer effect. It must have been an amazing sight to wake up to. It’s miraculous how the spiders could unite for their survival, also tremendously important for ecological as spiders are responsible for killing harmful insects.
So I hope that you all have a very good week over and out London.











Sent from my iPad

BEACH HUTS

 Hi bloggers how are you it’s very hot in Japan I think, it is here too tomorrow is forecast to be 30 degrees. Time to get the ice cream out!! Many people are making trips to the seaside and I was reading an article about a beach hut. I was absolutely flabbergasted, a beach hut was sold in Dorset for a staggering £330,000. I couldn’t believe a hut could be worth that much. When I was a child I remember my parents hiring a beach hut for the week at a nominal fee.
A beach hut is a small usually wooden and often brightly coloured box, some beach huts incorporate simple facilities for cooking and making hot drinks. I was wondering about the history of beach huts. In the UK in the 1700s the idea of the benefits of cold sea water as a cure for some health conditions, became a notion. People started visiting the coast and led to the development of seasides as destination for holidays.
The first beach huts were known as bathing machines. They were huts that were portable and horse drawn. People would be taken to the water, they undressed as they travelled to the sea and then went naked into the sea.
In the reign of Queen Victoria the beach huts became very popular women and men were kept separated. Over time degrees of nudity were more acceptable and the bathing machines became beach huts.
Demand for beach huts far exceeds the number available and hence some of the staggering prices. But goodness me the Dorset price of £300,000 seems astronomical, for a hut!!
So bloggers I hope that you have a really good week over and out London.









Sent from my iPad