SUMMER SOLSTICE SOLACE

I don't know whether it's the fact that yesterday was such a lovely day here in North Wales - with crystal clear views over the Clwyd Valley to Snowdonia - (yes, the whole range was in brilliant outline), or the knowledge that it was the longest day; or whether I hadn't been quick enough this year to book a day off so that I could climb Snowdon in the near darkness in order to see the
Sun rise on the horizon from the vantage of being the highest in Wales & England.

Or could it simply be that today is the beginning of the longer, darker nights........I don't know.......but a certain melancholy descended today despite the soaring temperatures, and I've had to give myself a stern talking-to.........remember............I'm fortunate to have health, work, a loving family and Ray Phillips' CD "a Birds Eye View Pt1" by Six Ton Budgie land on my doorstep late last week.

Ray was founding member of the Original Welsh Supergroup - Budgie - whom I can honestly say I've spent a deal of time with over the years, particularly in the 80's living in Cardiff. Ray's soulful music is quite haunting, and naturally took me back to my teeneage years in the 70's when I was first introduced to Budgie by a mate's older Brother (we've all had the musical induction by a mate's elder brothers haven't we).....so perhaps.....just perhaps...my melancholy realtes more to a yearning for the carefree days of my teens, when summer days seemed to last far longer, were much hotter and life was simply more enjoyable in many senses.

Don't get me wrong - my greatest love is my family, and if I had to do it all again, there would be little to change, but the halcyon days of everyone's teens is a treasured time-capsule which, and I truly believe this, informs our character for later life, and the friends from 'way back when' will always be there for you no matter-what.........

Never turn your back on a friend..........how true that is.........

So with a sigh and a shrug....it's onwards to tomorrow, and the smiling face of my young daughter, who is yet to experience the joys of teenage expression ...........Yes my firends....it's all worth it.

Smiling again......

http://rayphillips-budgie.blogspot.com/

A Warm Christmas message to everyone

The Holidays will be rapidly upon us, and amidst this "testing" period of economic uncertainty, let's simply be thankful for the little things like family, love and fellowship, and have a thought for those less fortunate than ourselves, whatever our faith or background....the true meaning of this time of year is compassion, understanding and friendship.

All the very best. See you in 2010

Enjoy.http://sendables.jibjab.com/view/7i2LOv5fH9FUns5e

http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/I1Okh2CzA14nhtcB

Happy Christmas / Holidays

Hi Everyone

Just a simple message wishing everyone well for the holidays and let's hope that 2010 is a bit better for you all.

enjoy

Mark

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

My Website's been a long time coming !

Although I've been playing around with my Frontpage programme for a couple of years and creating webpages (as home practice really) for me, my round Table and Area Table, It's taken until now to commit to hosting a domain name and starting in earnest to put up a web page.

My domain company was chosen around 3 years ago because they did all the plug-ins for Frontpage, however they were recently taken over by another company, and lo-and-behold, they don't support Frontpage because it's such an "ancient" programme.

You'll probably have gathered I'm not a programmer or Webbie, hence selecting Frontpage as my Idiot-proof way of creating reasonable looking pages with some functionality........well that's what I thought.....

I realise that Frontpage came along with a lot of "programming baggage" and is no longer available to purchase, but I must admit that I got to like it's simple interface, so now my choice is to go to another host who does support FP, or take the plunge and invest in Dreamweaver and start all over again.......or do I?......

I remember playing around with the web page templates in Word a long time ago, and so I've created some very simple pages to test out my hosting service, although I strongly suspect as it's Microsoft Word, the functionality will probably by Frontpage based.

I'll be attempting to load my pages this weekend at http://www.mark-roberts.biz/, and am hoping it will work, but I'm sure you guys and gals out there with even a hint of website building experience are splitting your sides at my newbie attempt to be seen on't web.

It's all good fun - I'll let you know how I get on.......