more on the netty

This is my Mum in front of the netty circa 1949. the netty 3ft wide 5ft deep is the door on the right with the hole over the latch having a string through attached to the lock inside so you could release anybody stuck inside. The entrance to the yard was to the right and the door on the left is the coalhouse. The brick on left of picture is the wall to the scullery.

The house on the right is where the netty was. 1 Strawberry Terrace, Burradon. The house is still there but the netty is gone.

Lockdown

Day four of lockdown and the from the garden list is 35 including the nine Greenland White fronted Geese that feed on the Carr every night returning to Big Waters for a wash and brush up around 8am. Nice to see them demonstrating social distancing.

Looking at the stocks I can survive 28 days without going out. Will run out of toilet roll and washing powder after the weekend but if nobody sees me I can stink as much as I like. There's still good old soap, water and the left hand!

I know the water authority don't want you to do it but I am of an age that when I visited the grandparents at Burradon there was still newspaper on the hook in the outside netty (toilet for those not of these parts). If you wanted soft you had to take the roll out with you from the house because if left in the loo it went damp. There's a hint to make newspaper comfortable....dampen it.

When every day is a bad hair day

 The Dinnington Bald Ibis is that bird

Escapee from Kirkley Hall gardens favoured the area east of Sycamore Avenue but has recently traveled to my patch at Prestwick.

Seen in flight over Dinnington First School has been described by a colleague as a vulture