WITH 147 DAYS TO GO PLEASE DON'T MENTION THE 'C' WORD

Not what it seems?
Fake baker, Steph Parker of Birmingham, has caused a stir with her giant burgers and bulti currie - because they are constructed out of sponge.
Spending up to five days at a time making them, the sandwiches even come in their own packaging, Miss Parker has become so good that many of her creations have moving parts and motors. More


Finished .... only to find one piece is missing.
Gretha Glasel, 56, of Norfolk, worked on a 32,000 piece jigsaw measuring 17ft x 6ft for hundreds of hours over six months only to find one piece was missing.
The puzzle – Double Retrospect, by American artist Keith Haring – comprises 32 different images, weighs 3st and comes with its own trolley for transport. More


That's not my oven, that's my van!
Ben Forrer had gone to a recycling plant to do the environmentally responsible thing and maybe get a little cash in return for his efforts but would soon rue the moment he turned up at the depot with a friend's old cooker in the back of his van.
The 33-year-old fireman unloaded the unwanted oven before going to talk to the manager in his office only to come out three minutes later to find his £5,000 van was not where he had parked it but dangling from a crane above a huge crushing machine.

Staff – who had mistaken the van for scrap – immediately lowered it to the ground, but it was already a write-off, the roof crushed in and the windows smashed from the mechanical grabber. More

Worshippers offered a place to say amen in 65 languages.

Instead of paying £5 for a set of four passport snaps, people can now use a converted booth in Manchester to listen to up 300 pre-recorded prayers and incantations in 65 different languages. As well as the Lords Prayer, there are Buddhist and Islamic benedictions; Aborigine devotional songs,Voodoo blessings and solemn chanting of an orthodox Jewish congregation. More


I don't believe it!
With 151 147 days till Christmas Father Christmas was in London on Thursday - dressed in his usual red robes, though with sunglasses on - to open Harrods Christmas department.
It is the earliest ever launch of the store's 8,000 square foot department Christmas World which it hopes will be a big hit with tourists coming to the capital for the Olympics. More


Oh the joys of live television ......

The culture and sport secretary, Jeremy Hunt, was left red-faced when a hand bell he was attempting to ring became unhinged and flew off, narrowly avoiding hitting a woman standing behind him. Hunt had earlier told reporters that the Games could not go off completely without a hitch. - The Guardian (27th July 2012)

How ironic!

The country's first 'Green' major was forced to pay £70* for a taxi after his brand new council-leased electric car ran out of power during an engagement. 

More (* Enough to fully charge the electric car 28 times.)

NOW THIS IS WHAT I CALL A PURR-FECT POST.

Adorable kittens having a CATnap.

Can I get some privacy here?

Now that's what I call a chilled out feline - Piggy takes a walk down the side of the fridge.

Life is like a butterfly ..... 

This adorable ginger tom went charging into a swarm of blue-winged butterflies trying to catch them, but after several failed attempt was forced to give up and lie down among them instead. More


Kittens V Furby ......

Like these videos?

You might be interested in the Internet Cat Video Film Festival.


Festival planners are accepting nominations for favourite videos, which can be submitted on the OPEN FIELD website.


Nominations are limitless so if you can’t make up your mind just send in a few, then head on down on August 30 to see if any of the make the final cut or even win.


But hurry, submissions must be made by July 30, and there are so many to choose from! More

BUILD A BUSINESS FROM YOUR KITCHEN TABLE.

BUILD A BUSINESS FROM YOUR KITCHEN TABLE by SOPHIE CORNISH AND HOLLY TUCKER.


Sophie Cornish and Holly Tucker are the founders of notonthehighstreet.com, an award-winning, multimillion-pound online marketplace selling 50,000 innovative, stylish products. But six short years ago they were maxing out their credit cards, trying to secure loans and crossing fingers that their big idea would take off. Now they've written down all the lessons they had to learn the hard way - drawing not only on their own experience, but also on that of the 3,000 independent businesses they work with - from finance and marketing to PR and getting your workspace right.


With startling honesty, they lay bare the truth about getting started while raising a young family at the same time. They believe that anyone should be able to achieve a great working life on their own terms. Here's how.
..... Outer back cover.


FIRST SENTENCE (Letter to the reader): Dear Reader, If you've picked this book up and are wondering whether or not it's for you, let us help.


MEMORABLE MOMENT (Page 1): An alternative culture of shopping started to grow - one that celebrated the local, the organic and the handmade ....

MY THOUGHTS: A bit dubious about reading, let alone reviewing, this one but what did I have to lose as at best I'd have found it an interesting, informative and, possibly, inspiring read, and at worst? A snore-inducing aid to sleep.


Thankfully, the former rather than the latter. I think that business women Sophie Cornish and Holly Tucker have found the right level in producing a very readable guide that all those interested in building a business from their kitchen table should find useful.


With personal accounts from both women, useful bullet points, a 'dictionary' of jargon busters and with headings ranging from 'The Story Of Us' through to 'The Secrets Of Successful Marketing' and 'Happily Ever After: The Truth About Being Working Parents' whilst this may be a bit on the heavy side to read page by page, chapter by chapter, I think it is an easily digested read that can readily be dipped in and out of, as and when.


DISCLAIMER: Read and reviewed on behalf of the publishers Simon and Schuster, I was merely asked for my honest opinion, no financial compensation was asked for nor given though I did receive a small gift and a voucher to be spent at notonthehighstreet.com as a small token of their gratitude. 

BETTER THAN THE OLYMPICS.

With only 2 days left to the start of the London Olympics I thought I'd post about some of the other championships, all of which sound so much more fun, that have been happening worldwide.


Snuff World Championships.

The preserve of foppish dandies in the 18th century, snuff, the name given to scented, finely ground tobacco leaves, is sniffed directly off the fingers or through special devices.


Imported from the Caribbean at the end of the 16th century, snuff is still provided for Members of Parliament by the entrance to the House of Commons chambers.


Taking place in Germany over the first week-end in July was the 18th annual Snuff World Championships in which 90 competitors competed to see just who could sniff the most snuff (try saying that quickly) into his/her nose within 60 seconds. More

Swap Soccer World Championships.

Believed to have originated here in the north east of England as a fitness exercise for soldiers, mud lovers in the 2nd Swamp Soccer world Championships competed in 30 minute games consisting of two 12 minute halves sandwiched between a six minute half-time break, all of which took place in a swamp measuring some 25 by 15 centimetres. More


Tough Mudder Extreme Endurance Challenge.

Designed by the British Special Forces to one of the most extreme tests of all-round strength, stamina, mental grit, and camaraderie thousands of competitors have just completed the most gruelling obstacle course in the world.


With the estimated 9,000 contestants paying up to £90 to take part,  obstacles in the challenge, which took on average 4 hours to complete, included electric wires designed to shock participants and a mile long muddy ditch. More

World Wife Carrying Championships.



Reputedly based on the early tribal practice of wife-stealing OR rooted in the legend of Ronkainen, a 19th century robber, who it is said tested aspiring members of his gang by making them carry sacks of grain or even a live swine?


This year's contest was won by a Finnish lawyer, Taisto Miettinen, who completed the 250m course, tackling a pool and several hurdles with his wife, 

Kristiina Haapanen, on his back in just over a minute.

The prize?

The weight of his wife .... in beer. More

Pea Shooting World Championships.


Held in a small Camebridgeshire village, the pea shooting championships began as a fun way of raising funds for the village hall but proved so popular that it soon became an annual event.


The shooters stand 12ft from a target which is smeared with wet putty. Only peas hitting the target are counted and depending on where the pea hits the putty, awards can be five, three or one point.


Some experts favour putting all five peas in their mouth at the same time and then, by deft use of the tongue, firing them off in machine-gun fashion. However, in the knockout section, competitors fire alternately and so are forced to reload. More

Zombie Walk. 


Thousands of blood-soaked, corpse like 'zombies' took over the streets of Birmingham for an eerie charity event which raised huge sums for good causes. More


Or, yet to occur, how about .......


The Great Gorilla Run 2012?

Since the first London Great Gorilla Run in 2003, thousands of people have donned their gorilla suits and run, jogged or walked the 7km City and Bankside fun run route that takes in sights such as Tower Bridge and The Tate Modern so how about donning yours and going ape on the 22nd of September? More

FRIENDS, LOVERS, CHOCOLATE.

FRIENDS, LOVERS, CHOCOLATE by ALEXANDER McCALL SMITH.


Isabel Dalhousie thinks often of friends, sometimes of lovers, and on occasion of chocolate. As an Edinburgh philosopher she is certain of where she stands. She can review a book called In Praise Of Sin with panache and conviction, but  real life is ..... well, perhaps a bit more challenging - particularly when it comes to her feelings for Jamie, a younger man who should have married her niece Cat.


And more disturbance is in store. When Cat takes a break in Italy, Isabel agrees to run her delicatessen. One of the customers, she discovers, has recently had a heart transplant and is now being plagued by memories that cannot be rationally explained and which he feels do not belong to him.


Isabel is intrigued. So intrigued that she finds herself plunging headlong into another risky investigation.
...... Outer back cover.


FIRST SENTENCE (Chapter 1): The man in the brown Harris tweed overcoat - double-breasted with three small leather-covered buttons on the cuff - made his way slowly along the street that led down the spine of Edinburgh.


MEMORABLE MOMENT (Page 160): Guilt, she thought, can sometimes be measured in physical quantities. A heavy drinker might measure his guilt in gallons or litres; a glutton in inches round the waist; and the editor of a journal in terms of the height of the stack of manuscripts awaiting her attention.


MY THOUGHTS: I know, I know, as I'm rapidly discovering I don't like the books of Alexander McCall Smith but with a title like Friends, Lovers, Chocolate how could I resist?


Sadly, still not to my taste, I once again found this a disappointing read.


Rambling at best, incoherent at worse, I'm afraid to say I even found the supposedly philosophical tone of the book to be quite moralising, many of the characters (especially main character Isabel) pompous and patronising.


And that wasn't the worst of it. Largely unbelievable, suspend disbelief all ye who turn these pages, with several strands to the story, the author kept unexpectedly going off at a tangent often leaving threads abruptly and without conclusion.


Perhaps best read after The Sunday Philosophy Club, part one in the series. Hmm, maybe but I suspect not.


KEEP IT OR NOT?: Ex library stock, I'm sure it won't surprise you to know I shan't be keeping this.

DEATH BY CHOCOLATE AND A RANSOM FOR NORMAN

That's right, it's left .......
Council workers in Swindon have baffled members of the public for the past three years with a pedestrian crossing that says 'look left' but points to the right. More

Bizarre story of the week ...... 

A historic letter indicates the Nazis planned to assassinate Sir Winston Churchill, the British wartime prime minister, with a bar of exploding chocolate.

Giving a new meaning to the dessert name “death by chocolate”, Adolf Hitler’s bomb makers coated explosive devices with a thin layer of rich dark chocolate, then packaged it in expensive-looking black and gold paper. More


More housework and less hunting?
Neanderthal man may have spent more time doing chores than out hunting.
Archaeologists at the University of Cambridge studying the distinctive skeletal features of Neanderthal remains say they have debunked the traditional image of our extinct prehistoric cousins.
They found that compared to modern and most prehistoric homo sapiens, Neanderthals had significantly overdeveloped right arms - in some cases 50% stronger than their left.
In the past this has been interpreted as a sign they carried spears in their right hands, but now researchers say the asymmetry was probably the result of less glamorous subsistence tasks. More

Fighting crime with FidoCam.
Jerry Lee the police sniffer dog might have kept James Belushi's police detective character out of trouble in the action comedy K-9, but dogs at Staffordshire Police are using digital cameras to keep their officers safe.
The Staffordshire police dogs are the first in the UK to be equipped with the new FidoCam, a digital camera unit fitted on their heads to fight crime. More


My two favourite stories of the week ....... 

1,000p or the gnome gets it. Kidnappers leave home owner, Lorraine Dearing, chilling ransom note and photograph of stolen garden ornament being held at knife point.
Mrs Dearing paid £5 for Norman the gnome two years ago but insisted she would not bow to the kidnapper's demands adding that she hoped 'nothing awful' would happen to Norman. More

It comes to something when the rescue vessel sent to rescue you needs rescuing!
The sailors - from the North Star Shipping company which provides maritime support to UK offshore businesses - were on a rescue rib conducting a training exercise when the engine cut out leaving them helplessly drifting in Aberdeen Bay. The company dispatched a fast rescue vessel to help the stranded vessel but then became caught up in the rapidly receding tide - leaving both boats stuck on the rocks near Torry lighthouse. More


Whoops - or words to that effect ......
Judges from Guinness World Records were due to witness bartender Salvatore make his “Old and Wise” cocktail at the exclusive Playboy Club in Mayfair, West London, when the plan to mix the world's most expensive cocktail had to be scrapped after a clumsy drinker smashed a 234-year-old £50,000 bottle of cognac. More

HEARTSTONE.

HEARTSTONE by C.J. SANSOM.


Summer 1545: England is at war. Henry VIII's invasion of France has gone badly wrong, and a massive French fleet is preparing to sail across the Channel .....


Meanwhile, Matthew Shardlake is given an intriguing legal case by an old servant of Queen Catherine Parr. Asked to investigate claims of 'monstrous wrongs' committed against his young ward, Hugh Curteys, by Sir Nicholas Hobbey, Shardlake and his assistant Barak journey to Portsmouth. There, Shardlake also intends to investigate the mysterious past of Ellen Fettiplace, a young woman incarcerated in the Bedlam.


Once in Portsmouth, Shardlake and Barak find themselves in a city preparing for war. The mysteries surrounding the Hobbey family, and the events that destroyed Ellen's family nineteen years before, involve Shardlake in reunions both with an old friend and an old enemy close to the throne. Soon events will converge on board one of the King's great warships gathered in Portsmouth harbour, waiting to sail out and confront the approaching French fleet .....
..... Outer back cover.


FIRST SENTENCE (Chapter 1): The churchyard was peaceful in the summer afternoon.


MEMORABLE MOMENT (Page 206) "God made the forests and game to serve man, sir, not to be fenced in for the sport of those who have full bellies!"


MY THOUGHTS: A HUGE of the Matthew Shardlake series of books. This, the 5th instalment, is my favourite yet, the author (C.J. Sansom) rapidly catching up with Phiippa Gregory as one of my favourite writers of historical fiction. Not that you can compare the two of course as Gregory's writing generally features well known faces (Queens in particular) from the past whereas, though Sansom might feature actual historical events, his characters are, on the whole, totally fictitious.


At over 600 pages long Heartstone is quite an epic novel and yet such is the quality of the storytelling, the plot, the characters that it is all too soon read.


A great 'detective' story as well as historical fiction, the plot set during the last few years of Henry VIII reign moves along nicely but as always it is the characters that make such memorable reading. Richie Rich as the villain of the piece is second to none and makes for such wonderful reading.


But it is Shardlake himself that makes the books. Hunchback lawyer and therefore, as some would have it, harbinger of bad luck, though he is a somewhat marginalised member of society himself, he is such a strong character, a protector of truth and justice, the very fact that we occasionally see glimpses of his vulnerable side making him such a wonderfully human and well-rounded character.


My only real criticism, if you can call it that, being that whilst we did get to see plenty of Barak and learnt the history of Ellen's incarceration in the Bedlam we didn't get to see as much as Guy the Moorish physician as I would have liked.


Best read after having read the previous books (Dissolution, Dark Fire, Sovereign and, Revelation), I highly recommend Heartstone to all fans of historical mysteries.


KEEP IT OR NOT?: Bought with a voucher received on my birthday, this is without doubt one for the shelves.

LET THE BICKERING BEGIN!

Yesterday Husband dearest broke up from work for the next three weeks (yeah) and so like naughty children we will doubtlessly be bickering over the use of the laptop. Well, I've never known anybody spend as much time just browsing the various sites dedicated to whisky. Do you know what some of these bottles cost? Hmm, (sighs loudly) I do.


Which brings me to the cleaning of my engagement ring.


Looking slightly less sparkly than usual (well that's what you get when you wear it in the shower, whilst washing up etc) I was advised by our jeweller sister-in-law that whisky would clean it up a treat so ........


One night placing said ring in a glass with a measure of whisky in it I left it to soak, only to awake the next morning to find Hd ranting something about whisky.


My first thought? 


OMG! he's drank the whisky and swallowed my ring.


Phew, thankfully not the case, Hd sat me down and pointed out that I'd soaked my ring in a very expensive whisky (a leaving present from work) and questioned, as if I'd know the difference, why I couldn't have soaked it in something a little cheaper.


Anyway, I digress .....


Just to let you know that though I have saved a lot of posts to draft and therefore will be able to concentrate on visiting you instead of typing posts my visits may not be as frequent as usually.


Fondest wishes, 




PS Soak your jewellery in whisky at your own risk. I take no responsibility for the consequences of doing so.

THE BIGGER THE BETTER?

Following on from THIS POST on Traci's post 'What Makes You Beautiful', in which I commented that as a child I was always told that I was beautiful virtue of simply being me, I was so upset and angered by this recent newspaper article .......

Meet the M family - their claim to fame?


They are the family who have had more 'boob jobs' than any other family in Britain.


Ranging in bust sizes from 32DD to 34HH these are all grown woman who have made their choices in life, what angered/upset me was the fact that they have been quoted as saying that they now want their 14 year old sister, yes, that's right, their 14 year old sister to go under the knife ..... when she's 18 of course .... her mother commenting 

"At the moment she doesn't really have what I would say are boobs - but I'd like her to follow in her sister's footsteps.

I really love the fake look of my girls and I know Britney will go that way when she's a bit older.

I love the idea of us all looking similar and glamorous." 

Almost speechless, I really am at a loss as to where to begin.

As I said these are grown woman who, though I'm personally saddened that they believe their lives have been transformed, made amazing by breast surgery, that they love the attention they feel having outsize breasts brings them, have made their choices. What upset me was that despite the fact that this 14 year old is seen as the 'brainy one' who (and I quote) 'just wants to work hard at school' it wasn't her brains that the family seemed to be celebrating, her continuing education that they were encouraging.


And as for mother of the family (53) who, when she 'hits the town with the other girls is often mistaken for their sister', believes her 32GG breasts make her as if young again.


Goodness only knows as women must of us understand the pressure that is put on us to remain looking forever young, after all, as opposed to men who it is often claimed grow more distinguished, we it seems just get, well, old and decrepit but surely the time must come when we accept that as older women we are beautiful within our own right and simply cannot 'compete' with women twenty years younger.


But do you know what upsets and angers me most?


This mothers comments with regard to her young daughter not really having what she would call boobs.


For goodness sake don't you realise that we come in all shapes and sizes. That we should be valued for who we are rather than what a plastic surgeon could make us. In your defence I can only hope that the newspaper has in fact misquoted you and these weren't your exact words. 


Hoping I'm not being too judgemental, it's not that I'm against plastic surgery altogether it's just that I don't buy into it being 'the answer' that transforms lives whilst I do worry about the effects attitudes like this can have on young, probably impressionable, possibly vulnerable, young women. AND if I were to be totally cynical would question if finding their large breasts no longer brought the attention they so enjoy had decided to have their story told all over the national press thus guaranteeing more attention ...... at least for a while.


What says you?

DREAM ANGUS.

DREAM ANGUS by ALEXANDER McCALL SMITH.


Dream Angus comes to you at night and bestows dreams - you may spot him skipping across the hills, his bag of dreams by his side. Just the sight of him may be enough to make you lose your heart, for he is also the god of love, youth and beauty. Divine Angus is adored by all, but fated to love only the beautiful Caer, swan maiden of his own dreams.


Five exquisite fables of modern dreamers unfold alongside Angus's search for Caer. Mesmerically weaving together the tales of the Celtic Eros and his contemporary alter egos, Alexander McCall Smith unites dream and reality, leaving us to wonder: what is life, but the pursuit of our dreams?
...... Inner front cover.


FIRST SENTENCE (Chapter 1): This happened in Ireland, but the memory of it is in Scotland too.


MEMORABLE MOMENT (Page 95): He felt awkward with signs, and words of affection, but he knew that she understood him and would know how he felt.


MY THOUGHTS: The re-telling of an old Celtic myth, I'm still unsure what exactly I thought of this.

Combining (literally chapter by chapter) the story that is Angus (God of dreams and love) with a set of short contemporary stories each of which somehow connects with the previous, I'm just not too sure how well, if at all, this worked.

A short read (only 173 pages) my first problem with the book being that the author didn't quite seem to know at which age to aim the book, the mythical elements seemingly aimed at a much younger audience than the dreaming elements of the story.


Typed less than 24 hours after having finished the book, my second issue being that, though peopled with relatively few characters, apart from Angus and his birth parents I'm at a complete loss as to naming a single one of them - never a good sign I feel.


Not what you could call a big fan of Alexander McCall Smith, I've only ever enjoyed one of his books, The 2½ Pillars Of Wisdom (Click HERE for my review), I still expected more from this.


KEEP IT OR NOT?: Ex library stock, this will be donated to a charity shop.

FROM TRAINS TO LAMPBRELLAS AND MORE.

Choo-Choo Train!
A retired accountant who loves trains built a £22,000railway line in his back garden.
Bill Barritt, 80, spent three years building his own private train and 1.2 miles of track, which takes him around his 13 acres of land at his country home. More


Kapow! Batman should consider a parachute.
Published in a University of Leicester Journal Of Special Physics paper entitled 'Trajectory of a Falling Batman' a team of boffins have concluded that Batman could fly using just his cape but would suffer serious injuries when trying to land.
If Batman jumped from a building 492ft (150m) high, the team discovered, he could glide a distance of around 1148ft (350 metres). But his velocity would increase to about 68 mph as he descended before reaching a steady 50 mph as he approached street level - a speed too great for him to survive without serious injury. More


Another case of more money than sense?
Stone Roses fans have entered into a bidding war on e-Bay over a container full of 'atmosphere' collected during the opening night of the bands sell-out concerts in Manchester.
Offers for the pot, which is believed to be a urine sample container, have already passed the £500 mark with fans desperate to buy a quirky memento of the comeback concert. More

ET phone home send a postcard ......

Government officials believe aliens may visit Earth and suggest harnessing UFO technology for UK defences, files say.

Documents from the Ministry of Defence classified archives show staff believed aliens could visit for “military reconnaissance”, “scientific” research or “tourism”.

In a 1995 briefing now published HERE in the National Archives, a desk officer said the purpose of reported alien craft sightings “needs to be established as a matter of priority”, adding there did not appear to be “hostile intent”. More

We all sleep in a yellow submarine ....

It's renowned the world over as the home town of the Fab Four. Now one businessman in Liverpool is offering what is, arguably, the must-stay experience for any self-respecting Beatles fan.

A narrowboat has been converted into a floating hotel - and painted to look like the Yellow Submarine on the cover of the Fab Four's iconic album. More

Wow, that's some left hook ...

In a case of David versus Goliath, this is the moment a Pomeranian is shocked to be on the receiving end of a left hook from a feline nemesis.

This freeze frame captures the exact moment that status quo is shattered as a Siamese cat takes his revenge. More


How romantic is this ........
A devoted farmer created this touching heart-shaped meadow as a tribute to his late wife - by planting thousands of oak trees.
Dedicated Winston Howes, 70, spent a week carefully planting 6,000 oak saplings after his wife of 33 years Janet died suddenly 17 years ago.
He laid out the fledgling trees in a six-acre field but left a perfect heart shape in the middle - with the point facing in the direction of her childhood home. More


What a good idea, perfect for the British weather ....
The Lampbrella has been designed for those of us who get caught short by the elements.
When the canopy's sensors detect rainfall the umbrella is deployed and if it is left unused for two minutes it will close again.
The Lampbrella's canopy, with a diameter of 7ft 2in and installed 6ft 5in from the ground, could comfortably shelter 10 to 12 people. More 




He(a)rd about the cow mooving with the times?
A dairy farm has come up with a new form of farming technology - putting QR codes on to cows.
The idea behind the digital bar-codes at Southfields farm in Somerby, Leicestershire, is to give consumers more information about their cows’ lives including details on Lady Shamrock’s opinions on her fellow cows, information about milking time, favourite foods and how she is cared for by the farm team. More

ALL ABOUT ..... THE WITCHES OF LANCASHIRE.

In August 1612 a number of alleged witches were put on trial and hanged in Lancaster.

It were enough to crack an hangman's heart.

Old, ragged, with chains about their ankles,

they were fetched to where I waited on the hill,

hissed and spat at by the sweating mob

and convinced to the end - the end of a rope -

that the power they stood accused of

were a power they truly possessed.

Each crossed herself as she climbed the steps

and none cried out as I tied the noose.

Witches? These were not witches,

only weak and half-cracked biddies

undone by wicked gossip and revenge.

It were enough to snap an hangman's heart

but not - I'm pleased to tell you, sire - the rope.

- Blake Morrison, A DISCOVERIE OF WITCHES (Faber: October 2012)

She was a very old woman, about the age of four-score years, and had been a witch for fifty years.

She dwelt in the Forest of Pendle, a vast place, fit for her profession: What she committed in her time, no man knows.

Thus lived she securely for many years, brought up her own children, instructed her grand-children, and took great care and pains to bring them up to be witches.

She was a general agent for the Devil in all these parts: no man escaped her, or her furies, that ever gave them any occasion of offence, or denied them anything they stood need of: And certain it is, no man near them, was secure or free from danger. 

- Description of Elizabeth Southern also known as Witch Demdike. Read her 'confession' HERE.

With most people, both rich and poor, simple and educated, peasant and royalty, believing in magic during the 16th and 17th century much of rural Britain was living in fear of witches and none more so than in Lancashire, England, in which in the autumn of 1612 twenty people (sixteen of whom were women) were committed and tried ......

Their crimes?

Causing madness, making clay images, and murder .... in other words, witchcraft.

The evidence against them?

A mix of memories, hearsay and superstition.

Take for example the afore mentioned Elizabeth Southern and her granddaughter Alison/Alizon. A woman in her 80's, Elizabeth, the head of her family, lived by begging and had a reputation as a wise woman who had the power to not only heal but also to remove curses.

It was when she was out begging on the 18th of March 1612 that Alison happened across one John Law, a pedlar from Halifax, asking him for some of his pins which he refused.

Supposedly cursing John, it is said he collapsed, lying paralysed and unable to talk, whilst it is now believed he had suffered a stroke, with no one willing to believe Alison the matter was brought to the attention of the then magistrate, Roger Nowell, who promptly had Alison arrested, hearing her confession that not only implicated herself but also a number of neighbours and even members of her own family, her grandmother, Elizabeth, included.

Their punishment?

With the exception of one who, though condemned to the pillory (a device made of a wooden or metal framework erected on a post, with holes for securing the head and hands) and one years imprisonment, escaped with her life, ten others were not so lucky and were sentenced to death by hanging. Thankfully Elizabeth died before she could stand trial.

Sources: The Telegraph newspaper, Pendle Witches.co.uk, Visit Lancashire.com