Joy Parry
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joy13.bsky.social
Joy Parry
@joy13.bsky.social
"Some stranger, somewhere, still remembers you because you were kind to them when no one else was."
Lover of books, history, mythology, family history research, music & films. Mother of adult children - and a dog.
#BookWormSat

"You grow up readin’ about pirates & cowboys & spacemen & stuff, and jus’ when you think the world’s all full of amazin’ things, they tell you it’s really all dead whales and chopped-down forests and nuclear waste hang-in’ about for millions of years ..."

Pratchett/Gaiman - Good Omens
November 29, 2025 at 12:18 PM
#BookWormSat

"Thank you, ma'am - thank you, sir. But I can't leave my father, nor own anybody nearer than him. And I don't want to be a lady - thank you all the same." [Here Eppie dropped another curtsy]. "I couldn't give up the folks I've been used to."

George Eliot - Silas Marner
November 29, 2025 at 11:13 AM
#FolkyFriday
Boreas - god of winds and storms - brought winter to the lands of Europe by sweeping down from the cold mountains of Thrace and chilling the air with his icy breath. His daughter Chione [Khione] was able to control snow, ice and hail ...
🎨S Atchill * Rick Riordon
November 28, 2025 at 6:54 PM
#FolkyFriday
Ageing in reverse during the winter months, exhausted from keeping the land covered in frost & snow, the Cailleach - now a young woman - hands power over to Brigid [bringer of light] in spring, going into hibernation to be reborn as an old woman at Samhain.
🎨Eran Fowler * ClairObscurArt
November 28, 2025 at 3:17 PM
Reposted by Joy Parry
Feel that chill breeze blowing in? It's #FolkyFriday, so wrap up warm! 🖤

Our theme today is "Ice Queens, Deities and Spirits of the Cold!"

From Skadi to Morozko, Beira and Tengliu to Marzanna and Boreas and beyond, tag related lore, art and customs #FolkyFriday for shares from 10am-6pm UK time!
a cat is laying in a pile of snow and looking out
ALT: a cat is laying in a pile of snow and looking out
media.tenor.com
November 28, 2025 at 8:53 AM
#LegendaryWednesday
Breton legend tells how Nimue [Vivien] was unable to leave the Forest of Broceliande. Merlin would frequently visit to show her the beautiful things he saw on his travels, such as a tree in which sat all the birds of the world ...
🎨Daniel Mackie & Jean-Noël Rochut
November 26, 2025 at 6:57 PM
#WyrdWednesday
Lenape myth tells how, during a bitterly cold winter, Rainbow Crow sacrificed his gentle voice & colourful plumage to collect a burning branch from the Sky Spirit & save fellow animals. His feathers were charred black & his voice turned harsh & hoarse.
🎨Davina Behin Jones
November 26, 2025 at 1:28 PM
#WyrdWednesday #BookChatWeekly
"... [Efnisien/Efsnysien] crept in among the dead bodies of the Irish, two Irishmen came to him and cast him into the cauldron. He stretched himself out in the cauldron, so that the cauldron burst into four pieces, and his heart burst also."
The Mabinogion
🎨T Prytherch
November 26, 2025 at 12:51 PM
Weekend trip to London to see the brilliant Lion King - after a wander round Covent Garden ...
November 25, 2025 at 11:43 PM
Tess of the d'Urbervilles is one of the most heartbreaking books ... 💔
"Having begun to love you, I love you forever—in all changes, in all disgraces, because you are yourself."
~ Thomas Hardy,
𝑇𝑒𝑠𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑑’𝑈𝑟𝑏𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑒𝑠

🎨 John Atkinson Grimshaw
November 25, 2025 at 6:05 PM
#MythologyMonday
The Mabinogion says of Arthurian knight Cai "When the rain was heaviest, whatever he held in his hand would be dry for a handbreadth before and behind, because of the greatness of his heat, and when his companions were coldest, he would be as fuel for them to light a fire”.
🎨14C MS
November 24, 2025 at 6:58 PM
#MythologyMonday
As it approaches death, the Phoenix makes a nest of aromatic herbs which it sets fire to. The Phoenix is reborn in an identical form ...

13th C English Bestiary [@britishlibrary.bsky.social]
& Northumberland Bestiary [J Paul Getty Museum]
November 24, 2025 at 4:17 PM
#BookWormSat

"Over the land freckled with snow half-thawed
The speculating rooks at their nests cawed
And saw from elm-tops, delicate as flower of grass,
What we below could not see, Winter pass."

Edward Thomas - Thaw
🎨Alexei Savrasov
November 22, 2025 at 7:02 PM
#BookWormSat

"... the groups of cattle formed tribes hereabout; there only families. These myriads of cows stretching under her eyes from the far east to the far west outnumbered any she had ever seen at one glance before ..."

Thomas Hardy - Tess of the D'Urbervilles
🎨Unknown Artist [Pinterest]
November 22, 2025 at 5:45 PM
#BookWormSat

"... Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies,
And tires their echoes with unvaried cries.
Sunk are thy bowers in shapeless ruin all,
And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall ..."

Oliver Goldsmith - The Deserted Village
📷Godwick Deserted Village, Norfolk
November 22, 2025 at 11:58 AM
#BookWormSat

"... [this visit to Helstone] had not been exactly what she expected. There was change everywhere ... a great improvement it was called; but Margaret sighed over the old picturesqueness, the old gloom, and the grassy wayside of former days ..."

Elizabeth Gaskell - North and South
November 22, 2025 at 8:40 AM
#FolkyFriday

"The Nine Men's Morris is fill'd up with mud"

Shakespeare - A Midsummer Night's Dream

Nine Men's Morris - also known as Merelles, Merrils or Mill - was common by Shakespeare's time. Carvings of boards exist in Indian temples, Christian churches and even on barrels on the Mary Rose.
November 21, 2025 at 8:08 PM
Trumplestiltskin's "Peace Plan" basically means Ukraine must give Russia everything it wants - and Europe must just sit back and wait a couple of years for Putin to invade the rest of Ukraine or any neighbouring country it wants to. Sadly, The US is now as much of an enemy of Europe as Russia ... 😢
November 21, 2025 at 6:50 PM
Reposted by Joy Parry
This weekend's #ShakespeareSunday theme: HOT & COLD!
a woman is talking to another woman with the words he 's hot he 's cold
ALT: a woman is talking to another woman with the words he 's hot he 's cold
media.tenor.com
November 21, 2025 at 5:44 AM
#FolkyFriday
Arthur & Owain are so engrossed in their game of Gwyddbwyll that they ignore Ravens swooping down "on the men who had previously caused them injury, pain & loss" and carrying off their heads, eyes, ears & arms behind them!
[The Mabinogion]
November 21, 2025 at 12:33 PM
While the government lied about putting a "protective ring" around Care Homes, those of us working in them saw the reality - people with covid, often with dementia, sent back to care homes where they infected numerous residents and staff. Boris Johnson and his ministers have blood on their hands ...
Today's report makes for devastating reading for all those who lost loved ones to Covid.

The actions of Boris Johnson and his colleagues led to thousands upon thousands of avoidable deaths.

Those who presided over that failure have no place in public life.
November 20, 2025 at 7:23 PM
#WyrdWednesday #BookChatWeekly

"The crow wished everything was black, the Owl, that everything was white."

William Blake
🎨Jamie Heiden * Annabel Spenceley
November 19, 2025 at 5:49 PM
#WyrdWednesday
The fascinating Day and Night print by Dutch artist M C Escher.
November 19, 2025 at 3:37 PM
Never thought I would be celebrating a Scotland win, but we were on the edge of our seats until those two fabulous goals in added on time. Congratulations Scotland! Great win! 👏👏
#Scotland #WorldCup
November 18, 2025 at 9:58 PM
#FairyTaleTuesday
The not-so-romantic tale of the Princess and the Frog Prince!!
#FairyTaleTuesday
The spell on the Frog Prince is broken, according to the Grimms, not with a romantic kiss, but by the Princess picking him up between two fingers and hurling him against the wall with the words "Now you will have your peace, you disgusting frog!"
🎨Arthur Rackham & Walter Crane
November 18, 2025 at 9:30 PM