Cooking from Scratch My partner and I have always cooked at home using raw ingredients. We are fortunate that we have the time to spend cooking and can avoid supermarket ready meals. The nearest we ever

STEEMING is great, but STEAMING ain't - at least in UK slang. It used to mean a gang of thugs invading a train or bus and making them hand over their valuables. Daylight robbery! That's why we still need

I wrote a parody 'updating' Blake's poem, 'Tyger, Tyger'. This is to be found in a book of parodies I wrote three years ago called 'Literary Mysteries Solved' The Tyger – updated by Viv Doyle Tyger, Tyger,

I wanted to write a story giving life to an inanimate object. Here it is. "What's this?" The man picked up the smooth, beige egg that lay on the mantelpiece. "It's a pebble." "I

A Real Coal Fire When we moved into our Victorian house there was an open fireplace in the kitchen. This was not the first time I had had a coal fire, so I knew how much work was involved, but I decided

EVERYONE MAKES MISTAKES Of course we are all capable of making mistakes in our work. Small slips, which are of little consequence, can easily be forgiven. Huge errors, with very serious consequences, are

"Associate with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation; for it is better to be alone than in bad company". George Washington, politician "When people hold you in high esteem,

Another of my animal poems for kids ALPHABET ANTICS What an Agile ANTELOPE, acting acrobatically! What a Beautiful BAT, Balancing Brilliantly! What a Crazy COW, Cavorting Comically! What a Daring DONKEY,

CHOPSTICKS, by Viv Doyle Ewan badly wanted to play Jack's new Nintendo game, but it was Tuesday. 'I can't come to your house. I've got to go for my piano lesson.' Jack's eyes brightened with spite. 'Piano

Staying out of Debt I have never had a credit card. I know there are pro’s and con’s to this, but I was brought up to believe that getting into debt was a bad idea, and I have stuck firmly to this principle

Another totally daft animal poem for kids ANIMAL ANTICS There's a frog on a log in a bog, There's a bat on a mat in a flat, There's a kitten that is sittin' on a mitten, And a fish looking swish in a dish.

I like to write poems for kids, especially about animals. THE ZOO HOUSE Koalas in the kitchen Playing with some flour, Bears in the bathroom Climbing up the shower, Lizards lying in the lounge Soaking

Here is a poem I wrote while on holiday with my mother in New Zealand: WHAT GIVES MARGARET HER GET-UP-AND-GO? Margaret Walker, eighty-eight, decides to tempt the God of Fate Against all sensible advice

On Being a Pedestrian When my Dad was alive he loved to say to us kids, ‘I’ve been a walker all my life’ (his surname was ‘Walker’). Now I can say the same about my own lifestyle, despite changing my name

Staying friends with my ‘ex’ My husband and I had an amicable divorce, back in the 1970s. It had just been made easier in the UK courts to do this and we went for the new arrangement because we didn’t

 Giving up ‘Work’ I used to have a proper job, with security, pension, decent wage. At first I loved teaching, and was good at it, but after several years everything changed. They dumbed down the

After reading some of your intros, fellow steemers, I realise that I’m a good deal older than most of you. So the theme I’ve chosen for my first scribblings seems appropriate: ‘Doing Things Differently’.

On being a lifelong non-driver When I was young, people began to ask radical questions about the way our society worked.  We saw the birth of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament – still in the news