Herald - Issue 413

Page 50 • The HERALD • 7th October 2021 v THE HERALD - INDEPENDENT AND PROUD OF IT v Innovators in Metal Quality Iron Works Guaranteed. Small and large jobs undertaken, from gates and railings to weathervanes & curtain poles. Call Nathan on 07500 016546 customerservices@phoenixironworks.co.uk www.phoenixironworks.co.uk Unit B, Brokenford Business Centre, Brokenford Lane, Totton, Southampton, SO40 9LZ Fred Hurst 023 8084 2191 or 07761 467217 • Grass Cutting • Garden Clearance • Hedge Cutting • Fallen Trees Cleared • Mini Digger Hire with Operator • Property Clearance • Small Demolition • Tractor Flail Cutting FULLY INSURED v FREE QUOTATIONS | DOWN THE GARDEN PATH | Foresters Flower Club by Debbie Thorne ursday 2nd September brought many ladies, members and visitors, gathering in Copythorne Parish Hall for our rst ‘open meeting’. Trainee NAFAS Demonstrators Sue Wall and Andrea Hillyard delighted us with four beautiful and innovative arrangements, which were ra ed and won by very lucky ladies! Andrea started with ‘Back to my roots’ - a delightful English farmyard arrangement. She used owers and foliage which complimented a silver milk churn – including pink Cosmos, pink and white Astrantia, owers that look like cow parsley, and pink Avalanche roses. Foliage complimented the range of colours, textures, heights, recesses, variety of shapes, volume and ow throughout the arrangement. Andrea told us stories of time spent on her beloved grandfather’s farm and how this inspired her to forage (sensitively, respecting the requirements of nature and countryside laws) and to grow a variety of her own owers and foliage. Next she made a forest oor arrangement to compliment the changing of seasons into autumn. Andrea used bark to cover her container, representing a log. A long arrangement was lled with di erent foliage, ferns, dried seed heads and teasels, giving volume and space, nished with Hawthorn complete with crimson berries and blackberry branches. She added pale green Lisianthus, Zinnia - orange with green centres, lime green Anastasia chrysanthemums and peach Avalanche roses - a true re ection of autumn. Sue‘s theme: ‘reuse and recycle’ was innovative and eco-friendly. Her rst arrangement was a plastic drinks bottle sliced in half, taped together and a grid made over the top to secure and arrange the stems. Outside a cardboard box, covered in grapevine, moss, and lichen. Sue used sun owers, peace lilies, chamomile owers, leatherhead ferns, ivy stars, bergenia leaves bunched together in the corners of the arrangement - all giving an array of colours, textures, volume, space and di erent heights and flow, she finished the arrangement with two champagne glasses. A happy, eco-friendly, rustic arrangement. en Sue used a paella pan filled with sand. Bark shards formed a structure interspersed with Allium seed heads. e sand allowed the display to form and contain the water. Flowers included pink carnations, rose pink protea (South Africa), wild chamomile and nished with salmon pink phormium leaves cut at an angle. An inspirational, professional, delightful evening was had by all! Upcoming meeting, 4th November: Apresentation by Pip Bensley ‘North East to Far East’. ExxonMobil Fawley Contribution Helps Refurbish Seafarers Centre A charity that supports sailors fromacross the world has thanked ExxonMobil Fawley for helping to make vital repairs to its centre located at the site. Stella Maris was established in 1920 and has been supporting seafarers ever since, visiting them on board ships and providing rest centres in ports across the globe. At Fawley, the charity’s centre is based near Gate 2 and is open round the clock, seven days a week. However, the facilities had been damaged by rain and needed refurbishing. Nick O’Neil, Senior Port Chaplain for Southampton, explained: “The centre provides a place to relax, watch television, have a drink and a snack, and to contact friends and family. Many ships ration drinking water, and what is provided can be of poor quality, so seafarers can be thirsty and welcome a drink. Also, while at sea communication with friends and relatives via the internet can be severely limited, and telephone signals can be patchy. Our centre at Fawley is used by about 1,000 seafarers every year and provides an important service all year round. Unfortunately, a roof leak had caused some damage to the Fawley centre which needed repairing.” A er hearing about the required refurbishments, ExxonMobil Fawley made a contribution of £3,000. Nick said: “ The money enabled us to fix the roof and carry out some repairs inside the centre, including installing a new kitchenette, lighting, flooring, seating, and redecoration. We also put in new power sockets with USB points so that seafarers can charge their phones. We are very grateful to ExxonMobil Fawley - the seafarers who use the centre are already enjoying the new facilities.” Angharad Vaughan, ExxonMobil Fawley Community A airs Adviser, said: “Our Marine Terminal is the starting point for our operations and welcomes seafarers from around the globe every day. We are delighted to help Stella Maris to provide a place onshore for them to rest and relax, continuing our proud tradition of supporting good causes in our host communities.” To learn more about Stella Maris, go to: stellamaris.org.uk or contact Nick at: nicholas.oneill@stellamarismail.org The refurbished Seafarers Centre at Fawley CATCHING SOME Z’S Written by Chemistry, Biology and Psychology Student George Lee in Collaboration with Brockenhurst College I had certainly never heard of Narcolepsy until I read ‘Why We Sleep,’ by the British-American neurologist Matthew Walker – a book which understandably takes you the science of sleep. is particular condition struck me however so I thought I would share some of what I learned. It is di cult to gauge the scale of Narcolepsy as symptoms may resemble other conditions and hence patients are misdiagnosed. For example, estimates for the prevalence of the condition vary from between 30,000 to 1 in 2,000 in the UK. It is characterised by 3 main symptoms. A) Excessive daytime sleepiness (this is sudden and is completely irresistible) B) Sleep paralysis, which is not uncommon in and of itself (it impacts around one in four people). In REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, your brain paralyses your body to stop you acting out dreams. is paralysis usually stops when you wake up, but sometimes your body doesn’t transition to wakefulness (the paralysis continues) even though you perceive the world. is means you won’t be able to move any muscles or speak for usually a few minutes. C) Cataplexy. is is the loss of muscle control, ranging from slight head drooping and slurred speech, to losing all muscle control and collapsing on the oor. Sadly, cataplexy is triggered by moderate to strong, positive, and negative emotions so people with narcolepsy sometimes become socially withdrawn to avoid situations which could trigger their cataplexy. e alamus is a region of the brain which acts as a sensory gate. Just below the alamus is the Hypothalamus. The Hypothalamus releases the neurotransmitter orexin when we are awake – this signals to the alamus to allow sensory information through the gate. When we go to sleep, the Hypothalamus stops releasing orexin and we stop perceiving sensory information. It was discovered in post mortem examinations of narcolepsy patients that 90%of the cells which produce orexin have been damaged (thought to be mistakenly attacked by the immune system). is leads to the brain not receiving enough orexin to dictate whether the individual should be asleep or awake and leads to the symptoms. There is very little treatment for narcolepsy. It is a very di cult condition, having a large impact on these individuals quality of life. If you would like to read more about sleep then I would de nitely recommend Walker’s ‘Why We Sleep.’ If this article has interested you, I would encourage you to do more research and talk to others about Narcolepsy. is series aims to raise awareness and understanding of different medical conditions and disorders. Sources: Why We Sleep, by Matthew Walker. www.nhs.uk/conditions/ narcolepsy. www.narcolepsy.org.uk