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amusements, personal

Unblogged March

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Some things from this month that I didn’t write about before.

Sunday 1
Very pleasant Sunday lunch with friends, including plenty of wine. Must repeat more often.

Tuesday 3
It was one of those days.

Thursday 5
Today my father would have been 106. It was warm and sunny, and I felt relaxed for once. It was nice to be able to go out in sandals and t-shirt and not get frozen.

Friday 6
After a lovely day yesterday, it was dull and rainy today. But then it is only early March. Although things are beginning to move. In the last few days I’ve seen the squirrel(s) going determinedly in and out of the drey in the top of our oldest silver birch – it was started last year by the magpies and the squirrels have taken it over and made a des res.
Also this morning there were two crows in the top of the far silver birch, tearing twigs off it – so they’re obviously nesting somewhere nearby.

Monday 9
So they’re going to completely close the A40 Westway between White City and Marylebone for 6 weeks: late March to end April. That’s our only sensible car route into central London. It will be chaos and the traffic will be a nightmare across the whole of west London. Fortunately I’m not committed to any hospital appointments or the like in central London in that period; just a Saturday pub meet.

Wednesday 11
I hosted another good literary society Zoom talk this evening. We do always seem to get a good number attending and some interesting talks. Now I just need to wind down and recover my stamina for next week, which is full (and I mean full) of meetings and medical appointments.

Thursday 12
You go to the osteopath and you come home with your arm taped together with zombies.forearm with zombie tapeThe tape is intended to take some of the strain off the tendons in my damaged wrist.

Friday 13
Blimey, that was a marathon! Packing orders for the literary society took both of us all afternoon, and the job still isn’t finished – I still have some of the postage and all the finance logs to complete. It doesn’t help that Royal Mail’s website is a complete nightmare to use; totally unfriendly and unresponsive so you end up doing things by the backdoor just to get the job done. And by tomorrow there will no doubt be more to do.

Sunday 15
Why are hearing aid batteries such a pain – apart from being such small fiddly things? This morning I had to put new batteries in my hearing aids as they’d died late yesterday. It took 8 batteries before I got two that worked for more than 10 minutes. It doesn’t seem to matter whether I buy better quality branded batteries, or use the cheap ones provided by the NHS. Yes, the batteries are always in date; I always clean new batteries to degrease them, don’t handle then with sticky fingers, and try to ensure the contacts are clean. Even so it is almost a certainty that at least one of a new pair will be effectively dead on arrival – but eight is I think a record. OK they cost only 20p-25p each, but it is such a waste, and a pain.

Monday 16
What a super view of the Kew Gardens Pagoda across Old Deer Park.

Wednesday 18
A glorious day. Wall-to-wall sunshine; blue sky; and warm. A trip up to central London for a routine hospital check-up, with all the cherries and magnolias in full bloom, and all the trees starting to break into leaf. Absolutely delightful.

Thursday 19
Hot water? We have none. Error code on the boiler. Boiler man supposed to come this afternoon; now coming tomorrow afternoon, allegedly. Well it was a good excuse to cancel my hospital appointment that I didn’t want to go to anyway and get a load of odd jobs (like filing) done.

Friday 20
Yes, the boiler man did come. He fixed the boiler (it sounded like a dead sensor) and did a service. It took about an hour. Then he emptied my wallet.

Saturday 21
Another glorious Spring day. And a really good doctor’s patient group meeting to go with it. Marred only by news that one of our members had died, although he was well over 80 and hadn’t been well for a couple of years.

Sunday 22
This orchid has been amazing. I bought it on 28 November from our local flower shop; it was in full flower with two or three unopened buds. It is still in full flower having opened those buds and dropped maybe four flowers. I know these phalaenopsis orchids normally flower for about six weeks but this is over 16 weeks with even more to come! Just incredible!large white multi-flowered orchid

Monday 23
This morning there was one very secure and relaxed Boy Cat!large white and tabby cat lying on his back

Wednesday 25
Sitting over lunch I realised just how well off we are for breeding wildlife. Just over lunch we had a pair of coal tits, a pair of great tits, and a solitary blue tit – three species of tit which are likely nesting within 100m or so. Add to that we have a pair of robins, a pair of woodpigeons and a pair of collared doves which must also be nesting close by; likewise the magpies. Some, at least will e nesting in the rampant ivy cover growing up our hawthorn and one of our silver birches. In addition we have at least a pair of squirrels with a drey in the top of the silver birch (see earlier). Plus our local foxes; and who knows where they have their den. And that’s what we know about; there’s likely more.
I’ve also seen a report today that the peregrines nesting on Ealing Hospital (so maybe 5.5km away) now have four eggs; which likely means they’ll fledge one, two if they’re lucky.

Friday 27
Yes! Much to my surprise and delight we got some early English asparagus in today’s supermarket delivery. OK, so it will doubtless have been grown in polytunnels as it’s almost a month before the real season kicks off. But I’ll accept that for English asparagus, as it is the only type we’ll buy (it’s fresher and hasn’t been shipped across the world). So hopefully lots of good asparagus for the next three months or so.

Tuesday 31
After a hiatus earlier in the year (see earlier posts) in the last few days I’ve finally completed the next board of 50 Postcrossing cards (numbers 501 to 550). It’s as eccentric as usual!pinboard with 50 varied photographs

natural history, personal, ramblings

February Unblogged

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So here we are, another month bites the dust, which means it’s time for a look at some of the things which impinged on me but which I didn’t otherwise write about.

Sunday 1
It’s tedious but sadly it’s necessary.

Tuesday 3
Did it stop raining at any point today? If it did, I certainly didn’t notice.

Wednesday 4
In contrast to yesterday, today was a lovely sunny day. Looking out of the bedroom window this morning, there were two goldfinches in the street tree outside – very nice; although they are usually around. But what is that? Flying steadily some way off, across a clear blue sky, and going south was a single swan: large, white with a long neck; quite unmistakeable. Not something one sees very often.

Sunday 8
There seems to be nothing happening at present. Everything is dull, dreary and wet. Motivation has disappeared today if only because I woke up feeling very depressed. That caused me to cancel my hospital appointment on Tuesday as I just can’t face the hassle – the appointment isn’t urgent anyway, it’s just a quick 15 minute check-up which will waste most of the day.

Monday 9

Image stolen from the internet

Wednesday 11
Sitting over lunch we looked out of the window to see not one, but two red kites gliding over, very low. They really are big birds. No wonder the pigeons scattered!

Friday 13
There are days when you have lots of sugar, and days when you don’t have any. Given my diabetes the latter should be the norm. But today was one of the former; I seem to have spent the day guzzling cake and fizzy pop. Well it would be rude not to! At least once in a while.

Saturday 14
Sunshine! Lots of sunshine! A glorious sunny morning, although cold. And the afternoon was good too, although it did gradually cloud up. Doesn’t it make everything feel so much better.

Sunday 15
Only a day late for our Valentine’s Day dinner. Something simple: sirloin steak with garlic roast potatoes and a tray of roast veg (tomato, fennel, pepper, mushroom, onion). Washed down with the obligatory bottle of Champagne. No starter; no pudding; the main course was enough. Despite all, food remains one of the pleasures of life.
We were remembering our first Valentine’s Day together in 1979. It was bitterly cold and snowy; we were at my parents. We went the 2-3 miles to a restaurant, despite 2 inches of ice on the roads (somehow the buses were still running!). The restaurant were glad to see us as almost everyone else had cancelled due to the freezing weather. Starters, main course and wine plus a Calvados each cost £50 – which was a fortune; probably the equivalent of paying near £500 now. Looking at the menu, which N has kept, a gastro pub starter now costs the same as a main course then. It felt like something we really couldn’t afford at the time, but looking back it was, in many ways, a great investment.”

Monday 16
remains

Tuesday 17
Hang on! This isn’t right. We had another essentially dry day and some sunshine. It’s definitely helping lift my depression.

Thursday 19
What an interesting day. The osteopath mauling my hand and back was the least of it! A trip to the doctors this afternoon produced two “amusements”, Firstly one of the receptionists asks me if the patient group could fund-raise as the nurses want an ECG machine – errrrr, maybe, but do the powers know about this? Then to see the nurse for my RSV jab, when she discovers the supply is out of date – rescued by one of the other nurses finding some OK stock well hidden in the back of the fridge. After witch tidying up the books in the book exchange was a piece of cake!

Friday 20
Felt distinctly mucky all day – and through into Saturday morning – which I put down to yesterday’s RSV jab.

Saturday 21
Well that’s a nice first for many years … this morning two (and sadly only two) greenfinches sitting in the top of the silver birch. They’ve been devastated in recent years by “trichomoniasis, a parasite-induced disease that prevents the birds from feeding properly”. In consequence I’ve not see them around for many years, so wonderful to have them back, however briefly. Add to that, a couple of days ago we had two redwings; they’re winter visitors and it isn’t unusual to occasionally see the odd one or two, probably in transit. Also this week we now have four squirrels!

Sunday 22
For the last several weeks we’ve been getting some really cheerful daffodils and narcissi from the supermarket – and they’re British grown!king alfredThey’re ridiculously cheap; in fact I’d say too cheap. But they do give a cheering lift to the dining table. And given the recent weather, I’ll take that.narcissus

Tuesday 24
Just after 18:00 I opened the study window. It was pitch dark, but there was still a robin singing its heart out somewhere close by.

Thursday 26
Walking out of the hospital to get my cab early this afternoon after my audiology appointment … the hospital entrance is blocked by at least three police cars, three fire trucks and an ambulance, all with flashing blue lights. Chaos; no-one can get in, but you can get out. Fortunately they all backed off after about 20 minutes so my cab was able to finally get to pick me up. And horrible traffic on the way home meant I finally got lunch at 15:15!

Saturday 28
They clearly know something we don’t! I don’t know what was happening, but somewhere around mid-afternoon I looked out the study window and the tree at the back of us, a couple of houses along, was full of magpies. And I mean full. One or two went away and a couple of others joined the throng. At one point I think I counted 20 birds sitting in the tree, without any that were flying around. Here’s the proof …a bare tree full of magpies

Count them: 19 magpies
[Click the image for a larger view]

personal

Unblogged January

Here begins this year’s series of “Unblogged” posts, being notes of things I didn’t otherwise write about.

Thursday 1
Why is there an empty Champagne bottle by the bed? And an empty crisp packet?
Was it just me or were London’s New Year fireworks particularly dull and uninspired this year? They’re usually much more varied and colourful.
Why is New Year’s Day always dull and grey, even if the previous day was bright sunshine?

Friday 2
Endless paperwork and admin, day 2. New Year is such a pain like this.

Saturday 3
Endless paperwork and admin, day 3.

Sunday 4
What a wonderful bright full moon in the western sky at 05:00, with Jupiter shining brightly below it. No sign of Quadrantid meteors though, but really needed to be looking NE rather than W.

Monday 5
Hi-ho! Hi-ho! It’s off to work you go. Not so fast. You can if you want to but this one’s not playing. If only because struggling for motivation.

Tuesday 6
Snee. Not a lot first thing in the morning and all gone by lunchtime. Then very wet overnight.

Wednesday 7
I don’t want to be here: depressed, anxious, stressed and panicking. Surprising? No, not with N in hospital.

Thursday 8
Despite everything I slept really well last night – right through from 00:30 to 07:00, then to 08:30 when the radio came on. A tot of Armagnac last thing certainly helped.

Sunday 11
Yes, it’s my birthday. But it is not a happy one with N in intensive care and the medics scratching their heads over the cause. Not conducive to jollity.

Monday 12
Better news today. N much improved though still in ICU. At least when visited she was awake and conversing, although not totally cogently. Medics still scratching their heads though.

Tuesday 13
It’s been raining here fairly solidly for days. Boy Cat has just come in and left a wonderful trail of muddy pawmarks across my desk. He now wants his tea, for which he’s two hours late.

Wednesday 14
N now on a general ward, and seems to be improving slowly.

Thursday 15
Another soaking wet day; really horrible. I still don’t understand cat feet. How can they come in, walk across the kitchen and hall, up the stairs, across the landing and bedroom (all carpeted except the kitchen) and still have wet muddy feet when they arrive on the bed?

Tuesday 20
After two weeks, N has been let out of hospital. S&Z very kindly went and picked her up at teatime. She’s obviously glad to be home, even if still feeling fragile. It’s been a tough couple of weeks (for both of us) and it isn’t over yet (if it ever will be). All our friends have been incredibly helpful and supportive in all sorts of ways. So thank you to you all (you know who you are!).

Wednesday 21
Biblical rain. All day. There’s a lake in the back garden large enough to float Noah’s Ark.

Thursday 22
Gorgeous crescent moon on it’s back in the western sky this evening – through gaps in the cloud.

Friday 23
We now have a handrail on the stairs, although a couple of sections to be completed.

Sunday 25
It’s a marsh.

Tuesday 27
That was an incredibly fast cash machine. Everything processed like lightning; three times the speed of most that I use.

Saturday 31
Well Spring must be here! Suddenly our lawn is a sea of pale mauve crocuses. Sorry no photo as I don’t fancy lying on the marsh masquerading as the lawn.

personal

Unblogged December

And so to notes of things I didn’t otherwise blog about earlier in December.

Tuesday 2
Last Friday on the way home from the osteopath, I stopped at our local flower shop, to procure a large bouquet of chrysanthemums for N. They also had some large Phalaenopsis orchids; some white, some a slightly striped mauve. I indulged in in an orchid for myself! Last evening I looked at it on the bedroom windowsill in the light of my bedside lamp and was struck by the oblique lighting effect. So with my mobile to hand I grabbed a couple of photos.
People think orchids are difficult, and have to be thrown out when they’ve finished flowering. But this is not true of Phalaenopsis. They just have to be treated the right, but simple, way. Although you may never achieve the floral magnificence which the commercial grower achieved, you can get them to repeat flower once or twice a year, for years. Orchids are fairly expensive, so don’t just throw that investment away after a few weeks.

Wednesday 3
Cracked open the first bottle of 2024 Tavel (see https://zenmischief.com/2017/11/rose/ for my first post about Tavel). Verdict: really lovely and only a little behind the 2021, which for me was the best vintage ever.

Thursday 4
I managed to opt out of accompanying N to her hospital eye appointment – and by all accounts it’s as well I did as it would have been time wasted because she just got a round of boring tests. So I stayed extra long in the nice warm, comfortable bed, and then failed to do everything I needed to get done.

Friday 5
Gorgeous pink and apricot sunrise this morning.

Sunday 7
Its raining. It’s dull and dreary. It’s miserable. It’s December. And yet we still have roses trying to flower!

Monday 8
Eating lunch today and there appears a squirrel to sit two feet outside the window. What on earth is it carrying? Oh, the remains of an avocado (it’s obviously raided the compost bucket). And it sits there, quite nonchalantly, destroying the skin of this half avocado and throwing fragments everywhere – there can’t have been a lot of flesh left on it, but it was clearly worthwhile.

Wednesday 10
Phew! That was a couple of days slog getting cards and parcels organised and (mostly) away. So nice this morning to drop round to friends for pre-Christmas coffee and mince pies, take their presents, and relax.

Sunday 14
My trail cameras are driving me nuts. They’re set to take photos during darkness. The newest one will not take enough pictures; just a few during the evening and nothing after midnight. It works fine indoors, but not outside. The old one takes pictures OK, but fewer than I would expect, but enough to show the new one doesn’t work well. WTF is going on? Still one thing they produced this week was three foxes in the garden, up near the house; they looked as if one (at least) was an intruder on an established territory.

Monday 15
Last night there were two crane flies on the bedroom ceiling. Why? I know it is fairly mild, but it really isn’t the right time of year. They were obviously Tiger Craneflies (Nephrotoma spp.) from the almost unbelievable, and unexpected, colouring – clearly pretending to be a wasp!

Wednesday 17
Weird pink fog! Very foggy at 04:00 and still foggy when I got up just before 08:00, which was roughly sunrise. Looking east the fog was distinctly pink, presumably due to scattered light from the rising sun. But a very odd effect.
PS. I was indeed right about the pink fog, see for instance this Guardian report.

Thursday 18
Today arrived two Postcrossing postcards. They completed my latest board and take my total to 500 cards received I under three years. I was wondering if I would manage to complete the board before Christmas, but I had expected it to be a bit more finely judged than this.

Sunday 21
This evening we had roast half shoulder of lamb which we’d had sitting in the freezer for a while. And guess what? All three cats came along for a share! None had a lot, just two or three morsels – just a little taster so we’re sure that the humans have been out hunting for us.

Tuesday 23
We saw the gardener today. He was livid with his GP and his specialists – and rightly. They demand this that and the other tests, scans etc.; don’t explain why; and don’t tell him the results without him demanding. Oh and they don’t talk to each other either; but when they do they don’t read the correspondence; and he’s left as a channel for information – especially as he’s caught between three different health authorities! I had to remind him that (a) it is his body and his results so he is entitled to know and should be told; (b) if they can’t provide a good reason for a test (like he has a symptom of something) then he is entitled to refuse to go along with it (you’re entitled to decline anyway); and (c) his GP is the one who retains overall responsibility for his total healthcare. Admittedly I have only his word for all this, but it looks like a classic example of how not to care for your patient. Some body(s) need the application of an Exocet suppository.

Wednesday 24
Last evening we had a small amount of mashed potato left over, which we knew we’d not use in the next couple of days. So with some scraps it was put out for the fox. This morning, everything had disappeared. Who knew that foxes like mashed potato? I’m always surprised at the things the foxes will eat – like digestive biscuits! But we do know that cats like prawns; so needless to say our three felines helped this evening with our prawns. Sorry, foxes, you didn’t get a chance.

Thursday 25
Christmas Day, and what a glorious sunny morning with not a cloud in the sky – but breezy and chilly. An Alpine day, except there’s no snow. And it has been deathly quiet here all day.

Friday 26
Boxing Day, and still the commercial world are pushing out routine emails. Yesterday (Christmas Day!) and today I’ve had four emails about our bank accounts, several about upcoming auctions, and at least one reminding me of an upcoming subscription renewal, plus a number of others. All could have waited until Monday.

Sunday 28
This afternoon I unloaded the last two weeks photographs from the trail cameras to find a couple of super shots.
First there was one from 19/12 of the fox going over the 6ft fence to next door, with apparently no effort.The thing is that the guy next door probably thinks that the fox can’t manage his fence.
Then in the small hours of Christmas morning something I’ve not seen before: two foxes having a jousting match (probably over territory).

Tuesday 30
“It was that prolonged, flat, cheerless week that follows Christmas … those latter days of the dying year create an interval, as it were, of moral suspension: one form of life already passed away before another has had time to assert some new, endemic characteristic. Imminent change of direction is for some reason often foreshadowed by such colourless patches of time.”
[Anthony Powell; The Acceptance World]

Wednesday 31
So the old year ends with a bright, sunny, but cold day. Which makes a refreshing change from the rest of this dismal year. Hopefully it’s a good omen for 2026 – I certainly hope so! As usual I’m not making New Year Resolutions as I view them as self-defeating ordinances, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be trying to tweak and enhance things. I’d love to be able to start with killing the depression. Perhaps I need to invest in a few sacrificial Gadarene Swine.

Happy New Year to Everyone
Let’s see if we really can make it better than 2025!

personal, photography, pleasures

Happy Christmas

Happy, Healthy & Peaceful Christmas
and a
Calm & Successful New Year
to all our family, friends and followers
Eleanor Cross, Geddington
Keith Marshall; Eleanor Cross, Geddington; 2025
Click the image for a larger view

In 1290 Queen Eleanor, wife of King Edward I, died at Harby, Nottinghamshire, and her body was carried to London to be buried in Westminster Abbey. Edward had a memorial cross erected near each religious house where her body rested overnight on its journey to London. This cross at Geddington in Northamptonshire is one of the remaining three. I was brought up at Waltham Cross, which has another of the remaining crosses – hence my interest. Find more about this piece of English history at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eleanor_cross, and in the text of my late father’s talk from the mid-1950s.