This morning I was officiating (lino) at a Bridgwater & District League cup final, being played at Bridgwater Town FC. On my arrival, I was a little confused as to where to park and went into what I thought was an overflow car park, decided not to park in there, so turned round to head out and I must have caught the side of my trusty Micra on a big metal gate. It made a horrible noise and, having parked up, heart in mouth I tentatively stepped out to survey the damage.
I had scraped the passenger side of the car, leaving some nasty scratches, scuff marks, and a dent, Its not a car killer, and a rub with a rag once I got home and it already looks better; have some touch up paint on order, but I can’t help but feel annoyed with myself.
We’ve been back at school a week already, and the weather has been kind – blue skies and sunny, although the start of the week was chilly, it has warmed up wonderfully for the latter part of the week. Have bought about 72 geraniums from Lidl – £4.99 for a pack of six – and have begun planting them up.
Perhaps its because we were away for so long in the Easter holidays, I don’t think we are as far through the season as we actually are, I think I may be a little bit behind schedule in the garden.
I gathered together all the geraniums I have successfully managed to over-winter:
… not all made it!
The picture at the top of the post is my room one evening, bathed in the glow of Spring sunshine, these long evenings and blue skies make such a difference.
On Monday we returned home from eleven wonderful days in Italy, visioning the Amalfi coast – staying in Salerno as a base – and then taking in Capri and Sorrento before finishing with a few days in Napoli …
Since our return, I’ve not done a lot – pottered around, making some attempts to chop back and tidy up the garden. The tulips are in bloom and looking good, both back …
and front…
I also cleaned the windows on the outside, and then gave them a clean inside, as you can see below
I did an oil change on the Micra, and have bought two new Kindles to replace mine and Becky’s from 2011 which are going to cease being supported. Weather has been a mix of rain and sunshine (typical for April), at times cold, but yesterday was lovely and I spent much of the afternoon sat outside reading (and snoozing!) Have run a couple of times since our return – my first runs since February, and my legs let me know for the rest of the day. and refereed today – so much more enjoyable on a warm spring morning.
Back to school tomorrow, but the summer term is always the best!
Having the best of times in Italy. Flew to Naples on Thursday, currently staying in Salerno. Today is Easter Sunday and we have travelled to the lovely nearby town of Vietri sul mare. The sun is shining, the town is pretty and bustling with Italians enjoying the day.
Becky was going down to Cornwall for a few days, leaving on Monday morning. Before I headed off to work I said I was looking forward to a fairly easy week, a bit of a downward slope, the final full week of term.
But that morning, at school, we got the call: the Inspectors are coming, and they were going to be in from Tuesday through to Thursday. This, of course, added a layer of extra work and, if not stress, at least a sense of heightened anxiety, and I began to rue having agreed to referee a school football game that evening, knowing I could have done with the extra couple of hours to prepare.
Then, that evening at home, Becky called me from Cornwall to say the car was making a terrible screeching noise when breaking. A certain sense of de-ja-vu and long distance fault diagnosis. Anyway, my suspicions that it was worn brake pads was correct, and the next day a local garage replaced the front pads and discs for £200.
On Thursday, Sam had the next, and final stage, of his job interview, to be a trainee manager at Enterprise car rental in Bristol.
In a borrowed suit and tie (the trainers were just for driving to the interview) he said it went well, and would find out early next week.
But on Friday morning they phoned him and offered him the job!
Needless to say, we are all delighted for him! He starts on May 18th, so will work for a couple of weeks up at school after the Easter holiday, before hopefully moving to Bristol.
On Saturday morning, I got up to find a note from Sam to say the boiler was leaking. Not the best start to the day – I really did wonder if this week could throw up any more surprises. On my return home, I did some investigation – took of the front cover – and it was clear that the leak was coming from the auto air vent. I’ve found a replacement on eBay for £10 – due to arrive on Tuesday or Wednesday – and have established it should be a (fairly) simple job to swap the old one out and replace it with the new one. And more research today has led me to discover that I can just screw down the cap and it stops leaking, although that does stop it being an “auto” air vent, so I my need to periodically bleed a radiator or two, but no big drama, and certainly a job that can wait until our return from Italy.
And also on Saturday it was my birthday!
I had some sweet treats and a chilled afternoon/evening, but I shall have to wait a few months to be in my true happy place pictured above!
And in the course of this week, I’ve refereed three games on the Sir Gareth Edwards picth: U14 (Monday) and U15 (Wednesday) mid-Somerset sides, and on Saturday our U17s v Bristol City U16s (we won 3-0) Today I was due to do a game on the Bridgwater & District League, but 5 mins into my journey I got a call to tell me the game was cancelled as the home side couldn’t get enough players, so I turned round and came home. After the hectic week I’ve had, I was quietly quite pleased!
No blog for the next couple of Sundays as on Thursday we are off to Italy for nine days. Arrivederci!
It has been a lovely week, weather wise, particulraly from about Wednesday on, when the sun has shone and temperatures have been warm, in the mid-teens. Everything is beginning to bust into life, trees are greening up and the front trugg is looking good,
No refereeing for me today, and I had planned on running, but I still felt a little tired when I woke up, so I didn’t run. Instead, I had a full morning in the garden, planting up an Abelia Grandiflora that will hopefully grow over the years to fill the hole left by the blighted box bush that I cut down last year.
It looks small at the moment, but hoping it doesn’t take too long to grow.
And in the back I tackled some of the ivy from the back wall, largely at the behest of Becky in her battle against her nemesis …
To be fair, the ivy is significantly above the top of the wall, so over the course of this spring and summer I intend to cut it down quite significantly
Sam has an interview on Thursday – for a trainee manager post with Enterprise rent-a-car in Bristol, having had a successful phone interview, and then a video interview. So we’ve been trying to kit him out in “business attire” for Thursday: I remembered I had some suits that I no longer wear as they are too big for me under the eves. Fished them out and they fit the boy! (Have since washed and ironed them so he won’t look so crumpled …)
Today is Mothers’ Day and Sophie and Becky have travelled up to Birmingham to see Benson Boone. Sophie came home on Thursday and its been nice to have her around for a few days (she plans to return early Tuesday morning) and so this morning we we all home together, which was nice. Sam has now gone to work, and I went to Bridgwater to referee a football match.
It was my fourth game in five days (and my third in three) and I am really starting to enjoy it again. It helps that the weather is warmer, and dry – Wednesday and Saturday were both beautiful days, Friday and today less so. March is oscillating from sunny blue skies to cold windy days, with the odd rain shower (which fortunately I have missed) Being on quality pitches – Pitch one twice, SGE once and BCA astro today, helps, both with the quality of the football, and the ease of running around.
I was a little worried on Wednesday as my left calf felt as though it had a tight ball in it – not a pull, but running wasn’t as fluid as it should have been. So I invested in a massage gun (£20) and it has been brilliant. Working the back of the calf, a spot, say 4 cm diameter, was painful, but by repeated use the pain has gone away, as if the problem has been “broken up”, and refereeing back to back games on Friday, Saturday and Sunday has been no problems, with no more than a “normal” post-exercise slight ache across all leg muscles.
With the light and lengthening says, colour is returning to our world: greens are vibrant with new growth, bulbs continue to flourish and blossom brightens many a tree. The forsythia on the way to school is a blanket of yellow
and the bulbs in the lawn and borders bring me joy, with grape hyacinths and the odd tulip joining the yellow see of daffodils.
I’ve moved my wildlife camera to a corner of the main deck and have begun to have some success – seeing sparrows hoping around during the day, and at night I’ve captured footage of a cute little mouse scurrying along its length. But the most exciting discovery was that we have a hedgehog!
I’ve captured footage of it rootling around on more than one occasion, a welcome member of the garden.
Hopefully you can see the video above. My camera captures video in AVI format, but this is quite an old and memory expensive format, but I’ve discovered they can be changed into the more useful MP4 format using (for example) https://cloudconvert.com/ which means I can post the videos here, and share them on Instagram. This camera was £35 well spent!
The garden and surrounding landscape is also greening up nicely, with lots of bulbs pushing through and bringing colour back into our world. Weather wise, after a beautiful start to the week, from Thursday it has gotten cold, grey and a little damp (drizzle, not the dreadful downpours of earlier in the year), but the vivid green foliage, and blues, yellows and whites of the flowers lifts one mood enormously.
Alliums (always later to flower) pushing through
This year (well, for this year, it was last autumn they were planted) I planted a lot more grape hyacinths and I’m enjoying their splash of blue amongst the vibrant yellow of the daffodils.
And whilst I always think they are a bit of a one-hit wonder – blink and you’ll miss them – the magnolias, like this in a neighbours back garden, or our white one in the front garden, do look good right now.
To be honest, I could have titled this post ” F$%k off February” – I must confess that I am glad to see the back of it. Although its not seemed too long, it’s been wet and grey, and I seem to have been either tired or full of cold, or both!
But the good news is is that these week has signalled a real change – the weather is improving: some rain still causing misery, but in between we are getting to see some blue skies, and feel a bit of warmth. And added to that, plants are beginning to come back to life. The back garden is awash with daffodils, and in the front wooden trug we now have some colour.
I do love the little daffodils, but I am regretting my decision to not plant some normal sized daffodils in there too – a planter of this size probably needs the height for impact. Noted for next year!
And its not just the daffodils that are brightening our days. Bird life is returning and bushes and trees are beginning to green up.
This morning I answered the call to referee a game on the Bridgwater & District league – glad I did, the game was good, the weather was pleasant and it was nice to be out and about on an early spring like day. I saw Keith, and he was encouraging me give him the next six Sundays, don’t think I’ll do that, but my head has probably been turned …
Last week I had my prostate PSA test, on Monday I got the results: in the green I’m pleased to say, with a recommendation to be retested in two years, Fen ’28.
And so half term draws to a close. On the one hand, I don’t feel I have done a lot, but when I look back, it has been an important week. I do feel rested – although still a little snuffly: mid-week I developed a bit of a cold, and I am still not 100% – but I do think it has taken most of the week for me to recuperate after a long, wet, cold, dark six week half term. This week has still been wet, but it has been interspersed with pockets of brightness – like now: I awoke to rain, but by mid morning it had stopped and now we have a mix of sun and clouds with a stiff breeze. I do get the sense that the awful, depressing locked in weather we have endured since the start of 2026 has now moved on, and that the weather (whilst still not perfect) has changed. And this, is evidenced in part by the flowering of some spring bulbs. Above are the snowdrops I planted in March ’21 – they are looking good, perhaps I ought to plant some more? And the daffodils in the lawn, and some bulbs salvaged from last year are in bloom, there yellow heads dancing in the breeze and lifting my spirits.
Also this week in the garden, I used a window of weather to remove a couple of the Miscanthus from the bed by the fig tree, and potted them into three pots. I hope they survive and thrive. (For the record, cut down the Miscanthus staying in the bed to ground level, but left those in the pots uncut.)
I also tidied up the porch – ditching some junk, gave the walls and floors a good clean, put up a shelf and built a couple of shoe racks from Argos. It looks a lot better: cleaner and more spacious.
Before …
During …
… and after
On a different note …
Yesterday I had my PSA test at an event run by Somerset Prostate Support Association. I went to Wells for my booked appointment, the test itself took less than 5 minutes – they took a small blood sample from m y arm – and now I await the results, which I should hopefully receive in the next day or so,
Whilst talking of my health – I went for a run on Tuesday, but at around the 5K mark my calf went ping again, so I hobbled home, and have done no exercise since!
Back to school tomorrow for a five and a half week term, hopefully the weather continues to improve, and at the end of which we head of to Italy for nine days, which I am starting to look forward to.
Yesterday was beautiful – blue sky and after an initial frost, some warmth to the sun. It was wonderful. But today the rain has returned with a vengeance – I didn’t run this morning: I just didn’t fancy getting soaked once again, and the picture above is me looking forlornly out onto the street this afternoon as, once again, the heavens opened. Tuesday was a particularly tough day – it was House football: we kicked of in the pouring rain at 1.45, and I finished two and a half hours later, cold, and very, very wet. I wasn’t best pleased!
Worried by a lot of soil activity around my compost heap – at times there seems to be as much outside the bin as in – I have invested in a “trail camera” and for £35 I am pleased with the results. You set it up and leave it, and it will take both video and still pictures. My first attempts didn’t capture anything untoward, just a wren:
(unfortunately, I can’t upload the videos directly to my blog, so will have to do so via Youtube)
I moved the camera so it was on the ground, and one night I got a bit of rat action.
The videos show it/them much more clearly.
Its a good little gizmo – I haven’t caught anything else on camera since Thursday night, but will keep trying. At some point I’ll move it to different parts of the garden,
