The first tulips are beginning to bloom, bringing a splash of red to compliment the magnificent yellow of all the daffodils that are in flower. Wednesday, and particularly Thursday, we had a burst of warmth and it was wonderful to see the sun shine and feel its warmth permeate through winter cold bones. The temperature has dropped back to more seasonable norms, but pottering around outside today it did feel like we have moved into a new phase, and with lengthening days and a more tolerable temperature it does feel like one can venture from indoors, and start to contemplate all those spring and summer projects.
The tiredness reported last week has embedded itself further this week – I have just woken from a delicious 40 minute nap, a real Sunday treat. I go to bed at a reasonable hour, and sleep well, and don’t necessarily feel tired but I’m conscious that I’m just a little slower in mind and body. I ran today, I enjoyed it, 7K, but each k felt slow (and was slow!) on my heavy legs. Anyway, last full week of the term to come – grind it out, and from this time next week its downhill all the way to Greece!
At last the weather has changed and blue skies and sunshine have arrived with the start of meteorological Spring on Saturday (1st March). The start of the week was wet, wet, wet, but by Thursday, for what seems like the first time in ages, we have enjoyed a period of settled sunshine, and it promises to continue into next week.
The daffodils are beginning to bloom and they make such difference to one’s mood. I did think to myself in the week that the £100 or so that I spent on bulbs in late summer/autumn is the best money I spend every year. The flowers, the light, the blue sky and sunshine give sense of hope. The winter has seemed long, grey and boring – not exciting storms, or extremes of cold, just a deep, penetrating cold dampness that persisted all the way through to half term and beyond, but now we have stepped through the door into brighter and better days to come.
Today I spent a while enjoying the sunshine and pottering in the garden, continuing to cut things back. I took more off the top of the buddleia, took a lot of ivy off the “post” at the bottom deck, and cut the Miscanthus (the swishy swashy grass) back, ready to grow again for the new season. I suspect that we are on the cusp of a green explosion – everything still seems dormant, but I am sure growth will be rapid over the next few weeks.
On both Wednesday and Saturday I refereed 80 minute games without trouble from my calf. I did “feel it” after 50 minutes on Wednesday, but yesterday was fine throughout – although I was aware of a tightness last night and this morning – it was good to get some exercise again, still not running, maybe next week.
On Friday Dad went into Taunton Musgrove hospital to have a polyp removed. I don’t think it went as smoothly as had been hoped, but now he seems on the road to recovery. They have kept him in over the weekend for observation, I suspect he will return home in the next day or two.
And today we booked our ferries for our summer trip to Greece – looking forward to it!
Half term comes to a close and its been varied and full.
On Thursday we went up to Cardiff to look round a few houses with Sophie (whilst it proved valuable in helping her understand what she actually wants, she didn’t end up putting in an offer on any of them) but first we met up at Llanishen resevior for brunch, meeting with Sam as well. The pic above was taken with my new phone – with which I am pleased, and also I woke up on Tuesday morning to find that Lebara had resolved my problem and internet was restored to me.
All week Becky has been painting the stairs and it is finally coming together. Looks good and will be even better in a little over a week when the carpet gets laid.
Thursday was wet – we spent much of the journey up to Cardiff, and quite a bit of it back home, in the rain, but it did mark a change in the weather, and it has warmed up a bit and, on both Friday and Saturday, we did see some sunshine. It is grey and v windy today (and rain is forecast, but not yet arrived) but it does feel like we are entering a new, more hopeful, phase. I’ve spent quite a bit of time in the garden, and have been quite vigorous in (some of) my cutting back, particularly the ivy on the back wall, but also on the raspberry/blackberry bed by the side door, much to Becky’s chagrin who thinks I’ve been too vigorous and ruined any potential blackberry crop to come. The bulbs in the lawn are looking good, and those in the pots and front wooden trug are showing great promise. Hopefully over the coming weeks they will burst into bloom, giving a much needed lift was we march through March on the way to Spring and greater greenery. I also found some bulbs in a box in my shed – these would have been from the wooden trug from last year that I hadn’t planted out – that were sprouting, so I planted them out in various places – nothing ventured, nothing gained ….
One negative by product of my gardening yesterday, as we were finishing lunch I felt something in my eye, probably a bit of leaf or twig from my mornings labours. I tried washing it out, but couldn’t seem to get rid of it. I got increasingly irritated by it, stripped to the waist I went outside and poured bottles of water over my eye to no avail. Had a shower and basically forced/held my eye open in the water stream, but I could still feel something in my eye. I found if I sat still it helped, so read for a bit, then had a snooze. Awoke to it feeling a little better, but still not good. Becky & Sophie had been to the cinema in Wells to watch Bridget Jones (they both said it was very good) – Sophie then kindly took me to Glastonbury Minor Injuries Unit. I was seen in about 10 minutes, my eye was examined, nothing in it, but their had been and my cornea was scratched. I was given some cream to apply four times a day, for five days, and by the evening was feeling much better. I’m still “conscious” of my eye, but it no longer hurts and is well on the way to being fully recovered.
Whilst on my “health” (and as I age, it seems that more and more I am reporting weekly on minor ailments and the weather – is this my future?!) I’ve done little (no) exercise this week in an attempt to give my calf plenty of time to recover. This morning, when I got up, I spent 10 minutes doing stretching exercises – I still wouldn’t want to push my calf too hard, but I could stretch it without pain when I couldn’t last Sunday, so that is encouraging.
And just a little follow on note from last week – the repair of my car tyre went well, easy to do and (I’ve just checked!) the tyre is maintaining its pressure of 30psi.
So the week begun with biblical weather: dark, dark skies, strong winds and heavy, heavy rain, but by the end of the week – on Thursday in particular – change had come and we enjoyed blue skies, a bit of warmth in the sun, and a sense of promise and hope that Spring will, one day come.
The back road to Glastonbury has been closed for much of the week due to flooding, although by yesterday it was open again and I had planned to go for a run this morning and see, at first hand, the results of the flooding we have endured of late. But my plans were thwarted yesterday when 20 mins into refereeing a game (on pitch 1)I felt a spot on my right calf go “pop”. I knew instantly it wasn’t good. I tried running, but couldn’t. I seriously thought I’d have to come off, but I gave it a few minutes, walking in the area of the centre circle. By half time, it wasn’t so bad – I could run slowly, and so kept going for the rest of the game, gratefully hobbling off after 90 minutes. It stiffened up on Saturday evening as I sat with my leg up, and an ice pack strapped to my calf. Today I can certainly still “feel it”, but its not as bad as I feared. I think I will put myself “off-games” for Wednesday, but I’m hopeful that I might be able to give it a gentle run out on Saturday.
With the weather dry – and even a bit of sun at times – I took the opportunity to do a bit of work in the garden today for the first time in a long while, cutting the apple tree down a little, and thinning it out, and also taking a few branches of the buddleia down. I hope that half term – in two weeks time – offers similar weather so that I can get out and get the garden ready for spring. This is a good time for chopping things back, just before they burst into like again. Lots of my bulbs – in wooden trugg, pots and lawn, are proudly pushing through the cold soil, some snowdrops are providing flashes of white, and a couple of daffodils are threatening to flower.
I’ve begun the big migration from BT – have bought myself a new mobile sim with Lebara, £5 a month for 5GB, monthly rolling, no contract. Its working fine so far – on Tuesday it should take over my old BT number. Then I need to move Sophie & Sam off their mobile sims with BT and then change broadband.
On Friday & Saturday Becky went to Cardiff to take Sam the stuff he’d left here after Christmas, and also go house hunting with Sophie. They looked at one house, but didn’t like it; she has another to look at on Wednesday, and this one seems more promising …
Back to school, and its been a cold week! The temperature really started to plummet on Tuesday, and its been cold ever since, with sub-zero temperatures most nights, and not much warmer during the day. I’ve used a fleece blanket over some geraniums that have still been flowering (on the shelf by the back gate) – looking at them today, they are still hanging on in there, whilst any that were unprotracted have been turned to a blackened mush.
I didn’t get to see it (sadly) but on Wednesday we had a Greater Spotted Woodpecker in the garden (well, next doors), a visitor we’ve not had before, and its not been seen since, but feels a little more “exotic and exciting” than the normal robins and blackbirds.
Car woes …
Wednesday was cold, but initially dry as I began refereeing at Kingweston, but then the snow started to fall and everything got damp, and much colder, and by the end of the game my hands were freezing, despite my gloves. Anyway, I put my bags in the boot of the Micra ready to head home, turned the key, and nothing, nada, zilch. Bugger. I grabbed a lift home, and then had Becky drive me back to KW, connected up the jump leads and old faithful burst into life. I don’t think the battery had drained – I think this is the problem Sophie had back in April. I’m annoyed that I didn’t think to just disconnect the negative terminal and reconnect it – it would have helped the fault diagnosis – but I didn’t. I was also annoyed I didn’t have my jump leads or booster battery in the car in the car, I do now. Used it again without incident on Saturday …
Today I’ve enjoyed pottering, both inside and out. Having lost my jeff and info @dotsandspots emails (due to my server migration – I hadn’t considered this), today I resolved the problem by buying email hosting from Ecohost – £20+VAT for the year. Took a little head scratching to get it all set up, but not too tricky, a good job well done. And I also trimmed down a “bush” in the front to bring its height down level with the others. At the moment its just dead/dormant brown sticks and twigs, but before too long it will, I’m sure burst back into bloom; much easier to manage in its dormant state.
I was “aware” of my tweaked hamstring when I refereed on Wednesday , back was fine, and by Saturday’s game my leg was fine, too. But, with about 20 mins to go, I felt a similar niggle on the other leg, so decided not to run today.
The temperature is due to creep up a little this week, I hope so, I’m not a fan of the cold.
On Monday it got cold, and Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday night saw the first frosts of the winter. I think it is the end of my nasturtiums, although my geraniums seem to be hanging on in there,
On Friday the temperature warmed up a bit, but on Saturday and Sunday storm Bert hit, and its been particularly windy, and pretty wet.
I did have to check myself earlier in the week when telling my class it was the 21st November – I’m not quite sure how we have ended up so far through the month! Hard to believe that we are a month from Christmas eve, and hard to believe that we only have two weeks of term left, although last week was particularly busy, and the coming week will, I suspect, be similar.
And my shoulder/neck still hurts. Thought it was getting better during the week, but on Friday it hurt pretty much all day; yesterday and today its been on and off with the pain. Now regularly taking Ibuprofen and also applying a cold pack each evening. Hope it gets better soon.
So last Sunday evening, I was brushing my teeth before going to bed, and over the buzz of the toothbrush I could hear a drip, drip, drip. The shower was dripping. Fortunately, I had Monday off as part of an extended exeat weekend, so was able to set too tackling the dripping shower. As I suspected, it was the cartridge. What I did not expect was how expensive it would be to get a replacement. £81 was the cheapest I could find one. Anyway, was able to remove the old one fairly easily (one nut that didn’t, initially want to crack) and then off to Bridgewater through the pouring rain (more of that later) to collect the replacement, which I re-fitted easily, once I’d figured out the order to put the parts back in. And now the shower no longer drips.
In some respects, it was good that I had the shower to fix as the weather on my extra day off was terrible – incessant, heavy rain all day, it really was miserable. We had a dry day on Tuesday, but the rain returned on Wednesday. Yesterday (Saturday) ended up being a lovely day: after a cold start, the sun shone and I enjoyed my afternoon refereeing on pitch 1.
The rain that had been forecast for today has not materialised (yet!) I didn’t run this morning – was still tired when I got up, and the weather forecast now had us dry until 2pm so I decided to have a leisurely start, and then get my (last years) bulbs planted into the lawn. I’m pleased to have got this job done, now need to wait until spring to reap the rewards.
And I’ve begun to re-engage with my Spanish. I have renewed my subscription to News in Slow Spanish – audio only, circa £6 a month – mainly for the “Rooms” where you join other Spanish learners for 20 minutes to chat in Spanish. Is great to practice chatting with other people, I’ve been into a couple of rooms so far, and enjoyed them. 20 minutes is about right – enough time to have a chat, but not too mentally draining! Hasta luego!
Its exeat weekend, which means I had a rare Saturday off yesterday (and, as bonus, I get tomorrow off, too) and what better way to spend it than by taking in some musical theatre at the Bristol Hippodrome. We (Becky, Sophie and I) went to see Grease – it was greats, a wonderful night out. The music and dancing got my toe-tapping, and before the show we had been for a slap-up Greek meal at the Hat Bistro.
On Thursday we had a fleeting visit from Sam, he’s been in London for the last couple of weeks. He got the bus to Bristol, then 376 home, had a quick bite to eat before hoping into his silver dream machine and driving back to Cardiff. Whilst he doesn’t start back for a week or so – the final year of his degree – it was evident whilst we were in Bristol last night that lots of students were there for the first night of their undergraduate adventure. Hope he does some work this year, graduates (I’m sure he will – but two, three years ago, this was not a given!) and starts thinking about a job/career.
The weather over the last week has been good – warm and sunny – but, inevitably, it turned on Friday and we have had a lot of rain over the last three days, typically in big bursts for up to, say, an hour, before clearing up.
I did referee this morning in Somerset County Cup, Vets competition (Pilton v Ashcott, Pilton won) I would say I get wet, not soaked, somehow we missed the massive downpours. Enjoyed the game, I’m thinking maybe referee one Sunday a month? Who knows, will see how things pan out. Everywhere is beginning to look distinctly autumnal as the leaves on the trees begin to change colour.
And after last weeks endeavours, the lawn is tamed and ready for winter. I had hoped to plant some bulbs into it this weekend, but its just been too wet. A job for another day … With the rain, and the (reasonable) warmth, everything is looking verdant and fresh, and growing well. Geraniums still in full flower, nasturtium leaves providing ground cover (and the odd flower) and we have a succession of sunflowers – with a fair number still to bloom – to provide colour and cheer and keep autumn and winter at bay for a little bit longer.
This week, I have been cutting back the lawn for the winter. During the week, I gave it a strim, then today I gave it another strim before running the mower over it. In the top section (nearest the house) there is now little coverage of anything, so I scattered another packet of wild flower mix in the hope that they come up, not roses, but wild flowers next spring and summer. Later, but not today – here’s hoping for some half decent weather next week, I will begin to plant some of last years bulbs into the lawn.
As is always the case when when I mow it flat, I think it looks better than it did, and doubt whether it is worth letting it go wild, but then I remember what it looks like in February and March, and then again in May and June, and it is worth – providing colour and interest when its needed, if it does then not look so good through July and August.
Still thinking of the garden, I’m pleased with my nasturtiums – even if they are not awash with flower, they are providing healthy green foliage to keep autumn at bay a little longer. These one were virtually dead – stripped of leaves by caterpillars – when returned from Greece, but a little nurturing has seen them burst back into life.
The side of the house still seems full of life, along with the front planter – the geraniums are still going strong, even if everything is beginning to look a little leggy. And we don’t have the same amount of sunflowers as last year, but there is a steady stream of flowering plants to give that little splash of clolour. Alas, there will be no pumpkins from the garden this year – a couple of healthy plants have thrown forth their wonderful big leaves, and plenty of male flowers, but we’ve only had a couple of female flowers, and neither has been successfully pollinated.
The weather this week has been chilly – particularly in the mornings and evenings – and I have succumbed and fired up the heating on a few nights. Wednesday was cold all day, yesterday, after a very chilly start, ended up as a lovely bright, warm, sunny day; sadly today never lived up to its promise, although dry the sun never really won out. I had hoped to sit out for an hour so in the afternoon, reading and soaking up sum late summer sun, but alas, it was not to be.
One more week of school, one week to get organised before we vanish to Greece for the month of July. And after a busy week at school, that’s what I feel like doing: just vanishing for a month, away from cares, concerns and questions. Of course, living in the digital age as we do, we’ll keep in touch with the children, and up to date with the news (filled in my postal vote today – looking forward to learning of the destruction of the worst government of my lifetime whilst we are away) but I’m really looking forward to escaping for a month.
The weather hasn’t been stella this week, but it has been largely dry and with the long days I have enjoyed the evening light, like the pic of the week taken, I think, on the summer solstice.
Becky is away at the moment for a uni reunion in Ambleside; on Friday night into Saturday, at circa 4pm ish I was awoken by some noise in the back garden. going downstairs to investigate, I saw the rear light was on, but nothing obvious. Then, looking out of the side kitchen door, on the wall I saw what I first thought was a cat, but then recognised it as a fox. I watched it for a bit – I think it was also watching me – as it calmly trotted along the wall, over the gate into the front and then across the road and away. In the morning I discovered one of my bait boxes in the middle of the gravel, and found a dead mouse in it – I suspect this is what the fox was after, and the cause of the noise.
Went for a run today – my first for a few weeks – I was slow, but that’s not a bad thing. Other than the first k, they were all over 5 mins. In part I think this id use to not having run, and in part due to being “end of term tired” but I do think I need to be running a bit slower – better to run and enjoy it, than ran at speed be end up whacked. Will be interesting to see how my speed changes over the summer.
