Oh well done Boogie - at the beginning of the year I started with WW (not our friend out East!) and hit the 10% mark just before I got plastered - my request to be weighed before wasn't taken seriously (I don't suppose A&E has much call for scales!) so I'm carrying on with my new regime and hope that when the plaster comes off in 10 weeks I'll have lost the next 10% which is as far as I want to go.
My GP tells me I need to lose some weight, which, alas, has increased by a couple of stone over the past two years due to the need to take hydrocortisone on a permanent basis, and perhaps also due to a lack of regular exercise.
Being a tall, thin person, from a tall, thin family, the increase is most noticeable around my now pear-shaped tummy.
Any suggestions? I do try to eat sensibly, though I may not always manage the prescribed 5-a-day fruit/veg intake...
Cutting out sugar is a good start and will do you no harm.
The Slimming World diet involves eating a lot of food but almost no sugar.
You eat tons of veg, fruit, fish and lean meat. Potatoes, rice and pasta are also unrestricted. Three large meals a day plus snacks.
The thing I really miss most is bread and it’s the thing I will re-introduce as soon as I hit target. You are allowed a small wholemeal bap as a healthy extra, but I save my healthy extra allowance for a snack at supper time consisting of a cracker and a little cheese.
You get 15 ‘sins’ a day, which I save up and spend on wine for Friday and Saturday evenings.
Apart from not being allowed bread, that regime looks quite appealing. I never used to eat that much bread, until I started making it myself - and I've no intention of giving it up. I still don't eat nearly as much of it as D. does, but I'd hate to have to cut it out altogether.
In other news, I'm a very sad piglet today, as our friend G. in Newfoundland died this morning after a short battle with cancer. He'd have been 67 in a couple of weeks.
Oh well done Boogie - at the beginning of the year I started with WW (not our friend out East!) and hit the 10% mark just before I got plastered - my request to be weighed before wasn't taken seriously (I don't suppose A&E has much call for scales!) so I'm carrying on with my new regime and hope that when the plaster comes off in 10 weeks I'll have lost the next 10% which is as far as I want to go.
After Boogie's comment about rotwein I initially took "plastered" in a different sense to the one you intended
I think there must be something in the water over in Blighty - not only Daisydaisy, but two other friends over there have broken limbs in the last couple of weeks - one a broken ankle, the other both arms - I need the <eek> icon.
Well done indeed, Boogie. I've heard a lot of good things about Slimming World and know a number of people who have been successful with it, not only at losing the weight but keeping it off which, in my experience, is at least half the battle. I don't eat much bread at all - my downfalls are wine and sweet things. But I'll get to grips with things again once back from a holiday in France next week. It would be churlish not to sample the local vinestuffs.
We've had rain today, the gardens look so much happier for it. On the downside I've had to use the tumble dryer for a load of laundry - things Mr Nen wants to take away with him that have been living in the piles of clothes he likes to build up.
Do other people find there are always last minute panics before a holiday or is it just our mismanagement? It's one of the things I hate about going away.
My GP tells me I need to lose some weight <snip>
Any suggestions? I do try to eat sensibly, though I may not always manage the prescribed 5-a-day fruit/veg intake...
IJ
First, the old adage Breakfast like an emperor, Lunch like a king, Dine like a peasant is fairly good advice.
Second, since modern dinner plates tend to be 12" either seek out old standard 10" plates in a charity shop or, if your plates have a raised rim, make it a rule that nothing should be on the rim of the plate. If you find that hard, try making it a rule to only have X serving-spoonsful per meal and swap your serving-spoons for dessert-spoons.
Third, absolutely no bread or cake after 6pm.
Lastly: good about the fruit and veg (although it should be more veg than fruit and 10 a day ...) so you could try to begin every meal with a bowl of salad dressed only with olive oil, pepper and lemon juice.
Do other people find there are always last minute panics before a holiday or is it just our mismanagement? It's one of the things I hate about going away.
We go away often with both sons living far away.
I have a hold-all in which I keep ‘holiday stuff’ (like passport, plugs, travel hairdryer, suncream, sunhat, sunglasses - all the bits and pieces). It helps a lot.
Do other people find there are always last minute panics before a holiday or is it just our mismanagement? It's one of the things I hate about going away.
We go away often with both sons living far away.
I have a hold-all in which I keep ‘holiday stuff’ (like passport, plugs, travel hairdryer, suncream, sunhat, sunglasses - all the bits and pieces). It helps a lot.
That's a good idea. We don't go abroad much, Mr Nen goes more than I do as I'm a poor traveller and particularly bad about flying. Maybe it does get better with practice.
It probably doesn't help that I try not to think about it until I have to. Hence mooching about on the deck of the Ship rather than packing.
In a former life I worked for a company with a company in Hong Kong and had to keep in the office in London a bag ready to go, plus have my passport to hand at all times: old habits die hard
Do other people find there are always last minute panics before a holiday or is it just our mismanagement? It's one of the things I hate about going away.
Yes, though my wife is probably worse than me in this regard. I tend to have the "Did I leave something turned on/Did I leave a window open?" type of doubts once we're on the way.
As I leave the house I have a mantra - tickets, money, passport. It’s all you need really.
But I always take a spare set of underwear, a toothbrush and a pair of shorts in my hand luggage in case the luggage goes missing - it did once. My son’s honeymoon in Tahiti (yes, he’s the rich son! ) was a little less than prefect due to his luggage not arriving. A pair of shorts in his hand luggage would have been ideal to tide him over until he found a shop.
I think there must be something in the water over in Blighty - not only Daisydaisy, but two other friends over there have broken limbs in the last couple of weeks - one a broken ankle, the other both arms - I need the <eek> icon.
That's three - you can all stop now ...
Oh no, both arms would be awful. I am grateful it was just my leg/ankle, otherwise 12 weeks without sewing would be too long.
(') (') (') for your friends
ALWAYS pack the spongebag, meds, nightie, change of underwear and a clean T shirt in the hand luggage. The passport, currency and plastic are, of course, on your person.
I think there must be something in the water over in Blighty - not only Daisydaisy, but two other friends over there have broken limbs in the last couple of weeks - one a broken ankle, the other both arms - I need the <eek> icon.
That's three - you can all stop now ...
Oh no, both arms would be awful. I am grateful it was just my leg/ankle, otherwise 12 weeks without sewing would be too long.
(') (') (') for your friends
Several years ago a granddaughter broke one arm at schooL, plaster to the elbow. That night she went to a poorly supervised church youth group and broke the other arm badly. Plaster from fingers to shoulder. She coped surprisingly well, I was amazed.
My niece, who as a very small child knew no fear (she still doesn't and she's nearly 31), at one point had one arm and one leg in plaster at the same time. My sister was beginning to dread taking her to Casualty in case they thought she was beating her up!
Re: packing - although we don't travel all that often, it's usually back to Blighty, so I keep passports, my jewellery roll and British-plug hairdryer and straighteners in the carry-on bag, so that I know where they are*. I always put a change of clothes in as well in case of luggage deciding to go somewhere else. As for being organised in advance? Not a chance - packing is done the night before at the earliest.
* When we were over last summer, I thought it would be very clever to leave the hair-dryer and straighteners at D's mum's house, because that's where we usually go straight from the airport. The folly of this scheme became apparent when we went over in February for Dad's funeral and went straight from Gatwick to Edinburgh ...
* * * * *
It's been a hot, sticky sort of day here, although I wasn't out in the worst of it (it got up to 26° a few hours ago). I'd dozed off while waiting for a batch of chicken stock to cook, and when I woke up the sky had become very dark indeed, and when I came through to look in on the Ship, I was watching and listening to a rather good thunderstorm. It's passed along the river now and brought the temperature down to a more civilised 19°
I broke both wrists in gym class at the age if 14. The doc took pity on me (I think) and let me off with a short cast on the right. The other was past the elbow.
Otherwise I'd have needed help with everything, including wiping my bum.
At age 12 I broke both arms roller skating. The two plasters balanced each other, so that I didn't feel the weight, as I did I did the one day when only one of them had been discovered to have broken. I attended a very large high school, and my parents said that on parents' night if any of the teachers was obviously struggling to place me (very undistinguished!) they just said "Two broken arms," and all was well.
... Otherwise I'd have needed help with everything, including wiping my bum.
It's the prospect of needing such intimate help that would scare me most about breaking a bone - never mind the pain!
It's been a lovely day here, and I had a nice walk along the walking bridge this evening while D. was practising tomorrow's voluntary. I really must do a bit more walking now that the weather's better.
I’m on AV at church today so it will be a short walk this morning beforehand then a longer one this afternoon.
Did I tell you I’m doing Couch to 5K? I’m on week 3 but have had to suspend it for now due to a cough - may have to go back a week. It doesn’t sound like much running - but it is for me!
Wall to wall sunshine in the Scottish Highlands. We will have Messy Church outside this afternoon. I hope it keep sup till Friday when I have a funeral to take on the truly hallowed ground of this community: the shinty pitch.
We went to see the wonderful Calan in concert in Abergavenny last night. There was quite an energetic storm going on as we came home - thankfully, most of the lightening was in the clouds.
This morning, we had a short period of heavy rain which eased when I left for church, though we had two claps of thunder as I arrived, so I think we got off quite lightly.
Incidentally, if Calan are performing anywhere near you, try to go to see them - folk music meets rock, good, foot tapping stuff.
It's a beautiful, sunny day here: 13° at the moment, but forecast to go up to 18°.
We're taking a little jaunt down to Rothesay this afternoon; the vicar there was D's organ scholar when we were in St. John's, and he's asked D. to do a sort of choral workshop thing with choirs from local churches - in reality, a rehearsal for Choral Evensong, then FOOD, then the service. It'll be simple stuff - Ferial responses, a unison setting of the canticles and a fairly simple anthem, as D. obviously doesn't know the capabilities of the choir that he'll get.
Re: packing for trips, one of the joys of being married to a techie is the lists.
We have an excel spreadsheet for any trips beyond one night away, adapted for foreign holidays / camping / etc. It is 5 pages long! Sounds overkill, but it is great and does mean we don’t tend to forget stuff, unless we do something silly, like taking nappies off the list when child B grew out of them, but forgetting to add pants....
I keep a list (in Word -- I don't like Excel) which stays basically the same, but gets a bit revised for each trip. The first page is stuff to pack; the second page is things to do -- everything from buy plane tickets, to stopping the mail, to adjusting lights and thermostat before I walk out the door.
No, Calan are a Welsh folk group that sing Welsh music in Gaelic. They are on my list of groups I'd like to see, but not an equivalent of Bellowhead. The current big band folk groups are the Oysterband, Eliza Carthy and the Wayward Band, Skippinish or the Keston Cobblers Club, although I find the Keston Cobblers Club a pale imitative shadow, not helped by seeing them first at the same festival as Bellowhead. I didn't really pay to see Keston Cobblers Club the last time I went to see them, what I wanted to see was the CC Smugglers who were on the same bill.
If you want to see the same arrangements as Bellowhead, Jon Boden has just finished a tour with the Remnant Kings - but performing his own work (and Sam Sweeney and Paul Sartin are both part of that band), Pete Flood is now drumming with the Oysterband, Rachel McShane has her own new band, Paul Sartin and Benji Kirkpatrick are both in Faustus, John Spiers has just started partnering Peter Knight, but I haven't seen that new band or Rachel McShane's new band live yet. I missed the Spiers and Knight because it was the day after I was assaulted and Rachel McShane isn't coming down to London until the autumn.
On Saturday a kind friend* took me to a seaside town to collect my latest mobility gadget (a knee walker - like a kiddies scooter) and then to another seaside town to visit a friend, and all 3 of us went for fish & chips on the sea front - an essential part of summer. The gadget has made such a difference - it's best at going in a straight line but can be pursuaded to go around corners so even indoors getting about is easier. Yesterday I even managed a solo stroll to post a birthday card and then to the shops, coming back via a nature reserve - bliss even if it was harder than I had anticipated. On the way back I had the sort of conversation only 4 year olds are honest to have ("what's that? Why?" etc) and then raced a 3yr old getting the hang of his strider bike (he won).
Not sure how hot it is here, perhaps 24+? so have set up a breeze inside and am watching storm clouds gathering - another kind friend* is walking over later to carry on organising me so I hope she misses the rain. We are both gardeners so will welcome it though.
*I am bowled over by the kindness of so many friends, without whom I'm not sure what I'd have done lately.
I had to google knee walker - they look like a great idea! I’m glad you had a good time @daisydaisy. Not long before you’ll be returning kindness to your friends
We took the dogs for a sunny walk in the nearby nature reserve, finishing with them having a good old splash in the river.
Then I spent ages relaxing and listening to my audio book (not a great book but a good excuse to snooze and pretend to be ‘reading’ )
We had a lovely jaunt down to Rothesay yesterday. The weather was perfect, the choral workshop was fun (we must have had between 20 and 30 singers) and the food was delicious - roast pork with apricot and cranberry stuffing, veggies and gravy cooked by two gentlemen from the congregation.
D. was very impressed at how easily the choir picked up the music, and the whole thing really went off well.
Eliza Carthy and Jon Boden were both on the Coventry stage of the BBC Big Gig this weekend, not sure they are going to be on i-player later. I caught the last bit of Jon Boden (who I've seen twice with this album, once solo at Cecil Sharp house and with the Remnant Kings at Cambridge, I sadly missed him playing solo at a campfire gig in March) but not Eliza Carthy who I've bought tickets to see twice and missed both times - shingles and daughter ill. The Remnant Kings are loud.
I did get out to see Quiz last weekend for the Saturday matinee which was fun - James Graham looking at the game show culture through the story of the coughing major. I then rearranged anything I'm doing to evenings so I only have to travel one way covered and won't have to find somewhere to cover myself with sunblock before venturing outside again.
Not that worked at a training day on Friday - lots of moving between buildings for the workshops and to get to and from the venue. There was an interesting speaker - Ros Blackburn talking about living with autism.
Today (yes, I know it's a bank holiday) my daughter had a PIP medical, which meant exciting travel on a bank holiday around cross-rail closures and far more time outside in the middle of the day than my fragile self can currently cope with.
O what a dismal day today! Thunder, lightning, rain, wind, leaks in the Palace roof (again)...
The cupboard yielded up some treasure in the form of a can of Pea and Ham SOUP, which, suitably garnished with black pepper and grated Parmesan CHEESE, has cheered me up a little.
Please God the rain will stop soon for a bit, so that I can go to the corner shop for more essentials. I'm walking so slowly now that I'd be positively drown-dead by the time I get to the car (driving is OK, thankfully).
If any kind Shipmate has some nice virtual SOUP, CAKE, or PIE, that they'd like to send to a Poor Old Man (via cyberspace), I will fall on their neck, and bless them.
O what a dismal day today! Thunder, lightning, rain, wind, leaks in the Palace roof (again)...
Well, if you insist on living in the drier part of Britain ...
I'm genuinely sorry to hear about the leaks. They would worry me stupid (as I discovered when the SNOW caused drips in March). We however have leeks (in the salad drawer of the fridge).
Sorry about the leaks BF. It is raining lots here, with thunder but not so much lightening. At least I won't need to water the pots, though I might have to go out and move the snails somewhere else.
I'll have a slice of chocolate hedgehog, please ferijen. We once bought such a cake from a charity stall and it was one of the best cakes I ever did have.
Please may I partake of virtual chocolate hedgehog?
Sitting watching the rain bucketing down, hoping the allotment is sucking it all up ready for planting some time in the next couple of weeks.
My new mobility gadget broke this morning and needs mending. I should have guessed this might happen when it was sold with the piece that needs replacing. Trying to work out who to call out.... or whether I simply sit it out until a new gadget arrives in a few days - I'd already decided that although it's a good idea in principle, the one I bought isn't useful outside or in small houses. Great in hospitals or supermarkets though!
so, for once the shoe is on the other foot in terms of the weather split in the country
up north (i.e. beyond Carlisle) we've been enjoying wonderfully warm and sunny weather.
It was a bit windy over the weekend, and the past 2 days have been spoiled by haar in the morning, but once that burns away it's been very pleasant.
Usually it is London Village and its surroundings which get the nicer weather
I hate to disappoint you, but we had glorious sunshine over the weekend down near London Village. The thunderstorm was overnight on Friday night. (and apparently shook the ground for the camping Guides). Sunday and Monday were seriously hot and sunny. Today is the first really wet and cloudy day.
Comments
Being a tall, thin person, from a tall, thin family, the increase is most noticeable around my now pear-shaped tummy.
Any suggestions? I do try to eat sensibly, though I may not always manage the prescribed 5-a-day fruit/veg intake...
IJ
The Slimming World diet involves eating a lot of food but almost no sugar.
You eat tons of veg, fruit, fish and lean meat. Potatoes, rice and pasta are also unrestricted. Three large meals a day plus snacks.
The thing I really miss most is bread and it’s the thing I will re-introduce as soon as I hit target. You are allowed a small wholemeal bap as a healthy extra, but I save my healthy extra allowance for a snack at supper time consisting of a cracker and a little cheese.
You get 15 ‘sins’ a day, which I save up and spend on wine for Friday and Saturday evenings.
In other news, I'm a very sad piglet today, as our friend G. in Newfoundland died this morning after a short battle with cancer. He'd have been 67 in a couple of weeks.
Why does cancer only ever affect nice people?
Yes - I make my own bread, it’s torture when a new loaf comes out! I’m looking forward to my target reward.
After Boogie's comment about rotwein I initially took "plastered" in a different sense to the one you intended
(Get well soon)
That's three - you can all stop now ...
Well done indeed, Boogie. I've heard a lot of good things about Slimming World and know a number of people who have been successful with it, not only at losing the weight but keeping it off which, in my experience, is at least half the battle. I don't eat much bread at all - my downfalls are wine and sweet things. But I'll get to grips with things again once back from a holiday in France next week. It would be churlish not to sample the local vinestuffs.
We've had rain today, the gardens look so much happier for it. On the downside I've had to use the tumble dryer for a load of laundry - things Mr Nen wants to take away with him that have been living in the piles of clothes he likes to build up.
Do other people find there are always last minute panics before a holiday or is it just our mismanagement? It's one of the things I hate about going away.
First, the old adage Breakfast like an emperor, Lunch like a king, Dine like a peasant is fairly good advice.
Second, since modern dinner plates tend to be 12" either seek out old standard 10" plates in a charity shop or, if your plates have a raised rim, make it a rule that nothing should be on the rim of the plate. If you find that hard, try making it a rule to only have X serving-spoonsful per meal and swap your serving-spoons for dessert-spoons.
Third, absolutely no bread or cake after 6pm.
Lastly: good about the fruit and veg (although it should be more veg than fruit and 10 a day ...) so you could try to begin every meal with a bowl of salad dressed only with olive oil, pepper and lemon juice.
Good luck.
Great idea, I’m going to try this. It’s quite hard to eat as much as I should on this diet I’m following.
We go away often with both sons living far away.
I have a hold-all in which I keep ‘holiday stuff’ (like passport, plugs, travel hairdryer, suncream, sunhat, sunglasses - all the bits and pieces). It helps a lot.
That's a good idea. We don't go abroad much, Mr Nen goes more than I do as I'm a poor traveller and particularly bad about flying. Maybe it does get better with practice.
It probably doesn't help that I try not to think about it until I have to. Hence mooching about on the deck of the Ship rather than packing.
But I always take a spare set of underwear, a toothbrush and a pair of shorts in my hand luggage in case the luggage goes missing - it did once. My son’s honeymoon in Tahiti (yes, he’s the rich son!
(') (') (') for your friends
Several years ago a granddaughter broke one arm at schooL, plaster to the elbow. That night she went to a poorly supervised church youth group and broke the other arm badly. Plaster from fingers to shoulder. She coped surprisingly well, I was amazed.
Re: packing - although we don't travel all that often, it's usually back to Blighty, so I keep passports, my jewellery roll and British-plug hairdryer and straighteners in the carry-on bag, so that I know where they are*. I always put a change of clothes in as well in case of luggage deciding to go somewhere else. As for being organised in advance? Not a chance - packing is done the night before at the earliest.
* When we were over last summer, I thought it would be very clever to leave the hair-dryer and straighteners at D's mum's house, because that's where we usually go straight from the airport. The folly of this scheme became apparent when we went over in February for Dad's funeral and went straight from Gatwick to Edinburgh ...
* * * * *
It's been a hot, sticky sort of day here, although I wasn't out in the worst of it (it got up to 26° a few hours ago). I'd dozed off while waiting for a batch of chicken stock to cook, and when I woke up the sky had become very dark indeed, and when I came through to look in on the Ship, I was watching and listening to a rather good thunderstorm. It's passed along the river now and brought the temperature down to a more civilised 19°
Otherwise I'd have needed help with everything, including wiping my bum.
It's been a lovely day here, and I had a nice walk along the walking bridge this evening while D. was practising tomorrow's voluntary. I really must do a bit more walking now that the weather's better.
Did I tell you I’m doing Couch to 5K? I’m on week 3 but have had to suspend it for now due to a cough - may have to go back a week. It doesn’t sound like much running - but it is for me!
This morning, we had a short period of heavy rain which eased when I left for church, though we had two claps of thunder as I arrived, so I think we got off quite lightly.
Incidentally, if Calan are performing anywhere near you, try to go to see them - folk music meets rock, good, foot tapping stuff.
We're taking a little jaunt down to Rothesay this afternoon; the vicar there was D's organ scholar when we were in St. John's, and he's asked D. to do a sort of choral workshop thing with choirs from local churches - in reality, a rehearsal for Choral Evensong, then FOOD, then the service. It'll be simple stuff - Ferial responses, a unison setting of the canticles and a fairly simple anthem, as D. obviously doesn't know the capabilities of the choir that he'll get.
Should be a nice wee trip though.
IJ
We have an excel spreadsheet for any trips beyond one night away, adapted for foreign holidays / camping / etc. It is 5 pages long! Sounds overkill, but it is great and does mean we don’t tend to forget stuff, unless we do something silly, like taking nappies off the list when child B grew out of them, but forgetting to add pants....
If you want to see the same arrangements as Bellowhead, Jon Boden has just finished a tour with the Remnant Kings - but performing his own work (and Sam Sweeney and Paul Sartin are both part of that band), Pete Flood is now drumming with the Oysterband, Rachel McShane has her own new band, Paul Sartin and Benji Kirkpatrick are both in Faustus, John Spiers has just started partnering Peter Knight, but I haven't seen that new band or Rachel McShane's new band live yet. I missed the Spiers and Knight because it was the day after I was assaulted and Rachel McShane isn't coming down to London until the autumn.
Not sure how hot it is here, perhaps 24+? so have set up a breeze inside and am watching storm clouds gathering - another kind friend* is walking over later to carry on organising me so I hope she misses the rain. We are both gardeners so will welcome it though.
*I am bowled over by the kindness of so many friends, without whom I'm not sure what I'd have done lately.
We took the dogs for a sunny walk in the nearby nature reserve, finishing with them having a good old splash in the river.
Then I spent ages relaxing and listening to my audio book (not a great book but a good excuse to snooze and pretend to be ‘reading’
I eventually got round to the washing up the dogs didn’t help!
We had a lovely jaunt down to Rothesay yesterday. The weather was perfect, the choral workshop was fun (we must have had between 20 and 30 singers) and the food was delicious - roast pork with apricot and cranberry stuffing, veggies and gravy cooked by two gentlemen from the congregation.
D. was very impressed at how easily the choir picked up the music, and the whole thing really went off well.
I did get out to see Quiz last weekend for the Saturday matinee which was fun - James Graham looking at the game show culture through the story of the coughing major. I then rearranged anything I'm doing to evenings so I only have to travel one way covered and won't have to find somewhere to cover myself with sunblock before venturing outside again.
Not that worked at a training day on Friday - lots of moving between buildings for the workshops and to get to and from the venue. There was an interesting speaker - Ros Blackburn talking about living with autism.
Today (yes, I know it's a bank holiday) my daughter had a PIP medical, which meant exciting travel on a bank holiday around cross-rail closures and far more time outside in the middle of the day than my fragile self can currently cope with.
The cupboard yielded up some treasure in the form of a can of Pea and Ham SOUP, which, suitably garnished with black pepper and grated Parmesan CHEESE, has cheered me up a little.
Please God the rain will stop soon for a bit, so that I can go to the corner shop for more essentials. I'm walking so slowly now that I'd be positively drown-dead by the time I get to the car (driving is OK, thankfully).
If any kind Shipmate has some nice virtual SOUP, CAKE, or PIE, that they'd like to send to a Poor Old Man (via cyberspace), I will fall on their neck, and bless them.
IJ
I'm genuinely sorry to hear about the leaks. They would worry me stupid (as I discovered when the SNOW caused drips in March). We however have leeks (in the salad drawer of the fridge).
Sorry to hear about the leaks...
I'll have a slice of chocolate hedgehog, please ferijen. We once bought such a cake from a charity stall and it was one of the best cakes I ever did have.
Sitting watching the rain bucketing down, hoping the allotment is sucking it all up ready for planting some time in the next couple of weeks.
My new mobility gadget broke this morning and needs mending. I should have guessed this might happen when it was sold with the piece that needs replacing. Trying to work out who to call out.... or whether I simply sit it out until a new gadget arrives in a few days - I'd already decided that although it's a good idea in principle, the one I bought isn't useful outside or in small houses. Great in hospitals or supermarkets though!
up north (i.e. beyond Carlisle) we've been enjoying wonderfully warm and sunny weather.
It was a bit windy over the weekend, and the past 2 days have been spoiled by haar in the morning, but once that burns away it's been very pleasant.
Usually it is London Village and its surroundings which get the nicer weather