Monthly Archives: January 2018

Kingfisher!

OK, you’ll have to take my word for it because, as usual, we didn’t get the photograph.

We went for a look at Budby Flash, because we wanted to see birds but didn’t want to walk. As we parked, Julia pointed at one of the feeders, where a Great Spotted Woodpecker was feeding. The photos are a bit hazy because we took pictures through the windscreen rather than risk scaring it off.

Great Spotted Woodpecker – Budby Flash

When we did eventually get out of the car it flew off, as expected.

The feeders were full of tits with the odd robin, chaffinch and dunnock having a go. The robins, which normally pose so well, were too busy chasing each other, resulting in a lack of photographs. I got one poor shot of a coal tit but it was mainly a day for blue and great tits, with a visit from some long-tailed tits (who did their best to hide their faces).

The view west from the bridge at Budby Flash

View from the bridge at

Ice on Budby Flash

While I was taking photos of the feeders Julia stalked round the trees that overhang the water by the bridge. A cry of surprise interrupted my photography and I turned just in time to see the eastern end of a westbound kingfisher. It managed to find a spot just round the corner, where it was still close, but hidden. I did think I’d spotted it later, but it was just a discarded beer can when I zoomed in.

Feeding tits at Budby Flash

Mute Swans at Budby Flash

Cormorant at Budby Flash

Drying wings at Budby Flash

Mute Swan

Breakfast Review – Sainsbury’s

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This review relates to breakfast at Sainsbury’s Arnold store, just outside Nottingham. As luck would have it, they also had a decent cook on today and we had a good, enjoyable meal. If a proper reviewer had been on the job, you would probably have had a photograph too. But I didn’t take my camera and I left my phone in the car.

I’m not really a fan of the current Sainsbury’s set up as the coffee set-up slows things down and, as a tea drinker, I don’t see why I should stand in a queue for 10 or 15 minutes as people are served, at great length, with coffee. In the good old days, when British establishments served a choice of tea or instant coffee I didn’t mind coffee drinker,s but now I have to stand round while they decide on which of the eight coffees to have I find them quite irritating.

However, today there was no queue, and we soon ordered (two Big Breakfasts and two teas) and sat down at one of the few remaining tables. It was filthy – covered in rings from cups, with a selection of crumbs and some horrible sticky patches with fluff in them.

Breakfast arrived swiftly and was excellently cooked and presented. This is not always the case.

The fried egg looked good, the sausages and bacon were both excellent (for taste and presentation). The hash brown was particularly good today, the toast was also good and so were the beans. Even the half tomato was reasonable, though a half tomato always looks a bit miserly to me.

So, that’s it. When the system is working well it is capable of producing an excellent breakfast. To be fair, it isn’t always as quick, well cooked and nicely presented as this – the last few visits here have included crusty beans and congealed eggs that seem to have been flung randomly at the plate.

In terms of a star rating – if the tables had been clean today’s breakfast would have been 5 stars. On an average day, with a queue and a breakfast that’s been flung at the plate it’s probably a 4 – good but could be better.

At £11.40 it’s not as good as the Little Chef Olympic Breakfast, but it’s almost half the price.

I’m going to try to persuade Julia to make breakfast reviews a regular feature of the blog. Wish me luck!

No Moon Now

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It’s not been the most industrious of days, though I don’t suppose that will surprise my regular readers. I have read a bit, shopped and cooked two casseroles and a pie filling. That still leaves a few hours and I can only suppose that they were spent napping.

Julia’s working day on Sunday is 6.00 to 4.30 and at this time of the year her shift is considerably longer than the length of daylight. I checked the day length before writing that, and found there are three types of twilight. There’s astronomical twilight, nautical twilight and civil twilight, which all follow on from each other and have various uses. I’ll let lawyers and sailors worry about the various definitions.

There is also, it seems, a popular series of books and films billed as “Twilight”, which makes a Google search a bit annoying if you want proper information on twilight. I imagine that anyone who has a man called Harry Potter in their family tree will suffer similar frustration in their searching.

The header picture shows the street at the time we got home – that glaring globe with starburst effect is a streetlamp, rather than a blazing desert sun, as it first appears.

The lack of smears is due to me spending time cleaning the inside of the car and windscreen. Assuming that cleanliness is still next to Godliness, as I was always taught, then, as well as having a better view of the road I am close to being a saint.

The closing photographs are two where I tried to take a faithful rendition of the sky colour. It was quite a deep orange, but the camera tends to remove much of the colour. I eventually managed to approximate the colour by using the Pop Art filter, which often gives quite a false rendition.

Sunset over Sherwood

Sky at dusk – Nottingham

Another Moon, Another Morning

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It’s not quite as sharp as I would have liked, but there’s a limited selection of sujects at 6am on a Sunday morning.

I’m a little puzzled by the fact it seems to show the half that was in darkness last time. I didn’t know it did that and I’m clearly going to have to do some reading on the subject.

The other shot shows the street, though, being taken by a camera braced against the steering wheel, it also benefits from lighting effects produced by a streaky windscreen.

Street scene in the dark

There was a definite dawn chorus his morning, though it’s far from the full thing. It was nice to hear, even if Spring is still several months away.

The temperature (around a degree above freezing – even two degrees at one point on the trip, – is higher than I’d been expecting after a dire forecast. Just goes to show you shouldn’t believe all you see on TV.

Loose Ends

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The header picture shows the bag of oats Julia bought from Heckington. They are produced at the Maud Foster Mill in Boston (yes, American readers, we have one too). She is determined that I am going to benefit from slow-release carbs and extra roughage in the coming year.

You’d have thought they would have stocked oats from their own mill, but it seems not.

I’m thinking of doing a series of posts on mills as there are plenty in Lincolnshire, and the surrounding counties, with many of them having tearooms attached. I’m trying to work a joke into posts/mills, or post mills but it’s not quite working yet. I’ll work on it as I think the world of mill blogs needs a joke or two.

Today’s work consisted mainly of washing windows and serving customers. This is a picture of the new shop, illuminated by sunlight streaming in through the newly cleaned windows. Once the building work is finished they are going to allow me to clean all the glass in counters and cabinets. As you can see, there will be a lot of work.

The new Collectors’ World in Nottingham

After work, we had roasted vegetables with belly pork and kale. It marks the start of my new healthy eating campaign. Well, healthyish. It’s a start.

Belly pork with roasted vegetables and kale

Heckington, Hovis and Hearts

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We were driving back from Springfields earlier in the week when, looking around for something to photograph, I spotted Heckington windmill. It’s an impressive sight, but as we drove towards it the sky turned murky and, as it was near closing time, we ecided to leave it for another day.

It’s one of those old-fashioned villages, which still has a few traditional shops, and even a Hovis sign.

Bench and Greengrocer – Heckington

Detail on house

Heckington Bakery

Bench at Heckington

Fence post on village green

The Village Green

Julia went into the green grocer while I took a few photos – she bought oats (which I still have to photograph) and meringues, which were very good when eaten with fruit and cream.

We will have another visit later in the year.

Finally, here is the phone box on the village green. It now houses a defibrillator, which is good for people having heart attacks and provides the third element of the title.

Phone box with defibrillator – Heckington, Lincolnshire

Next to procrastination, alliteration is probably my favourite thing. In a writing sense, that is. Neither, I feel, will ever replace Julia or jam doughnuts in my all time top two.

Mornings, Magpies and Medals

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Today I took some brighter pictures of the garden, including one of a Great Tit eating what appeared to be a caterpillar. You’ll have to take my word for that as it spent most of its time refusing to face me.

Great Tit at Mencap Gardens

When the Great Tits eat caterpillars. I feel that Spring is not far behind. Julia later saw a group of Long Tailed Tits on the feeders, though they flew away as she turned the camera on. They do that. Several Magpies took it in turns to contort their way into the fat ball feeder, but they also declined to pose for photographs.

Birds can be very annoying at times.

It was brighter today than it had been yesterday.

Morning sky

The Embankment, Nottingham

Trees at Wilford, Notts

No light, no water, but we do have a heater in the cabin

The work routine is beginning to develop nicely – taking Julia to work and the driving back round the ring road to idle away my days. I went through the medal stock today, including medal-mounting accessories, foreign medals and ribbons. That took me all morning, as there was a lot of chaos to tame, and a lot of bits and pieces.

Fortunately, nothing is beyond the capabilities of a man with time on his hands and a selection of plastic bags.

Wet, Work and William and Mary

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The slightly melting look of the header picture comes from the filtering effect of rain on the windscreeen. Yes, it was that sort of day again.

I wanted a couple of shots because a post always seems better with pictures but, in the absence of anything inspiring, it didn’t seem worth getting out of the car and getting wet.

Embankment, River Trent at Wilford

Trent Embankment, Wilford, Notts

After dropping Julia off at work it was just ten minutes around the ring road and I was at work – 50 minutes early. Nothing like ingratiating yourself with the boss.

Unfortunately he wasn’t there, so it didn’t quite work out.

When we eventually got going I refilled the albums of modern coins (I’m still getting used to the idea that decimal British coins are collected) and then sorted a box of halfpennies ranging from William and Mary to Victoria. There was only one William and Mary in the box, with the majority being George III, and many of them were heavily worn, but at they have seen some history.

We did a few other things, but those were the highlights.

The Year so Far

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It hasn’t been a bad start to the year. It could certainly have been better in terms of energy and computer use, as I have already noted, but it could also have been worse. It might, for instance, have featured snow and freezing temperatures. Instead, it’s been almost shirt sleeve weather at around 9 degrees Centigrade. I say “almost”, as there’s been quite a brisk wind today, which necessitated a jacket.

Yesterday I had my first day in my new job, though “day” is pushing it. I actually did three hours cataloguing a collection of 50 pence pieces and sorting stamps. It’s not exactly the glamour end of the antiques trade. It’s a sort of gentle induction as I’m not really required until next month.

Today I had my first day off. I have Wednesdays off as it matches up with Julia. I’m going to be having Sundays and Wednesdays off. She has Mondays and Wednesdays off. Apart from next month – I’m having to work Wednesdays too. It can be quite complicated synchronising three part-time jobs.

Power Station, Spalding

Steeple behind trees, Spalding

We took a trip to Lincolnshire today. It wasn’t very exciting, just a trip to Springfields, but with the days being short and us not being in a hurry to start, it was far enough. The choice of shops seems to be going downhill, and the attitude of some of the staff isn’t helping things.

The Power Station in the picture is gas-fired and seems to be owned by Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan and China Huaneng Group. Call me old-fashioned, but I liked it in the old days when we generated our own power.

I selected quite a few books in The Works, but I put half of them back. Experience suggests that if I buy more than two or three books I won’t read them before I buy more. I was quite proud of myself at the time, but I’m now thinking that I would have enjoyed reading them. Such is life.

I’ve actually set myself a target of giving at least 365 books away this year, so there’s no point buying another couple of hundred, even if they are only £1.50 each.

Talking of computer problems – the new settings (or lack of settings) is also interfering with photo downloads.

Humph!

I am vexed…

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That’s a line from The Lion and Albert, a venerable old monologue from the days of pierrots and end of the pier shows.

It has no bearing on the events of the day, but after the computer-based problems of yesterday it sums up my mood nicely.

After finally getting the computer to start yesterday I noticed quite a few things had disappeared. I then noticed that WordPress was informing me about all comments on the blog. That’s a lot of emails to go through. I assume that they have previously gone to the email account that I set up when I started. After changing email accounts I am now snowed under, and will be changing it again quite soon.

Then I noticed that my avatar has disappeared…

Vexed is probably an understatement.

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Life after the Care Farm