Optimist

Walking the Ouse

2012-01-26T11:57:00.000-08:00

The Sussex Ouse Path: Stage II (Stage I was not very memorable)
No sign of the river until reaching the viaduct that carries the train down to Brighton. Eleven million bricks went into its construction (this is probably not the exact number) but the structure is best admired from underneath, as there is a bifurcation in each arch, as in the photo. Enough of the walk - the whole point is being able to justify cake and a large pot of tea. We stopped at a newly opened, genteel establishment at Cuckfield. It can be recommended for carrot cake and the conversation of the friendly owner, who takes an interest in the fortunes of Norwich football club.

There has been bean failure

2011-07-09T13:33:00.000-07:00

Hmm - it was suggested to me that runner beans with white flowers were not pecked at by sparrows. Wrong! Even dangling CDs didn't put them off. Using them as frisbees might have been better. So, dragged in their pots to the fruit cage, where the beans with the red flowers are. It's therefore a bit of a race, the motley red flowered plants growing in near rock-hard clay v the white flowered equivalent in pots with decent compost but well-pecked.

Still, have to remain positive, next year the strawberry crop is bound to be better than this year - 4 (berries that is, not kilos).

A mirage in France?

2011-04-28T12:31:00.000-07:00

There we were, driving north close to Le Mans when we went past a camel in a field. I'll give you that France is slightly more south than the UK but this seemed a bit extreme. Fair enough, I thought, goat's cheese is a big thing in France, perhaps this is the next step. Or maybe it's for new, healthier milk - for cups of tea, brings a variation on sugar cubes, one hump or two?

Given the high temperatures and lack of water in April, camels might start to feel quite at home. And camel trains would be a welcome sight compared with the average camion. So, this is obviously the start of something big, a far-sighted investment in a low-carbon, high-quality cheese lifestyle except that the next field had the rest of the circus parked there.

Breakfast in France

2011-01-19T13:07:00.000-08:00

Brittany Ferries do a very passable Full English Breakfast- although the sausages might not be authentically English as there may be some meat in them. What a tasty treat as the boat surfed into St Malo for our early Jan lets-check-the-house visit. I do find however that I need very little justification for these jaunts, lets-take-a-spare-eggcup-there-just-in-case does it for me just as well.

The lawn was cut, the garden furniture was got out and cups of tea were partaken. What a delight in Jan in the Vendee. All too short sadly but we did spend an further night in Nantes on the return, the Ibis, http://www.accorhotels.com/gb/hotel-0855-ibis-nantes-la-beaujoire/index.shtml, very recommendable and provides suitable comparison material for the Full French Breakfast.

The season of Scrooge is upon us

2010-11-25T12:46:00.000-08:00

In the summer, we bought a flip-over desk calendar with a picture for each day of the year, of the Vendee. They were all taken from the air, hopefully using a telephoto lens otherwise there's been a lot of very low flying going on. Being financially prudent we have delighted in the fact that we'll be able to use it next year and the year after etc...... Hopefully with a year gap we'll have forgotten the picture and it will seem new to us. Sadly analogous to the goldfish, reputed to have forgotten by the time he swims the circuit of the bowl.

The shop where we bought it has already gone out of business. I can see something wrong with the business model of selling calendars that last forever.

Huffing and Puffing

2010-10-20T12:29:00.000-07:00

Tough luck on Googlers who arrive here wondering what the (headstone?) saying Win Cole 1940 is all about. I don't know either. It's in the middle of a wood, in the middle of Hampshire, just north of Winchester, close by St Swithun's Way. But now you are here, welcome to read on...

So last Sunday was the most excellent of days, wall-to-wall blue stuff and the opportunity to conquer another section of St Swithun's Way.

Started awkwardly, parked outside ancient church in middle of tiny village, got told to shift the car by an elderly aristocrat. It's a public road, we'll park where we like we thought, whatever happened to christian charity etc. Does he think he owns the village - then we thought he actually might, so we parked at the bottom of the hill by a stream. And what a stream - feeds into watercress beds....how do they harvest the stuff? The Mid Hants railway http://www.watercressline.co.uk/Home was huffing and puffing a few fields away. Those trains are noisy in the extreme.

So when we've all learned how to teleport ourselves, Startrek fashion, will Heathrow be run by enthusiasts who spend their Sundays taxying highly polished Boeing 747s?

Not quite the Harvest Festival

2010-09-22T12:32:00.000-07:00

As Growing Season reaches the finale of the 2010 tour, before autumn is on stage, what have I to plan for the 2011 performance?

1, Find some celery that grows properly, that looks like something out of Sainsburys rather than some spiky starfish. Still, only 132 plants left - more soup anyone?

2, Avoid planting haricot verts at the end of July. Why did I do that?

3, Definite lack of photons in the garden this year - some trees will be axed - sad but you can't eat wood.

4, 2011 will be the Year of The Large Net. Sorry to the lads who sit on the branches and squawk but you'll just have to stick to the stuff on your bird table.

The 2010 performance did not receive critical acclaim but there's still chance for a success - the pepper harvest is yet to commence!

Holiday happyness

2010-08-23T13:09:00.000-07:00

Halfway to the ferry, the car started to run roughly, I stopped at a lay-by and so did the engine. No sign of trouble in the engine compartment and when I tried to re-start it, it ran perfectly. Dilemma - stay in England or continue to the Vendee - chose the latter.

Engine management light came on north of Rennes. I can recommend the Volvo agent - and they didn't even charge for their help.

This was not the only holiday mini-mishap. I expect the bruises will disappear eventually.

Bad things come in threes. How did I manage to book the B&B for our last night - for the wrong night!

But did I have a good holiday? It was fantastic.

Northern Lights

2010-08-08T03:11:00.000-07:00

The Northern Lights are in my mind, from the song of the Seventies (for pedants I believe it's 1978). The Aurora Borealis - there's been a spate of sightings (this cliched phraseology seems to be often associated with UFOs, which are sort of similar, so I'll stick with it). Quite rare in the UK, best seen the further north, which is where we've been this weekend for a family wedding. I say the north, we were a bit short of sighting chaps in flat caps with whippets but the nearest town was Northampton so we must have been a long way north.

The wedding was a stylish do, with a peacock theme and all the tables were decorated with peacock feathers. I didn't know that peacocks were indigenous to the north - we didn't see any but I suppose if they were all bald they wouldn't want to be seen. The tables were all named, after places where the Happy Couple had spent happy moments. We were on 'Blackpool'.

I'd been discussing the Northern Lights several weeks ago with a friend. 'Yes', he said, 'I've seen them, lovely they were, all shimmering away - we were in Blackpool at the time'. I wonder if any of them looked tower-shaped.

Now is the summer of our discontent

2010-07-07T13:02:00.000-07:00

It is a truth often recognised that a garden can pretty much soak up whatever time you throw at it. Unfortunately I'm usually rather lacking in the commodity and that's my explanation for the micro dimensioned raspberries in the fruit cage. They are furthest from the water tap, whereas the raspberry plants that grow almost alongside - and out of the cage - are a substantial size. Sadly shared with the sparrows though.

The carrots are shared with the slugs and the broad beans, black fly. It's take, take, take in the garden although to be fair to the squirrel she has been pretty generous with the acorns. Should anyone need their lawn sprinkled with potential oak trees I can recommend just the critter.

The Man in the Moon

2010-06-09T12:08:00.000-07:00

It has been a bit hectic travel-wise the last few weeks but not quite up to the distances implied by the lunar title. Nevertheless, Rugby - the place - is not normally on our regular orbit of places to visit and a satisfactorily narrowboatish time was had - it coincided with a canal boating bonanza.

Even better was a short trip to the Vendee over half-term to mess around with yellow paint, with hopefully some of it finding its way on to the exterior walls. In the midst of painty paradise, a car pulled up outside. 'We are doing a car treasure-hunt' they said in gabbling French 'and we want to know where the Man in the Moon is'. Well, there is some dispute over whether the man in the moon actually exists but as sure as anything he wasn't in our village that morning. The treasure hunters thought that it might be something to do with the name of a house. After some puzzling, we admitted defeat and off they went to the next clue.

Not two minutes later another car pulled up. Great I thought, it's going to be like this all morning. So I walked over, they wound the window down and I said 'Sorry, got no idea where the man in the moon is, been thinking of it for some time and I really don't know'.

There was an odd silence. 'Sorry to bother you' they said, 'We are on our way to the tile factory and we're lost, please can you help'.

Wet Walk

2010-05-05T11:51:00.000-07:00

First long walk of the year, started St Swithun's Way http://www3.hants.gov.uk/longdistance/st-swithuns-way.htm

It was tipping down with rain, sort of appropriate really. A true test of wet-weather apparel and mine passed with only a score of 7 out of 10 BUT it does get invited back for next weekend's performance, which will be 10 miles around Hertford. For fellow veggie growers, we walked past a megafield of broad bean plants - and double the height of mine at home. Not a weed to be seen, unlike home but at least mine are organic.

The countryside of North Hampshire is gentle rolling hills, with scatterings of white and black cottages from the 1600s. You've probably seen the same thing on a big box of chocolates. I don't think they take the pictures in the rain though.

Back to the clothes wringer.

Recycling

2010-04-25T13:00:00.000-07:00

This is even shorter than usual and credit needs to be shared with G in Nantes. Here in Horsham we've just gone to the blue-topped bins for recycling, where everything gets chucked in and it gets sorted at the depot.

The council info said that house numbers needed to be put on them. Fair enough, A mission to town to get some fancy self-adhesive ones. Except they had sold out. Everyone was doing the same thing. Although oddly, they still had some '1's and a few '0's. That's when I had the idea, we'd do it in binary, i.e. 11010 or similar.

Or dust-binary!

Hundred Years War

2010-04-25T11:34:00.000-07:00

En route to the Vendee at Easter, we stayed at a B&B near Fougeres. Fougeres has a massive castle, constructed at the time of the Hundred Years War. At that time, it seems that marauding hordes of Brits caused general trouble and the locals had to protect themselves. I did read a book on the topic but it was so confusing as to what went on, I was not much the wiser. I expect after a hundred years they had probably lost the plot too.

We had a very civilised meal, delicacies such as home-smoked ham and bright green nettle soup. Our host had been a baker in a town and had sought a different life in the country. We were in a restored barn. 'Lovely building', I said in my best French. 'Goes back way into history' he said, 'Built by the English!'

Ferrari Day

2010-04-03T11:03:00.000-07:00

I consider myself as passionate about the environment, not particularly bothered about possessions, very concerned about safety and generally unworried about status. And yes, I read The Guardian. So, what to make of Ferrari Day in Horsham, with, I think, over 60 of the noisy, guzzly monsters parked in town yesterday to admire.

Wildly impracticable - one of them had a top speed of 206mph- and clearly unsuitable for the Tesco run (although the Co-op run would be more my thing). They even exhibit a remarkable lack of variety in appearance, being mainly exactly the same shade of red. And cream seats - how practical is that?

WHAT WONDERFUL MACHINES! How can I get one! Should I remortgage the house?

Silver Lining

2010-03-26T14:47:00.000-07:00

Every cloud has a silver lining, accentuate the positive - we've all heard these aphorisms (I had to check that word). Even Albert Einstein is quoted - 'In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity!'

So, then, what's good about my recent bout of flu?

Well, I was excused budgerigar feeding, for fear of cross-infection. Now this may not sound like an onerous task but the bird is so timid, she flutters to the other end of the cage in a panic, somewhat distressed. I worry about her having a heart attack and ending up on the cat litter that we use to line the floor. I should point out for all my bird-loving readers that it's not like she can't keep well clear of the feeding activities. The cage is big. In fact it could accommodate a small whale - well, the bars wouldn't hold the water in much, but you get the gist.

Apart from that, I can't think of much positive about being ill. Except that it's so good to be feeling better.

It's not 'otter in the Vendée!

2010-02-24T11:36:00.000-08:00

Half-term visit to our house in the Vendée last week. It was minus 7.1 one morning but the stream at the bottom of the garden hadn't frozen I noticed. Then for a golden five minutes I was really really happy (normally I tick-over at my standard really happy level). Funny, small-dog sized creatures in the field opposite. Crept nearer, they all dived into the stream but not before I saw their whiskers. Otters! One of the rarest creatures going - just fancy, at the end of our garden!

I started thinking, Tarka the Otter, Ring of Bright Water, perhaps I could tame them!

Put right very quickly by a neighbour. 'Blasted nuisance, Coypu (or Ragondin in French) - you can shoot them you know'. Apparently they make good pâte.

Mystery Story

2010-02-06T03:54:00.000-08:00

At Book Group this month we had 'The Testament of Gideon Mack' and 'Snow Falling on Cedars' to ponder. Quite different, like comparing black with white said one member, which was quite apposite considering one was about the Devil and the other, well, snow.

There was some discussion on the benefits of clear endings and the more ambiguous makes-you-think variety. I prefer the latter, so that is why I finish with my own (true) what-was-that-all-about ending.

So walking home, in the evening gloom, a young lady passed me, she had two white ferrets on leads, pulling her along. And a greyhound.

A Foxy Tale

2010-02-01T12:48:00.000-08:00

After the vegetarian foxes finished off my beetroot crop last year I resolved to keep aforesaid cunning creatures out this year. What do they see in beetroot anyway - I always thought my beasts (the correct collective noun can be lead, leash or skulk) looked a bit more purple than the average reynard. Not that it was straightforward for them, as they had to get through netting.

So this is my 'before' picture, prior to initiating anti-fox measures. Stronger netting is what I need. Or perhaps to grow something different. I wonder how foxes feel about carrots?

A snow story

2010-01-18T10:45:00.000-08:00

It's rare in Horsham to find snow lasting for more than a day or two, so virtually no-one, and certainly not me, clears the stuff from 'their' bit of pavement. Actually, I think it might be that slush is more slippery - or slippy, which I've heard a number of times. I had managed ok in the snow but come the slush, four times it took before I could get the car over the pavement on to the drive.

Next snow, I'll be shovelling.

Christmas in France

2010-01-07T10:53:00.000-08:00

A Christmas micro-trip to our house near Fontenay le Comte, primary purpose to transport G to Nantes, to continue his tuition of college students.

It was a surprise to be able to cut the grass in January. Even more of a surprise when it started to snow later that afternoon!

We stayed near Sable sur Sarthe on the way back, a farm offering Chambre d'hotes. The farmer's wife said that she was very worried about a chicken, whether it was keeping warm enough. Quite touching really and I had thought the French would only worry if their Coq au vin was warm enough. Actually, a problem of my language and over 1000 day-old chicks had just been delivered and it was minus 7 degrees.

Such confusion reminds me of when an elderly french neighbour told me that five babies had died in the village during some harsh weather prior to our arrival. I found it difficult to find a suitable reply for such awful news. And difficult to understand. It was a relief to realise that she had actually been talking about brebis but still quite sad.

Christmas in London

2009-12-23T13:18:00.000-08:00

A gathering of colleagues, 12 to 6pm in a pub off Kingsway. Pint of Winter Warmer, followed by venison sausages and chips, then on to Bombardier. Outside, low gold sunlight of nearly-the-shortest-day gradually degraded to artificial light silver through the afternoon. Snow not to be seen, unlike most of south-east England.

Most of the world's known problems were solved, many unknown problems were reviewed, with a planned follow-up meeting in late December 2010.

Cologne Christmas Market

2009-12-10T13:52:00.000-08:00

My first blog. It's about Cologne Christmas market, a topic I know very little about. I expect this trend to be a theme of my blogging career. Well, I had Kangaroo and Camel in an Asian? fusion restaurant for lunch so I was not surprised to be offered Krokodil kebabs in the market in the evening. Resisting the temptation to go for a trio of tasty but tough bits of respectively jumpy, spitting and downright dangerous animals, I went for Lengalenga instead. I have a lot of time for rice and spinach, never caused any grief to anyone. I think it's from Africa, as was the Krokodil, unless they have started to be more common on the Rhine now.