ladyofastolat | Reading

A local Facebook group is currently going nuts about the Appalling Behaviour of the Current Children. The Current Children have flicked balls of mud at a passing car!

Vaguely impressed they are out playing with mud in February, but I can definitely vouch that this is nothing to do with The Horrors of Modern Education, because 50 years ago, I and my friends did exactly this.

Though, so far as I recall, it was summer, because we scooped clay out of a convenient streambed to make our mudballs. The good thing about this was that there was a sort of tunnel that the brambles formed over the stream, so you not only had ammunition to hand, but also a handy escape route far too low, muddy and brambly for adults, in the rare event of the irate motorist noticing the crime in progress, leaping from their car shaking their fist. I think this only happened once.

heleninwales

Don't speak to loudly, but it's not raining today. We actually got out to the forest for a walk this morning and in the afternoon we had sunshine, and the daffodils are blooming... And after one decent day, rain is forecast for the rest of the week. :-(

But we had a good walk in the forest this morning. We did the circular walk starting from the car park in Ganllwyd in a clockwise direction for a change. This means setting off up the very steep hill past the village hall and then on into the forest. As we walked we talked about all the other walks that we haven't done all winter because the ground will be too wet. Slogging through quagmires is no fun and can get slippery and dangerous. Perhaps sometime in the future the endless rain will stop and we'll be able to do those walks again?

Anyway, here are walk pictures. Despite the forecast being saying it would be a dry day, it did start off misty with occasional faint drizzle. Looking out to the right as we plodded up the steep hill.

A welcome touch of colour. There are different varieties of gorse so you can find it blooming somewhere all year round.

( More walk photos here... )

In other news...

We have a blackbird in the garden again. We always had a blackbird and I loved hearing their song as afternoon heads into evening and in the early morning. For some reason there was no blackbird last year. I had read that there was a virus affecting blackbirds, so perhaps that was it? But I'd seen three or four blackbirds around recently and now one has started singing.

purplecat

Photo into a museum case with a Vortex Manipulator and Teleportation Bracelet prop from Doctor Who.

puddleshark

A cold grey miserable morning, but the rain held off for a few hours, so I headed over to the tip of the Studland peninsula to watch the ships leaving & entering Poole Harbour. Even on a grim morning, with no light for photography, and my hands freezing, there's still a certain comfort to be found in watching marine traffic...

( Boring stuff. No quinquiremes or galleons... )

puddleshark

A grey day, and the wind is in the north again, very cold. But at least the rain is holding off. And the days are lengthening noticeably. A few days ago, when the cloud cleared briefly, I set off on my morning walk around the forest in the dark. By the time I turned for home, the stars were fading and the sky lightening in the east, and the Woodlarks were starting to sing.

Despite the almost complete lack of sunshine, the first daffodils are starting to flower in one corner of the garden. (No spring crocuses this year. They came up a few weeks ago, but the rain flattened them before the flowers ever got to open...)

purplecat

I am surprised to find myself surprised by the arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. It reveals that I had subconsciously assumed that obviously he would get away with whatever it was he had been doing.

heleninwales

Searching the internet goes better when you know the right search term.

I ordered a garden tool that I'd seen advertised on Facebook. I was a little worried when I realised, after placing the order, that it seemed to be being dispatched from China. However, I didn't lose hope. The sun hats (also purchased from a Facebook ad and sent from China) did arrive and turned out to be excellent. Anyway, after watching the tracking, I saw that the item had left a town with a suspiciously Chinese name, then there was a little aeroplane symbol for a while and, finally, it arrived in the UK. The day before yesterday it had arrived in Chester and yesterday it turned up. Yay!

However, it needed a handle. You could buy it with a handle, but reading the comments under the advert, the handle the company provides is only a couple of feet long (60 cm) which would mean crouching or kneeling to use it and my back, knees and hips wouldn't stand that. No problem, I thought, I can buy a handle separately.

First I thought I could use the handle off a heavy stiff-bristled yard brush that I don't really use any more, but it proved impossible to remove. So plan B was to buy a new handle. But searching for broom handles didn't bring up any that were thick enough. After going round in circles for ages, I saw the words "shovel handle" and had a lightbulb moment. A quick Google on the new search term immediately brought up what I needed, and reading the reviews, it looks as though it's what other people who have bought the same tool have been buying. It will arrive on Monday and then, as soon as the weather improves, I can start removing moss and weeds from the paths.

purplecat

Oswin in her red dress, looking at the camera, frightened, face half in shadow.

Clara, head and shoulders, publicity still.

Clara holding the tiny Tardis from Flatline with the Doctor's hand coming out of it.

Clara's face, side view, emerging from the dark with a light shining on it.

Clara in her waitress outfit, face, looking contemplative.

heleninwales

After days of procrastination, I suddenly had the energy this morning to deal with the tottering pile of clean laundry that needed ironing and/or folding and putting away. I've had lunch, had a little rest and caught up online and then I now to pop out for a quick top-up food shop.

heleninwales

7/52 for the group 2026 Weekly Alphabet Challenge

This week's theme was: G is for Greasy

I hate things that are greasy. I can't eat greasy food or stand the feel of grease on my hands or a greasy surface. I love my cleaning spray that cuts through the grease in the kitchen. It also smells nicely of lemon.

In other news...

I can't get started on anything today. There was a 90 minute dry period, otherwise it has rained incessantly, sometimes mixed with hail, all day so far. The SAD lamp can only do so much and my brain feels as though it's mostly shut down due to the gloom. I feel I should be hibernating. I'll try standing just outside the front door for a few minutes, under the overhang of the roof and see if I can wake up properly.

bunn

I've stripped off a lot of the peeling paint. Now the boat looks like this:( Read more... )

puddleshark

Raining again. Mild again. A quiet walk through the forest, and along the edge of the marshes. No colour in the landscape - the endless rain has washed it all out. Brown heather. Dun reeds. Dun marsh grasses. Stopped a while to watch the rain falling on the black marsh pools: ripples spreading in perfect concentric circles, merging and dissipating. It's quite hypnotic.

The paths still passable, just, though navigation is something of an art. You can't just switch your boots onto auto-pilot and tromp along. You have to look ahead, see which side of the path you should take for the best chance of edging successfully round a puddle-turned-to-lake, see where the rivulet running across the path is narrow enough to leap.

Sat for a while on the wooden bench overlooking the marshes, with the rain pattering on my hood, and water from the pine branches dripping into my coffee. Watched the silver curtains of rain sweeping across the marshes, a pair of geese flying over the reedbeds. Said good morning to a couple passing by in shining waterproofs, accompanied by two cheerful Labradors.

leesa_perrie

So in 2025 I read and finished 90 books, plus 4 short stories, and didn't finish 12 books for various reasons. All of this doesn't include any Bible or fanfic reading.

Please note, just because I finished a book doesn't mean it was good or that I liked it, just that it wasn't so bad that I couldn't finish it (or it was historical detective and I wanted to know who did it). Conversely, just because I struggled with a book doesn't mean it was badly written, sometimes I just can't get into a book – a personal thing rather than a book quality thing.

The books are alphabetical via author surname.

( This way... )

heleninwales

The rain has stopped, but the weather has turned much colder. There was a heavy frost overnight so we postponed our walk until after lunch, by which time it was a little warmer and the frost had gone. We just did a walk along the Mawddach Trail to Penmaenpool and back. Although we've not had snow, there is snow on the mountains.

We had already postponed the Quaker meeting at M's house because one member is away this weekend. The weather is supposed to turn bad overnight, but none of us need to worry about travelling or driving up the very steep hill that doesn't get gritted.

puddleshark

It stopped raining. Just for one day. Blue sky and sunshine, and a northeasterly wind blowing bitter cold and strong enough to ground the skylarks - no song above the fields today. But this might be our only day of sunshine this month, so I set off for another walk on the high ground near the coast.

Kingston village at sunrise.

( Lanes, tracks, & fields )

purplecat

Cover for the New Adventure Warlock by Andrew Cartmel. Ace is in the foreground wearing a tight-fitting black outfit that is presumably supposed to suggest a combat outfit with a very improbable hairstyle, consisting of a ponytail sticking straight up from the top of her head held by some kind of tube affair. One arm is raised to presumably shield her eyes from the nuclear mushroom cloud in the background. In between is rolling green countryside containing a sheep, a cow, a fox and a rabbit.

The, in my opinion, disappointing follow up to Cartmel's Warhead novel. This one toned down the near-future dystopia feel of the first and rather undermined its anti animal-experimentation message by suggesting that anyone involved in animal experimentation is rather obviously a villainous cold-hearted psychopath.

purplecat

A stone wall with evenly spaced alcoves, apparently set into a hillside.

Chesters Roman Fort

heleninwales

6/52 for the group 2026 Weekly Alphabet Challenge

This week's theme was: F is for Frozen

The weather is very wet here and too warm to find any natural ice. As there's nothing in our own freezer that would be at all photogenic, I have resorted to the frozen food cabinets in our local Co-op supermarket.

bunn

He's about 11 months, and was rehomed, but his new people decided over the first night(!) that he was too nervous for them, and returned him the next day so he's come to us for a bit of rest and relaxation before trying again.

He is actually surprisingly friendly when he decides to come out to say hello, but has spent most of his time hiding away so far.

heleninwales

Choosing the habit pledge for the Get Your Words out challenge (which is on DW) was the right choice. I try to avoid revising when I write first draft. There's a danger of ending up in the endless revision loop, going back repeatedly over previous chapters without making any forward progress. However, I felt that I was losing track of exactly what was happening, so today I went back and read through some of the previous scenes and did a bit of smoothing. I also noticed that I'd used the wrong name for a character which meant checking through Book 2 of the trilogy and making a couple of changes there. It didn't result in many new words -- though more than I expected -- but it counts for the habit pledge, so that's fine.

Profile

ladyofastolat

September 2025

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
	1	2	3	4	5	6
7	8	9	10	11	12	13
14	15	16	17	18	19	20
21	22	23	24	25	26	27
28	29	30

Page Summary

Style Credit

Base style: Patsy by sforzinda
Theme: Clay Deco by timeasmymeasure

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags

Page generated Feb. 25th, 2026 01:55 pm

Navigation

Floating down to Camelot

Reading

I was that delinquent

There was actual sunshine today

Random Doctor Who Picture

Ferry spotting

Daff

Suprised

Finding the right words

Clara Icons

A brighter day

De-greaser cleaning spray

Dinghy progress

Rain falling on marsh pools

Annual book count 2025

A quick walk

Kingston

Random Doctor Who Picture

Random Roman Remains

Frozen

Foster Cat Bingo

Writing progress

Profile

September 2025

Most Popular Tags

Page Summary

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags