We met up with our son and daughter about 45 mins drive away. That meant going over the top of the South Downs, which meant seeing the beautiful view across the valley towards Amberley. Sadly I don't have any photographs...
But I do have a sketch of a very similar view, from Ditchingly Beacon as opposed to Bury Hill (Summer 2021)
Do you know this version of the popular hymn 'All things bright and beautiful' composed by John Rutter?
(I've pinched the blog title from Ang!)
I remember visiting Porthcurno in Cornwall, on the beach below the Minack open-air theatre and seeing the curiously small and insignificant hut where the huge, vital trans-world undersea cables came in;
Oh my, this brought back memories of watching a play as the sun set into the sea, a fishing boat slowly making it's way across the horizon...
The sea really was this colour, the sand really is golden....
The hut is at the head of the beach. We trudged up the sand to see the massive tarry cables emerge up through the floor, and continue to the office (now a museum) at the top.
But I digress. It wasn't that sort of cable...
I was momentarily baffled that she had only sent one photograph of the squares in the write-up, but she had created two the same. I love tracing the paths of the different strands in cable knitting.
It's a nice shade of green, very soft wool with good stitch definition so the cable really stands out.
The flat gift is an interesting guide to a textile exhibition she went to at Blickling Hall with fascinating pictures and information.
I sent her a square from one of my favourite patterns for knitted squares;
but I used self-striping yarn and let it do its thing. Two ends to sew in instead of many.
I've kept the pale square and sent Ang the darker one; it looked a little neater.
Finally, another flashmob. Clearly a setup, but still brilliant. The 'flute' player, Michel Tirabosco, is amazing.
Yesterday we did a quick round trip - Aldi, to leave a box of books that I'm selling back to World of Books in the in-post lockers, and the British Heart Foundation to leave four bags of bric-a-brac and other stuff - some books WoB wouldn't take, a couple of school bags (when did I stop teaching? when did my daughter leave school?) and oddments of china. Gone, gone, gone!
I've another box of books ready to go to WoB now. That will make six boxes and bags to charity by the end of June, so I'm back on track for the 'two boxes a month' New Year Resolution.
It occurred to me that the money I get back on the books could go some way to feeding my own book-buying...
....
Today was a cardiology appointment (all's well, no changes) and I had found out that there was a Little Free Library near the clinic premises. So we detoured there as it was on my list of places to visit, with a couple more Wob rejects and a Judi Dench biography to leave as a swap. Or just leave.
But we were out of luck;
It had been taken down on 9th June for repairs. Ah well, I'll put the books in the next charity shop bag.
In view if the possibility of building work starting perhaps maybe at the end of the month, we're getting a bit more focused on clearing the garden, moving plants and pots and ornaments down to a place of safety at the bottom of the garden.
Today Vicky-the-gardener came, and as she is bound and determined to rescue a rose, we cleared the space around it so she could try and extract it from its spot in the patio.
BB went out to help... I joined just in time to see him do a sudden backwards roll down off the patio steps, waving the main stem of the rose in both hands and scattering earth from the rootball. Judging by the 'ow' it wasn't a soft landing... fingers crossed he won't be too sore tomorrow.
Vicky has replanted the rose. We'll just have to see if it survives.
Meanwhile I've quite a few of the flowers and buds in a vase to enjoy.
We were trying to fathom out how to arrange the steps down from what will be the new patio, without encroaching on the garden. Tricky, as the patio is only 2m deep from house to garden, and because of the slope of the ground the garden edge of the patio will be about 45 cm above ground level.
This is one of the hymns used today at zoom church. The words are st Richard's. He was a 13th century bishop of Chichester, and is celebrated on 16th June, Sussex Day.
The prayer seems quite modern today...
In journalism and blogging, a listicle is an article that is structured as a list, which is often fleshed out with additional text relating to each item. A typical listicle will have a title describing a specific number of items contained within, along with subsequent subheadings within the text for each entry. The word is a portmanteau of list and article.
(Here I started down a rabbit hole... there are novels written entirely in the form of letters, could one write one in the form of listicles?)
Back to the here and now, I reckon my blogs are nearly all listicles; a variety of topic headings and then a few sentences to expand further.
Like this paragraph!
...
My father's flat isn't selling (yet, always add 'yet', to imply that any day now there will be a queue of people aged 55 or over and needing assistance to maintain their independence, all desperateto buy it). We've started to notice flyers from other estate agents appearing on the doormat when we go to check. They make me think of vultures.
I don't know any estate agents socially. It's rather hard to work out what they are doing for the fee... like spiders, spinning a Web and then just waiting to see if anything turns up...
I'm pretty certain that none of these companies are my friends!
The whole 'how can we sell the flat' issue nakes me want to hide... like Archimedes the owl meeting Wart, the boy who will become King Arthur in T H White's 'The Once and Future King'
I shut my eyes and say 'There is no flat'. Of course that doesn't work, and sadly neither does 'There is no me'. Life just isn't the same as fiction!
...
Eating noodles is always a messy business. We gad noodles with teriyaki salmon and various bits of vegetable; the last of the broccoli, the remains of the asparagus, the dregs of the packet of frozen green beans, a few rather dessicated spring onions... tasted a lot better than I've made it sound! We sat opposite each other forking up noodles and slurping the straggly ends, or chomping them off with our teeth. Not a meal for invited guests!
It reminded me of this passage in Cranford, by Elizabeth Gaskell, written in 1850, about how their rigidly correct ladies ate their oranges;
Miss Jenkyns did not like to cut the fruit; for, as she observed, the juice all ran out nobody knew where; sucking (only I think she used some more recondite word) was in fact the only way of enjoying oranges; but then there was the unpleasant association with a ceremony frequently gone through by little babies; and so, after dessert, in orange season, Miss Jenkyns and Miss Matty used to rise up, possess themselves each of an orange in silence, and withdraw to the privacy of their own rooms to indulge in sucking oranges.
Maybe we should have taken our dishes to eat our noodles in separate rooms?
This looks like being my vegetable harvest for 2026. Because of the impeding house extension work I haven't sewn, planted, or grown anything this year apart from three stunted broad bean plants.
Yesterday I noticed a few pods had filled out. I picked them this morning and we had them at lunchtime. Delicious!
There won't be any more produce until the apples are ripe.
....
Knitting the squares is a very pleasant way of filling in a few minutes here and there in the day. I've got a wooden knitting bowl which is perfect for a couple of small balls of wool and my needles
I've photographed it with the current square wrong side up in order not to give away the pattern, and I've added a few extra balls of wool for further camouflage.
The square I've chosen has an easy repeated pattern over a couple of rows so it is really simple to work out what comes next when I pick it up to add some rows.
I've also cracked continental combination purl knitting, a game changer for me.
Somewhere else I read that this method twists the stitches - true - and the work around if you want to knit these stitches in the next row is to knit through the back of the stitch - yes! Easy peasy too.
I think I must have spent nearly the whole day reading Kate Morton's 'Homecoming'. I had to pause a couple of times; a piano lesson to teach in the morning, a long detailed telephone conversation with our architect about the extension, and making supper. (BB cooked lunch; we had steak, his speciality, yum yum very yum yum!).
I also had to pause and brace myself a few times; there were moments when characters did things that were so breathtakingly awful that I needed time to think about what I had read before I could continue, and instances characters who where pillars of rectitude were concealing such terrible wrongs - but one could understand why, what had tipped them over the edge.
Finally, I needed to keep reading in great chunks as the book switches between 1959, 1979, 1989 and 1999, and even though the chapters and context were clear in the chapter headings it was still a bit of a jolt to time travel back and forth.
It's a meatier read than I was expecting, and although I had several ideas as to what the plot twists might be, I was still caught by surprise by the several revelations.
It's set in Australia, and I realise I have no idea of where the cities and provinces are. I should think my ignorance is not unusual for British people, judging by the woeful answers whenever Australia is the continent for the 'where is Kazakhstan' game comes up on 'Richard Osman's House of Games', where you have to mark where various cities and landmarks are in answer to the questions.
Maybe tomorrow something will get done!
Meanwhile it is nearly bedtime and my step count is a measly 1700 - I'll get a couple of hundred in before I go to bed, and will try and make them up over the next three days (or I could just play Relampago a few times on the piano...)
.......
Or I could try a bit of this... (in my dreams!)
Electro Swing by ShuffleDance.pl Parov Stelar Booty Swing, Em Delacrem choreography
There isn't any...
I knit, I write up my diary, I add a few bits to the ever-growing pile to go to the charity shop, I cook lunch, I read, I might tackle a housework chore (or I might not)...
Wednesday and Thursday are a piano lesson days, so I taught a piano lesson.
I played suduko,
and soon it will be bed time.
I'm happy enough with this... slow steady days are a blessing.
The New List; BB and I are compiling a list of places to visit, things to do, in the area. His 70th birthday, some years ago, was massively overshadowed by othe family events, and mine is later this year. So we're thinking of slightly celebrating both of them. At the moment we're concentrating on places within an hour or so of where we live;
Pallant House gallery in Chichester
Bignor Roman Villa
Wings Aviation Museum
Tangmere Aviation Museum
a Little Local Library box in Hove just because it is there
I'd love to set up a little free library outside our house!
That's as far as we got with the list today.
Which means 'lightning'.
Here's the first page; as I hoped it's not that difficult, but sounds very impressive. You have to remember to play it 2 octaves lower than written.
After I'd spent about half an hour on it, I discovered my fitness watch had added about 400 steps to the counter! That felt too much like cheating, even for me, so I took the watch off and added 400 real steps to balance things out.
I'm trying to achieve a total step count of 100,000 by then end of June. Not as a target, I don't like targets because I feel pressured by them. It's just a notion...
The first week is looking promising.
......
This looks a promising new book: Phillipa Perry well known psychiatrist and agony aunt, and also wife of artist Grayson Perry, has written a cosy mystery.
It's out in hardback, audio and rather expensive kindle editions at the moment, so I will have to practice patience and wait for the price to come down.
I'm thinking of the verse
'Peverse and foolish oft I strayed,
But yet in love he sought me,
And on his shoulder gently laid
And home rejoicing brought me.'
Today it came to mind when we saw this bizarre little scene through the window.
It's not very clear, but you should be able to make out the geese which nested by the pond. For some reason they have arrived in our road along with three goslings, and a neighbour is trying to persuade them to walk to the corner (about three houses along on the right) and then up to the pond. That road has about 14 semi-detached bungalows. Then there's quite a busy road to cross.. It's going to be a tricky bit of shepherding.
Next-door's cat it watching with great interest, but is keeping a safe distance away.
...
I vividly remember my class being made to sing that verse on our own in school hymn practice as a punishment for being too chatty. We were so embarrassed. We were a perverse lot, and often strayed from the rules.
Ang has written all about her square here;
She's called the colourway 'syrup and cream'
You can see the difference between having a yellow background with a cream stripe (left) and a cream background with a yellow stripe. She sentbme the left hand square.
There was also a little Lyles Golden Syrup recipe book to go with it. There are some delicious looking recipes in it.
I went on woolwarehouse just to snip the picture to show what I ment by yarn cakes, but I should really have stayed away... the colours are so tempting! These are lion brand... as they say on TV 'other brands are available '! I did manage to resist... (repeat three times at four hourly intervals NO MORE YARN.... NO MORE YARN.... NO MORE YARN....)
I was thinking that maybe this collaboration could as count as a slow decluttering project, except for every square that goes out of the house, one comes in...
We had thunder and lightning and heavy rain yesterday. This might even have been our first thunderstorm of the year; they seem to skirt round our town, kept off by the surrounding hills maybe.
My little Hazel tree that I'm following this year has perked up. We've been keeping it going with a proper watering every few days through the hot dry period, but there's nothing like Real Rain to freshen up the shrubs and trees;
Although the flowers took a bit of a battering.
I posted off my square to Ang on Monday; the first one of the new collaboration. Ang chose the very appropriate name 'Double Knitting', as that's what we're using. It's supposed to ge a bit of a stash buster. I shall have to be very strict with myself about that and not buy any yarn!
The pattern is called Horizontal Ridges. I've used one of those 'cakes' of yarn, where the colours change quite slowly. The lower square is the one I've kept, the colours were changing from sludge to quite a decent fawn. The top square is a lovely blue, from the same cake. I did block them, but as soon as they were unpinned they sprang back to how they were! It's the ridge pattern, which has a similar effect to ribbing, making them slightly stretchy.
I'm busy with the next one now.
Here's Nigel Kennedy playing the slow movement from Summer, Vivaldi's Four Seasons, complete with lots of extra twiddly bits and thunderstorms.
Basil cuttings; Sue (but which Sue? Suffolk Sue, I think) wrote in her blog about taking cuttings from her supermarket plant. She made it sound simple, so I had a go.
I took a good long length from several bits of my basil, trimmed off the lower leaves and stuck them in a jar of water on the kitchen windowsill.
113It didn't take long for the first roots to appear. I let them grow some more, and now I have potted them up. I hope they like their new home.
,,,,,
Last month wIas a spectacular success for increasing my step count, which translates as being generally a lot more active.
Just look at the height of that last entry! And an amazing total of nearly 102,000 steps for the month. That's a lot more than the previous maximum steps counts of approximately 80,000 steps.
I wonder if I can manage something similar for June? It would mean trying to average about 3,500 steps a day.
....
There's a passage in the novel 'A Small Bomb at Dimperly' by Lissa Evans, where Valentine, recently demobbed from the army at the end of the WW2, returns home because he is the heir to the family title and crumbling country house. His brother, Felix, had been reported as missing in action, and it has just been confirmed that he died, and so Valentine has become the new head of the family.
He is given the task of reading the lesson at his brother's funeral, a tricky task as he is severely dyslexic. Back then, dyslexia wasn't recognised, and so he was labelled by his family as rather stupid and useless. However he has memorised several useful passages, one of them being the Ecclesiastes chapter I quoted yesterday... here's the bit in the book;
All was going well, until he spotted an old friend in the congregation...
He’d no sooner spotted her than, with solemn deliberation, she stuck out her tongue at him and then the next word didn’t arrive. ‘… a time to … to …’
A dreadful nothing. A silence that reminded him of the moment when a doodlebug engine cut out and the world below sat waiting for the smash.
He looked down at the page, at the impenetrable thicket of lines, and spotted the word ‘dance’ tangled in the undergrowth, but surely he’d already said ‘dance’? And hadn’t he also said ‘weep’ and ‘rend’ and ‘sew’ and ‘cast away stones’? Which left … what?
His thoughts thrashed around and lighted on Felix. ‘… a time to … to hunt and a time to … to shoot; a time to spend and a time to … refrain from spending; a time to … turn left and a time to turn right; a time to fly and a time to … to …’ – he’d got himself into a mess with this one – ‘… to … to perch.’
There was an uneasy stirring at the edges of his vision, but just as he thought he would have to cut and run, possibly as far as Watford, the real words came surging back again (‘… a time to keep silence and a time to speak …’), and he rattled through the last few phrases at panicked speed and then flipped the Bible shut as if it were a hated text-book.
Looking up, he saw the congregation staring at him with the expression of spectators at a fairground Wall of Death. Apart from his mother, who had her eyes shut.
I hugely enjoyed this book, so much so that I've read it several times and even listened to the audio version.