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A wet day was had by all

We went grocery shopping today. They won’t let a couple go in together, so I usually sit in the car, but I wanted to see if there were any little treats I wanted for Weasel Day. So I went in first, and Uncle B followed five minutes later.

Got my stuff, wheeled it out. Realized if I tried to open the car, the alarm would go, so I stood by the car with my cart.

And the heavens opened. It was sunny when I went in! Couldn’t call him because there’s famously no phone signal in this village. So I just waited. And got wetter.

And wetter.

Turns out, they’d run out of sanitizer and kept him waiting in line for ten minutes before he even started his shopping. My case of birthday beer got wet.

Later, the balance of the universe was restored when the nozzle popped off the hose while he was watering the greenhouse and gave Uncle B a good soaking.

But look what I got! Aerosol whipped cream! Everything’s going to be fine!
 

 

p.s. They announced the next Assassin’s Creed game is going to be vikings! Looks kind of anti-England. Like, what were they supposed to do? Not try to hold back the viking raids?

Eh, screw it. You know I’ll buy it.

April 30, 2020 — 7:37 pm
Comments: 11

I got paid today!

I wish I knew how much. They’re using new payroll software and my payslip is encrypted. Nobody told me the password.

It should probably hit the bank tomorrow and I can see it on my statement.

Free money! I have a feeling we’ll be paying for this free money a long, long time.

April 29, 2020 — 7:13 pm
Comments: 17

What happens when you get them wet…

We have had glorious weather for the past six weeks, which has made my lockdown positively splendid.

Today, we returned to wet and cold and I can’t believe how miserable it is. I can’t believe we endured seven months of this, but darker and colder, this winter. I can’t believe I survived it.

It should be a little better for the next few days, and better still for a few after that, but I don’t mind admitting I got spoiled.

Ironically, the polands can see a lot better when their crests are soaked and spikey.

April 28, 2020 — 7:07 pm
Comments: 3

Stop laughing at me!

This time of year, our garden is full of laughter. Well, laughing frogs. Also known as the Hungarian marsh frog.

As the name implies, they are not native. They were deliberately imported into a garden in Ashford in the Thirties, from whence they spread to Romney Marsh and thence west from ditch to pond unto our very garden. They never stray far from water.

The story is here.

If you would like to listen to four minutes and thirty three seconds of what this shit sounds like (and who wouldn’t?), be my guest.

Hello! Happy Monday. Everyone still here?

April 27, 2020 — 8:28 pm
Comments: 6

Bunny season

Welly’s first bunny! Not this, this is a ten year old picture. I didn’t get a pic of today’s bunny, I was too busy bunny wrangling.

The boys didn’t seem to mind. They thought I was hunting with them.

Big boy killed one first. Not too much screaming or torture, so I didn’t interfere, but I’m sorry to say he didn’t eat it and it just lay in the grass giving the occasional post-mortem twitch.

Then Welly caught one. I think it got away from him – they were playing ball with it for a while. I grabbed someone’s bunny to rescue it and the little bastard fought like the devil to get away from me. Stupid bunny.

I don’t always interfere. I am at peace with the idea that cats are sadistic thugs. But I can’t have my peaceful garden experience tainted with the screaming and the running and the blood and the whole bunny murder thing.

I could see roughly where the nest was. Whenever I took a bunny away from Big Cat he’d shrug, go over to the bunny pile and grab another one.

Mrs Bunny made a very bad choice this spring.

Have a good weekend, everyone, and don’t bear your bunnies just any old where!

p.s. my Zoom call went better than expected. We had seven of us on at one time, and I was taken aback at how moved I was to see the old dears again.

April 24, 2020 — 7:17 pm
Comments: 11

Firsts…

Last night, Wellington didn’t come in when we called. Baby’s first all nighter. He was fine, and I’ll be astonished if he doesn’t do it again tonight.

I’m sure you’d like to see a pic of this handsome brute in color.

Today, I heard the old familiar shrieking and, sure enough, Big Kitty caught the first baby bunny of the season. I don’t know if he ate it or if it got away. I only interfere when I can’t stand the screaming any more.

And tomorrow, the old dears I used to have coffee with of a Friday morning are going to try and have our first virtual coffee morning by Zoom. We have our familiar Whatsapp to fall back on if everybody’s technology gets discombobulated.

Any of you using Zoom?

April 23, 2020 — 8:05 pm
Comments: 14

With a cat, always dignity

The two cats are getting along as well as I’d hoped. In the evenings, they chase each other up and down the length of the garden. It’s quite a sight.

Sadly, the new kitty is shaping up to be a chicken chaser 🙁

Must go. I have actual *work* to do. I have to do it as a volunteer, though.

April 22, 2020 — 8:54 pm
Comments: 1

Pardon me, lady, your chicken is leaning

Chel is still following me around the garden making a nuisance of herself. I stepped on her toe at one point today, which I felt awful about, but I don’t think she’s damaged. She certainly didn’t learn a lesson.

To answer your question, DurnedYankee, the landmark birthday coming up in May is six-oh. The funny thing about that is, I’m the youngest person in our social circle, so I get to be old and still be the stupid kid.

Age is just a number. A stupid, evil, painful number.

April 21, 2020 — 6:44 pm
Comments: 16

Beats the hell out of television

Meteor showers tonight! They peak tomorrow or the next night, depending on where you are, but it’s a new moon tonight and especially dark. Very clear here, too.

Named after constellation Lyra, the Lyrids are one of the oldest recorded meteor showers—according to some historical Chinese texts, the shower was seen over 2,500 years ago. The fireballs in the meteor shower are created by debris from comet Thatcher, which takes about 415 years to orbit around the Sun. The comet is expected to be visible from Earth again in 2276.

I don’t recognize the constellation Lyra by name. Does it have a different name back home, like the Skillet or the ‘Possum or the Banjo?

April 20, 2020 — 7:16 pm
Comments: 9

Not turning into Greta, I promise

Have you noticed the air is noticeably sweeter and the skies clearer? Do you like the silence? When you do go out and you’re about the only thing on the road, do you remember when it used to be like that all the time?

The Extinction Rebellion types are already saying, “see? We can do it if we try.” But I think the public reaction will be two-fold: now we have lived the way you want us to for a couple of months and it is not for us. And, gosh, have we let this island get severely overcrowded.

Yesterday they announced three more weeks of lockdown, taking us squarely into Weasel’s Birthday Month. It’s a landmark birthday this year, too. Oh, well…I guess I can stop worrying about how I’ll observe it.

Have a good weekend, everyone — where weekends are just days like any other.

p.s. no chicken pictures today. They hopped the fence and got into Uncle B’s vegetable patch and he is full sore.

April 17, 2020 — 6:59 pm
Comments: 13