Skip this if you don't feel political, but a few things have happened recently that make 2020 seem marginally less pants, although still the worst year on record for a very long time. Firstly some reasonable news about an acquaintance fighting cancer (never good), in that it appears to have been caught in time (fingers crossed). Then during the afternoon a rather weird way of announcing an election result - it was the media that announced the victor in the States. No concession (not really to be expected I guess), no formal vivat rex type moment from a senior judiciary (well they are political appointees after all), just CNN, Associated Press and the New York Times pointing out that with Pennsylvania going Democrat, Biden has won. It feels odd, not least as previously the BBC, FranceInfo, MSN and the American press all had different views on who had won what, but now they seem to be unanimous, so that is it. A bottle of pink fizz was sacrificed on the altar of positive news, even though it is likely to have little effect on us personally and for a while. Covid is after all still the biggest story in town.
Or is it? Today at 13:03, off the Sables d'Olonne on the Vendée coast, 33 intrepid skippers started off on what must be the most gruelling race known to man - the Vendée Globe single handed, unsupported round the world yacht race. The current record is just under 75 days. There are, I believe, 6 female skippers in the race. The fact that the race is still on is great, and I hope to be able to follow progress once I find the right link on social media.
In other news, we were felling trees and digging spuds this morning. I did go and check on the monster badger set in the wildflower meadow and found rather better badger prints for you.
I dug up 9 more spuds - just a final 8 to go. I wanted to crack the lot, but with all the rain, and working on a slightly different bit of the plot, the soil was wet, claggy and heavy. So I admitted defeat after 9 and bagged up the spoils - it was good I stopped when I did, as I didn't have enough bags for more. John weighed them when we got home - 31 pounds of spuds!! It would have been more but there appears to be a line of "poorer" soil across the plot, where the numbers and size of tubers was less and the leeks along side are looking a bit sad.
And finally, a Sunday treat! A friend of a friend who lives in the States and is a cat person, feeds some local critters. She shared some of her amazing photos of said critters, specifically, Audrey the Racoon! Say thank you nicely!
Comments