I'm tired and lacking inspiration - the last couple of weeks have been focussed on writing a final evaluation report for a funded project I have been following since 2017 (!). How do you condense the highs and lows of such a diverse and successful project in a reasonable amount of space? Rhetorical - no need to come back to me on that. So yesterday when I pressed the send button at 7pm, I wasn't in the mood to write a blog. To be honest, I'm not sure I am today either, but looking through the photos of the past week, I did spot some weird and wonderful things, and I share them here.
The black day lily is coming towards the end of its flowering season, but was looking particularly fine one evening this week, with flowers that were almost velvety. It has been abused for at least two years, living in an old metal beer keg, but seems happy enough.
I've been abusing semper vivums for even longer - they do remarkably well in the funny plastic pots you can get that strap on to downpipes. There is little soil in there, and when they do what they do, very little way to get any water into that soil as they make a seemingly impervious cover to the pot and beyond. Then, just occasionally, they go absolutely mad and flower, looking like some sort of extra-terrestrial. This year's display is particularly fine.
We share our lives with cats, six of them currently. Nibbles has been with us for 14 or so years, having decamped from living in difficult conditions with a tortured artist who had the hovel next door. She has certain bizarre traits, one of which is enjoying drinking her water (and the grottiest, dirtiest water she can find in general) from her paw. A video is better, obviously, but you get the idea.
Once I have finished doing time on the computer at the end of the day, and before cooking dinner, we sit out under the abri, perhaps having a small drinkie-poo, and relax. We encourage Nibbles to join us - she has hyperthyroidism and is on a drug regime that should sort her out, but the condition has made her a bit lazy. She also lost a bit of weight so it is pleasing, I guess, that she can put enough pressure through one paw to make an imprint on my leg!
It is hard to get decent photos of moths and butterflies, but I was delighted to get this snap of a tiger moth on our cristophine vine. It sat there very patiently as I balanced the cat I was carrying at the time, got my phone out of my back pocket, unlocked it, got the camera app going and then took the picture. Of course, with it sitting still, you only get the tiger stripes and not the vivid orange underwing colour, but even so, it pleases me.
Each evening, when I have done the watering, I got up to the car park over the road, stand on the edge of the field and look out. If I think I'm not being watched, I might also do a yoga salutation to the sun, but I have to be convinced! I do always look up to admire the sky - it's a big sky at that point, open to the south and west for kilometres without power lines or buildings, and makes the spirit soar, particularly after a glass of chardonnay. There was a day where the weather was changing last week, with cloud coming in from the west, with wispy swirls and higher masses all looking like harbingers of something new.
In a normal week, my lack of inspiration would have been solved by something from the trail camera. Sadly it appears that being attacked by boar and various small birds doesn't make for a long life, and I am having to look for a new one. But I still have loads of stuff to check through, so perhaps there will be videos next week, or I might just decide to stay away from computers and live life a bit. Have a good week!
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