carpet on the roof

(a fragment)

(photo taken by me this morning whilst scraping snow and ice off my car again! Excuse poor quality, it was a mobile phone camera and I was shivering - but it gives you an idea)

There is a frost carpet on the roof of my car,

Turning the world upside down and

Reminding me of a time when

Christmas came in the summer.

core workout

Our walk to the shops this morning took twice as long as usual due to the ice underneath the snow - so slippy! However, walking on ice does have it's benefits - it's a fantastic workout for the core muscles.

Hurrah to the gods of yoga for my core of steel ;)

snow day

In the bleak midwinter, frost wind made moan, earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone; snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow, in the bleak midwinter, long ago.

-- Christina Rossetti

The view from our bedroom window this morning

Our back garden

The fields behind our house (and this, dear reader, this view is why we moved out of London)

I have a day off work today. I was meant to be going somewhere on a train, but clearly that is now out. But it does mean a day to play in the snow (not that I could get to work anyway, I don't think you can get out of the cul-de-sac!)

Have fun and keep warm everyone!

Fog

(image courtesy of Jim Goldstein)

"Fog everywhere. Fog up the river where it flows among green airs and meadows; fog down the river, where it rolls defiled among the tiers of shipping, and the waterside pollutions of a great (and dirty) city.... Chance people on the bridges peeping over the parapets into a nether sky of fog, with fog all round them, as if they were up in a balloon and hanging in the misty clouds."
--Charles Dickens (Bleak House)

(meant to be posted yesterday when fog hung menacingly in the air all day, but alas the day ran away with me)

Day 22 - Sunny Weather

As you can see from this article, we are having unseasonably warm weather here in the south of England right now.

When it comes to warm weather, the English fall into two catergories: those that put on shorts and sundresses at the first sign of the sun (regardless of temperature) knowing, as we all do in this country, that it may not last. Then there are those that might put on a pair of flipflops and stop wearing their winter coat but still have a few layers. Followers of that ancient saying "ne'er cast a clout til May is out" (ie, keep your vest on until the end of May!)

I fall into that latter category. Whilst I agree the sun is warm, it is only April and in the shade or in the wind I think it's still quite chilly.

But whatever we choose to wear, good weather really does change everything. After a long, hard winter everyone is coming out of their shells. Their are more smiles on the street, more people acknowledging each other. And that is never a bad thing.

Now I'm just sending out messages to the universe that this fantastic weather will last right through to the autumn and this is not a quick introduction to the summer before the universe let's it rain on us all summer again!