Pandemic Pondering #427

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, Bobbing, SerendipityLeave a comment

This over saturated sky is not benign. Todays ‘ Bob’ was always a risky call, the weather is just dire currently. No one could have anticipated a hail storm in May. It was the weirdest sensation to swim with piercing needles of ice bombarding our out of water flesh and continuing to penetrate well below the waterline. Not an experience we need to repeat any time soon. In other bobbing news many of us are doing two swims on Solstice Day 21st June. 4:30 am and 9:30pm. Maybe a snooze sometime between the two!

This was how the weather looked as we got out, calm, friendly, welcoming. Do not believe these visual lies …

In other news I have read a book in less than 24 hours.

This is a page turner!

Beyond that a day of domestic admin and a little socialising. A friend also made this cool video of the art exhibition we set up last week. The link is below

Tuesday is my day for visiting as a regular punter. I guess we already know what the blog will be about!

Pandemic Pondering #426

On By theoldmortuary.designIn dog walks, Pandemic ponderingsLeave a comment

This one picture is all that was left of the day once weather and breakfast had taken what it wanted out of our waking hours. The Pandemic, guilty as it is for so many things, did not affect Sunday, or indeed this blog.

The weather was the most damaging. Another day deluged out of existence. This blog should have early morning action pictures of Pilot Gigs and happy rowers rowing on the Tamar. But the wind and rain postponed that. Nothing stopped our first meeting with friends indoors to share breakfast and natter over too much coffee. The rain continued to pour down on their courtyard garden , making everything lush and tropical looking. The trouble is we forgot our manners, we’ve not really used them for more than 15 months. A breakfast gathering suggests that other things might be done with the rest of the day. Not with guests like us! We left the breakfast gathering at 4:30 in the afternoon. We had talked and talked, fueled by good coffee and breakfast, but we had talked the day away, our ribs and faces aching from mirth. At 4:30 the rain still battered the streets but dogs needed walking, any pretence that anything else might be achieved was washed into the gutter with rainfall. A brief dog walk in waterproofs got the essentials done before book reading and cooking filled a couple of hours. Finally at 8:30pm we could find a rain-free period when dogs could be walked and 10,000 steps could be achieved. One day, one photograph, some sort of milestone.

Pandemic Pondering #425

On By theoldmortuary.designIn dog walksLeave a comment

After two days of near normal human socialising it was a huge shock to accidentally do something that involved no other humans and after a week of storms a couple of dry hours was an added bonus. We went to Dartington Hall for a dog walk and had decided to do the walk regardless of the weather. Suitably dressed we set off for a walk in the deer park. We were soon immersed in a landscape little altered for centuries. The recent rains had made the walk quite gooey underfoot. I’m sure this is the reason we didn’t meet any other humans. Despite having dogs with us, on leads, we saw plenty of deer close up, their natural camouflage protecting them from both predators and my photography. The bees were easier, fat and somnolent from rich pollen harvests they rested on blossom long enough to pose for pictures.

Bluebells and wild garlic scented the air of the woods and when the sun came out there was a woodland version of petrichor in the air, not perhaps as vivid as in an urban setting but there never the less.

Deep within these woods there were echoes of unseen steam trains chuffing and whistling their way on a local historical rail track. Running a service for the first time since last summer. Instead of a muddy, damp trudge it was a hugely relaxing walk in dappled sun. The sun came out properly when we got closer to civilisation.

With civilisation came coffee and for Hugo the chance to grab a quick snooze in a sunbeam.

Slow Sundays . Link to location below.

Home

Pandemic Pondering #424

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Art for sale, SerendipityLeave a comment
©Drawn to the Valley

The last two days have been both busy and hugely enjoyable. Finally we have been able to put on a Spring Exhibition featuring the work of artists and makers in the Tamar Valley. Last year we did all the planning and preparation work, only to have to cancel the exhibition at short notice. Planning for this year certainly felt like deja vu but with the added bonus of factoring in Covid safe planning for a public gathering in an indoor space.

‘Hanging Out’ with other humans for the last two days bringing the exhibition and its venue to life after so long was as much of a pleasure as seeing all the artworks blow in from all over the Tamar Valley.

And ‘blow in’ they certainly did with gusting winds of up to 55 mph and torrential rain.

After one day of construction and one day of curating and hanging we are ready to open the doors at 10:30 this morning. Here is a glimpse of what we have been up to.

The first floor mini gallery. Tiny works of art at affordable prices,with beautiful views of the surrounding countryside

Hanging in the stairwell, maximising available space to allow safe distance to enjoy the exhibition.

The ground floor gallery. If the weather improves this area will be flooded with fresh air and sunshine. What a shame we are not able to host a ‘Private View’ event this year. Doors open at 10:30 this morning. Opening hours are 10:30-4:30 daily for a week and then just a morning opening next Saturday. The address is on the posters below.

Pandemic Pondering #423

On By theoldmortuary.designIn artLeave a comment

Today was spent setting up this exhibition with a fabulous team of artists working hard together with the mundane, but essential, tasks of making an exhibition space out of a multi-purpose room. The weather, a wind speed of 45 miles an hour did not help with the delivery of boards.

Later in the afternoon artists were blown into the venue to deliver their work. Canvases turning themselves into sails propelling them to the door at speed. Friday is hanging day so tomorrows blog will be filled with wonderful works of art which were all delivered by the end of the day. It was lovely to work with a large group of people sorting things out and collaborating together, in person, for the first time in a very long while. I pinched the image below from a poetry brochure, but it sums up well the idea of the artists of a valley working well together.

Pandemic Pondering #422

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity1 Comment

About this time of year @theoldmortuary are sometimes to be found at the Chelsea Flower Show. Picking up gardening inspiration for our own patch of horticulture. Our next project is going to be a courtyard garden and with the Flower Show cancelled for a second year we will have to go it alone using photos we’ve take in previous years. The Islamic garden above is quite beyond our talents but we could get close to something similar to the one below.

You might think that gardening and sea swimming have very little in common, and you would be right, but in our post swim natterings the subjects we cover are wide ranging. Some would make a nun blush, and quite possibly do, as we swim and natter just below the walls of a convent. Gardens though do feature a bit in our conversations because that has been the only place we have been able to meet friends and family. Bobbing has become a bit of a social club and we are looking forward to gathering together, with our clothes on, in each others gardens during the summer. The picture below popped up on our bobbing WhatsApp page, most bobbers thought it was a garden designed to be open to the public. But it is actually a Bobbers Garden!

© Kim and Andy Bobber

Also featured this week, in the the Bobbers Whatsapp group photos, is Flossy, a guinea pig, who has recovered from a recent illness, which kept her mum away from bobbing for a while.

©Helen Bobber

Bringing the subject back closer to actual bobbing, the picture below is a Bobbers portrait of a fellow bobber with her daughter.

©Marianne Bobber

And finally given the unusual location of our beach a warship and an assault vessel.

©Andy Bobber

Have a fabulous Thursday !

Pandemic Pondering #421

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Pandemic ponderingsLeave a comment

Life is starting to stack up. With every slight loosening of government restrictions our lives @theoldmortuary get a little busier. In many ways it feels as odd as the sudden deceleration of our lives over a year ago. We are not even pushing ourselves to the max possible.

Lunch indoors with one set of friends yesterday followed later by a meal inside a pub with different friends was lovely and an enormous pleasure but it felt both exotic strange and exciting to behave almost normally for once . Just as lockdown deeply affected my sleep patterns, last nights sleep was disturbed by recalling the days events. We also have some longstanding domestic admin that keeps us awake and an art exhibition to organise at the end of the week. Just as Covid-19 has the physical nasty that is Long Covid, all our lived experiences will suffer from the after effects of this pandemic for a long while even if we have been lucky enough not to catch the wretched disease.

Another period of sleeplessness will not be welcome in this house.

Some people are, of course, oblivious, although even this doggy naughtiness is Covid related. Thermal socks for outdoor socialising and post swimming are the best for chewing and there are plenty of pairs to be stolen.

In other news, the Advanced Blogging course has been announced for October. Alongside this announcement, the delightful Gentle Author has decided to return to teaching the art of blogging. I will pop a link below, his courses are wonderful.

https://www.bloglovin.com/blogs/spitalfields-life-1516790/departure-arthur-beale-8006014249

So in a fine example of art imitating life everything is starting to stack up.

Pandemic Pondering #420

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity1 Comment

Quite the red letter day in England on Monday 17 th of May.

Hugging was allowed!!!! The Monday morning bob took on quite a different turn when our usual single file entry into the water broke out into serial hugging. Close bodily contact in Neoprene had a scintilla of Punk about it but in broad daylight, by the sea, we probably looked less intimidating than Punks and more like over enthusiastic seals. There are no photographs of this spontaneous eruption of hugging, that is often the problem with sponteneity, no evidence. Instead I can offer an image of recently disguarded swim wear.

Not only was hugging a first for today but getting drenched post swim was a first. Weve been bobbing for about 6 months and have never experienced such a downpour as we did today while we attempted to dry and dress post swim. With the relaxation of indoor regulations we could all make a dash for the concrete shelter that houses a couple of benches for people to enjoy the view, protected from the worst of the weather. An old chap was perched on one of the benches watching the rain cascade all around him. He cannot have imagined that his morning constitutional walk was going to be enlivened by 5 woman invading his space to dress and natter. He stoically focussed on the distant horizon, while we tried to accommodate our damp bits into reluctant, but dry, underwear  followed by outer clothes that wouldn’t go on easily because the rain had soaked them. As a brief break in the clouds allowed a shaft of sunlight to hit the tarmac he was off. The wheels on his zimmer frame sparking and carving trails in the puddles, so wide and frothy that a jet ski driver would have been proud of them. So intense and speedy was his need to escape and and put all that poorly concealed naked flesh behind him.

The brief sunlight made things look quite gorgeous but the lack of swimmers is evidence of how disgusting the weather really was.

Happy Hugging

Pandemic Pondering #419

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Home TownsLeave a comment

That really was a weekend of dodging heavy rainfall and sometimes being defeated by the gallons of water falling from the sky. Yesterday the only dog walk that wasn’t done in raincoats and wellies rewarded us with this lovely old window aperture. It overlooks The Elizabethan Garden. Nearby this brave rose had bloomed unseasonably early only to have its outer petals battered by the weather, but the internal folds look just like rippled ice cream.

Increased rainfall changed our plans but we just replaced walking activities with talking activities and eating out with eating in. Normally a weekend spent talking to friends and family might be described as ‘ putting the world to rights’ . But with a world with Labyrinthine problems, not unlike the folds of this rose, we talked ourselves in circles and had a great time doing it. The name of this fishing boat neatly sums up our revised weekend.

Pandemic Pondering #418

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Home Towns, SerendipityLeave a comment

A wet day out. Today we went to Fowey, a town we regularly visit but it is almost 2 years since we last were able to come. Many old favourite shops and cafes remain closed, maybe for ever, which is very sad. New kid on the block, North Street Cafe, looked very fine.

The weather was not kind to us but the occasional bursts of sunshine encouraged us to walk much further than usual and we found a secret garden on the site of an old Grammar School.

And watched sail boat racing. The day took on a dark turn , not only with the weather.A new sculpture has arrived in Fowey.

The sculpture celebrates the work of local author Daphne Du Maurier and in particular her book The Birds.

On a personal level the Alfred Hitchcock film of the same name scared me silly when I was a young Human. I’ve  never really felt an affinity with birds since , particularly when they accidentally get trapped indoors. I’m not so daft that the sculpture bothered me but at the end of our walk we sat by the Boddinick Ferry slip way to eat ice-cream and enjoy a rare moment of vivid sunshine. We were opposite Daphne Du Mauriers house. As the sun burnt through the rain clouds a huge cacophany of Crows calling and squarking filled the air behind us in the Rookery near by. The valley was filled with the sound that Hitchcock so effectively used in his screenplay. Right opposite the authors house, it must have informed her original writing.  Anyway it unnerved me so much I failed to take a picture of her old home. It is easy enough to find it on the internet.

https://www.visitcornwall.com/about-cornwall/blogging-cornwall/daphne-du-mauriers-cornwall

Instead I took a picture of the cottages she would have seen from her home and made them look a little nostalgic.

Despite the weather and ‘The Birds’ a good day out.