This was supposed to be the last December swim , presuming that we would ( The Bobbers) be off celebrating Christmas with our familial/friend bubbles. But Boris and the Virus changed all that at 4:30 pm when Britain announced sweeping new restrictions that would change Christmas for all parts of Britain.
Now we have the rest of December ahead of us to swim at sunrise.
And reward ourselves with tea and mince pies.
Naturally occuring hearts have been a little thin on the ground.
This one is not on the ground nor is it particularly naturally occuring. The bright blue heart is just an accident of light reflection.
Nothing in this picture shows how windy it was during this walk. Maybe the picture below gives a sense.
Dog walks in weather like this are for one reason only. Elimination. Picking up a dog poo in such winds is unusually difficult. It was hard to stand and open the plastic poo bag but once I had grasped the evenings offering the wind whipped one little nugget and blew it away before I could tie the bag up. I did not chase it!
Baubles, stars and twinkle. I’ve always been a museum and gallery kind of person. When my children were small I always chose a theme to keep them interested. I used the same thought process for my shift at The Box today, hunting out Christmas decorations cunningly disguised as exhibits in the Natural History Department. The magnificent egg collection was an easy replacement for baubles.
Cushion Starfish make pretty good stars.
Twinkle was provided by beetles and minerals.
Even the mince pie gift at the end of the day seemed a little closer to a starfish than a star.
All these pictures were taken in the Mammoth Gallery. For once she was not the main event. But she is not to be ignored.
Another day, another afternoon dog walk and another sunset. Portwrinkle was a very fine reward for a day’s work that failed to live up to expectations. It was nowhere near as dull or difficult as I had imagined.
Clearing a shed sometime this week was a plan that required reasonable weather and some sort of reward. As it turned out clearing the shed was not so bad. Two big bags of miscellaneous ‘stuff’ was whittled down to one small bag in a surprisingly interesting afternoon. Quite how the content of those two big bags had ended up together is a big mystery but ultimately the sort out was not so onerous that it required a beach trip afterwards. The dogs, however, insisted. Not that they helped in any way with the shed clearance.
We had the beach and harbour to ourselves which is always an extra pleasure. the dogs exhausted themselves on the black sand and I watched the sun set.
An afternoon well spent.
A new Christmas Star combined with blue white lights , vaguely reminds me of the accepted depiction of the Coronovirus.
As a creative person, fond of flights of fancy, it is somewhat disappointing that, the much anticipated, vaccine is a clear fluid, all very clinical and reassuring, I’m sure. The magnitude of the job, though, surely requires something that resembles a potion, served in an old chemistry lab beaker and smoking with the addition of liquid nitrogen.
The imagined potion would be green, Lime green through to chartreusse. I’m not overthinking this at all! Well actually I am overthinking this, I’m keeping my eyes out for baubles in this exact shade of green to hang in the Christmas tree alongside the Covid Star for this year. A visual immunisation.
In future years we will unpack the baubles and wonder why anyone would choose baubles in such an unseasonal colour. I wonder if I should do a bulk order of Reindeers to grant my tree some ‘ Herd’ immunity?
I blame these short days, the long nights allow time for folkloric Ponderings of a meandering and pointless sort.
Twilight dog walk.
One week from the shortest day in the Northern Hemisphere. These three photos were taken within the space of about ten minutes and all within the same geographical location at either end of the tunnel that leads to the sea from the Royal William Yard, in Plymouth.
It had been a very grey day but just at the last moment some colour grazed the sky. The photo above does have a filter applied and the other two are artificially lit but the vivid colours brightened up the end of the day.
These last few short days of December are my least favourite time of year. I completely understand why many cultures and religions choose to throw a festival into the schedule to perk things up a little. Two of the three daily walks get closer together as I try to catch the best of the day at either end of the available daylight.
Left to their own devices Hugo and Lola would not choose to interrupt quality sleeping time with scheduled walks at this time of year. They accompany me out of love not neccesity. To be honest I feel the same but we have never discussed it. Perhaps we should…
P.S This 10 year old post just popped up on Facebook, nothing changes!
Baubles, bubbles and the rule of 6. Driving home for Christmas 2020.
December 2020 in Britain and we are all finalising our rule of 6 festive bubbles to celebrate Christmas. Driving Home for Christmas is going to be different and in many cases impossible this year.
Nothing to be done about it. We are just going to have to sparkle within a confined gathering. Except sparkling may not be exactly what we do. This weekend we ventured into a physical shop to buy some festive clothes. Like hybrid magpie/moles, in drag, we are normally drawn to sequins and velvet accesorised by high heels( briefly) for the festive season. This year we’ve plunged into the high tech world of thermal underwear and wicking layers all the better to enjoy our outdoor gatherings. The high heels forgotten in favour of walking boots. Flamboyance is not found in the aisles of the thermal underwear world. Sparkle on a personal level will be replaced by the gentle glow of a pair of women who have the double security of knowing that the vest that is tucked into their knickers has additional thermal qualities. Seasonal Security in a 2020 world of uncertainty.
Another day, another dog walk.
We are really clocking up the footmiles this weekend. Fresh air and thermal underwear, the 2020 theme for buzzingly busy pre-christmas weekends. Except the buzz has been replaced by lateral conversations and an intimate knowledge of the state of neighbours illuminations.
Last night took in some luminous examples of house decorating and bush trimming. This one stands out because it has been done to raise funds for a charity and with all the ingenuity of a Covid world it is very easy to donate by following the instructions on a sign.
Donating is the easy bit, pondering rarely takes the easy bit. @theoldmortuary spent some time reading the charities web page while our feet throbbed from our pavement pounding. The work they do is significant and hugely important. The published case studies kept @theoldmortuary awake last night.
The United Kingdom is in a funny old place in this run up to Christmas. An apolitical truth is that none of this is the fault of anyone under 18. Christmas 2020 will put on a brave face but its midwinter, Stygian understory will be every bit as bleak as those Christmases of Dickens or Rossetti/Holst.
Those of us that are able should donate to charity, just like shopping, small and local is probably better than large and corporate.
Thanks to:- https://homestartmerton.co.uk/about-us
and :- CC Construction https://cccon.co.uk/
For inspiring this blog.
To donate.
https://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/donation-web/charity?charityId=1005628&stop_mobi=yes
In the UK there will be a Home Start somewhere close to you.
A day spent on the road with breaks for coffees and dog walks is not a great jumping off spot for a blog.
But the bricks on arrival brighten up life.
And the street art uses the same colours.
More tomorrow #quickie
A quiet day at The Box yesterday. Being in a gallery I’ve talked about a bit gives me the chance to talk about a very old ponder that took place in The Plymouth City Museum, the forbear of The Box more than 25 years ago.
https://www.theboxplymouth.com/
It happened in the galleries that are now called Port of Plymouth. 25 years ago I was a very regular visitor to the museum , particularly when the weather was not good and I had two small children to entertain. We always spent an inordinate amount of time looking at the case that held Plymouth Argyle artifacts and memorabilia, because my son was obsessed with football. On one visit a face and a name caught my eye from a 1920’s team photo. The name , Jack Pullen, and the face reminded me of someone I was at school with and briefly I wondered if they were related. In many respects this was highly unlikely as I went to school in Essex, The player in question though was a Welsh International player and my school friends name was Dai so it was not a completely unreasonable thought. In fairness I didn’t really dwell on it too much.
In 2010 I was living and working in London and the internet had changed communication in all sorts of ways. Dai, who lives in Australia, and I would exchange occasional volleys of emails. On one occasion I was nattering about both my grown up children working in hospitality at Plymouth Argyle. He responded by telling me his grandfather had played for Argyle for 10 years in the pre World War 2 era. My pondering of the team photo all those years ago had been correct. I did a little bit of research but didn’t find anything much about the talented player beyond what Dai already knew.
By the time I moved back to Plymouth the old city museum has been closed for a long time and the new museum was taking shape. It was only last week when I was working in the new museum that I remembered that strange coincidence.
Meanwhile Dai had misplaced photos of his grandfather. Once again the internet and chance/coincidence and serendipity took the old ponder and gave it some new life.
Whilst working in London I made a friend of another Welshman called Marc who had introduced me to a woman called Sarah that he had trained with. She is an ardent Plymouth Argyle supporter, not something you meet too often in the capital. Last week I contacted her and asked if she had any books about Argyle history. She didn’t but after a bit of research she came up with a really informative website.
https://www.greensonscreen.co.uk/
The picture I gleaned from the website and one of Dai, published recently in a Colchester newspaper show why this curious long time ponder happened.
Grandfather and grandson look pretty similar .
Pondering, it’s not a quick process every time.
theoldmortuary.design 