Hope you all enjoyed your extra hour in bed!
---and more good news from Lindy. Congratulations! Love the name.
Lindy - I am doing very well, thank you. I am gearing down for my retirement next spring (I hope). I celebrate my 80th in March and decided it
was a good time to retire. Once I set a date it has been hard to wait. My to-do list has gotten impossibly long.
Hi! I was glad to see the back of that wind and rain, but they were right about the cooler weather following it – 10 degrees now, after several days and nights at 16 or above. Neither OH nor I had to go out today, but the solar panel maintenance man we were expecting failed to turn up. J will be working the extra day this week – they need him in tomorrow; a good thing our meet-up with Dau#1 and appendages was moved into the evening.
Annette – good photo of Manhatten skyline, and I would love to visit that linear park, which I had seen featured on TV some time ago – a real oasis in the city (although I would also like to visit Central Park too). What a lovely home by the lake, must have been so relaxing. Does the Lake have a name?
AQ – those place names were real tongue twisters – glad I wasn’t trying to read them out loud! Thanks for the link to the photos; I had never realised there were so many varieties of Banksias, and so beautiful too!
Brenda - part of my reasoning re planning meals is that they are planned so that they can be changed – if a particular day’s schedule is changed, I know what was intended for the next day to move it down the line! I slept better last night, but woke at 6 – intend to go to bed earlier as I am definitely short of an hour each night.
Rita – what colour are your Sisyrinchiums? We have the yellow ones seeding themselves all over, and the more delicate blue ones, and when we went to Traquair in August, we treated ourselves to a new one which appears a sort of creamy-brown colour. The Geese we see are mostly the Svalbard Barnacle Geese which winter here on the Solway Coast – lovely sight when they fly over – and also the Whooper Swans from Iceland. Sorry you couldn’t be with the family for your Granddaughter’s birthday; the downside of a family spread around the country. Pleased the window-fitters were careful around your plants, and got the job done satisfactorily – good that the rain had moved away!
Heather – sorry about the poor workmanship on your roof – I can imagine your OH is probably saying “I wish I could have done that job myself”! I always keep a few meatloafs (?loaves) in the oven – so useful for an easy meat meal: lamb, beef or pork. My OH will be very jealous when he reads that you serve gravy with yours – he would eat gravy with everything if I made it, but I regard gravy as a non-essential except, obviously, in casseroles – but then I scrape a lot off my portion!
Linda – what a sensible size for a baby, and clever timing to arrive when his other Grandmother was available. So glad all is well and they are back home; I wonder how their first night will be! Have a wonderful visit tomorrow.
Margo – what a cheery post with your good news; I am so pleased for you, and also glad you can get your flu jab to protect you through the winter. It was nice that the sunshine gave Billie an opportunity to get out into the garden for a while. You wouldn’t admire me much if you could hear me on grumpy days, but generally there is no choice other than to just get on with the way things are – and I count myself very lucky in lots of respects.
Bjane – how lovely to see you posting! Congratulations on the impending Birthday and Retirement; I think you are amazing to do so much for so long! Are you gradually cutting your working hours as spring approaches?
Hopefully we shall hear from solar panel man tomorrow, and we are expecting a number of online order deliveries this week, having placed a number of orders at the weekend. We even got around to finalising the curtain order, but they will not be here for at least ten days. We are mostly at home apart from the family meal tomorrow evening and check-ups Thursday at the local surgery – and of course, that was the same day on which the hospital offered me a cancellation in rheumatology, so I had to turn it down, after checking that is doesn’t push me down the list!
Ospreys Rule OK, but Goldfinches come a close second!
Hello all, lovely to read all your news, mundane or exciting.
Annette - what wonderful pics of the new Trade Centre and of the 9/11 memorial. I expect that all the exhibits were very moving. Son and Dau-i-law visited the site when they went to NY earlier in the year. The house you stayed in looks lovely too, right by or near the lake. Glad you had a great time.
Lindybird - that is super news about the new grandson, glad to hear both mum and baby are doing fine and hopefully Tomasz will like his new baby brother.
Margo - that is terrific news , do hope you continue to improve and it is obvious that the chemo is working.
Weather today has been sunny and balmy for late October, although it did cloud over later this afternoon, perhaps we are going to get some of the rain that has been pelting Scotland.
Managed a few lengths of swimming today and hope to go again on Thurs. Remember I mentioned about the leaking tap, well our friendly builder came round last week and changed the plastic connecting pipes for copper ones and we thought that was it. However I found at the weekend that they are now leaking at the join so we have had to ring him again. It may need a whole new tap system for it to be solved, we will have to wait until he visits again, meantime I am having to ring out towels on the shelves every 2 hours and empty bucket and plastic container as they get full to bursting.
Oh well, the trials and tribulations we go through. It will be solved eventually!!!!!
Right, thats enough from me. Lovely to hear from you all.
http://scottishwildlifetrust.org.uk/things-to-do/wildlife-webcams/loch-of-lowes/
RSPB Giving Nature a Home
Congrats Linda to all the family
Great news Margo.
Rita & OG – More pics of Banksia Farm (by someone else) HERE
Evening all: Can't believe I filled the green bin and the garden looks only moderately improved.
Rita: Glad your plants survived the new windows.
bjane: good to see you. I'd say it's definitely time to retire! My friend just retired and is so happy to have so much free time.
Lindybird: It'll be wonderful to see the new family member. Have a lovely visit!!!! :-))
OG: The house is on Orange Lake- where my friend's grandfather originally bought a small cottage. which her parents sold to buy the current house. They left it to their kids when they died but my friend and her sister were the only two who wanted to keep it, so they bought out the others. My friend lives in the L.A. area but goes back for about 8 months of the year; the sister lives in the house year round.
Heather/Lynette: Good luck with the leaks.
Lindy: Congratulations on the birth. My best wishes to the new baby and your entire family!
Margo: Glad things are going well!
Annette: Welcome home. I've enjoyed your lovely photos. Ms. D looks both beautiful and smart. She's certainly growing up.
AQ: Terrific photos from you, too!
Hi to Heather, Brenda, Clare, Lynette, and everyone.
More pix from the trip: The neighborhood around Orange Lake (including the car I rented) and sunset from the closed in porch; and a few pix (if they load this time) from New Palz, settled in the 1670s with a history I knew nothing about.