carpet

Waiting for my first revisit to the hospital in a post-surgery context.

The appointment is set for tomorrow at 11am and it can't come soon enough.

I need to know that everything is ok and i am doing all the right things and we're not doing anything that will jeopardise the recovery timescale as laid out.

I imagine everything is fine but it's been a long two weeks counting down to the appointment, since surgery.

So, imagine my disappointment when they phoned today to say they have moved my appointment to later in the day..... i know it's not much but it's a few hours more to wait.... it feels like going the wrong way slightly.... we were almost there.

 I am reaching saturation point with daytime television quiz shows.

Tenable.... the ten most recent Bond films whose theme tune has the same title as the film?

Tipping point..... Which part of the ear is removed in a surgical operation known as the tympanectomy?

Lingo.... If you have ever watched someone else play Wordle then it's as annoying as that.

Countdown..... I am sure "furlined" is a word

Pointless..... i am notoriously bad at knowing the cast of actors in a given film.... very bad indeed.

The Chase - i don't like Bradley Walsh's delivery style.

I don't actually know a good reason that i've never applied to a gameshow to be a contestant cos i am pretty much an expert on the format.  In fairness to myself, i'd probably come across as a bit of a dick on telly so probably best just shouting at the telly.

Here's a ling to an online version of the popular puzzle, Murdle.... it's a logic puzzle and there's a new one each day - good luck

https://murdle.com/

murky

 Some of you may know that i sometimes enjoy the art of piscatorial endeavour.

To this end, with current sofa bound leg, it seems unlikely i'll be gracing the banks of the local waterways in the immediate future.

And so, it's a bit of a cop-out in terms of writing a blog, but i give to you the closest i'll get to handling my landing net.....

Basically the following website is an underwater camera near a lock gate in the Netherlands, where you can ring a bell and have a go at identifying any sighted fish.  The idea being that someone can open the gate and let the fish through.  It's quite addictive once you see a fish or two.

Fish Doorbell

Thanks, have a good weekend.

'Arrr

 Some years ago, a friend of a friend rented us their house in a little known village up Northumberland way.  Scremerston, to be exact.

Truth is, over a few successive visits, we fell in love with the area, and we've been back lots of times..... it's like a roll call of fabulous places when you start rattling them off.....  Bamburgh, Amble, Warkworth, Seahouses, Berwick, Eyemouth, Lindisfarne, Low Newton, Craster, Alnwick, Alnmouth..... it's amazing.

As a rule we don't tell many people about it because we think it's better left unspoiled.

Well, we always went up there.... i dunno.... mebbe later in the year, like September and stuff, and we've even been up there in the snow, so later in the year too..... turns out that the enduring, repeating motif of the area is the puffin, and we never got to see them.

Time and again we'd visit and we'd never get to see a single puffin.  Lots of seagulls and grey seals and stuff, but no puffins.....

The traditional way to see Northumberland puffins is to take a boat from Seahouses to the Farne Islands and just drive around there looking at the sea bird colonies......  mostly during ur visits the trips were sparse and mostly consisted of dolphins and seal spotting.

It got so bad that every time i saw a puffin emblem or a badge or one on TV or something, i'd just start screaming abuse at it, almost like they were mythical creatures..... not something you could ever see.

One year we decided to make the puffin pilgrimage and went up towards the end of June with the specific task of ticking them off our list of things to do or see.

Imagine, perhaps ten years of anticipation, and needing the stars to align and the weather to be right for a boat trip and getting all those ducks puffins lined up....  the excitement, the elation.....

Here's the video that Dawn managed to make of our epic adventure.... Filmed from abord the boat Glad Tidings that sailed out of Seahouses on 21st June 2021 - i am the person in the orange t-shirt in case you couldn't tell.

bin

 Bin a bit of a morning.

Had a rough night.... quite painful, but not in the traditional broken-knee, surgery, stitches, fixed position, brace, sleeping on my back sort of way that you might expect, but more..... one of my arms and my elbow were really hurting.....  i can only assume this is a symptom of using every other part of my body to compensate for the lack of a leg and for the effort of not toppling over onto the space that would normally be occupied by said leg.

I also had a telephone interview today for a job i'd rather like to obtain.  Difficult circumstances and conditions to be taking a new job, but the right employer looking for the right employee could hopefully give us a shot.  The interview went "ok" at best..... i am terrible in interview situations despite being confident in the job requirements.

So.... everything's settled and i am trying to just bloody relax..... just five minutes of quiet time, on my own, no distractions..... watching a film.....

knock on the door..... the dog goes mad..... much barking and running round and i grab my crutches, leap one-legged from the sofa, balance myself.... take a crutch in each hand..... one breath and i'm off,,,,,,

Traverse the lounge obstacles to the top of the stairs..... sort the crutches out so i am using both in one hand as i half hop down the steps to the front door......

I get there......  the caller has gone.

I step out into the garden.... the door's threshold is a difficult step to cross and terrifying on crutches and one leg.

No parcels left, no calling cards.... nothing..... traversing the threshold again to get the key for the letterbox..... and back again to the letterbox, only to find it empty.  Back again, and inside, to contemplate my sweating brow and racing heart.

I rearrange the walking sticks into one hand, clumsily, and hop my way back to the lounge..... my film is still playing and is now some ten minutes in the future, and i've missed a chunk.  I lower myself to the sofa and get settled again, only to realise that the dog has not reappeared.....

I've shut her in the garden haven't i?

I get up, go through the whole one legged rise.... sort the crutches out.... make my way around the lounge obstacle course to look in the garden and there's no sign of her, so i'm pretty sure she must be down in the kitchen still.

Back to the sofa..... rewind the film......

Fifteen minutes of my life i'll never get back.... and presumably now five of yours!

Here's a candid photo of my old warehouse on 18th Dec. 2019 - it looks pretty empty and we were three months away from Covid lockdown..... I miss the warehouse.....

fuss

 I was just sitting here, eating a biscuit....

A Garibaldi biscuit.....

And a couple of questions idly float through my mind....

Firstly.... i am sure that Garibaldi was a person but who the hell were they?

Second.... why the chuff does a Garibaldi biscuit come in a strip joined together, usually in a string of five biscuits and you have to snap them apart.

So i went digging....

Turns out Garibaldi was an important Italian general.  Giuseppe Garibaldi, in fact, was a revolutionary, and a republican.  He lived for seventy-four years (a remarkably long time) between 1807 and 1882.  Contributing to Italian unification and is considered to be one of Italy's "fathers of the fatherland".

Digging through Giuseppe's history - it's a long and complicated story spanning continents and wars.

I could only really think of someone like Che Guevara as a direct comparison that people might be more au fait with, for reference purposes.

Then.....

Apparently Giuseppe came to England in 1864 - he was well respected here for being a voice of the oppressed, and was warmly welcomed in our yard.  It is thought that, around this time, Peek Freans, the biscuit company from London, decided to name their pastry/fruit slice after Giuseppe, in order to capitalise on his popularity.  So they named their biscuit, the Garibaldi.

In fact the biscuit was invented in 1861 by a chap called Jonathan Dodgson.

And why do they come joined together?  Well, the jury is out on this but all i can find is that the currants that are contained within would be displaced by the cutting process..... doesn't stack up for me, but there it is.

And so i got to thinking..... why is it the only biscuit that arrives jointed?  Well, of course, after a bit of thought..... shortbread..... it often comes conjoined..... and i guess the reason for this is that it gives structure to the biscuit while in transit.  So for that reason, i am going to say it's the same for the Garibaldi.

Case closed, Miss Marple.

rest

 Some days when you're resting it feels exhausting.

I think that's just a fact of life.

It's probably the mental exertion that can tire us while we perch on the sofa.

Not being able to change position.  Can't quite reach the phone that slid from the cushion onto the floor, the remote, the drink.  Trying not to knock the crutches over while wrestling a phone charger, a laptop cable, a blanket.

Choosing a source of amusement.  Skimming the channels on the tellybox, movies, media library.  Checking emails for job application updates.  Video games, phone games.... how about a movie about a video game?

I've tried books but not yet had the patience..... i am sure they will feature at some point.

Visitors.... singular, groups.

Bathroom.... whether this is a symptom of my condition and everything having be undertaken in full consciousness, precariously, cautiously on crutches, but i seem to "make water" a lot.  Brush teeth, have a wash..... navigate the water-splashed tiled floor with crutches..... it's like trying to navigate a lava flow.

I think in-between all of the above, yesterday, i just forgot to blog, and that's ok..... just means that while lying here, resting, immobile, i was actually quite busy.

We discussed the concept of whether it's a fatal flaw in humans that we don't have additional appendages for the purpose of redundancy.... a third leg would certainly be useful.

Anyways..... 

Here's a little haiku.... it's a thing i thought about to sum up what it feels like.  The passing of time is weird, and i only have a view of clouds from where i sit.... no earthly reference to what is happening.... the idea of grass growing conjures up so many metaphors..... like the saying "the grass growing under your feet" meaning lazy, or that it's very earthbound, or it represents time....  and the windows in my lounge are like picture frames to an ever changing skyscape......  hard to boil your feelings down into so few words but i was pleased with this.....

Lying on my back.

Squares of sky floating past me,

can't see grass growing.

And i am really running out of photos to throw on here, so lets see what random stuff i can find..... in fact, here is a photo of my POV of the skyscape described..... seems appropriate:

kip

 It's a funny thing, innit?

What is?

Bubblegum!

Alas, i jest.... and that's also funny.

Sleep, my friend.... sleep, perchance to dream!

Without sleep we all get a bit frazzled.... a bit crispy around the edges.  Our soft skin suits take on a more ragged, depleted air, and mentally, we just stop functioning properly.  More importantly, and i'm no scientist, but i'd say we can't "heal".

Finally, a night where i've more or less slept straight through......

Woke up once when i did the whole multi-coloured leg stretch of doom and the searing pain of a thousand knife wounds wrenched me into full consciousness in a micro-second. 

Perhaps i had to wee four or five times in the night too, but those are short breaks and having a bottle beside the bed means i don't have to go through the rigmarole of putting the lights on, lifting myself out of bed and traversing the flight of stairs to the bathroom, below.

But, other than those little breaks in my sleep cycle, it's the first full night's sleep in almost a fortnight, and i feel optimistic about it.

I can, however, say that sleeping in a single position, flat on one's back, unable to move, or turn over, and in the hottest week of the year, it would probably not be normal for me to sleep straight through anyways.

I am taking this as a small win.

Morphine is more fun,

than croissants or cereals.

Warmer than porridge!

Here's the POV from my sofa this morning 

sick note

 Well, i feel the need to apologise for my absence but sometimes blogging has to jump in the sidecar of life.

I've had a couple of days.

"Just come to the main entrance and we're in the basement in the day surgery unit" - turns out to be a massive hike on crutches through the labyrinthine corridors of Huddersfield Royal Infirmary.

I'm there for seven in the morning and seated right next to the "alternate entrance" straight into the car park!

Gowned up by nine and in a recliner reading a book about moss while a string of people around me go in for "quick" biopsies and such.... and before you know it they're eating toast and drinking tea.

"You're in the trolley" a nurse shouts across to me, suggesting my paperwork has entered the system and apparently this is further than some people get.

I get the signal at what i'll interpret as eleven, and the kind nurse whose daughter is receiving worse knee trauma treatment than i, carefully wheels me in a chair up to theatre.

The anaesthetist, i think his name is James, seemed so calm and nice, and we chatted a bit in the moments before darkness about moss and the moors and a few of the nurses walked in the areas i've been curating.... there was no mention of counting back from ten.  I mentioned Himalayan Balsam bashing and ....

Tube being pulled out of my throat.... "Jason!" and my eyes open and i;m in recovery....  i don't have my watch with me and this stage is sketchy.... i ask the guy if i'll be able to play piano..... but he doesn't get the joke....  my heart rate is stubborn and everyone panics.... except me.

Eventually i am wheeled into ward ten.... lots of nurses fussing about and calling me James... I eventually get everyone corrected and convince them i have a broken knee not  broken arm, and we all agree i am the right person in the right place.

Surprisingly few medications are administered, but i'm comfortable.  The big, heavy, full leg cast has been replaced by a knee brace and some bandages over the surgery scar.  I notice three o clock.

Paracetamol arrives and much compassion from nurses.... heart rate stubborn.... sleep eludes me.

The temperature in the ward is almost thirty degrees and someone brings me a fan.... no curtains or blinds to shield my room..... this happened to me before in HRI.

Eventually i nod off in the early hours..... i wake myself twice by flexing my bad leg whilst sleeping and the dazzling kaleidoscope of pain colours is tremendous.  I see twelve-thirty and one-thirty in this same manner.

Nurses take observations through the night..... blood pressure, heart rate, oxygen levels.... all that stuff that even my watch and phone can chart these days.

Morphine and toast for breakfast.

Long wait for the physio team to see how i get in and out of bed and how i walk up and down the corridor.... they are happy with how i handle myself.

Longer wait for a doctor to come and cut the bandages off and to pronounce me ..... fit to go home.....

Then a REALLY long wait while the prescription is sent to pharmacy.... in fact it takes so long that they allow me to go home and we can collect the prescription later..... 

Home for five PM,

Thirty six hours from start to finish.....  feels like i've been on a long haul flight but without a destination.....  just flown round to get home.

I have NEVER had a carrier bag of medication before, until yesterday.  I also don't think i've ever been allowed morphine before, but needs must.

I've had a fairly comfortable night in my own bed.... there HAS been pain but the carrier bag comes in handy.

Six weeks with no weight on my foot before physio begins.......

Before:

After:

Donkey

 Right.... today i have achieved absolutely nowt.

Fairly standard....

Settee....

Painkillers....

Games.....

Tellybox.....

Non-stop messaging from friends and family.....

Two phone calls with the hospital:

First phone call:  Hopefully get you in tomorrow but we'll call you later to confirm

Second call: You'll be in tomorrow morning at 7am please

Ok..... so mebbe we can get moving.....

There's a chance they could still cancel at any point in-between now and the knife hitting my leg...

Fingers crossed, eh?

See you on the other side!

(for anyone dipping in and not reading the whole saga.... i am in for knee surgery tomorrow to put a plate in, to fix my fractured tibia plateau)

Here's an abstract shot of the side of the fantastic pier at Saltburn by the Sea - 1st March 2020 - probably a week before lockdown - i can remember using a LOT of hand sanitiser in the penny arcades handling all them coins.

stagnant

 Rolled about on the settee a bit.

Played some games.

Watched some films.

Watched some quiz shows.

Updated my film reviews.

Waited for the phone to ring.

Tried new combinations of laptops/settee/table - went back to the original version and ordered a new laptop table.

Going to bed to count down the hours to the next painkiller.

To counteract the "heatwave" that we're about to get into here in UK, here's a throwback to 13th Feb 2021.... a snowy view of the Colne Valley.

harsh

 The world is eating itself and i can't get near a window to watch.

In really serious news, or rather at the END of the serious news, we're missing our regular meteorologist....  So, as we always ask ourselves where she is....  i wrote a haiku for your pleasure.

Absent from the screen,

the real drought is upon us.

Come back soon Keeley!

You're welcome....

Here's a photo of our chickens (Buckbeak, a Bluebell and Pecky, a Nero) - sadly, Pecky is no longer with us but Buckbeak is still going strong.  She's massive! (25th March 2022)

binoculars

 Stranded at the battle of broken knee.

I had intended, today, to write up a little precis of the Battle of Wounded Knee.... just 'cos it seemed like an opportunity to learn something......  but, bloody hell, i've opened a can of worms..... what a complex subject it is.....

I mean it's a bloody rabbit hole.....

I learned a little bit about the Ghost Dance..... here's chatgpt's very concise summary of the Ghost Dance - better than i could summarize it:

The Ghost Dance was a spiritual movement among Native Americans in the late 1800s, hoping to restore their lands and way of life and bring back the dead. It frightened U.S. authorities and contributed to the events leading to the Wounded Knee Massacre. **

** i would add to this that at Wounded Knee there was some discussion suggesting that the accompanying shirts to the Ghost Dance would give bullet protection.

The whites were apparently so scared of what the Ghost Dance represented...... it contributed to the confusion and massacre at wounded knee, which chatgpt eloquently summarizes as:

The Battle of Wounded Knee, in 1890, was a massacre where U.S. soldiers killed around 300 Lakota Sioux, including women and children, at Wounded Knee Creek in South Dakota. It marked the end of major Native American resistance to U.S. government policies.

It was a massively significant event both in terms of the timeline of the troubles between the whites and the Native Americans but also in scale..... and it's not something that i, in any way make light of.

My personal battle of wounded knee is much less meaningful or significant to anyone.

Here's a pretty good wikipedia page about Wounded Knee with a lot more backstory.

Here's a photo of some jelly ear fungus in Pighill Woods from .... March 2024?

'pologies

 Yesterday was a bit of a "down" day, and that's not why we're here......  I will try and raise the spirits a bit but here's my caveat:

I reckon, over the next few weeks/months there's gonna be some right old highs, and some very low lows.

However....

Let's remember that everything that happened before, got us to where we are today, and we don't cry over spilt milk.

Therefore:

Everything will be an experience and an adventure.

So, today i've looked at some positives.....

I had a pretty nice phone call with the guy who was supposed to be interviewing me for a job this week.  He seemed genuine and we agreed that the timing is all bad and there may be something in the future and i have his details to keep him updated if anything changes.

I've had SO many well wishes from friends and family today..... lots of messages and good distractions.

I've watched some movies and updated my potted movie review page.

Actually got on my feet, and with Dawn's help managed a decent flannel wash and felt vaguely human for half an hour.

Slept a bit.

Had a call from the hospital trauma co-ordinator who basically said that they are struggling for appointments and she'll ring me early next week - this is all i needed just to know that at least i m on the books.  I mentioned my gripes and they seemed to think everything was ok and gave me the number of the "plaster room" in case i need it.

and that's pretty much it....

Lie on the sofa, count down the hours between pills..... dread the 6pm self injection of anti-coagulation stuff..... watch TV till you start falling asleep.......

Struggling to find decent photo content, but here's a photo i took of Halifax Borough Market while we went there for some Thai food.....  (October 2024)

flap

 We're flapping a bit today.

First off, Dawn's been staying home from work all week to look after me.... i mean, given that my house lies across three storeys, and the route between those floors and rooms is often difficult for someone on one leg, can you imagine me making a cup of coffee in the kitchen and trying to get to the lounge upstairs with it where i can elevate my leg?

Hundred hours since i did the damage to my leg.... i say "I" did the damage, but we all know which dog to look in the direction of!!

Temporary cast on my leg which was a little bit butchered by the attending doctors on their rounds on Monday morning in the emergency department.

Having been told by the attending doctors that i may be expecting my surgery on Thursday or the weekend, and having still not heard from the hospital since i came home...... it being Thursday already.....

We start to raise questions to ourselves.....

How long can Dawn realistically expect to be fetching and carrying on my behalf?

How long is too long to be waiting in which:

• The bone may start its own healing process which could complicate things
• The cast may not be supporting the leg correctly for this amount of time and could potentially be doing more harm than good?
• Could they potentially have forgotten about me in the same way they forgot to give me anticoagulants or pain meds?

So....

We .... i say "we" when i actually mean "Dawn" has started the convoluted process of trying to speak to a person at the hospital.... any department will do.....

Turns out, it's impossible..... a string of defunct phone numbers, unanswered phones, handsets picked up and put straight back down......

Eventually we Dawn phoned my GP and they told us her to call the hospital.

Finally i found a number for PALS.... it's the Patient Advice And Liaison Service.....  Seems like they have the brief that bridges the gap between who i am and who the hospital are....  Dawn rings them up and they tell her they'll get someone from the hospital to ring me.....

It's been challenging..... and of course, thirty minutes later and my phone hasn't rung yet......

How long do we have to wait.....  i just want some information.

From one waiting list to another.

Here's a photo from this tine LAST year,,,,, i was out walking the dog.... somewhere down Old Lindley near Holywell Green.... one year later, rendered incapacitated by that very acr.

pills

So many pills.

I've had to start a book.... you can tell i am poorly because, under normal circumstances i'd be monitoring my medicinal intake with a carefully crafted spreadsheet, but instead. i've got a book.

Blearily i squinted at the watch face and the illuminated digits would not come into focus.  I look at the  radio for a second opinion and receive a vision of more fog before fumbling, rattling, dislodging.... the contents of the top of the bedside cabinet. some glasses.... the strength of which i have to concede would be entirely pot luck as there will be at least three pairs of glasses all of different magnification all jumbled up with the phones, chargers, tablets, drinks, remote controls, books..... the maximum load permitted on a simple eighteen inch square of veneered MDF at the side of the bed.

Donning the spectacles..... i look at my watch..... 1:17AM.... this is good.... it means i've probably had two hours sleep.... the most i have had in a couple of days combined.  It also means i am due some codeine.... in the dark, i manage to extract the blister pack from the box, pop out a tiny tablet, grab a glass of water..... flick, gulp, knock something off the central repository of life support beside the bed and ....

and....

this is where i'd normally turn over and go back to sleep......

I can't turn over because i've got my leg elevated.  The weight of the cast and the lack of a functioning knee makes it entirely impossible to do anything but lie, like a riggwelter, and hope that someone comes and picks me up before .... well..... 

A series of shooting pains from nowhere and everywhere remind me not to move.

I drift off back to sleep, eventually.....

Here's a photo of a green veined white?

school

 They tell me that every day is a school day.

If that's the case then let's learn something new......

Tibia - aka the shin bone.  Comes originally from the Latin, tibia meaning flute, or pipe.  This bone was occasionally used to make musical instruments, of course.  Borrowed into the English lnguage in  the 1540s.

Plateau - has loads of French connotations, mostly meaning flat, broad, etc and can be traced back to Latin "plattus" which of course means the same.... flat, wide, broad.....

Fracture - Latin origins from the word fractura, meaning breach, cleft, fracture.  In turn, derived from fractus, the past participle of the verb frangere, meaning to break or shatter.  Ultimately tracing back to proto-indo-european root bhreg, meaning "break".

Put 'em together and what have you got?

Tibial plateau fracture?  Never heard of it......

Until Sunday night that is when i had cause to read all about it.......  basically the shinbone connects to the thigh bone..... now here's the word of the lord...... and where these two bones meet each other they have the classic fist shaped heads that form the knee......

Supposing you bent your knee sideways with enough force, the two bones fight against each other, and the tibia, in this case, can shatter vertically, knocking one of the knuckles off the end of the fist shaped bone end.  This is a high force trauma injury, common in car crashes.

In my case, take one lurcher of about twenty two kilos in weight...... multiply her by about thirty miles an hour, then aim her at your left knee......

Eighteen hours in accident and emergency - xrays and CT scans..... a full leg cast..... and i have to go back for surgery to put a plate and some screws into my leg to pin it back together..  

There is pain..... so much pain.

Here's a lurcher.....

And here's me, pissing in a bottle for the next three months after introducing her to my knee!

problems

 A wise man.... well, a balding boss with a Donald Trumpesque combover, once said to me..... Don't bring me problems, bring me solutions..... so here's a solution....

European peacock butterfly.

That's the answer to yesterday's conundrum.... to the best of my knowledge.

Had a fairly busy day today..... 

There was some rain, and i loved the way the water was playing with the plants in the garden..... here's a couple of abstract photos of said event.

Nonsense

 Stuff and nonsense.

Not been up to much but i've done some amazing admin over the last 24 hours.... still plenty to do, but it's good to get some stuff sorted......

Other than that.... not much to report.

Highlight was getting in touch with a solicitor who couldn't see me till next Thursday, but pressing on and managing to meet her while she ate her lunch in a coffee shop not a million miles away.....

While her food was going cold, she got a series of official stamps and embossers out and notarised a copy of my passport..... same day service......

Hundred quid for the privilege and not bad earner for while you're on your lunch break, eh?

Now... here's a photo.... i've obviously worked out what this is but wondered if anyone else would like to use their Sherlock Holmes skills to tell me what is going on here?  Feel free to leave your suggestions in the comments..... (spotted this out on a walk this evening)

wetter

 We've moaned about no rain for a few months, well it's making up for it now!

Spent the morning in the yard, stripping more and more melted tree tubes..... cut of the manky bits and split the recyclable bits..... times x thousand.

Skip's pretty full with the melted bits, and the zip ties, and the tree whips that are bonded with the melted goo.

It rained on us..... and the sun shone.... and it rained again......

If it wasn't June already i'd be telling you that this was typical April showers weather..... the climate feels pretty broken.

Good job we're working hard to fix it, eh?

I wouldn't be so presumptuous to imagine anyone, let alone me, could "fix" this..... but we have to try and work with the new new.

This afternoon we went up to a stubborn patch of Himalayan balsam and pulled them out of the ground..... squished em...... and got rained upon..... heavily.

My boots will likely still be wet through the next time i need them, on Monday.

After drying out at home i spent a good deal of time searching for my bank branch address..... given that my bank sort code points to a branch of the bank that has now closed down..... what the hell is my branch address??  I still do not know.....

Here's a photo of a nice bridge at Midgehole near Hardcastle Crags..... in the foreground is a large section of Himalayan balsam.... it's a trial.... i think they've introduced a sort of rust into it to try and biologically control it.... but what do i know?  The bridge is nice - the balsam not so.....

tubes

 Melted plastic tree tubes.

Since the fire on our moor..... i probably wrote about it but it's a good few weeks back now..... well, we lost fourteen thousand trees...... and what that also means......

There are fourteen thousand burned and melted plastic tree guards.

There are probably twenty eight thousand cable ties

There are fourteen thousand tree stakes

.... and all these need to be brought off the moor and processed in some way......

Well, lots of them HAVE been brought from the moor, and stuck in a yard, to be dealt with...... it's a job "anyone" could do but it's a job nobody wants to do.....

Cut off any bits that are melted 

Remove any remnants of trees

Remove the cable ties

Any tubes that still look a bit like a tube after all that get split lengthways and stacked in builder's bags, to be sent back to the manufacturer for recycling.

It's a thankless task borne out of a mindless act.

After some of that we went onto the moor and scythed some reeds to clear the edges of the packhorse trail up Haigh Gutter.

Cheers!

Here's a hedge, clipped in the shape of a pig's head...... it's outside the Blue Pig Working Men's Club in Midgehole, near Hebden Bridge...... we sat and had a pint after a little balsam bashing party.

kick it

 Three minutes thrashing about in the river.......

What is it good for?

Well.....

 A handful of river invertebrates....

Cased caddis flies..... pretty spectacular!

Caddis flies uncased......

Olives.... and their corresponding blue winged version......

wait..... i've written all this before, haven't i?

Well, today's a bit different because it's the second time i've been involved...... and i am growing slightly in confidence, and it "feels" better when you understand the task a little.

Someone explained the "trigger" levels to me..... so basically this.... forgive me if i haven't grasped it......

Each critter count yields a score..... 

More than nowt less than ten is one point

Over ten is 2 points

Then i think you hve to get over a hundred to get a third point

When you add up all the points, if it falls below the "trigger" level..... let's arbitrarily say six points..... then you're gonna have to see the headmaster.  In reality it's probably the environment agency that will come and REsample the area that scored poorly and if it still misses the trigger then there'll be an investigation......

We passed the trigger levels of course..... to fail them there'd have to be an "event" of some sort....

Fishing around in a bucket of river slops with a plastic spoon isn't everyone's cup of tea..... but i enjoyed it..... so go find your own fun!!

Well, river kicking apart.... at the weekend we went balsam bashing..... and i found a log.... and on that log were what i thought to be fungi.... turns out, they might be wolf's milk.... a slime mould.... so here's two pictures of the peach coloured blobs.... one close up and one further away just to give a better sense of scale, if that works?  Never seen this before, so here it is for you.

whizz

 As a man of a certain age.... i take exception to York City's agressive stance on public urination.....

Not because i want to "make water" in public, or that i am in any way into "water sports" but purely on the basis that all the public lavatories seem to have been closed down, or they now are in private ownership and the landlords can charge whatever they like for this "convenience".

I personally have an issue..... if i go in a bar.... drink a pint...... like an obstinate child, upon leaving and being asked the question "are you sure you don't need a wee?".... of course i don't.....Step one foot outside that establishment though..... and .... well you know what happens.....  it's annoying.

So it irks me more than most, in that, on the one hand you reduce the opportunities for me to whizz in peace...... but then you can't, simultaneously, clobber me over the head with a hundred pound stick for getting caught short.

As for defecating or letting my dog foul in public places..... i think i have a bit more sympathy....

Here's the article from local news today that got my dander up!

Here's a picture of our garden looking quite verdant after a sudden rainstorm today..... view from the kitchen door....