New Year!

It may be a sign of getting older that a New Year doesn't quite inspire me as it once did. I used to feel I had a clean slate, a new beginning, practically a sense of redemption. It was the same in September with the start of the school year. Of course it's been decades since I went to university. And I never felt quite finished with 2021, or 2020 for that matter, not even 2019. I don't think I'm finished being 53 or thereabouts. Time really has begun to slide past, a rushing river rather than the trickle of molasses I used to experience. 

Nevertheless, the calendar says I must learn to write another set of digits and so I sit me down to see where I might push myself for a while before getting, not discouraged so much as, distracted. I struggle to remember what seemed so important in January that I can't do something different in February or March. 

Bill and I returned to pilates class yesterday. We even paid for new instruments of torture: a squishy ball  each and some exercise bands. He is very good at finding a quiet moment to practice in the dining room. I quit trying to do this because he always seemed catch me out and want to watch. I'm better at ignoring him, I guess. Our instructor keeps asking me if I'm not really proud of him, which I am, though it's becoming rather annoying how she fawns over him. He is often the only man in the class. I'm mostly proud that this doesn't bother him like it would many men. The other guy that sometimes shows up is also a long distance walker, but probably closer to 64 than to Bill's (very soon) 74. 

Bill and I have been doing some running "together" several days a week. We've been doing something called 'parlauf', which apparently just means paired interval training. Bill has always used the term to refer to running in circles. We used to do this with the running club where he paired the fastest runner with the slowest then the next fastest with next slowest and so on. As part of a group, each pair would run around the pond at Exhibition Park until they met their partner, then they would each turn around and run until they met again and so on. This meant each person ran to their ability, with the faster person running further. Bill and I have a circular course that includes our front gate and circles the Metro station. My side of the course is slightly hilly, into the sun and wind on the way back and passes two bus stops (people waiting surely wonder what I'm up to if their bus is slow); I've no idea about his side of the circle. Of course I'm familiar with the route, but things look altogether different when running. The fact that I can't do more than two out-and-back efforts tells me I'm ridiculously unfit.

I've been moving our (my) diet towards being more plant-based, and seasonal. My current rotation for main courses through the week is (Sunday) soup/stew, roasted vegetables, beans, lentils, grain, fish, meat or cheese (Saturday). We each cook our own lunch and Bill frequently chooses sausage or beef burgers. I try to keep my opinions to myself, but of course I don't succeed. He is aware of both the personal health and the environmental issues associated with these choices and that's all that I can do. He nearly always eats whatever else I put in front of him cheerfully, so I can't complain. While I'm not likely to ever be vegetarian, never mind vegan, when I do eat meat I really appreciate it. 

I have pages and pages of other wishful thinking I'll not even mention now, but if anything comes of it I'll try to let you know. 

A lovely Christmas present from Helen & Martin.

Learning New Tricks

One thing that has seemed to fill a lot of people's time during this pandemic has been cooking. I think that's brilliant as people can only control what they y eat by cooking their own meals. I've often seen a sign on local restaurants 'Don't Cook Just Eat', which infuriates me. Turns out this is a delivery service that restaurants can contract with to do deliveries. I gather it isn't cheap and they collect their money whether or not the restaurant is selling delivered food, though I could be wrong about this. 

In any case, Bill and I have been out of the habit of eating out much for years now. Once I retired, cooking dinner didn't seem particularly onerous, particularly since I had any number of 'recipes' memorised. My favourite involved starting with sauteed onions and then adding whatever vegetables and possibly meats were on hand. Stir fries cook up quickly and you don't have to use a lot of oil. 

However, I must admit it started to get a bit boring and, far worse, I started gaining weight. So I got out my Betty Crocker's Cook Book from 1987, which has calorie counts for each of its recipes. I had at some point circled the calorie count of any recipe under 300 calories and those are the ones I focussed on. Besides calories, I've been trying to cook less and less red meat and more whole grains and vegetables. I frequently substitute yoghurt for sour cream or oil for bacon fat (it is an American cookbook after all). 

Some of Bill's favourite recipes of late have been cream of mushroom soup and Pennsylvania red cabbage (cooked with brown sugar and apples). I've never, in the 30+ years I've owned this book, looked at the vegetable recipes. We've also discovered that bulgar wheat cooks up as easily as rice and tastes something between white and brown rice. 

So, amazingly, some bulgar wheat cooked up with a vegetable stock cube and some red cabbage and some Brussel's sprouts (shredded and stir fried with a diced onion) is a pretty satisfying meal. Who would have thought?

Breakfast

On Fridays at our house Bill makes bread in the bread maker. I stocked a small tin of yeast for Brexit last year and had a few part-bags of various bread flours when we went into lock down. Since then we've shopped at Buy-the-Kilo, just down the street at the Metro station, to top up the strong white flour. 'Strong flour' has plenty of gluten, needed for making most breads, and is made from durum wheat. This is what all regular flour in the US is made from, apparently, something I only learned in the past few years. We enjoy toast and home made jam on Saturday and Sunday mornings - in bed, to be completely decadent.

The last of the birthday flowers: lavender alliums and some sort of white filler flowers.

During the week, however, we have breakfast at the dining table. Following advice from a former blog Like Merchant Ships (she stopped writing her blog in 2010, but carried on at Tumblr until October last year) to avoid using commercial labels at the table, we have decanted porridge oats (oatmeal) and Grape Nuts into glass jars. Also my instant coffee. In winter we have hot porridge.

The circular metal tray on a hardboard place mat (a British thing, most place mats in the US are fabric) acts almost as well as a Lazy Susan (I wonder, who was Susan?). In addition to cereals, coffee and sweeteners are containers with Bill's 'medications' recommended un-officially by his consultant after he cracked a knee cap while running a couple of years ago: glucosamine and cod liver oil (he pays me no attention when I mention dioxin concentration in fish oils). His knee no longer bothers him - other than I think he drags that foot a bit and needs physio / exercises - and he's thinking of giving these meds a miss when they run out to see what happens. He buys them by the million on eBay. (I see he has put them in plastic food containers that still have a label - must try harder!)

As well as the circular tray, we have our good china and silver, a teapot (full of tea) for Bill and another pot of hot water for me. Bill likes to chop his fresh fruit each morning. I make a box of a wider variety of fruits - including some tinned peaches or fruit cocktail - on Sunday afternoon in preparation for the week. There is also a small creamer jug filled with the last of a wine bottle of orange syrup, or sometimes rose hip syrup, and a large jug of milk.

We eat, then drink hot beverages until we are sloshing, or out of conversation, and then get on with our day.

Collecting Rainbows

I was glad I had my camera when I saw these daffodils.
I would have kicked myself otherwise. They are fading fast.

One of the biggest habit changes I've had to make with starting to blog again is to remember to carry my camera around. On our front door a post-it note faces outwards to remind us to 'Wash Your Hands!' while another faces inwards so that before I go out I'll remember to get my 'camera'.

This is a weird picture, I know. The rainbow is made of a bunch of dots, 
which was different. And I loved the flowers in the window. But then glass
makes life awkward at times and that darn shadow
on my camera lens - it comes and goes.

Bill is still running and we both go for walks several times a week. One day on my normal route around the park, the riverside and the seafront I counted 91 people with whom I needed to negotiate space, doing that little dance we all do these days if we are sane and sensible. After that Bill and I started finding other places to walk. Beautiful as the sea is, it's not worth dying to see. 

Then we started walking after a slightly earlier dinner and there were a lot fewer people around. 

When all this started it seems the kids staying at home were encouraged to paint rainbows to put in the windows. As I originally understood it this was about giving older people something to count / collect as it were. Then it changed into being about the NHS workers, then other essential workers like in the food sector. Later people began putting stuffed bears and other animals in their windows, I gather for children to count / visually collect.

At least that's how I understand it. In the first week or two of March we weren't watching BBC news and so other people seemed to have information we didn't about how things were developing, in spite of reading newspapers online every day. We've gone back to not watching the news as it is just a bunch of numbers we can't do anything about other that what we are already doing. 

Do they do rainbows in the States I wonder?

Easingwold - Part II

Though the centre of Easingwold isn't very big at all, they kindly provided signs directing me to the Tourist Information Centre. There I met a very friendly lady who rattled off all the places she thought worth seeing. She was fairly modest about the place, it had no 'great' sights, but lots of 'moderate' ones (my words, not hers). She gave me a map of streets and circled a few places. [Note, the photos were somehow removed from the blog, so I've replaced them...mostly at the bottom. Will check back later to see if they remain.]

The village green. It wouldn't really be a village without it. Though,
properly speaking, Easingwold is a Market Town.

She even knew the 'best' charity shop, right next door. So to St. Leonard's I went. They had a delicious display of scarves in the window, several of which were silk. For £1 each I bought any that fit into my colour scheme (cool, light, muted). I have now filled the pink gap in my scarf collection. Then I saw a lush piece of moss green chenille, probably something suitable for upholstery but for £3 it was irresistible. I was to regret that rather heavy purchase later in the day. 

I know I got a grey t-shirt and a blue silk sweater and another grey blue scarf plus some beaded necklaces and bracelets (more for the beads than the bracelet) and a very small book on home interiors by the lady who runs the White Shop for 50p. I spent just over £17 and filled two bags. Bad move at the beginning of the visit, but the shop wasn't open all day. 

Another place the tourist centre mentioned was on the other side of them, a community hall holding a fair to raise money for the burned animals of Australia. I didn't see anything I wanted, it seemed mainly aimed at children, but then I did find a gym bag for £3, only I gave her £5, saying my sister-in-law lives in Sydney. That made carrying my charity haul much easier, though I wished I not brought my handbag. 

After that I found The Regency Dress Agency. I wasn't feeling particularly 'elegant' by then, but I was determined to find anything worth having. The prices were of course higher but then this wasn't a charity shop and the merchandise was of a consistently higher quality. I looked at every single thing in the shop and came away with several tops, a dress and a pair of shoes. The best part was that the lady behind the desk was easy to chat with. I could easily have spent several more hours visiting with her. She recommended a tea shop across the square, which was also one that the tourist info lady mentioned.



On the way I found a boutique - I'd tell you the name, but I can't find it anywhere on the internet and Google maps doesn't go down the little alley towards Market Place, darn! - with a pair of grey jeans in the window, something for which I've been searching for over a year now. So in I went. 


Also, I wanted some silver earrings as I'd forgotten to put any on Friday morning and had also come away without my jewellery pouch. One feels naked without earrings these days. I found earrings and two pairs of grey trousers/jeans, very modern stretchy ones. They don't fit into my natural fibres goal, but they took me a long way toward my goal for lightening the colours in my wardrobe. I doubt there was one other thing in the whole shop I'd be seen in, though. I think a lot of modern clothes are ridiculous, that's how old fashioned I am.


I was desperate for some refreshment by then so on to the Tea Hee Shop I went (I remembered it as Tea Pee, shows how my mind works). I had just settled with all my various bags when I realised I'd left my handbag somewhere. It didn't have anything valuable in it, but a collection of small things that fit into a small bag. I gathered up all my shopping bags and re-traced my steps. It was nice to see the lady at the dress agency again and there sat my handbag, unnoticed in a corner. 

Back to the tea shop where I inhaled a pot of tea and a bottle of water while perusing the home decorating book. Then I pulled out the map and braced myself for a long walk carrying lots of bags. I still wanted to see the Georgian houses and so wondered in the opposite direction of where we were staying for a short while, snapping photos along the way. 

Then I stopped to chat to a lady gardening in front of a Georgian house just off the Market Square, asking her to verify I was going in the right direction back to our digs. She studied my map so long I wondered if I'd found a tourist who couldn't resist improving the flower bed, but she eventually confirmed I was headed the right way. I stopped and bought a sandwich at the Co-op on my way out of town.

It was a long trudge with the gym bag slipping off my sloping shoulders and shopping bags cutting into my fingers, along a sometimes muddy, bramble-filled verge facing into racing traffic. My boots were definitely not made for walking, though they just lacked support, at least they didn't give me any blisters. 

I took a guess at the roundabout which had no sign whatsoever for the Emergency Planning College (a lack of planning in my opinion) which fortunately turned out to be correct. My sense of direction is slightly better than I get credit for having.

I had a lovely old green brooch on my collar which got damaged with my sling bags onto my shoulders and I was sad to have lost one of the green stones, glass though it likely was. To my amazement I later found it at the bottom of one of the shopping bags. How lucky is that? 

How convenient to have a phone box in your front garden! People would
always be able to find your house.

Easingwold - Part I

Everyone here seems to count the lock down from the 23rd of March, when Boris was very firm and very specific. But I count it from the 16th, when our WI craft group was cancelled because of his announcement about staying home and not gathering, made at 17.26. I went to the church, a few minutes' walk, to check that none of our members had missed the cancellation email and was surprised to find a meditation group in our usual meeting room and a business meeting down the hall. Then again, Bill had left at 5 to go to the running club.

Since I was out anyhow I nipped into the Co-op and bought fresh fruit and veg, a bottle of wine and a pizza for when he came home. I saw my neighbour, Dave, there and he was bemoaning the lack of paracetamol anywhere. I commiserated as Bill and I had searched North Shields that day for any hand sanitiser or paracetamol or even hand washing liquid (Bill's preference, I like bars) and came up with only some strange dissolving paracetamol tablets (that taste awful). I've not been in - or even to - a shop since.

But this is about Easingwold, where we'd just been the previous weekend, attending the Annual General Meeting (another phrase I never met until coming to Britain) of the Long Distance Walkers' Association. I had misgivings about going, but I knew Bill would go without me. If there was anything being passed around there he'd just bring it home and I'd spend the weekend worrying, so I went. I'm so glad I did.

Not only was it our last taste of freedom, but I met a different set of people this time, people who were great conversationalists and they always seemed to remember my name! Also, I got to know some of Bill's walking buddies a bit better. As usual the food was pretty good and definitely plentiful. Our digs were unusual. We were staying at the Cabinet Office's Emergency Planning College, which somehow seemed appropriate. 

We arrived on Friday afternoon and there was a series of walks of varying lengths planned for Saturday morning, one of which Bill planned to do. I could have taken a coach trip to York with a bunch of the other wives, but I've been to York quite a bit. I'd investigated charity shops at Easingwold and nearby villages online and when a gentleman at the front desk recommended Easingwold I was set. He described it as a 'lovely little village full of Georgian houses, clever little boutique shops, great charity shops and wonderful teashops'. Who wouldn't be sold? 

I decided that since it was only 2 miles to the village I would walk as parking cars can sometimes be complicated. Besides I'd had a large dinner the night before that needed addressing. The 2 mile route was on a main road without a place for pedestrians, though. I asked for and received a map of the area and saw that there was a short cut across fields, but did I dare? Another gentleman suggested that their walk would begin along that exact route and that I could accompany them to the village and then go my own way. So I did.

I was trying to notice markers so I could get back the same way. We went across a very bumpy field, then over a stile into a smooth field. We went across at an angle to another stile and then along a fence to two stiles, one right after the other. Then we went through a gate...and then I don't know what all. We were in the village. Much as I tried turning around to see how it would look on the return I was pretty certain I'd be coming back along the main road. 

The original - it was a big field! I do so love the lacey trees.

I had a lively conversation from a retired medic originally from Ireland, County Mayo. He had a lot to say about 'caring' as well as 'curing', which I found quite refreshing. I got some insight into why people might spend hours and hours each week wondering around together in all sorts of weathers.

There were no women on this walk, or if there were they were at the front. I chatted with a couple of men designated as 'sweepers'. The back group found my attire quite amusing, though they described it as 'elegant', which of course was ludicrous. One of them even asked to take my photo, saying I should be on the cover of Strider Magazine as the 'best dressed walker'. I thought he was crackers but I agreed to a picture. It hasn't appeared on Strider, but it did show up on the LDWA Facebook page.

My cropped version.

Jamieson's of Cullercoats

If I can I try to make my hour-long walks serve a purpose. One day Bill pointed out a van with lettering that announced a fruit and veg shop in Cullercoats, a village that neighbours ours. We'd neither one ever heard of the place. We looked it up and found it on one of our later walks. Bill pointed out that there was free parking in the street just outside. I noticed it was just across from the Cullercoats library and Metro station. I didn't think, though, to find out what hours they kept and never could find this information online.

So another day I walked back, this time on my own. It was one of the autumnal days before the recent cold snap but the wind was brisk enough I took the sheltered route behind the Boating Lake. I snapped a photo of the Clock Tower Cafe and the bowling green at Tynemouth Park. I wanted to remind myself to check out the coffee shop there - and turns out there is also a bar for parents whose kids are playing putt-putt golf or whatever. I tend to avoid child-friendly type places but maybe in the dead of winter it might be safe. I've strolled around the Boating Lake any number of times, but never visited the cafe. I'm compiling of list of cafe's and coffee shops to which I can drag Bill during dry months. 

I took the time to try to 'compose' the photo, lining up with the tree, but it is the many shades of blue in the sky that catch my eye first, reminding me one of the things I like about winter here, seeing everything from pale turquoise to darkest grey in the sky. 

I was amused to find a barber shop called Van Gogh. I found myself being thankful Bill shaves his own head a few times a year. Brits pronounce his name VanGoff, which took me a while to get used to.

I had a good look around Jamieson's and a chat with the man himself behind the counter. I didn't take much note of the fruit and veg prices but saw there were many interesting items along the lines of unusual sauces and products bearing names suggesting local manufacture. It struck me that this would be a great place to come when we next shop for our Christmas hampers. 

Love the location, the produce and the stained glass windows!

As I walked away I realised I was still none the wiser about his hours and he let me take a photo of his poster for my own reference.

Supporting local shops is high on my agenda these days. I hope it is on yours as well.

Last Tuesday's Walk

I set myself a goal to walk for an hour most days in January. I did pretty well with that until Bill brought me home a cold. For now I get all my exercise coughing.

He just had his follow up appointment for his pacemaker surgery yesterday and has the 'all clear'. So of course, being a normal 70 year old, he signed up for the Allendale Challenge in April, 25 miles in the fells and valleys. Over here a 'fell' is a noun which means hill or stretch of high moorland, especially in northern England. Unless it's me doing the challenge in which case it is the standard use, past tense of fall. 

Before he was given back his status as active athlete he would walk around with me. I enjoyed showing him my usual two mile jogging path, measuring the route to the knitting shop, having him show me Preston cemetery. He enjoyed playing with his Garmin wrist watch / heart monitor that he got for Christmas. It told us how far we'd walked and, if we remembered to set it, how long this took us. 

Bill prefers to be out in the countryside but I prefer an urban/suburban environment in most instances. I do love a good wood or a beach but one with facilities would be my first choice. The way I see it, nature is infinitely beautiful, but people are just as surprising. 

 For example, what would possess someone in a nice neighbourhood with a perfectly decent house to put a giant spider on it? 

I feel for the neighbours, don't you? I'm not sure I could sleep with that on the wall outside my bedroom.

On a happier note, I saw my first snowdrops of the year.

Dancing Like I Type

I've been going to a Zumba Gold (as in for old ladies) class for a couple of months now. It meets at noon on a Monday and even better than exercise, it makes me smile. The ladies there are quite friendly, always smiling and they often come over to chat. I've even run into people I already knew: a consultant microbiologist I used to work with and, once, Meriel's sister in law.

The class is run by a mother and daughter, Irene and Catherine. As much as dance leaders they are almost a comedy act. Irene expresses horror at some of Catherine's burlesque-type moves, then again, Irene shakes her booty pretty well too. The idea is that if you want a gentle workout, follow the Mom, if you want to work harder, Catherine is your leader. I tend to follow Catherine mainly because she wears very bright workout clothes that make her easy to see against the black background.

When Nutbush City Limits comes on, my heart sings along, but other than that I'm not really into most of the music, pop songs I don't know, strange Bollywood type stuff, or - I don't even know what it's called - I think of it as 'gangsta' music (and the choreography matches). I'm not sure what makes me smile more: the comedy act on stage, getting to shimmy and Charleston, or being a room full of women mostly over 60 doing gangsta moves or gyrating their hips.

There is a wide range of fitness and of dance abilities of course. Not everyone understands the way dance generally works (if we do it for 8 counts on the right I'll bet money we're going to repeat that move on the left). Some of the old dears end up just shuffling around and waving their arms, which is perfectly fine; better exercise than sitting in a chair all day. It's taken me several months to get several of the routines and there are still parts I haven't figured out since I can't always see Catherine's feet to follow. 

That's the part I was explaining to Bill about dancing and typing. When I learned to type I read every word but after several years of office work I discovered that sense of 'flow' where the letters enter your eyes and come out your fingers, without reading them at all. That's how people answer the phone and type at the same time. 

After 13 years (aged 3 to 16) of dance training, I've learned to watch someone's feet and to just follow, without much thought. I figure getting the feet right is the first priority, if only not to get stepped on when Catherine says 'travel'. The arms can come later. I can imagine that if you have to think about each step as it's done on the right and then figure out how to do that again on the other side, it can be frustrating. You can tell the ones who have dance experience, they just pick things up faster, and if I can't see the leader I try to follow them instead. 

If you haven't tried Zumba but you like to dance, I recommend you give it a go. I don't think of it as exercise at all, but playtime!

Halloween

Well, better late than never. This is another of the Halloween costumes I made for my step-son after my "frugal awakening".

It's not the best photo (and clearly I should have washed the window first), but this scarecrow outfit was a relatively successful and inexpensive costume.

These were old jeans that may or may not have already had holes at the knees, but I added patches anyhow. I found bits of rope to tie around his waist, ankles and wrists. I remember we visited the fairgrounds to find some straw to glue here and there, mainly sticking out of the front of the flannel shirt, which was a charity shop find. 

For me the most fun part of this costume was the birds (a blue one on his shoulder and a red one on the hat) and the hat. These were also charity shop finds. The hat was actually a straw basket thing intended to cover a plant pot (was that ever a thing here in Britain?). I just turned down the top edge and flipped it over to be a straw hat. 

The costume was a success in that it was comfortable enough for him to wear all day at school and it kept him warm when he went out to trick or treat.

We're not participating in Halloween this evening. I've taken in my (uncarved) pumpkin from the front porch; it was actually purchased for making pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving. We will be hiding at the back of the house, pretending we aren't home. Hopefully my observation that most kids haven't yet worked out what 'trick' means will still hold true.

On a slightly different note, I've just finished reading Better Than Before, a book by Gretchen Rubin (The Happiness Project author) about habits and how we form them. Each chapter begins with a quote. I found some of them rather disturbing / motivational. So I will leave you this slightly scary thought:

"All our life, so far as it has definite form, is but a mass of habits -- practical, emotional, and intellectual, -- systematically organized for our weal or woe, and bearing us irresistibly toward our destiny."
                      --William James, Talks to Teachers and Students

I set the alarm and went out for a run the next morning, something I've not done in ages.

Happy Halloween!

Anchovy Sauce

So, this is sort of about France, but not really. The photo is a front door in Bourdeaux (Drome) France (not Bordeaux the big city in Western France). 

I always let myself buy a few magazines to while away the driving hours. I've also discovered the joys of bullet journals, though I am in no way as dedicated as some. As a compulsive note-taker this has been quite satisfying.

So, I read and took notes on (English) magazines while we were in France. I also made a notebook, but that's another post.

Wanting to eat more oily fish, which are healthy, and having survived a venture into (ick) anchovy eating via a recipe on The Frugal Scholar, I bought more anchovies, but didn't remember to bring the recipe (and didn't think to look it up). I happened across one in a magazine and scribbled it down.

Bill asked what on earth we were going to do with the anchovies and I brought forth this recipe:

Anchovy Sauce for 6

75 ml olive oil, 3 cloves garlic (minced), 150 g anchovies (drained), 1/2 tsp chilli flakes

Heat olive oil on low heat (it burns easily), add anchovies which "melt" in the heat; add minced garlic and chilli flakes. Serve over pasta.

Simple enough. Bill was cooking so he used the olive oil the anchovies came in. And he halved the ingredients more or less for just us two.

We did something (else) odd: we took our bathroom scales with us on holiday in France. We've both been losing weight slowly and I really didn't want to find it all again while we were away. Weighing faithfully each morning kept us conscious of our choices.

The weather being really warm, we had protein and a big salad most nights. The night(s) we had anchovies over 'pasta', there was a handful of bow-shaped pasta in there, but it was mostly strips of courgette (aka zucchini). 

When I was a teenager working in pizza places I really hated handling those anchovies and I never ate one until recent years. They are very 'fishy', but having met and loved smoked salmon, I don't really mind 'fishy' and in addition, anchovies are oily and very salty. Oil and salt are two of my favourite food groups, so while I wouldn't have anchovy sauce every night, it is a reasonable dish on 'fish' night.

My Colours

Going through my photos from some months past. I'm afraid this post will include yet another granny square throw. This time in the dusty colours I feel suit me best. It was hard to give this one away.





In fact, part of my affinity for the beach near my house is that the North Sea is rarely the bright turquoise of the Med. It's main colour is a dark, almost ominous grey and only sometimes is it a greyed-blue (my favourite colour of all). On a sunny day though it can be a pale silvery blue. It tends to be whatever colour the sky offers it. 





The beige sand often has flecks of black coal in it, burning it less a tan than a taupe shade, another of my favourites.  The algae that grows on the rocks can be anything from bright green to hot pink, other colours I love, though I rarely wear them. 



One day I cycled up the coast to my knitting group and luxuriated in the ease with which I could pull up and snap a photo when the scenery demanded it.




Sometime around then my craft group decided to do a project of indigo tie-dying. 



Indigo, the colour of jeans, is another of my colours, but I've been over tie-dying since the 70s so I didn't participate.

I did admire some of their results, however.

Another Granny Square Project

This is another of my watching-telly projects for the Age UK knitting group. Granny squares really are about the easiest thing to do with yarn and I still absolutely love playing with the colours. 




About the time I was delivering this, I was trying to exercise more and so I cycled the 3 or so miles to the Comrades Club at Whitley Bay, where my knitting group meets. 







It was a gorgeous day and I couldn't resist stopping to snap a few photos. 

On the way to Whitley Bay

Being able to stop at take pictures - along with not having to pay for parking (£1.20/hour!) - are two huge advantages (not to mention the exercise of course) of cycling over driving. 


I generally drive when a) the weather is bad; b) I have loads to carry; or c) I've let myself run short of time and in many cases I find the car as much a nuisance as a convenience. 

The pier and the Priory

The ability to walk to most places I would generally need to go is now firmly in my list of requirements for a place to live - not that I plan on moving any time soon! Folks in the US - particularly the midwest - never think of this, but my experience is that it adds a lot to quality of life, having that sort of convenience and community.