Well here I am, at the half way mark of when my dissertation needs to be written by, and needless to say half a dissertation has not yet been written. Still, this was to be expected as anything even remotely related to me always takes the most unlikely of courses, so I would be a fool to think this would be any different. Indeed it has been a somewhat turbulent time since the end of May with joys and sadness in fairly equal amounts.
At the end of May we celebrated Neil’s Mum’s birthday with another trip to Vinopolis (which is becoming a bit of a favourite haunt of ours now), where I fell in love with a £40 bottle of Chateauneuf du Pape. Needless to say we had to part company at the ‘tasting table’, but I hope one day we will meet again.
Throughout June work on the garden has been in full swing with Neil and I having finally established gound level, and are very pleased to have taken our final van’s worth of weeds and rubble to the tip. Our modest patch of earth still does rather represent ‘the Somme’ with an added hint of ‘Auschwitz’, following the discovery of a barbed wire overhang belonging to a neighbour. I am hoping a well placed clematis may help resolve this issue, although I also have my eye on some bamboo we could use for screening that, when cut and dried, can also be fashioned into the most terrific pea shooter! In a sense this will be killing two birds with one stone – although it is not birds I intend to target with my hand crafted device – but rather next doors cat that keeps peeing on my alchemilla mollis.
The middle/end of June was largely consumed by some very sad news, as my favourite uncle Phil lost his life to Lymphoma. Needless to say it has been a bit of a rubbish time for everyone, and none of us can quite believe he is no longer here as his was such a big character. In true Godfrey style however (my Mum’s side of the family) he got (and quoting the vicar) “a bloody good send off” as the church and get together after the funeral was packed with people wanting to share their memories of Phil . My Mum in particular recalled accounts of being left up trees and locked in the chicken shed by her big brother! Be good up there Phil – I know Granny won’t think you too old to give you a good clip around the ear…..!
And now it is July, it is raining, and I can’t believe that midsummer day has passed and its all downhill again from here! Still, our holiday is booked and so I am not short of things to look forward to, including the handing in of my dissertation and the receipt of my freedom. In the meantime I am taking stock, and as recent events have taught me, I have begun appreciating the everyday as you don’t know what might happen the next. With this state of mind, food shopping has again taken on an additional amusement value, in particular the root vegetable aisle.
Now I am not sure whether this is a recent occurence, whether the EU have relaxed their rules regarding vegetation perfection, or whether for comedy value those hard working polish people trudging away in the fields of deepest darkest Norfolk have let a few slip through, but amongst the box of sweet potatoes I have recently uncovered some interesting finds:
Further proof I am not yet a grown up…
Cleavage shot….
I fear this may turn in to a weekly feature.