Of Toes and Travels
A month ago I had my left big toenail removed. It didn't hurt at the time, but once the anaesthetic had worn off, it throbbed nastily for a few days. These things take a long time to heal and even [...]
A month ago I had my left big toenail removed. It didn't hurt at the time, but once the anaesthetic had worn off, it throbbed nastily for a few days. These things take a long time to heal and even [...]
View from my bed, in Dorset at 8am on 1st January 2025. A few fanciful thoughts: The bare trees symbolise the falling of the dead leaves and the ephemera of 2024. The Viburnham winter flowering shrub with its pink flowers [...]
Encouragement is a real gift which can lift people up, console, comfort and inspire them. But it is also an ability we can learn and develop with practice. I have selected various quotations under four headings which show how important [...]
Free Friday is the one day each week when there is no employee, contractor or part-timer working at our home either in the office or on the land. My ‘other half’ and I savour not having to get up early [...]
Three years after their wedding Ella’s husband Andrei ran away to sea. He was a Romanian bricklayer who had always had a dream to sail the oceans. It came as no surprise - he had always been so impetuous and [...]
The times in which we live can seriously impact the type of books we choose to read. When an economy is booming, unemployment low and the national feeling is upbeat, we often indulge ourselves with reading books about war, natural [...]
I lost my balance recently. Few of us care to admit having problems with mobility until it becomes obvious. I started falling over a lot. Luckily I’m expert at falling without hurting myself (I used to do ‘pratfalls’ as my [...]
Over 50 years ago, I was living in SE Asia. When on leave from my teaching job in Thailand, I used to travel around the neighbouring countries. In 1970, I bought an inexpensive airline ticket with five destinations, one of [...]
Big cities or small villages - I’ve lived in both - and I know which I prefer. In my twenties and thirties I lived in Dublin, Bangkok, London and Bath, but I’ve remained for longer in villages - both in [...]
"We're out of gas - again!" The exasperation in my husband's voice yesterday was evident. Like many people, we live in an area with no piped gas, and all our heating and hot water is provided by boilers that run on LPG (liquified petroleum gas) provided by [...]