The Hull Boy does it!

When so many bad people get media coverage it's easy to begin to think the world is going to hell in a handcart. That's why this is such an encouraging story. Actually it would be encouraging even if the world were in a wonderful state.

Marcus Skeet aka Thehullboy, has just run the length of Britain, from Land's End in Cornwall to John O'Groats in Scotland (837 miles). He's the youngest and first under 18 person to accomplish this. In the process he's raised £110,000 for Mind charity.

His story is much more than that though. It's about his own and his father's battle with mental health issues, and the fight to get out of the darkness into the light. And he only started running a year ago!

I've been following his progress on Twitter and it's not been an easy journey for him but he's done it. It's a fantastic story of hope, courage, and, most of all, love.

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I'm sorry to keep going on about them but I love my roses!

The dark pink ones are too heavy to support themselves. I've just tried tying them up so maybe that'll help.

Postscript

My plan for peanut chicken stir fry for dinner tonight has been thwarted. I don't have any chicken.

Adders and cinnabars

Tuesday

A wild but mild evening for eight of us to meet under the portico of County Hall. I shared my bit and we ate cake and chatted.

Wednesday

A much brighter day. Walked with Husband, Daughter, three grandsons, and two dogs, to Pobbles. Daughter spotted a cinnabar moth on the ground.

She also showed us two small marks on her foot. "I think I was bitten by a snake! But I didn't notice it."

Husband shook his head. "It would have hurt and been worse than that if an adder had bitten you and grass snakes don't usually bite."

Me: "I'd definitely say I was bitten by a snake if I had those marks!"

There are regular sightings of adders on this part of the coast, especially in the warm dry weather.

Daughter also said she wanted to pick some elderflower blossom to make syrup for drinks but, "I can't reach them because I haven't got waders."

(They were in the midst of bramble bushes.) (And probably snake lairs.)

On return I took the three boys for lunch. GrandSon3 didn't want fast food, like McDonalds. He had a second football trial that evening and he wanted to be in peak shape so we went to Verdi's and he had pasta to fill up on carbs. This trial is for what is probably the top academy in the area. He likes his current academy, and won Player of the Year, but will be torn if offered a place at this other one.

Then I've told you about my day yesterday. Oh, yes, food. I've been trying a few new recipes. On Wednesday we had teriyaki salmon. A very simple recipe: salmon, noodles, and teriyaki sauce - though I added green vegetables of course. But the sauce was lethal. It wasn't so much that it was too hot but just too strong. A very powerful taste, that would have drowned the salmon. I don't think I misread the recipe either.

Last night it was Keralan prawn curry, which was okay.

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Elder son and family are staying with the in-laws so we have house guests: Toby Dog and Stella Cat. We must be getting soft in our old age. We have never allowed our own dogs upstairs but Toby has free run of the house. He comes to see us in bed in the morning and I think he would have slept in our bedroom if Husband hadn't insisted I make him go downstairs. (He didn't stay there but slept on the middle landing on the stairs.)

I feed Toby, I walk Toby, yet he chooses to sit with Husband. It was ever thus. 

Let's talk about . . .

Have spent the afternoon trimming side stalks off bamboo stems. Now have a load of each. Missed a trick there: should have done it before Easter and I could given every church in Swansea some palm branches to wave.

Also have a blister on the side of my thumb.

I stayed outside even though there was rain in the air. I needed to compose myself and an email.

Just before going outside I received an email from Sir Keir Starmer, Prime Minister of Great Britain, and leader of the Labour Party, in which role he was writing to me. The email was entitled, "Let's talk about Nigel Farage."

You see why I needed to compose myself?

I've replied saying, "Let's not. Instead let's talk about Gaza, benefits cuts, the NHS, assisted dying."

Honestly the BBC does enough talking about and on behalf of the MP for Clacton without giving him the pleasure of knowing the leader of the party in charge of the government is worried enough to talk about him. I honestly think Keir Starmer needs a new PR team.

Deep breaths. And flowers.

Peony

Face the music

You know that little strip at the bottom of your monitor? Mine has a weather thing on it and it's currently saying, "Rainy days ahead," so obviously I am compelled to face the music and dance. Which is just as well as today is a really gloomy and miserable wet day.

I told Husband I had cabin fever and I'd only been indoors for half a day. He said, "What's cabin fever?"

I'm ready for Zac's tonight: I've prepped and made blueberry muffins. And I'm sure there are lots of things I should be doing but I'm tense and have to had to resort to doing a jigsaw. It's the one thing that I can rely on to focus my brain. 

Intermittently I browse fjord cruises, find an attractive-looking one, and then read that it carries over 6,000 passengers, and am deterred. Also amazed at the price of some cabins on some cruises. And yet they fill the ships. If we were to spend over £8,000 on a week's holiday I'd keep thinking about all the other things we could be spending the money on! Like taking the children on holiday or something.

History of quick showers

My Sainsburys delivery was coming between 10.00 and 11.00 this morning. At 9.58 I realised I was still in my jimjams so rushed upstairs for the quickest shower in the history of quick showers.

By 10.08 I was showered, teeth cleaned, and dressed. Delivery arrived about five minutes later. I'd completely forgotten it was a Bank Holiday when I placed my order. I asked the young lad doing the delivery if he was getting double pay. He said he didn't think so.

I've completed my jigsaw (one piece missing), done some prep on a short reflective piece for Zac's tomorrow evening, and toyed with going to do some gardening but deterred by the rain.

And now we've just come back from a very wet walk with Elder Son and GrandSon3, and Toby, and I've put a chicken in to roast. It's the sort of day you need a nice roast dinner.

Quick garden update

All the big bamboo chopped down. Roots can be dealt with another time. If they can be dealt with. No birds in the bushes and, sadly, no pandas either. I was mislead by Field of Dreams: If you build it they will come. But they didn't.

Now all that needs doing - to the bamboo - is trimming off the side shoots to create canes. 

As I'm here I might as well show you my favourite climbing rose

and the glorious display on this bush. That's just one bush though it looks quite widespread.

I glance out of the window before I go to bed and see rain. "Oh, good, a lovely downpour. The plants will like this."

Happy face!

The face of someone who's realised there is space for another rose in the garden after all!

That was before I went to the garage to get the branch lopper to cut away a rogue bit of bush and was distracted by the bamboo.

Yesterday, as I tried to chop a bit more of the top of the bushes shading some of my roses,  I noticed that, behind the bushes, there was a lot of wasted space. If the bushes were cut down and a lower hedge planted it would a) give more space and sunlight to the garden, and b) make it easier for us as we age to keep them trimmed. I didn't mention this idea to Husband as I didn't think he'd agree.

Then, this morning in bed, Husband said the exact same thing!

So, as I say, I was distracted by the bamboo that I'd started chopping back yesterday. Next thing I know I'm in the bushes lopping away, eventually realising I might have taken on a job not best suited for a relaxing Saturday afternoon. But it's fun!

Anyone want some bamboo canes!

* * * * *

For Christmas, or maybe my birthday, Daughter bought me a book on punctuation. It claimed to be a fun read. I began it, stopped, started again, stopped, before picking it up again yesterday because I wanted to check on the use of the Oxford comma, and I remembered it was the next subject to be covered.

First thing I discovered is that it's called the serial comma in America. After that I must have blacked out. No, it was helpful, and gave some good examples. On the other hand I am now querying every comma I write. And on the other hand, I think some people are just a little bit obsessed. I do care about my punctuation and will re-read things and delete or add commas as I feel appropriate. Which leads me on to the hyphen, the en dash, and the em dash. Now that's where I got really confused.

You might have noticed I used an exclamation mark after 'Anyone want some bamboo canes'. I would have used both exclamation and question marks but the author pointed out that it's obvious that it's a question so exclamation is all that's needed. The interrobang, about which I wrote with glee in 2024, was also mentioned. 

* * * * *

I've thoroughly enjoyed two books recently. Us Against Them is the second part of the Beartown trilogy by Fredrik Backman. I had previously read books 1 and 3 not realising there was a book in between and being puzzled by the talk of events I couldn't remember (not entirely unusual). I've now ordered book 3 to read again in the light of my discovery.

And I just finished my second Cormoran Strike novel by Robert Galbraith. Although each novel is a different story the characters develop and change through the series. The books I've read were, it turns out, the last two in the series. So I've ordered book 1 so I can start again. The next book comes out later this year and, as it was left on a cliff edge (is that right? Cliff hanger?), emotionally speaking, I can't wait.

An unexpected turn

My second hazelnut basket sundae in three days! Today's was with Vivien and I prepared for it by not eating breakfast. My plan was to return my library books afterwards but I got there and the library was closed!

No idea why. Something needed doing I guess. Anyway, I ended up buying a dress and a jigsaw in a charity shop, and three plants from the mini garden centre.

I seem to buy plants every time I go out these days: I must be turning into a gardener, although it's definitely the "I'll do this and see what happens" sort rather than the planned, prepared, knows what she's doing sort.

But George's bench is beginning to look beautiful, and my ramblers are mostly doing what they're supposed to.

Smelling the roses or not

Having done all that I really wanted to do I asked Husband to suggest somewhere for us to visit on Tuesday. He knows I love gardens, especially of the walled variety, so he came up with Upton Castle Gardens. 

The castle is privately owned and not open to the public but the grounds are managed by the owner and various Welsh agencies, with EU money. Which I assume has long ceased.

Before hitting the gardens we did the woodland walk, which led us to the largely silted-up creek, looking quite prehistoric.

There was a wild flower meadow - not in flower at the time - as well as the vegetable and walled gardens, an arboretum, and the rose garden.

The herbaceous border

The rose garden. It makes me so sad that I've lost my sense of smell. While I can still appreciate the beauty of the roses I'm no longer able to enjoy their fragrance. All the roses in our garden I chose primarily for their perfume, and now they're wasted on me. So I both loved and - not hated - was grieved by the rose garden.

The chapel predates the 13th century castle and is Grade 1 listed. Within it is the 14th century tomb and effigy of Sir Walter Maliphant.

We were walking through the woodland when I noticed something out of the corner of my eye that made me jump.

There was an exhibition of driftwood sculptures scattered around the gardens. I think the creator is James Doran-Webb. They were amazing!

My absolute favourites were these incredible horses.

After all that it had to be cake at the Tipi.

We're both quite predictable when it comes to choosing cakes when out. Husband will usually opt for the carrot cake; I will have scones but on both days I had flapjack instead. Day 1 at Stackpole Quay the flapjack was very buttery and delicious. Day 2 at Upton a different sort of flapjack containing nuts and seeds. Probably healthier but not as yummy.

Then it was a quick return to the cottage to pick up swimming things before heading off to Freshwater East beach. I swam again and stayed in for a long time. Do not listen to Husband when he says it was only 45 seconds, and he knew that because he'd counted. It was definitely longer than that.

It had turned a little hazy and cool so while Husband continued to sunbathe/sleep I wandered around collecting stones. I have a cunning plan though whether it will work as well in reality as it does in my head remains to be seen.

A pub, The Dial Inn, in a nearby village, was our next venue for dinner.

My main course. Moroccan-styled but didn't really work as it was all a bit dry.

Husband opted for the ricotta and spinach lasagne because he didn't want too much to eat. He should have told the chef that as our plates were loaded.

My starter: salmon and prawn fishcake with mornay sauce and a poached egg - not ice cream as Husband thought.

Husband's starter: king prawns in chimichurri butter. Again he made the better choice.

And that was our short break in west Wales at an end. Thoroughly enjoyed it all and have started planning our next holiday - maybe a cruise to see the Norwegian fjords.