Bear me stiffly up ...*

I feel I may have overdone a bit of the physical exertion today, but surely in the worthiest fashion. (I sometimes feel it's fatuous to spend so much time wandering about in the countryside having walks). Today's weather was much better than I expected, though rather odd in the morning in that occasionally it would rain lightly out of a blue sky, into which large grey clouds would gradually appear before the rain stopped. However, the afternoon was simply sunny if not hot, and I look as if I'd been sunbathing somewhere, as far as my face goes anyway.

As to the sinews, I had Pilates in the morning and seemed to work quite hard, having an epiphany about just how holding my chin up while lying on my back alternately touching my ankles as I rotate them in a cycling motion actually works; I'd been misinterpreting the instruction with the result that my neck muscles ached. It's taken me almost four years ...

After a rest, sitting in the garden doing my Italian, and a spot of lunch, I decided it would be a good time to weed my existing potted plants - the roses and other things that came from the border that was sacrificed last year to the patio. This involved kneeling in front of said pots, as they're way too heavy for me to lift up and besides I don't have a potting shed or any other useful places to do such things. I ended up with aching knees and multiple rose-induced injuries to my hands, my gardening gloves making any precise grabbing of weeds impossible. 

Simultaneously with all this I was following my #2 son's dash round Heathrow Airport and his subsequent flight (which we were mightily relieved he caught) to Doha. You know how it is - you say "Safe journey: let us know how you go) and find he's shared his location and flight code and then it's too much of a temptation ... Or maybe you don't, and it's just me being neurotic. Ah well. 

Apart from that I checked in for our flights to Gatwick in a month (you can tell it's Easy Jet) en route for the Dolomites, where it is currently snowing. A lot can happen in a month - I just hope it does!

Collage shows the colours that are out in my garden just now - the vibrant red azalea is in the front; the lilac, Weigela and bluebells in the back. All but the azalea came with the house 49 years ago ...

Footnote: since our neighbour retired, there is a constant rumbling noise - music? gunfire? - from his tv which is just through the wall from our hallway. Mercifully we have no rooms on that side of the house ...

*Oh, fie! Hold, hold, my heart, And you, my sinews, grow not instant old, But bear me stiffly up. (Hamlet, Act 1, Sc.5)