Burgeoning

After yesterday's relapse into what felt like early March weather with added rain (and me wearing the winter waterproof I'd put aside to wash), today was dry from about 9am and sunny in varying degrees from mid-morning, so that the word I've chosen for my title seems appropriate for every growing thing - grass, daisies, weeds, slugs and yes, my meconopsis. I know you've had a blip of it already this season, but it's sprouted a further four blooms since that first one and there are still buds to open and besides I think the above is quite a dramatic photo...

This morning saw me doing Italian in bed (and giggling slightly at the connotations enlarged upon by blipper Wildwood) before getting up, collecting stuff to wash, putting on two loads of washing and drying it all outside, making a loaf for lunch, doing extra Italian because I had extra points to use ... and then, after coffee, I wrote the Intercessions for Sunday, leaving as always the possibility of having to add to or alter them as the week progresses. 

That done, I crashed over lunch and fell asleep fitfully while trying to read the paper - I still feel incredibly tired. However, the sun shone and we both thought we'd improve our mood and our wellbeing if we gee-ed up our circulations and headed off down the coast to walk under blue sky. We left the coast to walk up the road between the farms, marvelling at the great banks of purple rhododendrons in the woods of the Castle estate and round the fields of the farmland - they're being eradicated as invasive pests in some areas nearby, but at this time of year they look amazing. We stopped to talk - for a surprisingly long time - to one of the several people we've known almost the whole time we've lived here, this time the wife of a former colleague, people the broad sweeps of whose lives we know without being aware of the daily detail, so we weren't able to stay for long on the beach road where we like to end for a change of scene. It tends to be beset by dogs having a last walk before teatime, and they're not all on leads ...

We finished the day with online Compline, always my favourite service with the most lovely prayers, all in the space of under 15 minutes. It is a service I hope we continue with when our Rector, who initiated it during the first lockdown, leaves us to be our Bishop. But tomorrow is early shopping day and I must off to bed - but before I go: 

Anyone care to suggest what I've done with my waterproof overtrousers?