Light in the gloom

As forecast the weather closed in overnight. Gone is the glorious sunshine and warmth of yesterday, replaced by a southerly wind, mizzle and the promise of significant rain from mid-afternoon until early tomorrow morning. 

The truck looked positively inviting as I went about the morning chores at 8.30am. Bean had left me to it by then, and was already curled up in a warm ball on Pink, next to the heater. It's a dog's life.

One of my jobs was to check the new drainage ditches and pipes in the chook run, in the hope that the deluge won't turn it into something like the trenches of the Western Front again. And I deepened the shallow trenches that run across the drive, which channel surface water into the adjacent garden area instead of flooding the garage. By so doing I will sleep better tonight.

We definitely do NOT need any more rain. No farmer or gardener is happy about the wet conditions at the moment. The poor farmers are pugging the ground in their paddocks every time they drive across them, or move a herd/flock around. 

And this gardener - for one - is heartily fed up with getting coated in mud every time I do any work outside. 

I shall try to be phlegmatic and look on the bright side of having plenty of water (with even more to spare), knowing that spring will spring with good soil moisture. That cannot be taken for granted in this area. Only one spring in the eight that I've been here has been so blessed.

We are spending the afternoon in the study with the Bean is - true to form - now curled up on MY armchair beneath her Best Blanket Ever, fast asleep. 

PS The steps behind the truck go up to a platform which once upon a time had solar panels attached - long before I lived here. It is now used by Paradise Shelduck to observe their territory.