Merry Date Change Day

Always seems a bit arbitrary celebrating a 'New Year', but I guess it's a marker, and a chance for people to set out to do things that, ultimately, they'll give up on after a few weeks (or months if they're particularly headstrong). I think I could probably get more into celebrating the changing of the seasons, than the flicking of a page on the calendar - always feels there's more to look forward to as spring approaches and you can feel some coming warmth in the air; things start getting planted in the garden; and layers get fewer for cycling. Equinoxal type stuff seems more ripe for celebration as well, marking some grand change bigger than ourselves.

But then again, maybe I'm just grousing...

Staring Contest

p.s. almost started 2014 a chicken down. There I was in the garden, about 10.30am, as they free-ranged, when a fox popped over the wall at the back. Managed to grab a mouthful of feathers out of Blue, but fortunately got spooked on realising I was there, otherwise Holly was then cornered with Blue having run free.