Strange fruit for round these parts

Having posted yesterday (and incidentally, thanks for the lovely comments) I learned some very bad news about a friend I was at university with. I had met him recently for a reunion meal and remarkably he looked even younger than he did 20 years ago. Anyway he passed away four days ago and I have been numb ever since.

We have had this orange plant for several years, for the first time it has actually resulted in some fruit and given the enormous amounts of snow I saw I think something a bit more sunny was called for. We started moving the snow that had gathered just after 10am and we finished 2 hours later and it was worrying how little we had actually shifted in the grand scheme of things.

I often mention our neighbours, and they all chipped in and moved some gargantuan quantity, so impressed I was having had to take daughters to various dance classes and not be able to help, I made them all tea. They were seemingly very grateful for this, I was unbelievably grateful to have such a community spirit in our neighbourhood.

While out delivering children to dance classes, I saw something which reminded me of the Hollywood disaster blockbusters. The day after either aliens/giant monkeys/volcanoes destroy cities, there is invariably a scene where you see ordinary people tidying up the mess. Today was that day, I saw dozens of people, I'm guessing too busy through the week, moving snow, for themselves, for neighbours, for the elderly, for others. It was great to see. Don't get me started, but bring back the community spirit which for some reason has vanished over the last x years.

Otherwise have car, will do chores. And a favour for our local chip shop owner. He is a lovely fellow and has never sent photos of his shop back home, so I agreed to send him them.

I'm totally exhausted so time for some whisky or something to warm the heart.

Hope the weekend is going well for everyone.

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