The theme for the second half of January was snow, rain and flooding. I cannot tell you how much I would have preferred to have been in southern Spain!
16 January
I finally finished the jumper I started knitting in the middle of last year. Being distracted by Erica caused the delay. It's remarkably similar (i.e. same colour and pattern) as the jumper I finished in Germany in the summer of 2019. The only differences are: 1) this one is made with pure wool (c£32 vs £4 for the original cheapy acrylic/wool mix); and 2) I made it too small. Given point 1, point 2 is somewhat annoying. I'm yet to wash it to see how much I can reshape it to a bigger size.
As much as I enjoy cables, once I'd finished this one I was ready for some plain knitting for a while!
17 January
I must have taken a long run on this day, because these snaps were taken a good few miles away from home. A lovely day for it, but there was a lot of water around. Believe it or not, the second snap shows a public road, not a farm track!
21 January
Every couple of weeks we've been nipping up to Mick's mum in Halifax, to take her shopping and help her out with anything she needs doing (she's approaching 96, still living completely independently and, understandably has been rather fed up with being so confined to the house), and throughout late December and January all of our trips seemed to coincide with snow. On this day the snow was accompanied by high winds, and I hadn't taken any sunglasses with me, which meant that the first half of my run (during which this photo was snapped) was carried out with awful posture, as I kept my head down and my eyes scrunched into slits against the conditions.
22 January
Whilst it had been snowing in Halifax it had been raining at home. A lot, and for days. On this lovely sunny day I ran down to the canal to see how flooded it was. Gosh! I've never seen the water that high! The lake you see in the first snap covers the slightly-flooded fields shown in my photo from 1 January. The second snap shows the stile used to access the tow-path (which on this day was underwater). The third snap, if you look carefully, shows a car up to its doors in water on the other side of the canal. As I returned to the road, Postie stopped me to ask if he would be able to access the moorings; I described the conditions and he decided against.
24 January
A sub-zero morning with ice-rink streets, so surely the mudfest of the estate would be frozen? It started with promise as the open ground was solid. However, the muddy sections are protected by trees and were just vaguely crispy rather than having reached the level of solidity for which I'd hoped.
Then, in the afternoon, it snowed and accumulated with rapidity that's unusual in these parts.
I distracted myself by improving my crumpet making skills:
25 January
I went for a run in a winter wonderland. And got abused by a dog walker for having the temerity to ask (politely!) if she could call her dog off. Then I baked some banana muffins because the boiler was being serviced the next day and I can't have the boiler chap around and not give him cake.
26 January
There was excitement in the morning when both Erica and Bertie went for a drive (and all perfectly legally, even though Bertie was untaxed). I think I'll tell that tale in a separate post.
By late afternoon the temperature had risen above freezing and rain had washed much of the snow away, so I nipped out for a little jogette, splashing my way through slushy snow and getting cold wet feet almost as soon as I'd set off.
28 January
It had rained quite a bit overnight, but even so it was unexpected to find part of that morning's running route cut off by a deep flood. I've never seen that area flooded before and it wasn't apparent to me how it had come about. I'd run speed reps along this road the day before, and there'd been no hint of a drainage issue then.
29 January
We'll finish the month (because I didn't take any photos on 30th or 31st) with the contents of another good £1.50 veg box!
I'm envious of those veg. boxes (and the muffins and crumpets). I'm fed up with on-line supermarket shopping. I keep getting confused with quantities end end up with huge packs of things and last time I ordered 6 x 6times bottles of fizzy water but had made a mistake receiving still water. I sent them back. What a catalogue of weather for you - much worse than here I think, but we have had similar quantities of mud.
ReplyDeleteThe crumpets have been a bit hit and miss, with the problem being that I don't know what causes the 'miss' occasions. More practise* required!
DeleteMick's brother did some online shopping for his mum last spring/summer and on her first shop there was a confusion with the bananas, resulting in her receiving five bags of bananas, rather than five individual fruit. She didn't know she could hand unwanted items back, so her neighbours got some fruity gifts that week. I nearly got caught out in the other direction when doing an online shop for my sister and almost bought her the tiniest pizza ever seen, because, of course, they all look the same size on the illustrations.
I've very much enjoyed the last week of dry weather and the last few days of sunshine. For the time being, the tow-path has become passable again, although other areas are still decidedly muddy still.
(*I put a great deal of thought as to whether that's a noun or a verb in this context and thus whether it should be an s or a c. Had a discussion with Mick on the subject too. Still unconvinced this is right. Perhaps I should have said 'need to practise more'.)