Monday 1 June 2020

The Dawn Chorus

The Dawn Chorus is loud. It is also very early. I don’t know the exact earliness (it obviously varies depending upon the Dawn). I didn’t (couldn’t) get my phone out to check the time but it was early. Too early. Early as in ‘I’ve just gone to bed, closed my eyes and here’s the Dawn Chorus’ early.

After getting up (after being awoken by the Dawn Chorus – not that I’m bitter) we went to the Chandlery. This is going to be a regular occurrence due to it being a small food shop as well. We were greeted by good news – the Whilton Marina Cafe, which is just next door will open for takeaways this coming Saturday – yay!

Today is my first workday – post retirement but not really. Working remotely, everything is working. It is a beautiful day once again. We have the louvre windows open to extract a breeze where we can (I love the louvre windows). In the background, the droning sound turns out to be Silverstone and not a bluebottle (Silverstone race track is not too far from here). Once you realise this, it’s quite comforting in a way).

We’ve Got Mail

A Birthday card from my team arrived. It had a narrowboat on it which was nice. A large Retirement card arrived also. It had a large (too large) picture of me on it, taken at Uffington White Horse last year. A smaller image of me on the back was taken at Dartmouth and Nb Silverdale pre-overplating adorns the inside. These were pulled from my Social Media feeds. I never thought they’d be put to such clever use – thank you Simon.

After work, mu and I went for a walk around the marina. The Buckby Flight Bottom Lock is literally just off the marina basin. Nb Darth Wader was just coming down through 🙂

The evening meal was partaken out of baking tins as our plates were still in the lock-up. We could have walked over there but it was hot and the route is very dusty, due to its crushed hardcore nature. Think of it like going to Glastonbury Festival (a sunny one, not a wet one) but without the music or the Cider bar or the village. We rolled up the stern cover to let in a breeze and a view of the marina – tranquil waters. A duck sat quietly on the end of the pontoon we were moored to. It had found an idyllic spot.

Ah well, here’s until the next Dawn Chorus.

rp – peace and narrowboats