Another grey day. Cold and wet. Last week the weather teased us with some dry days, and strengthening sun. Back to the murk now.
Trying to stay positive, but it's difficult to go out and enjoy the outside when the ground is mud and the air like a cold shower.
Maybe I need to find a tropical garden to visit.
#WatchingMyWorld

Daffodil thinking about blooming. Weather feels warmer and dryer, though it is still pretty muddy underfoot. Feels like spring could be just around the corner.
#WatchingMyWorld

Flowers seen in the garden today:
Witch hazel, clusters of yellow fireworks close knit to the branches.
Hellebore, gently drooping green white bowls, subtle.
Narcissus, a yellow daffodil with three tiny heads for the price of one large head (lots if daffodil spikes forming, this was just the front runner).
#WatchingMyWorld #gardening

The pair of crows I noticed in the tree this morning, replacing the ubiquitous pigeons, are now shouting at a pair of magpies who have turned up and are chattering back at them.
#WatchingMyWorld

Catching the bus for a trip into town. I used to used this bus route when I went to work 20 years ago. BC - before children.
The route has been renumbered and moved a little here and there, but it's still the same. Past county hall, the hospital. Heathley Park, Mary Road, Garland Crescent.
The daffodils on the millennium green still start to bloom in January.
#WatchingMyWorld

Morning at the storm's edge.
The sunrise sky is dark indigo.
The wind is having a tantrum, tossing the rain in all directions, and banging on the windows. Insinuating it's way into all the cracks, whistling and wining.
#WatchingMyWorld

Suddenly there are birds.
The local greenfinches, which has been all I've seen really since I added the second feeder station, hanging out on the sunflower feeders. The bird equivalent of chatting at the water cooler.
A blorb robin, a red flash as he darts to the seeds, then back to his spot on the naked apple tree.
Miscellaneous tits, mainly coal tits today, trying out the new station, dropping down from the favoured perch of the hawthorn tree (tree in size, not a bush).
My eye caught quick movement in the foreground, an itty bitty wren at the pond.
And suddenly sparrows. A fraction of the numbers I used to see in childhood, but a tiny flock, trying out the camellia bush for a perch, testing the seed feeder.
#WatchingMyWorld #birds #UKWildlife

Driving home before dinner time. Fog so thick the world was looming out at us around every corner. Full beam headlights just created a white blanket obscuring the road. And then, as we got close to home it just vanished, leaving behind dreary rain.
As with the snow, it appears that the next village over from us gets more weather than we do here. We are towards the edge of the valley that our nearest city sits within, the next village still uphill from us, so more exposed.
#WatchingMyWorld #weather

Had to wait outside momentarily tonight, and remembered to look up at the stars. I miss seeing them. As a teenager I had an evening hobby several nights a week, and also lived somewhere with less light pollution, so got familiar with the winter night sky. Nowdays I don't look at the night sky enough.
Trees in the way, and time constraints meant I could only pick out Orion, but it was like seeing an old friend.
#WatchingMyWorld #astronomy #stargazing

It's been over a week since I took a walk where I could concentrate on being, not on what I was doing. 10°C, so a lot warmer than the last fortnight's near freezing. Slightly rainy too, so I was grumbling to myself about the nasty weather, until I got to the top of the hill and stopped to watch the view for a while. Suddenly I was transformed into seeing the environment as invigorating and wild, rather than miserable and hostile.
The road passes through a tunnel of trees, the effect of the windbreak was notable. As walking along I swore I saw a stocky dark welsh cob pony standing watching me. As I got closer and the whippy brush moved out of the way, I saw it was a tree, the bottom part dark with rain, and a scar from a long since gone branch being the exact size, shape and height of a forward looking pony head.
#WatchingMyWorld #countryside