Sunny.

Beautifully sunny and warm today. Out on the cliff the edge of the grass is sprinkled with daisies.

Every day there's more sun in the front garden and on a day like today it was a real pleasure to be working out in the garden. I finished thinning out the hedge at the end and also went out to the street to trim the hedge from that side. It wouldn't be nice for a passer-by to be poked in the eye by a twig or slapped by wet branches. Working in the street gives me a chance to chat to our neighbours and although the lady with the dog that bit me made a quick retreat up the street when she saw me I had a good chat with a chap that lives up the road. He was waiting for the postman to empty the post-box opposite as he'd mistakenly posted a letter with an old Christmas stamp that only was a 19p stamp (much less than either of the current rates) and wanted to put an extra stamp on the letter so the recipient didn't have to go and collect the letter from the Post Office and pay an extra £1. The box is supposed to be emptied at 11.00 but the postman was very late today and Rob was planning to go out so was getting worried. Later when I'd finished gardening the postman rang our doorbell with a parcel for us so I asked him 'Have you seen Rob?' which had him and another passing neighbour laughing as she'd just asked him the same thing, as had a number of other neighbours. He had, and the letter was fully stamped and on its way.

Early this morning the Boss builder and two other workers turned up to take down the old chimney. Apparently the cement around the chimney pots was so loose the builder was able to lift them straight off. I'm so glad they are now safely in the back garden. It was quite unnerving working at my pc and hearing the banging and rattling as the brick chimney was dismantled and bits of mortar went rolling down the roof. I've saved all the bricks too as I'm sure they can be used in the garden re-modelling.

Naturally I took myself off for a beach walk in the afternoon. Gone were the more sophisticated subtle shades of grey and instead we had summery blue skies and sunlight sparkling on the sea. It was lovely and warm and I saw a number of people either carrying their jackets or having them tied around their waists. One young lad had his trousers rolled up to his knees and was paddling in the waves.

I often see single shells of this large bivalve but today was the first time I came across a live one. Before we came here I hadn't seen this type of shell but after much hunting on-line I found out that it is an Arctica islandica aka ocean quahog, mahogany/black clam/quahog, an edible clam that is commercially fished.  It certainly felt as though there was a decent amount of protein inside but I left it for the tide to cover up. I used my sunglasses (dark ones today) to give an idea of size. They take 5-8 years to grow to maturity and then are very long lived. One was found to be 507 years old and another 374 years old and are commonly found to be 150 years old. How can you eat something that has taken so long to grow? 

I took lots of photos of the sun on the waves and will post more tomorrow when the forecast is for rain once more.

We were waiting for a different builder to come and cover the chimney hole and re-tile the roof but in the end the morning team came back and did the work. That's one important job done.