Wintry.

We had a chilly start to the day with pockets of frost in the garden and a distinct nip in the air. It warmed up a bit later on but the low light levels made it feel dismal and damp.

I walked down to the surgery this morning and had two vials of blood taken. The nurse mentioned that the doctor had ordered a large number of tests from thyroid and iron levels to magnesium and vitamins. All good if it helps find out why my hair is thinning. If I don't hear from the surgery first I'm to phone on Monday for the results.

While I was in the waiting room I listened to an older couple chatting in Welsh. I was pleased to find that I understood about half of the words they used but I still couldn't follow what they were saying apart from the fact that as many Welsh conversations go they were chatting about people they used to know. Who had moved where, who had married whom, that sort of thing.

Walking back through the village there are already small signs of Christmas preparations (I discount the supermarkets' efforts to get us thinking of Christmas mood as soon as the summer clothes and toys have left the shelves.) Here the beach shop and next-door café, closed for the past few weeks, have set up their Christmas display including  a large miniature village. On my way a truck loaded with Christmas tree drove past me and on my way home I spotted the village tree lying by the RNLI station. At home I swapped out some peacock feathers in a large jug for branches brought home from the woods to give me more places to hang all those decorations I couldn't help buying. Nothing is going up until December when I shall have fun decorating the sitting room. I suspect I may well be moving away from my minimalist tendencies.

The zoom lesson went okay. Though there were different sets of mutations to remember, some numbers have masculine and feminine forms, some words lose their final consonant if the following word begins with a consonant and so on. No wonder it's taking so long to make progress.

 

It's disco aerobics again this evening, I've spent some time sticking back the crystals that came off my trainers using builders' superglue and I've had to swap out the light-up laces as the battery on one has run out and they're not rechargeable.

I do like before and after pictures so here is the door/gate in its sad state last August and below how it looked yesterday. Next spring I'll finish off all the odd bits of outside painting that need doing and you never know, we might even have a porch by then.