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Rained

Finally it’s RAINED, ok rained is probably exaggerating a little, we’ve had drizzle. But it’s a start, we will take it after nearly 7 weeks of complete dryness. Dryness is not a word that you normally associate with Yorkshire. A few days back we walked along this path and it was a dust bowl, usually this walk is only passable with wellie boots. So any dampness is much appreciated.

As we got back to the car park it was time to pay the parking fee. My mind went back to the times when you would desperately ferret about in pockets, in the glove compartment, underneath the seats for enough coins to put into the parking machine, usually falling short by just one coin. That’s all gone now, a swipe of a card or mobile phone does the job now.

Time moves on….

How many years is it now….

As I watched the person in front of me effortlessly use his phone to pay I realised that this would all be an alien world to Hawklad’s Mum, she was definitely in the coin generation. A lot has changed since she left us. If anything it’s not the rising year count that marks the passing time, it’s the changes in the world that is the real defining time marker.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 40 Comments

F1

Last weekend brought our second trip to the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. A wonderful, exciting but crowded day, it was a sell out with 168,000 there on a dry, very warm day…… Last year we had lightning and torrential rain storms……. So walking around in shorts and a T-shirt made a nice change.

Slightly limited photos this year due to my inner Muppet. I did bring my best camera, unfortunately I didn’t bring its battery…. that stayed back in Yorkshire, happily charging in the wall socket. Once again the iPhone came to the rescue.

But I do need to discuss something very weird, very strange, kind of unnerving. The WEATHER. Yorkshire is a wet and windy place. It rains, in winter it really rains, in summer it really rains. We get lots of clouds, clouds permanently live here. But for the last couple of weeks it’s been hot and dry. NO RAIN. And then you get this weather forecast.

Yes it’s getting cooler but where on earth are the clouds. This can’t be, this is Yorkshire. Two days ago I went to buy a watering can. Yes a watering can. My poor plants need water and I have never really needed to water before…. I usually live under clouds in Yorkshire, they do my watering for me. As I walked out with my brand new sparkling green watering can, I bumped into a neighbour, and quoting her exact words….

“… hope you have left me one, I’m off to buy my first ever watering can. This is what it must be like to have proper summers …..”

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 36 Comments

Easter Storm

Easter brought more rain, thankfully some Sun and a Storm. 90mph winds brought some trees, some poor folks lost their roof slates and chimneys. One household in the next village lost a large stone chimney, which crashed down conveniently perfectly between two cars parked 3 ft apart underneath. Not a scratch on either vehicle.

A common sight currently around here is Farmers walking around fields like this, checking just how wet the fields are. Like this Field, very very very WET indeed.

As one of the Farmers said to me, ‘Not Good, Way TOO WET. Over my Boots in places. Ducks have even moved into one of my Fields, I wonder if they are cheaper and easier to keep than Sheep.’

That took me back.

When I was a kid, my Dad decided to build a goldfish pond in the garden. I’m not sure Mum was entirely impressed by the eventual size of the pond, Dad had a tendency to get carried away with his plans. It was a big old pond in what was a not very big garden. Only problem was as soon as Dad had filled it with water, two ducks arrived from out of nowhere and claimed Squatters Rights. On and off, we had those ducks for weeks. These days, I would have shed loads of photos to show you those ducks but not back then. No photos, just faded memories. Thankfully I can still see those Ducks and the Pond, but only after the Farmer reminded me.

But without the aid of ever expanding data clouds filled with digital photos, I wonder just how many memories of my childhood are hidden from view. A few too many I FEAR.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 46 Comments

Drizzle

Another glorious Yorkshire lunchtime…. A local amateur weather station has recorded so far 40 days of consecutive rain. Mostly not the biblical type of rain, often that dreaded Yorkshire Drizzle, blanking out the Sun, nithering, slowly seeping into your bones.

The kind of weather that even Count Dracula clearly thought too grim. In the novel, he arrived in Yorkshire during a storm and quickly scarpered.

But hope shines eternal.

As I walked through the sodden village, a hardy chap wearing about 30 layers of clothing was carefully weeding his soon to be planted flowerbeds. He looked up, smiled (might have been a grimace), and issued the immortal words

“I pigging hate the Yorkshire weather. Why do I keep living here. Lived here for over 70 years. Well, at least it’s perfect weather for my rhubarb. I do love my rhubarb and custard”.

I think it might well be a bumper rhubarb crop this year….

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 37 Comments

Somethings are written in Stone

It’s been hot here, well hot for Yorkshire. Touching 30C for day after day. On top of that, it’s been seriously dry this year. Our area was the first in the country to get a hosepipe ban. Hardly a drop of rain for weeks, the reservoirs are no more than a third full. We do need RAIN.

Some things are just written in Stone…..

Hawklad loves F1 motor racing, so this year he got his first taste of seeing it for real.

The British Grand Prix at Silverstone. 165,000 fans about to get VERY WET.

Even the Drivers getting very wet….

One support race Red Flagged and stopped as the track was too dangerous.

Talk about four seasons in one day. Blazing sunshine, fork lightning, sudden wind storms, torrential rain.

But thankfully there was just enough blazing sunshine and three of the biggest sponges ever…

Hawklad got to see his first live F1 race.

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Storm Farage

A peaceful walk in a Forest. But it’s not always this peaceful. It took the Forest Rangers quite a while to deal with the aftermath of the last storm which hit the area a few months back. Lots of tree damage still evident.

In the UK there is a new word hitting the dictionaries. One which has several meanings. The word is FARAGE. Often found in the phrase ‘Nigel FARAGE is a …..’

FARAGE can mean to some – a wise and gifted political orator who is a man of the people.

But FARAGE can also mean ….

a Charlatan…

a Dangerous Opportunist…

someone who feathers his own best…

someone who tells others it’s wrong to be a part of Europe, has denied the right of his countryfolk to have free access to Europe yet keeps his own European Passport, enjoys unlimited access to Europe for himself .

someone who screams immigration is bad/foreigners are taking all our jobs, filling our schools and hospitals, YET is married to a French Woman

someone who bemoans Europe for how it’s wastes taxpayers money yet then keeps his lucrative European provided pension for life…

someone who is a fascist…

someone who is a racist…

someone who is a right f#@### w#@@#£#

The word FARAGE can also been a family commitment. Hawklad is one of those souls who struggles to find fault in others. Yet with Nigel FARAGE he gets very frustrated, very angry. ‘How can people vote for him, how can they not see through him…’

Once the idea of FARAGE being our Prime Minister seemed like a joke, but then we did get Johnson and Truss. Sadly now his party are increasingly winning local election seats. Unbelievably it could just happen. He could be in charge in a few years time.

That thought horrifies Hawklad. My thoughts are unprintable… Hawklad has made me agree (I didn’t take much convincing) that if that disaster ever happens, then WE will seek to leave the UK. See if we can move to say Ireland or France or Germany or Switzerland or Canada or somewhere that will have us.

All because of a nasty storm called FARAGE.

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Swan Lake

Whisper it, a few days of nice weather in Yorkshire, we can do it…

A bit of Sun brings out the hooligans.

This Swan is a bruiser.

Swims about on the lake until it sees someone he or she doesn’t like and then…. races out of the water to stand on the narrow lakeside path. That’s it, wings spread, puffed out chest and the path is closed. As we were walking towards the danger zone, we passed a couple heading back saying an aggressive Swan had forced them into a hasty retreat. As we passed we got a good staring at, but were granted a pass. The walker following us was not so lucky and after a brief standoff, the swan won….

Wonder why some people are allowed through and others are chased off. It’s not a nesting thing, as the nest is on the other end of the lake, and apparently the Swan is never aggressive there.

Bizarre old bird. Definitely swan of a kind….

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Stones

We are so blessed to live on the edge of The Moors. Close enough that just 30 minutes after Hawklad’s last lesson of the afternoon we can be here…

The Bridestones…..

The name is likely to come from the Norse Brinkstones, stones on the edge.

Natural sandstone sculptures formed through an Ice Age and shed loads of Yorkshire Weather….

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 18 Comments

Not raining

Scarborough and unbelievably it’s NOT RAINING.

With one finger briefly dipped into the water I can confirm that the North Sea is absolutely frigid at this time of year….

That was Thursday, Friday was way more misty. Perfect weather to visit the cinema, or as my Mum would have called it, THE PICTURES. Dear Mum, when she was young she loved going to The Pictures but then life happened and she stopped going. For many Decades….

She did go one more time to see The Horse Whisperer. She was rooted to her chair as the credits finished rolling, a little disturbed to discover that the modern Pictures experience doesn’t include a PATHE News bulletin and the singing of the National Anthem. I’m also not sure what Mum would have made of the movie we saw on Friday, the new Bob Dylan biopic. A Fantastic movie but maybe wouldn’t have quite been mum’s musical cup of tea. However we loved it and Hawklad shared a thought while watching Timothee Chalamet hauntingly accurate portrayal of Dylan. Thinking of Dylan performing back in 1961 (even before I was born….) and then realising 63 years later, Hawklad got to see him play live just a few months back. Had to agree with him, that is mind blowing.