First

Three weeks into January already? How did that happen? January always felt like the longest month of the year. Not in 2022 it seems. To be honest, not much has happened. Weather has been mostly wet and when it’s not wet it’s freezing. I forced myself outside one sunny morning and walked up the High Street. The swan family are looking good and hassling people for food.

They’re so big when they walk up to you out of the water! They spend a lot of time preening to look as beautiful as their parents one day. There are seven cygnets in this family.

We’ve visited the allotment most weekends but it’s been too chilly to hang round and too wet to do much, even if we were so inclined. We actually had an excellent snow shower one work-day afternoon; lovely huge flakes and it quickly settled, but 10minutes later it had all disappeared! I’m still working from home and hope I can continue to do so, at least until after my fourth jab which is due in February.

I made a tasty spicy soup, with a Festival squash which had been stored in the polytunnel over Winter. Unfortunately a lot of the pumpkins went mouldy so we put them outside and they’re being eaten by wildlife now. I think I’ll set up a wildlife camera to see who’s enjoying them.

Ivan gave us a couple of yacons that he harvested last year and had stored in his polytunnel. Fellow plotholder, Min, started growing them and shared some growing tubers. The bushy plants have small yellow flowers. It’s an interesting sweet tasting crunchy fruit and it’s very juicy. We have one more saved in the fridge.

I made a Smokey bean stew, with dried Borlotti and runner beans. Two tasty evening meals and enough for a lunch with these blue corn tortilla chips that were included in a hamper we received for Christmas from my nephews.

I’ve literally only left the flat about eight times this year, with two outings to Swindon last week (one for a blood test and one for a clinic appointment 😄) That’s enough excitement for one week so now I have a couple of days off work. We visited the freezing plot yesterday afternoon. Unsurprisingly no-one else was there. We saw three grey squirrels frolicking in the trees and were joined by a very friendly robin near the wildlife plot. We saw a female bullfinch there last week - I must remember to take my big camera, rather than just my phone.

As I walked back to our plot to get the monocular to look at some other birds, I noticed a movement in the hedgerow. Look at this little bank vole! 

He was so unconcerned by me that I’m worried that he may not be long for this world ☹️ So cute and lovely to see. 

I never did get the monocular. It was so cold after watching the vole, for about 20 minutes, that we went home. Look at that sky and the weather says that today is going to be more cloudy!

My first post of the year with an appropriate song by Cold War Kids.