By Slanted Light

Hello from the other side of the world - I made it! *g*

I left with the sunrise on Saturday morning...


Boarded an aeroplane, and went flying...


Next thing I knew, I looked down - and we were flying over Greenland, which was amazing! The gorgeous coast, and then a land scoured by glaciers - and "scoured by glaciers" made absolute sense from this angle...


Stopped in Seattle...


...saw a copper-gold half-moon, and a distant aurora borealis from the plane windows, landed, found my way to the hostel, and then the next day...

I was in proper autumn!

And now it's evening, and I must to bed...

The clocks went back last night, and I had my covid booster yesterday, so I'm feeling a bit dazed with the world so far today. Solution? Post to lj! *g* I actually went to bed early (for me - just before midnight), so it rather threw me to wake up at 5.45am-ish, having actually had nearly seven hours sleep (again, that's my normal - in fact pretty good for me!), but not feeling quite ready to get up yet, so I didn't... and when I did it was still before 7am!!

I had my jab around 2.30pm yesterday, and my arm didn't even start aching until not long before I went to bed - but then I couldn't sleep on my left side all night! *headdesk* I think the ache is fading now. I have a slight headache (barely counts as a headache, but there) and feel a bit drippy, but that could be me rather than the shot... *g* Well, it's probably the shot, but it's also Sunday, so I can roll with it. *g*

Here's the last day of the year when sunset was around 6pm...


It is looking a bit autumn-y in the village... *g* Yesterday was ridiculous though - when I finally got up (after working until about 4am *headdesk*) I'd missed half a day that was warm, with an amazing balmy breeze - my favourite kind of day! It's cooler today, but still not October-cold. Absolutely no need to put the heating on yet...

Some pics from the day before (the first one's for tinturtle - green fields *g*):

Okay, clearly those trees are doing the autumn thing...!

And finally - a very fun surprise when I finally sorted out how to hang the big mirror my last landlady gave me. It only had a hook to hang it vertically, and I wanted it horizontal, so I was peeling back the tape to see what the wood was like for attaching things to, and... How cool is that?! I have a film-star mirror! I can't at all work out what the other bits of writing mean, but I'd like to think it was hints to the film it had been in. *g* That middle word that's a bit cut off just before "Sold" looks like "THARAT"...

And now I'm feeling a bit droopy as well as drippy, so I think I'm going to take a break from sitting upright!

How are you doing? *g*

This is getting silly - I posted a single meme in October, and otherwise nothing since my aborted September posts. So I'm going to give it another go, because I like posting to lj, and giving it another go is what I do... *g*

First of all - how is everyone? Are you still out there at all? Hello...? *g*

September ended in the most fab way, with a long weekend in London that I was determined to post about (and didn't...). As soon as October hit, everything just went to pot! It was busy workwise, as I tried to squeeze in as much Job 1 as I could (for which I get paid weekly) before shifting to Job 2 for 6-7 weeks (for which I get paid at the end of months). And it seemed like everything local kicked in then as well - book club, history society, my flu jab... and then Job 2 itself. But happily also nice things, like meeting up with f_m_parkinson and chatting Pros for most of a day - how lush is that?! So that's my excuse for neglecting lj and everyone here for so long - sorry!

Here is the very end of October, the 31st, when I decided that things had to change! I was asked at the very last minute to go around the village and judge the scarecrow competition, as I did last year, and much as I would have loved to do it, and see all the displays, I remembered that it took way longer than expected last year, so I was good and reluctantly said I couldn't. And that was partly because of Job 2 busy-ness, and partly because I've been aching to get out into the fields again, which I haven't for ages, and just walk quietly and peacefully up and down for an hour or so, breathing air touched by sunshine, and not doing anything else - except digging for the occasional potential-treasure. *g* And my first decent signal was just where the field had called me to, and was a coin. *g* I could only make out a "G" on it, because it's very degraded, so it could be anything from George III to William (Guillame) (late 1700s/1800s) - but it was a coin, not just a random piece of old metal. *g*

And then it was yesterday - November - and especially with the clocks having gone back, I made sure to get out into the daylight and see some sunshine. I walked down to my favourite field, though no time for detecting, and looked back over the farm to the village, which was being very picturesque under the autumn blue sky.

...and back past autumn hedges and a sun explosion just before sunset...

And now I must get on with Job 2 again... but there's sunshine again today, and I will go for a walk again!

A bit like late summer around here...

I'm a day late now - this was yesterday! Tuesday, that is. *g* And I'm getting a kind of Christmas-y vibe from these two pics, for which I do apologise (since we've not had bonfire night yet...), it wasn't intentional! I think it's all that white paint looking like snow... It was the first time since covid that I went and sat in a pub - socially distanced, with a long hall open to the outside at either end and open doors leading off to the room we were in, but still - an enclosed space with people I didn't know! I thought about wearing my mask at first, but obviously you can't do that and drink coffee and talk effectively, so... well, it would be really really unlucky if I went into somewhere once and caught it then, right?

Anyway, the occasion was meeting up with LW, who I knew way way back when at Manchester Uni, when we started up Warped - the University of Manchester Science Fiction and Fantasy Society! And the cool thing about that? It's still going! Thirty-five years later (we counted - and gulped), our SF/F society is still going. *g* I think it might be the most long... longev... longevitous thing I've done in my life. You know - it lasted a long time. *g*

It was very cool to meet up with LW again (thank you for hooking us up, helenraven!) - I swear she looked the same, very much still her, and a couple of hours passed pretty quickly, catching up all those thirty-five (thirty-five!) years. She lives not too far away, and hopefully when all this covid stuff is sorted out we'll get together again. Amongst other things there's some metal detecting to be done at her place too... *g*

(In a bizarre twist, LW is a science fiction author, and I ordered one of her books from the local Waterstones a week or so ago, after a rec from Helen Raven. I phoned on Tuesday morning to see if it was in/expected/what's going on with book orders in lockdown, to be told that the distributor didn't have it in stock after all, and they couldn't say when it would be back again. Sigh, but okay... Only this morning (Wednesday) I had an email from Waterstones saying the book I'd ordered had arrived and I could go and pick it up at the branch. What?! How can it be out of stock and simultaneously being sent to the branch...? Did they send it and then report to me that it was out of stock cos actually I'd ordered the last one, so it wasn't there any more?! Anyway - at least I can read one of her books now! *g*)

Didn't I say I was going to post pics for October? And yet I went and automatically took some today, so... *g*

It's been a much more useful day too, so that was good. I ticked everything off yesterday's list, all ready to make a new list for tomorrow. Skyped with my brother's family first thing too - it's their first weekend out of lockdown (only 61 cases in Melbourne now) and W's birthday, and the Aussie equivalent of a Baker day at school (whatever they're called now - not Inset Days any more either, not teacher training... I do know...!) and it's Melbourne Cup Race Day on Tuesday, so it's a looo-ong first weekend out of lockdown for them too! And good weather forecast.

Meanwhile, here on the grim side of the world... last night I listened to owls that I could hear through my bathroom vent, and this morning I listened to birds through it. This evening I nipped out to measure something in the shed, and a bat swooped down.

Carpark leaves are still doing their thing.

But there's definitely a more wintry vibe around too!

Brilliant berries against the stone... ...and the village starting to look cosy as night began to settle itself in...

Oh yeah - and I was writing my nephew a birthday letter, when I realised that instead of writing "and wash our hands alot" I'd written "and wash our lads alot"... Now was that the autocorrect trying to perk me up a bit, or am I trying to tell me something...? *g*

The worst thing about Job 2 is that it doesn't come with weekends - it's just one long slog until it's done. And this time it's followed immediately by Job 2.5, which is the same. It's going to be December before I get a weekend again - waah!

In the meantime, I went for a walk slightly earlier today - it was still light!

Farmcat. Autumn farmcat. And I have no idea what the second pic is, but I kind of like it!

Kitchen sink view...

Halloween village

Big winter sky

Today was a bit of an odd one - I was waiting for the Job 2 go-ahead, which didn't arrive, so sort of filling in time trying to be useful, but not feeling as if I was accomplishing much. So I went out to find a place I've been meaning to find for ages - a local wood, apparently centred around a dozen round barrows (I thought there was only supposed to be one - going to have to go back and find them all now. A dozen - wow!) there's a standing stone on top of one of the mounds, though that's probably 17th century. And the Fosse Way, a Roman road, runs straight along the edge of the wood (and was what I drove on to get there). Nice idea, but I could hear all the cars whizzing by as I wandered the wood, so probably more atmospheric back in actual Roman times! Of course you can see Glastonbury Tor from the edge of the woods. *g*



No berries on the holly here, which surprised me after that amazing bush the other week.

This last pic is from when I was out foodsaving later - Halloween has come to the village! *g*

Things picked up after the walk too - I finally remembered to drop off a tool that my movers had left, weeks ago, then I headed for the DIY store and bought some loft boards and some bits of wood to lift them off the insulation, and nipped into the supermarket next door too. Home, got the ladder out, and hefted the boards up. Turned out there was only one patch without wires laid all around, so I could only use one of the two boards I'd bought, but I got that set up, and then piled on the boxes from packing that I'd been storing in my car, and also my Christmas boxes (it's not time yet, no matter what the shops have got out! Not that I haven't been musing on a certain Pros challenge and card exchange and things like that... *g*)

Then it was dinner, and off out foodsaving - and I came home to find my Yuletide assignment in my inbox (that's going to be interesting... *g*) and also Job 2 had got back to me at last! So a couple of tasks there, and now I'm all set to carry on with it tomorrow after all.

So - it was sort of one of those days that went from nothing to lots of quite good somethings! Hope you had a happy Monday!

Wet outside today, but I was back in meetings, so didn't mind too much!

We finished early enough for me to nip out before dark though - last time for a few months too, as the clocks go back tonight.

Had a wee wander around Frome (and might have stepped into the stationery shop... *g*), then grabbed a couple of essentials, and home again. And now it's that time of day again... Goodnight!