January – Month 12

This is a very important entry of two halves. First of all this month’s achievements which I have to say, feel like a bit of a barrel scrape and, as it’s month 12 (how did that even happen?) ‘The Audit’.

This month
On January 1^st I took up two, one a day ‘new’ activities. Inspired by Annie Wilcox I bought A Cloud A Day and every morning, with breakfast, I read about a cloud.

This then inspired me to go back to something I failed to complete a couple of years ago – Clemency Burton-Hill’s book A Year of Wonder.

In it she writes about a piece of classical music for every day of the year and someone has usefully put together a Spotify playlist to go with it. It’s another breakfast activity, and a real joy. If a particular piece of music is not a joy – because not all of it is – Clemmie makes it one with her writing. I’d like to add a gentle acknowledgement to two friends Sue and Fiona who are also listening, and with whom I have an, albeit brief, exchange of opinion on what we’re listening to. Winter lockdown isn’t tremendous fun and this fleeting daily contact is just lovely.

I decided that I should post here, my favourite piece of music and my favourite cloud from the month. Here they are:

An aside – If you don’t know anything about Clemency Burton-Hill, look her up on Wikipedia and listen to her recent Women’s Hour interview. She’s amazing.

Staying with the music theme, I have to report that MATTHEW HAS NOT SENT A CD THIS MONTH. There you have it. I paid too. Now laugh! I’ve forgiven him and he says that one is on the way. He asked me to rank the music I’ve received over the last 12 months. You’ll notice that there are 12 EVEN THOUGH I HAVEN’T RECEIVED ONE THIS MONTH. That’s because I’ve included Bruce and put him first because that’s where he belongs.

Birds! I went for a walk and heard, as well as saw, a woodpecker. Can you:

I almost took part in the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch.  I say almost because it turns out that I did it wrong because you’re supposed to count number of birds not just the type.  So, for my readers only, I saw blackbirds, jackdaws, sparrows, blue tits, robins, thrushes, and pigeons.  That’s it.  I was very disappointed that the tiny wren who dances around the garden from time to time didn’t make an appearance.

The canal. No walks this month as we couldn’t get to the starting point without an unofficial drive. I did, however, find out that there’s a map of the canal and I’m using it to highlight the walk. You can see how much has been achieved. The orange sections are those where we’ve had to walk ‘there and back’ because of lack of transport. It’s a great map – all 167 bridges have names!

A couple of recipes – lentils cooked in coconut milk. More than edible but ‘presentationally’ dull…

and something called Hoppin’ John cooked to use up a lot of spring greens delivered in the veg box! Unexpectedly delicious.

Books – The two bookclub books this month couldn’t be more different. The Wall by John Lanchester, a dystopian novel which describes a scary Britain protecting its borders after a climate change catastrophe, and The Wintering by Katherine May, a book about preparing for the ‘down times’ in life. I thought I wouldn’t like this at all but I absolutely loved it. Maybe because of the times? I liked The Wall too, but it I suspect it wouldn’t be everyone’s cup of tea.

This month’s donation went to the Abergavenny Food Bank.

THE AUDIT
It’s happening. In a few days time I’m going to be 70. Instead of ‘celebrating in style’, at least the style I’d hope to have planned, it will be champagne with Pavel at home. Maybe I’ll get dressed and put on shoes and if so, I shall wear make up.

This blog and the tasks/challenges I set myself were all about having a bit of fun because of my birthday.  Yes, I’ve had a bit of fun, but not exactly the fun expected!

70 tasks.  Without going into detail they break down as:

47 completed

13 pandemically failed to complete

 9 actually failed to complete and

 1 was not allowed to complete

What I’ve really delighted in are the readers who’ve said ‘oo why don’t you do this? Or you’ve inspired me to do this!’ And things like last month when I mentioned decorations from the Sacramento Street Christmas shop in San Francisco when Yvonne undressed her tree and sent me a photo of all the decorations she bought there, with the comment, ‘I can’t toss (them), it was a hell of an era.’ So then I emailed Christine, my flat mate from above the Christmas shop and we had a little reminisce.

I’ve wondered about carrying on with the blog and the tasks, and I’ve decided that I’m going to. Until all 70 things are ticked off. I’m nothing if not obsessive. What’s the point of having a list otherwise? As I add the pandemically inspired ‘extras’, who knows, there may end up being 80 or more tasks and…. well, you can see where I’m going with this!

There may not be a monthly update but there will be updates.  If you’ve read this far you’re on my mailing list.  Do let me know if you want to be deleted – I won’t mind at all. But thank you for staying the course this time around!