Category: Cloudy.

Northern winds.

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The path down to the bog.

Warmer this morning but with an annoying wind from north but warmer, despite northern winds so why complain 🙂 Also today it took some time before the clouds flew away so that the sun could reach us.

Lots of water in the small creeks.

I met our new neighbours today and can happily tell You it’s a younger couple who loves how quiet it is here. Very easy to talk to as well so that’s a relief 🙂 We met them on our morning walk when they were out walking with their tiny white dog and I shouted to them that Alma most likely would scream as obsessed but that she’s harmless 🙂 🙂 🙂 Yes Alma did shout and pulled the leash but gently greeting their dog and so did Malkolm. I told them that Alma is an escape artist and that they most likely would meet her when they walk out of their home but that she also most likely would run away from them after a sniff or two 🙂 🙂

The path down to the bog.
Lots of water in the small creeks.

They told me that they have chicken and that the rooster crows all the time. No problem said I. I mean roosters do that and I like the sound so that was nothing to be worried about 🙂 They had also already noticed that the wild hogs comes close to their cottage. I didn’t tell them about our wolves though, better to save the exciting things to when they’ve settled 🙂 🙂 🙂 

One really doesn’t want to sink down in that mud 🙂

We walked out to the bog to see if the ground still was frozen enough so that we could walk out to my favourite island but it wasn’t. The ground was frozen all the way to where we’ve just passed the creek and that’s where the sun had reached. If I had had rubber boots I might have been able to go out there but I think it is Alma who chewed through my old ones and I’ve never bothered to buy new ones. The sun slowly started to break through the clouds on our way home but not fully until we’ve had come home, so we’ve spent a lot of time in the garden instead 🙂

I’ve baked some rolls so it is time to have that last cup of tea for the day and then try one of the rolls 🙂

Have a great day!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

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The snow started to fall already yesterday afternoon, just tiny flakes but with time they grew bigger and multiplied as well. I’m not surprised because this always happens after the first crane has arrived 🙂 🙂 🙂 I’m not a fan of it though, I would have preferred it to stay green and nice. The weather sites seems to agree that this is the last snow for this time and from Thursday and eight days into the future we’ll have cold nights but fairly warm and sunny days, none of us will believe that’ll happen until it does 🙂 🙂 🙂

The wind today is a bit nasty so we had our morning walk in the forest where it couldn’t reach us. All birds were quiet, even the jays and ravens seems to have thought this weather was just too much 🙂 Yes I admit that it does look pretty with snow everywhere but it is enough to see it in photos and post cards 🙂 Back in the days warm weather like we had just a day ago was quite unusual in March. March was sort of the last winter month and April could go either way. Just around 21 years ago we still had winter the first of May when I opened my garden centre. It was so cold that I couldn’t bring out any spring flowers.

Now days it’s rather unusual to have winter at all in April, the only exception in recent years was last April when I brought home Malkolm, we had had spring temperatures for quite some time when easter came and Malkolm as well plus a snowstorm we haven’t had in years 🙂 🙂 🙂 40cm (16 inches) of snow here but not far away they had 90cm (36 inches) during one day 🙂 🙂 🙂  I don’t miss the old winters but they were more predictable. Winter now days seems to be shorter but more intense when they come.

Since the wind can’t reach my garden I thought it would be a good idea to let the monster kitten meet snow for the first time 🙂 Well I would be lying if I said I think she likes it 🙂 🙂 🙂 She just stood still looking at all this white garbage on the ground and falling from the sky. So I brought her to the apple tree where she was the last time she was outside with the rest of us, she didn’t like that either and suddenly she started to shiver so I put her inside my jacket and brought her inside again. I think I honestly can say that there’s at the moment no risk she freely would go outside again until the snow is gone 🙂 🙂 🙂

Spring flowers are thankfully used to setbacks in the weather but I was surprised to see this spring iris in bloom now.

It is time for a pot of tea and perhaps read a book or see if they show any interesting re-run on tv. I can also take a nap even though last night was the first night in some time that I slept really well.

Have a great day!

Roaring winds all night.

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A Hazel in bloom, lost of allergic people now have problems.

I didn’t get a good night sleep last night, I was woken up several times by the roaring in the trees, still no wind in my garden though since all wind hit my neighbours cottage and garage 🙂  Much less wind when we finally could go out for our morning walk. From what I could see al the trees had managed to still stand up.

I went to the grocery store yesterday morning and left both dogs in the dog yard and the evening before Malkolm and I slept without being leashed during the night. Malcolm’s injection seems to have kicked in rather well and Nova is just not interested any more. Since a similar thing happened back in the days and My Erna later had puppies I know nothing happened during the time I was away 🙂

The reason I eventually decided to bring the dogs was because the last time I drove, before the cold hit me my car started to beep every time I drove in a steep up hill road. Didn’t tell me why though, it just beeped until it was less steep for flat ground I was driving on. Really annoying and I think it is a French car thing 🙂 🙂 🙂 It wasn’t too hard to figure out what it was though since it only happened when driving uphill. It must be a fluid and I can only think of three ones. Either it’s for the brakes but then it would have warned as soon as the car started, or it must be the motor oil but the level was good there as well.

So it could only be the coolant level. There’s never any problem seeing the level in a new car but more tricky in an older. So I poured in some more just before driving to the grocery store. No more beeping 🙂 I didn’t have to fill especially much at all so I mostly felt annoyed when I had to 🙂 🙂 🙂 Back in the days we only had a blue coolant but now days we have red ones as well and I have no idea if they work together or not 🙂 🙂 I don’t think the blue and red mix together but what about the different brands in either colour? What actually happens if mixing the wrong kinds together? I need to ask that next time I’ll have to go to the garage!

It is time for that last cup of tea and I bought bananas yesterday so I might have one of those as well. Too green yet for my taste, I don’t mind if they have brown spots.

The Croci show everywhere now.
It looks like all three Camellias have survived the winter but spring is the big killer here so it’s too early to say yippie yet.
Many years of dogs running along the hedge shows now 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

The vet visit.

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The photos will be a mix taken these last days.

I had set the alarm today because we were going to the vet this morning. Malkolm would get the chemical neutering and Sara the real surgery. We were all up long before the alarm started so we even could go back to bed and just wait for it to start :-)Well I couldn’t leave Alma at home because I like try little cottage and the little I have here in my home. I couldn’t leave her in the dog yard because this is not the time to renovate it, too cold to even try to dig down net in the ground 🙂 🙂 🙂 So she came along as well.

Alma hates car rides but jumped in to the car, Malkolm loves car rides but refused to put his paws in the car at all 🙂 So it was a bit tricky to even lave the village 🙂 🙂 I didn’t have to scrape any ice from the car even though it was well below freezing point so I took that as a good omen 🙂 The ride to the vet was unusually calm, Alma only whined a little and managed to tie her and Malkolm together with the seat belts. She calmed down even more when she could put her nose outside the car on both sides, the inside of the car went a bit chilly but it was worth it 🙂 🙂

We could course not bring Alma when it was time to insert the chemical neutering in Malkolm so she had to stay in the office. The vet said this will hurt and he must be absolutely still so he called the ones working there. The syringe was pretty big so I held  Malkolm firmly and so did two employees as well. That when we all heard Alma shouting her lungs out so I said For heavens sake You didn’t leave her alone there because nothing will remain 🙂 🙂 🙂  but there was one person still there to keep her as calm as she could 🙂 🙂 🙂 Turns out Malkolm didn’t feel a thing and was so happy when three people hugged him so much 🙂 🙂 🙂

I had to go back and pick up Sara before lunch and she was not a happy camper but I doubt that she actually managed to notice that we were going back home again. They checked her ears and it turns out she had ear mange so we went to the pharmacy on our way home. Almost the first thing she did was to tear off the cone of shame but I managed to make it a bit more tight but still let hear breathe so I hope it stays on at least during the night, she’s supposed to have it for ten days but that’ll never happen 🙂 🙂 🙂 The toughest job will be to keep the dogs away so they don’t clean the area where the surgery took place. I won’t argue with her if the cone at least stays for four days 🙂

It is time for that last cup of tea for the day and hope there will be something interesting on tv. I doubt that though 🙂 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

We even had sunshine today :-)

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Not an eating day in any way but suddenly the sun started to shine!! It wasn’t supposed to show itself until it was about to set but it arrived pretty early instead. We are supposed to have sunshine all day tomorrow but I’ll believe it if it happens 🙂

Nothing much new about the shooting yesterday, at least 11 dead but some are so badly injured that it might end with more dead. The suspect shooter is said to be a 35 year old man born in Sweden and so are his parents, so at least the far right can’t attack immigrants. He’s a loner and it is said by a relative to him, which we can’t trust since he said it anonymously, he was supposed to have problems with his mental health. The suspect did kill himself.

They haven’t even identified all the dead yet, which is a bit odd but that can indicate that they mostly were immigrants. Normally I doubt it would take especially long for us who has grown up here to be identified since even our phones would help to do that, I think we might be one of the most digitalised people in the world, most of us don’t even use money now, I don’t and haven’t since many years ago, but just one look in my wallet or phone they would identify me in seconds 🙂

I’ve never seen a Beard lichen this big down here in southern Sweden, they grow slow so it must be really old.

Birds or mice have found their way in to the squash and eaten almost all seeds.

Well here in the village at the outskirts of the world it’s calm and quiet as usual. My neighbour were outside when the sun arrived so we had a little chat and the dogs jumped over the fence and played with the children. After that I made some rose-hip soup and now I’ll have a sandwich or two with cheese. No tea today, I had a cup way to late yesterday so I had to go up in the middle of the night to visit the bathroom 🙂

Have a great day!

School shooting.

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So the photos today were taken yesterday, no snow left today.

 

I can finally walk stairs without wanting to cry and wonder if it wouldn’t be better to jut end it all 🙂 🙂 🙂  Now however the coughing is a bit worse, then again I’m not freezing as much so I think I’m half way through this now. 

I heard a bout a school shooting on the tv today and of course I felt sad for You Americans, not only do You have the fat orange as a leader (or isn’t it really the South African nazi?) You have these shootings as well. To my very big surprise it wasn’t in the US, it was here and not especially far from where I live!! (a couple of counties north). The information is still rather fuzzy but it is not small children but I think something like Community college. Grown ups who either trying to get higher grades, repeating highschool to get the grades they need and so on. Still that doesn’t matter but it isn’t small kids that have been shot.

The latest I’ve found out is that ten people has been killed and there are injured people as well. The shooter is a 35 year old man (with a weapons license) with no criminal record and so far we have no info about any motive. We’ve gotten used to drug gangs shooting each other or blowing up doors but this school shooting doesn’t seem to have anything to do with gangs, gangs tend to do that in the big cities and their suburbs.

So this was a nasty wakeup call for us. We do have rather hard weapon laws but I guess they’ll need to make them even harder now. If one has a weapon one really should have to be checked about the mental health, this man can’t be mentally healthy if doing something like this. 

It is time to have that last cup of tea and then check the news again, if they’ve found a motive.

I wish You all a good and safe day!

The flu.

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So I have the flu or something very similar, every single fiber  in my body has been aching, especially in my thighs and it really hurts while walking in stairs 🙂 🙂 Not so great when the computer and bedroom is upstairs 🙂 🙂 It still would most likely hurt really bad but I’m putting on anti inflammatory ointment and it helps enough so that I can hav walks with the dogs and get to the bedroom without wondering if it wouldn’t be better to just sleep in my sofas 🙂 🙂

To be honest it also helped a lot by walking the dogs, terrible in the beginning, got easier the more we walked and it felt almost normal when we arrived back home again. However an hour or so later it felt worse than before 🙂 🙂 🙂 I’m freezing like a doge every no and again, not especially sour in my throat but almost no coughing, so far that is. So this could have been far worse to be honest.

Between walks very little has been done though, lots of resting and tea drinking and watching tv programs I haven’t enjoyed and I’ve also read a lot. I only wish I’ve had some rose-hip soup at home so I’ll make sure to buy some next time I’ll go to the store. Warm rose-hip soup with tiny almond biscuits/cookies (when asking google about the name it suggested almond macaroons but to be honest I don’t think that fits at all) they’re only 1cm (two fifths on an inch) big and not in two pieces as macaroons always seems to be. They more or less only works with rose-hip soup or as a sort of snack to be honest 🙂

Yesterday we had a nice thick fog almost all day and today we’ve had a grey and dull weather bit with frost instead. We were supposed to have fairly much snow but only had a dusting and that’s just enough. Still a long time till spring but I don’t mind if it comes early and I really don’t want a snowstorm like we had last April, the snow melted away after a week and then spring sprung but I still didn’t like it even though it happened when Malkolm just had arrived and I was forced to have a week of vacation since I couldn’t leave a puppy in the dog house/ yard in there while I was working.

I think it is time for that last cup of tea for the day and then find that book again. I think I finally have found a way to move the photos from the editing program to the blog, I’m crossing my fingers and holding my thumbs for good luck 🙂

Have a great day!

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Nothing happened here the previous two days so I really had nothing to write about. We had some snow, it melted away, then we had some rain and today we finally had some fog. Only one problem, I missed most of it.

I was just going to apply to a couple of job ads, no big to be honest. The little problem I had was that no matter what kind of document I tried to save it in no site excepted it, not even as a pdf?! I was trying well over an hour seeing how the fog became weaker and weaker. I was so desperate that I finally called one of the bigger companies telling what I had tried and all versions Id tried as well. They were really confused because all versions I’d tried were accepted.

Then they asked me what browser I used and I said Safari and they said oh 🙂 🙂 🙂 Do it via Google Chrome and it’ll work. So then I needed to find chrome in my computer which the computer said I would have and showed what keys I should press to get there. The problem is that I have a keyboard for pc but adapted to Mac, so those hints didn’t help much 🙂 🙂 🙂  So I had to download it from the net instead 🙂 🙂 🙂 Another fun thing that happened was that My keyboard then changed from a Swedish keyboard to a British English one. So suddenly three of the letters in our alphabet suddenly didn’t work 🙂 🙂 🙂 That one was easy to fix though 🙂 🙂

Well all is fine in the end besides that I missed the best fog 🙂 Alma was nothing but good the first two hundred meters (no big difference in yards) but  then she finally calmed down and we did have a nice walk in the end. I heard one bid sing the entire time and oddly enough it was a spring song. Even though this bird starts earlier than the others it still should wait until late February. I must say it did sound so wonderful hearing it though even if I know spring still is far away for us up here in the north. It is time for that last cup of tea and after that I’ll most likely read a book 🙂

Have a great day!

More snow to melt away.

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it was just grey and dull when we went out on our morning walk and from that it went downhill. First some lighter snow with tiny snow flies that couldn’t be seen when they landed on the ground, then rather big and lots  of them that really showed on the ground and then it started to rain. Still lots of snow on the ground but hopefully those slightly higher temperatures they’ve been talking about will arrive as they’re guessing.

I can never capture this old tree trunk properly but I still keep on trying 🙂

Canada geese, many of them refuse to leave when the nasty weather comes.

Besides that very little has happened, the most exiting being that the dogs and I had pancakes for lunch 🙂 The dogs are bored but every time they go outside they want to go inside again. So we have most been indoors being inactive watching tv or napping. The monster cat was active for a while though, one could think that if she tries to do a thing on and on again and fail she finally would understand that it won’t work next time either. I don’t know how many times she failed to pass an orchid by the windows and both she and the poor plant have fallen down to the floor 🙂 🙂

I guess it is time for that last cup of tea for the day but today I’ll try and stay awake since it’s a weekly science program I want to watch, they re-run it several time but for some reason I’ll still miss it if I don’t watch it the first time they show it 🙂

Have a great day!

There’s always a way.

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Computers are great to have, computers can be really fun but computers that behaves like they want to is a really big pain in the a..e 🙂 🙂 Well it isn’t the computer but the photo editing program. I really don’t want to do anything but reduce the size both in pixel size and MB size but it refuses to do the latter. I’ve figured out a way to go around this problem but it takes so much longer time.

I have a slight problem with what photos I post because the icons are so small and I can’t find anywhere to make them bigger in this folder so I can only hope I put in the better ones 🙂 🙂 🙂

Well life could be worse and I do have lots of time now days. Still really annoying. The hunters should have been here today but so far no one has arrived, so we had a walk in the forest and down to the creek. I figured that if they would come we still most likely already had come down to the creek and soon out of their way anyway. A bit windy but much calmer than the previous days.

I haven’t been totally idle today though, I did some laundry for instance. Now that doesn’t sound like a lot of work but I have a sort of manual washing machine. My bathroom is so small that I can’t fit in a normal sized one but since I’m not a big fan of washing laundry by hand I bought one that fits in a caravan. That means that I need to fill up water for washing and rinsing the laundry, no big deal, what is a bit annoying is that when the clothes are going to be centrifuged I need to move it to the built in centrifuge and load it by hand so that it is in balance, if I fail it’ll sound as if the centrifuge is on its way to fly out the cottage all by itself 🙂 🙂  I’ve had it like this for rather many years now so I’ve learned how to do it but still 🙂 🙂

I’ve also baked some French rolls, how much can one change the recipe without having to change the name? 🙂 🙂 I almost always use different flour and sometimes I have cheese in it as well. Turned out really well this time. A warm roll with melting cheese on it is hard to beat 🙂 Tomorrow I’ll keep on doing some laundry, I’m a bit behind, and after that the dogs and I will have pancakes for dinner, I’ve just bought a Black berry jam just for that 🙂

The beavers are back 🙂

It is time to get that last cup of tea for the day and I’ll most likely fall asleep in the sofa after that 🙂

Have a great day!

Snow and rain.

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Just a short one today, the weather is not nice and hasn’t been all day. Very windy with both rain and snow. It hasn’t at all been as warm as they  guessed yesterday so most snow is still on the ground and it’s impossible to walk outside without getting soaking wet. WE. have been in the garden though but the dogs have just done what they need and then wanted to go back indoors again 🙂

In any photo editor I know of in a PC the original photos that one has placed in a file they stay there no matter what one does with the copies we make to put in social media, that’s not the case in a Mac 🙂 🙂 If I reduce size in the copy the size will also be reduced on the original and if I delete that copy so will the original be deleted as well 🙂 🙂 🙂 So today I learned that I need to make a special file for the originals and place that file outside photos, a bit complicated to be honest 🙂 I’m learning more and more every day now 🙂

Have a great day!

Everything tasted bacon :-)

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I tried to aim on the mouse wearing a head lamp at the same time I took the photo, more tricky than one can think 🙂

No snowfall today but we’ll get rain later tonight instead and it will continue all day tomorrow and it will be mixed with a lot of snow as well, but according to the weather sites and the tv forecast it’ll stay above 0C (32F) so I guess it’ll all melt away quickly, at least I hope so. This is a cold hole so one never knows 🙂

We walked the same way today but in the opposite direction, Yesterday I noticed how much of those small fields were worked on by wild hogs and they had been busy last night as well. I do hope they’ll keep their distance because meeting wild hogs in the garden the first thing in the morning is not on my top ten things to do 🙂 🙂 🙂 I think however it will be easier for them to walk in to my neighbours garden since they  only have a thin hedge beside the electric fence that goes around the entire pasture and that fence hasn’t stopped them so far.

I think this is one of those stones they used way back in the days to grind flour. I wonder how old it is, after all people have lived around here since the Stone Age.

Writing about electric fences, today Malcolm learned how it feels to get stung by one and unlike all other dogs he didn’t blame me for it 🙂 🙂 He did keep his distance to the fence after that though 🙂 I was later thinking of the hogs when I was frying some pork for dinner, when I did that I came to think of my mother. She has never been a good cook, quite the contrary and that’s why I learned to make my own food already as eleven years old. She’s amazing making sauces and for some reason she has always been good at making mashed turnips and pork knuckle, well it is her favourite food 🙂 🙂 🙂 Her meatballs however were either hard as a bullet and used like one a moose wouldn’t stand a chance, or they could just disintegrate in to a powder 🙂 🙂 🙂

Anyhow she became a bit more interested later in life. She and her then fiancé were quite often out fishing and always caught a lot of Cottidae, a small and rather ugly little fish but that tastes really good, so she learned how to fry that. They also were out picking mushrooms in autumn and always found a lot of Puffballs, they are edible and quite nice as small and she learned how to like those too. One day I asked her what the fish tasted like and she said: It’s the oddest thing but it tastes like bacon. I asked her if that really was true and she said it was. Well why not but then I asked her if she liked the puffballs as well and yes she did, oddly enough those tasted like bacon as well. I eat that mushroom a lot and they sure doesn’t taste like bacon 🙂 🙂

This is the old well to the cottage the Beekeeper lived, clear and nice water but the well dried out almost every summer.

This was their spare well, never dried out but so much rust in the water that it was almost un drinkable.

My mother belongs to the old kind that if You fry something and there’s fat still in the frying pan she saves it for next time 🙂 Well I think You’ve guessed it, they tended to eat a lot of bacon so every time they fried something they did so in bacon grease 🙂 🙂 🙂 everything from broccoli to any kind of fish tasted like bacon 🙂 🙂 🙂

It is time for that last cup of tea for the day, I might have a banana too but I’m really not hungry after my dinner. It will at least stay above 0C (32F) the coming week but oh how I long for spring!

Have a great day!