Keeping a blog

It's a funny ol thing, blogging. I love writing anyway and as Ken says, keeping a blog is quite addictive. If you choose, as I've done, to not have Sitemeter or any other means of checking who reads your blog or to find out how many read it (or don't!) , you feel free to post your thoughts quite openly, without fretting about turning people off. I hate being monitored so wouldn't inflict that on others.
If you also choose, as I have, not to censure comments, you accept that others can criticise you openly. So, I suppose that's the difference with keeping a personal written diary - there's knowing someone may read your stuff and knowing that they may comment on it. I like that not-knowing that anyone else is even bothering to read what I write and it's always a bit of a surprise when they do comment!
So why does it feel suddenly intrusive when your blogging gets posted on a forum? Perhaps because it does away with the last pretence at a blog being personal. You may have had a good, cheerful day, or a fed-up rant but when taken out of the context of the diary it stands alone, naked and chilled.
So, I wonder - should that stop someone from writing a blog - fear of being left exposed? I don't think it should. After all, I do a lot of copyright-free illustrations for people and risk having my work ripped off left, right and centre. I guess I must just accept that opening your opinions and thoughts to others, like falling in love, is a risky venture. If I try to live by the principles I believe in, I needn't be afraid of others.

What a morning!

I looked out the window this morning at 6.30am and had to leap straight out of bed, it was so beautiful. Lots of snow, sunshine through the trees, blue sky - lovely! My dog loves the snow, though it does make him look a bit scruffy cos he'll never be as white as that. He snuffles madly in it, getting his snout all covered and rolls over and over like a puppy.
(My computer won't let me post a photo right now so I'll try and add one later.)
A nice family on their hire boat made snowmen of each of them on the roof before setting off. It's very peaceful here with the sound of woodpeckers up in the branches overhead.

Stocking up

I travelled on a fair bit today, stopping at Rugeley to stock up with food. The dog had started eyeing me up - always a reminder to buy him some food quickly. I'd run out of bread a couple of days ago so I made some and it was sooo heavy! I made a nettle and goosegrass and lentil soup (all comes under the generic term 'hippy-slop') which was ok and put some sprouting potatoes out of their misery, but it really was time to rejoin society and splurge on fresh-ish veg and Frys chocolate creams and bourbon biscuits and a couple of bottles of Weston's cider , for a few days at least.

At Kings Bromley marina, that massive house on the waterfront is still empty. There's room for 3 families in there. That and another estimated 700,000 empty houses in the UK, not to mention unused factory buildings and offices. It's madness to talk about building 3 million new homes and pretend they can all be carbon-neutral. The government clearly doesn't have a clue what carbon-neutral actually means. Talking of houses..
I took a photo of a brand new housing estate full of diddy doll's houses made to look like olde worlde cottages, with plastic window frames and 2/3 cars to every house, all framed within the giant backdrop of Rugeley power station. The horror, the horror. I'd better not put up the picture as it's too depressing and is bound to be someone's dream-home. Shit, I'd rather live in a tent.

I'm in a beautiful wooded place now, which calms me immediately. I spent half an hour watching a little mouse grooming and skittering about on a tree stump on the opposite side of the canal. Then watched tree-creepers flitting spirally up the trunks of alders for insects, dropping back to the bottom and starting up again. I have a pair of binoculars but only one eye of them works so I have to squint at things. After half an hour, you come away with blurred vision and a squint - most attractive.

Later, I checked out lots of trees and came across a duck nesting right inside the bole of another tree stump. I distracted my dog so he couldn't disturb her. There was a felled beech and I counted the rings - it was 150 years old. Some parts have been roughly carved to make a couple of lovely unpretentious seats, which made me very happy. Someone altruistic out there. There was a bank full of tiny holes that I saw were home to a sort of bee but my insect book offers me too many looky-likies for a positive ID.
Tomorrow I must go down the weed hatch. I picked up something dodgy today and kind-of ignored it as I was able to keep going and steer ok, and because it's a nightmare getting to the hatch with no head room to lever the plate off. But tomorrow will do.

Recycled wallet

A friend made me a wallet from a tetra-pak which as you probably know is not usually recycleable - though I hear that scum-bag Tescos has recently started offering recycling of tetra-pak in some areas. Oh the irony!

http://www.tescopoly.org/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1

Anyway, here's how he made my wallet:

Waterproof, strong and just the right size for bank cards. I don't tend to buy anything in cartons but it's almost worth it get a fruity wallet. You just have to be careful you don't chuck it in the reycling by mistake!

Hopwas wood

What a glorious wood is the Hopwas wood. Mentioned in the Domesday Book (did you know you can check out the Domesday Book online?!) so some of it is ancient woodland. At the moment there's a starry firmament of wood anemones throughout and you can see there will soon be a vast carpet of bluebells.

I met a lovely old man who walked my legs off for miles along towpath, through the woods, around the village and back. He told me how a large part of the woods had been bought by Nash Rocks and was currently under threat from quarrying. That figures. Show me a stunningly beautiful place and home to miriad wildlife and I'll show you the corporate bastard waiting to fuck things up.

Then I met a guy on a boat who carves mushrooms and benches and planters from trees. His boat is covered in giant mushrooms! I don't know whether he cuts em down just for that purpose. I couldn't bear to know the answer to that particular question, but I did go back and help myself to the large amounts of sawdust for my compost loo and discarded bark as firelighters.

With the rain, came the ducks. One duck was very brave and tame and came to beg at the window. Then she leapt up onto the roof and I took this picture by sticking my camera out the window. A second later and she pecked it but I didn't manage to capture that!

Fork handles

..or that's what they could be!

Here are four of the fifteen candles I made from all the saved drippings and stubs of my candles and a right mess I made of them too! It all seemed so simple in my 'How to live without electricity - and like it' book (Anita Evangelista), which explains how to melt the bits together, pour onto a greased surface, lay down lengths of string and roll up. Voila! Some dodgy sausages.

But they do burn fine and as I mostly use candles rather than the yukky little flourescent strips in my boat, I suppose it's a saving of sorts. If you melt the wax using the gas stove instead of the wood stove, you're probably wasting more energy than you save!

After a stay out by Alvecote Pools - a pleasant wooded and wetland area that used to have collieries nearby, I've had to move on to collect water and find some food. Olive oil and marmite on stale bread is becoming monotonous - need to find me some nettles! I got into a boating convoy, which I hate and now I'm lying low, waiting for the flood of hire-boaters to subside. But they're a hardy lot those hirers - rain, snow, wind doesn't put em off enjoying their holiday. I know they're on a schedule but you have to admit they're up for it!

Cool!

Moving a narrowboat through snow is wonderful.

My dog, looking confused.