Stormy Weather

We are having a gloriously thundery day: showers of rain intermittently, with big soft peals of thunder every so often.  Lefty thought it was hilarious when I jumped, once, startled by the noise.

Surprisingly, we did garden work in the rain.  Mr J took charge of mowing the lawn.  He learned last time we mowed and now sees it as his particular responsibility.  Lefty trimmed edges with our big garden shears, and then the front hedge.  Righty went back and forth between trying to help and being distracted by examining all the insects which crossed his path.  You win some, you lose some.

I worked on emptying old pots and sorting through rubbish.  Much was thrown away, more ended up in the compost, and even more disappeared into our brown garden bin to be collected tomorrow.  My herb box is cleared of its dead plants and is now ready for new ones, and I'm writing a small list which includes things like dirt, and bark chippings, and small stones to add to the settled ones now bordering our fire circle.  Buying dirt.  How strange, to buy dirt.

We took a walk later this afternoon, trudging through new puddles and rain in search of adventure.  Our exploits included finding full-blown yellow roses, sweet-smelling lavender and pungent rosemary, and being drenched in the park.  Completely.  We slogged home as hail pelted us, arriving just as the sun was appearing from black clouds.  

I'm reading Trees Tall as Mountains, by Rachel Devenish Ford. She is Journey Mama, one of my favourite bloggers, and this book is a volume of blog posts from her early days of blogging.  I've read them all before but trawling through entries on a glowing screen is nothing compared to turning real pages that smell sharp and clean.  

One of my favourite aspects of blogging is the real side of it.  It's real stories, real people, real lives.  Of course there are bloggers who present a particular image --maybe unconsciously-- of lives neatly sewn up with no raw edges.  Journey Mama's edges are unravelling and not hemmed, and that's the very reason why I like her.  

I'll write a proper book review when I've finished it, but for now I'll go back to a cup of sweet chai and my book and try to forget that Coo and Mr J have completely unearthed nearly every toy and intentionally, but with no apparent plan, scattered them all over the upstairs' rooms!