Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness

Okay, so it’s another sunny Sunday morning – just how I like my days, a fresh touch in the air and Mother Nature painting the trees in beautiful shades of Autumn. It is a split between autumn and spring as to which season is my favourite. Spring is a re-birth of life, new plants and fresh bold primary colours – sparkling Snowdrops, dazzling Daffodils and twinkling Tulips. Autumn is a quiet repose, reds, browns, russets, bronzes and golds, a rich time before the little death that is Winter.

Those pesky squirrels are digging up the bulbs I have planted and are burying them around my garden or in other pots – no wonder things keep growing where I haven’t planted them, well sometimes I get nice surprises, perhaps a peach tree starts growing where I had planted a tulip or a miniature oak tree pushes its way out of one of my hanging baskets – I could have sworn I planted some crocus bulbs there??

The local foxes have started preparing themselves for the oncoming mating season, ripe musky smells from scent marking males are all over my garden, why the vixens find this smell attractive I will never know. The foxes are looking particularly fine at the moment, sleek and fat with beautiful shiny russet coats, now if I was a vixen that would probably be more of a turn on – heh heh!! In the next couple of weeks I am sure to be woken up by the blood curdling screams of foxes in the throes of passion – lucky foxes!!

I am off now to make myself and my sons a late breakfast or brunch as we brits like to call it – all the mundane things that need doing and should be done are calling to me, but I am finding myself drawn outside again.

One more look before it all fades away….



John Keats - To Autumn

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.



Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.



Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, -
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

This is one of my all time favourite poems – enjoy.

Until the next time my friends.

Jo xx

Life in the life lane

Hello - where am I – Oh it’s Blog World!!!!

I haven’t been here in such a long time, so much and nothing has happened I don’t really know where to start.

My holiday was a bit of a washout for several reasons:

I hate where my parent’s flat is, it’s noisy, smelly, hot and dusty and if you don’t have a car, walking in 40 degrees of heat is no laughing matter.

The nearest beach is 25 minutes walk away – in 40 degrees heat.

The flat – in 40 degrees heat – has no air conditioning!!

My poor niece was ill for most of the holiday and was unable for most of the time to leave the flat or even eat anything and the temperature (40 degrees) for her was unbearable.

Did I mention the heat – heh heh!!

Most of the rest of the holidays was spent DIYing, my eldest son has built himself a wardrobe, it was his first attempt at carpentry and he has built a solid fitted wardrobe in his room – the doors don’t fit too well and are slightly different sizes, he has yet to put on the handles and the whole thing still needs painting, but for a first attempt, I think it is marvellous!!

We got a new garage door, new guttering, new slabs for under the little tool shed, cleared out: the garage, behind the garage, the big garden shed and loads from the attic into a giant skip.


The skip had amazing magical properties as whenever a metallic item was placed into it, the following morning it had disappeared – washing machines, garden rollers, old vacuum cleaners, metal chairs and assorted chains and rusty tools all vanished mysteriously – well actually they were taken away by rag and bone men (scrap merchants), who clambered all over the container looking for anything they might be able to salvage for scrap. This was actually a bonus for us as we were able to get rid of far more rubbish due to the self-emptying properties of this device.

Back to work at the beginning of September and the perennial problem of trying to find a new staff member – I am very fussy and know exactly what I am looking for, so interviewing has been quite a depressing affair, I have now interviewed around 12 people for the post of Librarian/Open learning officer and fussiness aside none of them have been suitable.
They either have no experience working with children, they cannot speak English, they cannot understand English, they do not read books or know anything about books, they know nothing about computers – the list goes on. How do they expect to be able to cope with a job where children are constantly asking, demanding, requesting all sorts of help?? I do find sometimes, that we are holding X factor auditions and have to stop myself laughing at the answers some people give to questions at interviews.

For the last 10 days I have been spending a lot of time with my Dad. My mother has gone away for a well deserved holiday with my brother London Cabby, so the rest of the family: Sister from Palmers Green, Sister from Harrow and Wealdstone and Brother Agnostic Joe, including assorted children and partners have all taken turns in spending as much time as possible with him. Since my Father was literally on death’s door, two years ago, he has been on a huge number of medications, having all kinds of treatments and numerous hospital appointments. For all these reasons we thought that we would draw up a Rota of times when we could all help out – it all worked out really well although it was tiring for all concerned trying to fit in this extra responsibility with out normal busy lives. My Dad loved being fussed over and was delighted with all the attention, he even showed the District Nurse the rota, which had been laid out in chart form by my sister in Harrow & Wealdstone. When my Mum returned from her holiday my Dad also showed it to her and she became quite emotional. I am just glad that my parents have such a big family, because looking after anyone is a huge responsibility and we only did it for a short time, some people have to look after their loved ones for years.

To all of you out there, you unsung heroes, carers of family or friends, my love and admiration goes out to you all.

Best wishes and Big hugs to you all.

Jo xx