The gaps between these blogs are getting longer. Perhaps it’s a sign of my preoccupation with other things; trying to squeeze in as much as possible in the slots available.

Getting a dose of flu didn’t help either. High temperature on a Saturday is not recommended.... NHS GP’s don’t do weekends anymore. I’m supposed to hit the alarm button if it goes higher than 38°C and it was 39, but with such timing (and previous experience of hospital admissions at the weekend still fresh in my mind) I stuck it out and by Monday was coming out the other side. Although it took several weeks to regain my strength.

When I told this story to my consultant, Dr. Clark, I got a rap across the knuckles: he said I was lucky and not to do it again.
I had bearly recovered from that episode when Christine came back from a trip South with a sore throat; it inevitably found me and left me drained yet again.

However there were interludes in between all this - little 2 hour bursts of energy usually in the late mornings - when I got some sense of achievement and progress.

The hole in the middle of the garden that was supposed to be a pond for instance - filled in with boulders, levelled with earth and sown with grass seed. Been thinking about doing it for years. What a feeling of space it has created. With only a couple of hours a day available these jobs can take a while... but ‘slow and steady’ gets there in the end.

The vegetable garden: now weeded, composted and half dug over. Seems to have been raining for days.... can’t get back in to finish it, and get the spinach seeds sown.

Some cement work and paving in the back courtyard around the newly constructed base for the Air Source Heat Pump . [It was supposed to have been installed weeks ago and is beginning to drag on a bit. The workshop area around the sink and back of the kiln has been cleared out for ages and they still have not finished. Seems like one day a week for the last five. Most of the plumbing is in place but no electrics yet. Christine would really like her pottery space back to normal; the chaos is beginning to get her down].

Oh... and the Pottery accounts for 2010/11 got done - whenever I needed a sit down job or it was raining. Wonder when I’ll be working in clay again ?