Bills Posts

1838 -A Normal Sunday

I took the picture a few days ago. The main thing to notice is that the old Cowes chain ferry has gone. I understand not for scrap, but I think the council asked for the unsightly object to be moved elsewhere.

I really should have gone for a walk today, but the weather has been rather unpleasant – wind and rain.

We’ve been busy doing things around the house, most of them related to the buildup towards Christmas.

1837 – Christmas Trees & Town

Today, there was a display held in St Mary’s Church in Alverstoke, of Christmas trees that had been put together by various parts of the community. There more than 70 trees on show from groups as varied as infant schools and estate agents.

It was quite a delight wandering around the church, admiring all the different trees and how, in a lot of cases, the baubles on the tree (many, perhaps mostly, handmade reflected the function of the organisation. One that made me chuckle was The Shed, which had a rotating shed instead of a fairy.

We had a good wander around, and then afterwards, we headed over to the community centre for a piece of cake and a cup of tea. I had lemon cake with cream in the middle. I was quite a large piece, and was very nice indeed.

I know timing-wise it’s out of order, but I wanted to do the Christmas tree bit first. In the morning, I had an Amazon return to complete, so I had to go into town for the post office.

After doing what I needed at the Post Office, I headed toward the waterfront. I did pause and look in a couple of shops, but didn’t buy anything.

At the waterfront, my attention was drawn to the fountain in the middle of The Falklands Park;

The fountain is in a bit of a sorry state; It hasn’t worked for at least 18 months, possibly quite a bit longer. That has come to the attention of the Town Council (well, it probably had, but they had not managed to do anything about it.

I think their attention has now been captured well and truly.

I was reading the agenda pack of the upcoming Council Meeting, which I won’t be able to go to, but I am quite happy to read about what they will be discussing, and the fountain is one of the topics.

A variety of options are under discussion, from re-engineering the fountain – apparently, one reason why it failed was that it couldn’t cope with the wind. Another option is to do away with the fountain and turn it into a raised flower bed.

If I were to be honest, the council’s gardeners are pretty good (ok, excellent) at their flower beds and consistently make them look lovely. So, turning the fountain into a flower bed would be fine with me.

I didn’t take any pictures of the bus station. No change. I think they are waiting for reports on things like drainage and soil quality. I’m sure they will come along soon

1836 Not quite winter

Just over 5 years ago, I committed myself to doing a blogpost every day for a year. If I am completely honest with myself, I failed in that mission. I missed days. Now, admittedly they were the odd day here and there for the most part, so whilst I didn’t strictly meet the target, it was close enough for me.

Now, I am beginning to wonder if I am heading for another commitment to myself; that of doing the walk1000 again, or at least going for a walk every day for a year. I think I may do that.

One good thing about doing a walk a day, now that I will soon be retired, is that I can do it at whatever time of day I wish. A benefit of this is that each walk gives me material for a blog and/or Facebook post. Plus, if I do it during the day time, I can stop of at a local haunt that I may wish to develop for a brew. Now, wouldn’t it be nice if the people’s park were up and running? Ideal for that.

There are, though, several ports that I can visit on the high street, so I may look to cultivate one of those – or indeed, a couple.

1835 – Even if for only 20 minutes.

Apart from the lovely walk on Sunday, I really haven’t managed to get out of the house anywhere near as much as I would have liked. So, this evening’s quick pop to the shops was a very welcome moment.

It was getting dark of course, but that just added to the atmosphere. I can’t quite figure out at the moment what people’s feelings are about the time for year, is it Christmas time yet? The lights are up, and many houses are putting up their christmas lights (we’ll probably. Do ours this weekend).

1834 – R-3 (Well, 2 and a bit really)

I guess there is no point in denying it, well, I haven’t really been denying the fact that days until my retirement are getting fewer. I now have 2 and a bit days until I start a chunk of flexi-time and annual leave that will take me to 02 January, my official last day at work. I did ask if I am likely to be asked to come into work over the period. The person I asked just laughed.

One thing that would stop my being called in is that I have to return my laptop. I’ll be doing that this coming Tuesday. Obviously, it has to be before cease work, so I’ll probably do it early in the afternoon, then spend a bit of time walking around saying goodbye to people.

I do have a kind of a plan for retirement. It remains to be seen how well I get started with that.

1833. – They went that way

Tonight we had a competition in the Camera Club. Competition rules allow us to enter up to 3 images, and we both entered the maximum amount. The header picture is my best result. It was held back but eventually ended up getting 9.5 which to be honest, I was more than happy with. My two other PDI’s both got 7.5, which again I was quite happy with. In my mind, the judge had been generous. They weren’t really quality images.

Elayne was in a similar position. She also had an image held back that ended up a 9.5 and two images that were both 8.5. She also picked up her award of third place in the previous print competition.

The next competition isn’t until February, and is prints – our topic is Architecture.

It was a very pleasant evening, we both enjoyed it.

1832 – It’s a bit rough!

Rain & wind have been big features of today. Because the wind is blowing from the south, opening our front door can be a bit hazardous. A failure to control could result in being thumped is the wind pushes at it.

I wanted to get to the waterfront. The separation at the port entrance gives you a good idea as to what the water would be like outside the harbour – rough.

There is something about being out in rough weather, especially if you have the right clothing. My main waterproof coat has served me very well sinnce 2012 – £200 well spent (I wasn’t confident at the time. We were in the Lake District, I needed a coat, and it was the only one that fit me. Wearing the right coat helps feel comfortable, handy when it comes to taking photographs.

The coast may make you feel comfortable, but I didn’t have my monopod with me, and the wind was buffeting, so I wasn’t confident about taking a long-lens shot of the harbour entrance, to show just how rough it looked out in the Solent.

I really relished being out in the fresh air, even if it was rough.

1831 – Woodmill & The River Itchen

Today, members of the Gosport Camera Club went for a delightful walk along the River Itchen, starting at the Woodmill Centre. How do you find out about places like this, other than through friends? If you want a calm, peaceful walk along a lovely rivers edge, you would be very hard pushed to find somewhere better than this.

The path along the river side, not quite sure of the length is probably 3/4 of a mile after that it moves away from the river. But for a pleasant stroll, with opportunities to stop to admire the scenery and wildlife or talk to strangers is ideal.

Then, at the end of the walk, there is a very nice little cafe, which even at 10 AM on a Sunday was packed. They had some very nice cakes on show, and to my deep shame I succumbed to rather large piece of Rocky Road. Yes, I know, I shouldn’t have done. It was though, really rather nice.

From the walk we had a shortish drive to the pub (we took the wrong turn) , The Cricketers Arms. It’s interesting to note that the pub had sold out of a couple of the main courses by 1230 (including the one I wanted – Lamb Shank) I ended up going for the Roast Beef.

It was an excellent meal. The Yorkshires in particular are worthy of mention. They were crispy and literally melt in the mouth, I’d never had one like it – as far as I can recall. I will definitely be taking Elayne there.

It was a really nice day out.

1830 – A trip to the Island

I promised myself that if a bus turned up within two minutes of my arrival at the bus stop at the bottom of our road, I would save myself a bit of time and get on. Something was working in my favour because I looked around just as I got there and stuck my hand out to request a stop. Pretty much simultaneous arrival. It was lucky really as the rain wasn’t particularly heavy but it was persistent.

The ferry trip over to portsmouth was a little bit bumpy, which had me wondering what the Catamaran trip might be like. i could see that the water out in the solent, outside the harbour entrance was distinctly choppier than inside the harbour, which promised an interesting ride.

All the good timing meant that I had about half an hour to wait at the Wight Link terminal, which was fine. I watched people & dogs. The man almost opposite managed to cover himself in coffee whitener as he tore open the packet, which perked up the interest of the dog belonging to the man sitting two seats down from him, and meant a bit of restraining. The Dachshund 10 seats down started to get excited as well, and was yapping away, with his owner trying to quieten him.

Boarding was smooth and efficient and the Cat slipped smoothly away from the mooring and did its twirling to line up with the harbour exit. The journey started nicely, with the slow gentle cruise along the exit channel, it was when the captain started adding throttle as we moved out of the channel heading towards Ryde that it got a bit more interesting.

Before Aurora was born, I confess, babies & young children crying used to bother me a bit – I guess that’s what it is intended to do, grab attention, and Hoo yes, this one was doing that! The little boy or girl was having a monumentally serious meltdown, the increase in speed had added a delightfully exciting bounce to the trip with some good stomach drops. Oh dear, that was not popular, each bounce brought an increased intensity of the screams, which I could clearly make out to include the phrase “I want to get off” and “Are we there yet”? it was only when the Captain eased off for the approach Ryde Pier that the screaming eased to some serious sniffles. The docking was as smooth as the departure.

The trains now run all the way down the pier (they had been suspended for quite a while – maintenance to the pier), which at just under half a mile long (the second longest pier in the UK) would take me roughly 10 – 15 minutes to walk. There were no indications as to when or if a train was due, so I decided I had to walk. It was a good job I’d worn my full-length raincoat. The 25mph south-westerly wind was blowing straight into my face, full of what can only be described as obese raindrops, great blobs of water that seemed unhealthily excited at the prospect of making my walk as miserable as it could.

I was determined that the rain wasn’t going to beat me. There were several groups of people walking toward the end of the pier, and as they approached me, I’d smile and say cheerfully “Bit of an adventure isn’t it”? Nobody responded to me, but I did notice expressions on faces that aligned with “who is this weirdo”? (see earlier posts about weirdos, I thought it more apt than nutter).

Luckily, the bus was waiting, with door open. I boarded and waved my pass at the sensor, giving the bus driver a cheery “Good Morning”. The bus driver responded with “‘Morning, how are you”? I replied “Wet”. She laughed.

I arrived in Newport just over an hour before I was due to be at the pub. I took the opportunity to have a browse in Waterstones, and yes I decided that after my event, I would return and buy a book or two.

What was this all for you might ask? It was the day of the Isle of Wight Radio Society’s Christmas meal – these events are always interesting. Meeting people that you speak to on a fairly regular basis, whom you only see once a year – some for the first time. The pub was The Bargemans Rest, and the food was delicious.

I will be brief about the return journey; it was routine, unexciting and dark. But, it was the end of a delightful day. Everything linked up and I was home by 1750. A lovely day out.

1829 – Writing

The house at the end of our road has his Christmas lights up. It’s always a nice display, and I think it has fired Elayne in to getting our decs down out of the loft and up ready for christmas.

It seems that writing will play a role in my retirement, well at least, until I get bored with it, and going by this blog, that may hopefully take quite a while. I have a number of topics, that I am inclined to write about. One of them warrants a separate resource, so I’ve started a substack, which I am planning to update once a week.

I can’t really start writing about the topics until I have material, which needs me to have the time to gather, which means being retired! I just hope it works. Sorry, it’s all a bit silly isn’t it. I have plans. Plans don’t always survive first contact. Only a few days to go now. Let’s see what happens.