Afterglow

Today I'm still in a state of mild intoxication from the treat of a day out! They are rare enough...but a day out in pleasant company with a car? Can count on the fingers of one hand this year, and still have a thumb left over, if not a finger or two too! Very rare and special pleasure...and great thanks to Peter for putting up with my wittering and childish delight so amiably!

When I woke in the night with knees giving me gyp I was able to remember what I'd used them for and not mind - they can hurt if I do nothing at all and that is a bit harder to be grateful for! I gave thanks for remembering that I'd remembered to buy proper Tiger Balm (the pound shop stuff is pointless) but couldn't be bothered to get out from under the cosy covers to try it. This morning I have tried it, not with great optimism as I associate it with muscle pain, headaches, coughs and colds rather than joint pain (I've been an occasional user for many years and have even been to the Haw Par Gardens in Singapore which probably means nothing unless you have too!) but I decided the natural urge to rub a sore spot combined with the fiery afterglow would be a topical distraction at least. And indeed it is! Now I've looked on the internet and see the original balm and various off shoot lotions and patches are used by many arthritis sufferers who can't take anti inflammatory meds so I've also the glow you get from having a provenly bright idea!

The weather yesterday was rather like it is today, soft and still and mild and actually rather pleasant though not obviously appealing to the untrained eye which is probably why everywhere we went was so luxuriously empty...we had a small cove to ourselves and most of a rather large and often teeming tourist attraction comprising rustic thatched hamlet and small stately home with a church in the surrounding parkland. Ideal.

I didn't take many photos but there are images etched in my memory of the strange coloured and patterned stones on the beach and the amazing bright yellow leaved (beech?) tree not in the park but growing out of one of those little squares of earth in a pavement. I thought I'd see what time of year it was pictured on Streetview and it's amazing on there too because as you go from one click to the next it goes from buds just opening to pretty much full leaf. Heck that car must have been driving slowly...or else the tree grew very fast!

Today I'm grateful I've bustled about a bit while the daylight lasts and that now as it begins to fade I can exercise the remote control and biscuit tin instead of self control while waiting for the slow cooker to do what it does best...