Wild West Surrey

Who'd be a cow in this weather? I had to drop some papers off so took a different route into work today, across the inhospitable prairies around the borders of Pyrford and Wisley where the bulls are mean and some of the people meaner still (the place I stopped to take this picture is awash with the "no parking", "neighbourhood watch" and "have you SEEN Deliverance?" signs of the home counties redneck). I didn't linger long for fear of walking into the office very late and muddy and with Land Rover tyre tracks up my back.

I'm probably being unfair. I mean they do have a lot to put up with, what with the evil land barons of the Royal Horticultural Society right on their doorstep and the endless coachloads of hired plant spotters coming in and painting the town fuchsia every weekend.

Glad to escape to my warm NHS Saloon further up the road in the little town of Leatherhead or as we call it, Lackaclarity. And boy did it live up to its name today. We all received personalised letters about our future this afternoon that were so full of politically driven gibberish and at odds with the reality of redundancy around the corner that we just reached for the herb tea and drank ourselves into camomile oblivion.

It's tough in today's NHS. I actually had a really difficult day again, full of picking up other people's mess and getting no thanks for it. Ah well. One good thing, we did nip out at lunchtime for a farewell plate of pasta for a colleague who is doing the sensible thing and going off to have a baby until all the dust settles on the latest rodeo of change.

End of blip. Not sure why I got into a wild west theme; must have been the sight of those cows in big wide open space and a general feeling that someone is gunning for me ...

PS - to see this blip at its best you really need to "go large" for the full big country effect ...