Autumn Days

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.

John Keats

Struggling to find things to blip these days, I don't know why! This is a calendula showing its time to die. Just natural, nothing but a heavy 'crop' :)

At least the sun is shining and its a day off for me!

We've had such a brilliant summer with the Olympics and Paralympics! Everything feels really flat now, and as the days get shorter, I struggle even more because I suffer from SAD (seasonal affective disorder).

For those that don't know its a condition related to depression. I was trying to get a lightbox to help me before it gets too bad this year but am unable to afford it now.

Trying to focus on the good things is sometimes quite hard.

I loaded the computer this morning and my online diary reminded me to book an appointment for Tigger to have her boosters.

Then I realised that it was exactly 6 months today I had to have her put to sleep. I was 2 days post op from my second lot of knee surgery, and she came home from the cattery very poorly. The vets said that her heart was racing and most probably the tumour she had, had just got to her heart! She was 16 and I'd had her 14 years.....

I know I have the gorgeous, wonderful Billy (in fact I got him just a month later on 12th April because I couldn't bear life without a cat).....but I had Tigger for a long time....gone but never forgotten!

So today's list is:

Soup already cooking in the slow cooker for tonight! I've used up all the veg that needed using up and half a tin of tinned tomatoes, so its got butternut squash, tomatoes, potatoes, carrots and some onion in veg stock :)

Shopping and picked up rest of prescription from Chemist already done

Washing
Hoovering
Tidying
Coursework for Footsteps 2

Freezer to Microwave Curry for lunch with nan bread which I just fancied when I was shopping~might manage to make a proper curry one day :)

In other news, Billy has suddenly become very kittenish! He caught and played with a bumble bee today :) Nearly managed to blip him doing that!!

Have a great day blippers!