Chicken Head

I originally thought that I would pop outside to take a photo of one of the blooms that's still clinging on in the garden, despite its being November.  However, one look at the very wind and very, very wet scene that assailed me when I opened the back door into the garden convinced me that this would be a Mistake.  Given the wind there was no reasonable prospect of my being able to keep the camera  even slightly dry.  

So instead here is a treated shot of what is known as a "chicken head" knob. If you look at it sideways on I think you can see where the name comes from :-)

I rather liked that you can see reflections in the knob's surface.

I've just finished reading Michelle Paver's short novel "Thin Air" a ghost story about a fictional expedition to climb Katchenjunga in the Himalayas between the World Wars.  She brilliantly captures that sense of isolation that mountains can produce along with the constant risk of making a fatal error in challenging conditions.  It is not a long book but it gripped me from the start, and I'm not normally drawn to ghost stories.  I can see that it will take a day or two for me to disengage from the events she portrays!