an hoot in the trees ahead

As the air in the chalet had been hijacked I ran away with the wingpiglet as soon as I could. It wasn't even particularly cold outside - even before sunrise the snow was flumfling in bulk off all the tree-branches where it wasn't dripping away to nothing. We watched some horses for a bit then built a snowman with a beard next to the deserted swingpark, briefly hearing an owl somewhere above but not seeing any. After his lunch after a late-morning swim the boy (despite sleeping through all the disruption and heating overnight) slept right through most of the period when he'd been booked into the child-wrangling facility. I probably caught a quarter of an hour in the bunk above until the sounds of a television blaring out assocation football performance results, which wasn't enough to make up for the lack the previous night but which at least kept me going for the rest of the day in the absence of freely-available proper coffee or freely-available breathable air.