Back to the gloom

I didn't realise till I saw the ten o'clock news tonight what a grim day parts of England have had today - that flooding in Worcester and other horrors. We had reverted to the gloom that has enveloped us for so many days recently, and for much of the time it was raining, though in truth it was so dull we couldn't really see the rain falling. I chose to stay in bed until the darkness outside showed some signs of daylight - I did my Italian and drank my tea and then had another wee lie down...

I made up for this sloth by putting on a washing and actively taking care of its drying - whether in the tumble drier, over a chair in the warm living room or upstairs hanging on a rack. I also wrote things on the new wall calendar that actually warns us best of upcoming events - like me realising I've a sermon to prepare for the Sunday after Epiphany ... And this segued on into thinking about our upcoming holiday, which should begin less than three weeks from now. I'm appalled at how far ahead you're advised to turn up at the airport for the long-haul flight - we have to build in contingency plans for poor weather, which complicates matters. And I put the first batch of my holiday photos on Flickr.

There were some powerful posts about Palestine in my life today - catching up on the Sunday paper, in an email from a friend linking to a sermon preached in Bethlehem's Lutheran Church, in a blog post by a woman who'd spent a week in the West Bank. And then there was Yaroslava, the young woman I follow on Twitter, returning to bombed Kyiv from her mother's house in the west. She assured us that her flat was untouched, that she had internet, water and coffee and would survive. So brave.

I felt my own day was strangely purposeless - perhaps the biggest benefit of the two-day holiday in Scotland. Despite the gloom we went for a walk - just round the back of the town past the hill where the church stands and on down to the West Bay, where four geese gliding over the high tide headed for me as I took their photo, probably hoping I'd feed them. The photo is of the curve in the road leading to our church, hidden in the trees above the old stone wall, with the single light illuminating the squirrels sign as well as the Weak Bridge warning. Up in the hill to the right lies the Bishop's Glen, out of which the burn runs to the sea. We walked just over 2 miles and felt marginally better of it.

Dinner was a wonderful truffle pasta with lemon pesto, part of Ewan's present to us of a canvas tote bag from Valvona & Crolla. It took about 5 minutes to cook and assemble, and was glorious. 

And then I gave up and sprawled in front of the TV.