4.03.2020 Recalcitrant sunshine?

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Wednesday 4th 34-41F, overnight, white frost, bright and sunny with a little cloud. Hardly a sign of ice on the puddles and only slight frosting on the grass in shade by 9.00. Walked briskly to the lanes in bright sunshine and almost, dead calm.

A magnificent stand of Japanese Knotweed planted by the council.

A single goose flew over, talking to itself. Quite a sunny morning but with lots of fast moving cloud from the west. Grey, breezy and cold before 13.00. Both my wife and I have had several days of sore throats, a wet cough and runny noses. Probably just a cold.

Thursday 5th 36-41F, calm, rather cloudy but with blue patches. As I left the gate the sky was blue, the sun was out and a few, high fluffy clouds were overhead. Within ten minutes, patchy mist had thickened, the sun had gone and the sky became a grey overcast. A cool breeze dropped the temperature. This is not what we were promised!

Heavy shopping in the car. UK experts suggest the elderly avoid crowds. One large supermarket was packed around the checkouts as only two checkouts were open. With very long queues. Keep taking the money. Until you can't. Because all your elderly customers have succumbed to the virus.

Friday 6th 37-41F breezy, heavy overcast. Still following new stories on the virus. Websites are still completely blocking access to their [claimed] vital information in exchange for my inside leg measurement. Bullshit is still going the rounds. Eat more oranges? Yeah, right! I must see if they have any at the local chemist. The Africans are being told that shaving a beard off is guaranteed to protect them from the virus. Did you hear about the African preacher who was going to China to instantly cure the Pandemic with prayer? Presumably it was proximity related prayer or he could have done it from home.

Today I walked up to the forest in a thin, cold wind under a leaden sky. The tracks were very soggy, heavily puddled and badly cut up by water flow on inclines. Progress through the woods was a tangle of brambles and standing water. It all seems to get worse as the years pass. Field flooding/puddles have become the year-round norm rather than winter seasonal. I disturbed a large deer which ran in a circle before escaping into denser undergrowth.

Incredibly noisy woodpeckers were sharing the beech canopy with smaller birds. The prairies are bare and ugly. Or ploughed and even uglier. Large areas exist where no crops have developed in the wet conditions. Ironic considering how record warm this winter has been. Hardly a frost to its name and no snow to speak of. That said, today was a long, grey, cold day with a nasty wind. As I watched the anemometer spin and the wind vane pivot around the north, a large bird of prey swept through the garden.

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