24.08.2024 Rural decay.

 ~o~

  Saturday 24th 54f/12C [7.00] Blue sky with mottled, high cloud. The sun has yet to rise. The forecast is for sunny periods with southerly winds. Leading to potential thunder storms and gales from late afternoon onwards.

 Up at 6.15 after a restless night. I really must drag myself outside today. Perhaps even a ride. 

8.15 Returning from a brisk walk to the lanes. The sun broke through just as I turned into the lanes. Painting my favourite landscape in a warm wash of light. My foreground shadow grows longer with each passing day. Making photography awkward unless I zoom in. 

 12.00 Returned from a 38km ride. The garden is full of butterflies! I rode south, down to the bumpy coast. Fighting a headwind all the way. To look at an old farmhouse my wife and I once saw for sale. We visited it a couple of times. It was thatched and once pretty but just too isolated and needed far too much work. 

 Somebody else eventually bought it and was making good progress. Then nothing. No sign of life as it steadily deteriorated over the years. It is now wide open and abandoned. 

 I see a lot of what were once cheap, rural properties for sale becoming dilapidated or demolished. Perhaps it was lucky we never made the decision to move. It would have meant starting from scratch but at well over 20 years older than the last big effort. I almost rebuilt this place since we bought it 28 years ago. It has hardly changed in value. Unlike all the other houses I am hundreds of meters from the road. So very little road noise.

 Two of my neighbours along the road have been up for sale for years. One gave up and the other has just sold his old farmhouse At a price below many secondhand car sales. The busy road is within an arm's stretch. 

I passed Dreslette Church.
The tower was built by a rich, local farmer.
Who wanted to be able to see the sea.

 Two similar properties close to the verge never sold and went to forced auction. To be bought by a waster who wrecked them and then abandoned the ruins as an eyesore. Using the gardens for storing scrap metal, vehicles and building materials. Which will never be used again. Trees and shrubs grow out of the insides and hide them from the outside. 

 The same has occurred in several local villages. Where his activities have ruined property values and made many of them unsaleable. As occurred with my two nearest neighbours. Both now appear to be abandoned. 

 16.00 73F/23C. A visitor has just left. I am going shopping in the car.

 Returned for my shopping trip but felt dizzy. My vision is spinning. No dinner. Slowly reducing while sitting and watching TV. 

10.00 Having slight pains in my chest and back over my heart. Slightly nauseous. I am going to bed.

 

  ~o~