Guildford – Speak Easy

The weather

There, day after day of bright sunshine and little change in temperature.

Here, weather changes thrice a day.

Garden update

Today…

Two new leaves in one of the hardy geranium cuttings. It’s made it! 🙂

First flowers bloomed in the new viola. Violet and yellow beauties 🙂

Moved the last three yellow begonias and the Dianthus from flower bed to tubs. The snails have been busy butchering them 🙁

The white mustard has flowered beautifully. It was nearly dead in January; now it’s dense and getting whiter all the time 🙂

A rose I’ve been trying to revive/keep-alive for at least 3 years, produced its first bud in many years. It’s a beautiful light pink bud. Rewarding me for the effort, clearly 🙂

Earlier…

Moved all the orange and one yellow begonia from flower bed to one big pot. Two of them were near death, all were suffering. One still might not survive. Damned slugs, snails and earwigs!

The petunias and bidens in the window basket produced their first flowers. Bidens are pretty yellow, petunias surprised with a Burgundy red/pink with veins 🙂

The geraniums are blooming big time! All of them—7 surviving from last year and 8 from this. Loads of beautiful red flowers everywhere 🙂

The three campanulas are all nicely settled in, blooming and growing. Hardy, self-seeding, and beautiful blue and violet flowers. They’re amongst my favourite plants this year.

The lobelias in the other window basket are like one huge (South Indian politician sized) garland of blue and violet.

After mowing the lawn every two weeks, I haven’t mowed it in 4 weeks now. It’s still now growing. We really need some good rain 🙁

Olfactory nostalgia

The backyard smells lovely this morning. Smells and feels like Ambleside, my favourite getaway in the UK.

I fell in love with Ambleside because it smells and feels like the Shimla we grew up in. Slightly chilly, wet and fresh.

I haven’t visited either place in a while. Must correct this.

I hadn’t seen anyone from my old triathlon club—Pheonix Triathlon—in over six months. In the last week, I ran into three of them! The cooler weather and beautiful autumn colours must have drawn the Phoenixes out of hibernation (aka the gym :) )

Chewie and I met Kate Fargus last Sunday at the far end of Sandy lane. I didn’t recognise her, but she called out to say hello to Chewie. It took me a few minutes (after I left her) to remember her first name. I only remembered her last name after Koldo helped me out later in the week.

Saw Graham French on Wednesday as he flew down the hill while we were running uphill on the trail home from Sandy lane. He lives in my part of town, so it wasn’t much of a surprise to see him running our trails.

We met Koldo Loidi, one of the friendliest Phoenixers, on our backyard gravel path during Friday’s run. It was about 5°C and he was running in a thin tee and shorts; I was clad in my new full-sleeve running jacket. He admired Chewie, and suggested catching up in town sometime. It was his 50th birthday that day, and he seemed to be enjoying it out on the beautiful trails.

Hope to catch some more of the friendlier Phoenixers out on the trails as I increase the miles over winter.

I went to pick up a book from the library…

I ended up getting five. I would’ve brought more, but I’d gone late and the library was closing.

I’d reserved Walter Isaacson’s biography of Leonardo Da Vinci, so got that.
I’d been looking for a few Hemingway books. I didn’t find anything from top of the list, but did find these two, so got them.
Brad Stone’s Everything Store has been on my radar for a while. When I saw it on a shelf, I picked that up.
And close to it was Seth’s little book. So got that too.

I didn’t get to visit the Sports or the Scifi sections before they announced the library was closing.

Aside: I like how the three small books on the right are, together, about as big as the fourth book. And the four books on the right are again, together, about as big as the one on the left. Fibonacci-esque.

Haul from the library

Went to return two books, and maybe borrow one. Ended up bringing seven of them home :)

The one I went to get: Shoe Dog by Phil Knight

The two that were in my read some time list:

The Art of failing by Anthony McGowan and
Mr. Iyer goes to war by Ryan Lobo (finished)

The four that I picked up from browsing around the sections:

Gizelle’s bucket list by Lauren Fern Watt
– A dog story, my weakness
Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry Like Christmas by Maya Angelou
– Saw her name, picked it up
Can’t Swim, Can’t Ride, Can’t Run by Andy Holgate
– I’d come across this book often in Amazon recommendations, never enticed enough to buy.
Running up that hill by Vassos Alexander
– Running & hills, two of my many other weaknesses :)

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