It's all a bit pants, really

The Grand and Circular Payshos of Hexenhäusli Device on Friday.  But wait - what's that on the table?

 

 

 It must be the time of year, Mitzi.  Not only did I find my nephew's pants on the paysho table on Friday, but on this morning's walk with Bitey another two pairs of pants made themselves known:

 

This pair on the High Street looked like they belonged to another child.

 

Whereas this pair dropped on the old railway line between Cromer and Overstrand were adult sized.  Overstrand is obviously up there with Chester, Jon.

 

 

 In other news: Bitey managed a whole walk without killing anything.  Although he did find this dead muntjac on the beach - handily already half buried!

 

Of sunshine and hideous, snap-jawed sea creatures

 We've actually had rather a nice weekend, weatherwise: sunshine, balmy temperatures when the wind wasn't blowing, and when it was, it was coming form the south which meant that at least it wasn't frigid as per.

 As well as spending time up the allotment and in the garden, I also took Bitey down to the beach for his now traditional Sunday morning walk (we meet up with one of my friends who has a black lab who Bitey is always very excited to see, and vice versa).

 

 Anyway, here are some photos from that very walk: 

 

 

"Surprise!"

 In the absence of anything with any substance - an impromptu adventure over the Cusp, for example - may I present another excerpt from 2017's Ms Scarlet in the Pantry with the Can-Opener, the unofficial and unauthorised biography of our very own Ms Scarlet!

 

 

 Today we'll be looking at chapter 4, "A Day Without Rain":

 

Vos Grace*

 It's been a lovely sunny - if a bit cold - day here, so this morning I took Bitey down to the beach for a walk.  We came down the cliff just before the east slope and slipway and made our way west. 

 (That's Trimingham sticking out into the sea on the horizon in the photo above; and the view north-northwest from halfway down the cliff, below.)

 

GPE #11 : IDV's Year of the Greengage

I N E X P L I C A B L E

D E V I C E

 

 Yes, it's finally my turn!

 I'm sure you mean our turn, hmm?  After all, whose hands and body - not to mention knowledge and bank account - is used to maintain our garden?  If it was left to you, the Hexenhäusli Device gardens would be a prickly, poisonous wilderness of brambles, apple trees, hemlock, and foxgloves!

 It would save having to go out on the increasingly unsafe Broom to gather ingredients.  Besides, you like those plants.

 Yes, but not just those plants as a garden!

 Oh, fine.  You can get on with the captioning and the like as you're the "expert"!

 I will, then!

Oh, good.  This is turning out well, as usual.

Wake me up when it's all over.

 

 Right.  Now that Witchface and the dratted SubCs have shut up, I'll continue.

 You may have noticed that we've been decidedly absent from the blog this year, which means that there were rather fewer garden updates than usual.  A consequence of that is a glut of garden and allotment photos that are all being dumped here because they haven't yet seen the light of day.  I've tried to include mainly plants that haven't featured in the previous couple of years, and I've smushed some together to make sure this post didn't wear out your scrolling fingers.

 

It may be rather dull and overlooked usually, but when in flower (such as here in early May), I think laurel is quite lovely.

Four Photos: The Drier Side of Britain

 

Something for Ms Scarlet to consider...

(Proof of North Norfolk's dryness compared to Devon's - well, Cornwall, as Bude is the closest weather station to Ms Scarlet's neck of the woods) 

 

 

Stinking iris or roast-beef plant (Iris foetidissima)

 (A native to Britain, but "exotic" in New Zealand - the tables are turning, Dinah!)

 

 

A practise pose from 2021's Hallowe'en Star Trek Art Challenge

(I've included this as a reminder for me to concoct an Art vs Artist collage)

 

 

An unused photo from 2023's Salt Rooks

 You know, to show how dry it is here and all that...
 

"Just spun in a web made of moonlight"

  Another clear sky yesterday which means more photos!  And a timely release from Sophie Ellis-Bextor with "Freedom of the Night" as an accompaniment.  Yes, I know: I spoil you.

First glimpse of the Moon emerging from the hazy clouds over the North Sea horizon

Tails and Orbs and Fairy Rings

 Just dropping off some photos from a couple of Bitey walks (as vaguely requested by The Very Mistress, here): the sun setting over the trees set are from Saturday, and the fairy ring and sea set are from lunch time today.  The musical accompaniment - "Locked Out of Heaven" by Bruno Mars -  is only featuring because it popped into my mind while swimming this morning.

Orb!  Or Camera artefact...

Out and about with Bitey

 I was just thinking how lovely and easy it is to upload photos to Blogger and pop them into a post in a specific order,* and that it could stand to be far more difficult and annoying.**  Fortunately the Google Blogger gnomes heard my thoughts and intervened.  Hooray!***

 Anyway, now that my patience and copy-&-pasting fingers have had a work out, here are some photos from a few perambulations up Toll's Hill to Skylark Field where Bitey likes to run around and stick his nose in everything.  And also catch rabbits and chase small deer.

Golden Towers

 Yes, I know at the end of the previous post I said I may return the following day, but I also said that "normal service may resume" which, as you all know by now, means days if not a week or two between posts.  And, if you hadn't already gathered, this post includes the previously mentioned space shuttles and golden towers - I'll do the Bitey walk and Norwich skyline photos another time.

 So, why are there space shuttles and golden towers on the beach, I hear you clamouring - or at least tutting indifferently about?  Well, it was all for June's Star Trek art challenge which had a "World(s of Star Trek) Buildings" theme.  I had intended to construct a little cardboard castle or palace to represent Lwaxana Troi's family home, but despite collecting various cereal boxes for the raw material, time escaped me (again).  So, in a last minute panic, I rushed down to the beach last Thursday evening with a carrier bag full of coffee jar lids and a small model shuttle.  The photo above and those at the end of this post are the result. 

 I also took some non-Star Trek photos for those of you who couldn't give two figs about such things (i.e. most of you) - and these are them:

That's either the sun setting or everyone in Cromer forgot they left the gas on as they lit a fag.

'Tis Done

Who doesn't enjoy a battered old groyne surrounded with spume to start their evening?

 Well, 'tis done.  My Ten Day Blogging Challenge that I didn't advertise or commit to or even admit to doing ends with this post.

 What?  Your ten day challenge?  I did most of the posts!

 Pish posh.  It's done now.  No one will care who did what.  Although, they might care to know that it was I who took control of your button pushing finger while you were swinging Camera around and snapped the photo on the right.  I had to time it just right to get the horizon and sea wall to line up with the railings.  Pretty good, eh?

 Bah!

Yeah, bah!

 Oh, don't you start.

 I'm off to bed.

Cloud Mouth

 Under threat of a Sideboard Invasion if I don't make an appearance before Friday, here I am!  (Although, I'm not convinced that the invasion won't go ahead anyway...) 

 I don't have much to say for myselves, so may I present a selection of photographs depicting some of what I have been up to this month: 

From the 3rd . . .

This huge cloud-with-a-mouth loomed over the garden, but moved on when I hid under the trees pointed out that my sister (who lives down the road) has more meat on her bones than me.

 

From the 13th . . .

I popped down to the beach for an early morning swim - the first of the season!

(I had to brighten this photo considerably in order to make it resemble how the beach really looked - Camera didn't like being pointed at the sun, I suppose...)

Highlights and Horrors of Hexenhäusli Device Gardens

 Hello!  I thought I'd better pop in as it's been a couple of weeks since I last surfaced.  I don't have very much to say for myself, but I do have some photos from the gardens here at Hexenhäusli Device.  

 Above is the second showing from that Hippeastrum in last month's Of Hawkmoths and Drag Queen Knock-Offs (you can see the first set of blooms in the photo below). 

 To the right, the first little 'pineapples' of my Pineapple Lilies (Eucomis comosa 'Sparkling Burgundy') sprouted earlier this month. 

 And below, rocketing up in front of the jasmine, clematis, and permanent pea (everlasting sweet pea), is a double white hollyhock (sourced from Delargo Seeds back in 2021).  I sowed it and its many siblings last year (along with some other seeds - as seen here), and while most found their way to a border at the side of the house and flowered that year, this one was a spare that I tucked in beneath the trellis next to the paysho.  It didn't seem to do very well then, but it was obviously establishing itself ready for this year.

This was taken on 2nd July.

The hollyhock is now even taller at just over three metres (that's nearly 10 feet)

Sea Cows at Sunset

 Had I been a minute or two earlier, and that annoying cloud bank not been there, last night's sunset is something like what you would have seen at the end of last month's Summer Solstice.  Although, preferably without the sea cows...

White Cliffs of Over(strand)

Uh, oh...  This doesn't seem right?

 On Thursday, knowing that the temperatures on Friday were going to hit at least 30° and therefore any outside venturing then would result in heatstroke, and crisping of skin followed by complete desiccation, I slapped on some sunscreen, stepped outside and sloped off down to the beach to get some fresh air and have a paddle.

 

 

 Only it didn't quite go according to plan...

A sudden embiggening of the landscape alerted me to the fact that I had inadvertantly happened upon the Lilliputian Cusp interface again, promptly becoming debigulated.

Creatures From the Black Lagoon* - And a Load of Tits

 

 While having a little break by the pond, I thought I'd try and take a few photos of some of the creatures that dwell within.  The frog tadpoles are quite big now, and have started to grow legs as you can see above. 

 They'll come in handy for certain spells... 

 We'll see about that!  And most of the young water boatmen (Greater waterboatman {Notonecta glauca} above and below) will leave the pond and fly to other bodies of water later in the summer.

This dragonfly nymph seemed to be attempting to get out of the pond...

A Paddle At Last!

 I've got to prepare for an invasion - I suspect The Little Witch and Vom Smallhäusen will appear any moment now - so, as I have just finished sorting out the photos I took on this morning's drift along the beach, I thought I'd pop the least boring up here for you to peruse while I'm battening down the hatches etc.  Besides, I haven't furnished you with beach pics for quite some time, so this will be a nice(?) change from Triffids and such (although there are some triffids here).

 I shall return once normality has descended upon Hexenhäusli Device once more...

Not More Hats of Dame Barbara Cartland?!?

 Would you excuse me, please.  I'm just navigating from one disaster to another.  Having finally got to grips with The Great Comment Catastrophe, I now find myself without a suitable hat for the Queen's Platinum Jubilee.  I've already missed nearly two days of it because Liz threatened to revoke my Royal Garden Party invitation if I didn't attend at least one day out the four suitably attired.

 I've resorted to trawling through Dame Barbara Cartland's photo album* looking for inspiration because I couldn't find a thing I liked in her Collectors' Edition brochure...

You'll probably need to click then right-click and open in a new window to see this properly

 I quite like her witch's hat, but that's probably because it's very similar to my day-to-day wear.  However, I think I'm going to go for the swimming cap (although I may dispense with one of the masts and its array of sails). 

 Now I just need to get measured up.  Does anyone know if the Infomaniac House of Beauty is open today?

 

* More of the Pink Dame's photo album can be found here.

Damselflies Doing It!

 Aaaaarrrrgh!  I'm having the devil of a time trying to comment both here and on any other Blogger blog.  Blogger tells me I'm either not signed in (clearly I am as I've managed to post this!), or 'There has been an error.  Please try later."  Oh, shit off!

 I wonder if this is the same problem that Melanie was having last month?

 Wordpress blogs don't seem to be affected though, as I've just commented successfully at Ms Scarlet's...

 As I can't be arsed to deal with this nonsense right now (too hot!), here are some photos from my earlier escapades around the pond:

Common Blue Damselfly (Enellagma Cyathigerum) on a Primula leaf

Damselflies Doing It!!!  And right in front of me too...

If you don't sort yourself out, Google/Blogger, this could be you...

::

EDIT: 23.05.2022 19:09 - I thought it Blogger had sorted itself out, but after four comments, I got the dreaded "Failed to publish comment.  Please try again later" message.  [sad face]

 I'm not ignoring you, I promise!

EDIT: 23.05.2022 19:14 - It worked once more then decided that was enough.  Grrrrrrr....

My Small Red Bush* - A Garden Photos Event Announcement

* Which could never be confused with Ms Scarlet's Big Pink Bush™

 

 Prompted by Mr Tonking's recent seed spreading effort and Dinah taunting Us with her bat (also, to a lesser extent, Jon's pricking out) I bring you the first reminder (following February's general announcement) to get gardening and to photograph evidence of your efforts ready for: 

The House of

I N F O M A N I A C

Garden Photos Event 2022

 

 As with the last couple of years, this year's event will be held in November and will follow straight on from the now traditional Hallowe'en prelude, Terrifying Triffidery.  There is no theme for the main event but, inspired by a comment from Dinah, I would like you to search out old photos of gardens you tended - or even played in as a child - from years/decades/aeons ago and send in one or two (or more, if you feel so inclined) to be featured along with your efforts from this year.  Remember to provide captions and/or blurbs to go with your photos, too!

☙❧

 Right.  Now that's out of the way, here's how the Hexenhäusli Device Gardens are coming along:

 Above is the titular Small Red Bush (which was a free gift with last year's two bat flower rhizomes which came to naught.  Bah!).  And to the left, an orchid (that first featured here) that until recently was positioned on my bathroom windowsill, but once it flowers it drips sticky nectar/sap everywhere so it's now outside in my Gin Time Corner.  You can see it festooning a stem of a Himalayan Honeysuckle below.