Sunday Sunshine

 Having found myself awake just before dawn, I thought I may as well go out and see the sunrise as the sky was relatively clear.  In the fifteen minutes it took me to get dressed and make my way to the cliff top, the inevitable clouds had arrived and made things a little more interesting.

It was (and still is) very cold and frosty, so I had to be careful getting down the slope to the promenade. Once down there, I could only get about halfway along before great sheets of extremely slippery ice across the prom (from all the water draining out of the cliffs) halted my progress.  Fortunately, there was a small amount of beach, so I descended the steps to the sand and made my way east.

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Happy

 After the weekend's snowy disappointment, I thought I'd do a happy post to make up for it.  So, without further ado, these are some of my (current) favourite things:

Superstore:

 I found this sitcom on Netflix on Sunday.  Or, rather, Netflix displayed it prominently on the home page and I got suckered in by it.  I watched the little preview (with the sound off - always with the sound off) and thought I saw Ugly Betty.  I kept watching and, yes, there was America Ferrera along with a very attractive Pretty Boy (Ben Feldman), so of course I was going to watch it.  Well, a few minutes of the first episode, anyway...

 It was joyful!  I couldn't stop at the first episode, and now I'm halfway through season 2!  I hadn't realised how much I really needed something light-hearted and entertaining to lift me out of the lockdown doldrums.  I urge any of you who may be feeling a little (or a lot) glum to find something fun to watch or do  (I have also watched a couple of French & Saunders episodes, and 13 Going on 30 starring the delightful Jennifer Garner and adorably handsome Mark Ruffalo).

~o~

A wet, white flurry of mushy disappointment

 It snowed this morning.  A wet, white flurry of mushy disappointment.  It wasn't cold enough for it to be that nice crisp, dry snow that's good to walk in, so I stayed in and made paper globes to replace the Christmas/Winterval baubles on the cake stands in the kitchen.

Blue Bottom and Rainbow

 So, what have I been up to since The Year of Ferrero Rochering Dangerously ended and now?  (Other than that Tippi Hedren moment and Ms Scarlet's First Vinyl meme, of course - see previous post.) 

 Well, apart from work and wandering about the countryside surrounding Hexenhäusli Device, not a lot.  As these photos go to show...

 First up from 27th December, the titular blue bottom and a load of clay: 

Near the end of the End-of-the-Line is a blue bottom!

 

Don't worry, this photo was taken from quite a long way off.

This grey seal pup had just been disentangled from a discarded jacket, and was getting over the ordeal by lounging about waiting for its mum to return from the sea.

Stay, Destiny Foghorn!

 I've been half-heartedly working on a photo-post on-and-off all day, but my heart just isn't in it, so instead, here is my go at Ms Scarlet's meme: "What was the first vinyl single you ever bought?"

 Well, it was "Stay" by Shakespears Sister back in 1992:

 

 In fact, it was the first and only vinyl record I ever bought.  And the only reason for that is that all the cassette tapes and CDs had sold out (although, I'm not sure that I even had a CD player back then?).

~o~

 On a related note, I really wanted to feature French & Saunders' spoof of "Stay" (and "I Don't Care") "Destiny" by Dickens Daughters (which features in the first episode of their fourth series, "Misery"), but there's no clip on YouTube (however, for those of you in the UK, it is on BBC iPlayer!).

Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders as Siobhan Fahey and Marcella Detroit

EDIT: Jon found the clip on DailyMotion:

 So instead (of the clip that wasn't on YT, but is on DM, and can now be found above, meaning that this bit is now surplus to requirements but I'm keeping it as its funny.  Well, I think so anyway...), may I present this exceedingly poor quality, much shorter clip - that I still find pant-wettingly hilarious - from The Mary Whitehouse Experience, performed by David Baddiel and Rob Newman:

 

~o~

Drat!  Perhaps I should have written out this quote for
Ms Scarlet's "Did I Win Yet?" Award/Quiz/Competition/Event thingy?

The Birds

 A new day dawned and, as I was awake and it wasn't raining, I decided to go out on Broom to see the sun rise.  I hadn't taken Broom out for a spin in ages - Autumn and Winter are generally too windy, wet and cold - but as there was only the lightest of breezes and the likelihood of anyone seeing me several dozen metres up (because most people would be still in bed, or nursing hangovers from the night before) was slim, this was as good a time as any.

 After some persuading, a couple of choice swear words, and a good kick, I eventually managed to get Broom airborne.  Then, after only a modicum of cajoling, I enticed it back down so that I could get on!

 A rather wobbly ascent to clear the trees around Hexenhäusli Device, and a stomach-churning plummet over the edge of the cliff later, I managed to get Broom steadied just over the beach huts on the promenade.

The Year of Ferrero Rochering Dangerously

 Good afternoon, and welcome to the 2020 Coven Awards!  We hope you've all been to the loo and got yourself a drink and some snacks, as this does go on a bit.

 I'll say.  I've worn my fingers down to mere nubbins with all the keyboard clacking I've had to do to prepare all this!

 Oh, stop complaining.  You love it really.

 Well, it does keep me from getting bored, I suppose.

Let's hope the same can be said for the poor Blogorati that have to wade through this

miasma of muddled memories and self indulgent claptrap!

 I say!

 Shall we get on with it before this devolves into unrecoverable unpleasantness, hmm?

 Hmmph! As long as you can keep your SubC under control.

 Fine.  Carry on.

 Right.  Here we go: Well, this hasn't been the best year, has it?  However, we're not going to dwell upon the bad as amongst all the toothache, shingles, and Mondays, there were fuchsias, Freakin' Green Elf Shorts (sort of), and Ferrero Rocher!

 

Despite appearances (you know, if you squint a lot and have had a gin or twelve...)

this is not Ms Scarlet, Intergalactic Global Ambassador for Ferrero Rocher.

This is, in fact, a decoy.  Ms Scarlet is cunningly disguised as the youthful,

rather vertically challenged Ambassador's handmaiden, second from right.

(One of the other two at the back might be Charmaine...)

Uh, oh...

I'm just dealing with... something.

Back soon.  I hope... 

P.S. I hope you all managed to enjoy part, if not all, of your day yesterday, and are continuing to do so today?  I shall be visiting your blogs as soon as I trap these little nylon nasties, and round up the others!

Of Baubles and Blog Parties

 As I said to Mistress Maddie on Monday:

I don't have a tree (haven't in years), but I love all your baubles and such.  And you know what?  You have inspired me.  So much so that tomorrow I'm going to the garden centre next door to buy some of the baubles that I've coveted for the last two or three years.

I'm going to find a nice bowl or somesuch and display them with the pine cones that I collected last month.

 Well, I got some, and here is my first effort at displaying them.  This is The Mother's dresser (and the Christmas cake that she made), now complete with be-pineconed & baubled cake stands.

 The pine cones have been in the house for a week or so now, and only a couple of them have opened up.  I'm hoping that now they're subjected to the intense furnace-like temperatures The Father keeps the house, they'll open before the winter solstice.

Sunrise 13

 When I woke up this morning, I was delighted to discover that colour had returned to the world!  Yes, for the first time in what feels like months - although, at most it's only been about three weeks - the morning murk and oppressive, cloudy gloom had buggered off somewhere else leaving the sun to light up the sky.

 Scarcely able to believe my eyes - and after only a modicum of dithering - I decided to forgo my first-thing-in-the-morning coffee and pop down to the seafront to take some photos.  And here they are:

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Overheard and Wonky Words

 I think my old Back Passage has been on display for long enough, but as I don't have anything prepared to succeed it, I thought I'd share something overheard along with some wonky words.

 First, the wonky words: The effervescent Ms Scarlet is hosting the "Did I Win Yet?" Award/Quiz/Competition/Event thingy after she won the said award back in January, here.  As well as a quiz bit - consisting of as many as two (!!) questions about our dear, departed blog friend LẌ - Ms Scarlet has come up with an inspired creative bit in which one must write out a favourite quote and photograph it on a chair! 

 After much roiling and churning of ideas in my overexcited mind, I have settled on a quote, and begun writing it out in an attempt to decide how best to display it.  Here is a little teaser of one of the ideas:

~o~

 Now, on to the overheard.  As I walked down to the beach this morning (for a walk into Cromer), I passed a house undergoing some building work.  From the open front door came a trio of male voices ranging - in order of appearance - from exasperated, to fed up, and finally cheeky:

That Old Back Passage Called Love

 Madam Arcati's latest Delargo Gardens post once again had me reminiscing about the tight, jungly confines of my own Back Passage when I lived in Norwich twenty-odd years ago.  So much so, in fact, that I found myself trawling through reams of old pictures on a USB stick trying to find some photos.

 Well, I did find some, and rather than let all that time and effort go to waste, I thought I'd pop a selection of them up here (because I have nothing else prepared or even remotely ready in draft).  I also searched through my dusty old blog crypt for ancient posts that featured the original Castle DeVice's tiny garden.  Although I lived in Castle DeVice from the back half of 1998 to early 2009, I can only find photos from 2006 onwards (I think that this must have been the time I discovered digital photography)...

 While you explore my back passage, why not listen to Ella Fitzgerald singing about it (she misheard "Back Passage" as "Black Magic", but she is getting on a bit...):

Note: I spent ages getting all the photos in date order, from August 2006 to December 2008.  Then, as soon as I viewed them all together, I realised that they'd look better in month/season order to show the progression of growth, so that's how I've displayed them here.

Late April (2008) - Left: Halfway down my back passage and nearing my back door, an avocado tree (grown from a pit), arum lily (Zantedeschia aethiopica), various ferns, a hanging basket in need of a good sort out, and some bamboo.  

Middle: Just inside the entrance to my back passage are a couple of New Zealand flaxes (Phormium somesuch), heuchera, a tufty old bit of blue-green grass, and some daffs.  

Right: The paysho - or staging area to my back passage - repleat with a potted box (Buxus), rose, bluebells, geranium, daffs, scylla, and violas.