Holne three

The end of our stay in Holne was marked by a cold. A cold of the three day variety which seems to have replaced the nine day variety of old: three days coming, the ill bit; three days here, the messy bit; and, three days going, convalescence. So on this occasion: sore throat coming on the first day; a couple of feverish, sweaty nights; and, convalescence on the third day, that is to say Friday. Quite a lot of day time dozing, not to say sleeping.

Quite a lot of bird activity outside, absence of bird feeders notwithstanding, but all too fast to catch what it might have been.

A couple of cyclists in the lane, pulling up from Holne, at around 15:30 on Thursday afternoon. They said they were on their way to Plymouth - so they had a few hills to conquer on the way through Hexworthy and up onto the Princetown Road, but largely downhill after that, as once testified by a couple of cyclists in the Fox Tor café there, cyclists who had just come up from Plymouth. While I would not have made it much past Venford Reservoir, and that starting from our cottage, rather than down in Holne.

A couple of walkers coming the other way, but they declined to say what they had been up to, so probably not much.

A few catkins but no nuts that I could see in the hedgerows. I don't suppose that flailing the hedges every year or so helps.

Getting towards the end of 'Bleak House', I decided that it was time to retire the dust jacket - not usually going in for either sellotape once favoured by FIL or the plastic covers favoured by libraries - and not having either to hand. And now I come to think of it, I don't think my father went in for dust jackets at all. None of his classics - nearly all small format from Oxford or medium format from Everyman's - had them in my time, and there must have been dozens of them, so I suspect he made a point of chucking them at purchase. Perhaps they were untidy to his tidy mind.

On Friday, fortified by super-orgo-Devon honey and super-orgo lemons. These last being so important that they were sold by weight, rather than by the each. But not so important that one of the two was not well past its sell by date, with not all that much inside. Maybe the not-orgo wax they spray on regular lemons helps them to keep a bit longer.

But sufficiently idle to notice that our kettle had a square top rather than a round top, as snapped at the top. I might also say that we might have been in darkest Dartmoor, but the tap water was not as soft as that in Exminster. It did fur the kettle up a bit, although nothing like as much as it does here in Epsom.

In any event, by Saturday I was fit to admire the fine view over the misty hills first thing, and, more important fit to drive.

A good run, with BH taking the middle third and I was alert enough to capture the Wellingtonia noticed at reference 1. On the other hand I missed the turning into Guildford Cathedral off the A3, where we had intended to picnic, and so we had to picnic at home, in the kitchen. Seemed a bit silly to picnic on our own back patio when it was neither particularly warm nor sunny.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/10/wellingtonia-47.html.