journal entries 18th to 25th November.

First day done of dog sitting for Ruby. We had a lovely morning walking from Plumpton Rocks to Knaresborough and then through Starbeck to Harrogate, were we had an hour before catching the bus back around 1pm. Ruby ate her dinner, as did I, and we hardly moved afterwards...

Second day included Lola on a walk to Collingham, alongside the river and back via the golf course. We had a short break for a coffee and some doggy biscuits in Apotheco. Later I managed to read three chapters as I digested three halves of stout(one BD and two Guinness) after I'd taken Ruby for a second meander (down to the river and back) and fed her hungry body. I ate the shepherds pie with the processed maize kernels. Proper grits... I only had to cook thrice before they became soft!? Maybe it's an alkali and time which serves?

Day three ... Oh bugger. 5 pints and a disturbed night. but I am nearly at the end of day four. It's cold. A deep frost. I've been with Lola all day and she has some tender thing between her toes which is causing her some grief. It looks black and swollen and she won't let me near it... Vets on Friday morning for our lass. I may be walking back towards Leeds in the beautiful sunshine if it continues?

Friday morning.

Awake. Fully. Slept deeply and well until 4:30am. Oh well. Coffee time. And a podcast - IOT the Origins of Infectious Disease which is very interesting.

Then another IOT - John Wyclif and tartine de confiture at 6am.

Gathering my stuff together at 6:30 then ablutions prior to departing into the frozen wastes... Winter came early this year.

And then it began to rain...

Looking out this morning I thought 'great snow!' but as I stepped out it had turned to a proper downpour. We've not had one for a while? Since I arrived back from Reus? When was that ... 20th of October.

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Applied for UC before stepping out into the deluge. England had been drying out, but now it wet again! The application process was straightforward, but I have to contact the DWP for them to tell the DWP that I am in receipt of ESA...

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Kind of got stuck in Leeds. Not leaving for Wetherby until 12:22 from Oakwood Clock. But it's OK. I drank three coffees in various locales while enjoying the final volume of the story of Penelope told by Claire North. I returned to Wetherby and had 3 bottles of Paulaner Weisse over three hours and read more chapters until I returned to mum's, for the first night since Thursday, for a bowl of very very tasty allotment grown Bartlett potatoes - not many showed under the soil, but most of my crop of potatoes was good this year (indeed I have, potentially, a few more which I will winckle out this week when the rain passes?