We had guests from California and they fancied walking The Great Ridge. The problem; it’s the Bank Holiday! A nice quiet start from Hope, few people and a gradual climb. Our two women [...]

My recent article on bluebells at Chatsworth reminded me of other flowers I love. The fields around Bradwell are currently displaying masses of meadow saxifrage. When I lived down south this was [...]

I set myself a number of objectives each year, not written down but purely cerebral. Seeing some bluebells is one of these and here they are shown in a wood above Chatsworth. Flowers are a great [...]

I was out in the garden and a neighbour was playing with his toddlers. They were laughing and having great fun. Suddenly, I flicked back to the 1950’s and my three sisters, all of us out in [...]

Spring is sprung and the tulips are out. This is one of the flower beds in my front garden. It seems to have taken ages to actually flower but now it is out in all its glory. If you plant mixed [...]

I was very close to my sister Sally. However, she married a props master from the film industry and he killed her. Not murder, of course, rather than circumstances, but that is another story. I [...]

I am washing up and then suddenly laugh to myself; does everybody do this? My laugh is about me reflecting on existence, the sheer absurdity of life. A couple of years ago, when we needed to buy [...]

Ann has had a problem with our bread machine: flat loaves. Speaking to an expert on bread baking for Panasonic, the expert suggested that there is a national problem with bread. It appears that [...]

Am I gullible? I love all those health articles in the newspapers but you really have to wonder. The essential food for my leukaemia is liver, the giver of iron. I read one story which [...]

The man in the cubicle next to me uttered the immortal words, “how does the doctor know what my prostate is doing by sticking a fingure up my backside?” I laughed to myself even [...]

Whilst I was pontificating about creating a vegetable garden, it struck me that I forgot to mention turf. Firstly, it’s that green stuff under your feet. Secondly, its perhaps the one plant [...]

I am reading various publications promoting the growing of vegetables. This is to save money but also to create healthy food for us to eat. Most of us realise that supermarket vegetables are [...]

Talking to somebody in Bradwell the other day, they told me they had read my latest book. I hung on to every word, such readers being rarer than hen’s teeth. They wanted me to do for [...]

For energy, we don’t really need sun as long as we have good light. Then the solar panels transmit power to our battery. One day last week, the battery reached 90%. That confirms what I was [...]

I once spent a week, with Ann, studying lichens at a Field Centre. It taught me that after miles of walking, searching, the best lichens were often in the vicinity, usually where I parked the [...]

An author writing about the Cairngorms discussed the psychological landscape as opposed to the physical one. I wondered what that meant. Psychological, of course, relates to the mind or mental [...]

For many people it has become de riguer to claim childhood poverty. However, this must stop. It is a valid claim only to those of us who really experienced childhood poverty. What is that, you [...]

An author called Richard Askwith has written a book called The Race Against Time: Adventures In Late Life Running. He has previously written about fell running but, at the age of 62, has now [...]

Well, here we are, recovered from the virus highlighted in my last post. It was, not to overstate the case, the worst virus we ever caught. Paracetamol disappeared down throats at an amazing [...]

Ann and I just want to be together, even in illness. Tuesday lunchtime and the decline begins; by evening we are unstable on our legs, headache, body aches and then the cough. I tested but no [...]

The round walk at Bradwell is a joy. However, I would say that because it is also the regular run for Ann and myself, assuming we are not up in the high hills. Consequently, I thought I would [...]

As I observe the current mental health epidemic, I find myself disagreeing with those who feel a need to stop work. For certain, they see work as the problem and not the solution. My experience [...]

I note a lot of people showing overly concern about longevity in the modern world. It’s as if they are embarrassed about dying too early, that it looks bad for the family. I understand [...]

Enigma abounds in this amazing country of ours. It often arises as something done by people in the past, and yet we don’t know why or when. Stonehenge might be the greatest enigma but what [...]