The Great Portmeirion Discovery in November!
Things on walls; I’m a bit hopeless at jig-saws; PupperJack is startled by an intruder
I have mentioned before the habit in my neighbourhood of leaving things we don’t want on our garden wall for anyone to take if they want it. All kinds of things appear.
On one of our daily rambles PupperJack and I passed a wonderful jardiniere — a plant pot cover with a separate, but matching, column for it to stand on — I love these and have a couple at home already. There was also an enormous plant pot cover, too.
Ooh — I really, really wanted them but they were way too big and heavy for me to carry plus dog pulling on lead at every available other-dog sighting, howling gale, rain raining, horse whip (for potential dog thieves), plus bag of PupperJack’s poo — and we had to leave the pots behind!
Oh, no! I so wanted them! I dragged myself away but I was thinking that when I got home I’d get in the car and go back and get them. By which time someone else might have got them; maybe I could call someone to come out and fetch me and them.
All this time, though, I AM trying to declutter my house, not get more stuff in it.
It was sooooooo hard leaving that jardiniere and plant pot behind. So hard!
So we marched determinedly, and virtuously off, rounded the corner and … there was a Portmeirion vase! On a wall!
There was no way I could leave that behind!
It was in perfect nick, too. And was obviously my just reward for not trying to drag the plant pots home.
Although … maybe I could still get the car, and go back to get the plant pots …
The photo above shows the one from the wall — plus some roses I put in — it didn’t come with the roses — the one at the head of this story shows it in relation to two smaller Portmeirion vases I already had, which shows you how big the new one is. Fab!
Teeny-tiny crab-apples! They are so very teeny-tiny that the holly berries to the right of them — above — are almost as big as the crab-apples.
Oh, look — another piece of Portmeirion pottery. I already had this one.
And another. Also, already owned.
Seriously, though, how can I possibly declutter my house while pieces of Portmeirion are trying to get in?
I got out a jig-saw. I get one out every year. It’s always a different one, although always a Christmas picture. And, every time, I think to myself: “Yep. This is it, Susan. This year you’ll learn the art of being so chill, of being so serene, that you can get a jig-saw done.”
Every year it gets to the stage you see in the photo. And then it gets put away again. Next January we’ll know if I’m chill and serene enough yet to do a jigsaw puzzle.
This intrepid warrior-doggo ventures out every day exploring the wild, wild world outside. It holds no terrors for this courageous doggo. No.
So when there was a fusillade of hysterical barkings in the dead of night (well — evening) I knew that something serious was up. I leapt up from my desk (where I work upstairs) and tiptoed downstairs ready to defend doggo from whatever peril was threatening.
I found him in the breakfast-room dogfully defending his house and its occupants from this outrageous breach of our security.
It was dark, so I set my phone to flash and took a photo to catch the miscreant in the act and have a record.
That worked. It was this blimmin’ deer, hanging around on the wall. PupperJack told him off good and proper.
(He’s only been hanging around there all year …) (Not gonna tell PupperJack that.)
It’s the first November for a few years that I think I might get through relatively uninterrupted so I’ve started NaNoWriMo
I’ll be doing it under the name of: montrose.
My aim is to get 90,000 words down in first draft of the third in my ‘White Lies’ series of slice-of-life rom coms.
In the meantime, the temperature has become properly wintry; the energy bills are shooting up; and PupperJack and I would quite like to hibernate. Illustrated by above doggos. However, we’re leaping out of bed, in the cold and the dark, at six in the morning to do our 3,000 words for NaNoWriMo. Oh, yes!
Until next time — keep warm, you all!
Dennett started the Photo-a-Day Challenge to help combat the pandemic blues. Since then many others kindly share their week with us:
Erika Burkhalter, Anne Bonfert, Tracy Aston, Lisa Bolin, Juan O. Aguilera, David Wade Chambers, June Nguyen, Mia Verita, LensAfield, Barbara Radisavljevic, Diana Lotti, Barb Dalton, Kim Zuch, K. Barrett, Penny Grubb, Ellie Jacobson, Shruthi Sundaram, Jillian Amatt — Artistic Voyages, Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles, Ann James
(If your name should, or should not, be on this list, please let me know.)
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