It was a wet start to the morning as I went around with my buckets.

Haakon and Iacs

Kolka looked particularly striking when I took this photo (but how I wish I had included the top of her ear!)  Possibly another potential album cover for a solo female artist.

Kolka

This breakfast, I managed to place everyone’s buckets where no one else could get them. I have few goals in life but I consider this the beginning of a successful day.

Vitamin and Fivla

And this is Iacs having a thought, but no one is sure what it was.

Iacs in front of Stourbrough Hill

This lot finished their breakfast and took to their container.  They are not huge fans of the rain and I refused to give them more hay.

All of them were in except for Albie who hovered about outside or in the other container on his own.

In revenge for not letting Albie join the gang, I went amongst them with scissors and trimmed all their tails – they were beginning to drag along the ground.  Waffle was less than impressed at this.  Tough, it needs to be done, I told him.

Then, as I had some time to myself, I sat with Lambie and we listened to classical music together.  Recently Lambie has been in the wars – he has been fighting with possibly Gussie and lost his magnificent horns (cough – he had nubbins) and there was blood.  Lambie is now very stiff and sore from this and I hoped sitting listening to music with me would help.

Apparently, it did. I love his cheeky grin.

And ‘Bert turned up too.  When arguments break out, it does no one any good, I told them.

I needed to go to town for rations – horse, dog, chicken/duck and people.

As Pepper was hopping up and down by the front door on my way out, I decided to take her with me for company.

First stop was the animal feed merchant, where Pepper is allowed inside but back in the car to drive round the back to collect the big sacks.  She watched everyone and everything.

Next, “the Street” – aka Commercial Street where I went to the Bank, etc. chemist, Jamieson’s sheep field…..

There were lots of dogs around and Pepper wanted to say hello to all of them.  I always asked first before letting Pepper talk and some were nicer than others. We definitely stayed away from two Shelties who were shouting their heads off at us.  There was an enchanting little terrier from the USA who was divine and beautifully behaved.  I was so tied up with leads and bags, I couldn’t take a photo. I wish I had.

The street was full.  There were two boats in so masses of folk milling around looking for things to do and stuff to buy.  “Buy my sheep, buy my sheep”, I whispered as we walked past.

The M.S.C. Virtuosa – (6,334 passengers) and the M.S. Island Sky (118 passengers) were in port.

Having done our messages, Pepper and I quickly left.  The weather was beginning to close in too.

Pepper had to wait in the car while I went round Tesco’s so I shared my lunch as a reward for her good behaviour, and drove home in the pouring rain.

By now, the rain was tipping it down and all the ponies were in the container feeling hungry so I made up four haynets because it is only going to get worse tonight and I want them to have something in their tummies.

The rain lashed down and then there was thunder and lightning too, which, for us, is very unusal.

Obviously I felt so sorry for the ponies and shouted for them to come up to the shelter but they refused – so I left them, thinking “your choice”.

However, I did go outside in full wet-weather-survival-suit gear and let the sheep out of their field (they didn’t need any encouragement) so they could shelter in their shed.

While I was outside there was a lightning strike which made me cry.  I have no idea why I did this. I was howling, tears dripping, snot, the full works, with a huge amount of throat-rising anxiety.  It has taken me all day to come off this particular mountain.  So not like me.  I am not scared of thunder and lightning and in fact was looking forward to photographing it but failed. I have no idea what happened.  Perhaps it was a delayed reaction to when BeAnne (my dearest darling Patterdale who is no more) ran away many years back in a thunderstorm and was lost for 24 hours – that feeling of worry and utter dispair when a beloved has not come home.

So, once everything weather-wise had calmed down, I took the dogs for a walk so I could get some perspective and breathe again.

Eventually the Shetland ponies came up and I gave them two haynets so they could feel full and happy.

This was gratefully received and helped to make me feel better.

Althought not BeAnne, Pepper was a good subsitute and has been with me all day.

Even offering a sympathetic ear to my silliness.

Later, poo-picking, I realised everyone was fine and we have all weathered this particular storm.

You’ve gotta love a man with a digger and today they arrived first thing to dig out the muddy gateway of the winter track – the one where Newt struggles to walk through – so I had to feed the Shetland ponies away from there as a) they would offer to help, b) escape and c), d) and e) be very annoying….. a lot.  T’is their way.

I know this.  They have form.  Many a fencer has been “helped” and had his tools taken off him and sandwiches not-so-very-politely removed.  I have heard the outraged screams and pretended not to notice.

Not mentioning any names but honestly the finger points mostly Waffle (and all his friends).

So the digger and the driver were spared the expert help of the Shetland ponies because I shut the gate first.

However, the boys didn’t seem to mind.  As they are not used to eating from real buckets (we favour the indestructable rubber trug method), they had a great time trying to work out how to steal from each other.

And my new and improved gateway is now a vision and ready for winter.  Hopefully it will harden up and dry out in the next few months and then be ready now firm, not waterlogged mud for winter and not descend into another soggy pile of gutter (Shetland dialect for mud).  This is an experiment.

Well, if I had nothing much to write about the other day, I have even less today.  I really need to go out more (ugh * shudders *) or stop writing this blog before I bore everyone to death.

But my same old, same old routine suits me perfectly.  I want everyone to stay exactly how they are – well and looking good.  It is all I need but I do realise that this may not be for everyone.

The excitement of poo-picking the track every afternoon listening to an audiobook, while I am being stalked by five creepy neighbours is all that ever happens.

I like to spend my time watching Newt annoy Silver, and anyone else who gets in the way of Newt’s World Domination.  The smallest v. the biggest of the Shetland ponies and we all know who wins.

You guessed correctly.

But I have changed my daily routine slightly – I now make my sheep in the afternoon and have gone back to transcribing my Great Great Aunt’s diaries as I really want to finish this project in my lifetime.  I have reached 1944 and, although the writing is teensy-tiny and almost illegible, I only have 17 more years to do if my eyesight doesn’t give out first.

I found this tucked into the 1944 diary and spent some time trying to work out each “interpretation”.  I thought it was amusing, and if you have trouble just try saying the words out loud.  I will admit that I had to have help on a few.

The answers:
Charing Cross
Marble Arch
Strand
St Paul’s
Hyde Park Corner
Baker Street for Madame Tussaud’s
Mansion House
Tottenham Court Road
Hampstead
Elephant & Castle
Oval
St John’s Wood
Hammersmith Broadway

Very clever.