First Saturday in July

I fitted in quite a lot this week despite watching Wimbledon, the England match and catching bits of the Tour and an unexpected drive to Bury St Edmunds hospital to pick up BiL. He's had some tests for something that sounds just like the Angina that his Grandad and Colin had. He'll get another appointment for something, he's not sure what  as he's half deaf and said  he couldn't understand what the doctors said behind their masks!  Everyone has been telling him to get a hearing aid for years.

Monday saw me making a batch of Ricotta cheese again and it's certainly much easier than the Halloumi and more useful as I turned it into 6 portions of Ricotta, Spinach and Pine Nut Lasagna as  before. I've got to be more careful about batch making with no chest freezer as I'd also planned to make a pan of pizza topping this week but found there wouldn't be room for it once the lasagna was boxed and stored away.

I whipped through  this little book when I had no library books. It's about one of the families who took part in a TV series several years ago.

 

Thought it was about time I went swimming again, missed last week, can't remember why - how do weeks fly by so quickly............that's why I do a Saturday roundup of the week - to help me remember what's happened! Only two of us in the slow half of the pool - so a good swim.

Flowers on the table this week - more rosebuds from the garden - pink this time - and still no scent.

On Friday morning I popped over to the coast to see Youngest Daughter and Eldest Granddaughter. I got the hedge cutter back to use because the neighbours on my right told me the Yew Hedge is mine. They said previous owners of my bungalow planted it as soon as they moved in as there was nothing at the front marking the boundary between the two properties. I said "do you love it?" and they said no they didn't like it much at all. So they won't be bothered if it gets replaced sometime by something much more interesting and there are lots of things more interesting than a Yew hedge which just sits there looking big and green.

Summer of Sport update........oh dear, not such a good day in the Men's Singles at Wimbledon yesterday. Dan Evans out in 4 sets. But the young Canadian guy who beat Andy is awfully handsome (if I was 50 years younger!) and may well be one to follow in the future. I always think it's annoying that the Doubles matches only get mentioned in passing because there were 5 British men playing doubles yesterday who are through to the next round. 

I missed most of Le Tour due to the above.

Then of course tonight there is a Very Important football match.

 This week I'm grateful for

• Being able to help with transport for BiL
• A super-douper pile of reading matter
• A warm and sunny Friday at the end of a chilly week

 My plans to go to the re-opening of the Saturday car-boot sale (first since the world came to a halt ) at Needham Market  may get cancelled due to a grotty weather forecast. We shall see.

Hope you have a good weekend.

Back Monday

Sue

The First Library Book Photo for July

I have to set the alarm on my phone to go to the library van since moving here. It arrives up the road at 3.15 which is sort of in the middle of doing afternoon things (this week that means watching Wimbledon!). At Clay Cottage I drove up the road to catch the mobile at a pub in the next village where he came at Noon which seemed easier to remember.

A good looking heap of books that I'd reserved were collected yesterday

From the top down 

Rose Macaulay - Crewe Train - an oldish fiction book - 1926- by the Author of The world My Wilderness - which I loved.

Donna Leon - Falling in Love - another of her crime books set in Venice

Elizabeth Gifford - The Lost Lights of St Kilda. A new to me author this is set in wartime (what on earth am I doing with a historical romance!?)

Mary Paulson Ellis - The Inheritance of Soloman Farthing. This kept popping up as recommended for me - it's classed as a mystery.

Nadia Sawalha - Honey I Home-schooled the Kids. Non fiction by the actress and TV Presenter.

Charlie Carroll -The Lip. A Debut novel set in Cornwall.

Rachel Hore - A Beautiful Spy - Latest novel by this author whose books I always enjoy

Kathleen Hart - Devorgilla Days: A Memoir of Hope and Healing - Non Fiction. I was drawn to this as it's about the author moving to Wigtown - Scotland's book town which we visited and loved.

Cal Flyn - Islands of Abandonment - Non Fiction......A journey to places around the world that for various reasons have been abandoned by humans.

and to the right

Ula Maria - Green: Simple Ideas for Small Outdoor spaces. Full of photos with ideas for small gardens.

Cora Harrison - Murder in an Orchard Cemetary - Crime fiction, latest in a series set in 1920s Ireland

Donna Fletcher Crow - Against All Fierce Hostility. Crime Fiction. 6th in a series of Monastery Murders. Written by an American author but set in this country although this one has the characters traveling to Canada.

 Unusually not many crime fiction this time. I do have several on order -  but some only just published and others with waiting lists, so they'll arrive in due course. There will be two visits from the van this month as it comes every 4 weeks. 

I wonder if they'll have found a new permanent  driver as yesterday was our drivers last day because he's taking an early retirement to look after his disabled wife.. I've known Andrew-the-library-man for years as he was the relief driver for the van when it came to Friston when we were at the smallholding. He sometimes worked at Broomhill library in Ipswich which is where I went when we lived at the Very Small Bungalow and then he's been the regular driver for the last 5 years since I've been in this bit of Suffolk. 

If I get through all the books pictured in the next 4 weeks  I'll be doing very well.

Many Thanks for comments yesterday. Here we are in Suffolk getting below average temperatures for the time of year and needing to click the heating on for an hour in the evenings (Its JULY for goodness sake) while comments from over the pond tell me it's hot, hot,hot and what awful news about the deaths due to heat in Canada

Back Tomorrow

Sue

July Country Days

The July page from An Illustrated Country Year by Celia Lewis

(Puffins for my penfriend on a windy Scottish Island!)

 

 July is named in honour of Julius Caesar and apparently the word July used to be pronounced with the stress on the first syllable as in duly and truly. It changed to the way we say it now during the 17th century.

Dog days. the sultry part of the summer, supposed to occur during the period that Sirius, the Dog Star, rises at the same time as the sun: now often reckoned from July 3 to August 11. a period marked by lethargy, inactivity, or indolence.

Anglo-Saxon names for the month are Heymonath or Meadmonath referring to haymaking and the flowering of the meadows.

And from the other book by  Celia Lewis 'An Illustrated Coastal Year'

.

From the poem by Sara Coleridge..........

Hot July brings cooling showers,

Apricots and gillyflowers.

"Gillyflower is an old name that seems to have been given to a whole group of fragrant flowers in the 14th-16th centuries. One definition says that the name means 'July flowers', derived from the French, juillet , (jillyflowers) This would make sense as French was the language of the Royal Court and was widely spoken. As time passed the name was used for mainly just for Pinks, forerunners of Carnations and the 'clove gillyflower' was Dianthus caryophyllus."

There were no Gillyflowers/ Pinks here so I have remedied that by picking up one from a stall on the Saturday market in Stowmarket. They are not a flower that I've had much success with in the past in other gardens but I'll try again.

There are very few weather saying for the days of July apart from St Swithin's on the 15th although in one of my books I found the following 

If you hear the Cuckoo after Old Midsummer's Day

Ere the end of the year your death duties you'll pay

 

 From the  poem 'January Jumps About' by George Barker (who I'd never heard of until I found this)

July by the sea
sits dabbling with sand
letting it run out of
her rather lazy hand,
and sometimes she sadly
thinks: "As I sit here
ah, more than half the year is gone,
the evanescent year."

That does seem a depressing end to the 1st July post! ......................

But on the plus side the Wimbledon bit of the Summer of Sport was pretty good yesterday with fairly straightforward wins for Cam Norrie and Dan Evans and it was a  nail biting night watching Andy M battling brilliantly through his second round - what a win! Not forgetting  a young unknown British girl Emma Raducanu won through to the next round too.

There have been years when no British player has got further than the first round so to have at least 3 in the 3rd round is a treat to see.

(I had a quick look at Le Tour but time trials didn't seem very interesting to watch. I'm waiting for them to get out into the country and up some mountains so I can see the views! )

Back Tomorrow

Sue