I’m not sure where this week has gone, but it feels like it’s been quite constructive. I do seem to have broken something on the blog though as ads appear to have returned. I’ll try working out how to turn them off.
I took Wilson back to the vet’s on Tuesday, a pre-booked appointment to have some stitches removed but also to see if they had received the outstanding test results. We achieved both, the tests were delayed by a covid outbreak at the lab where they do the analysis but they had now had the outstanding ones. It turns out he has an autoimmune disorder – Pemphigus Foliaceus – on top of everything else that he has. This latter point dictates a certain treatment regime and he’s started on a course of medication. We’re back at the vet’s this coming week for a blood test to see how the treatment is working. I’ve now been able to file an insurance claim and I hope that will be accepted.
I didn’t manage to make it to the 1984 Symposium this week. George Orwell’s – Eric Arthur Blair – was born on 25th June 1903.
Reading. I read an article on The Last Word on Nothing this week that sent me down another rabbit hole. It bought back memories of sitting and watching coastal birds through a telescope in the early 1990’s, in Devon I was counting Avocets. I sat and sketched an avocet and made plans to dust off my telescope and go out and look at coastal birds through it again. The article also mentions a book by Peter Matthiessen – The Wind Birds – which doesn’t look like it was ever released here in the UK, probably because it’s about US coastal birds. I did track down a paperback copy though and I would like to read it, given how much I have enjoyed many of Matthiessen’s other books including the Birds of Heaven, The Cloud Forest and The Snow Leopard.
Watching. The final season of Bosch was released this week, it’s only an eight episode season and I’m nearly finished watching it. If you haven’t watched it yet I recommend it, it’s consistently good from season one through to eight and I’m pleased that it gets to go out on a high. A spin-off series is planned, so there might yet be more.
Great to see the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness video podcast back again
Allotment. I’ve been pretty busy in the garden and allotment this week, I’ve had a lot of Hollyhock plants to transplant into bigger pots, and I still have a tray of seedlings which I’m planning on transplanting out around the garden. These won’t flower until next year, assuming that they survive, but I’m investing in future colour in the garden. I don’t know quite what colour they will be as they are saved seed from a number of different plants and I suspect that there has been some cross pollination. They could be anywhere from jet black to a light pink colour.
My neighbour gave me some sweetcorn plants that she had spare and I’ve planted them out onto the allotment, I didn’t grow any myself this year because of the risk that the badgers will come and knobble them before I get to eat the cobs. So at some point I’ll have to construct some sort of frame around them to keep the badgers at bay!
I’ve also sown Tuscan kale, pak-choi and mixed mizzuna seeds this week.
Links.
The Greatest Walks in Literature.
Half the Trees in Two New English Woodlands Planted By Jays.
Stories to Save The World: A New Wave of Climate Fiction.
That’s it for the week ahead. I have a few diary commitments this week but many are weather dependent. Whatever you are up to take care and stay safe.
Electronic Scrapbook 
Glad to hear that they may be getting a handle on what’s been happening with Wilson. Hoping the treatments go well.
I’ve actually started to do more reading, myself. After Dad passed, last October, we were given what was left of his Reader’s Digest condensed books collection. He really enjoyed those books and even got me interested in them too for a time in the late 90s and early 2000s. Last week, I finally got around to building a new bookshelf and got his collection out of storage, along with mine, and now have them out on display once again. Now that they’re out, I’ve started reading them and have been enjoying it.
Seeing them up on the shelf once again brings back such fond memories for me. Reading from Dad’s collection of RDs (these particular ones are from the early 70s) makes them even more special to me.
Anyway, stay safe over there!
Hi David, great to hear that you are enjoying revisiting those RD books, great that you are also revisiting those memories too.