An Early Start To Friday.

Driving Bob to work at the crack of dawn.

We've had a cold start to the week and the last few days we've even lit a fire. A real one in our old Aga stove. Best warmth ever and as it is a very old stove and still stands on iron legs, it affords our cat a permanent warm sleeping place underneath.

Today the cold has lessened a little bit but it has been replaced by rain. Reversing our car out the garage had rather a romantic feel about it. Darkness accompanied by the metallic sound of raindrops falling on the car roof. I didn't have to drive far and was home ten minutes later.

The roads feel and look so much nicer this early in the day and they are also less crowded. Bob's off to harvest grapes somewhere in the Neusiedl area and will be gone all day. An adventure for him, one he loves.

A while ago my neighbour came over to ask if she could have some of our plums because for some reason our trees were the only one in the neighbourhood bearing fruit. Actually laden with it!

Well, I think it had to do with not mowing our lawns and thus providing an all day buffet for bees, which they thanked us for by pollinating our orchard.

There was a knock on the door yesterday afternoon which gave Mausi and I a bit of a startle as we'd both gone into that elusive yet unbelievably addictive afternoon couch slumber...she was curled up on my stomach and rather useful too, moonlighted as a heater...she who let off a strangled meow at being pulled back from chasing an imaginary rabbit.

My neighbour had come over to bring us a jar of this plum jam made from our plums and naturally we chatted for quite a while. It might not seem a lot or even exciting but for me it was just nice to have this neighbourly contact. Most of us tend to hide behind our imagined distrust towards others which really is just a one way ticket to loneliness. Village life, love it.

Biggi