All Hale the Cool

Yippee to closing the door on the summer heat.

Yep it's time to dig out something a little fluffy and to snuggle up.

But it's not like we have to stuff a cupboard with supplies and hibernate for the winter. Nope. Not here at the Goldie. Here it's still thongs and shorts and walks at the beach, paddling and playing the 'Sand Game' with Dog during the day and donning a pair of less than sexy socks and a layer or two at night.

In London I had a rule that I'd wear sandals until the last holidays before winter just in an effort to extend the summer and this sometimes meant bare toes in the snow. Some people saw this as a little odd. My expectations then were different. 10 degrees C was considered positively balmy, and now I reckon 10 degrees is just a little chilly.

Sandals were finally swapped for boots and I had quite the range. Flat, low, high, cheap, stupid expensive and in about every colour, but you know what, even though I whinge about the heat here and I reminisce fondly about the long cold grey winter months, I don't fancy wearing boots anymore. I am not at all sure I'd be able to squash my feet into 'em after all these years of thongs and bare feet.

So no boots, but scarfs and wraps and little blankets over knees at night. Bloody bliss.

And loads of slow cooked dinners with scrummy sauces and loads of veg.

And closed windows to keep the bloody road works noise out.

Shorter days and pale blue skies, well except for today cos it's raining and I like the grey closed in rainy skies too.

From this vantage I cannot recall ever whining about the long cold wet winters in London, but it must have worn a bit thin, cos a number of the paintings we have hanging were chosen in a bid to eliminate the gloom.

We were driving home one Sunday with the top down and we stumbled across an art show out in the boondocks countryside somewhere and we popped in and fell for a couple of wildly bright paintings, I said to Stevie that if we hung these in the house we'd never notice the blahs of winter. So we paid for 'em and then faced the very real problem of fitting them into the back seat of the car, and then yep, you guessed it, it started to rain. I can't remember HOW we got 'em home but I'm glad we did, cos even here on the other side of the world they brighten things up.

Boredom must consume folk who live in places with no seasonal variety. 

I just don't even want to imagine it.