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The walkers walking “two by two”

And we wore masks too. We passed two friends on the road and two dogs

When I got home the sheep were shouting for their concentrates. Di came out with me and she hand fed the girls and Tufty. Toffee was a bit shy but most of the others were friendly.

Tufty the ram
Perky – who looks ready to “pop”

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Grandchildren are the crown of their grandparents (Proverbs)

That certainly resonates with me – all the joy and delight without the responsibility and work. Today one of the jewels in that crown celebrates her seventh birthday.

Not only were we blessed to hold her on the day of her birth but my parents, her great grandparents, were able to share the joy
Growing up with regular visits to us and the animals
Blessed with a baby brother
A first two wheeler bike for an earlier birthday
Dressed up at Purim time two years ago
And out with her daddy for “cocktails” that same year
And now she is seven! Bless her, and all the children, and may they be able to return to school and their friends in the year ahead.
Great grandma and carer behind the window this morning.
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It’s good to take a daily constitutional but

Sometimes I need a reason to get me up and out of the house.

These Silkie eggs were my reason today

I took them to the gate at a friend’s house and left them for her to pick up as I walked away.

Oh how we would have enjoyed a chin wag over a cup of tea. But that was what we used to do in “the old days”. When I was a child I used to ask my paternal grandmother to tell me stories about “the old days”.

Let’s hope that these old days will soon be history.

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Making a mountain out of a……..

Molehill! I love those little piles of earth that appear, randomly in the field

On a dry day I fill a wheelbarrow and then shovel the mole-sifted earth into storage bags

We use the soil for potting up seedlings.

The solitary moles live (in their millions) beneath ground digging up to 20 metres of tunnels each day. Their digging helps to aerate the soil although their molehills can annoy gardeners and even farmers. They feed on earthworms and only look for a mate during the months of February through to May. The gestation period is six weeks and the pups leave the underground nest about 6 weeks after birth. It’s a solitary, underground existence with average life expectancy of 3 years. Occasionally we spot moles above ground but then they become prey for the cats or buzzards. They are safer staying below with Nigel and Mabel on the prowl!

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If anyone can understand this – good luck

The “happiness engineers” at WordPress have given advice about the problem of those without iPhones or iPads being able to watch the videos that I occasionally post. Well if you can understand the advice you’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din!

Norman (Automattic) 

Jan 15, 2021, 11:06 UTC 

Another friend said she can watch the videos in edge but not chrome.
Lots saying they used to be able to see them but not for some months

Hi,

I saw that your movies are originally uploaded as MOV. I suggest converting them to .mp4 format using tools like https://handbrake.fr . MOV is an Apple Proprietary format and hence can play tricky at times. I have read reports about later versions of iPhones using some proprietary ways to compress and save videos. Those may not work reliably on non-apple devices.

You may want to ask your friends to update to latest version of Edge, since the older ones were terribly buggy. Microsoft recently changed the base of the Edge browser to Chromium (same as Chrome’s ) . So hopefully it should work well if they all update to the latest version.

Regards,

Norman – Happiness Engineer | Automattic Inc. |

Well I downloaded Edge to my laptop but I still couldn’t see the videos ! And I’m not clever enough to convert the videos (plus I would lose the spontaneity of the blog. So it ain’t happening – sorry!)

If anyone is that keen to see the short videos then send me a comment with your mobile number and I will WhatsApp them to you).