Sunshine and slippers

Hasn't the unexpected and unseasonal sunshine been lovely?

Maybe it'll stay like this until about September or October. What do you mean? I can't help it, I'm an optimist. Even in the face of adversity - like when my cooker blew up on Friday night just as I was going to prepare a sumptuous feast. Ok, so I was cooking frozen cheesey pancakes, but one man's meat is another man's poison, and I LIKE cheesey pancakes. I had no power, except for the lights, and at first I thought it was the television, which would have been a bit of a pain, then I thought it was the PC - which would have been a disaster, but fortunately, a foray into the meter cupboard to inspect the RCD thingy revealed that it was in fact, just the cooker, which is obviously an optional extra in my house, and not worth worrying about. So I didn't. And I still haven't. It's nearly summer and everyone knows you only eat salads in the summer, don't you. I do think, though that it should still be under guarantee - I've only had it for about four years, and in vintagerockchick years, that means it's only about 3 months old, given the number of times I've used it. My Dad reckons it's caked up with dust.

You wouldn't think I'd still be prepared to sit for another art class would you?? Well, clearly I just don't learn, so that's just what I did on Saturday. It was lovely to meet up with a group who I used to paint with - I haven't seen them for ages. I'm only going to put one rendition on here - Dave said he would make me look 20 years younger - and I think he has! Look what my friend Jane has bought me! I'm not really a slipper wearer, I think my aversion to indoor footwear dates back to when my Mum sewed black elastic across my slippers when I was a child, to stop me kicking them off - but these are the most beautiful specimens. Leopardskin ballet pumps with pink ribbons and real pink diamonds on the front. Jane says she got them because she was fed up with my indoor boots (the closest I get to slippers) leaving black marks on her kitchen floor. To be honest though, after an hour of my pirouetting around her kitchen in these little beauties, I think she would welcome the odd black mark.

Sunday was a beautiful day, and so we went for a lovely walk to the Woodman - where we had scampi and chips. Obviously, under normal circumstances I would have cooked a Sunday roast, but what with having no oven or anything .............

Finally, sorry if I'm becoming a bit of an ornithological bore, but look at the latest visitors to my bird feeder - I saw a bird I'd never seen before a couple of weeks ago, and yesterday I managed to get a photo of not one, but a pair of nuthatches. Bill Oddy, eat your heart out.

Aren't they lovely. And such an original excuse for being a bit late for work - "Sorry, but I was taking pictures of the nuthatches on my bird feeder". It worked for me.