It's Still Life

1. Fabulous old words that really shouldn’t be archaic, like GLOAM or GLOAMING archaic, twilight, dusk, the fall of the evening. Germanic fem. 

2. Spicy tinned tomato and limp vegetable soup with orzo and big fat prawns. That’s orzo not ouzo. And that’s a real photo, not AI. 😂

I love emptying the fridge and calling it soup.

3. Thankful for an extra thick blanket on the bed; it was -7C one night. For you Fahrenheit-favouring folk, that’s about 19.5F.

4. Thankful that all the frozen-dead-wilted-rotting summer plants are now composting into lovely stuff for the worms to play in. Everyone needs playspace.

5. Marks & Spenser boot socks for my walks in the forest. And black and white poke-a-dot gummy wellies — I might need a new pair; these are getting a tacky, gummy stickiness about them.

6. Thankful for familiarity: ScandiKitchen delivered my order of proper stinky-squeaking cheese, pickled herring plus another in curry sauce, Baltic smoked mackerel, and salty liquorice, my favourite pate (leverpostej), and Danish salami (that’s for he who must be appeased occasionally)

7. An early night in a nice warm bed with a book, Scattered Minds by G Maté. This book is a complete eye-opener.

8. Thankful we finally have a gas and electricity “Smart Meter” that works. I won’t have to crawl through winter-twiggy bushes to read itsy-bitsy numbers on a little box, and then tell EDF what our numbers are. Smart meter, my arse. It took 4 years for Électricité de France to replace it.

9. Thankful for an efficient international postal service that delivers to the correct address. I won’t complain that it took 10-days. Nope, I won’t.

I won’t.

10. A walk in the forest, kicking up leaves, breathing in the cold Nordic air (that’s the prevailing wind direction lately) — laughing and howling (it’s exercise) at the fog. That’s a real photo, not AI. Pretty as a picture.