Seeing red

-


‘We apologise… the e-mail didn’t look legitimate however, we can confirm this was a genuine e-mail.’

Did you get this from the Council? If I get a message to say, ‘this is genuine’, I begin to doubt that it is. I first had an e-mail asking me to update my details ‘here’. Now, I don’t know about you, but I was always taught never to press on a link in an e-mail. I ignored it, then I had another message to apologise that the first e-mail did not look legitimate and assure me that it was genuine. I ignored that too.

Undeterred I had another council contact asking me to check my electoral registration, again by pressing on a link, considering the recent scams I have been reading about I rang the council instead. They were very helpful. I am no expert, but I prefer to visit the website directly which I then did using the phone directions.

I have been following the diversion links to my friend’s house. Our little lane is closed, it leads directly to my friend.  But there are road works and when there is a notice saying ‘road works’ you know that the road does not work! I have to go round and follow the signs. There is a new housing estate being built and the builders need access so the road will be closed for several months. How often have you gone past a road closure sign hoping that it is an old sign or that it does not mean your road? I know that I have and regretted it several minutes later. Cars are doing the same here, buzzing past the sign only to reappear dejectedly a little later.

We borrowed a friend’s trail camera last week. You set it up and if any wildlife goes past it switches on and takes a video of any activity. I could not resist going up to it and ‘bombing’ by appearing in front and smiling and waving. Mr T was not amused when he came to check the pictures (though he laughed afterwards). We saw magpies coming to our pool for a drink, moths flying past and an early morning robin coming for a bathe. Not as much as we thought but quite exciting all the same.

It is thrilling to see all our fruit and vegetables ripening too. The blueberries are weighing the branches down and it is hard to pick them fast enough, our tomatoes are turning red and beans and peas are ready. It is all at once and the autumn raspberries are a bit early and are diverting our thoughts towards the beginning of the next season. 

(Taken from my column in the Shropshire Star)



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The dangers of living in the country

-
I know that you might think that living in the country we do not get to see people very much. And it is true that I cannot walk out of my door and have a natter with a next door neighbour and I can’t just pop in to a cafe and catch up with friends who happen to be there. But you would be surprised how often I do meet up with friends – it’s just that you have to make more of an effort and it all has to be arranged and planned and when we do meet – we never stop taking – you see there is so much to say after only having our pets for company. Well, anyway, I am trying to tell you about what happened last night. Now the nights are drawing in we all agreed to meet up for an evening meal in our nearest town to cheer ourselves up. I offered to pick up a friend in a nearby village and drive to the nearest town miles away. What a good time we had catching up on news and ... well, just talking to a person and not a cat or bees or the like. But at the end of the evening I was dismayed to find tha
Read more

Flying through the air in summer

-
Image
Here come the butterflies searching for flowers rich in nectar This is the Peacock with the Holly Blue butterfly They are back! Now the buddleias are in flower the butterflies are here to drink their nectar. I especially love seeing the beautiful red ones. There are whites too, of course, they have been here for some time. We don’t like the whites as much, because they lay eggs on our cabbage plants and, when their larvae hatch, they eat the leaves. But there is another ‘white’ butterfly that has just appeared. It is not quite white, in fact, this is the male and is very yellowy, the yellow of butter. I wonder if this where ‘butter-flies’ got their name. The female is harder to spot as she is a cream colour. I like them in the garden because they do not eat our cabbages, their caterpillars eat buckthorn leaves. Once you have seen them with their big yellow wings flopping around you will never mistake them for cabbage whites. There is something else flopping around our garden, but
Read more

Home from hospital (again)

-
Image
Bang, crash flash. It was not a thunderstorm but noises in my head as I gradually came back to consciousness. My operation was over and I slowly checked my senses I could hear the theatre nurse on my right, I could smell the disinfectant air, I could feel my fingers and I could see. But could I read? I remember when my mother had a brain operation (mine was not this) they asked her as she came round from anaesthetic, ‘Who is the Prime minister?’.  She knew it was Harold Wilson – not too difficult as he had quite a long stint in the job. But if they asked me the same question, I think that I could have been forgiven for not knowing because we have had so many different ones recently. In any case, my brain seemed to be working as I squinted to read a notice on the wall it said, ‘Quiet Please’, and of course all I wanted to do was to shout out in joy that it was all over. When I was waiting the long weeks before my operation, I read a poster telling me how to prepare. Lose weight (I a
Read more