Planting the garden

Above is the garden about 10 days ago. The snow had melted. Husband had raked and turned over the soil. I still had a couple of night shifts before I could start planting.

I had a the last week of April off from work, and spent it (between visits from my son, then my mother, pluss and agility competition) planting the garden. I am trying these plastic tunnels for the first time this year. They have holes for letting in the rain and for air. In previous years I have only used the fiberglass cloth that you see on the farthest bed. If the plastic doesn't work (I have my doubs) I might try the fiberglass cloth over the hoops. You see,I like the idea of the tunnel.

What do I have planted, you wonder? Under the fiberglass cloth I have various salad greens, spring onion, dill and radishes. Under the 2 adjoining tunnels are carrots and onions (companion planting) and the tunnel by itself has may turnips and kale. A row of sugar peas are on the one side of this, and in the empty space I plan to transplant some broccoli when I get it from the garden center in a week or so.

Agility competition

Today Lucy and I successfully completed two agility courses. The event was a club competition in Eidsvoll for the Nannastad, Eidsvoll and Hamar dog clubs. The courses were a beginners agility course and an open jump course.

Here is Lucy jumping the first hurdle of the beginners course.

Comming over the "bridge"...

And through the tunnel...

And here jumping over 4 hurdles arranged in a star pattern.


And here the finish of the open jump course.

Easter

For Easter this year we had lovely sunny weather. I went to a concert on Good Friday at the Stange Church: organ and piano, violine, cello and flute. I love the flute. It makes my spirit soar!

Audun contacted me earlier in the week, wondering if I was working this weekend. Turned out we both had the Easter weekend off and he was looking for some family time. I picked him up at the station on saturday and we had a lovely few days together.

Easter sunday, while Husband was out biking we did our easter egg hunt, each hiding the easter basket for the other. The weather was so great that we had our first bbq of the season on Easter Monday, before Audun went back to Lillehammer.

Walking the dogs

I decided to visit my thinking spot again: this time I could sit on the stone looking out on the water and reflect on the positive things in my life and my goals for the day.

Afterwards I walked with the dogs through the woods by the lake. I loved the way the sun fell on this green glade. Unfortunatly the picture doesn't show the colors right.

Lucy had been gone for a little while. Suddenly she comes tearing up the path with this huge backbone in her mouth.

She spent several days carrying it around. She'd leave it somewhere along the path, then find it again the next day and carry it some more. One day Topsy was the first to find it. As she stood sniffing it and deciding whether to pick it up, Lucy came running. There was a short fight which I translated as:

Lucy: That's mine. Get the hell away from it!

Topsy: But I'm the oldest. - Okay then, if you feel so strongly about it, you can have it.

April showers and Spring Flowers

I am obsessed with spring. We have had several warm and sunny days in which I rolled up my sleeves and got my hands dirty in the garden, clearing away dead stalks and the first weeds from the flower beds. In addition to the snowdrops we have crocuses now: a garden variety of "wild crocus". They are smaller but earlier, and they have a different color inside than outside.

Then yesterday we had pouring rain all day. A perfect day for paying bills and cleaning. As the day progressed the downpour began looking suspiciously like sleet, until it started coming down as snow from about 6 pm. Luckily the next day it was all gone and another sunny day dawned.

The place where I work is about 100 km south of where I live and a bit warmer as well. There wild coltsfoot is dotting the roadsides.

Back in Norway

After the green and the flowers it was an anti-climax to look out of the airplane window on the brown, white and black of the Norwegian april landscape. However I took this picture today, just to show how much snow actually has melted in the last week.

The fields are so muddy that I have started taking the dogs to the woods to walk them. Went to see if my thinking spot is accessible yet. It wasn't - there's still too much snow on the path, but here is a picture of the Mjøsa from a nearby spot: still covered with ice, but open areas are forming.

Cornwall - London

Left Cornwall yesterday. This is the top of the steps going from the student houses to the road that takes us into Penryn

The organic cafe where we had our morning coffee and tea (respectively), and where I got a sandwich for the journey (organic brie and rocket on multiseed bread) and 2 freshly baked cornish pasties for lunch. Mine was potato and organic steak, Irene's was potato and cheese. We ate them at the station while waiting for the train.

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While I was in Cornwall Ingvild had been exploring London. When I got back to London she was full of all the places she wanted to show me. St Pauls Cathedral is close to her house so we went there. That's where these 2 pictures are from.

One of the things she'd discovered was a very posh glass shopping center right behind the cathedral. The amazing thing was that you could take a glass elevator up to the roof. The elevator looks onto the cathedral and from the roof you get a marvelous view of London.

As you see it was getting dark. And tomorrow morning I am on my way back to Norway. It has been a wonderfull week and I have thoroughly enjoyed getting a glimpse of my girl's university lives.

Mothers Day in Cornwall

Today is mother's day in England. Irene and I spent the whole day in Falmouth.

First we had a Cornish Cream Tea. It consisted of a pot of tea, a pitcher of hot water, a pitcher of milk, and for each of us two scones, warm from the oven, full of raisins with cornish clotted cream and strawberry jam.

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We visited Irene's favorite sweets shop, and bought an assortment of fudge: peppermint, blueberry and clotted cream fudge.

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It was low tide when we got down to the harbor, and all the boats are at the bottom of the basin. Below is one of the pubs by the harbor with the casks of beer piled outside.

A little beyond the harbor we found the spring festival which has been going on all weekend. There was a market, and a few simple rides. No noisy tivoli with flashing lights and blaring music here. This merry-go-round is being cranked by hand.

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We met up with Jenny, one of Irene's friends at Falmouth, and together we walked all over Falmouth, enjoyed the park and looked at the house Irene will be living in next year. Finally we had ice cream made from organic jersey milk and cream at a local farm.

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After Jenny left us we still had over an hour to kill before going to the cinema. So we walked along a pathway from the beach in Falmouth to another beach further away.

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Our day ended at the cinema. The Falmouth cinema is very cool in that it has armchairs for seats with a little table and a menu between each 2 seats. You can order snacks and drinks to go with your movie experience. We had nachos. The film we say was thought-provoking but a little strange: "Never let me go" - a science fiction film of a society where a class of people are raised for the sole purpose to become organ donors for the rest of society. The films weakness was that you didn't get any sense of exactly how these organ donor children originated. The ending was kind of wierd as well. You kept expecting them to rebell, but it never happened. They just accepted their lot.

Surfing in Cornwall

Lounging around in our animal onesies at breakfast: Irene's is a cow with little horns and ears. After breakfast Irene showed me around the campus of her university. The grounds were lovely: full of flowers and rabbits hopping about in the evening.

Afterward we went for a walk up a country lane to a daffodill farm. There were horses grazing and you can see the student houses in the background. Irene lives in the green house.

We got picked up for surfing at 12:45. Irene has her own wet suit and board. I rented both.
The surfing was fabulous. And the water didn't seem cold at all. Porthtowan beach too was a facinating spot, with cliffs, blooming gorse and abandoned tin mines dotting the heather all around. And who would have thought it was such a workout! I have muscles aching that I didn't even know I had.

We watched "My Sisters Keeper" this evening. I'd read the book, and the ending was changed in the movie, but it still worked very well. If Irene was crying when we saw "Earthlings", it was now my turn for the tears to flow. That movie is sooo sad!

London to Cornwall

Got up early this morning and went to Marjana's cafe for breakfast. This time I had a hommous, haloumi and tomato bagel. The metro station is a minute away, and Ingvild went through first. I however didn't have enough money on my oyster card. When I went to the machine it refused to recognize my card so I stood in line for the ticket guy. After the 2-3 people before me were done, he validated my card and sent me back to the machine to top it up. In the meantime, the cafe called Ingvild to tell her that I had left my suitcase there! My second travel blooper! If I'd had money on the Oyster card, we would have been halfway to Paddington Station before getting the call!

The rest of the trip went without incident. It was wonderful from the train windows to see London falling away, and green fields appear with pastured cows, sheep with tiny lambs, free range chickens, and even a hog. Norman churches with their cross-shape and spuare towers, little villages, and farms. I love the english landscape. As we got into Devon and Cornwall the train began following the edge of the sea, and we passed resort towns, quiet now, in the off-season.

Irene met me at the station and we walked to her house. Here she is in front of the student houses. And below is Irene in her room. Much more spacious than Ingvild's room i London and with it's own bathroom. The kitchen too, was twice the size. Unlike London, where most of the students are still there revising for exams, the students at Falmouth are mostly away on Easter break. So we had Irene's flat to ourselves.

After dropping off my stuff, we went into Falmouth for the afternoon. It is the cutest town, reminding me of Ithaca. We shopped at her health food store, and I got my hair cut by her hairdresser. It was the coolest place full of odds and ends reflecting his various interests, and heavy on the sci-fi, particularly Star Wars. The clipping session was accompanied by rather loud, but not unpleasant music, and he told us about the parties he throws in the shop with dj's and live bands.

Haircut in Falmouth

The main street in Falmouth

A view of the harbor through an alley. Isn't the decoration great!?

Irene is really into organic food and vegetarianism. We watched the documentary "Earthlings" this evening. While it focuses on the horrible attitudes and practices of human beings towards animals as they use and abuse them for companions, food, clothing, science and entertainment, I didn't have the impression that what they showed was manipulated. I didn't like that it just gave a onesided picture, however I agree that it is important to be aware of the dark side of our relationship with animals as well as the positive side. And while I am not sure that I will become a vegetarian as a result of this awareness, I do intend to be more discerning in my consumption of animal products. In Norway for example, even though many of the practices so common in the USA and many European countries are illegal, poultry and swine do not lead a live in accordance with their basic instincts unless they are organic. Cows, sheep and goats have a pretty good life in Norway though.