A change in the weather.

Wake at seven to a cloudy and stormy morning, gale force winds drive the clouds across the skies and Norman hurries back from his trip to the garden for his morning toilette. I make a full English breakfast, and share the spoils with Normy, who sits patiently by the door waiting for grub to be up. The ibuprofen, has worked and the pain in my hip is noticeably reduced this morning. We sit in the Garden Room, while I drink my coffee and watch the weather stream past the window and then catch up on last night's blog. This means that today's Guardian will have to wait until this evening before I can read it. After a shave and a shower I feel slightly more human and ready to face the day. We leave at nine thirty. They are digging up the road at Molescroft, so we vary our route to Cherry Burton and drive through Beverley and come into the village from the York Road. Dolly and Teddy are waiting for me, in eager anticipation of their walk, and jump gleefully on to the back seat of my car. By the time we get to Newbald Road, the storm is in full swing, about gale force eight on the Beaufort scale, large branches being moved by its force, but not yet whole trees. As we walk through the woods of Nrwbegin Pits the wind is roaring through the tree tops and a constant flurry of leaves is being torn from them and forms a minor cloud of detritus about forty feet in the air. The real challenge comes as we head West into the teeth of the storm, towards Black Mill. I have to lean into the wind to make progress, the dogs have less of a problem, it is only vertical mammals that feel the effect of such weather so strongly. Low slung horizontal designs, like dachshunds, do particularly well! There is something about unusual weather, even adverse conditions, that shakes you out of the rut of complacency and makes you feel more alive. We walk the whole common again, but the change in conditions, as we come into the lee of Burton Bushes is remarkable. The wind chill is greatly reduced and its force, so walking is easier, clouds of oak, ash and hornbeam leaves are carried on the wind in a constant stream, from it's trees. In Burton Bushes itself there is a strange calm at the centre and to the eastern side of the wood, as the western edge takes the full force. It is twenty five years since the great storm of October 1987. It was the day after the great storm, that I drove to Windsor for my interview with a headhunter for the job at Kingston Communications. Time flies faster than the leaves in a gale. We drop Dolly and Teddy in Cherry and drive back to Tickton for noon. When we get in, Norman drinks two bowls of water before eating his biscuits, the exercise and the salt in the fry up have made him very thirsty. I feel OK today, so grab my swimming gear and drive to the pool, which is quiet, perhaps because of the weather. The fast lane is free, not that I intend to go fast after over two weeks out of the water. I decide to limit myself to a 1600m swim and warm up with 400m backstroke. I feel surprisingly good, the only problem is with the seal on my goggles that have dried out after so long in my bag. This causes me to stop after 200m and drain the water that has seeped in. Backstroke is followed by 400m breaststroke and then 400m freestyle, finishing off with 4 x 100m individual medley, and a 100m backstroke warm down. After showering and changing, I drink tea and eat some oaties in the cafe, before calling at the supermarket for toothpaste. The wintry weather has put me in the mood for comfort food, so I buy a small topside of beef, a red cabbage and some roasting vegetables, as well as extra sausage and bacon, that were on special offer. When I get in Norman is waiting to greet me, his tail wagging furiously, mindful of his water consumption, I let him out into the garden and once he has drained his bladder, he sprints back into the house in anticipation of dinner. I intend to meditate after my swim and know full well that he will start whining for food if I don't feed him now, so I take the easy option and serve him an early dinner. I meditate and feel refreshed, so set too and slice up the red cabbage and fry it in a skillet with some streaky bacon, a Bramley apple and an onion. The result is then duly transferred to the slow cooker and a few juniper berries are added to complete the concoction. Slow magic will transform this into Germanic rot kohl by tomorrow. It is now six o'clock and time for our walk down to the bridge. The gale has blown itself out, the air pressure has risen, and the skies cleared. In short, it is a lovely October evening, the sun has just set to the west and there is a peach coloured vapour trail of a jet making its way north, above the darkening earth. We play praise and pat on our way home and walk the last couple of hundred yards with a woman who is walking her golden retriever on the same errand. When we get in, I make a tossed salad, with shavings of goat cheese, that forms a starter to the Parmagiana that I should have eaten last night. After dinner Normy cleans the dish and then we retire to the lounge to listen to Manuel Castells on the iplayer. His talk is interesting but frustrating, as it provides little more than a tour d'horizon of his ideas. Like me, he has a Marxist orientation, in that he believes the economic infrastructure determines the sociopolitical and cultural superstructure of society. He seems to be saying that the ongoing financial crisis since 2008 has revealed the true nature of affairs. In that the elite, who control the political and financial environment, have been exposed to public gaze and to critique through the new media networks. His contention is that the current power structures will remain impervious to change, until a new consciousness of the futility of consumerism to provide happiness, reaches a critical mass. His quantative analyses shows that early adopters, in significant numbers, are opting out of the consumer economy. In order to get a better handle on his views and to critically assess them, it will be necessary to read him carefully. I shall consider this over the next few days. To bed for ten.