A walk round the fields with Norman

Get up around eight to a lovely clear, dry morning, and after letting Normy into the garden, make our breakfast, a full English, as usual, and then putting a load of socks and towels into the washing machine, before taking my coffee into the garden room and reading the Guardian. I shower and dress, put Norman on his lead and set off for a walk round the fields. At first my dog is a little reluctant to walk, as I have left his coat off, it is a mild day and there is hardly a breeze, but once he sees that I am determined, he trots along behind me, as we work our way through the estate. An elderly man is taking Xmas icicle lights down from his bungalow eaves, so I wave and say hello, when we emerge onto Carr Lane, the path has dried out and blackbirds are singing in the trees. The weather is almost spring like, Noah must have felt like this when he eventually emerged from his ark after the deluge. We pass the stables, where the young girls are mucking out and brushing the horses, past the farm, with the alpacas and chickens in the field, and down to the little wooden bridge over the drain. The huge puddle, that barred our way last week, has dried up, although the ground is still a little soggy. We cross the bridge and then follow a path adjacent to "almost straight wood", for about a hundred metres, before cutting in, thus avoiding the boggy part of the path, in the trees a goldfinch is piping, and another responds. Clearly someone else is thinking of spring! In the pine wood Norman comes to life, he adores this place and snuffles about like a little truffle pig amongst the roots and discarded cones, the resinous smell of the pines, like a disinfectant advert, but more subtle and infinitely more pleasant. We emerge onto the path that goes round the fields and by staying on the margins of the track, manage to avoid the worst of the mud. Because of the bad weather, it is almost six weeks since we have walked round here, the farmers have been busy, all the ditches and drains have been cleaned out with a digger and piles of mud and reeds line the edges of the path. We are both enjoying our walk, although I am not deceived by the mild weather, and expect an arctic spell or two before the winter is out. We walk slowly, letting Normy have a good sniff and explore, as we go, and are overtaken by a woman with a spaniel, who is covered in mud. She lives around the corner from my bungalow, and although we haven't spoken before, she seems friendly and we walk back together, talking about our dogs, children and Xmas. We part company at the snicket, as Norman has disappeared into the hedge and she needs to get back home, he emerges after a minute or two and then we play "praise and pat" until we return home. It is now twelve o'clock, after putting down fresh water for my dog, I drive to the leisure centre for my first swim of the year. As I arrive, I remember that today is Thursday and therefore, aqua aerobics, aka the wave machine, has a class from twelve thirty for an hour. Fortunately the pool is otherwise quiet and I am able to share a lane with another swimmer, who I judge is a little slower than me, so wait until he is about five metres from the turn before pushing off, thus effectively giving myself almost two lengths of clear water between us. As it turns out, I am only taking a couple of strokes a length out of him and he leaves the lane before I overtake him, and complete my 400m freestyle warm up. The water is unusually warm today, but I have a full litre bottle of water on the poolside and intend to take things easily, as I haven't swum for a couple of weeks. I complete a 1700m program, swimming a mixture of strokes, but only doing butterfly during a set of individual medleys. Afterwards I feel OK, but realise that it will take a couple of weeks to regain my pre Xmas fitness levels. I drink tea and eat some oaties in the cafe, Helen, one of the cooks, tells me she is going to be a grandma in July and obviously has mixed feelings about the change to her status. After my snack I drive into town and make my way to Tim's, my barbers, although Tim only comes in to do appointments on Mondays now. After a short wait, my hair is cut by Paul, Tim's one time apprentice, who now runs the salon, we chat about the Tiger's chances of promotion and I wish him a Happy New Year as I leave, promising to return in one month, as I always do, my fine hair quickly grows out of shape. On the way back to the Chrysler, I call in at Boyes' sale, on the off chance that they might have some Speedo shorts, as the chlorine is quickly eating through my current costume, but I am out of luck. I will need to buy some in Hull or York, the next time I am there. Norman is waiting for me when I return home and has been attending patiently for his share of the lamb casserole, so after hanging my swimming gear in the bathroom, I ladle out our dinner and leave it to cool for a minute, whilst I recover the socks and towels I had hung on the line. Like the pants and vests earlier in the week, they are not quite dry, but will air on the radiators, I leave them in the basket to hang up later and return to eat dinner. The casserole is well worth the wait and between us, we eat the lot, I don't think Normy has had a dog tin for over a week. After dinner, I air my socks and towels, and then experiment with a drawing App, from the iTunes Store, it has several colour palettes and three modes, brush, pencil and crayon, with an adjustment for thickness or fineness, it's only limitation being that one has to use one's finger. I can draw reasonably well and thought I may use it to illustrate swimming drills, if I ever get round to publishing a program on technique. Instead I doodle a very crude representation of a kind of Mandala, that came to me this morning in a half awake state, and resulted from seeing the Ang Lee film, " The Life of Pi", the App, is strangely satisfying, though the result is hardly draftsman like and I realise I have been playing around for an hour. It is now seven o'clock, so I call Leslie to see if he would like me to call, he tells me he is going into "The Grange", for two weeks respite, arranged by his GP, Doctor Hill, in whom he has great faith, and asks me to visit him there instead. Doctor Hill has prescribed an anti depressant and sedative, amatriptolene, to help his insomnia, but wants it given under the supervision of the nursing staff at The Grange. I am looking after Louis and Alice for the weekend, in order that Sarah and Richard can take a weekend break to Harrogate, so promise to visit Leslie on Monday. Then I call Felicity, who suffered an anal bleed in the night, resulting from her blood thinning drugs, which her GP has now stopped. She says she is OK now, but asks me to ring in the morning to see if she is up to the visit to her sister, which I promise to do. At eight o'Clock I have a delayed dessert, Frozen Black Forest Fruits, with Greek yoghurt and then retire to bed and read Cormack McCarthy's Sutree until ten.