I’ve had a whirlwind few weeks starting a new job and now… I’m off to Japan! I won’t update while I’m gone so won’t be posting for a few weeks. The house renovations are still in progress but we had a good deadline of getting some things ready for the people who are staying here while we are away.

These are pictures from a lunchbreak at the botanic gardens a few days ago.

For the past two years I have been commuting from Oxford to out-west in the Cotswolds, but now I am about to start a new job that is situated in the heart of Oxford. Of course I’ll be back in the Cotswolds from time-to-time on the weekends, but I thought that before I leave this landscape I should do a round up of some of the pictures from my commute and the extensive walks I have taken in every direction from the office. So here it is…

From the post: Little Milton Fete and Charlbury

From the post: Sun

From the post: To the shop and back again

From the post: Exploring

From the post: Wilderness Festival

From the post: Foggy sunrise

From the post: a lunchtime stampede

From the post: sheep paparazzi

From the post: Near my work

From the post: Lomo foggy mornings

From the post: you know

From the post: sunrise

From the post: Next day in the life

From the post: early mornings

From the post: Little Horse

From the post: A commute

From the post: Sunrise

From the post: hoar frost

From the post: stick

From the post: before spring

From the post: spring

From the post: Cotswold Snow

From the post: Grey skies

From the post: we have snow

I have also made a new topic category ‘Cotswolds‘ that shows all the Cotswolds posts of the last two years. There are going to be a lot less pictures of sheep on here! :)

We met our allotment neighbour! She seems nice and a good knowledgeable person to have as a neighbour. Today was our first attempt at rushing down there after work. There is a lot of digging and weeding to do, more than can wait for the weekends. Simon helped me by starting on the next section I want to clear. There doesn’t really seem to be too many bad weeds – just couch grass (elymus repens) or squitch grass to give it its local name. There is a local road called Squitchy Lane after the grass.

I took these as we were leaving as the sun was setting. The first is Port Meadow from by the gate, and the second is across the allotments from the far side from our allotment. We took the long way round to the gate via the compost bins to see what the other side of the allotment is like. I tried to see which is my friend’s allotment but I couldn’t quite figure it out, we will have to meet there to show each other our plots. On the way out we passed right through the middle of the allotment site so got to see many more plots than I’d seen before. There are over a hundred plots and with lots of people having half plots the industry and variety of the plots is very inspiring.

Here is from the other angle. So it is from these bushes, and beyond where my spade and fork are, to the posts in the distance. The other side of the plot isn’t mine.

These scrubby bushes are actually some raspberry bushes, I don’t know if they are summer or autumn fruiting, I guess I’ll find out.

I’ve started the clearing work. I spent a few hours digging and filling one of those big blue IKEA bags full of weeds and dragging it to communal compost pile five times. There are still lots of roots I have to rake out but it is some progress.
BEFORE:

AFTER:

What is particularly nice is that it is right by Port Meadow (which I’ve taken pictures of lots of times like in the snow and in the sunshine). There is a possibility that the plot will flood in the winter and there might be a slight shade late in the afternoon from the trees but I think it is worth it to be right by the meadow.

Here is the compost pile :D

Out and about being a sheep paparazza :)

Over the Easter weekend we went to Compton Verney with my family, it is a place we’ve visited before. Again my favourite was their collection of British folk art. That is my mother’s cooking, really delicious :)

This was my egg dyeing this year, I dipped some of them into several colours to see how that would work.

I’ve seen lots of beautiful pictures of the blossom season happening over in Tokyo, we are not at that stage yet here. I must stop talking about the weather! A good stick to stir the old leaves and an audio book are excellent companions on a solo walk :)

It was all over in a minute. I think that figure in the distance is one of my colleagues who hadn’t noticed the stampede happening behind him as he walked up the road at lunchtime. My favourite is when they stampede alongside me when I am on my bicycle. I was on foot today though, out enjoying the sunshine. Aren’t the white deer amazing!

These are two pictures that I never shared from our West Coast trip two years ago. The top is the Chelsea Hotel in New York and the bottom is a Walmart somewhere outside Portland Oregon. Walmart was on my to-do list to take a look at while we were on the trip as you see them in films and so on. Wow those shops are huge.

I can also see that the top must have been from a roll of Kodak Portra 400 VC and the bottom from a roll of my beloved Kodak Ektar 100.

For my sister’s birthday we had a delicious feast of Japanese food cooked by Momo of I’m Japanese. It was so good! The bowls and things on the table are a mixture of her’s and my dad’s. The fish in miso, the inari, and the Japanese potato salad were my favourites.

I’ve never really thought about it until editing these pictures but for some reason at my dad’s house we are always short by one dining chair so, as one of the junior members of the family, I am always sat on a piano stool. Not that I mind at all! I like it as it means I get to sit at the head of the table. I think now I would find it really weird to be on a real chair at a family meal anyway. It just occurred to me that in all these years no extra chair has ever been bought. A funny family thing I guess :)