Mushrooms are such a useful cooking ingredient, they add a lot of savoury flavour to any dish. Cook them with a good sprinkling of freshly ground black pepper and a little olive oil (or butter if you prefer) and tip them onto hot toast – mmm… Try this search for mushroom recipe ideas.
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Here’s a foggy day about a year ago, captured by my camera. When warm, moist air mixes with cold air – this is the result. Some of the moisture condenses into tiny droplets, distant objects are obscured, and closer object lose much of their contrast and colour. Everything looks washed out and grey.
Everything is still (even a light breeze will sweep away any hint of fog). The world seems mysterious because so much is hidden from view. Do you know the difference between fog and mist? it’s all about what is hidden from view; if you can see further than a kilometre it’s mist, less than a kilometre and it’s fog (technically). But in everyday life it’s normal for the cut-off to be much closer, around 180 metres.
Time for a Haiku, perhaps?
Winter fog and mist Hidden heavy blanketing Cold and damp and grey
When: 6th December 2023 Where: Cirencester Park, Gloucestershire
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Image 108 – What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every day or so.
Click to expand
I wonder what past events might have been witnessed by this lovely, old window at Chastleton House in Oxfordshire? Windows are not made like this any longer, the window frame is stone-built as part of the structure of the house. The panes of old glass are held in place with lead, reinforced by a horizontal iron bar for additional strength and rigidity.
Chastleton is on the eastern edge of the Cotswolds, between Stow-on-the-Wold and Chipping Norton. It’s famous for its amazing plaster ceilings but it would still be an architectural gem without those. It’s managed by the National Trust these days.
The house was built in the Jacobean period between 1607 and 1612; it was owned by the same family for almost 400 years until the National Trust took over in 1991.
When: 15th December 2023 Where: Chastleton House, Oxfordshire
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Image 107 – What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every day or so.
Larger view
Winter storms occasionally bring down mature trees, even if they are healthy. That happened on the road between Stratton and Cirencester on 21st December 2023. The picture shows the clearing up afterwards. The car driver had a very frightening experience and a lucky escape; the tree trunk crushed the right hand side of the bonnet and I imagine the car was a write-off. Amazingly the windscreen was undamaged and the driver presumably shaken but unhurt.
The road was completely blocked by the trunk and branches of this large, mature lime tree, but the team worked quickly and it was clear again later the same day.
Life is full of unexpected events, most of them entirely harmless, some of them inconvenient, and occasionally something that shakes us up and makes us think about life in a different way, at least for a time. It’s probably good for us to face these think-about-life-differently events once in a while. It helps us to realise that some things are important, that we should do the things that matter most right away, that we should not fritter away our time, that life really is precious, and that we should be sympathetic to those who have suffered unexpectedly in life.
I suppose in the end the important thing is to love others regardless of whether they are close family, complete strangers, or somewhere in between. Everybody matters!
When: 21st December 2023 Where: Cirencester, Gloucestershire
Cirencester
For convenience, here’s a list of all the Cirencester area images:
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You can see the Churn’s flood plain very clearly in this image. The treeline on the horizon marks the border of Cirencester Park and is on much higher ground.
Image 106 – What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every day or so.
Larger view
This is a view of the River Churn overflowing into fields, the village in the background is Stratton, where Donna and I live. As you can see, Stratton is on higher ground and is not at risk of flooding, though some parts of nearby Cirencester are at risk during the winter.
You can see the Churn’s flood plain very clearly in this image. The treeline on the horizon marks the border of Cirencester Park and is on much higher ground, and beyond those trees the beech woodland is criss-crossed with rides at different angles, very different from farmland and home to roe deer and many kinds of wild woodland plants and animals.
When: 23rd December 2023 Where: North of Cirencester, Gloucestershire
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Journeys of Heart and Mind 