On Wednesday, I did something to a calf muscle during my early morning walk. Whether it was the cold weather or trying to walk too fast or what, I’m not sure. But it went into some sort of spasm and became incredibly sore. The older lad’s a physiotherapist and, having checked, as he always does, that it wasn’t a clot, gave me some stretching exercises. But it rather heralded the end of my lovely early morning walks, and my relationship with this guy …

Actually, I love this. The heron was concentrating on something. Probably breakfast. I had to go by him on a pretty narrow path and I tried to do it in such a way that I wouldn’t make him fly off. But there was no way anyway that he was going to miss whatever opportunity he saw in the river. So, with the minimum of fuss, he flew just a couple of feet upstream and resumed whatever it was he was doing. (I have no idea whether the heron is a he or a she actually. Or even whether it would resent such a binary denomination.)

So foot power being out of the question for a while, I switched to pedal power. I do like cycling, to be honest. Better than walking. The pace suits me and it never seems like exercise. But I do miss the wildlife and the opportunities to photograph beautiful things. Like last Monday’s moon before it had gone to bed …

Or these blossoms …

Or these alliums …

Which I attempted to capture on a teabag at the weekend.

On the upside however, I got to see the sea for the first time since March on the first of my bike rides …

Otherwise, a slow week arty crafty-wise. I did stuff everyday but I didn’t finish much. A few pebbles decorated …

… and, on a whim and without much planning, I decorated a broom handle with pyrography. the flowers and leaves were inspired by those Indian printing blocks I got a few months ago.

And I bottled that rhubarb vodka …

And then I had a minor meltdown on Friday. I hadn’t really had one of those for a few months and, for me, that’s good going. I do my best to be relentlessly positive and optimistic because it gives me energy. But sometimes, it’s like being behind a dyke, with waves of self-doubt, uncertainty, and negativity crashing against the other side. Slowly but surely, the waves break through my defences and overwhelm me, pulling me down into a miasma of overthinking, self-criticism and pessimism. It always takes a few days and a lot of internal dialogue to pull myself out again but that’s just the way it is.