Water Meeting

We attended the Chester University's CLiCC (Center for Living with Climate Change) forum to discuss water availability, controls, preservation and quality last week at the Cross Keys coffee house in our town. 

The research project sought input from community members and locals in an informal setting.

We met many interesting and like-minded people from our community, and heard more about the Cain Valley River Group. They are looking for someone to take up the reins as they have run out of steam and leadership ... 

Does it have my name on it ... ? I need some time before I jump in and get my feet wet, but I'm thrilled to hear they want volunteers to help in the town's wetland project, and removal of ... Japanese knotweed. What am I waiting for?

Shopping

We had a quick lunch at the Charlie's shopping complex. It offered a great view

over which to sip our drinks

Then we added Morrisons to our list of grocery shopping experiences. I was so very pleased to see I could buy loose (not pre-packaged) produce - oranges and mushrooms were available this way, and small brown bags are provided for this! Yay, Morrisons. They also have a deli section, and sell lamb samosas - yum!

I've compared prices across 4 grocery stores, and the basics I buy are the same or very, very similar in price across them all. Some stores are better for variety (Tesco, especially alcohol), some better for bulk buys (Morrisons, Sainsburys), loose produce (Morrisons) and some for their meat selection (Aldi).

 Aldi Price Matches are advertised at all grocery stores, clearly indicating they're the baseline. But Aldi stocks aren't always consistent, and the checkout process can be rather hectic.

This summer our local Tesco has had its fridges break down on 3 occasions, so Aldi across the street has benefitted from their losses. 

Interestingly, we've encountered more people we 'know' or recognise in grocery stores and about town in Wales, than we ever did in Maine!

Tight Squeeze

This tractor with a trailer of hay bales squeezed its way past parked cars by partly driving up on the sidewalk to get by - all part of a normal day in Llanfyllin. Look at the grin on his face as we marveled at the close shave!

This is, believe it or not, a two-way street

Another tractor in a tight squeeze, trimming the hedges on our street, Coed Llan Lane:

Photo: D. Schultz

Room With a View

 Here is my room with a view, a favorite spot

and view of a room

The third of this season's heatwaves has passed, though we are still very short of rain. It's over 2 weeks since we had any precipitation and things are drying out and burning up.

The sale of our lakeside Limerick home is proceeding and our buyers want to bring the final closing forward to July 31, which is fantastic news. 

Hedgehog Rescue

We drove to Llangedwyn this week to listen to a talk given by a hedgehog rescue team,

calling themselves Hokey Pokey. We knew that hedgehog numbers in Britain have been declining and we were interested in learning how to be sure our yard would be a safe and inviting place for them.

Heather described the hot and dry conditions of this summer as being 'rubbish weather' for hedgehogs since they're unable to produce milk for raising young when there's no water available. We have a 'hedgehog house' for our yard, provide fresh water, and have set up a feeding station. Now we are volunteering to have rehabilitated hogs released on our property.

Since hedgehogs are nocturnal, it's not easy to know if there are any around in one's yard ... we've been examining and photographing poop in our yard to try and determine their presence from their scat. Today Heather confirmed that our pic was a positive ID. Sadly, also because they're nocturnal, there were no live hedgehogs to see at the presentation.

The 'Friendly Club' of Llangedwyn hosted this event at the same time as their weekly £5 'Ploughman's Lunch' for locals and visitors.

They had a Bra Bank in their hall too

Land of Dragons

Dragons (draigs) have historically featured in Welsh folklore as symbols of might, strength and national pride. 

It is said that the red dragon of the native Britons defeated the white dragon of the invading saxons to claim Wales' sovereignty

  

A young Merlin (Myrddin, pronounced mur-thin) features in one of the Welsh myths about the battling dragons and how they disrupted the building of a castle

Charlies

There's a shopping complex near Welshpool known as Charlies - it's like a sprawled out country mall on what was once the farmland associated with Powis castle. 

The assortment of things available here vary from tractors to plants, livestock feed to clothing, kitchenwares (but not general groceries) to candles, specialty foods and wines to hardware, tools, and screws ...

We visited last week to get a feel for all that's available there, to do an explore without an agenda

There's a large free (noteworthy in the U.K.) car park, a restaurant, benches and pleasant walkways

And there's this goofy looking sheep statue in the foyer! What???

Patterning Fascination

 

Hazardous Door Handles

Never mind bed knobs and broomsticks, what about door handles and doorknobs? Some of our interior doors have door handles, and others have doorknobs.

          

On two occasions now, I've had trouble with door handles, or rather, my t-shirts have had trouble with door handles. They're at the exact height to be able to slip under my sleeve as I walk past, and I've found this to be hazardous when I'm carrying something I don't want to spill.

The jerk is so sharp and unexpected that my sudden stop results in what I'm carrying to propel forward - last night a wine glass flew off the tray, smashing on my tile floor of course (Ha! Lucky we brought so many of our glasses over in the container)

.

Last week as I was taking a rotten mango outside on a cutting board, a different shirt got caught on a different door handle and stopped me in my tracks, jerking the mess off the board onto the carpet. Argh! I feel like such a klutz when I do these things.

Staying Local

This little adventure took me to our town's butcher, hairdresser, charity shop and laundromat, all bipedally. Charity shops in the U.K. are a lot like a thrift store, but they're 'cause' based and not-for-profit. That's the £1 rack on the sidewalk.

Our local High street store is run by the North Montgomeryshire Volunteer Bureau to fund their community car scheme, where volunteers drive elderly or disabled people to appointments, social activities and local services. The organization covers the cost of gas and parking.

After that, I did some yardwork, of course, on my own two feet

and was able to run away from some fussy wasps, mostly bipedally.

One sting only.

PLAS Fest

PLAS (Pints, Live Acts, Smokin' BBQ) Fest is a one day summer event, where local artists perform at the beer garden attached to an old pub, built in 1702. It's loud! Here's our neighbor's band sweating and performing in our heatwave - they even got quite a few people dancing, despite the exhausting heat.

They were facing the sun, and it looked really tough for them while we sat under shady tents.

 

The pub provided a BBQ banquet for £20pp for this occasion. The poor chef cooking over the hot fire! We had a selection of the following, which was a great feast: