This morning, I was in my study, doing my usual back up routine with the blog when there was a sudden, anguished shriek from the bedroom. “Quick! The woodpecker is back!” This was followed by a speedy exit from the bedroom to the glass room. My exit was a bit more sedate.
A local woodpecker had decided a bird box on one of our trees was his personal Bento box. He was pecking away, trying to get to the baby blue tits inside. Mirinda started telling him to go away. I bent down and picked up a chunk of wood and threw it at the tree. Had I been playing cricket, it would have hit middle stump. The woodpecker flew off.
It reminded me of the tale of Claire and the cat in the tree and I told Mirinda she needs to go and fetch the rifle from under the bed.
It was a very exciting start to the day.
Mirinda, having calmed down somewhat, went into Stockholm to watch a bit of dance school graduation, along with a theatre full of excited relatives. I stayed home for a bit of a bludge day given my whole week had been spent in a classroom. My brain needed a day off.
Not that I did nothing at all. For one thing, I took the girls for a very long walk to the World’s End and back.
Before that, though, Harald came over to shave a few millimetres off the bottom of a door and to sand some paint off some drawers. He also advised on what to do about some shoddy work done in the stuga bathroom.
The walk to the World’s End was long, hot and thirst making. That was fine for the girls because quite a few businesses in Trosa cater for thirsty dogs. Not so for humans. Everywhere was so full that I was almost tempted to bend down with Freya and drink from the bowl outside the ice cream place.
While the walk was lovely, if somewhat tiring, unusually, most of the faces I saw today were a bit miserable. It was quite odd. I’m used to seeing happy people, tossing around pleasant greetings, and running into people I know. I think they all stayed at home today, leaving the town to the miserable noll åttas.
There were a few exceptions to the misery. One old lady couldn’t help but smile at Emma and a group of dressed up wedding guests who were obviously early for an afternoon wedding at the church all cheerfully returned my summery hej.
Actually, the walk almost ended before it had really begun.
We were almost at the main path, through the woods, when I realised I’d forgotten Freya’s collar. I was debating whether to turn back or just walk around Mount Trosa when Necessity woke up its mother who insisted I employed a couple of unused poo bags to form a makeshift circle around her neck.
It worked just fine. Mind you, by the time we returned home, my feet were wondering whether a walk around the mountain would have been a little less painful. The beer waiting for me in the fridge was entirely necessary.
Mirinda returned home with a flurry of barking Emma, waking me up from an unscheduled afternoon nap, and regaled us with her adventures which included the Stockholm Marathon, inconsiderate theatre patrons rustling paper in the seats behind her, fika at the Grand Cafe, tales of Vikings, the use of artificial intelligence in museums and, bizarrely a group of Morris Men.
As Joe Orton said, “Just when you least expect it, the unexpected always happens.“
