Today’s guest picture is another blast of sunshine from the past. This time it is a pleasant valley scene from one of my brother Andrew’s Derbyshire walks in early October.
After a rather restless night, I got up to a sunny morning and a much improved interior economy and after a quiet morning, I was back to normal by lunchtime and able to eat without any ill effects.
I didn’t take any risks though and did nothing more energetic than have a walk round the garden where Mrs Tootlepedal was hard at work.
The berberis was positively glowing….
…and the special Grandma was having a final fling.
The display of rose hips is easily the best that I can remember and many roses that don’t usually have any are covered with them after the good summer.
There is no denying that we are well on the way to winter though.
It is good to have blackbirds back in the garden as they have been pretty scarce since July.
I didn’t stay out long and when the sun went in so did I, and I was soon back in the kitchen looking out of the window.
It was an extremely quiet day for birds.
I haven’t been able to work out why the feeder can be mobbed one day and deserted the next.
Even the sight of plenty of available perches didn’t discourage some uncouth pushing and shoving.
After lunch, I tested my constitution and my leg by going for a short walk over three bridges.
As I came to the river, I could see glowing trees in a garden on the hillside opposite…
…and golden willows below me on the river bank.
Wherever I looked on my walk, there always seemed to be a defiant patch of colour among the leafless branches.
I was impressed by the careful relaying of turfs on the site of the big bonfire on Sunday.
After I crossed my second bridge, I met a fellow camera club member walking his dog and spent my time chatting rather than snapping and it was only when we went our separate ways that I took the camera out again to record a little more late colour.
I crossed my third bridge and made my way quietly home…
…only pausing for a wild flower on the edge of the Scholars’ Field.
My leg is working but still sore and there is no chance of getting on my bike for a while yet but my constitution was unruffled by the walk so I was happy.
When I got back, Mrs Tootlepedal was busy watching a YouTube video on sharpening woodwork tools so I realised that she had left the garden and gone back to rocking horse restoration. I settled down to put a couple more weeks of the newspaper index into the Archive Group database. My lack of cycling may be regrettable but it has let me catch up (a bit) on the backlog of data.
My friend Susan wasn’t available to come to our monthly recorder group meeting today so I had to drive myself to Carlisle. The effort was very worthwhile as we had an excellent evening of music. One of other members was unwell so we were a quartet tonight and this made for a change with some different music to play.
Having been 150 miles ahead of my mileage schedule at the beginning of October. I am now 200 miles behind and with no hope of catching up, I am officially abandoning any targets for the year and will take any miles that I can squeeze in as a bonus.
Once again there are two flying birds of the day, this time goldfinches, one with wings in…
…and one with wings out.
Variety is the spice of life.
Tootlepedal's Blog 
Sorry for these glitches in your life. My recent one has been 3 weeks of laryngitis, and I have to wonder where all these weird bugs come from.
Laryngitis is no fun and you can’t even complain to people about it because they can’t hear you. The bugs are all around all the time and we are just lucky if we can escape from them most of the time. 🙂
I am just hoping I don’t get everything going like I did last year!
I have had my flu jab so I am keeping fingers crossed.
Beautiful goldfinches
It just shows how useful a camera is. I had probably never noticed one until I got a camera and decided to put up a bird feeder to give myself something to photograph.
Glad you are feeling better even though your leg is still a problem. Loved all those pictures of autumn colour.
Some lovely pictures both in your garden and on your walk. Glad you are feeling better – hope you will soon be back on your bike, though it looks as if this may take some time.
Nice color on the willows and other trees and shrubs and I’m glad you were able to get out and enjoy them.
Too bad your leg made you miss out on your mileage goal but I’m still impressed by the huge amount of miles that you did ride.
It may just make it easier for me to beat this year’s total next year so it is not all bad.
That is a very good way to look at it.
It’s distressing to hear that you have to give up on your goals for cycling, but as they say, stuff happens, and there’s no way that you could have known that you were going to injure your leg in advance of setting the goals.
It’s nice to see the colors in the leaves that you have left there, and that you had a nice day for a walk. It’s snowing here already, a wet heavy snow pulling the few remaining leaves off from the trees.
That must be a bit depressing for you. Is that it set in now for the rest of the winter?
The snow on the ground will come and go, but there’ll be plenty of days when it snows from now to April. We don’t have as strong of a maritime weather pattern as you do, but it’s close.
I am hoping to get no more than two or three snowy days (with accompanying sunshine) at the most this year. A man can dream.
New follower. Sorry to hear you have a problem with your leg. Lovely autumn colours and bird photos.
Thank you for visiting.
Autumn colours back, a lovely walk, feathered friends keeping busy and you are feeling better…all’s well in TP land…wish we could say the same for our country!
Yes indeed. The quality of leadership is definitely strained.
I am pleased you are feeling better and I hope your leg continues to improve. It is a pity you won’t be able to achieve your cycling targets this year but I still hope you will eventually get back on your bike and have enough decent weather to add some miles to your tally.
I am secretly hoping for a miracle cure but meantime I have put my old bike on a turbo trainer so that I can do some gentle pointless exercise indoors.
New follower. I hope you will eventually get on your bike. I like your photos.
That second shot of the goldfinch with wings out is impressive. I can’t get over how much more colorful your goldfinches are with those red faces. Ours get pretty drab in the winter and even in summer, they’re just yellow.
Sometimes you wonder how such different birds ended up with the same name. Your blackbird is another very different bird from ours.
Glad you’re feeling better and could get out to enjoy those lovely yellows along the river.
It is always makes me feel better if I can get outside for a bit.
Me too.