I Am Only Making One Post Today,

as I am out early to go to a stamp fair,

a good start to the day for Diana, one from her coffee advent calendar,

we had some good news from the Philippines,

the windows and doors,

were being fitted,

there is still some painting to do, 

but the hope is that in 2 weeks or so the house will be finished,

and moving in can start,

as you can imagine everyone is looking forward to the move,

as it happens Donna has been out with Mum buying new furniture,

what a Christmas this will be in the new home,

I joined Diana on her walk to the bus stop,

the trees now bare of leaves, I left Diana waiting for her bus to go to work, I walked into town,

first stop, pick up my now repaired shoes,

the stall that normally sells flowers now selling Christmas trees,

on the green the first signs of the Christmas fair,

a couple of workmen getting the tree ready,

the chair I normally sit whilst typing the blog really needs reupholstering, so I called into Beckenham Upholstery Ltd. and had a chat with the owner, I will send him some photogrhs of it over the weekend to get a quote,

outside and looking back to the green,

into M & S to buy a few bits and pieces for my evening meal,

I popped in to wish Paul who owns the jewellers a Merry Christmas, but he was not at work today, we have known each other since the late 1960s,

in to the post office to post the Christmas cards, 

what a queue! I made a note of the time, I arrived at 2.25, and left at 2.55,

cross the road by The George,

I was heading for Lidl,

a bit difficult to see, a nice display of elves,

and a Christmas tree in the florists,

shopping in Lidl completed I walked back home past the green,

in the afternoon I decided to have a look at our cats, regrettably we had to leave them in Thailand as where we now live pets are not allowed, also I did not want to put them in quarantine for 6 months when they arrive in the UK, here are a few videos of them,

the good news was that the breeder we bought them from found them good homes and sent some photographs of them in their new home,

other than friends in Thailand, it is the cats that we miss most about Thailand,

and if you like the cats palying witn a red laser have a look here ,for some reason I could not copy the video,

and here they are Mariana, Cable and Hogue, all looking at the birds outside,

I just love this photograph of Hogue, giving me the evils after Diana had given the cats a shower,

time for my evening read and sherry,

for my starter the rest of the tiger prawns,

main course toad in the hole,

I rounded off the meal with a fresh fruit salad,

next stop the club,

where I meet up with Steve, we chatted the night away, he kindly dropped me off at home, no sooner had I sat down when it was time to meet Diana, arriving home,

 it was feet up for Donnie Brasco, which was very enjoyable, especially as it was based on true events, with the end of that we were off to bed.

Another Christmas Start To The Day,

as Diana opened,

the second of her advent calendar coffees, 

today this one, before she was off to work in the afternoon,

after she had left I popped upstairs,

to print off our tickets,

for the Lightopia at Crystal Palace, 

the blue light effect in the corner is caused by a ultra violet light I had fitted, many of the rock specimens I have glow in UV light,

without the light,

the owl,

and the fox keeping a eye on everything up here,

the attic is '⊢' shaped, this is the bit sticking out looking towards the club, I spent some time up here playing on the computer before coming back downstairs, after my evening meal Diana called, arriving home it was feet up for our usual Lewis followed by a New Tricks before we were off to bed.

Back In November,

I made a post, 

 about the British Army fielding a pink jeep in WWII, photograph PA Blanchard & Co. ‘Desert pink’ as it was once referred to, was first used in the Africa campaign of World War 2,

then much to my surprise I have found out that the R.A.F. flew a number of pink Spitfires on reconnaissance missions, photograph and story nowiknow, from the article:

 cloud layer proved to be an excellent cover for these planes. The Spitfires would run their missions at a relatively low altitude, hanging as close to the bottom of the clouds as possible. Enemy planes would have trouble seeing them through or against clouds, as would the forces on the ground. The pink planes, which stood out on the ground, were much harder to detect when in the air — which is where they were being used, 

a pink airplane in war time how amazing is that? another unusual color was used by the Royal Navy, in this case lavender-grey, it happened like this, in 1940, WWII British Royal Navy Admiral Lord Mountbatten had a cunning plan, a particular vessel was painted a lavender-grey colour, a hue that made it harder to detect the ship, both at dawn and dusk, 

Mountbatten felt this clever form of camouflage would give his ships an advantage over the enemy and promptly had his entire destroyer fleet painted the unconventional colour called Mountbatten Pink, but there was a slight flaw, the colour made them more visible in full day light!, illustration and story here, what ever next, a pink submarine?

Woodmere Avenue In Watford, UK,

is becoming famous world-wide,

all because of a Ring doorbell facing the road, where a vehicle width restriction island with bollards has been placed, photograph Google street view, Mr. Vigor a local resident caught a series of crashes on camera. He started posting them on a dedicated Facebook group, and before long compilation videos of car crashes were doing the rounds online and getting picked up by major news outlets,

“I totally get why some people find it funny because it is not outside their house. I didn’t want it to become a joke because I want the thing removed,” Tim Vigor told the Watford Observer. “I’ve had a few spats because people are saying the bollards are an inanimate object, which is true, but the whole design is wrong.” “The width restriction is clearly signposted both on Woodmere Avenue and on adjoining roads. Provided your vehicle isn’t wider than seven feet, you can access the road,” a press statement read. “To put this in perspective, seven-foot is wider than the entrance to a normal garage. Several thousand cars use this road on a daily basis without any problems so we have no plans to make changes to the posts on Woodmere Avenue unless local councilors ask, through the Joint Member Panel, for alterations to be made.”

with a reported 12 crashes caught on camera by Tim Vigor’s doorbell camera in the last six weeks alone, the Woodmere Avenue width restriction is a bigger nuisance to motorists than it ever was, above the most recent crash compilation,

as it happened a film crew arrived and guess what? whilst there they filmed an 'incident!', well I suppose this is one way to get Watford noticed on the world stage!

The First Day Of Christmas,

Diana started it with her advent coffee,

the countdown to Christmas has truly begun,

for the first of the month a Ispirazione Venezia,

Diana left for work, meanwhile I was posting the blog, in the afternoon it was a trip to town for myself, the trees in the park losing many of their leaves, 

it must be the start of Christmas, Rudolph appeared,

in the Foxgrove Lodge garden,

as did the Christmas tree at the front of the building,

I has some dry cleaning to drop off, so past the green, to Domino Dry Cleaners, next I popped into Marks & Spencers to buy my evening meal, 

good fortune favours the shoe repair shop on the corner, as I approached it a huge rainbow appeared over it, and as it happens I had to call in, I left a pair of shoes their to have metals put on the heels,

in the evening it was time for a sherry and a read, 

I am so enjoying a modern reprint of the Journal of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks: During Captain Cook's First Voyage in H.M.S. Endeavour in 1768-71 to Terra del Fuego, Otahite, New Zealand, Australia, the Dutch East Indies, etc. / edited by Sir Joseph D. Hooker. I should mention that Otahite is now known as Tahiti, what I enjoy so much about this book is that instead of saying for instance, 'we caught a bluebird', the journal gives the Latin name, 

so you know exactly what creature is being discussed as above,

here are a couple more examples,

which means that every so often if I do not know the creature, I can easily look it up in the Internet,

tonight I had a starter of breaded tiger prawns,

followed by slow cooked BBQ beef brisket, eyes down and tuck in,

and a healthy dessert of mango, strawberries, raspberries and blueberries,

when Diana arrived home it was time for the chocolate countdown to begin, a Lindt Lindor for Diana,

a Lindt Teddy for myself, we then settled down for tonight's New Tricks before we were off to bed.

Looking For Nothing In Particular,

I came across this stop motion film,

Anu-Laura Tuttelberg is an Estonian writer, director, and animator,

the stop-motion short “Winter In The Rainforest,” sets a cast of fragile, porcelain puppets within the lush rainforests of Chiapas, Mexico, and the Peruvian Amazon,

look out for the carnivorous flowers as they trap their prey,

shot with 16-millimeter film, the short was years in the making—Tuttelberg details the process on her site,

in the making of the short the animator explains:

'While moving the puppets frame by frame, I let the light and the nature in the background move naturally. In this way, the puppets are moving smoothly in their own pace and the nature around them is changing rapidly. This creates a new obscure reality of time and space in the film. It keeps the viewer aware of the stop motion technique in the film. I don’t want to hide the animation technique behind the scene but rather to bring it out and observe the new strange reality it creates'

it is a mug of coffee long, I quite enjoyed watching the film, it is just so unusual, if you like her style you can watch the animator’s previous works, on Vimeo.

I Am Not Sure,

that I would enjoy my English fry up breakfast, 

with black eggs! photos and videos of the black eggs were posted on Sina Weibo last week by a man surnamed Zhu from Hangzhou City, in China’s Zhejiang Province, He claimed that the eggs came from a friend of his who kept many grey geese on his farm, Zhu explained that the eggs had all been laid by the same goose, and that, except for the yolk color, they smelled and looked like ordinary goose eggs, someone suggested that the goose must have eaten a lot of black mulberries, which are known for their high melanin content. Zhu then confirmed that there were indeed many mulberry trees planted at the back of the farm where the geese were raised, but he was skeptical about this possible explanation,

“These geese are all raised freely. When mulberries fall to the ground, they run to eat them. They contain melanin, so it may also be caused by eating too much mulberry, but this explanation is not particularly reasonable, so I am not sure, in short, it is quite strange,” the man wrote,

a poultry expert asked by a Chinese news outlet to provide a potential reason for the black yolk said that the only thing he can think of is environmental pollution, adding that “scientifically speaking, such a phenomenon should not occur”, you can read more of the story here on Ettoday, so black eggs or not? I think I will stick to the normal ones, it just looks so strange seeing a black egg.