6th December

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

1803
"N.B. Something metallic, silver playfully and imperfectly gilt, and highly polished; or rather something mother-of-pearlish, in the sun gleams upon ice, thing ice." S.T. Coleridge, 1803 (Cumberland)

1841
"I never saw a more straight-forward day of rain out of Cumberland, Wales, or Naples, and so dark withal I could scarcely see to read at midday, and got dreadfully low. I am ashamed to find myself so much at mercy of a dark sky." John Ruskin, 1841 (Denmark Hill, Surrey)

2009


A day, again, of many parts. I thought it would never stop raining when I realised how hard it was coming down early this morning, but sure enough the winds swept it all away, and there was blue sky again. I was just about to go to bed when there was a screaming from outside, and I threw the window open to make sure that it was an animal rather than a person, which of course it was - a fox, perhaps? But looking up, the stars were gloriously out, Orion shining bright, and there was a strange promise of warmth to the wind - especially odd, since I'm now sitting here rather chilled! And so, to bed... Byslantedlight, 2009 (Cambs.)

2010

A cold, clear day and the sun setting as I drove home around 3.30pm... Byslantedlight, 2010 (Cambs.)

7th December...

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

1886
"Winter. The landscape has turned from a painting to an engraving: the birds that love worms fall back upon berries: the back parts of homesteads assume, in the general nakedness of the trees, a humiliating squalidness as to their details that has not been contemplated by their occupiers." Thomas Hardy, 1886 (Dorset)

2009

A grey start, then rain - at one point at work we looked up to a hugely rushing sound outside, as if some massive machinery had started work, but it turned out to be a particularly pounding squall of rain! Byslantedlight, 2009 (Cambs.)

2010


( And a couple more under here... )

The hardest, thickest frost I've ever seen in England today - as if snow had fallen on Cambridge and decided to shine and twinkle at us all day! I couldn't resist going for a walk with my camera at lunchtime - everything was coated, and it was just beginning to melt in the sun, falling in shining drops to the ground as I passed under it. Even the monkey puzzle was decorated like a Christmas tree!Byslantedlight, 2010 (Cambs.)