Ooh you got some lovely pictures of the moon. Its not dark here yet but will see if we have the same view later. Glad you have enjoyed your lazy day, you deserve it. Your always a buzy little bee.

Sunday 13th July

Five o'clock start and beat that man again but if his volume is up I'm very tempted to cut a wire at some point.  Now I'm hearing that this is being produced and delivered by the Hojja in Djebel and it's relayed down here and to the rest of the villages.  Friends in high places like at the top of a minaret might be able to make a little adjustment to the volume without me having to take drastic action.  I suppose the only alternative is to have the bells of the church in Djebel hooked up to the same relay and have those going off every Sunday at full volume.  The farmers would think that the sheep and cows had got hooked up to an electric fence....

My kettle has given up the ghost and I'm using the gas hob for my coffee.  It reminds me of that camping smell first thing in the morning and it brought back memories of a Norfolk Broads sailing boat that my ex-father in law had on the Thames just below Henley.  We had some good times on it and just a quick happy birthday to my ex and his lady who are both celebrating their birthdays today...Hope you've both had a good day.

Over to my student and they have their cousin from Turkey visiting who was still snoring her little head off when I arrived.  The eldest managed to wake her though by banging the dust out of a carpet on the stairs leading up to her bedroom.  She arrived, was still half asleep and we sat around talking about the happenings of work, Djebel and forthcoming potential holidays until lunch of veal and potatoes with stuffed vine leaves, tzatziki, tomatoes and peppers was ready followed by water melon.  As for the holiday it was a toss up between Bursa or the latest development is a spa hotel in Davidkova which I'm warming to.  It's more like a sanatorium with doctors, thermal treatments and massages and who could blame me.

The Golden Oriole was out today and managed to catch him as he left one tree for another deeper in the valley.  Not a very good shot but it's was the best I could do and he wouldn't come back for a retake.  As for the magpie...he / she was having a lovely time this morning catching breakfast..I think the dew had brought them all to the surface and I noticed that the Acacia had got flowers on it which is it's first year for blossom....everybody else's has finished...mine's just starting.   First sweet peas are out against the front wall and really must do something with the ones that are ready for planting out and my chickpeas have germinated and standing about three inches high.  I better read up what to do with them....first year for me.

No need for supper tonight...I'm still replete from lunch.  There should be the Super moon again tonight at about nine my time so camera at the ready but looking at the cloud base...it might not be happening.  I'll say LN.....Kindle out and chill until the camera shoot...LN

Monday 14th July

Mackerel sky this morning and last night I actually closed the curtains so that that lovely moon wouldn't keep me from slumber and I shut the bedroom door so that the man in the hight tower would sing to the rest of the population but not to me.    And it worked...six and I raised my lovely head from the pillow grabbed a coffee and sat on the terrace downstairs watching the sky....bliss.

Boiled some eggs for breakfast and six more for the fridge for snacks.  I have put on weight while my guest was here and now comes the day of reckoning....no alcohol before six in the evening....no butter and no mayo... no cooked breakfast and salad for lunch.  Let's see how long it lasts.  Not a bad morning...I took cuttings of the things that the Librarian had half inched from Kardjali...me your worship...I was looking the other way...and they're now in the nursery bed along with the others and suddenly the sky clouded over, there was a rumble of thunder and the rain started so back in doors.  Problem is the wind gets up and I worry for my sunflowers that are now coming to fruition.  Big as you like and ready to take on a yellow hue....and talking of yellow hues......I have a pair of Golden Orioles that are frequenting and there was a hell of a racket going on this afternoon.  I'm not sure if they are territorial to the point of murder or whether someone was attacking them but there was mayhem,  Lots of screeching and I managed to get some shots of them but the bastard of a camera wouldn't fix on to the object in question which was big and yellow....so sorry for the poor shots...maybe tomorrow,  It's been a day for birds...lots of swoopers after the midges with rain and hot weather come midges....keep it up birdies.  

And talking of birdies...I have level three in all but one illusive Angry Bird.....I've sworn at it to no avail and it's still playing hard to get.  As for the rest of the day ...it's been pretty chilled.  I toyed with the idea of digging up the baby beets and bottling them and found a super recipe for rhubarb chutney but's that as far as it got.  I also down loaded some plans for furniture from the internet and that's as far as that's got as well.  Ah well tomorrow is another day in paradise so they say...LN...it's after six my time so I can have that drink   LN

Just been looking up about Golden Orioles and it is as I thought - as a child, my favourite bedtime reading was the bird book and oh how I longed to see an Oriole. The female is altogether drabber than the male, so if you have got two of the brightly coloured chappies scrapping, they are likely to be two misters, doing what the males of so many species do so well!  

Monday continued....

Thanks Jean...that accounts for the 'noise' that appeared to be going on....so now back to the moon.....it showed it's lovely face again tonight but it's getting smaller as we speak...or as I write....

Tuesday 15th July

Drew the curtains last night again because of the moon and it worked...six this morning, down for the coffee and back to bed with Angry Birds.  Now this is one heck of an angry bird...there are thirty puzzles in the series and you have to get three stars for achievement for each of them to complete the level.  I've managed twenty nine of them and the illusive 30th remains and illusive 30th.....I have two stars and keep increasing my score but still not enough...ggggrrrrrhhhh.  I could always buy a set of 'enablers' but that;s a little bit like cheating so 'one more day' as they said in Les Mis at the Bastille.

Funny weather again today.  I woke up to ground mist that appeared to burn off so out I went into the garden but still wearing the black top that I bought for sleeping in.  Suddenly occurred to me that the sun on my back was really painful and I know the top is black and it absorbs the heat but I wondered if it was made in China and had some substance on the fabric so straight in doors and into a cotton t-shirt.  Side garden weeded so now you can appreciate the old fashioned marigolds that are there, cleared out most of the onion bed and the mini cucumbers that I'm supposed to be putting into jars with vinegar when I get round to it.  I told there supposed to be courgettes but they don't look much like them to me.  I disturbed the lizard when I banged on the fence to throw a weed over for the sheep and he shot out and I think we disturbed each other.  He was very good....he waited on the tyre while I went in and got the camera and on my trip round the gardens I came across a very small tortoise and the ant on his back shows just how small he really is.

Boiled ham and hard boiled egg for lunch or rather brunch...I've missed one today and stayed out in the garden until about five thirty when the wind really got up and there's thunder rattling around now.  It's just very silly weather this year....I don't think it's been like this ever since I've been coming here,  Just tidied up my tools and put the wheelbarrow into the garage for the night....looks like it might start throwing it down any minute now and that's going to save me a job.  

Warming up for a soak tonight in my bath.  Showers are all very well but I'm thinking that a good lengthy dip will reach the parts that a shower can't.  LN.....I'm away to fresh pastures and my feet should certainly look a lot cleaner for the time that I intend to invest in there....LN

Wednesday 16th July

So I lay in the bath last night and listened to the thunder and watched the flashes of lightening.  I go into PJ's, dried my hair and the storm suddenly got louder.  The wind got up, there was little space between the lightening and the clap of thunder but I was so relaxed that I nodded off.  I recall thinking that it hadn't rained and I'd not watered the garden but all my qualms were over when I head the downpour start and it was still raining this morning.  Bekir and Sally working at the Schoolmaster's place were rained off this afternoon and he was clearing flood water from inside the property at one this morning.....Don't anyone say we don't have fun.  I reckon he'll be sleeping in wet weather gear tonight and if I had a boat, I'd have made my bed in it by now.  Breakfast was a tin of cold baked beans as part of my diet but no toast to go with them.  I heard the bread van delivering this morning just after eight but I was too lazy to go down there and it was raining too hard.  Another day without bread won't hurt me.  As for me.....I had endless possibilities today and did...nothing.  I did manage to get the last of those Angry Birds this morning but goodness knows how I did it.  Just got the bombs in the right place I suppose but sometimes there seems no rhyme or reason to it.  

To say that I did nothing is not quite correct...I'll say that I did very little.  I've caught up with old friends on FB and made new on a couple of other sites playing the banter game, found a book on the bookshelf that I thought I hadn't read but I believe I must have gotten part way through it and still unsure whether I made it to the end or not.  Because it's so heavy, I checked out my disk of books that I acquired but it wasn't on there so I tracked it down on Amazon for the princely price of two ninety nine and it means that I can read it on the Kindle.  What I like about it is that it's not heavy when I go to bed and if I drop it when I nod off, it doesn't wake me up again....

Went out onto the terrace and watched loads of buntings after the insects in the grass or seeds...not sure what they eat but they were flitting backwards and forwards.  I heard the calls of the Golden Orioles and caught a glimpse of them leaving the mulberry but they were just too quick to get the camera on them.  A flash of yellow and that's it...gone.

Pork chops for supper done it the oven and I can smell them cooking.  A little sweet and sour sauce on them and that should be enough for me for tonight,  A lazy and restful day...a new book and tomorrow is another day for making hay but only if the sun shines...LN

Wednesday continued

After a good watering, I thought I'd take a few of the gardens....

Thursday 17th July

Very misty start to the day again with the morning mist eventually burning off by about eleven of the clock.  Made myself a bacon omelette this morning so the  July resolution for healthy options resulted in a very full stomach and needing nothing until the mood took me at about four thirty tonight.

It's been another day of nothing.  I did put the chair back out onto the balcony now that the rain has ceased and hoping that it stays off...it's a heavy thing to manoeuver in and out and this time I had to put it on its side through the doorway.  Either the door's shrunk or the chair has spread....   I eventually got up the effort to drive into Djebel to get some more paint brushes so that I can make a start on painting the railing that's if the rain stays off.  It did come over dark and dull about lunchtime and there was a rumble in the jungle but it seemed to blow over thankfully.  

Checked out my new cuttings and it appears that the new ones seem to have taken already and are pushing out new green shoots.  The bougainvillea has thrown up some new shoots so I suppose this weather is good for something.  Hacebar was chasing a couple of cows today and I've found out that they are Besir and I didn't know she even had any.  Apparently Hacebar doesn't have one at the moment...it was fed the wrong stuff and exploded if my translation is correct but anyway it's dead.  She's having a rough time of it...her husband is in Kardjali and has had an operation...I didn't ask for what....it would have been difficult to explain and understand.  I offered to take her to Kardjali if she needs to go to see him....she knows where I am.

Went down to the garage in Djebel to get them to look at the spark plugs since it seems reluctant to get started but they were so busy I decided to leave it until Monday.  I've also checked in the Beast for its pre-MOT look over....as well to get it done before I take it in.

Supper was fillet steak on fresh French stick and it was delicious.  Michael Jackson is singing his little heart out and all's well in my world.  LN...no photos.....the likely songbirds never put their little faces out of the bushes and you had the garden and the flowers yesterd...LN

Friday 18th July

And good morning everyone.  Last night I spotted Harold out in the garden...not my resin bronze copy but Harold the living breathing one but it was dusk and my camera would not focus.  And this morning he was out there again, he ran across the garden and finally made his way to my veg patch so now I know who's been eating my new chickpeas....   I grabbed the camera and from my bedroom took some shots through the window but the camera would not focus and everything is blurred.  I knew that if I went out he would be off but I opened the flyscreen very slowly and managed to get a few before he ran off at quick speed down the garden, turned and sat for a while looking for the threat and then legged it over the hillside.  Looking at the eyes...he's a demon bunny.....but he'll be a dead one if he goes for my chick peas again....

As I turned to go into the house I noticed the sun as it started its journey this morning.  Let's hope it stays today.  The morning mist is in the valleys and its starting to burn off.  Bodes for a good day.....