Grateful: Day 102 - Bubbles

Let's start with yesterday - what I forgot to say was how much I loved swimming through the water in the gentle rain. There was beautiful light in the sky, so when each drop hits the water and bounces back out, the light picks it up as it lifts, and it picks out a little horizontal line too.

As you move through the water, it's being surrounded by Disney fairy sparkles, or floating in a night sky.Today, grey in the sky. The water was cold and it bit the backs of my arms and the fronts of my thighs. It really made its presence known today. I love that it's not about how cold it REALLY is; it's about how cold you perceive it to be. Today, I perceived it to be cold, and I loved it.

I was on foot today, with a wheely case instead of my backpack. I was returning the case to beautiful Celine Boulhaya, who has generously left it in my care for two or three months now. I had to walk through the mud with the case lifted. One trouser leg drank dirt. The other didn't. I think my legs are roughly the same length. Obviously not quite, though, or maybe one thigh is broader, making that pant leg ride up.

I carried the case across the heath too. It wasn't muddy, but the wheely scrape noise was blocking out the birds and I wanted to listen. I am so grateful and wide-eyed on that heath. It gives me such joy. And today I was treated to a proper mound of dogs. The first, as I was walking to the pond, was a wildly barking Red Setter.

They're mad as a bag of spoons, those dogs. He was barking because he was happy. I've seen him before. He barrels it down the lane with every bit of him wagging, shouting. A bit like the little boy on his bike, screaming Yeehaaahhhh. Oh, I do hope they're related! I can imagine people not familiar with dogs finding that a bit scary, a lone barking dog coming at speed. His owner usually follows up in an exhausted jog a little bit later.

I saw, among others, lots of black Labradors (not my favourites, but I'd no doubt love it if I had one), a bunch of little terriers (on stalks, Eshter Lilley, and wrapped in crepe paper, a proper bunch), a running curly thing, like a moving wig with eyes, two dappled Spaniels egging each other on and a beautiful, gentle-eyed Dalmatian with a lump on its face. And later, in the street, a Weimaraner - sleek and lean, this one, with a half-docked tail. What a haul!

Then over to Ealing for a hospital appointment (in and out, all clear) and a meeting, which was interesting and full of potential. I sorted my phone. I got what I wanted - an upgrade to an htc - the cheapest, but so much better, even in the first four seconds, than the Huawei I'd been sold. I saw the salesman in action again, lying through his teeth but in such a charming way. Sweet boy. Never to be trusted.

I'll check this phone out and see what's going down. Seems better, though. The speed with which he went against everything he'd said last time, and offered me exactly what I wanted (to get rid of this crappy handset) against policy and without my even asking, tells me his claim that 'I've sold loads of these recently and none of them have come back' was a bucket of tosh.

I'm grateful, though. Already, I have my phone keyboard back and I can text without straining my eyes - or even really looking at all. And I can choose a ringtone and an alarm sound, just like that. They're basic things, but you miss them when you can't.

I am outrageously sleepy today, so I will follow my urge and be in bed in next to no-time (possibly with a warm cup of milk). Before I do, thank you for a tasty dahl all cooked, ready to be eaten once aged overnight. Thank you for moments of glee inspired by yesterday's playing; for the man in the launderette who was warm and friendly and possibly from Hawaii.

Thank you for the gentleman I've never met who tried everything he could think of to get me in on this African roleplay job. I couldn't make the dates, but we really did do calculations of all kinds about when I could fly, how we could make it work; for some pay from a previous job; for decisions bubbling in my brains, ripe to be made. And for Ruth, just home. She is such a good egg, that woman. I like her very much.