Friday 3rd August 2018

The day I had not been looking forward to, taking Molly to the vet.

But in order to do so, I needed the car, so Jools needed to get to work, and collected when she finished.

Jools was up first, and after getting Molly to eat something, Molly was put in a cat box until time to leave.

We had coffee and breakfast, before Jools got dressed and we went to the car for the drive to Hythe. At least in August, with the kids on holiday, there is no real rush hour any more, so it is a quiet drive through Dover and up on the A20 to Folkestone.

Hythe is decked with dozens of fine looking hanging baskets, something to look at for drivers later in the day when the traffic is nose to tail? Maybe.

So we reach the factory at quarter past seven, I turn round and drive back, in heavier traffic, but with the radio on and all the car windows open, its a fine thing to be doing.

Once back home it is straight to work, doing the chores I needed to do, which was mainly battling MS Word, that decided as I had finished work, it would change many chapter's fonts into Times New Roman. It took two hours to check everything manually, by which time it was time to leave for the vets.

Molly had sat in the box, silently, which showed how low she was, as she is normally a fiesty cat. She did give some half-hearted meows as we drove to Whitfield, and then in the waiting room.

Once in with Chris, he got her out and was concerned: she is indeed nearly blind in her right eye, caused by low blood pressure forcing the lens in that eye out, drying out and clouding over. It will not get any better. The real danger is it going to her left eye, making her totally blind, so all we can do s make sure she takes her blood pressure pills each morning.

And that is that, we have some more drops to put in, which might make it less uncomfortable, but not much else can be done.

But once home, I give molly some food, stroke her as she eat, and she was back to herself, trotting out of the kitchen to find her dark place to hunker down for the day.

At one I have to go and collect Jools again, so work is done for the day, but I have done my tasks for the week, even closed out my travel expenses. Which is nice.

Darn, it was a hot day, 31 degrees, or so the car said as I climbed in it for the drive along to Hythe.

Jools comes out dead on two, and now we can drive to Canterbury so I can get my latest camera toy, a ring flash.

We travel up Stone Street, stopping off at the garage to fill up, and get an ice cream, then carrying on into Canterbury, parking on the edge of the ring road so we could walk to the camera centre.

I was shown the controls on the flash, tried it out, and all seemed good. I paid.

And on the way back we go past Barham, so it seemed only sensible that I try the flash in the wild, as it were.

So it was at the hottest part of the day that we parked up under the shade of the wood, I now have an extra bit of kit to carry about, so I leave the tripod behind, and we begin the long slow walk up the down.

It is still where the orchids were. And green Not a sound broke through the heavy air, and the orchids just stood in groups of two our three. As I snapped away, Jools went hunting for more spikes, and found them, at least six more groups, and all open or opening.

I take hundreds of shots, most useless as I had forgotten that flash needs time to recycle power, so many were without flash, and those with were over exposed. But a few came out.

Thankfully.

We walk back to the car, and then drive back, taking the quiet way through Barfrestone, as we thought it would be good to stop for a drink at the Wrong Turn, but we couldn't find the village let alone the pub. We reach Eythorne, and decide to go straight home, well, through Pineham and Guston, thus avoiding any traffic for the port. We each have pints of iced squash, and take shelter in the cool of the house, once we have opened all the windows again.

It was too hot to do much to be honest, so once the sun began to set, with sat on the patio with more iced drinks, in the shade of the hedge, just watching the shadows lengthen.