Friday 26th July 2019

End of the week. And the last day of the Danish (and German) vacation marathon.

So, next week there should be more stuff going on.

Maybe.

So, for the day it was more of the same. Answering mails, updating databases and so on.

And Jools was off work for the day, but had a day of stuff planned, so I would be mostly alone.

And it was going to be hot. Damned hot, if not quite as hot as Thursday. Though, as it turned out that was relative.

Despite it being hotter and a Swedish sauna, once the thunder and lightning the night before had dispersed, we slept well, and work up just before six, ready for the day.

Jools had a coffee then nipped out for a yoga class, then went into town for an optician appointment to have new contacts fitted.

I stayed at home, did my weekly admin tasks, finished off my travel expenses, got into the inbox.

After going Swimming, Jools came back, then went out to do the weekly shopping; she was all go.

I sat working, in the hothouse that is our house on another hot and humid day in Chez Jelltex. Not quite as hot as the day before, but still hot. The thermostat gave up trying to show how hot it was, and I resorted to drinking pints of iced squash. Not beer.

At half twelve, I went to sit on the sofa to watch Le Tour. Another day in the mountains, with the GC due to do a day of mostly climbing in baking hot temperatures.

I watched whilst working, an eye on the TV scree and another on the work laptop.

At three work ended for the day, and the cyclists continued going up and up. And then nature intervened. A snow shower at the beginning of the final climb caused the race to be suspended, then stopped. Chaos at the end of a race of high drama. Later, shots of a landslip showed the route impassable.

At four, we went out to look at our local colony of Violet Helleborines.

We dodge the rush hour traffic, driving in the other direction to Barham, then stopping at the Black Robin to wait for an orchidist friend. I suggest we go in for refreshment. Refreshment is beer and wasabi peanuts, apparently.

We retire to the beer garden, in the shade to wait.

Gwen arrives just after I had supped the last of my pint, which was brilliant timing, so we drive in convoy to the wood, park then walk up the sloping wooded down to the orchids.

Even with the hellish hot temperatures, the spikes were hardly any further on than last week; none in flower.

Jools and I do a hunt, but Gwen finds three new spikes, before I find another three.

Next week.

It is early evening, but humid as hell.

Going back home to cook bangers and mash with Boston beans doesn't make it any cooler. So once we had eaten, we sit on the shaded patio whilst the sun goes down.

Phew.

The sun goes down, and dusk creeps over the land. I sit outside as the humidity drops, finally cooling off enough to go to bed.

Phew.