My kind of beautiful

Routine .... WHAT routine?

Life is one tumultuous topsy turvy swirl of colour and action.  

I’m trying to embrace it.  

Not always successfully but always with humour.  

Even in the darkest of moments.

As the hound and I walked home from our ramble this morning 
a thought flitted briefly through my head.  

When will life be ‘normal’ again.  

Yes ... normal.

definition: 

(n) the usual, typical or expected state or condition

 (adj) conforming to a standard.  Usual, expected or typical.

My kind of ‘normal’ has been AWOL for a while now.

This last week has been full on with work as one of my colleagues resigned.  

Filling her shifts till someone new is employed has been expected of us.  

The extra cash is nice.  

The hours spent in the shop though reduce the hours available for photography and rambles.  

It doesn’t sit well with either the hound or I.

We’ve NOT had ANY mornings this week to indulge in a longer than usual ramble.  

Not even this morning.

Whilst visiting the SO today he remarked on how mundane and routine his existence is.  

Each morning it’s the same people he talks to, the same procedure that’s followed.  

We couldn’t BE at more opposite ends of the spectrum.

He’s bored out of his skull whilst I struggle to maintain equilibrium.

How weird is it though that a thought that popped into my head during my morning ramble should be voiced by him during our visit.

It did make us laugh.

Synchronisicity in thought despite the marked difference in circumstance.

His boredom though made me value the busyness of my days.

I don’t have time to over-analyse what’s happened to us.

I don’t have time to ponder on the unfairness or otherwise of life.

It was a necessary and timely reminder to appreciate and accept life as it is.

At this moment in time.

Coops, the flying hound

Keep moving forward, don’t look back.

Step by step, strength is gained and adversity overcome.

Take-off!

Besides, when did I ever  DO ‘normal’.

In cruise mode

“Be your own kind of beautiful.” 

~ unknown

Touch down

I'm not normal ....

When I say I’m NOT normal, I really mean it ... I’m not.

It’s NOT normal to venture out into the wild, windy, wet and woeful weather ... with a hound and a lemming .... AND still be laughing when you come home wet. I think that particular lemming’s NOT normal either ... nor is the hound.

The wind was so vile we tried walking BACKWARDS along the beach. There was no worry about bumping into anyone ... there WASN’T anyone ON the beach to bump into. Just the dog to trip over .... or the lemming’s BIG feet when you’re playing soccer with a rugby ball. I’d forgotten how big his feet are and how difficult it is to get back on your feet whilst trying to retain possession of a rugby ball, and NOT wet your pants laughing.

Wet, windy and Wild!

The hound loves it. The wilder the weather the stronger the waves and the larger the logs on the beach. Caffeine was a necessity and not just to satisfy a fix .... I needed it to warm my hands too!

Sunday morning's cloud formation

Why is it that when the weather’s wet and windy, some people persist in using umbrellas? They get blown inside out and have more rain on the inside than the outside. Candid camera moments aplenty IF I didn’t mind my camera getting wet! 

Give me a raincoat with a hood any day!

Sam the Man has the Lahood household taped ... wrapped round the smallest part of his very large paws! Carol and Pete have just got back from participating in a half-marathon on the Gold Coast this weekend. Sam, on arriving home from the kennels, immediately claimed ownership of the couch ... a battle he’s been waging with Carol since he became part of their family.

Kingfishers on my beach

I think today he won that battle .... the couch is HIS!

Heron foraging in front of my favourite piece of real estate

The cat that lives WITH us has a cold ... he’s sneezing all the time. If you’ve never seen a cat sneeze, it’s actually quite funny .... for us that is, not him. The first thing the vet asked was if he’d been in the cattery recently. He has ... he spent two days there while we moved. 

There are so many birds in the shallows when the tide's far out.

The vet has seen 3 kitties this week with the same symptoms and they’ve all spent time at the same cattery. It’s not a virus they’ve caught at the cattery though. He believes they’ve been bullied by another cat whilst there and it’s stressed them out. When they get stressed it affects their immune system making them susceptible to viruses.

He also gave us a copy of his latest newsletter as there’s an article in there about ‘the cat who lived’ and her amazing recovery. He’s still in awe that she survived and that she’s recovered so well. So are we.

I’m trying to get some work done today and this is supposed to be a QUIET household with fewer bodies in it. Strange then that there are 4 lemmings sitting around the playstation ... 2 of whom don’t live here anymore. They’ve been raiding the fridge and freezer and are eating ice-cream when it’s so icy outside .... brrrrrr!

“When we seek to discover the best in others, we somehow bring out the best in ourselves.” ~ William Arthur

The full moon this evening.