Findings on going somewhere else

and some drawypaintings.

We spent three days in Swanage (for my mother’s secret BIG birthday surprise, see previous post). Swanage was definitely never in Dorset before. I could have sworn it was in Kent, and not on the coast. My sister felt the same, but she thought it was in Essex. Anyway, Swanage is a nice little town in a very wet February. The hotel where we stayed was delightful, especially the staff. They were so exceptionally kind and friendly, and willing to join in the surprising my mother thing, that I am moved to write a trip advisor doodah in their favour, something I NEVER DO.

I’ve driven through bits of Dorset plenty of times, but have rarely BEEN there, probably because I come from an adjacent county, i.e. Devon, the best county.

My findings on Dorset:

It is very pretty, like Devon, but it has much bigger fields than Devon, and the edges and hedges are the same but tidier. The main roads are very slow with far too many speed restrictions (compared to the wild west of Devon and Cornwall), and with enormous amounts of traffic. It takes 2 and a half hours to get from Bristol to the south coast and it’s only 80 miles.

Somewhere in Dorset

My findings on being driven in my sister’s electric car:

I will never have an electric car, thank you, but no, unless they invent one that only needs to be recharged once a year. Sorry, but I love petrol. Mmmmm… petrol and the autonomy of a full tank.

Little yellow boat

My findings on surprising my mother for her big birthday:

I kind of knew her response would be “you bastards!”, but in a nice way. Genes.

Waders

My findings on spending 3 days in a nice hotel, with a teensy spa in the basement, on a cliff overlooking the English Channel:

I REALLY need to do this sort of thing more often. Our hotel room overlooked the choppy English Channel, and the sound of the waves all day and night, and the changes in light through the day made me happy, relaxed and, most importantly to me, painty. Also, I think I should to sit in a jacuzzi daily, it would help the world.

A Swanage

My findings on my sister’s cat:

A cat

My findings on being home in rain-soaked Portugal:

I left when it was raining. I’m back and it’s still raining, and Portugal has seen some terrible calamities and some shockingly but predictably awful infrastructure has been revealed. In the last couple of weeks, I have seen several noobs in Portugal a estranhar (that is, thinking something is odd) that the world’s press hasn’t said anything about the storms in Portugal. To them I say, get very used to it, because the world’s press never does, never has, and never will, unless the disaster is related to something they’ve heard of, is yellow, and looks like a tram. Maybe if there were a botulism outbreak due to pastéis de nata consumption would the press look again. You picked the wrong country if you want to be visible to the outside world, folks.

A bit of Swanage

My findings on being back at my desk:

January work doldrums are officially over, as it is now February and everybody’s woken up, so I’m back at my desk today, writing the list of stuff I have to do in the coming months. So far, I’m keeping the AI bots from destroying me, although I’ve noticed a significant uptick in really shitty AI/effing-Canva type motion graphics being used in youtube ads. They are staggeringly shit, so that’s heartening, I guess. There’s still use for an old broad who knows what a bloody keyframe is… for now.

Moon over Swanage at 4am

Now, get back to work.