Flowers, Lunch and Early Darkness

Bella did not put her clock back last night, so she was still awake at dawn, wanting her breakfast. Su got up and fed her, and made a cup of coffee too - which was most welcome! After breakfast, we went back to our allotment one last time to collect the last bits that we will use at home. I was struck by the number and variety of flowers in bloom for the end of October.  Next year's primroses have popped up very early...

 Some dwarf tomatoes we planted are still flowering!

 Evening primroses had appeared during our time away in Turkey and Greece

 What we left behind for the next tenants to work with

 After cleaning ourselves up, off we set cross-country to Barbara & Richard's for lunch. Over lunch Trish revealed that, rather than reset her watch twice a year, she has two watches - a silver one set to British Summer Time, and a black one set to GMT, which she put on today for the first time since March. 

One delicious meal later, we all managed to stir ourselves for a walk with Bella who had patiently watched us eat - with just a couple of little snacks Richard smuggled to her.  On the return leg, this intriguing notice left us all a bit bemused. Thermal imaging is in the news at the moment with tents around St Pauls being scanned to allegedly show absence of sleeping protesters - any connection?

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 Back from the walk we subjected our hosts to two short slide shows of our recent travels to show our gratitude for such a lovely meal. Then it was time to head home and feed the hungry hound - through the far-too-early afternoon darkness that is the British winter.  I hope that proposals to move to European daylight hours get approved next year!