Here Comes The Sun

To say that it has been bitter over the last week or two would be an understatement. The log burner has been working overtime and has kept us snug and cosy in a sort of retirement hibernation as we've busied ourselves with booking a winter sun holiday for next January. I'm pleased to say we've done it and we're off back to Bequia (and for three weeks this time). It's the first time we've returned to the same place for a holiday for a very long time but it was so relaxing that we think it would be very hard to beat.

We've also watched moreTV than is good for us. There's so much choice now with Amazon Prime (when it works), Netflix and Sky. We've seen some rubbish (Cell and Silent House) but two films that were worthy of note are Nightcrawler and The 13th. 

We watched Nightcrawler on Amazon Prime one afternoon (Prime seems to fail in the evening at the moment - hope they sort it out soon). The film is everything it says on the poster and we'd strongly recommend it. Jake Gyllenhaal plays a strange loner (possibly on the autistic scale) whose lack of emotion and feeling enables him to film accidents, fires and murders for local news channels in graphic detail without qualms. It's a sinister and well acted movie that's well worth looking out for.  

Netflix's documentary The 13th which won a BAFTA at the weekend is another excellent movie. In the current political climate, both here and in the USA, its message is extremely relevant and brilliantly presented without being over manipulative.

We haven't been inside all the time. We recently went to yet another brilliant talk at Framlingham College. This time FramSoc members were entertained by the eloquent and very funny Benet Brandreth who spoke at length about the art of rhetoric and, in doing so, cleverly promoted his book The Spy Of Venice a "what if" novel that explores the possibility that Shakespeare visited Venice in his youth and used his experiences there as inspiration for his plays.

We also got to the wonderful Ipswich Film Theatre Trust to see My Feral Heart a story about a young man with Down's Syndrome who loses his mother and consequently loses his independence. It's a very moving little film.

When I said at the start of this blog "Here Comes The Sun" I wasn't only referring to the Caribbean holiday we've booked. Today the sun did indeed show itself here in Framlingham and the temperature gauge rose into double figures for the first time in a while.

It was so mild and sunny on Market Hill this morning that we enjoyed our regular coffee OUTSIDE the Dancing Goat for the first time this year.

The castle was packed with half term visitors (although I have to say that shirtsleeves was overdoing it a bit).

And I managed to take a nice shot of the church beneath a brilliant blue sky.

When I did a bit of gardening later in the day I was treated to my own private airshow as this helicopter performed all sorts of training exercises right above me. I only managed to get my phone camera ready when they had completed a full loop overhead. This was taken as they straightened out.

An exciting end to the week awaits us as two of our grandchildren are going to come and stay with us here in Framlingham on Thursday and Friday. Let's hope that the sun stays out for them and they can go and fight some knights at the castle's half term entertainment.