Nature notes

Mild wet and very windy up from the south, so mild that, when I went downstairs to get a bedtime drink last night, I found that the cats had brought a frog in, and were just sitting around looking at it.

And while a few clear cool nights have just about ended the tomatoes for the year, it was only a couple of days ago I picked the last couple of properly ripe fruit off the Alicante in the greenhouse. The chilis are still going wild, and we're just getting the first capsicums ripening.

And of course even the tender plants like the fuchsia are going strong.

Nature notes

Driving home, after dining with colleagues, in the hard bright moonlight of a Hunter's Moon, I actually saw a live badger ambling along the verge at one point, a rare spotting of some of the larger wildlife around here.

Quite how starkly bright a winter full moon can be always comes as a surprise.

Also, still harvesting a last few tomatoes from both outdoor and greenhouse plants.

Nature notes

Rain last Thursday night was heavy enough to put the pilot light out in the back boiler!

Harvest time is upon us -- a little early even, as windfall Bramleys from next door join the plums and tomatoes; and the cut and come again salad is losing the fight against other predators.

Dead-heading the California poppies in the front yesterday late afternoon, I disturbed a frog who was hiding in the mass of vegetation. If it'd just stayed still, I'd've been none the wiser.

And I was in the garden because the front gear cable on my bike had snapped when changing up gears after getting to the top of the one noticeable hill in the area; when leaves me in bottom on the front set, and only the lowest few gears on the back block accessible without the chain catching on the front dérailleur. So, workshop fun at the weekend!

Miscellany

Thursday morning just gone, stumbling downstairs in the dark at twenty to seven, to see the cats sitting at the patio doors, looking out, with the just-past-full moonlight streaming in.

A* in Scala -- would be a fairly mechanical translation of the F# version with probably more explicit type declarations. The F# inference of a numeric type for operator < and + fails, so those operations on generic type B have to be pulled into a Graph[A,B] trait.

A few apples still left on the Bramley, and a lot on the Charles Ross. And this lunchtime, a tortoiseshell butterfly and a fallen leaf lying side by side on the picnic table, looking almost the same at first glance.

Nature Notes

A magnificent, if topless, rainbow showed as I drove home this evening, the setting sun streaming into the squall that had just gone over (as in, I waited for it to pass before going out to the car).

And, driving through Bourn, a black squirrel bounding along the road-side. First one of them I've seen!

Spring

The sunrise beating the sunrise alarm; cock pheasants squaring off on the unpaved side-road in Bourn as I drive into work; bright twilight at 6pm.

Were it not for the windy & wet weather, it would be bicycling season now.

.Net, IronPython and the shell

One step forwards, two steps back, trying to get a uniformly applicable method to get the displayed icon for a file-name that doesn't drag in attributed code at some point.

We can P/Invoke to get file icons through SHGetFileInfo -- but that involves attribute decorated methods in a C# shim.

We might be able to get at IExtractIcon via COM Interop starting from the Shell like this:

though that route doesn't yet work on Mono (GetTypeFromProgID isn't yet implemented -- and the type being of type System.__ComObject, that's probably not there either). And in any case we still need to either P/Invoke DestroyIcon or read the icon resources directly from PE format, and manage the object ourselves, even if all the other argument passing works.

We could use Icon.ExtractAssociatedIcon if only it didn't restrict itself to just files that exist (in particular, unlike SHGetFileInfo, it does not do folders, or drives, let alone abstract allusions to files by their extension).

*sigh*

Nature notes

Yesterday morning, when I was in the kitchen putting breakfast together, there was this sudden flurry of feathers outside.

Looking out onto the patio, I saw hawk holding a young pigeon on the ground, raking around with one foot, while keeping a good look out.

Eventually Jemima wandered up to the patio doors, which was a bit much, so the hawk flew off, promptly followed by the pigeon.

Long day

Woken about 04:30 by having to help Karen to the bathroom, by 05:00 I gave up the unequal struggle and admitted that in the morning light, I was awake; so fired up the laptop and fiddled a bit with the blog, setting up Google Reader and tapping aggregations from that.

I wasn't the only one active at that time -- one of the UK blogs produced a flurry of posts at about 05:20.

On the road by 07:00, at the office by 07:50 for Bike-to-Work Day, and breakfasted copiously; then showered, and with the rest of the team, hit the road down to Chalfont. Going A1/M25, with stop/start traffic from junctions 19-21, it took 2h15. On the return, starting at 15:30 went A413, through Wendover to Tring, B488, A505, A5, A4012, A421, A428 took the same, even with a stop for petrol, and unusually slow traffic between the M1 and Bedford.

In the garden, about 30 minutes ago, just enjoying the slow twilight, I was taken by surprise by a hedgehog crossing the property, and disappearing under the fence.

Nature notes

Sitting out in the garden blogging, after having done another batch of garden work, and tidying up the garage. Still a lot of stuff for the tip, and more for jumble. Cherry blossom is falling in the breeze, carpeting the lawn like snow.

There's a lot of tidying to do after last year's total neglect, but when there are wanted plants in amongst the weeds, simple clear to the surface and suppress won't do, so it goes more slowly. And unexpected tasks like removing the suddenly expired clematis add to the work. At least there's a natural limit — stop when the green bin is full.

The frogs are appearing in the pond again, lurking at the surface; and there's at least one newt as well.

[Now playing - Planet Rock]

Spring again

Yesterday was pretty horrid -- dull, and in the afternoon, cold drizzle, unpleasant to cycle home from town in. It was an afternoon to retreat back to bed, with cat and laptop for warmth.

I slept in solidly this morning, even after settling down around 10pm last night, pretty much sleeping the clock round (even without figuring summer time into the equation).

Having covered the pond with bubblewrap last Sunday (ahead of sleet and frost), the warm and sunny weather meant it could be exposed again. As expected, the frogspawn was gone -- having been there since more than 3 weeks ago -- and I spotted a couple of tiny tadpoles.

Leaf buds are starting to burst now, so maybe real spring is here again.

A taste of spring

A week of fine, mild, sunny weather has meant that I cycled to work every day this week -- I don't think I'll manage to do any earlier in the season than that (compare last year :) ).

On Wednesday, when we went out to the pub at lunchtime, it was warm enough in the sun to sit outside at one of the picnic tables to eat.

And now we're promised a plunge back to sleet and snow next week. :(

Spring

The frogspawn I first noticed last Saturday has accumulated further over the week. The forsythia is now bursting its buds. And today was warm and sunny enough for wearing a T-shirt while hoeing the cow-parsley and mowing the lawn.

There is a lot of moss in the lawn this year -- not having done any treatment last year has brought it all back.

Spring approaches

Today was my first day cycling to work, in beautiful clear sunshine in the morning — though the cloud had come up by the time I headed home.

From now, it's down to the weather and other committments.

Spring

When I went into town today, the daffs were out on Parker's Piece.

Dawn Chorus

The past few days, while the sunrise alarm has been ramping up after 06:00, I've been aware of birdsong outside. And today was thoroughly springlike for cycling into town and back.

Is this ridiculous or what?

I mowed the lawn for the first time this year; the strong winds having dried the grass that their mildness has been encouraging to grow.

Admittedly, I would have done it a couple of weeks back, if it hadn't been so wet; but this is just crazy.

The weeds think it's spring already, too.

Hot

I went on the Cambridge Cycling Campaign leisurely ride out to Cambourne today — and ended up leading much of it, as the only one with on-the-ground knowledge. Then having cycled home->town->Coton->Cambourne->Toft->Barton->back to Parker's Piece, I had to head out to Teversham to help Karen, before heading back home over the Gogs. Tiring, especially in 28C weather, with little in the way of breeze.

Getting back on the bike tomorrow will take some effort, even wearing my padded lycra discreetly under my shorts. It was a refreshingly lycra free outing, and I was clearly toward the top end of the fitness/scope range, not way down like I had expected.

I did see bird perched on a horse near Teversham; and now, Saturn looking very red in the southern sky, with Arcturus high above it.

Spring at last

For the first time in years, the frogspawn has actually developed, and is now starting to hatch!

Forsythia at its height

The pond and other blooms

Nature notes

Yesterday, just setting out to work, a sudden explosion of feathers caught my eye. It looked like a sparrowhawk taking a bird, but fumbling, and the two of them zoomed across the road ahead of me, the hawk closing in for a second try, as I went past.

Today, pushing the bike into the wind along the bridleway, there were daisies out.