Monday, January 11, 2010

The bird, thaw and boneshaker.

I put three more blogs on the Roll of Honour yesterday: Nicsknots, For the Love of Beads (home of regular commenter Rosebud) and Tru's Flickr photo set.

Both Feather Duster and Joannezipan have been following footprints in the snow. I loved Den's picture of a prideful garden bird.

In one of those odd thematic co-incidences, a small congregation of 3BTers have written about places of worship this week. Whitney (who got a wonderful treat on her birthday) had a Yoda moment while serving communion. Raymond Pert has been feeling at home in his church, and so has Leonora. Lynn uses a lovely phrase to describe packing away the decorations in her church, and enjoys one of her mother-in-law's sayings.

Finally Ruth at Sheer Sumptuosity raced through the snow for an Arabian treat, and shares a picture of the beautiful badges she is making for Valentine's day.

1. I am on the phone to my mother-in-law when I spot a bluetit on the bird feeder. I haven't put food out before because I assumed we had no birds in our corner. But the forked footprints in the snow made me realise that they do come down here. I put out fat and a dish of water, and was rewarded by a scribbled mass of bird prints.

2. The chorus of drips, draps and splats of the snow melting. Two lines of translucent slush now pass our door.

3. Boneshaker by Cherie Priest. It's the story of a Chicago that never was -- ruined by a mining machine gone mad, poisoned by a blight gas and walled up the protect the people making a miserable living outside. A boy in search of answers crosses the wall and is trapped. His mother follows, hoping to protect him from the horrors inside -- or is it the truth about his father that she's trying to save him from?

Book treasure, worn and speaker.

1. Finding treasure in the Oxfam bookshop. I only popped in to look for a card. 2. Bettany doesn't wear makeup out and about, but noneth...