MEERDOG WELCOMES 2014

Caught in the act at last! He can keep it up for quite some time, but, until now, has eluded the camera. So - Happy New Year to you all and apologies for blog silence; we've been so busy. New Year's Eve involved a brief respite from the APPALLING weather and we all managed to get out for a walk. OB likes to see how few strides he can take between two points, normally two rocks:

A handstand on a hump:

Trying to annoy Dad:

The river was running pretty high and fast. This is close to where a girl drowned a few years ago while training for the Ten Tors challenge that takes place every year on Dartmoor. So sad and we are hyper-aware of how dangerous water can be:

Wind rippling the water accumulated in a track between two fords:

Wallabrook:

OB doing something inexplicable on the clapper bridge over Wallabrook:

View through the bare trees:

Watching white water:

More white water. I know people who have kayaked down this. Rather them than me:

The day before, the river was even higher; sorry about the raindrops on the lens:

The dogs and I got rained on despite being surrounded by blue sky and sunshine. the rain cloud seemed to be following us:

Full rainbow over the shelter belt and my unavoidable shadow:

Sunshine amid the rain:

My saviours, the Devon Air Ambulance, off to rescue someone else:

Meerdog on the rampage:

The birds have run out of berries and are clustering round the feeding station, including this Nuthatch, who flew off as I pressed the button. I just love the blur of Nuthatchy colour:

Female Chaffinch:

Dunnock:

Male Sparrow:

Robin:

Male Sparrow with another coming in to land:

And finally, the Magpie skulking in the tree:

We've all been sleeping a lot and getting up at 8.00am sometimes, which is seriously late for me. I find it just makes me feel lethargic and guilty that I'm losing so much of the day. I've been really lax about taking Trigger down to see the Dartmoor Madams too. He went down there today, but when the weather is awful, he just stays up here. I'm itching to get the Christmas tree down but OB insists on it remaining. Thankfully, he's staying with a friend tomorrow night, so I'll probably do it then; I find it a rather depressing reminder that the excitement is over and the snow is probably coming soon. Looks like we're in for more floods unfortunately though. Yesterday, we set off in the raging winds and rain, to see M's dad in Paignton and had to turn back when my mum's car clearly wasn't going to make it through a giant lake puddle. The Polo is making a nasty squeaking sound so we are borrowing the rather insubstantial and low slung Kia Picanto. It still smells new despite being two years old. Not for long if we have it for any length of time. Batten down the hatches all of you affected by this next wave of storms and keep safe. Until next time, here's Jack still looking like a puppy; Snippet is being camera shy again....