Christmas round robin 2014

Facing many half-used packets of Christmas cards this week with the realisation that I may commit the faux-pas of sending someone the same card I sent last year, or maybe even the year before. If this is you - I apologise.

Here are my 2014 highlights:

Running-man:

• My first two 10,000 metre runs: Port Sunlight & Manchester Great Run on consecutive weekends

• My first "fell run" : Leg it Round Lathkill.   

• Completed 50 Park Run 5km runs  (November)
• Now training for the Wilmslow half-marathon on 22nd March 2015. My first.

Bagging-man:

• Only 10 Scottish Munros bagged this year. Superb as they were, they became slightly eclipsed by the year's walking highlights: Brokeoff Mountain and Yosemite Half-dome 

Gardening man:
After the Garden Meadow project, which enjoyed early success until the cats joined in,  not much  beyond some purple broccoli, a few broad beans & raspberries. Here, pathetic carrots:

Retired-man:
The biggest change this year of course: my "retirement" from end of April. I'm still enjoying all that freedom & have learned the following:

• Avoid expressions of envy from strangers by lying when answering the "what do you do?" question.
• "How do you fill your time?" is actually a rhetorical question.

So far:

• Completed Health-informatics course
• Corsera course on Programming in Python - great, time-consuming fun
• Visiting Mum & Dad (in Northern Ireland) twice, for several days
• House-clearance in Stratford-Upon Avon, & a visit to the fabulously outlandish Pitt-Rivers museum in Oxford



Car doubling as a skip

• Taken on more PTA activities and a "web-master" for Stockport Walking group.
• House-husband, or "Glorified catflap" according to Rowena
• Teenagers' taxi driver
• Midweek walks:

Shutlingsloe

Coombs reservoir, with pensioners

Family man:
Penny's ear infection nearly cancelled Christmas 2013, but regular lunchtime "patrols", weekend gardening and walks show she still loves the outside life. I think she's rather enjoying having a house-husband this year, too.

Rowena was 16 in October & is in her final GCSE year - working very hard, getting good grades. On top of this she has been fitting in ballet and acro-dancing; guides-leader; rangers participant. That's four evenings a week, with 2 activities on Monday. Some Saturdays an assistant at her dance school with the junior classes. She leads a recorder group at school; anti-bullying ambassador,  member of Comenius project (we hosted a Latvian student). The taxi-ing demands are considerable ...

Clara was 14 in June & is in her first GCSE year & working very hard, most evidently in Art, which seems to take hours at weekends. But she's very sneakily working hard at other subjects too, given the school report. Attends a drama club on Wednesday, works in a charity shop on Saturday. Clara's signature cooking dish is chocolate brownies - these are excellent. And she likes walking, occasionally demanding to be taken for a walk!

Paddling in Yosemite