1. Do you mostly drink tap, filtered, or bottled water?

    Tap water. I drink bottled water if I forget my refillable bottle, which isn’t very often.

  2. Is it safe/recommended to drink tap water where you live? If not, why?

    Yes, it is safe to drink the tap water here. It’s pretty soft water as well.

  3. What does the tap water taste/smell like where you live?

    Nothing, which is how it should be!

  4. Do you collect rainwater? If so, what do you use it for?

    Yes, we have a water butt in the back garden. We use it to water Keiki’s collection of carnivorous plants all year round, and for the indoor plants in summer.

  5. Do you/have you ever had restrictions on water use where you live? What did you have to change about your lifestyle?

    We haven’t had water restrictions here, even when a lot of the rest of the country did last summer. I have lived in places with water restrictions previously (southern California). It taught me to have short showers and/or turn off the water when, say, shampooing or conditioning my hair, which I think are generally good habits anyway. Dishwasher appliances also use less water than hand-washing dishes, which took me a while to accept but once I did, that also reduced my water consumption.


In other news, it has got quite cold here, by UK standards. Scraping off the car in the morning and ice on the roads is what defines "quite cold" here. Those, and the eternal promise of "significant" snowfall. Certainly there has been in a number of places, some of which are a handful of miles from my location, but the photo below shows the extent of the snowfall we have experienced to date!

20260102_085105


Somehow I was under the impression that I didn't do much travelling in December. Making this video reminded me that I went to London twice as well as Harwell and then Norfolk for Christmas. I didn't fly, but I certainly spent a lot of time on trains and in the car.

The full year video reminded me that I flew to new places for conferences: Hamburg (Germany), Nicosia (Cyprus) and Larnaka (Cyprus). I visited my parents in the USA. I went to Paris (France), Darmstadt (Germany), and Frascati (Italy) for workshops. We travelled as family by train across Western Europe to go to a conference in Vienna (Austria). We holidayed in Wales and Norfolk. I went to Maui (USA) for a conference. It was an incredibly busy year.

Full year - 12 min 30 sec )


Apparently I went for a lot of canal walks this month. This was partly because both children were off school for multiple days with a high fever, and I worked from home far more than I’d planned. There are even more cats than usual, too, because I made a lot of new, temporary moggie friends in Cyprus.
nanila: me (Default)
( Nov. 2nd, 2025 09:15 am)


Regarding the penultimate video (30 October): Whenever the bloke goes away, Astro goes into a heightened state of alertness. He comes into the front room every evening to inspect the adult humans. If he finds me alone, he will go and sit on the mat by the front door. He curls up and faces me with his ears back, half-closes his eyes, and stays there until I go to bed. He follows me upstairs and curls up on the landing. I don't know if he stays there all night, but I often find him there when I get up in the morning.

If he sees both of us in the front room, he will come and stand on me for a short while, make biscuits on my legs, and then transfer to the bloke's lap, where he rolls onto his back and flops out blissfully. It's as if he can't relax completely if Alpha Cat isn't present.

Comet, on the other hand, couldn't care less about us in the evening. He's only interested if Humuhumu is around and has left her door open so he can sleep on her bed. When she isn't here, he walks around the landing and gives occasional plaintive yowls.
nanila: me (Default)
( Sep. 2nd, 2025 02:42 pm)


Despite all the Welsh holiday footage, Astro managed to sneak in here quite a lot. Meeting the talkative long-eared owl was one of the highlights. She had many and varied opinions.
nanila: me (Default)
( Aug. 1st, 2025 08:54 pm)


There is a lot of wildlife in here, and for some reason both Keiki and my voice feature quite often.
nanila: me (Default)
( Jun. 30th, 2025 10:04 pm)


I can't quite believe how much has happened this month. At least 60 days of stuff were packed into June's 30. And now we're halfway through the year. Dear Time, Please slow down, Love, Me.
nanila: me (Default)
( May. 31st, 2025 02:18 pm)


Vienna => home => Cambridge => home => Hamburg => home => Norfolk => home

Not a lot of Humuhumu as she's been away for substantial portions of this month. We'd all like a little rest from travel, I think, but it's not happening until mid-June.
nanila: me (Default)
( May. 4th, 2025 01:34 pm)


I rather missed the boat on this one, apologies for its lateness. In my defence, we've mostly not been in the UK for the past two weeks.

April starts off quite domestic with lots of cat clips, and finishes in central Europe with lots of adventure clips. We travelled from [home] to Vienna, Austria via nine different trains, one of which morphed into a German rail replacement bus services which turned out to be terribly civilised.
  1. Who was your first crush?

    Real person: It was a boy named Colin, in the fifth grade. I would have been ten years old. I can't remember anything about him except he had blue eyes and I could make him laugh until he cried.

    Fictional TV character: Jean-Luc Picard.

    Fictional literary character: Sherlock Holmes.

  2. Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

    I have extrovert energy, but I'm an introvert and I very much need my alone time.

  3. What is your favorite non-sexual thing you like to do with the love of your life?

    I can't think of a particular favourite. I just enjoy his company.

  4. What is one quirky habit your partner does that either annoys you or makes you grin?

    This does both: throwing his pants at the laundry basket and missing. Like, every single day.

  5. Do you believe in monogamous relationships?

    It works for me. I do understand they're not for everyone.
.