In the sitting room we have one of those fancy things that tells you not just the time, but also the temperature indoors and the temperature outdoors.

Of course, I can’t see this device from where I spend most of my day in my office. However I am able to rely on more natural methods to keep abreast of weather conditions. So going by the puffed-up size of the normally much more streamline starling I spied from my window, it was clearly cold enough for it to be a good idea to stay indoors with my feet on the radiator.

I’ve had a plan, which has been slowly coming together over the past weeks. I believe I now have all the requisite elements at hand (most of which are stationery) that allow me to announce the launch of:

www.doow.co.uk

Here you’ll find a permanent display of postcards I’ve had printed from my own photographs. These themed sets are now available to buy in my Etsy shop, nestled somewhat unexpectedly among the hats and scarves. Well, I guess it’s not unexpected if you know me. The following sets are currently available: flora, fauna, water world, culinary, autumn and festive. The photographs were taken at home here in Kent and as far from home as the Galapagos Islands, offering a real spectrum from the familiar to the exotic.

I’ll be adding further sets and perhaps individual cards for sale too in the future.

You see this is what happens to crazy flowers that bloom in autumnaltude: they get zapped by the frost and then look all mournful and sorry for themselves. I had pulled on my neckwarmer and zipped up my cardigan to go outside for a while this morning. Granted I only managed ten minutes out in the cold with not much to do, but I wanted to get away from my computer screen if only for a moment. I spend way too much time staring at these 1,764,000 pixels.

Outside the dew of a foggy morning was still decorating the plants and grass, soaking in through the cracks in my old boots to make my socks damp. Spiders had woven intricate webs between blades of grass, droplets of water hung from bright red pyracantha berries and fallen brown leaves lay in the cold, cold water of my little pond. They can stay there. I’ve gathered plenty of leaves into my black sacks already; I don’t need to dip my fingers into that water for one more handful.

So you remember my first carrot, right? Well, I’ve dug up a few more since then. Five, to be precise, giving me a second harvest of 247g. Four carrots came from the left hand end of the row; the end that didn’t look so promising. They weren’t particularly long, but they were nice and thick and were a glorious bright shade of orange.

I puttered further along the row and found one that had pushed itself a good inch out of the ground. Ok, I thought, if you’re that keen, out you come. I carefully dug it out, trying not to disturb its neighbours and pulled out a fabulous nearly 8″ whopper. Yay! Clearly, the measure of a good harvest is one that I can’t balance on my face.

Click for the set

Lauren and I went to the zoo just over a week ago, shunning work for a gloriously sunny day outside, looking at giraffes and eating ice lollies. Damn, being a grownup is awful. But do you know what is the best fun? And I’m sure Lauren will only concur: going to the zoo with someone who walks around the zoo saying, “I saw these in the Galapagos”. All that money to spend a week in an archipelago halfway around the world and I could have just hopped onto a train and spent £17 to see a damn penguin in London. Though it wouldn’t have been a Galapagos penguin. They’re a special type of penguin. More expensive.

We saw all sorts of wild beasts, including a couple of lions, who chose to do the wild thing right in front of us, leaving the small group of visitors outside the enclosure to get all British and flustered, not knowing quite where to look. There were the gorgeous giraffes, so content just chewing on lovely, lovely sticks (I’m expecting one of those giraffes for my birthday, by the way - gift wrapping is optional), zebras, a variety of crazy birds, gorillas, burrowing owls, warthogs, creatures great and small, cute and ugly.

There’s also a “meet the monkeys” enclosure at the zoo, where you can walk around in the same area in which black-capped spider monkeys are climbing and jumping about all around you. Jumping into a kid’s pushchair as that Starbucks paper cup he’s holding looks as though it might just contain food - thank you, that’s so thoughtful … damn it, that’s just a cup of pebbles. What the hell, kid? It’s best not to hold  your phone out at arm’s length to take a photo of the monkey who’s staring at you from his branch either, because as the warden warned the man doing just that, you risk having the phone swiped from your hand by the cute little thing you’re trying to photograph. Fortunately a D80 is too heavy to snatch, so I have a few photos to share.

Click for the set

A day out at the zoo with Lauren. We saw all sorts and so once I have been through the hundreds of photos no doubt I’ll be flooding my stream with all kinds of crazy animals.

Thanks for another amazing week, you guys and gals. I’m currently incredibly behind on going through the pool, but I’ll catch up soon! Then I’ve got to make the traditional mosaic. Do you realise how many of us there were this time?!

(and don’t you just love how Lauren and I simultaneously wrote pretty much the same thing under our respective photos? Except she offers moderation in posting and I do not)