Mindful of You the Sodden Earth in Spring

"Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring,
And all the flowers that in the springtime grow,
And dusty roads, and thistles, and the slow
Rising of the round moon, all throats that sing
The summer through, and each departing wing,
And all the nests that the bared branches show,
And all winds that in any weather blow,
And all the storms that the four seasons bring.
You go no more on your exultant feet
Up paths that only mist and morning knew,
Or watch the wind, or listen to the beat
Of a bird's wings too high in air to view,—
But you were something more than young and sweet
And fair,—and the long year remembers you."
-  Edna St. Vincent Millay, Mindful of You the Sodden Earth in Spring
 

 

Winter was finally over and it was about blooming time. After weeks of snow and freezing weather, spring had arrived bringing temperatures of up to 20C. Woop…woop. The Jetstream, which governed the weather in the northern hemisphere, had started to move north leading to spring-like conditions. But don’t reach for the parasols, shorts and flip flops or ditch the winter coats yet. Bitter Scandinavian winds kept temperatures freezing and the settled weather meant heavy downpours. Meanwhile brighter, warmer weather was promised. A typical spring mish-mash.
We’d another party to say good-bye to MK who will be returning home to Nigeria. MK had been one very busy lady. She’d completed her Phd and will be getting married too. I’d known her ever since I started working here and I’m going to miss her loads. My colleagues and I all turned up to give her a wonderful send-off. I contributed my signature spring rolls for the table. Goodbye and good luck to a great colleague. We promised to keep in touch.

Another colleague, KJ, had just moved to Coventry and wanted CC and I to take her to the Noodle Bar. She didn’t have to twist our arms cos we went willingly. As usual, I ordered my favourite Fried Udon with the seafood special and Chinese vegetables and washed down with cups of steaming Chinese cha. We ate while watching people walking below. It was buzzing in the city-centre because 3 different sports were being played on the same day. We were trying to match the clothes they were wearing to the sports they were attending.

At the Ricoh Arena, Marray and Fleming beat Kunitsyn and Balluda to revive Great Britain hopes in the Davies Cup. On Sunday, the team defeated Russia 3:2 in the Europe/Africa Zone Group 1 second round. They were drawn away against Croatia for September’s World Group playoff and Andy Murray had promised to make himself available. Also at the Ricoh, Coventry City equalise 1:1 to Brentford. While Coventry Blaze ice hockey team went down to a 5:1 defeat to Belfast Giants in the play-off semi-final in Nottingham.

After the lovely meal, we took KJ to a tour of Coventry Market which was voted the National Association of British Market Authorities' Indoor Market of the Year for 2007 and Britain's favourite Market in 2010 in an online poll. 1958 was the year Europe's only circular retail market was built, with 234 stalls, including a fish market, storage in the basement and a car-park on the roof. It has twelve sets of doors , giving each trader a fair share of any customers entering the market. Plans for a £1bn transformation of the city centre were thrown into disarray when English Heritage announced the market had been given Grade II-listed protection. In granting its listed status, English Heritage said the building was "nationally important" and praised its "flying-saucer like" building with its painted murals and mosaics. It was a symbol of the city's rebuild after being bombed in 1940. "The impressive socialist-realist style murals by East German artists show humans and animals in farming and industrial scenes and are very unusual in England," a spokesman said.

A new staff member, CF, reported for duty as RC’s maternity cover. She’d a long list induction programme and I’d her for 2 sessions. One was the introduction to classification where I showed and demonstrated the different classification systems we used. There was Library of Congress ( standard and local), Dewey Decimal, Moyes for law, UDC and other schemes for official and European publications. Although she was working primarily on thesis, she need to keep abreast with developments in cataloguing and classification. I also had another short induction with a new member of staff, LM from Resource Delivery. It was just a short introduction to who’s who in Data Services and what were our contributions to the library. 

Babe brought down the nest box at the bottom of the garden. We wanted to clean and disinfect it before the next occupant arrive. Last year, we’d seen a pair of Blue Tits last year inspecting the box but they didn’t stay. We’d a wonderful surprise when Babe opened the roof and found 3 old Blue Tit eggs. Wow… they’d taken residence but somehow had abandoned the nest. I hoped they will be successful this year. Check out the size of the very tiny egg against an ordinary chicken egg.

 

“It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. we are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.”

~C.S. Lewis~
 

It was that time of year again for the dreaded Annual Review. As usual, it was a cutting last year’s aims and objectives and pasting it on the new form. Easy peasy. It was listing the objectives for the coming year that was a bit hard. I’m very smug that I’d completed all my aims and objectives due to good time management. In fact, I’ve accomplished a few that wasn’t on the list. It was going to be hard to beat that. But I’ve still got a few up my sleeve.

I also attended a drop-in to the Teaching Grid for an exhibition-style update on the latest Library projects. Colleagues who were involved in the projects were on hand to give demonstrations and provided updates on their work. I was available to check-out and thoroughly enjoyed Talis Aspire, WRAP, the Environment videos and Website redevelopment. It was a good opportunity to network with each other, ask questions and catch up with initiatives before the start of the summer term. And I thoroughly enjoyed the generous helpings of cream cakes. Yummy…

I’d another outing with the girls at Ikea. Yummy, mummy RC needed some time away from her gorgeous bubba and have some adult conversation. It was lovely seeing her again and motherhood suits her well. I’d the usual fish and chips with a slice of cheesecake and washed down with glasses of lingo-juice. We’d a wonderful time exchanging gossips, laughters and news.  The views of Coventry from the top floor were breath-taking. After lunch, we checked out the different floors and I came out with a pot of Sansevieria Cylindrica, a white serving plate set, 2 packets of biscuits and a bottle of lingon juice. I’d to leave early because Babe wanted to have a quick walk at our favourite playground.

 

Before I met the girls, I noticed this handsome Stormtrooper causing a stir among the shoppers at Broadgate. He was standing so still that you think that it was a statute. I managed to get a few shots before a little boy and his father walked by and asked him for a photograph. They were posing happily before a few other children were brave enough to join in. I think he was raising money for
charity because there was a charity pail beside him.

Babe and I made our usual trip to our favourite playground. As we were walking along the path towards Baldwin Hide, a wren was vehemently rattling a territorial song. When we opened one of the shutters, we saw a Canada Goose nesting right below it. What a risky place to have a nest, The Great Crested Grebe was sitting on a nest, well hidden under a weeping willow. A pair of very noisy Oyster-Catchers with their black and white plumage and startling orange bills landed on the island beside the hide. All you could hear was our cameras rattling away

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After getting our fill, we walked to East Marsh Hide. We heard the familiar shrills of the Long-tailed Tits from the bushes, When we looked up, we saw this adorable cutie gathering moss. We quickly walked away because we don’t want to stop it flying to its nest. From East Marsh hide, we spotted Little Ring Plovers and Common Snipes but they were too far to photograph. We went home as the hide was getting too crowded and noisy

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“And Spring arose on the garden fair,

Like the Spirit of Love felt everywhere;

And each flower and herb on Earth’s dark breast

Rose from the dreams of its wintry rest

~Percy Bysshe Shelley~