The news from here

The news from Hepworth Towers is that I was sitting in bed one morning reading last week, when a loud crash made me jump and look up and I saw the window was smashed.  I thought ‘Why would someone be throwing a brick at our window? Why?’

I got up to look out and saw a stunned pheasant sitting on the lean-to roof below. I am not fond of pheasants. They are stupid and the noise they make is annoying. And now, apparently, they smash windows. 

We get birds flying into our windows all the time but this is the first time one of them has smashed a window. I called Dave, who was in the shed, and five minutes later he was doing a quick fix-up, to be finessed later. The pheasant flew off.

The other news is that although my painting (see earlier posts) came in the top ten of the people’s vote at the gallery, I didn’t win. Though in another way, I did win. I was at the prizegiving and spent a pleasant hour chatting to a very interesting fellow artist about her life and her work. When I got home I checked her out on Instagram, and realised I had something she had made. She was the woman (@lcnaylorhandmade) who my daughter saw at a local craft fair, selling her work, and donating half the profits from her badges to Medical Aid for Palestinians. And my daughter bought me one.

How cool is that?

Ironically, the last bit of news is this: I am going to be silent for a while. I am taking a break from the blog and I don’t know for how long. Thank you for reading this far. Happy Christmas when it comes, and keep up the good work that you’re doing.