The difference between one friend and another is in their reaction to Grianan.

Friend no 1: "Where could you get as fabulous a view as this anywhere in the world"; "It's the air up here -- it's so clean."

Friend no 2: "Grianan gives me the creeps."


But then, she's the sort of person who prefers designer shoes to the open air.

Summer's Lease...

Finally a day that felt like summer. Warm enough to go bare-shouldered and to eat outside in my hodge-podge pocket hanky of a garden. Warm enough to run with the dog through newly cut grass. Warm enough to have to water the plants again this evening. Finally something like summer.

But also warm enough to notice the flipping litter strewn all over the place; plastic bags and fast-food containers and broken glass pock marking the hedgerows and the verges. Warm enough to hear the roar of motorbikes as they do double the speed limit with blithe impunity. Warm enough to hear the neighbours' dire choice of country'n'western dross on one side and teenaged metal rap on the other. And no matter if I was ill mannered enough to turn Radio 4 up to the max, I don't think the sound of The Archers would drown either of them out.

More and more I wish that I didn't live in the suburbs, where everyone sees you the minute you walk out the door; where neighbours impinge, however thoughtlessly and where the roar of the dual carriageway is never too far away.

When I first moved here, years ago, the countryside was still only a lane away and the road was a trickle of traffic. There were no grumpy teenagers with blue bags and loud music. It was peaceful here, then. It's still pretty quiet, here, tucked in my still little turn of a few houses. But it's no longer quiet enough.

Summer's lease hath all too short a date....

Happy Lughnasadh, by the way, to all.

One of the advantages of living half-way to the wilds of Donegal is that, well, Donegal is so close. Twenty minutes from my suburban doorstep are half a dozen beaches, each more beautiful than the other. On the other hand, each of those beaches is also twenty minutes from all the other suburbanites. Ah, well, a girl can't have everything. And when the scenery so short a distance away is this drop-dead-gorgeous, who can complain?

The dark fort.

Not sleeping.

I think I may have mentioned that sometimes I don't sleep. Much, anyway. Especially this last year or so. And when I don't sleep, I write. Well, it's either that, or tramp the streets.

I have been known to get up at 3am to scribble down something or even stumble downstairs to boot up the PC and write. But I draw the line at blogging at dawn. for the moment, anyway.

After a couple of weeks doing nothing but cleaning and thinking about a new kitchen, I need to do something else. Like work, for example. It was just thinking about a new kitchen, mind you. Actually getting my backside in gear to do anything about it is another matter entirely. I have a bad habit of procrastination – one good reason to be working again, where the mountain of mounted up stuff has a nice manageable order to it. I make a list, work my way through it and there’s no space for procrastinating or looking at Dr. Who fansites on the web. I still prefer Jon Pertwee to anyone else, although David Tennant comes close. They say the regeneration will be Bill Nighy, which would be a glorious riff on Pertwee and might be my favourite yet.

It was a lovely weekend, even if it was stifling hot in Dublin on Saturday and poured with rain all the next day. I went to a party where the French windows opened out into the garden of my childhood summer memories, all tumbling red roses and high hedges and the canopied seat where we swang and laughed and imagined all sorts of worlds fuelled by Gallifreyan timetravellers and the Starship Enterprise. We imagined ourselves in all sorts of adventures and scenarios, except the one where we ended up as grownups with sorrows and joys and kitchens to procrastinate over.