A lovely day (for once)

We've had the most lovely day today, one on which it has been a true pleasure to be alive (which, of course, is the case nearly every day - a thought that we should particularly treasure on Remembrance Sunday and Armistice Day, and particularly when they coincide).  There was not a cloud in the sky all day, and it's not often one can say that.  We had some Australian visitors overnight Friday into Saturday.  We'd had three dry days up until their arrival and it's been glorious today - but, would you believe, we had solid rain coming out of leaden skies for their only morning here (ie yesterday).  So unfortunate.

Anyway, my two rides today were a real pleasure.  The first one (on Ethics Girl) took me past St. Mary's Church just as the sun was coming up behind it, and that was lovely, as you can see.  I once attended the Remembrance Sunday service in St. Mary's, my local church, but I wouldn't make that mistake again: the gist of the (young) vicar's sermon was basically that the deceased should have known better as they shouldn't have been out there fighting anyway.

I wonder if he did wonder why he had a congregation of about a dozen, which was one more than it would have been had I known in advance what he was going to say.  Anyway, that's another story (and the church has a different vicar now, the previous incumbent maybe having joined the real world if we're lucky - and you can take that phrase any way you like - but the damage has been done).

Anyway, that exercise involved heading over to the other side of town firstly to go up to the Links to remind Ethics Girl what jumps are, and secondly to let her have a strong exercise along the Cambridge Road AW gallop.  Why?  She's running at Southwell tomorrow in her second hurdle race.  You might have noticed that she often races in a tongue strap, which gives you the clue that she's thick-winded, hence her having a stronger exercise on the day before a race than it would generally be my wont to give a horse.  So that was enjoyable, as she's always a pleasure to ride, and conditions really were very special indeed.

The other horse whom I rode was Ollie (whose shadow on Railway Land you can see above, even if you can't see his body) and he gave me a nice ride too.  So it's been a lovely day, great for man, horse, dog and cat - and, although the forecast tells us that tomorrow, inevitably, will be considerably less lovely, let's hope that the rain which is guaranteed to arrive solidly into the west of country doesn't make its way too far east too quickly, as Ethics Girl really would find things considerably less easy in the 3.50 at Southwell if the track had copped a hammering from above than if it hadn't.