One day I will enter this century properly, and get the proper equipment so I can write and publish my blog whilst on the move.  As it is, here I sit, resistant to change, upstairs at The Gables at my PC, this being the only place in the world so far where I write and publish my blog.
Why is it so late in coming? I have been away for a few days, and away from the only place in the world where I can……….

Before going away, to spend a long weekend with my Mum and my bros, partners and select offspring I visited son John, to see the progress being made at Butser Ancient Farm.  If you ever visit, do buy a bag of food to feed the sheep. They were so noisily enthusiastic (stampeding and baa-ing) that it was well worth the £1 I spent on the food.

Here are John, Darren and Simon in action, I had to use a really quick shutter time for this, to capture the action!

There they are, lowering the latest upright carefully, after Darren has deepened the hole by another 2 inches.
Darren is away next week, in France, which in theory leaves John to be the man in charge.  Darren might return to find a pile of  broken archaeological students, who have buckled under the strain of lifting timber with John.
And no John, breaking the students is like this not the way to gain superiority!

But at the moment, things are running smoothly, thanks to the hard work of the above three,and constant bad jokes, usually involving cheese, from two of the above.

Last week I finished by wondering how my progress would be in 3 things. The 'Mousie Mousie' cake, flying milk bottles and mice, and the National Open Art competition.
Well, let's start on the most positive note.  The 'Mousie Mousie' cake.

I started off by making my 6 coloured and tasty mice……….

………..I always seem to model coloured mice better, whilst drinking gin.

Then, for the first time ever, after having made my 'classic yellow butter sponge' from my Martha Stewart baking book, I covered it with buttercream, prior to icing it with fondant.  And before you say it, Mr Cooper, it was the cake I covered, and not the book!

You may not be too impressed at this stage, but I certainly was!

To complete the cake, after icing with fondant the mice were applied, looking a little apprehensive as if they were at the start of a real game of 'Mousie Mousie'.

A word of advice here, a cake that has been covered with buttercream beneath fondant will not look at its best after 4 hours in a hot boot, plus at least one emergency stop.  But you would probably have known that already. We gained that knowledge through experience!
 After the cake had been re-aligned, we all enjoyed a slice as part of Saturday tea.  And I am not blowing my own trumpet here, but rather trumpeting about the recipe I used.  The cake was absolutely delicious, and well worth the initial outlay of £16 just for the right sized tins.
I will be baking much more from this book.  Thank you Martha, and thank you John.

Then comes flying milk bottles and mice, to surround Fluffy in heaven.  I have started my sketching, but have come to a bit of a stop, regarding the mice.  Obviously it would look pretty non-heaven like to  show the mangled mice corpses that surrounded Fluffy when on earth.  But that would be from my point of view, and not necessarily Fluffy's.  Then I thought, probably prompted by coloured fondant mice, that perhaps when in heaven, mice could become beautiful and edible, and sugar mice!  And why stop there?  What about foil-covered chocolate sardines also to be found gliding around in a beautiful way?  Sorry Fluffy, aesthetics have triumphed yet again!
So it is 'watch this space' again, as my idea takes itself on another direction involving pastel pinks, shiny foil, and wonderful wings.

What about the National Open Art competition?  Let's just say that next year's entry will almost certainly be based on a series of works entitled 'Rejection', and the many forms that it takes.  It has rather been a week of rejection, in several forms.

Let's blow away sad thoughts and cobwebs now, and head to the seaside, and to sunny Hunstanton, my Mum's second most favourite place, to be found on the North Norfolk coast.
It is a resort of two distinct parts, Old Hunstanton with its dunes and gracefully ageing beach huts……

………………………and New Hunstanton with the funfair, public conveniences and rock shops.

Both are brilliant, in many ways.  But I would choose to live in only one of them.

However, whichever part we are paddling in, it is still the same cold North Sea.  The first time Mr Cooper visited Hunstanton with me, he was struck, not by the clarity of the water, but rather its opacity.  For those of us who grew up for many years only knowing the North Sea, this appearance is normal.  But for those like Mr Cooper. who had enjoyed many childhood holidays in St Ives, this was horrific.
Here is a picture of me paddling, wearing my wonderful, new, bright turquoise crocs.

See what I mean? Or rather, you can see, by not seeing.

As we walked from Old to New, I took several photos, many of the cliffs that are crumbling and falling.
This one in particular reminded me of a walk Mr Cooper and I did many years ago in West Sussex, near West Dean.  A walk on which the sculptor Andy Goldsworthy had placed many gigantic chalk snowballs, which then began to weather, change colour, and crumble.

So this cliff-fall, at first a mis-hap becomes a thing of beauty in itself.  Perhaps a series of rejections from this week will become a series of artworks that will reach national acclaim next year. or even just acclaim. Who knows?  I do know that painting and drawing troubling thoughts and experiences is, to me, a far safer conclusion that just thinking about them..
So this coming week I am going to pick myself up and carry on.  You might be joining me in this, or be fortunate in just having to reach for a 'pick-me-up'.  May I suggest a G and T, or a bowl of Tiramisu? Whichever it is, enjoy, and I look forward to being with you in a week's time (approx).