I started doing this diary in June, it's quite new. If you haven't been following have a look at the Cast of Characters which gives a quick low down on the essential day to day characters who are mentioned here...it will make more sense if you do.

My sleeping pattern is getting worse and worse, even when I manage to get into bed by 2.00am I still seem to be awake at 5.00am, even 6.00am or later. And for some reason I nearly always then wake up at exactly 12.18pm. I'm still trying to figure out the significance of that precise time. Anyway, when I did get up I realised that the sun was out, blissfully hot after all the rain and dreadful weather we've been having here. I just had to do something outside, something, anything. So I put on the dungarees and changed my hook for the clamp and went up the field with a wheelbarrow, shovel and rake to clear some horse shit away. It's not the easiest job, the clamp is great for the wheelbarrow but won't fit over the handle of the shovel and because of the lack of wrist flexion is hopeless with the rake. The technique involves bracing the shovel handle against my body then raking the shit onto it, dropping the rake and picking up the shovel using my left hand and right elbow to transfer it to the barrow. I did several barrowloads, but I did have to take frequent stops, not through fatigue, just to look around me and enjoy the views in the sun.

I had stopped for a break when Lorna and Irene arrived home and something in the conversation we were having made me think about photography. I'm always wanting new pictures to show here and the weather was just right for taking pictures and I'd seen the views from the field and wanted to capture them. I used to have quite a good camera kit but I gave it away when I lost the hand because I thought I couldn't use the manual focus camera any more. Clare had a camera up at the mine last week and I did manage to take a couple of shots by balancing the camera on my socket to focus it then reaching over to release the shutter. So I borrowed Lorna's camera and spent the next few hours wandering around and snapping everything in sight. The dogs, Tom the cat, all the views from the field, of the field, the tractor, the garden, the lane outside the house, the baby apples on the trees, the horses (of course), I even took a picture of the car. The only thing I couldn't get a good picture of was the barn which is too big and there's nowhere you I could get far enough away from it to get it all in the frame. What will come out is another matter, I think there may just be an element of camera shake.

By the time I'd finished doing that I had to get ready to go out. (Getting ready to go out involves removing the dungarees and putting on a waistcoat.) There was a wimmin only night out going on locally and as this is such a rare event, it was one of those thing you just have to go to. I had to first drive over to Liv's and pick her up as her car was broke and I had the directions written down because I hadn't been up to her new place before. Unfortunately I was driving with all the windows open and when I glanced down to look at the directions they were no longer there having, presumably, blown out the window. So I had to try and remember what was written there but what I remembered did not tally with the location and when I reached a big cross roads I knew I had missed the place. I stopped to call Liv who failed to answer her phone, much to my irritation. Wondering by now if I had turned left at the crossroads by the post office/ shop in the wrong village I headed back the way I had come and spotted the the track I was looking for quite by accident. I had to stop Liv making cups of tea etc because I was running late by then and still had to pick up Vicky in Lampeter on the way. Now, I do know that nothing ever starts on time round here but I still have this strange compulsion to arrive on time. I met several wimmin there who I hadn't even known were in the area so we should have a few visitors tomorrow. It actually started only about half an hour late, surprisingly and featured two sets with Helen Watson (damn, there was meant to be a link there, but her website isn't where she told me it would be) who was so fantastic I bought all three of the CDs she had brought with her. Lunar Cycles performed inbetween and were on much better form than last time I saw them and did a really good set with some new material. Lorna and Irene then came on and did the disco and it was way past midnight when I was ready to leave and it was still going full swing. I'm just not used to be out in the evening, it felt very odd, perhaps I need to do it more. As we were about to go out the door one of the women from the bar came out and said that we had better not leave right then because there was a crowd of people on the steps and we would never get through. It was one of those situations when, despite wondering just how many people could be on the steps at that time of night in a small country village, you just believe what you are being told. She was quite insistent and made us all have a drink on the house. I did the poster for this weeks ago and at the time I did wonder about the location of the venue. Llanybydder is not like Lampeter where things are pretty friendly and all the hippies and lesbians are just part of the scenery and no-one really bats an eyelid. Llanybydder is home to the local slaughterhouse and though this may have coloured my opinion of it I have always sensed something of an atmosphere of intolerance there. I had wondered how it would cope with the sudden influx of women in waistcoats. When we were eventually cleared to leave there was still quite a number of people out on the steps. One particularly unappealing boyo was making cracks at the top of his voice, I caught something about "...and do they all have big dicks between their legs?" I had to refrain myself from saying "bigger than yours I expect" but it wasn't all that hard, there was a lot of them and they were pretty much beered up. We had heard as well that someone had been beaten up in the pub across the road, so there was obviously something not so nice going down in Llanybydder tonight. It was way past 1.00am by the time I dropped of Vicky and Liv and got home. Lorna and Irene got back about ten minutes later and I was quite relieved to see them, I wouldn't have been at all surprised if some shit had gone down there.

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