Warming Up

Not the weather, that's for sure.

This morning (Tuesday) we had arranged to meet friends at the cafe in the park up in Ramsey.  We thought it would be a good idea to take the bus and use my new bus pass.  However, while we were eating our porridge at 8:30 the sky turned black and it started to sleet then hail.

Right. The car it is.

The drive up the west coast road takes around 30  minutes and the sky had started to clear after a while, with some blue bits showing in between large lumps of black cloud.

We stopped off first at the Co-Op store, as we were early, and did some shopping.  Due to the recent stormy weather the ferry hasn't been running for the past few days so the shops are starting to run low on fresh food.  Luckily, the Co-Op has a warehouse on the island so is able to keep some stocks without relying totally on daily deliveries from the UK.

Suitably loaded up with fruit and veg, we drove along the promenade to the park. Before we were able to get out of the car a heavy rain shower passed overhead, which quickly turned to sleet and hail again.  We still had 15 minutes before our friends were due to arrive so we just sat in the car with the engine running and the heater on and waited for the shower to pass.

A brief stroll through the park to the cafe and then a very enjoyable hour and a half drinking coffee, laughing and chatting.

On the way home there were a couple more showers and the strong wind was certainly chilly.

I really fancied soup for lunch for some reason - must have been the weather - so when we arrived home and had unpacked the shopping I made P wait for 20 minutes while I knocked up a pan of homemade leek and potato soup, which we had with chunks of the still-warm rye bloomer we bought from Co-Op.

That warmed me up.