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UK WINTER 2012 - to - Spring 2013 - Thoughts!!

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tonyco1:
Thanks folks, I was just reminiscing, and it occurred just how much it has changed here, when I bought the house, there was an orchard at the rear, and horses.
Now it's a little housing estate of 1 or 2 bed maisonettes, built for Air-Crew.
Plus side - I now have a road up to my back gate and now I have a Garage.... down-side - they moved out and rented the flats out.... lost my lovely view...
Opposite the front - playing fields - - now it's a long-term car park for the Airport, plus-side = none (lost a nice view),
down-side = they planted a concentration of high bushes and trees, and that is all I can now see....
rilo57 - what you have is on the lines of what I will look out for....
Rod... round this way.. lots of youths...Asian, white, black.... and they all try to talk like South East London Jamaicans - "Sauf Londin pattwa" init!! - - boyakka!!
rae21 - it happens in all the big citys
Thanks Dibully

Jimbo:
Tony - That's a great account of urban misery as the clocks change and darkness and winter fog descend.

I almost never regret moving back from London to Hull. My second-floor study window is parallel with the tree tops in the Victorian avenue outside, and the textures and colours change through the year.

At the back we have a very large garden - part of it used to be a tennis court in Edwardian times. There's no real road between us and the houses in the next avenue - just what's called a "ten foot" in Hull, a narrow rear access way. Along this are sycamores, chestnuts and a beautiful poplar that's at least 70 feet high. In the spring it changes colour very subtly from winter grey to a whisper of pale yellow, and then, as though by magic, you look up one day and it's green and flying a wonderful banner announcing summer. There's a mulberry tree in the garden. It's at least a hundred years old. When the fruit drops, cutting the grass is like a kind of blood-bath. But the jam is great!

In the garden you would never know that you were a fifteen-minute walk from the city centre. But just around the corner is a vibrant cafe and restaurant strip - live jazz, folk and comedy. Gillie and I went out for lunch today at the Pave wine bar; she had home-made pumpkin soup, big bowl - £3.50; I had venison and vegetable stew with mustard  dumplings - £5.25.

This, of course, is in the city frequently described as the worst place to live in England by journalists typically living in some pokey house in Stoke Newington, for which they are paying astronomical money. Good luck guys - long may you stay there! I escaped.

All over the country there are nice places even in apparently awful cities. Just as, on Corfu, there are lovely places not far from the cynical tourist hot-spots. And my experience even in many parts of London was that in the winter, when you come in and shut the door and draw the curtains, you make your warmth and sunshine with love, friendship, and cooking!

dibully:
That last paragraph is a lovely sentiment Jim we all can't live where we would love to I suppose it's just making the most of where we are with our families and friends and enjoy our holidays to escape

Teamnickos:
I was feeling depressed by the sad but true post, but Wow Jimbo you really have a way with words....back to the first post, we used to live in a quiet street, we were the youngest here! But no longer,alas, motorbikes and noisy youngsters whose parents don't give a .....damn. Seems to me that parents will just put up with anything

 and will defend their kids whatever they do. Sorry, rant over....

tonyco1:
But don't you feel better now that you've said it?? - - -  - I do!! LOL

Jim - I always had you figured as a Venison man, stuck in a Northern version of Utopia and loving it!

Home surely is what you make it when you close the curtains and door, but it has to be nice when you go out as well!!

The inner city has spread it's influence and it's wings, but I hope to escape it soon!
At least I am still in a fairly low crime area!!

Well said everyone - - now we can face the nasty old winter again - - enjoy a bit of Xmas cheer and Spring will soon follow.......

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