Good Riddance to January

 That was not a good month.

My Mother-in-law died after what should have been a routine knee replacement. 

A dear friend and colleague lost his wife of fifty years.

And many of you will know Phil Parker also lost his father.

Then there are all the minor things that have gone wrong, most of which have been about frustrations with technology, but also including losing a crown and a filling, and concerns about the declining health of our older pets.

There were some good things, I suppose.

Issy and I managed a couple of nice trips out. I took the younger dogs for a walk through Buxton Country Park in the snow, whilst she and mum sat in a warm cafe, and, at the end of the month, we walked them along part of the Cromford and High Peak trackbed.

Issy also managed a quick trip to Poland with the eldest daughter, although Barb's death overshadowed it.

I also ended up on the centre pages of an American IT magazine, pontificating, as usual.

What about railways?

I was hoping to have a bit of a push on Dark Hall, helped by the discovery of detailed photos of the later station structure, but what spare time I had got eaten into by my volunteer commitments.

Whilst Issy was away, I had another blitz in the garden. Largely repairing the damage done by a rogue tree surgeon, but also clearing away a lot of creeping groundcover plants that were beginning to dominate the colour scheme and smother anything else. That did get me reassessing where the 7/8ths line(s) should go. There are a couple of possibilities, but I'm favouring a relatively small continuous run to make running steam that bit easier. The next step is to remove three 6ft high concrete posts next week to open up the space.