reasons to be fearful, and tearful

I've uploaded some more photos to the gallery, if you want them. These include:

• Some photos from when Hazel and I went up to my Mum & Dad's place in early December. Things to note: a couple of dead things. Suggestions for what they might be gratefully received - my current thinking is that the corpse at the bottom of the picture might be a hare (or a very lanky - and slightly manky - rabbit) and that the skull might be a (smallish) badger. Apparently the ridge down the middle of the skull is a badgerine feature. The two creatures appear to have been dead for different amounts of time, so I don't think there was a cross-species life-or-death single combat situation, thrilling though it might have been to watch. We also encountered a dead sheep, but it was even less photogenic than the carnage depicted here, so I skipped photographing it.


• The IPL ball from mid-December. My friend Andy very kindly invited me along as his guest as his wife was off on a separate Christmas jolly in Germany at the time. For those not in the know IPL are an IT company based in Bath - not wanting to plug the competition or anything, but to be fair they do lay on a Christmas ball every year with a FREE bar, which is nice.


• Various pictures of parsnip-peeling and Christmas-pudding-igniting action from Christmas at Emma and Ray's place in Reading.


• Photos from New Year - the majority taken in The Butler pub near Doug and Anna's flat in Reading on December 30th; the others in my flat in Bristol on New Year's Eve - except for the last one which was taken in the very exciting Giant's Cave in the Avon Gorge on New Year's Day. Things to note: the obligatory giant inflatable penguin (see right).


• Stag do pictures (see a couple of posts back).


• Pictures from our "training" walk around Cheddar Gorge a few weeks ago (see several more posts back).


• Pictures from our partially successful trip to Dartmoor. Most of these are nicked from Andy's photo gallery, of the rest a few are Robin's and about 10 (all taken on day 1) are mine.