I have a few different hobbies all of which, I think, can be described as pretty geeky. One of these is Napoleonic re-enactment. Generally this involves me spending a few weekends a year sitting around in fields in funny clothes drinking tea/wine (depending on the time of day). There are various things that attract people to re-enacting but for me it’s all about the people and getting away from the stresses and strains of modern life. There’s something about changing into ‘kit’ at the beginning of weekend that lets me switch off from all of things I normally spend my time worrying about. Also you get to meet a whole range of people in a setting that means you don’t have the normal tools to judge them – which is a great leveller. I’m not one of life’s outgoing types and I cope far better with situations where there is easily identified common ground to start off conversations.
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I am in semi-rural North Kent. Just outside the M25. Definitively NotLondon.

I like it here. There’s lots of sky and the fields are long.

I went for a run today. The first time since the epically rain-sodden Big Fun Run last October. It was a beautiful day. I discovered that something which I thought was a school was actually a community centre, and the play park behind it which I thought was part of the school is part of a community park, so there’s somewhere walkable that I can take Junior to, when he’s desperate to go out and run around and the garden isn’t enough for him.

I also found a nature reserve, and as I climbed through the woods, I came out into a field, where I could see all the way across the village.

Field and Village