It's been a while indeed. Not that Frynwys has changed much since the last bulletin, but there have been a few small developments since the never-ending winter in June of last year. My home village is so small that the minutest of changes is headline news, and fortunately for this next installment of Frynwys Features there have been a few of them over the autumn and the Christmas period for me to jot down here.
The first item on the Frynwys grapevine this time is that the council have renovated all of the footpaths through the fields, a step up from the gravel path that was laid three installments ago. It seems that they've been getting help from some schools in the nearby towns. I've seen several groups of primary school children being led through the field at the bottom of the village to help with laying a new gravel path. They've also been helping with constructing timber benches on the other side of the fields and decorating a new flight of steps leading down to one of the more inaccessible streams in the area. Before this the paths through the nature reserve were all mud and were being slowly worn away. Hopefully now that half the village seems to be involved in their renovation, all the local dog walkers won't have to worry about traversing the marshes anymore.
In slightly more worrying news, there's been a stronger police presence in Frywnys over the last few weeks. There's been a few police helicopters flying overhead, and I've often seen them circling across the village before heading off to the south. Whether it's to do with missing people or criminals on the run, I'm not sure, but it seems they're stepping up their efforts if my latest encounter is anything to go by. As I was walking towards one of the village's smaller parks the other day, I spotted the unmistakable yellow high-visibility jacket of a policeman, complete with the hat and badges. He appeared to be looking for something, as he peered around the side of one of the climbing frames and then headed up to the kissing gate at the top of the field. The policeman was unaware of my presence until he was just about to step through the gate, at which point he turned, looked at me, and then exited the park. Whatever interest the police have in Frynwys, I doubt they'll find what they're looking for on a climbing frame.
Meanwhile, in the gardening section of this bulletin, it appears that the local daffodils are once again rearing their yellow heads. There's a cluster of them up by the old nursery, huddled on a bank at the side of the road, and despite the wintry weather Frynwys is currently experiencing, a few green shoots have already appeared. This is highly unusual as the first daffodils generally don't start appearing here until around the end of February, but it seems a few of them didn't get the memo about spring and have popped out early. I suspect it might have something to do with the aftermath of the Beast from the East from last year, where snow enveloped the village just as it seemed spring was about to arrive. Perhaps the daffodils reset their photosynthesis clocks for this year to avoid another scheduling issue, but this is of course speculation from somebody who has no botanical credentials. If any botanists are reading this post, please comment below and tell me what an idiot I am for suggesting plants can talk to each other.
In more recent phenomena, you may or may not have been lucky enough to witness the super blood wolf moon which appeared in the sky early in the morning on the 21st of January. I myself was hoping to witness the enormous red moon, but it turned out to be a classic case of the British weather conspiring to thwart me once again. Last year I had tried to see a similar moon, but just as the moon was rising a thick bank of clouds smothered the sky and I saw nothing. What made it even more frustrating was that the the moon behind the clouds caused them to glow red. I had hoped to overcome the weather itself this time and catch a glimpse of this solar marvel, but unfortunately I had to resort to looking at photographs on the news that people with clearer skies had taken. Apparently the next super blood wolf moon won't be around for at least another three to five years, so I'll be waiting for a while before I try and outwit the clouds again.
That brings us to the end of another installment of Frywnys Features, but don't worry; if anything changes even in the slightest around my home village I'll be sure to make a note of it. In the meantime, stay tuned for more poetry and possibly a few tigers as well.
