Well, after a very quiet start to the day and the rest of the family got up very late, the lazy devils, we went up to Durham for a walk along the River Wear. Most of the leaves have been blown off by the gales and there were piles of them by the track. Nice! Best of all about a mile out of the city centre we spied 2 Little Grebes looking ever so small and vulnerable diving and feeding in the river. Of course they are anything but because last winter when there were huge wide rafts of sludgy snow floating down the river these small birds would swim through them against the current. They may look small but they are very strong. Fiona is still not very well and she could only manage 3 miles but we had a look inside Durham Cathedral and it was all dark, mysterious and very beautiful. Biscuit break was good as well. When we got back home I knocked up the usual meatballs, tomato sauce and pasta with some garlic bread and watched the film Galaxy Quest a sort of sendup of the Star Trek series which is very ironic because we watch Star Trek all the time. A lovely afternoon out but I will be happier when my wife is better and up to her normal strength. Only two months ago she was trekking around the Lake District for goodness sake. But that's the way it goes: when the going gets tough: and we all know the rest!

Today, I feel as if I have spent most of the time in the car. 250 miles of it! This morning I took Miles to RKade skate park and he had a really good session with his friends. As soon as I got back Fiona and I went to see her mum at the new Residential Home she is at in Barrow in Furness because her vascular dementia has deteriorated. I was slightly apprehensive about going because she was so happy in her old home but once I got there, after I found the flaming place, it was a really good establishment. Veronica was in a medium-size room with several other residents and they had been listening to a music video. She really glowed when she saw us and as I helped her over to the corner of the room where we arranged the chairs to show her photographs and have a good chat, Fiona and I introduced ourselves to all the ladies in the room. They were very nice people. As usual Veronica really enjoyed the photographs and it was a good discussion and focal point and she asked several questions. I found the whole experience in this new establishment a bit emotional but also paradoxically quite beautiful as well because she is in good hands it is a well-run place with kind workers the sort of place I would be happy to end up in! Particularly with all those ladies! Anyway, we never took the boys today because we did not know how much room there would be and it was a bit pinched but they will be coming next time or a least one of them. I am sincerely glad that she is in good hands. The journey there and back was tricky because there was an awful lot of fog which disappeared completely as we climbed up to the Stainmore pass, like a summer's day up there, and then reappeared again in the Eden Valley but a bit thinner. It was the same going back and the fog seemed to have thickened in the Vale of York. I was very careful to make sure I kept everything together when driving as well as being aware of other people because it is easy to run into somebody in fog and to be run into but all the drivers were behaving very sensibly. A very beautiful afternoon out which could correspond to duty but was in actual fact a real pleasure. God bless Veronica.

Yesterday I got out into the centre of Darlington again to do a Baha'i stall. It is interesting because as people see you there more often they become quite friendly and I got a lots of smiles as well as a bit more interest in the stall. With the guys down the bottom end of the traffic free zone playing panpipes it felt a bit like York! A nice time. In the afternoon I had a short walk around Durham with Fiona and the lads and that was lovely in the slightly hazy autumn sunshine. Fiona wasn't feeling so good so we cut short our walk but coming back over Elvet Bridge there was a really good blues singer and guitarist doing his stuff. Then eyes were caught by what looked like a waterfall plunging over a bridge. Someone had put in an art installation and it was really brilliant. We were cooing away about this and there was a guy stood next to us who I asked what was going on and he told me and he should have known because he was the artist responsible for the installation. I only found that out this morning when I saw him on the breakfast news! I just love chatting to people and asking questions because you never know who you will be talking to and he was very interesting and funny. A lovely afternoon out followed by the usual meatballs tomato sauce and pasta.

Yesterday with Fiona, I went to Saltholme RSPB bird sanctuary at Teeside near Middlesbrough. The weather was overcast and the light not so good but there were literally thousands of birds around particularly Plovers and Golden Plovers. When they all flew into the sky it was like great clouds of them swishing around. There were also hundreds of Canada geese. Best of all was a Hen Harrier had parked itself on the site for a few days and when we went to the highest point and looked over the hundreds of acres of reeds I actually saw it rise very briefly over the reeds and then dive back down into them. Total magic. Fiona did not feel so good with her sinusitis and was positively dizzy at one point but it did not stop her enjoying her RSPB lunch and the many exciting birds.

Last Saturday I had a gorgeous afternoon out walking in the Durham woods with my family. It was also a religious celebration as well because it was the Birthday of the Founder of the Baha'i Faith. The woods were browning nicely and quite big gaps had appeared higher up in the vanished canopy. At Framwellgate Bridge we saw two herons flying low over the River in formation and then they both alighted on separate sides of the river. There was a third one parked beneath the weir. Fiona was in good fettle but she still has sinusitis and who will be off work for a couple of weeks. It hasn't affected her legs though!

‎"I keep wondering about a different world where science got there first" ( to Toby Philpott) It did get there first with trial and error , the little monkeys remembered the result and improved or rejected that which didn't work. Naturally with that comes a desire to understand the unknown and that is one of the ways God or rationalising the unknown comes in. We evolved that sense as an aspect of experience and had the capacity to do that. God is just a word by the way that reflects a real experience as in the unknown produces things we have to deal with . You could never name the real "God" completely in the same way you can't name the unknown ie because we can't know it completely. It is also worth thinking that it isn't so much that the monkeys became us as individuals but they responded to changes in environment ie loss of tree cover. In a sense you can say that that is what is decisive and neither them or us has any control over that whatsoever. Another good question is why some monkeys could respond to environmental changes but others couldn't . There doesn't seem to be any geneticically causal evidence to say why and it is doubtful that there ever will be! Only man has the capacity to believe in or invent God : the unknown.

Lovely weekend. Walking around Durham Woods yesterday was great thats after Fiona had been cleared though xray at casualty that her leg wasn't injured from assaulting a poor stream bed in the Howgill 13 days ago! Wish she'd leave those stream beds alone ! Poor things. Anyway alls well and poor old leg just needs some miles putting into it and it enjoyed the woods and ways of Durham . The leaves were golden, glorious and the family in high humorous spirits. Way Aye Man!

Today after the lads cruised RKade Skatepark in Redcar and a poor teeny broke his wrist right in front of my lads my Mum cancelled our weekly visit so I went out on my own to the autumnul,browney, leafey Richmond . It was magic and I said a prayer in Easby Church after I looked at the medieval wall art. Magic. Christian Church + Bahai praying = nice experience. Stopped at the Old Station for refuel and the coffee and company were great. At the yearly craft fete they have there I bought the lovely Fiona a lavender bag which when I presented to her at home got lots of hugs and kisses. Women are strange. Brill weekend.