He was reputed to have made the most tedious films ever, I’ve been fortunate to miss them, but here’s my own contribution to the ‘cannon’. Off we went for a good old country walk into the village at the top of the hill that’s a good deal colder than around here, but is also blessed with some wonderful cotswold stone walls. The village itself is ‘owned’ by one estate so all the cottages there are in the same style and painted in the ‘estate’ colours.The entire village is in the ownership of this estate so you can’t buy anywhere there, all the houses and cottages are let out by the estate and the result is somewhere that is in many ways unique. It means that there are no ghastly additions and the place looks not unlike a film set for Mid-Summer Murders.

The owners were responsible for getting most of the population in this country smoking cigarettes, so their fortune is based on a habit that has been a curse on many. I could comment but perhaps best not to. Let’s put that aside for the stone walls. All beautifully maintained and in the sunshine they are a thing of beauty, a major work of art to me, with the litchen gripping here and there and the colours glowing in the sun.

My latest blockbuster

There’s a real skill in the building of these walls and , unlike in the top photo, where the wall has been ‘capped’ by concrete, the really ‘pure’ builders never do this and the walls simply have the stones on the top without any ‘glue’. The old litchen one in the lane image gives a better idea on how they used to be finished off. There’s apparently a way of laying the stones so that the water drains through so that the stones won’t frost, and therefore last for years.

You might reasonably wonder where are the cartoons? Well I have been busy drawing and keeping my resolution of last year to do a drawing a day. So they will be back!