The Wanton Burden

Keats is everywhere at the moment and it's becoming rather tedious. Autumn, which really is a splendid season, is invariably accompanied by mass Keats quoting to the point where you just want to stuff your ears with dead leaves and squirrels so you don't have to LISTEN to the wretched stuff anymore. It's a nice sonnet and all that, but it raises the foppery quota to unacceptable levels.

So just for a change, we'll go with Shakespeare's Autumn - "Bearing the wanton burden of the prime." It has a fruitier ring to it. And it's not Keats.

To celebrate the wanton burden, here are a couple of autumnal pictures taken on some of our recent walks. First, we have Ham House, a super Jacobean building near the Thames which I rather like even though Mr Horse was underwhelmed.

Ham n' Pineapple, please

It's where Charles II was famously presented with a pineapple. I quite like Charles II but pineapples give me the fear, so fair play to the Merry Monarch for giving it a whirl.

And here is lovely, lovely Winchester cathedral which has featured on this blog before but you can never have too much of it, I say. It was a lovely, crisp day, the water meadows were on top form and the pub wasn't too full. Bingo!