Tuesday 13th July 10

A good day, up early and encouraged the children to get out to school on time, and then went on the computer to do today's emails and facebook messages.

Gill had an appointment mid morning so I stayed in to deal with the Suma order which arrived at about midday.

During the afternoon I got a lovely message from someone. The message says it all:

"You may not remember but I watched you do a Professor Fiddlesticks show a few years ago and afterwards we had a chat about juggling. I just wanted to write a quick note to let you know that I've recently been reading your blog and I really enjoy it, your positivity is a real inspiration to me. I feel the world would be a better place if there were more people like you."

I replied with a big thank you and an invite to come and visit, and maybe see St Nicholas Fields.

The reply was incredibly moving and left me in tears:

"I'd wanted to write to you for a while but I was concerned it would seem odd (I have some issues with anxiety or 'nerves' which cause me to overthink things) I looked your name up out of the blue one day to find out if you were still doing Professor Fiddlesticks and I was amazed to see all the good work you did on the green side of things. As I read on through the diary I could really feel a positivity and enthusiasm that inspired me during a slightly dark time. My 'problems' were nothing major, just some concerns about what I wanted to do in life and whether I had made the right choices. I found what I needed in your words to reassure me that you can do whatever you want to in life. The fog lifted then and it was a wonderful realisation, there are people out there who lead a somewhat modest life and are happy and others who have lots of material things who are not. At the moment I'm doing some work down south so won't be back up north for some weeks but I would love to come to York to shake your hand, see the environmental centre and ask a few questions about my own green living aspirations."

I thought about this for the rest of the day. I feel it is just as important that I get positive feedback about my lifestyle choices as it is that I encourage and support other people (which I do a lot of, mainly privately and not explaining in great detail on the blog). We all have doubts about how we live and the choices we've made, even people who come across as very sure about their path, and for me, this message was very life affirming. Thank you to the person who sent it and I look forward to meeting you soon.

In the afternoon I decided to have a go at protecting my walnuts from marauding squirrels, so I put several bunches in plastic bags. I've had success in previous years with plastic bottles, but getting them onto the tree is not easy. I have no idea if bags will confuse squirrels, or whether they will just laugh at them and tear them open to take the walnuts out. Maybe I should consider getting a squirrel trap.

After tea I dug out a New Zealand pallet bin and put it all into the newly reconstructed Komp 700 on a solid based pallet, hopefully this will be less easy for rodents to access. My rat trap is working well at the moment, placed inside covered containers and baited with bread.

I also did quite a bit of Fiddlesticks stuff today, several phone calls from people booking me and a chat with my agent about a future gig. However, the most important bit of 'paperwork/admin' I did was to initiate a CarFree York group, on facebook initially, but I hope to expand this to a website and meetings, actions etc. This felt like a positive thing to do.