As we all know, there are good days and bad days. And sometimes we suspect the intervention of forces unseen, because we find it hard to believe that, when we are having a ‘bad’ day, such a series of unpredictable mishaps can happen without assistance from invisible gremlins. This is how it must have seemed [...]
With winter on the cusp of spring, and new life squeezing bright buds from the honey suckle and the other early starters, it is good to see that the blackbird with the broken wing has survived. He has evidently learned to live with his disability, though his flights are still mostly in a downward direction. [...]
Stop press: female wagtail discovers glass ceiling! As I write, Waggy No-brain, the demented wagtail, has given up trying to seduce all the other wagtails that she can see in every wing mirror, windscreen and shiny car roofs of any car that is parked in our yard, and she has turned her attentions to our [...]
I’d known for some time that it was going to be a difficult day. That particular bit of knowledge had drifted in during a brief and mildly furtive conversation on the phone with one of Sally’s erstwhile work colleagues. As a quick aside, Sally would no doubt be impressed to see ‘erstwhile’ in that sentence [...]
My brother’s birthday (and Abraham Lincoln’s too, as it happens) and I forgot to send him even an email greeting. Too late now, of course, because as I’m getting up he’s about ready to go to bed. Not that he does a milk round or anything – it’s just that he lives in New Zealand. [...]
After the frenzy of activity over at the New Harp last month, the place has developed a Marie Celeste look. You know the sort of thing – kettle boiling in the kitchen, on the table a plate containing three beans and a half eaten sausage with a fork sticking in it, bath taps running, TV [...]
First of February – how scary is that? I’ve just about managed to complete my job list for November, and I’m confidently scanning the list for December, knowing I’m on course to be able to put my feet up for Christmas, when the banging on the little door in my head becomes so loud that [...]