But, as he would say, 'Keep your eye on the donut and not on the hole.' … It's a beautiful day with golden sunshine and blue skies all the way." Words to live by www.bbc.com/news/article...

A perfectly still night and a walk to the pub and back brought with it a host of treasures: a huddle of ducklings on the shoreline, a cat on a roof, the moon on the water.

One sleepy weasel

I appreciate that I'm nearly 30 years late to the party, but good grief, The God of Small Things is beautiful, isn't it?

An auspicious start to 2025 as one of our dogs, King, casually cocked his leg and proceeded to piss on my foot this morning. May your year be as free of self-doubt and as (surprisingly) productive as King's has been thus far.

I love Kevin Barry's writing. So much colour and texture with so few words. www.theguardian.com/books/2024/d...

It's that time when I make my yearly case for Paul Kelly's "How to make gravy" as the best Christmas song. It's one of the few Southern-Hemisphere Christmas songs, and has everything a Christmas should: family, friends, booze, melancholy, and a recipe for gravy: youtu.be/noDE38viJN0?...

The scar has healed, the post-op onesie taken off, and Quince is once again free to charge over the hills like a fool. There is no greater happiness than hers right now.

There probably isn't a perfect balance of place, character, dialogue and plot, but Ode to Billie Joe by Bobby Gentry comes pretty close.

This. Living somewhere with no bookshops, where books can take several weeks to arrive and cost as much as £15 for air postage, the local library is a lifesaver. Great community space too.

Quince looking dapper in the post-op onesie of glory.

Me, finishing a first draft and reading back through it.