With the lime tree not yet in leaf, I see some goings-on in the branches this fine afternoon, which would normally be hidden. A female starling sits on a bough making fluting noises. It is unusual to see a starling on its own; and I reflect on the decline in starling numbers, which I have read about in the papers. In a while, she is joined by a male, who, to her apparent displeasure, sets about trying to increase the starling population with her help. She is not keen to cooperate and flies off with her swain in pursuit.
In his autobiography An Interesting Life, which I am reading at the moment, the historian, Eric Hobbawm remembers (as I do) war time London with "barrage balloons tethered like herds of silver cows in the sky".
I watch a feather in the wind climb the sky, attracted by feathery clouds.
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We recently acquired a DVD of wartime Ministry of Information films scripted by Dylan Thomas; they're a mixed bag, but one of the best is about the barrage balloon girls, it's funny and eye-opening, but I just love the shots of the ballons being manoevred about, they are so stately and very much like some kind of enormous airborne cattle.
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