Pigeon in the net, alternative destination, thistle

To deter pigeons, they have suspended netting from the roof structure of Charing Cross Station. One pigeon must have got through and, sad to say, is now suspended, dead and shrunken, by a wing from the netting. Its little head hangs down, curled over like the hook of a clothes hanger, and its little claws clasp the air.

I like hearing the announcement for the Hastings train which ends its journey at a place called Ore. You hear: "... West St Leonards, StLeonards Warrior Square, Hastings and/or".

They are refurbishing a house which abuts on the Grove, which explains, why beside a recently planted magnolia on the grass by the wall of the house, rises a magnificent, four-foot high thistle, with a stem about an inch in diameter.

Wildness, false perspective, orange fungus

There is a narrow strip of front garden behind iron railings in front of one of the 18th Century houses in Mount Sion. It has been sown with wild flowers, a small formal hedge, at the back. Charlock, poppies and thistles push through the railings and spill on to the pavement. Wildness imprisoned, you think.

Walking up the High Street I hear a snatch of conversation from two men sitting outside a cafe: "You have a false perspective on the state of England..." I hear no more. Football, I wonder? Probably. Or politics? Or geography?

In the Grove, I catch sight of what looks like an orange plastic flower in a corner between a gate post and a wall. It is a bracket fungus prompted into existence I suppose by the unseasonable weather.

Bank holiday, blue geranium, watering in the rain

I wake up remembering that today is a bank holiday, and think of the money suspending for a while, or at least slowing down, its breeding activities.

The first blue geranium, urged on by the sun between showers, is in flower by the front door; others, in full bud, are waiting to follow suite.

In the vegetable garden I hoe for a few minutes and then, driven in to the greenhouse by a heavy shower, water the the tomatoes in their grow bags.

Hedge between showers, starlings gone, letters of Gustave Flaubert

Rain prevented me from tackling the long, high hedge which separates our garden from the road and shelters us from the curiousity of passers-by. An electric hedge-trimmer is not a good idea when the leaves are wet. Today they were dry and the job is nearly done.

The starlings, which were so busy a week ago, are relieved for a while of their parental duties. The recess, where they nested at the top of the column inset into the wall of the house opposite, is silent and empty after the raucous screeching of the nestlings, which must now be foraging for their own meals.

Flaubert's letters, which I am reading immediately after finishing his marvellous but neglected last novel, Bouvard et Pecuchet, is proving even more exhilirating than I had imagined. "Don Quixote and Sancha Panza are more real than the Spanish soldier who created them. But no invention of Flaubert is as real as Flaubert," wrote the Argentinian, savant, Jorge Luis Borges. He is right.

hillside trees, lost lawnmower, oriental radish

I like the sight of trees dressing a hillside.

In a neigbouring garden is a small, unkempt lawn, where rye grass has sprouted its seeded stems. Watching balefully over it, the grass nibbling at its rusting blade and roller, is an abandoned lawnmower.

In the Farmers' Market this morning there are bunches of long, white oriental radish, such as you might see in a market in the Far East.

travellers, broken umbrella, tricyle power

"True travellers alone , " wrote Braudelaire, " leave for the sake of leaving".

A broken umbrella, with its ribs broken and its black cover flapping like a bat's wing, is a sad sight, but a surreal one too. This afternoon I see one stuffed into a litter bin which bears the logo of Walls Icecream.

An immense noise in the Grove as two small boys race down the sloping path on strange tricycles. They have two small wide-tyred weels behind and one big yellow-hubbed wheel in front. They are low slung and the seats are angled so that the drivers can lean back a few inches above the ground to obtain maximum leverage on the pedals.

Wet and warm, noisy starlings, internet statistics

After the cold and wet, it is warm and wet, with the wetness on the grass and in the soil. So a good day for setting out lettuce and courgettes plants. This afternoon you feel the wamth of the sun and you can almost feel and certainly smell things growing in it.

The starlings, which have been feeding their young in a nest at the top of a column set into the wall of the house opposite, must now be breathless, if that is what birds become, with rushing to and fro with food. The nestlings are becoming increasingly aggressive in their cries for more. What is the world coming to?

Well I'll tell you. With today's Independent came a map of the world in facts and figures.
It tells us that the population of the world is estimated to be 6.525 billion by July of this year.
Of these 1.018 billion are internet users. That's what it says.

Pushy clematis, buttercups, foxhole

A clematis montana alba grows through the bay tree in our front garden. Last year the tree had to be pruned and the clematis didn't flower. I thought it might be dead, but this year its white, star-shaped flowers are pushing through on top of the bay and at the sides.

There is an unculitivated strip of garden in front of one of the houses in Mount Sion. Recently it was a mass of bluebells. Now the bluebells have, for the most part, gone to seed; and amid the fresh grass has appeared a galaxy of buttercups.

A deep hole has appeared in the shrubbery bordering the drive, which I have to cross when I go to the vegetable garden. There is no sign of the fox; if I were smaller, I might, like Alice, be tempted to plunge into the hole. Then, who knows what?

Copper, bare wall, stretched leaves

The colour of copper beeches in full sun shine, now that the leaves are fully open, is at its best and deepest today.

Gustave Flaubert wrote to George Sand of the pleasure which he felt in contemplating with "his heart beating faster, a wall of the Acropolis, a bare wall".

In the Grove the wind drives at the new leaves on the trees, which stretch away from it.

Crabbed age and youth, everything but treacle, limestone paving

In the supermarket, a very old, small and frail lady is provided with help by a strapping girl twice her size who adjusts her pace courtiously to that of the customer.

An old shop sign in the pub reads: " D B Hanson, Camden Road, Tunbridge Wells. Prams, Mangles and everything but Treacle. Easy terms. From 2 Shillings per week.

Some honey coloured limestone paving arrives to replace the ugly cement slabs which we have put up with for too long on the path to the front door.

blue mist, cows, halo of stamens

When you look long enough at the dense blue flowers of the ceonothus in bloom just now in people's gardens, a blue mist seems to grow round the shrub almost like steam.

Cows grazing in a field all face in the same direction.

The slight yellow poppies which I put in a vase a few days ago have shed their petals and leave a halo of gold-tipped stamens clustered round the green ovary.

Flying sunshade, ants and lettuce, sashaying sheet of paper

In the Pantiles yesterday, a gust of wind picks up a sunshade from outside a cafe and blows it into the air, where it turns a somersault and lands without hurting anyone.

Joyce tells me of a Thai restaurant in London, which was infested with ants on her last visit. When she referred to the invasion and pointed out that it wasn't much fun to eat surrounded by ants, the management said that the ants must have arrived with the lettuce.

From the train outside Charing Cross, I see a sheet of white paper shashaying down in front of an office block fronted with black glass.

All books, wisteria, tree-top sea

I step aside as three bargain-hunting women barge into the Oxfam bookshop in Chapel Place under the impression that it is the more general sort of charity shop selling discarded clothes, lonely teacups, prints of imperial India and the like. "It's all boo oks!" one of the women says, her north country accent doing nothing to hide her disappointment.

Pendulous blooms of wisteria are outside the study window, and beyond, across the road there is more wisteria on the wall of the house opposite.

Coming out of the Grove this windy afternoon I hear the sound of the sea in the tree-tops.

Daisies, coppiced oak, hieroglyphic rooftops

The grass is still uncut in the Grove. And the daisies accordingly flourish. They look like stars.

An oak sapling has been pruned in someone's front garden and though only a couple of feet high it has begun to sprout new branches in all directions.

I look up at rooftops and notice how lines of aerials describe hieroglyphs across the sky.

Raindrops, happy talker, pied wagtail

Big drops of rain this afternoon, and so widely spaced that you could almost run between them without getting wet.

People on mobile phones seem to talk louder than they have to, which allows you to overhear some interesting, if puzzling, statements. "I'm happy," shouts the man walking across the pedestrian bridge at the station this afternoon.... "because I'm seeing someone. I'm happy in that respect."

Pied wagtails often turn up in the Grove. They are sprightly creatures with a pretty, swooping flight. No bird has a name, which better describes it, for it is both pied and manages to wag its tail as it hops on the ground in pursuit of food.

Starlings' nest, grass in seed, dog's pub

So intrusive have been the blackbirds with their fluent song and their territorial squabbles, that I have not mentioned the starlings. They are nesting in the space on top of a corinthian column embedded in the wall of one of the two houses opposite (we look out in two directions). Compared with the blackbirds they lead a respectable middle class existence bringing up their family with determination and energy. The capital of this column could have been designed specifically for starlings to nest in.

The grass in the Grove has not been mowed for a time and it is going to seed in places, a pleasing sight in an orderly context.

Outside the Grove Tavern there is a plastic container, on which are written the words: "Water for Dogs". This is a rare facilty in this country, but I noticed, when we were in Munich, that Gasthouses (more or less the equivalent of pubs) nearly all provide such a service .

Fighting blackbirds, passing push chairs, when losing is winning

The two male blackbirds are still fighting. This morning the are at it on the pavement opposite, and this afternoon clashing in the air above the fence between us and our neighbour. Cherchez la femme? But there doesn't appear to be one at the moment. So it must be just about territory.

Two people pass each other on the pavement outside the post office, with push chairs. One is an old tramp and his push chair is loaded with his posessions. The other is a young women; in hers is a small baby.

The relief when you forget to do the lottery and your regular numbers don't come up.

Blue Angel, green asparagus, hedge connects

DVDs of old black and white films sometimes astonish by keeping you glued to the screen. So it is with The Blue Angel in which a young Marlene Dietrich sings, Falling in Love Again for the first time, and succeeds in vamping and, in the end, destroying the poor old school teacher who falls for her.

Freshly picked green asparagus from the farmers' market is vegetable perfection for supper yesterday evening with sweet Italian ham and a little melted butter.

The arch, which I have been hoping for when the two sides of the 8ft hedge on either side of the front gate make contact, is about to take shape.

Playing the game,argument, dandelion moon

A little boy is playing hide-and-seek with his father. The little boy covers his eyes as dad runs towards a tree to hide behind it. The little boy takes his hands away from his eyes as soon as dad has turned his back, and watches him hide, a naughty smile on his innocent face.

Reading this morning Bouvard and Pecochet by Gustave Flaubert, I note this vignette from a description of one of those arguments which occur in France, and which the French enjoy ridiculing as much as taking part in. "The notary stopped him and raising himself at each word on to the tips of his toes, said: 'I find your system completely immoral....'". The motion described contains the essence of a certain sort of comic behavior, ridiculous because the person performing it is taking himself so seriously, that he cannot see how daft he must look.

I spy on top of a high wall a dandelion clock. It rises into the sun and the perfect seed-head shines agains the blue sky like a full moon. I don't have my camera so have now to content myself with a verbal photo.

Periwinkles, Jack Russell, wisteria

The popular ground-cover plant Periwinkle (vinca) is in flower all over the place. Sometimes the blush-purple flowers seem overwhelmed by the dark green leaves, but this year the flowers are holding their own.

There is a Jack Russell in the Compasses pub nowadays. Someone must love him. A red lipstick imprint today sits in the middle of his forhead.

The scent of the wisteria, which climbs over the front door, floats in the garden.