nature

here is another reconstructed deconstructed cellotaped unnatural natural thing.

guess what happened here ?

that’s right. i was trying to kill a bug after midnight last night (this morning). the bug was on the stairs and I decided my best strategy was to keep throwing newspapers and magazines at it from the landing until i hit it.
In the end i stunned it by bashing it directly with a Swimsuit wearing ‘celebrity’ called Michelle (on the cover of Heat magazine).
I then trapped it under a glass so i could inspect it in the morning. notice the sugar bowl on top in case the beasty woke up and tried to push the glass out of the way.

here are a couple of photos of the beast

jane and i are proposing a ‘bush tucker trial’ for anyone interested

this seat has been surrounded by stingy nettles. .

there was masses of pollen (or something) in the air today. it was settling big time and made this little lake look like it was frozen with frosty whiteness. quite amazing.

esther asked me why this duck had a big lump on its head. i didn’t know, but i said you probably would. please help me solve another nature problem so i don’t appear a completely useless dad !

this cat lives under a hairdressers shop. here it is looking up at the street from the stairs that lead to its cellar flat. perhaps it was waiting for the baker to turn up with his slice of white.

last night when i was helping clear up the garden i stumbled across this scene. esther had been picking ‘rabbit ears’ and sticking them together to create art for the senses.
she had another one with some mint cellotaped together and the idea is that you stroke the rabbit ear leaves and sniff the mint and experience the various sensations.
i was very impressed

taking photos of flowers is a bit boring. but boring is what i do best. so here are some daisy things:

and here are some wet crokii:

click for big version
update: our friend lynda just emailed me to say that they aren’t okey-crokiis, they are in fact turnips. highly unlikely in my opinion, but what do i know (very little probably, though i can’t be sure).

here are some bluebells in kew gardens

here are some weird little flowers from our garden. esther spotted that they looked like little hearts. and so they do.

there was much excitement this afternoon when the girls found a big snail walking across the lawn. unfortunately it moved too fast for my camera skills to catch a photo of it.
but a little later this massive worm wiggled by our feet. it was above half a metre long at maximum stretch. (jane says it was around 20 centimetres – andy or mary-anne may wish to add their estimates as they too witnessed the monster).
whatever it was i didn’t like it and will NEVER go in to my garden again.

i didn’t realise that both of these things are dandelions until fairly recently. i’ve posted this picture so you’ll know if you don’t or be reminded if you do.

here is our friends’ dog in a lovely fairy hat.

here’s a flower i saw near paddington station this morning. it’s nearly black which is an unusual colour for a flower (because bees are scared of the dark and won’t go near black flowers for fear of being sucking in to eternal torment).
of course in the light of my office it now looks dark purple and is therefore a pointless slightly battered flower picture.