Spinning love into divisive fertility

I'm not sure how Bessy arrived at such a conclusion but it was one I couldn't ignore: when being divisive one's mind is at its most fertile. I asked Margaret if she had changed Bessy's breakfast mix but in spirit Margaret was communing with wasps in between the rafters above the kitchen. The question meant nothing to her at that moment.

Felix, thankfully, was in his normal spot overlooking the Channel. Except that half of him was also in a love-struck relationship with a woman he'd once known when marching with Oliver Cromwell. I asked if there was any point, given that she wasn't around anymore. She is where he is, he responded, and suggested I find some way to take advantage of life's opportunities a little more rather than picking holes in others' life formats. It got me wondering about my life format and then I got a bit confused.

George told me once he'd won a competition for spinning around and wondering why. I've no idea why one would do that.

Cookie has gone on holiday. She went via the high volume suction.

Divisions and creativity, spinning and suction, love and wasps. It's all there, every day.

Rhythmic bellows anticipating swallows in their pyjamas

There are days when everything seems to come together. This weekend Bessy, Margaret and I had ventured once again into the mountains and landed in an abandoned Welsh farmhouse.

There were sheep communing, fern-clad slopes waving and the faint mmmmmm of something wonderful - there but intangible, warmth without source, anticipation dangling like a brother with a spider on his thread.

Yes, it was my birthday and one not to forget. Bessy dived into a nearby reservoir and resuscitated a thought brought to a halt when it was constructed. Funnily enough, the thought - which Bessy communicated by whipping the wire of the fence in a particular rhythm we two understand - was one that made absolutely no sense to me: will the bellows in the kitchen turn the corner before the pyjamas catch them? It might be that I missed something. Or it might not.

Margaret watched a few swallows doing their thing above us as we ate lunch and decided to take to the air too. It was quite something to see her manoeuvre in such a way, particularly when in the air. I think that's why I love her so much - there's nothing she won't have a stab at and entertain me with as she does.

What a birthday. Simple things like lots of air and loose-fitting clothing. Lovely.

Hot coals in whimsical patterns of beauty

There was a peep from Margaret and then a sigh and then it was all over. Bessy cocked an ear and looked like there had been a meltdown on the far end of a never-ending poker, a poker that might one day have shifted red hot coals in patterns that in their random re-allocations pronounced beautiful dreams that might have been. I read those coals and I realised the dreams would never be and yet, there remains with me Margaret and Bessy and the fleeting whimsicals that pass through my head every now and then.

Flips in wrinkles and unconventional spots

Big days, small days and all those in between. Wonderful. That was what was on my mind this morning when Bessy triple flipped and dreamt a fantastical thing about love and bunnies and things that are warm but unconventional. She didn't come down and I don't blame her. Margaret was inside a tulip bulb in the process of budding. For a few moments she thought she might bud too. It was something I had to contemplate a few moments. Which I did.

Felix had visited a group of men whose faces are covered in wrinkles that simulate sand dunes, and then dug as deep as he could into them and discovered there was nothing but nothing. Drinking tea with him wasn't much fun, it has to be said.

George once won a competition for the most upside down and roundabout flips a person could do whilst pretending not to move. I asked if the judges had to anticipate the flips in order for the person not to move - relatively speaking. George looked up, crossed his legs and said that wasn't the point. I guess that's something else to ponder on.

Cookie was running on a spot left by a fly with a dirty foot. It looked like hard work. I got on with the day and treating all my wonderful patients, who are wonderful people, like so many people.

And that brings me back to the flip. Whatever works seems to work with others too.

Generational dividends on enthusiasm at the bottom of the English Channel

When Bessy woke this morning there was a stir in the air and a gentle waft of enthusiasm made its way across the bedroom. Mornings are rare like this. They have a special meaning for those in search of tranquil places. Unfortunately for me Margaret was in no such search and so the chorus of birds that might - in a fanciful state - have accompanied Bessy's postures of positivity were instead replaced by a somersault, a T-bone handstand (that's what she calls it) and an elevation of tips of hair manoeuvre. Yes, it was a spangly (I heard someone say it once) start to the day.

Felix had managed to avoid anything excessive when he arrived from a deep-sea dive this morning. Down on the ocean floor last night - out there between us and The Continent (his capitals - not mine) - there stirred the beginnings of a generation of morbid realities waiting to be caught. I had an inkling this was something prophetic but Felix said they dated from 1929 and bore no relevance to us. I sighed with relief.

George was upside down again on the reception desk. Why not when nothing else seems to bear any resemblance to the earth as we know it?

Cookie was chatting to our first patient when I entered the surgery. I greeted Mr Philpot with a generous grin (at least I thought it was) and asked if he'd ever heard of Grayling Sispepsia. He said it was a term for generational dividends maturing in a stepwise fashion on moribund mortgage dues. Cookie nodded her head knowingly. And there I was thinking I had just made up a couple of words for enjoyment.

Which is where we started. Enthusiasm for a day can soon turn to realism and then there's a smart answer for it. I find this rarely reassuring.