1. I do very much like simple pen drawings on white paper – yesterday, some scrawled kitchen utensils and today, outlines around pixelated shapes.

2. I drop some beans while draining them and eight flick themselves neatly into each segment of the plughole.

3. Lily stretches out on her back and her ears flick behind her head giving us an idea of what she’d look like if she had upright ears like her long ago ancestors. She would be officially funny lookin’.

1. Carla hasn’t been up to the bedroom much recently – she’s spent the last fortnight glued to the sofa – but today she comes to find me. She sits on my chest and purrs a loud rumble until it’s time for me to get up.

2. “Hi handsome,” I say as I stick my head around the door. Boron looks up and blinks slowly at me: “hello to you too”. We don’t think he has much time left – his body betrays his ancient age but his eyes are still as bright and shiny as they’ve ever been.

3. We don’t use the spare (attic) room as much as we should and every time I go up there, it’s like those dreams where you find a new room in your house and think “of course this room is here, how have I missed it all these years?”*. The view from the side window always surprises me too – a familiar view from a new perspective.

* Although to be frank, every day in this house is like that. To date, we’ve found two new rooms, a cupboard, and two doorways (including one through to next door) behind walls, and that’s not counting the window in the wardrobe we knew about before we moved in.

1. Since it’s been hot, there are few black items in the washing. The line is filled with my favourite shades of purple, blue, orange and pink, with John’s equally colourful stripey socks inbetween.

2. My first dog walk since last Thursday. We discuss word definitions and personal characteristics while Lily runs through all the undergrowth and meets a long dog in natty jacket.

3. It’s the local ‘neighbourhood community forum’ meeting as organised by the local council: John ducks out and I go with a heavy heart after last time was almost entirely raging and moaning. But this time is different – it’s very positive and we come away with a list of ideas. It’s nice to run in to a friendly old colleague from my university days too.

I have a cold yet again – it sucks but it’s on its way now. This week has been a slow one as a result so just a few beautiful things from the week rather than a three a day :)

0. (One I forgot from Sunday) Without discussing it, on the walk to the shop, we both start humming a harmonization of the Super Mario Bros theme and we both know to stop at the same time too.

1. (Monday) So much fiction is predictable but this isn’t (even though, in hindsight, the clues are there). The pleasure of not knowing what comes next is novel and exhilarating.

2. (Tuesday) The bars of the tapestry frame clunk together to make a pleasing sound. The simple smooth lines of the wood are lovely to touch too.

3. (Wednesday) When the Calpol kicks in and then the rain comes to relieve the mugginess, I feel vaguely human again for a short while.

4. (Thursday) As John is out at day and all evening, I have a lazy day on the sofa. I watch, amongst other things, The Young Victoria, which I admit is a strange choice for a republican like me (I think of it as just a story like Game of Thrones and am just disappointed there aren’t more beheadings/dragons in it.) In one scene, Victoria hugs her then shiny-new-husband Alfred from behind, her hands clasped across his chest, her body pressed against the full length of his back. This is how I’d hugged John before he left for the office that morning and it makes me smile.

5. (Friday) Two days of rain and the garden feel more solid again: the soil no longer dusty and the leaves are heavy and green.

1. We have nothing to do but enjoy the day.

2. John is “indifferent” about whether to walk further down the path to the canal or just head home and collapse instead. If he’d wanted to go home, we’d have gone home but since he’s “indifferent”, I take us to the canal. A few minutes later, when Lily is dripping wet and running around with gay abandon on the gorgeous green bank, chasing sticks into the water and splashing us with her post-dunk shakes, he tells me I made the right decision.

3. We’re listening to the new Admiral Fallow album. “This bit [in The Paper Trench] is like the bit in the Beth Jeans Houghton track,” I say. // “Who’s Beth Jeans Houghton?” John asks. // “The song that was on 6Music all the time when I was tiling the kitchen. And I showed you the video.” // “The video?” // “Where the girl has sex with all the men then wakes up with a rabbit,” I explain and funnily enough, he knows exactly what I mean.

1. The man pops from the cloisters into the old body of the church and double-takes Lily with a smile. Later, we see him with a four month old springer puppy with similar markings as our old girl and the double-take is explained.

2. They’re not really brownies – they’re more like gooey flourless chocolate cake – but we’re not complaining in the slightest.

3. I show her the trick to drawing a cartoon springer spaniel and she repeats and repeats it all over the cloth.