1. Lily and Tilda share the tuna water. John tells me how Tilda runs with optimum tail efficiency (ie low and streamlined) until she gets near me then her tail shoots up to vertical.

2. I write up another stream of memories. Some seem inconsequential, others more important but who knows what I’ll find interesting to revisit in the future.

3. I finally make the paneer and chickpea curry I’ve been meaning to make for weeks – it’s worth the wait.

1. I have inadvertently dressed myself like a pink grapefruit – a deep coral pink vest under a golden yellow (and white) top. The colours are both autumnal and fresh at the same time.

2. The mozzarella on the sandwich is warm, smooth and elastic.

2b. The little shop has an amazing beer (and cider, and wine, and whiskey) selection – juxtaposed with displays of random Post Office supplies.

2c. We’re away less than an hour but the wood shavings & straw has made the car smell like a hamster cage.

3. We have a quiet evening reading.

1. To finally recall a familiar taste from the past – it’s been bugging me all week.

2. As I fetch in the washing, I hear a bell tinkle behind me. When I turn around, I see the two cats from next door watching me from the fence. A few months ago, when R was a little kitten, they were mortal enemies but now they seem to be friends – probably ganging up to take on our anti-social felines.

3. John’s cold makes him sound even more like Tom Waits than usual. He records his version of Tango Til They’re Sore and when he plays it back to me, it takes me until a particularly Yorkshire vowel sound before I’m sure he’s not tricking me by playing the original.

1. Annoyed that someone has stolen two of my pumpkins from my plot and about hearing how a friend’s employer is messing him (and vulnerable customers) around in a dodgy way, I get angry with how selfish the world seems to be these days. I try to think about people acting decently and an image from half an hour earlier pops into my head: on the way over to the plot, I saw two people we know and a third person working on the community garden at the crossroads.

1b. Bags full of runner beans – probably our last huge harvest of them, close to 15lbs today alone, but there will be more trickling in until the first bad frost. A handful of red tomatoes and goji berries. Two perfect courgettes.

1c. We meet a puppy in the park – such a little cutey that even grumpy Lily can’t get annoyed with him. He runs over for some attention and, with a triumphant air, steals a bean from one of the bags. His mum uses it as a throw-stick to lure him away from us.

2. I notice that the wood on the footboard at the end of the bed is slightly smoother on John’s side than on mine.

3. A pack of Fruitella Crunchies and kitten videos on Youtube.

1. We bump into a couple from down the road – and their big fluffy dog – at the start of our walk. We haven’t seen each other in a while and are all relieved to see both the elderly canines are still doing well. E-dog seems pleased to see us too – she snuggles into both mine and John’s legs in turn.

2. My purring over the blanket has changed focus – as I finish the coloured stripes and start on the blue border, I keep stopping to marvel at how the border will pull it all together. I don’t even mind that after hours of work I’ve only done three rounds because oh doesn’t it look nice.

3. I’m reading ‘I Capture the Castle’ very slowly in French – looking up any word I don’t completely understand and making a note of it to help me take it on board – but I’ve decided to take a different approach with another (‘Prep’) – reading as I would do a book in English at bedtime, getting the gist of sentences rather than the precise translation. I’m surprised how much I can follow without even thinking about it and keep surprising myself by spotting words or phrases that I have explicitly learned recently. I’ll have to read the book a second time to enjoy the nuance that I love so much but for now, the immersion is fun and confidence building.

1. Lily and I make a poorly timed visit to the allotment – it starts drizzling as soon as we get there and continues getting heavier and heavier as we wait in the shelter. I don’t realise at the time of course but we abandon the visit at the peak of the rain – when it’s hammering down and the cambers of the roads have been turned into fast flowing rivers to jump across. I’m as soaked as I’ve ever been by the time I get home – so wet that it crosses over from being annoying to being funny. Later, when I’m dry, I open the living room window to listen to the roar of the beck.

2. With the day of bad weather, the cats are stuck inside. From as soon as I wake up, Tilda is more clingy than normal while Strange cuddles into her favourite round hound for various stretches of the afternoon and evening. Kaufman spends much of the day on his favourite cushion but at one point, he plays with his sisters – twice in a row, he leaps in the air, passing at the peak of his arc through the dining room door and out of our sight. John comments that for all we know, he kept flying and that’s why he did it again.

3. The soup is sour with vinegar but in a good way. Later, the sauce on the main dish is a balanced combination of tangy, sweet and spicy – perfect Peach comfort food.