SueRichards

Love the London life, cycling and cats. 😘

[James Melville 🚜 @JamesMelville]

Adverts were way better back in the 1980s & 1990s.

Case study: Gregor Fisher. Photo booth. Comb-over. Hamlet cigar.

Good advertising was a cigar called Hamlet.

[Aloysius O'Hare in memory of Angel Cilla 🌈 @OutwoodsCat]

There’s 4 perfectly good open windows, 2 doors & a cat flap, but I insist on this exact entry & exit point.
Happy #WorldTeacherDay to all educators, especially those whose paperwork doubles as doormats. 😹😹
#cats #CatsofTwitter #Hedgewatch

[Malcolm & Baby Dog @Malcolm_theCat]

Friends! Cousin Teddy chewed a Baby Bunny yesterday, which he didn’t realise he shouldn’t do, so I’m now on Bunny Watch… protecting them (mostly for Cleo, who adores them). It’s a big job, so my Deputy Percy came along to help. Mum needs the help - she’s a bit poorly with suspected Covid. It’s going around again! ❤️

[Malcolm & Baby Dog @Malcolm_theCat]

Chums! Baby Dog here. It’s nice having a Walking Companion whilst Cousin Teddy stays with us. Look at how in sync we are!! Cousin Teddy doesn’t understand the power of goodness that our social media can spread so let’s show him lots of love ❤️

[Sama Hoole @SamaHoole]

We put the rewilding argument to Keith.

"Keith. There is a scheme that will pay Dave to take this field out of production and let nature recover. No grazing. No cutting. Just leave it. How do you respond?"

Keith did not stop chewing. He was in a hedge at the time, six feet up, with his front feet in the hazel.

"Keith, the idea is that without livestock the land returns to a natural state. Wildflowers. Insects. Birds. Would you accept that your absence might be good for the field?"

Keith came down out of the hedge. He walked, at his own pace, to the corner behind the barn, and we followed, because there was no indication we had a choice.

The corner behind the barn is a quarter of an acre that Dave fenced off in April on the advice of a leaflet. Nothing has grazed it since. It was supposed to be wildflowers.

It is nettles. It is nettles to the height of a man's chest, with bramble coming through the nettles and a young sycamore coming through the bramble, and the one patch of anything that ever flowered in it is under all three. A blackbird has taken it. Nothing else has.

Keith stood at the fence and looked at it the way a decorator looks at a wall somebody else has painted.

"Keith, is this what you mean by nature recovering?"

Keith put his head through the wire, took a mouthful of nettle, and pulled the whole plant out by the root, which is a thing a goat can do and a leaflet cannot.

"Keith, are you saying the field looks the way it looks because you are in it?"

Keith looked at us with the patience of an animal who has answered this before and would appreciate it if somebody wrote it down this time.

He then walked the length of the fence, found the post Dave had not sunk properly, leaned on it until it went over, and walked into the wildflower corner.

By dusk it was a third smaller.

Dave stood at the kitchen window and did not go out. He has been meaning to get round to that corner since June.

He is putting it down as nature recovering.

[Robert Allotment cat,now helped by Janet & Amanda @AllotmentCat]

(Betty)

It's 4 years today since lovely Red Fred left us to join his best friend E.T. 🌈

Red Fred was E.T.'s carer and was always by her side, helping her to walk.

He must have beendevastated when she died and only a month later he joined her. 🌈

Rest in Peace sweet boy, you will never be forgotten.

[Malcolm & Baby Dog @Malcolm_theCat]

Friends! We all know that Baby Dog loves a Treat. But he’s very SUSPICIOUS when he’s never had the Treat before. Here he is trying a Bonio for the first time. Mum had to edit this down, because he STARED at it and GUARDED it for a VERY LONG TIME! Daft Dog! 😹 🦴

[Malcolm & Baby Dog @Malcolm_theCat]

Chums! Baby Dog here. As promised, here’s Part Two of my Beach Adventure! Mum says she loves watching me run on the Beach because I look so full of Joy! It’s true - I am Rather Happy! 💛💛

[SueRichards @iamaconker]

@AllotmentCat Yay!

[Sama Hoole @SamaHoole]

Pat and Margaret were in Steve's garden on Wednesday morning, two retired Texel ewes who have never in their lives left a field under their own steam, and Keith was not with them.

Steve found them at the compost, standing side by side the way they stand everywhere, looking at the bindweed like two women told to wait outside a shop, and they did not run when the back door opened, because nothing has chased them in a decade.

Steve rang Dave.

Dave's account: the yard gate was open, the field gate was open, and the goat, who has had those two ewes following him at thirty metres for a year without once acknowledging them, walked them through both gates, along the boundary, through the gap where the corner post used to stand, and into Steve's bindweed, and then went back to Dave's side and got on with the bramble.

Steve's account: "He's delegating."

The ewes came home for a bucket. They did not know they had been anywhere.

Steve did not write. He watched two sheep leave his garden with a mouthful of his bindweed apiece, looked at the goat on the other side of the wire, who was not looking at him, and went in.

Dave's log: "Pat and Margaret in Steve's. He put them there. He is training a workforce."

[Malcolm & Baby Dog @Malcolm_theCat]

Friends! Our amazing 3D printed toy that we showed you yesterday is causing Baby Dog serious amounts of consternation. He sees the ball. He hears the ball. But he can’t get the ball. I have explained to him that this is a CAT TOY but he’s not having any of it. SOUND UP to listen to his disgruntled noises! 😹

[Malcolm & Baby Dog @Malcolm_theCat]

Friends! Just look at this pair! Such posers! 😹

[Detectorists Addicts @DetectoristsA]

Happy 60th Birthday Lance - aka Toby Jones 🥳
You're a true legend 🎂 🎈
@BBCiPlayer
#Detectorists

[Robert Allotment cat,now helped by Janet & Amanda @AllotmentCat]

(Amanda)

Auntie Sammy took this photo of me and Betty loves it!

She says it shows how perfect my whiskeers are.

That's a funny thing to say, isn't it?

I'll have to look at Maurine's whiskers when he comes round for breakfast.

I wonder if they are as good as mine?

[🐐Winston🌈Thatcher🌈Domino, Walnut, Jasper🐐 @WinstonThatche4]

Hi machine! Bye machine! #SterlingZoomies

[MarshFamilySongs @MarshSongs]

Here's a twist on Canadian legend @Alanis's "Ironic" (who was fab when one of us saw her live last month) - in an acoustic version that addresses Trump's #tradewar with Canada and his attempted renaming of Lake Ontario. It's called "Moronic" 🎶 - lyrics: https://t.co/EXENOvVUj2

[SueRichards @iamaconker]

@Malcolm_theCat Another Handsome Boy ❤️

[Malcolm & Baby Dog @Malcolm_theCat]

Chums! Now that I’ve been groomed, my Amazing Eyelashes stand out even better. In case you didn’t know, my Eyelashes are rather famous. I told Mum that my Eyelashes should have a post dedicated to them. So here it is. I hope you enjoy it 👀 ❤️

[SueRichards @iamaconker]

@Malcolm_theCat Handsome boy ❤️