Bonfires, Swallows, and Cuckoo calls

The last two mornings I have been tackling this green pile of branches from an old cypress tree that we had cut down last summer. This picture was taken in early August. Since then the pile has settled a bit and I had shredded some of the green and piled the logs to carry on seasoning at the edge of the garden. They can be chopped and used in the stove in due course.

Wood pile on part of the climbing frame
that got bent by another falling tree.
It has come in handy for stacking wood on.

There's still quite a bit of the green pile to go but I can now see the Rattletrap over the top of it, which I couldn't a couple of days ago.

I decided to burn the green stuff (it burns very well) so the task involved grabbing branches by the horns, so to speak, and dragging them up the garden to near the bonfire site.

Dragged by the horns

I won't be able to stack much more on the climbing frame so I've started a 'wigwam' pile against the Grey Sallow I pruned last autumn.

During a break for a breakfast slab of home-made bread with butter, quince jam, and Cambozola cheese and a mug of tea, which I consumed sitting in the sun at the top of the companionway steps, I used a posh plastic bag that came home full of Fortnum & Mason biscuits when Toad returned from a London trip recently, to cover the nearside wing mirror of the Rattletrap. Bluetits were getting very angry with competitors that they saw in the mirror and were making a right mess of the car door!

Oh yes, swallows and cuckoo calls.... well, I had my first sighting of swallows flying over while I was eating my piece, and throughout the bonfiring exercise I could hear cuckoo calls from up the hill.