Teeth, going out and smallish town.

1.  A nice chatty gossip with the hygienist who is, it turns out, a mum from the children's primary school. I see the dentist straight after and get extra points for clean teeth.

2. '...and don't let any strangers in.'
'But why?'
'It's for their own safety.'
I leave them arguing about which of them I should pay for babysitting the other.

3. To live in the sort of town where you can go to a literary festival show and have people you know sitting nearby, and a writer you know warming up the audience (Andrew Wallace — always entertaining, always thought provoking). And I think we all feel pretty lucky to live in the sort of town that Richard Ayoade feels is worth promoting his book to.

Chime, dogs and get-away planning.

1. The doorbell chime signalling the arrival of a child home from school.

2. It strikes me how frequently the seconded coppers I am editing for mention their dogs, and the pleasure of their company.

3. For a planning call, there's a lot of laughter -- but we're all of us looking forward to taking a road trip west and a few days away from our routines and worries.

Hair, supper and finishing early.

1. His hair today is glossy and clean. It smells faintly of oak moss, and is exactly the same colour as my own.

2. Nick has come home with an idea for supper and is searching through the spices.

3. I realise with only a little push I can finish this job today, rather than on Friday.

Getting closer, witches and watching the sea.

1. As the train gets closer to Hastings, more and more details develop -- a woman in white carrying a drum; a crown of flowers; a conversation about recording folk traditions; green dabbed noses; a hat with horns; a jingle of bells.

2. Green painted women -- later I learn they call themselves crones -- with twigs and flowers in their hair ululate and call like foxes in the night.

3. Watching colours flicker across the water -- from sea glass green to indigo to slate grey.

May, deer and pointing.

1. The may blossom has been hanging heavy on the hawthorns for a few days, but I have been too polite to mention it before the actual month. It has a strong smell that is faintly fishy: not something I'd like indoors; but out on my walk I love to see the tiny rose-like blossoms and the tight white dots of the flowers to come.

2. There are a lot of deer droppings on the paths -- strange to think of so large an animal stepping between the parked cars, grazing on the cricket pitch then melting away into the woods when people start their commutes.

3. The man cleaning the glass between the sanctuary and the church café pauses to point us up the stairs to the polling station in the hall.

Cold drink, fan and slime.

1. In the back of the fridge, on this hot day, I have a huge mug of green tea.

2. Remembering that I have a USB fan tucked away.

3. There was a science fair today. I catch her mixing slime on her dressing table, but don't say a thing.

Genre fiction, weeds and film night.

1. It's difficult to dislike waking in the small hours when I can read myself back to sleep by sliding into  the soothing, well-worn grooves of genre fiction. This week's favourite is Julia Huni's Triana Moore, Space Janitor.

2. I do love the soft fern leaves and pink flowers of herb robert; and the sparky blue flowers of alkanet; and the way wall toadflax softens edges -- even if the RHS says they are all pernicious weeds. I only pull them out when they seem to be congesting the garden, or once they start looking leggy, mildewed and seedy. 

3. We disappear into the misty deserted world of the Russian classic Stalker (1979). It was made seven years before the Chernobyl disaster, and I'm struck by its prescience -- although it's pretty easy to guess how people might behave when presented with a forbidden zone that contains invisible danger; and it's not too much of a leap to use those guesses to fire up a narrative.