Oi! Where’s me tiger’s ‘ead?

Four foot from his tail! (Lonnie Donegan, “My old man’s a dustman”). This tiger graces the garden of Gerson, a former circus clown, now the caretaker of a house near us. A small man with a giant voice and a giant heart. He’s the one who remembers lost souls like Jean Cristiano (the local mystery man I mentioned in a previous blip) at Christmas, and has them in for dinner.

Whoopee! Neither the anticipated ton of work nor the rain materialized, allowing me a quiet day on the porch to write letters and make the odd foray into the garden to fiddle with plants and watch the birds. A pear plopping down the bank signalled the squirrel’s return, but Kayla raced up and scared him off before HH arrived. Thought I could hear him rustling in the leaves, then decided it was a squirrel cuckoo – or no, a wood rail? Seeing some red under the tail, I grabbed the bins and found it was a toucan. Once again, HH got there too late to spot him. He misses half the fun, sitting at the computer inside – the light is too strong on the porch and he can’t see the screen properly. Not a good day for him anyway, as he’s run out of one of his Parkinsons meds – hopefully playing catch-up when we get back to Rio will keep him free of twitches. They already caused him to sleep in a separate room last night and may do again tonight.

Back down to Rio in the early evening, already looking forward to going back up the hill at the weekend.