STONES OF TIME

I went out to photograph yesterday's scene of carnage, by which I mean the day-long uproar caused by wild boar hunters. I'm not an expert but it seems to me that wild pigs are nocturnal, either by wisdom or by nature. Hunters are diurnal so the pigs have to be flushed from the undergrowth by dogs and shouting men and driven to areas where hunters can get a clear shot.

Our neighbourhood hero, historian, environmental watchdog and all around good guy, Mauro, saw that the hunters had gutted a pig on the road and were about to leave the entrails on the spot. He blocked the narrow road with his car and made them clean it up.

Today, it's the song bird shooters who are out. The season ends 31st January, not soon enough.

So anyway, I shot the scene. When we came back and I got out of the car I saw the light on the above. I have been trying to get a shot of the fossils in the slab of stone for ages. They are still quite vague (a clever person could probably make them stand out via PhotoShop) but they are of plants millions of years old. They existed long before man arrived on earth and made a mess of it. It sort of brought things into perspective. The round stone has been sitting there for years. I didn't touch a thing.

The dot on the hillside is our house.

I liked this cat sitting on a car but cats are for emergencies, aren't they? Cat on car.

For the record: It is +13C, 53F and positively balmy. Cats were snoozing on car bonnets/hoods in the warmth but there was not a soul about. The house is a terrible mess again.