from my notebook

Broad-leaved Dock leaf (Rumex obtusifolius), or what's left of it when it's been food for something, presumably larvae of the Green Dock Beetle (Gastrophysa viridula).

(Above and below) The great pine of Brislington (outside Hartwell Jaguar showroom), as much admired, on weekday mornings, by commuters with nothing better to do while they're queuing to get through the Brislington bottleneck into Bristol. It's more pleasant to see it on a Saturday, from the convenient Subway on the other side of the road, which was constructed purely to allow a more leisured contemplation of this magnificent tree. It is a Corsican Pine (Pinus nigra var. maritima), a variety of European Black Pine, so-called because the tree tends to look blackish from a distance, even though the foliage is green. Corsican Pine has a neat arrangement of level branches, unlike the more scruffy upswept habit of Austrian Pine (Pinus nigra var. nigra). By pine standards it is fairly resistant to air pollution, but when I first noticed this tree in 1991 it was evidently finding the conditions of Brislington Hill a challenge; it looks much happier now.

in Somerset

[Above: The Cheese & Grain, Frome, drawn this morning while stallholding at the Collectables Fair; note lava-lamp in foreground.
Below: Scenes from the Bay View Cafe, Burnham-on-Sea, on an overcast New Year's Day.]

Parrett Estuary / Bridgewater Bay

Morrisons Car-Park

The Quantocks

Laura

Also in a Somerset groove, tune into Brenda's charming Bristol Channel, but you've only got until Friday. Swedish Mik may possibly be me. I hear it will be returning as a blog in due course; I'll post the link when I know.

notebook

Copies of old watercolours found in Hastings Old Town. (Above: by me; Below: by Maria)