The camp teenage boy is talking to his companion on the bus

The camp teenage boy is talking to his companion on the bus: “I can tell he’s got a crush on me but if I say owt I know he’s just gonna say ‘I’m not gay!’ in that stupid indignant voice”.

Behind me, the grey-haired hi-vis man has been to the new restaurant that apparently everybody is talking about: “I ordered the lamb but when it came it was all fat. I got one tiny thin slice of meat off the whole piece! I sent it back. I can’t eat that I said, it’s all fat. The woman asked me ‘Do you want to order something else?’ I said, ‘No love, you’ve put me right off my tea now, I’m going home to make myself some beans on toast.’ The chef chased me out into the car park and told me he was going to have word with the butcher but I’ll not be going back”.

I walk down Leeds Road behind a girl in skinny jeans and a black puffer jacket. She’s talking loudly on her phone in Polish, emphasising key points with wild, histrionic hand gestures.

There’s a woman in the Costcutter with ‘Nobody’s Cow’ appliquéd onto her onesie above her breasts. Outside, the man with the piercings is polishing the alloys of his Ford Fiesta with one hand while he smokes some strong weed with the other. He smiles and waves.

Out in the sticks, it’s all long shadows, wood smoke and lavender, starlings on wires, church bells, dried hydrangeas, Kate Bush songs from the open windows of ex farm buildings, wicker-baskets, wellington boots, a possible sighting of a small flock of waxwings and a definite sighting of a huge flock of lapwings.

There are plastic bags in the trees.

I was nearly hit twice by flying objects today: I had to swerve to avoid the soiled nappy that somebody threw from their front door towards the bins without looking*, then at the farm I had to duck under the flight path of an enraged goose. It hissed and honked and flew over the five bar gate at me in a rage. The old farmer ran out and got himself between the goose and me, flapping his arms at it. “It’s a right little bastard this ‘en!” he explained, as he tried to shepherd it back into the yard, “It dun’t like me either, keeps biting me. It’s never flown ovva t’gate before though!”

*This has happened before: http://goo.gl/edTd1A

An old man was cleaning egg from his front door...

An old man is cleaning egg from his front door. He tells me that some vandals threw it at the house on Halloween. He says he’d like to pin them down by the throat with the handle of his broom and stamp on it.

At a house on Sycamore Close, the bald man wearing motorcycle leathers and a Bluetooth earpiece says “Hold on John”, and makes a “Do I need to sign for it?” sign by pretending to write in the air in front of his face with an imaginary pen. I make a sign for “No” by shaking my head and I hand over his package. The man gives me an emphatic thumbs up and continues with his Bluetooth conversation with John, “...the thing is mate...”

The old lady whose light blue fine knit cardigan exactly matches the colour of both her garage door and her meter housing box is very pleased with her parcel of garden bulbs, she says it’s “just the right size”.

Twice in succession during my parcel delivery, the door is answered by a middle-aged woman with a broken arm.

The German shepherd at the bottom of the street seems particularly keen to get at me today. It’s on its hind legs at the gate barking and snarling. The fur on its back is on end and it doesn’t take its eyes off me as I deliver the mail to the neighbouring houses. As I approach, it becomes apoplectic, barking furiously. A thin woman with a blonde perm and skinny jeans opens the door of the house, runs up to the dog and grabs it by the collar. She pulls it down from the gate but it struggles loose and leaps back up to continue its frenzied display. The woman makes a second attempt to grab the dog and this time she manages to keep ahold long enough for me to pass over her mail. “Thank you!” she shouts in a strong eastern European accent, “She is very friendly dog!”

As I queue in the Co-op to buy a new jar of peanut butter and some Mini Cheddars, the woman on the till shouts to a colleague, “Lisa, would you class this as quiet?” Lisa breaks off from her customer and briefly glances around the shop, “Umm, yeah, I reckon”. My till woman shouts back to Lisa, “Good, I need a wee”.

I see another headless pigeon. This one is on Yew Tree Road near the junction with Weatherill Road.