twins

Which one was that, Zig?

Dan.

How can you tell?

Dan’s the one with that face. Joe’s the one with the other face.

trouser snake

Today was Zig's a bit belated seventh birthday party. I met the Queenie. She stretches from here to here or there to there, and weighs five stone.

Her tail liked my pocket:



But her head preferred the birthday party boy:



Psssssssssssssssssssssssssssssst.

Over here, little boy ... You and your strange extra hand ...

like the first bird.

Is it darkest before dawn? Is it always darkest before dawn?

What happens if you don’t get that far? Don’t even get to the night proper? Don’t even get to the stage where you shower, clean your teeth, have the last wee of the evening (and wash your hands, ladies and gentlemen), set the alarm for a couple of hours after the dawn it gets darkest before, fumble into bed and fall asleep over the same page of the same book you’ve been falling asleep over for five days now?

What if the nearest you get to the night that gets darkest before the dawn is the dusk? Some perpetual twighlight: after the blackbirds, before the stars. Some still, grey brown suspension you breathe through gills.

Scientists have recorded the noise of Jupiter. They call it the dawn chorus.