Snail City

Proper snow today, always a pleasure till you have to take the doggy for a walk. Turned round at the end of the Millenium hedge, much to Hattie's disgust, didn't even get to the gate, way short of the river edge and the walk back thru the trees.

The river is brown, yesterday it had real waves in the wind, ridden by white horses, but they couldn't gallop over the road as they sometimes do when the wind and high tide combine. Then the cars have to crawl by on the other side of the road which is somewhat higher.

Resident swans gather in the lay-by, it is my ambition to see them floating along the road, but not so far.
The Hedge was planted by the local worthies with millennium money, to replace the one destroyed by the farmer in less integrated days. Now he has extended it himself. I assume it is him as it is growing more strongly than the careful placement of the village ladies. There is mostly hawthorn, May and blackthorn [is that the same thing] and occasional holly sentries that grow well in this sandy soil
A few weeks back we discovered tree snails, loads of them nestled in the cleft of branches, is this usual?

We did not have such things in Ilford when I was a child, no trees on a new council estate. I didn't know corn started off green, I thought it grew yellow from the beginning, but i did know milk didn't grow in those special little milk bottles, a daily crate balanced on the heaters in the classroom, warmed and disgusting, complete with straw. Milk monitor was not really a position of power.