Easily Pleased

I'm famous for being easily pleased. An alternative way to put it is, "Tiny things please tiny minds". Today I am very happy with myself because, walking an old horse on the beautiful Wiltshire downland between Chisledon and Liddington Camps, I noticed a funny sort of ash tree, brought a bit home and have identified it as the Single-Leaved Ash (Fraxinus diversifolia). It's sticking out of my scanner right here beside me as I write. You can see the single leaves coming out from the actual twig. Extraordinary. I don't believe it's wild. It was obviously a planting from many years ago when someone planted it all along both sides of the road, almost alternatively with the common ash. What a happy Bank Holiday Monday. It was so quiet and peaceful up there as we plodded along like gypsies and barge people must have done with the leading rein.

Here is a beautiful picture of Liddington Castle (word for an Iron Age Camp) which appears on the great site http://www.geograph.org.uk/ where you can search for good photographs that people have taken near your place. My congratulations to Brian Robert Marshall, the photographer. He has caught some of the essence of Wiltshire.