Tailpiece

If you're a fan of drawing journals, you might find that this shed looks vaguely familiar. It appears occasionally as one of the settings in John Welding's Awakefield diaries (currently up to issue #6, right, see link below).

Some plants in John and Helen's garden are under attack; snails have reduced the fennel to what looks like an exaggerated cartoon version of extreme snail damage: if Elmer Fudd had trouble with snails, this is what his fennel would look like.

Jack fights back

As far as Jack, Helen and John's ginger tomcat, is concerned, the garden is under attack from another intruder; a rival tomcat who has been trying to muscle in on his territory.

He patrols around the perimeter of the lawn, standing every few yards with his back to a prominent selected plant (so the fennel no longer qualifies) and squirts it with a jet of urine. I was very nearly sprayed by a tiger that was marking its territory in this way while drawing close to the bars of its cage in Chester Zoo.

I'm surprised that John hasn't seen this behaviour before. Jack is going to have to do a lot of 'labelling' to hold onto his territory.

My drawing of Jack (right) makes a suitable tailpiece for the final page of my little orange sketchbook from Amsterdam, which I took as my pocket-sized sketchbook on our trip to Mallorca in April.