Dog by the Roadside

Half an hour past midnight. Managed to make it back to the bedroom after falling asleep - for a few minutes - during episode 5 of the Doctor Who story 'The Chase' I was watching on DVD. A cool night tonight. The quilt doesn't seem warm enough somehow, but the fact that it actually is cold is now a relief.

Had to go down London Road at lunchtime to pay the council tax. Saw a sad dog tied up to a drainpipe on a narrow pavement, lorry sweeping past alarmingly close. The thought of the dog haunted me during my last few hours at work, and I had to go back after work to make sure the dog had gone - which it was.

The air is beginning to taste of winter now. Unmistakeable scent of smoke and cardboard, that folded-Sussex smell I noticed last year. Trees are empty and the nights are full. I saw the perfect shadow of a naked tree perfect against the wall of the Salvation Army building up Sackville Road. All the windows are boarded up from the inside, but there is light at the edges of the screen. I thought the building had fallen into disrepair.
A few months ago, I saw a woman dressed in the Victorian-like apparel of a Salvation Army member outside the building, and wondered, briefly, if I had seen a ghost.