I'm always delighted when, as happened last week, two people came up to me in the supermarket and said 'I always read your column'.

Over the years, people have written or phoned the newspaper, or stopped me to comment... and it really is a help to know that what I write is of interest. It helps so much when I'm writing this column, to know the audience I'm writing for and to know that my very ordinary life resonates with aspects of the readers.

My cat chased a squirrel up a tree yesterday; the cat was on the lower branches and the squirrel was clinging to a top branch and looking at the cat. I ran in to get a camera and, of course, by the time I returned, the squirrel was gone; the squirrel must have jumped trees. The cat was staring up into the foliage, wondering what had happened. I'm glad the squirrel 'escaped'; the cat only wanted to play (I think), but the squirrel would have given him quite a shock.

My theory about dandelions turned out to be a load of spheres. Every year, as I've reported in this column, I've gone dandelion hunting, collecting bucketsful of them, and noticing that if I did this for several weeks, the grass would become dandelion free. This year, someone pointed out that this would happen anyway, even if I didn't go hunting. And blow me... it does! Except for keeping seven-year-old Robin occupied some days ago, there's been no dandelion picking here this year... but they've disappeared just the same. Bang goes another theory!