hot day and headphones

 Gather a few maple leaves from the young trees at the bottom of the hill, and walk out of the valley, gathering a few more leaves on the way. At the top of the hill go to the enclosure where the Rhea birds live. They are fall sitting on the ground, they just look like mounds of grey feathers. One of the birds raises it's head, now it is a mound of feathers with a long flexible neck topped by the head with the big beak and the eyes with the long lashes. Then the bird rises up on its long legs and stalks over to the fence. The head darts forward and the beak grabs a leaf, tearing the green part down. A large bird in the background sees this and it and a smaller, probably younger, one approach. The three of them hungrily feed on the maple leaves, they are absolutely not shy.

When the leaves are gone, proceed down the back way to town. It is still quite early, and there are very few people about.

Walk all the way across town, crossing the wide river, and then the smaller one, and going on to the huge drainage channel which will catch all the water from the floods when these occur. When there are no floods it is just a long wide park with a small stream in the middle and a cycle path going up the centre.

At the electronics store leave the channel and cross the main road and go into the store. There is everything here from coffee machines, televisions, vacuum cleaners, vehicle simulators, electric bicycles, to small robots to wipe up the mess on floors. Search for a pair of headphones for the son, and allow an assistant to help. The assistant demonstrates a pair of sound cancelling headphones. They are strange. As soon as they are switched on, the noise and hum of the shop vanishes, and there is only the sound of the recorded speech and music. He attempts to sell the most expensive headset in the place, but convince him that the more modest ones will serve well.

He is a friendly young man from Syria, and he does his job well.

Walking back from the shop suffer a dizzy spell, and the small cut on the finger starts to bleed. Visit a chemist's shop and buy a package of sticking plasters, the chemist puts one onto the bleeding finger.

Visit a supermarket and buy a small tray of apples and a bottle of water. 

Sit down on a roadside bench untill things are a better. It is a very hot day today.