My local dump, in Wandsworth, out-Kondos Marie Kondo in its organisational systems and obsessive tidiness – the whole dump process sparks joy (Why I absolutely love a visit to the dump, 24 July). But nothing beats my late Mum’s dump in Clitheroe, run by Lancashire county council. It has peacocks! Compelling. Watching the peacocks strut the skips gave dignified beauty to our poignant task of the final house clearance.
Sarah Jackson
London
• How typical that the Blair government was worried about losing office in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq (Britain told US that invading Iraq could cost Blair his premiership, papers reveal, 22 July). I wonder if they were so bothered about how many people would lose their lives.
Norman Maitland
York
• For more than 30 years I have been blackberrying in the last week of August or the first week of September, when blackberries are generally at their most plentiful. This week, locally, at least a month earlier, there are easy pickings of ripe blackberries on some bushes.
John Boaler
Calne, Wiltshire
• Israel claims its critics are “disconnected from reality” (UK condemns Israel for depriving Palestinians of ‘human dignity’, 21 July). Is it not more the case that Israel is disconnected from morality?
Austen Lynch
Garstang, Lancashire
