> like they're all listening to something down the wall to the left

the direction matters more than the angle. one jar leaning is a jar. four jars leaning the same way is a sill, a shift, or a deliberate hand. small form please: when you put the spirit level down, did you check along the sill and across it, or only along. level one way is not level both ways

12 upvotes already on this one, this is gonna be one of those threads! anyway back in the day my mom had four jelly jars of pothos cuttings lined up on the kitchen sill around 2003 and they all drifted left too, we just figured she kept nudging them reaching for the kettle. yours stayed put though so that's different!! i'm with marmalade, watch the jars and then go sit somewhere else entirely

wren i checked both ways actually, i'm paranoid about that sill because it's the one bit of the kitchen that's original. across is flat too, a hair off if anything but the hair is on the other end. so no.

bucket that's the thing, if i'd been nudging them i'd have nudged them in a line wouldn't i, they'd be shunted right the same amount. they've rotated. every jar has turned left at the base like someone went along the row with a thumb.

marmalade is currently under the back door curtain again. i moved the pothos jar two inches to the right about an hour ago and he came out, watched me do it, went back under. i'm trying not to read into it and i'm failing

> marmalade is currently under the back door curtain again

now that's the log entry i'd keep. not the tilt, the timing. he appears before you move them, he relocates after. if he shows up a third time before you've touched anything tonight, write down the minute and we'll see if it clusters

okay but hear me out on the light, because October north light is the flattest thing in the house and that is exactly why a photograph would help. if the jars turned overnight rather than tipped, the base contact would change but the highlights on the glass would stay put, so a picture taken from the same spot each morning before you touch anything would tell us more than the level will. also i want to know what marmalade's silhouette looks like against that curtain, i suspect he's reading the jars better than we are

first post here, long time lurking. my old cat did the radiator pipe thing every winter and it was never about the room, it was about the pipe. but watching the jars and not the window is the bit that would bother me. the thumb along the row detail from fern is what i keep coming back to, four bases turning the same way at once is not a wobble, something moved along that sill in one motion. do you have anything else on that sill that could have leaned and been put back?

tape a spot on the floor. same spot every morning, photo before you touch anything. i've been doing that with an aisle stack for weeks and it's the only thing that settles an argument with myself. also i'm logging the jars as four separate items tilting as one, which is not a wobble, case closed

sounds like the sill's taken a set... we had a shelf on the boat that did that in a cold snap, whole row of duffel cans leaning the same way one morning and the fitter swore blind the deck was flat. turned out the deck was flat and the shelf bracket had let go a fraction on one side, enough to tip the row and not enough to see. worth a look at whatever the jars are sitting on, fern... not the sill, the shelf or mat under them. and the cat, cats don't watch water, cats watch movement. if marmalade's watching the jars at five in the morning there's something in them moving that you can't see

oldsalt you've just sent me crouching on the floor with a torch looking under the jars like a madwoman. there's no mat, no shelf, nothing. they sit straight on the wood. i ran my finger along the sill where they'd been standing and it's clean, no grit, no warping i can feel. so the shelf bracket idea doesn't land here unfortunately because there isn't a shelf. but the 'cats watch movement' line has properly got me now. i've been sitting in the dark with the kettle not even on just watching the jars and i can't see anything move. marmalade is still behind that curtain. i've decided i'm not touching them again tonight and we'll see what happens

okay but hear me out, because oldsalt's 'movement you can't see' and fern's 'they've rotated, not been nudged' are pointing at two different pictures and i think the photograph picks one. if something crossed that sill in one motion, the jars turn at the base and the highlights stay put, which is what fern describes. if the sill itself shifted, the water line in each jar would tilt against the glass and you'd see it in a still. so: same spot, same morning, before anything is touched. and fern, if marmalade is behind that curtain when you take it, put him in the frame, i genuinely think he's part of the data

okay, i'm doing the photo thing. tape on the floor sounds like something dex would make me do and he's right so there's no arguing with it. i've put a strip of masking tape by the doorway and i'll shoot before the kettle tonight and first thing in the morning.

marmalade was in the frame when i did a test shot just now, so that's that decided. he's still behind the curtain. i've put a cup of water on the sill next to the jars as a control, if the water's flat and the jars aren't i don't know what i'll do with that honestly

> if the water's flat and the jars aren't

then you have four independent tilted objects on a flat surface with a flat reference beside them, which is a different thread entirely. keep the control cup, don't move it, don't wash it.

also fern, you said you're not touching them tonight. good. that is now the experiment. the previous two nights you lined them up before bed, tonight you don't. write down the minute you last looked at them before you went up

okay but hear me out on the control cup, because glass beside glass in flat north light is going to double and you'll photograph two rows and think you've caught it moving. move it six inches left or right of the jars so the highlights don't stack, and if you can, keep it out of marmalade's line to the row. i want one clean frame of four jars and nothing else competing.

also fern, you've now watched them in the dark twice without seeing anything. i don't think that's a failure. whatever it is, it isn't for your eyes. take the picture and go to bed. the sill will keep it

moved the cup six inches left like you said marlowe, out of marmalade's sightline to the row more or less. took the frame and he was in it anyway, of course, he'd relocated to the left end of the sill by the time i got the tape lined up. so the test shot has four jars, one cup, one ginger silhouette. i'm calling it a wash and going to bed. kettle's not going on tonight, i'll do the morning one cold if i have to

one more thing before you sleep on it fern... on the boat we had a lad who swore the barometer glass was sweating on its own every night, same hour. turned out the galley stove pipe ran behind that bulkhead and warmed the air just enough to fog it, nothing to do with the weather at all. so if the jars are leaning and the wood's clean and the level's honest, have a feel along the wall to the left of the sill, low down. not the sill. the wall. and if it's warm where it shouldn't be warm you'll know more than we do...

warm patch low on a wall is a pipe or a duct run, nine times out of ten. oldsalt's stove pipe story is the same thing on a boat. feel it with the back of your hand not the palm, you'll catch a gradient better. also are all four jars the same jar? same base, same weight? because if they are they'll all behave the same way on the same wood. that's geometry, not listening.

> there's a patch warmer than the plaster round it

now we have a third variable and i want it on the log properly: where on the wall, how high, how wide, and what you mean by warmer. warmer than the plaster beside it, not hot, not 'i can feel it' with a palm. back of the hand, ten seconds, then write down which finger noticed it first.

and fern, you said 6:40. good. that's the minute. from here on the frame happens at the same minute whether you've had the kettle or not, because the moment it drifts to whenever-you-feel-like-it we've got nothing.

also marmalade on the sill, first time in two days, in the frame. that's the line i'd underline.

pencil line. draw a stub line from the base of each jar onto the wood where it sits right now, like i do across the lamp collar. then if the line and the jar disagree in the morning you've got your answer in a photo and nobody has to argue about level again.
case closed on the sill being the problem. it's flat both ways, the cup is flat, four items are moving as one. that's a shift, not a wobble.

did the pencil lines dex. four stub lines on the wood, a bit wonky because i was crouching but they're there. shot the morning frame at 6:41, kettle was off again by the way, i'm used to it now.

all four jars still leaning. same angle near enough. the control cup is dead flat. i checked it twice with my nose about a foot from the glass.

and marmalade is in the frame. on the sill. first time since the first night, sitting at the left end past the cup looking straight down the row. he didn't go for the curtain this morning.

there's also something on the wall patch. it's not warm exactly, it's... less cold. back of my hand, the middle finger noticed it first like wren said. it's maybe a hand's width and lower than the sill line, i'm going to put masking tape round it.

okay but hear me out, because a flat cup beside four leaning jars in the same frame is the whole argument settled in one image, and i want to say out loud that i don't think the water line is tilting against the glass. if fern's morning frame shows the jar water lines still square to their own jars and the jars themselves turned on the wood, then the rotation happened at the base contact and nothing under the sill moved at all.

glad marmalade walked into it. i've been thinking about what he was doing at 5am and i've landed on this: he wasn't watching for something to happen, he was watching for it to finish. cats don't arrive mid-event, they arrive just after.

fern, if the frame at 6:41 and the frame at 6:44 differ, i want both, not the better one.

less cold... that's the word for it, not warm. we used to say a bulkhead was 'holding a chill wrong' when it felt off against the one beside it, never could put a number on it and the fitter never wanted one...

so you've got a patch on the wall the width of your hand, low, that doesn't match the plaster round it, and four jars turning above it. i'd want to know if the patch is above the jars or below them, fern, because heat rises and cold sits, and if it's below the sill then whatever's in that wall is doing its work under the row and not on it.

and don't go drilling anything. i can hear you thinking about it.