Blue sky and brown lawn

I was asked for pictures. I took pictures.





The soil in my garden is sand on gravel and it's a dry part of the country anyway, so I've always taken this into account with planting. In this exceptional heat, however, even good-natured shrubs like hebe and potentilla are shrivelling up, although they have have been there for years and are well established. The gravel area is doing pretty well; not much is flowering any more but I allowed for that with variations in leaf colour.

The grass is almost completely brown. The ragwort manages to stay alive, but it will be pulled up of course, it's poisonous to grazing animals (the poison is stored in the liver and will kill them over time if they eat enough). However, the cinnabar moth caterpillar lives on it and is impervious to the toxin.










The trees are still green, though they will lose their leaves early this autumn.
















































Masonry bees have lived in this ancient wall for years.
Goosey and the chickens manage to find some shade.








































There are still some flowers in bloom however. Some of these are in tubs. I grow most flowers in tubs as they are more manageable to water.




















































And the greenhouses are cropping well. The jalapeño peppers are not hot yet, I ate one yesterday that didn't have a hint of heat, but in a few weeks they will smart nicely on the tongue.














































And, just to finish with, the chimneys. The Tudor and the Victorian ones.

A balanced diet (warning, contains nuts)

I shocked my son Ro yesterday, when I admitted to conduct unbecoming in an elderly mother. It's hard to feel like eating much in this heat, but on the other hand one has to keep the nutrition levels up with regular nourishment. He does this by making himself a splendid packed lunch; two salads, one green or mixed, the other with something like beans, couscous or pasta, a sandwich (wholemeal bread of course) containing something protein-rich, five items of fruit and, usually, yoghurt.
Yesterday at lunchtime, I was alone, mildly hungry and nothing in the fridge appealed. I didn't want to cook. "Icecream" I thought, "there's the thing .......... mm, Magnum. Seems to deal with most of the major food groups, chocolate is a vegetable, milk, carbohydrate. Is there sufficient nutrition for a full meal? Ah!" I pounced. "Almond Magnum. That'll do it."
Ro thinks I'm decadent.
I'm wondering what to have for lunch today.

Summertime, and the - ah, I've been here before, nearly

This summer weather is wonderful if you don't work 9 to 5. I've been waking early, but not going to sleep any earlier than usual, which has meant 4 - 6 hours sleep most nights. That's fine, daylight is good and I like getting up early in the summer (just don't disturb me once we are on to GMT) but the lacking sleep-hours catch up every so often. And so they did today - after I'd done all my daytime work of course (of course!). Oh it was lovely. The best part of 2 hours napping.
I didn't go to bed. If I had, I'd still be asleep now. But a comfy armchair, feet up, book, cup of tea, bowl of cherries, home-made (though not by me) lemon cake by my side, and I was very happy. I finished the food - well, did you expect anything less - and then I was away.
Still a bit zonked when I stood up, unsteady, at 6 o'clock; but since then I've watered the greenhouses and the tubs, picked the vegetables (courgettes, french beans, the first green peppers, tomatoes) and cooked dinner (all of the above plus a neighbour's - given - potatoes and some salmon) and have read the papers.

And people complain about the weather? But this is England, it could change tomorrow and each day could be the last of summer. It's the delicious uncertainty that gives it its enjoyment. Of course the gardens/the farmers need rain. But, although my delicate skin cannot spend time in it, I love the sun. We're all happier: more short-tempered, it's true: but in the summer people smile more, we chat more, we enjoy life. Relax, go slower, there seem to be more hours in the day so you still have time to get everything done.
We'd be so miserable if it rained every weekend.

A child can be rude, but do you have to boast about it?

I was more than startled to read this article in today's Times. If any of my children, at the age of 12, had come to give me a 'good morning' kiss and then, unprovoked, told me that "I’m fat, my hair needs cutting, that the bags under my eyes are the size of suitcases and that my breath stinks," I'd have told her that sort of gratuitous offensiveness is unkind and not acceptable (I'd have been awfully hurt too, whether it was true or not). Kate Figes seems quite proud that she has brought up her daughter to be rude (or, as she calls it, 'outspoken'). Sure, in the heat of an argument, an adolescent says hurtful things, but unless Kate is exaggerating wildly - and in that case she is being offensive to Grace - she seems to have taught her nothing about tact, thoughtfulness or respect.

I was completely out of my depth during my daughter's teenage years and if I'd had another girl, I hope I'd have done better; adolescent boys are quite different. Even when we did have rows though, there were several things about all my children that I only became aware of when I talked to other mothers.

They never scored points off each other. If one was arguing with me, the others kept out of it.
None of them ever sulked. They would walk away (whether slamming the door or not) and on their return the matter would be over, or we would talk it through.
They were not unkind. Occasionally there was a hard personal truth, but that was rare and it was never gratuitous.

Anyway, sorry Kate, I won't be buying your books. If I were your daughter I wouldn't want you to be writing about me as a teenager or yourself as a menopausal mother, and I don't want to read about it either.

Ha ha

What Your Underwear Says About You

You tend to buy new underwear instead of doing laundry. You're sexy, in that pinup girl, tease sort of way.

The Underwear Oracle

No, I'm too old and too married.
Unless my husband is a very lucky man of course ;-)

Update next day - I tried again with the knickers du jour -
"You like to think of yourself as innocent, even though you're not!
You're a closet exhibitionist who gets a thrill from being secretly naughty."
Sad to say, this is nearer the truth. All part of my cheerful mid-life crisis.

I'm only here for the beer

At the village festival* my daughter El won, on the tombola, a jar of frankfurters, a jar of pickled sliced cucumbers and a tin of spaghetti hoops. She was not impressed and they did not travel back to London with her on the train.
Ro spotted them tonight and enquired. I explained that there was no danger that any of them would be on the family menu any time soon. "But what are you going to do with them?" "Put them on the next bring & buy stall." "What, and be seen?"
He's right, I'll have to sneak them on anonymously. Call me a food snob, but the first on a depressing list of ingredients on the frankfurter label is mechanically recovered chicken.
Call Ro a food snob too - he said that El had won another tin of spaghetti and had given it to the raffle. "Mind you, at least it was edible. Well, barely - wasn't even Heinz."

*She asked me what was the difference between a village fête and a festival. I explained, it was the presence of the beer tent.

Result of the scarecrow competition

And the winner is............

The scare-crow!

Warning, picture of frog (lovely frog, however)

Al and the Sage sold nearly 400 punnets of strawberries in a couple of hours this morning at Bungay's Street Market, which meant they were able to come home early and have the afternoon off. I went in for an hour, but that was enough for me (noon was the most convenient time, but the hottest, of course, too).

I have the prospect of counting the votes for the scarecrow competition. We have gone for a complicated method of counting, to make it fair for the entrants, so it may take me some time. Unless I bung it all on a spreadsheet and let my good friend Mac do all the hard work. Which, of course, I will. But maybe not tonight. I am, I'm sorry to say, completely drunk on only two glasses of wine. I have been next door, chatting to Al and Dilly and Dilly's parents - D's dad managed to cut the tip of his finger off this morning, which has left him with a large throbbing bandage. He is being manfully brave about it though.

A frog has taken up residence in a plant tub in their garden, by a clump of moss. He is very beautiful and posed nicely for a photo................

And my favourite entries from the village scarecrow competition
Ho, shadow of Z visible.

And the bit of the river Waveney as you cross from Norfolk to Suffolk. Please excuse my presumption, owner of bridge and willow tree, if you read this and object, of course it will be deleted. But you have a lovely garden.

The Sage has fallen for another piece of china. He is consulting me before buying it though, we'll look at it tomorrow afternoon. Well, I'm a complete sucker for early Lowestoft, he's on pretty safe ground. I appreciate the delicacy though - my choice, woo-hoo.

Huh

I'm making quiches. Oh dear, not my strong point. For one thing, I can't make shortcrust pastry. Every other form of pastry is fine, including trickier and more pretentious ones, but regular shortcrust and I just don't gell. So I bought it, no problem there. Then of course there's the business of blind baking. Oh, there's a tedious extra step - a pastry case, so good they cooked it twice? Huh.

I was asked to make them in foil cases. Beastly little shallow things they are, although I've left extra pastry sticking up at the sides and all that sort of tedious gubbins they are still only about half an inch deep when they come out of the oven and there will be hardly any room for the delicious filling.

I think that I'll leave them at home, saying they are too hot to bring and I need to let them cool down, and hope that they aren't actually needed. Then I can foist them on my unfortunate family tonight, who will be too busy comforting my lamentations that I can't cook, to realise they are giving themselves indigestion. If the lunch turns out to be unexpectedly busy, the latecomers will have to make do with my sad efforts after all.

Maybe I'll just pop down to the supermarket and see if they have any ready-made pastry cases.

ps - actually, quiches tasted fine. In the end, one went to the lunch and one was cooked later for us. Ro praised it, which has mollified me entirely. Maybe my quiche-making days are not altogether over.

Goodnight

I love the honeysuckle on the fence by the door for its wonderful scent, particularly on a summer evening.

This chicken chat will finish soon, honestly

It is giving me such pleasure, having the chickens where I see them every time I go to the kitchen garden. Usually they are in an area that needs a special visit as it's not on the way anywhere else, and that's where the Sage is usually to be found. Chickens have the same soothing effect on him that seedlings have on me. But they love the new site as it is full of plant and insect life and happily cluck all day - it's a soft and happy sound like a cat's purr, used to keep in contact and to assure each other that all is well. We shut the bedroom window on that side of the house last night, so I slept through cockcrow.
Of course, the downside is that a hen run is the first thing that visitors see, but hey, this is Norfolk and we hold our heads high - as Maudie Littlehampton* said "If it's me, it's U."**

I've had a busy and tiring day and it may be a measure of both these things that I have not glanced at one blog today. I might, this evening, but actually I quite want to go to bed. I probably won't, as early to bed, early to wake up is one thing, but 3 a.m. is another, and only too likely if I sleep before midnight. I couldn't be arsed to do the watering tonight, which I will regret tomorrow but, after all, life is full of regrets and it is character-building to learn to cope with them manfully.
You'll be awfully pleased to know that I have recovered from my strop of yesterday, although it lasted well into this afternoon and I am being civil and pleasant this evening.

*She is a character from the cartoons of Osbert Lancaster. And do click on the link, a most entertaining potted biography by Chris Stamatakis.
**The Mitfords - quite a family

Little Miss Grumpy

I'm afraid I had a bit of a strop this evening. There's a village festival this weekend on the village green, which is all good and lovely and the weather forecast is fine, so it should go well. There will also be displays of various crafts and things like that in the church, and I'll help quite a bit with one thing and another. On Sunday there will be a service at 5 o'clock. This evening I had a cheerful email saying that there will be a music group rather than the organ (which I'd arranged for someone else to play as I'll have too many other things to think about), so will I play the clarinet.

I've written back to say no. And had a cheerfully sarcastic reply saying, never mind, you do have such a busy social life, have a relaxing weekend.
My son has chuckled at my rantings to the extent that I've almost regained my good humour.

I went out to dinner this evening; it's a monthly occasion with a group of friends. It takes me about 45 minutes to get there, but we eat quite early as most of us have quite a long way to go. There was an accident on the Norwich ring road (a lorry hit a tree, shot across the road and hit another, so there were bits of lorry and tree all over the road and a bridge had to be checked for structural damage. Driver not badly hurt though.) so a section of it was closed and long queues were diverted, so my journey time was doubled. As I approached the ring road junction from another direction, I glanced at the Honda CR-V in the next lane. The driver was reading a newspaper spread out over the steering wheel. We were approaching traffic lights, so were slow-moving and sometimes stationary, but if you see this Honda, HD55EVP, do give him a wide berth as he may not be looking out for you.

This is the cock that crowed in the morn

That waked the z all sleepy at dawn. The new hen-pen is nearer the house than the old one and he certainly sounded cheerful first thing this morning. I did doze off again, but then woke up when a fly landed on my mouth which was, fortunately, closed. Extremely unpleasant though.


The mother has her head down and tail up as she is scratching vigorously at the grass. The baby has seen something that looks promisingly edible, so she has her head down too.



She just looks handsome and posed so proudly.
The dirty white object behind her is one of the feet of the LPG tank. It might seem a little odd to have a large gas tank in the kitchen garden, but I'll get used to it.

On the move

The bantams are moving house. There's a bit of land which we mean to incorporate into the vegetable garden, and which should have been dug over and planted with potatoes this spring*. Not surprisingly, we didn't get around to it, so the chooks are going to do the job for us**.
We've moved the youngsters first and, after some anxiety at being moved from their coops, they settled quickly. Their mothers and a few other adults have been shifted this evening. I offered my help, but the Sage can just pick them up and they don't mind.

Not good photos, especially the second and if I can get something better I'll replace them tomorrow. The black mother is moulting badly; that pedigree breed of bantams loses whole clumps of feathers at a time.

*Potatoes are very good for clearing the ground. They are vigorous enough to outgrow most weeds and having to dig the ground two or three times both clears and aerates it. It's an excellent way of clearing the ground of wireworms, though if there's a bad infestation you need to leave the potatoes until the autumn and then put up with the creatures or destroy the spuds to kill the pests.

**Planting potatoes might be a bit beyond them, although I'm willing to teach them.

Brrr

A few weeks ago, I said I liked clicking on random dates on Tricks of the Trade. This was tonight's lucky dip - not at all seasonal, but it does make one appreciate that, in England (not sure about the wilds of Scotland where it can be bloody cold or, indeed, Wales), we don't know what weather really is.

October 28, 2004

Coping With The Cold: Frozen Feet
If your feet start get painfully cold while outside in the winter, stand some deep unpacked snow. Snow has a constant temperature just below freezing, which could be quite warmer than the air temperature on an exceptionally chilly day.
-- McGub
Posted by Matthew at 10:38 AM
October 27, 2004

Coping With The (Extreme) Cold: Arctic Explorers
If you're camping in the arctic and the temperature at night dips below
-40 farenheight, not even the warmest sleeping bag will keep you alive all night. To survive, you'll have to wake up after a few hours and eat something to give your body the fuel it needs to keep on keeping warm. Pop tarts are the perfect midnight snack-- just put a wrapped one in your sleeping back with you when you go to sleep for the night. When you wake up chilly, eat the warmed pop tart and sleep warmly until morning.
Posted by Matthew at 10:42 AM
October 26, 2004

Coping With The Cold: Car Keys
If you find that your key won't fit into a frozen lock, stick the key into the snow for a couple of minutes. The metal will usually contract enough to allow you to unlock your car door or whatever lock.
-- Karen
While not strictly on topic, I think we're declaring it "Coping with the Cold" week here at TotT. If you have a trick for weathering the weather, send it in.
Posted by Matthew at 03:23 PM
October 25, 2004

Coping With The Cold: Frozen Windshields
If you live in a cold area you may sometimes walk out to your car to find the windshield completely frozen over. Rather than scraping away at it you could just start you car, urn the window defroster on, and -- here's the trick -- put down the sun visors. The warm air will be forced back onto the inside of the windshield and it will defrost much faster.
-- Jaan B.
Posted by Matthew at 09:44 PM
October 22, 2004

Street Musician
Wear a kilt when playing bagpipes on the street. You will make twice as much money than if you wear regular clothes.
Posted by Matthew at 01:02 PM

I can't decide which of these is the most excellent!

I couldn't find anywhere to say these are copyright, if they are I will plead besotted adulation and apologise deeply.

A puzzled Z.

I was sitting in bed doing a Tough Puzzle* at half past seven this morning when the Sage called upstairs "Hello?"
"Hello," I replied.
And waited.
"Do you want something?" I added after a while.
Politeness is excellent, but sometimes you need to come straight out with it. Al had just had a phone call to say his assistant had hurt her wrist and couldn't come in to work, and was wondering if I might be free for the morning?
A slight rearrangement of jobs and the abandonment of Tough Puzzles and I was free. I went and picked tomatoes and courgettes to take in with me and spent an enjoyable morning in the shop.
I'm not sure I'd like the sort of emporium where you have to do the hard sell, but a shop where people go because they want what you've got is very enjoyable. A particular pleasure at this time of the year because all the produce is so good. Local strawberries, currants of various colours, raspberries, cherries, gooseberries, and all the summer vegetables too, such a pleasure.
One customer has asked for a seasonal fruit box each Monday. Al is sometimes asked if he does fruit and veg boxes, and of course he is willing to, but he really prefers people to say what they want. As he says, if it's a family of 4 or 5, they will want plenty of each item, but a single person or a couple probably wants a little of many things. And he would want to cater for personal preferences too. However, Dilly has said she is willing to make up this box, so Al just asked a few pertinent questions regarding number of people and any particular dislikes, and the chap paid for next Monday's box.

*that the name of the magazine, not my judgement. Have you come across it? It was started up back in September 1983 (I have a random memory, erratic but specific) as a subscription only magazine. The various Logic Problem and other mags were offshoots or derivatives from it. A couple of years ago it went from monthly to quarterly - same price, same total number of puzzles, but presumably cheaper to produce, it must have a very small circulation.
We are keen enough in this family for me to have, for years, paid for three subscriptions, for me and each of my sons. Last year they offered to let you download it instead of having it posted. I opted for this - it's over 50 pages so I'm not sure it saves me a great deal, but you are allowed to print off four copies, and since Dilly likes it too, this seemed a good idea.

I'm not sure that I'll do it again. I've felt guilty all year at having denied them the extra subscriptions - even though it's now owned by WH Smith, who can well afford it. And Al thinks I shouldn't have done it. Even though it's allowed (my original justification), he still says it's not right. But, in practice, if I pay for three or four subs, I'll still only download from one log-in. Of course, the simplest thing to do is for each of us to buy our own, but it's been my little pleasure, to give a gift of something I like too. My father enjoyed crosswords and other puzzles and got me hooked from an early age, and I like the family link.
This is the Puzzler link. If you click on one of the Top 5 magazines, it takes you to the offer of a sample, if you might like that kind of thing.

The fine art yacht

Not for the first time, I think I've seen it all. SeaFairis a travelling art fair, cruising up and down the east coast of the United States. I'm sure it will do very well the on its first tour, but long-term? Well, what do I know about these things. It's another world as far as I'm concerned. It may be marvellous. I hope they keep well out of the hurricane season though, just imagine the sound of delicate porcelain and antique furniture hitting the deck with great force.

Quick and dirty?

Your IQ Is 130

Your Logical Intelligence is Below Average Your Verbal Intelligence is Genius Your Mathematical Intelligence is Genius Your General Knowledge is Exceptional

A Quick and Dirty IQ Test

None of the words given is actually the opposite of gregarious (boringly, I go back to Latin derivations rather than colloquial approximations) - the result is entirely unsurprising except for the first item, of course.

You Passed 8th Grade Math

Congratulations, you got 10/10 correct!

Could You Pass 8th Grade Math?

It wasn't hard, not impressive. Though, since the last maths exam I took was O Level in 1969, I was relieved I could still do simple sums.

Cowed and relieved

"Darling" said the Sage casually, "can you come with me for a minute?" I shot out of the room. He is so polite that I knew it was urgent but he didn't want to alarm me - usually, he would have asked if I could "spare a minute."

He had spotted Foster, his favourite cow, grazing by the kitchen garden. She looked at us and turned towards the greenhouse, then, trustingly, veered back on to the drive and onto the field. She is so used to being hand-fed that she let my husband go past her and open the gate to the field for her to go back in.
Then we saw Bart Simpson (we do not name the cows, they come to us already monickered) in the kitchen garden. We hesitated, not sure how to head her back towards the field safely. Dilly appeared and stood guard by the gate, I went into one end of the greenhouse, meaning to come out the other and drive Bart back; I reckoned that her going towards one greenhouse was better than the gap between the other two but, inevitably, that gap was her chosen route. Across the pumpkin patch and then we saw where the fence had collapsed. She ambled back into the field.

So, drama over and rarely have we been so glad of an anti-climax. We were very shaken. If one had blundered into a greenhouse, she could have done herself terrible damage. I went to check the plants, not caring in the least. The whole vegetable garden could be wrecked for all it mattered. But no, a few broad beans leaning over and nothing else touched. Even the pumpkin patch was unscathed; they had walked between the plants and not trodden on anything at all. I can't quite believe it. I've firmed in the beans and put the sprinkler on and we've temporarily mended the fence. We discovered that the ballcock on the water tank had stuck and it was empty, and the beck had run dry; they were simply thirsty and in search of a drink. The other five cows were on the other side of the beck, thank goodness, for seven of them would surely have come to some harm.

Summertime, and the pudding is seedy

There's only a brief window of opportunity each year to make a summer pudding with English fruit. Black and red currants aren't in season for long, though the different varieties of raspberries take us well through to the autumn, with the odd break. No one in the family likes it as much as I do, and it is not often worth ordering in a restaurant. They are too often tempted to put in strawberries or cherries, which just don't add the required tang and, understandably but annoyingly, they usually make little individual puddings, which make the proportion of bread to fruit far too high.

You may have surmised from this preamble what we had for pudding for our Sunday dinner. Everyone else enjoyed it moderately, although it was generally agreed that the best way to eat it is to swallow the currants whole to avoid the seeds. I protested at this, as I love seeds. Particularly raspberry seeds, and especially when one discovers one in a deep recess of a tooth an hour or two later and has a tasty nibble. Furthermore, as I continued to enthuse to the gathered family, I love apple skin. If I peel an apple, I eat the flesh and then enjoy the flavoursome skin most of all. And if you have peeled the whole fruit in a spiral, rather than quartered, there is an extra pleasure in not breaking the long piece.
I broke off and looked around. As usual, they were all politely bemused. "Have you noticed" I added "how delicious orange pith is?"

When I was a child, I was much too polite and shy to spit out cherry stones. But, liking cherries, I used to swallow them instead. It was not so easy to get down plum stones, but I managed it once in a while. The old wives' tale says that this gives you appendicitis - indeed, one was recommended not even to eat apple and orange pips whole. However, this old wife has not come to any harm yet; I didn't believe it then and have no reason to now.
Times have changed and I have too. When the schoolchildren visited, one of them fished an interesting object out of the pond. ""What is this, it's got a line all round it?" I examined the little item and identified it as an elderly cherrystone. "Sometimes" I admitted, "we hold cherrystone spitting contests out of the window. We're not a well behaved family, I don't recommend you copy us."

Paul Pitt

We won the scarecrow competition last year. I think I may stop at that.
It took most people some time to 'get' the name.

Thanks

I've just opened today's post, which included a letter from the head of the Diocesan Board of Education (the village school is a Church of England school and I represented the village church on the governing body). It is quite the warmest letter of thanks that I could have received, and has touched me immensely.

Even the Sage, upon reading it, gave me a kiss (he's not big on expressing praise, though appreciative in his actions).

Though still mindful of and affected by the sadness and problems of friends, I'm looking forward to the weekend. My daughter is visiting, we're going to a party later to celebrate the 25th wedding anniversary of close friends and the sun is shining.

I wonder what you thank, if for you there is nothing beyond? Doesn't have to be a god, let alone my God, but something beyond this world - maybe for me God is someone to thank?

I really meant to move on. But the third piece of bad news has rocked us most of all, the death of a friend in a car accident. not a personal friend, in that we've never visited each other's houses, but we have known and liked each other for years; he was a well known and much respected and liked local businessman and he will be missed so much. I'm not superstitious, but I really hope that bad news comes in threes, because that means that's the last of it.

Uneventful day, for me. Squiffany was sweet, except that she bit my nose when I was expecting a kiss. She went to sleep in the afternoon, half an hour in her cot, then she woke up and cried (because she does not like the travel cot, but I prefer to have her downstairs where I can keep an eye on her) and I picked her up and she slept for another hour and a half on me. I dozed off myself.

Friday evening market at Lovely Next Village. Many friends there, including people I don't really know, but who are very friendly. Actually, I have a slight quandary which I would appreciate any views on - my son is thinking, at some time in the future, of raising a pig or two for meat. Now, I'm not a vegetarian and, being a professed animal lover, I accept that some may find that hypocritical. But I'm interested in ethically raised animals, humanely killed, and I have to accept that my choice to eat meat means that I'm responsible for animals being raised for the purpose. If I became vegetarian, I'd not touch dairy products either as I think that dairy herds are unnaturally and arguably cruelly treated. Hens can be raised ethically (there are compromises, but not ones the hens are aware of) so real free-range eggs are okay.

Now, we were talking about that this evening. One friend, who is vegetarian herself but her husband and sons aren't, once raised a pig - they called her 'Louisa for the Freezer' and, she says, the point is that you have to accept this from the start as you cannot kill and eat a pet. Several others agreed. But I remember a friend who kept a few sheep. There was one, Longlegs - yes, she was tall - who had a personality rare in sheep. She was different. The others were nice enough, and some of them had distinctive natures; but Longlegs was one on her own. My friend took a full-time job in the end and couldn't keep up her small hobby-flock. But she had to have a few sheep, so that Longlegs would not be lonely, as she had to stay in the family until the end of her days.
What if we had a pig like that?
But 'happy pig' until the time comes, I can respect that too. It's not my choice, it's Al's and Dilly's. Can I deal with it?

False memory

Although I'd lost the letter about yesterday's meeting, I knew where and when it was. Or so I thought. Fortunately, I checked my diary at the last minute. It was in a different town and at a later time than I'd expected. Don't quite know how that happened. There were three sessions, from 4.30 to 8pm and so they had laid on quite a substantial buffet meal, which was a nice surprise. I restrained myself to a couple of strawberries at first, but after the next meeting I gave up my virtuous self-denial and tucked in with everyone else. I knew I'd be cooking dinner when I arrived home, so didn't want to eat much.

People seem to agree with me about acronyms. So why do we put up with it? At the end of the session - which was well presented and entertaining, partly because hardly anyone wanted to do it and there were only three of us, in contrast to the thirty at the second meeting - we filled in an evaluation form. To the question asking what I'd do as a result of this training, I said that I'd stop people in meetings and ask them to explain every acronym or abbreviation, as it was apparent that I knew hardly any of them.

Squiffany will arrive in ten minutes and I haven't put in my contact lenses yet. See you later.

BTW

I had two emails, on Tuesday and on Wednesday, from different people, each titled 'bad news' which was an unpleasant coincidence. Not good taste to blog about other people's bad news however, so we'll move on.

I'm still tired, so it's a good thing I don't have any appointments until 4 o'clock this afternoon and I can do whatever I like with the day. The house is pristine (by my relaxed standards) and all I have to do domestically is watering. There is always work I could be doing, but not today. It's such a luxury to have a free day in the middle of the week, makes me feel quite incautious. Pity the sun isn't shining. I blame all those gloomy people who grumble continually the moment there's hint of summer.

I've got a governors' training meeting this afternoon, which I daresay will be useful. It's one of those dos where you have two sessions, each on a different subject. I'm not thrilled to see that one of the ones I've been put down for is on acronyms. I'm turning into a grumpy old woman on acronyms. Each profession has its own set which, it seems to me, is designed to keep out non-members. In education, the acronyms are constantly changing, for no good reason that I can see except to bewilder governors. And once you get into the way of abbreviations, you tend to shorten everything.
In our church, for example, there is a weekly newsletter. This quickly spreads news and information across the six churches and was a useful innovation by the last Rector. It's called News for the Pews. But several people have referred recently to NFP*. Oh really. Brings out the impatient side of me. It saves all of one syllable, though is, I agree shorter to type (by all of ten letters).

In fact, I've lost the letter so I am a bit vague about time of meeting and the other thing I'm to learn about. That's the result of being too tidy, how are you to find anything if it's been put away? Chronological layers, that's the way to go.

*Could be worse. They could write N4P. That would make me retort snappishly.

And, by the way, at the school prizegiving I went to yesterday, there was one chap who was the absolute image of Steve Buscemi, except very short, and another who looked exactly like Rick Moranis. Just struck me, because they are both men with quite an unusual appearance and you would hardly expect to find both their lookalikes at the same time.

Just pictures

As I'm tired and haven't anything I feel like writing about.

Campanula


The first runner bean has set. I adore runner beans.


Lavender


Swiss chard comes in wonderful colours, bright red, pink, yellow and white.


The grapes look promising don't they. They usually rot before they ripen however, I only keep the vine from sentiment (cutting from my mother's vine from many years ago) and because it shades the greenhouse nicely.

Naughty, but very nice indeed

It was only a few days ago the the BBC gleefully promised us a heatwave. Now they say it will soon end and we will have the relief of cooler weather by the weekend. I wish they would just tell us the weather forecast and not add their interpretation of whether we like it or not. What would suit me best of all would be a straightforward weather forecast, briefly repeated at the end for those of us who tuned in half way through (either by turning the set on or by starting to listen), only to find the bit of country we live in has already been mentioned and will not be referred to again.

Some may be finding it a bit too hot down in the southern part of the country. But there are flash floods in Manchester and it's raining in Edinburgh. I am managing to stay quite tranquil and cheerful - I'm not going to have a holiday this summer, so sunny weather at home will do me nicely instead.

Men seem to have more trouble with the heat at night, or so it seems from my attentive blog-reading. I advise a mini-fridge by the bed, with spare pillowcases in it, bottles of water and half-bottles of champagne for those moments when neither of you can sleep and you decide to make the best of it. I've recommended it to two people so far, both with vast readerships, so if the sale of such fridges rockets, I will take quiet pride in my part in the boom.

Actually, when I thought of the champagne (suggested to Greavsie today), the thought was appealing enough to make me want a mini-fridge myself. Can you think of anything more delightful? Really beats tossing and turning hotly at 3am. Geena doesn't think it's practical, but I think it's a good enough idea to ditch the boring bedside cabinet and all that sort on nonsense. Books can go on the floor, water is in the fridge, alarm clock can go on top.

Off to google mini-fridges.

The pink and the pond

I have pink shoulders. Oh, and I'm usually so careful in the sun. I have a pale complexion and freckle rather than brown. But today Class 3 (that's the 8- and 9-year-olds in the 3 class, 5 year-group, village school) came round to visit my wildlife garden. That is, of course, a euphamism for so many weeds that everything thrives except the expensive bought-in plants, and all wild creatures have somewhere to live.

They divided into three groups, one to look at the bantams and the trees, one for the vegetables and greenhouses and one for the pond and hot and sunny area. There was a teacher, a teaching assistant and me (have no fear, I have higher level CRB clearance, which proves I am to be trusted). I was, of course, given the pond etc, which meant I was an hour and a half in the full sun and far too intent on making sure the children a. did not fall in and b. were learning something useful, to notice I was reddening.

The wildlife came up trumps. I caught a water boatman and children caught pond skaters and a diving beetle larva, as well as a good many snails and all the other little pond creatures you would expect. We saw a frog but, try as Josh did, he couldn't catch it. There were beautiful little vivid blue damsel flies whizzing around, some of them paired up, which gave rise to some knowledgeable comments (without embarrassment) about mating, likewise with some rapturous snails. None of them, this year, knew that snails are hermaphrodite, although they had all heard of both Hermes and Aphrodite. I made them think about why a pond needs greenery and how a water spider breathes.

The most exciting thing, to most of them and to me, was the discovery of the empty shell of the dragonfly that I wrote about the other day. The first group saw it on an iris leaf, so we left it there until the end when I reached perilously to the middle of the pond, picked the leaf and gave it to them to take back to school. It was a good one too, in perfect condition. And I didn't take a picture, d'oh.

I'll email them the photos of the dragonfly, anyway.

And the Sage picked up one of the 5-day-old chicks for them to stroke. I can't remember if I mentioned them (and too lazy to look), but two broody girls were each sitting on an old egg to keep them happy - and then both eggs unexpectedly hatched, on the same day, too. We have made up for the depletions of the fox, which has not made a return visit since the hayfield next door was cut. Soon all the chickens will be moving house, as I need an area cleared to enlarge the kitchen garden and it will give the grass a chance to grow in their normal roaming area (far too big to be called a run). Since I don't want them getting out into the vegetables, they will be properly fenced in. Unfortunately, it means that a chicken run will be the first thing you see as you arrive in our garden, but it is there for a reason and so I am resolutely unembarrassed.

I didn't mean it how it sounded.....

You know how it is when a chance remark really upsets someone? Fortunately, upset person had the good sense to say so, and I was able to apologise: there was something of a misunderstanding in fact, as what I said was taken in somewhat the wrong way, but there was enough meat on the bone, as it were, for a simple 'sorry' to be better than a long explanation. Unsettling all round though, I don't like making someone unhappy, or to have them worried about me.

And my sister had a motorcyclist go into the side of her car the other day; she pulled out from a junction and he came round the corner fast; probably about 50:50 blame there. Neither of them was hurt, which is all that really matters, but she's very shocked and upset still, not surprisingly. I was in a meeting when she rang; luckily I'd forgotten to turn my phone off, as talking to her was more important than the meeting, and I was right by the door and could slip out (this is not something I normally do, of course, I switch it off).

A gorgeous day, I've been thinking of my mother. She hated hot weather with a real passion and would have been saying "dreadful weather, you can't breathe" just as you were settling down with a long drink and a good book on the lawn. She was a Land Girl in the war, so she must have coped with all weathers then, but her thermostat went wrong in later years.
I've had a lovely day, I shelved all plans to be useful and simply relaxed. A barbecue tonight, once I've done the watering. We had delicious spinach, broad beans, artichokes, new potatoes and courgettes, all village- or home-grown, last night. It is not a good gardening year at all for me, most of the french beans and nearly all the peas dried up and frizzled in the June sunshine, but one takes the good years with the bad, and I didn't have a good start in any case as I was so late. I'm so pleased with the seed catalogue I mentioned the other day; next year I am going to rekindle my gardening enthusiasm by growing lots of unusual varieties - they have any number of interesting seeds.
I will, no doubt, enthuse about this another time (memo - limited interest only, one for most of you to miss).

I hope you had a very good weekend.

Global opinionated news

I received an email from the Globe Theatre. In addition to their programme of Shakespeare's plays, they are putting on a production of UNDER THE BLACK FLAG -The Early Life, Adventures and Pyracies of the Famous Long John Silver Before He Lost His Leg. For a limited season this summer. We are promised, in capital letters, that THIS PRODUCTION FEATURES BARE FLESH AND FILTHY LANGUAGE.

You should come here and watch me cooking dinner in this hot weather if you want BARE FLESH AND FILTHY LANGUAGE, for no charge at all, except a snappy request to unpack the dishwasher.

Having said this, I feel quite mellow this evening. If you are in the right sort of mood, a gentle trickle of sweat down your backbone and your, er, frontbone (with no risqué undertone, if you please) can feel quite interesting.

But back to the Globe. I don't know if a reproduction of a Shakespearian theatre is wonderful or simply kitsch, but I like it. I used to go every year, but I've skipped a couple of years. Partly because of family weddings in Augusts and partly because they will do 'themes' (historical plays, for example) and if you don't care for the subjects, you are not so likely to go.

This year they are doing Coriolanus. Not one of my favourites, though I haven't seen it for years and years - but it doesn't seem a play for a summer evening. And Titus Andronicus. Um, no. I haven't seen it, but it just could replace Measure for Measure as my most unloved Shakespeare play. And Antony and Cleopatra. Well, watchable enough, but I have seen it several times and it is very long... They are hastily bringing in the Comedy of Errors too, I see from the website. That could hit the mindless entertainment spot.

It is the place and its atmosphere that sells it to me though. I have seen some distinctly indifferent performances there, the most disappointing of which was Vanessa Redgrave as Prospero in The Tempest. Miranda was good, Caliban was absolutely wonderful and the supporting cast was fine. But she was dreadful. She underplayed it to the extent that you could not tell what she was saying - she evidently didn't want to Declaim the Famous Speeches, but surely you should act? and be heard? and she really was being carried by the rest of the cast. I saw her years ago, in the late 60s, in London - I think it was in Camelot, but someone may correct me. I do remember that Laurence Harvey played King Arthur (unless I'm wrong again and he played Sir Lancelot) and my mother complained that he had bandy legs, or possibly knock knees* and was not best suited to tights.

*It's been pointed out that he could hardly, as I first said, have both.