“A Cash Machine that Sings! How Marvellous” she exclaimed

I am delighted to report that, at least at the time of publishing this post, there have been no further deaths or misfortunes at Blackpitts – if you discount the fat Bluebottle that buzzed annoyingly around our bedroom the other night. Eventually, I caught up with him sitting on the chest of drawers looking like an overweight Nigel Farrage.

Suffice to say that he will buzz no more.

Thank you to you all for your kind and supportive words: it has been a tough couple of weeks but life is returning to somer sort of acceptable – though different equilibrium.

Instead this week has been all about plants. It might seem that such a thing would not be a completely unheard of occurrence in the life of an itinerant garden designer and you would be right. However, this week was not just airily thinking about them or writing long shopping lists but actually getting down among the things. The more cynical among might not believe it but I have much dirt beneath my fingernails. It has been a frantic flurry of actually placing plants out ready for planting.

Sometimes I do detailed planting plans but no matter how detailed they might be I always change my mind when it comes to actually putting them where they should be planted. As a result I often just make it up as I go along which is usually much more interesting in the end although some of my more rigidly disciplined fellow designers may well disapprove. This week I have done both.

This one was done by the book: neat coloured plan and all that stuff. We tore out everything that was there except for a Magnolia grandiflora and a couple of roses.

As a contrast the  one was on a wing and a prayer: I ordered about two and a half thousand plants and until I got there I had no idea where they were going to go – apart from the hedges, one hornbeam and one of Chilean Guava (Acca sellowiana – Mark and the Edible mafia would be proud of me: other edible stuff included Cardoons and Angelica. I also wanted to plant Asparagus but the nursery had run out so that may have to wait.)

Would a list amuse anybody? If not then skip the side bit. I will show you the end result in due course.

Cornwall, I have decided, is very lovely in very nearly every way (beaches,hedges,lanes, fields, moors, countryside etc) except architecture. It boasts some really hideous houses many of them with porches that would not look out of place in the rougher parts of Pyongyang or 1950s Potsdam.

There have been two more, one in a heavenly bit of North Wiltshire and another beneath the temporarily aeroplane free skies of Berkshire. I will spare you further photographs of pots lying around on empty soil as you have probably got the idea .

I have decided that I don’t really care very much which party wins the election. They are all pretty similar and it really is not going to make a lot of difference to anything. Perhaps the fairest way to decide would be to stage a giant marrow growing contest. Or maybe tallest Sunflower – except that then Dawn’s competitive streak would kick in and she would win. Then we would all have to weed things, make hospitals out of loo rolls and participate in amateur theatricals.

Three Men Went To Mow are previewing at Grand Designs Live on May 3rd. I have a number of tickets which I am happy to distribute to the more deserving members of  my readership. I am also there on Saturday May 1st on my own talking about interesting stuff.(i) The tickets are valid for any day if you wish to avoid our frivolous cavortings.

I am listening to Marcel’s by Herman’s Hermits a song with lyrics worth reproducing

Marcel lives in Wapping, the ducks are due his tapping

Marcel’s got a houseboat on the Thames

There’s grotesque decorations, eccentric demonstrations

Let’s go down to Marcel’s on the Thames

CHORUS:

Knock knock, sesame it’s open, it’s Alice in Wonderland

Marcel, Marcel

Can we come around, can we see you right away?

Can we come around? It’s such a groovy day

Marcel, Marcel

Meet the oddest creatures with unfamiliar features

Greeks & Turks with clerks & lemon tyne

Men with long eyelashes & ladies with mustaches

On Marcel’s creaking house, it’s on the Thames

The picture is of the blossom of Prunus Tai Haku

(i) As is Matthew Wilson – landscape superstar and badger botherer.

Everything He Touched Turned To Jam

I have been asked by Clare Grant who writes a very lovely blog called Three Beautiful Things to list three things that happened yesterday. Clare does this most days (when she is not writing excellent posts about biscuits) and it is rather a good discipline to get into: here is my list..

1. I have been listening to wheelbarrows trundling past my office window all day and the sound of shovels scraping tarmac. As a result all my borders are covered in dark,chocolatey mulch (i)

2. Four Plain Chocolate Digestive biscuits, three black Papermate Tempo felt tip pens and a cup of tea.

3. I made a list of plants to order from Crug Farm which is always a pleasure. Sometimes I am tempted to only order things because I like the sound of the name. Who could resist: Aesculus wangii.. Zanthoxylum myriacanthum. Belamcanda chinensis ‘Crûg Colossal’. Ranzania japonica

It has been quite a busyish week actually. I know that calendars are dull but indulge me, I will be brief.

Client on Saturday to outline intentions: they were happy.

With contractors in Gloucestershire on Monday morning to sort out a wall.

Another builder mid-morning to talk about ponds and to set out Rhododendrons for planting.

Tree surgeon in the afternoon to condemn a load of scraggy sycamores and leylandii.

Forester at 2:30 to mark out site of new one hectare woodland (One hectare = about 1500 trees)

Bought a packet of Revels.

London on Tuesday to listen to Carol Klein at the VISTA thingy at the Garden Museum. She was charming as always and wearing a particularly nice coat, I thought. We also took time while we were there to film another episode of Three Men Went To Mow. If you were at all interested in Green Walls then this is the one for you: very educational. Perhaps.

Wednesday: wrote stuff – including two months worth of my shiny new column in the English Garden. It is called The Rake and you should read it: it also appears, in a slightly truncated form, in the American edition so you lot over there have no excuse. Made lists.

Thursday: A meeting of the Wisley Six: The very,very lovely Hayley Monckton and Alex Denman from the RHS. The gorgeous Cleve. The bit of country rough Mark Diacono. The bright light that is Juliet Roberts. And me. We lunched (with cake), gossiped scurrilously (enough indiscretions to make Matthew Appleby froth himself into a right state) and then walked around the fine gardens in beautiful crispy sunshine (with another cake stop later).

There were some fine plants ranging from subtle winter colours to vulgar glasshouse danglers

.

It is unfortunate that one of our number decided that he had to continue his already documented practice of fruit sniffing.

If anybody would like a ticket to the Ideal Home Show (March 20th-April 5th) at Earls Court then ask.

Monty is there on a couple of days. And the shouty man from Masterchef. And Linda Barker.

I have a handful which have been very kindly provided by the willowy Willow at MediaTen. She is also organising the Grand Designs Show in May. That is particularly interesting because, firstly, I am talking there on Saturday May 2nd and secondly (and more interesting) we are doing a Three Men Went To Mow Live Preview there on Bank Holiday Monday before we go to Malvern on the Friday.

Further details will follow. It is almost a mini world tour. But without tour buses or groupies – except for Cleve who is always being followed by women: it must be the memory of youthful thigh again. He also, apparently, has a picture of himself with not only a perm but a daffodil clutched between his buttocks. The stem was, he recalls, very cold: that is why, in my experience, it is always better to wait until the weather has warmed sufficiently before trying such things. Lilies are as effective as Daffodils and benefit from a better scent.

I am currently in negotiation for that picture and will make it available to readers of this blog the minute it is in my possession.

The picture is of an Hamamellis.

I am listening to She Said by Holly Golightly.

(i) The more observant among you will have twigged that, as I was listening to this noise then I was not actually wielding the shovel myself. Normally I would have done this as I quite enjoy muck spreading but unfortunately I did my back in a week or so ago by dragging a large tree up a hill. That is my excuse and I am sticking to it come hell or high water.

Normality Was Scattered All Over Costa Rica

This is one of those weeks where I am not at all sure what I should write about as nothing particularly fascinating has happened. I have driven to Cornwall and back to collect my daughter from University, I have ordered an enormous number of plants from various places and we went see the legendary Patti Smith in concert in Leamington Spa. This last was actually quite fascinating: she is always good. My wife is mildly obsessed with her (and has been for many, many years) so this was her second Patti smith concert in a week.
So (in the words of Marriott Edgar in Albert and the Lion), “seeking for further amusement” I have decided to write about my first visit to Malvern – as the show is looming and everybody else seems to have had their say over at Meet At Malvern.
I was first asked to talk at Malvern Spring Show in, and I get a bit fuzzy over this, 2004 on the back of a television series I presented called Small Town Gardens (it was the third and last series, in fact the last series of garden makeovers that the BBC produced). It was also my first proper lecturing gig – I had done a couple to local horticultural societies but this was different. I had never been to Malvern before so had no idea what to expect.

I was put up in a hotel in Malvern that was also being occupied by all the RHS Judges who had convened in Malvern in their official capacities. One of the things about RHS Judges in general is that they do like to let their hair down a bit whenever they are together. As a result the joint was jumping until the early hours: I didn’t really know them terribly well so merely observed from round a corner (at my lonely table for one).

Next morning I rocked up at the show ground and reported for duty. I was shown a large echoing barn that had, until recently, been the site of the fattest ewe or glossiest cow contest (the Three Counties Showground is not just about gardening: there are a lot of other things ranging from agricultural shows to meeting of the VW Camper club). I was junior end of the bill after Nigel Colborn – who did wise things chatting about plants that he had just picked up on his walk around the showground: I don’t know whether he paid for them or not. I was rather too intimidated to ask. And Joe Swift who drew things on an easel and talked about designing gardens on the diagonal – yeah,yeah. The whole thing was compered by a cheery fellow called Mike from local radio.

I was very scared: like rush to the loo petrified but by the end of the second session I was having a ball and realised that this was actually quite a good way to pass the time. Joe and I had a great time being very well looked after by the fabulous Nina. She was driving us around in some sort of golf cart at one point and as she slowed for some slow moving people we leapt off the cart and disappeared into the crowd. She didn’t notice for a while and then realised that she had lost us and an expression of panic crossed her face. We were forgiven.

I also decided that Malvern was actually rather a wonderful place run by jolly people and I wanted to come back again so started plotting…
Since then I have returned every year: the theatre materialised the following year – the first at any RHS Show – and has got bigger and better.
I have cavorted with Alan Titchmarsh,

pranced with Monty Don (sorry,couldn’t find a picture with his donship)

dallied with Diarmuid Gavin and debated whether Men or Women were better gardeners with various eminences gris (women won: mostly because there were more of them in the audience

The weekends are usually spent with my bald friend, Joe Swift.We are given a pretty free rein by the show organisers especially when it comes to competitive flower arranging. He is winning at the moment, but then he always plays it very safe while I am more avant garde: my “Bridge over the M6” was a conceptual triumph, although sadly no photographic evidence is available.

The second picture is of us with Reg Moule from BBC Radio Hereford and Worcester (who knows everything about nematodes and wriggly pests) and Katie Johnson who adds bubble and fizz to proceedings – although in this picture she seems to also be squeezing my breast.

I have presented fashion shows with the gorgeous Sabrina Duncan International (a firmly muscled Drag Artiste)

and I have been both boiling hot and absolutely soaking wet.

I have interviewed a whole string of supremely knowledgeable and talented nurserymen and designers
And a chicken has laid an egg on me.
Outside the theatre the gardens have got better and better. And there are more and more of them: the idea is that Malvern is a first stop for young and emerging talent. Especially since the elfin Chris Beardshaw has started his scholarship scheme: a chance for a young designer (designer, not Sock) to spend a year stalking Chris and building gardens at both the Malvern Autumn Show and the Chelsea Flower show.
It is a friendlier, less frantic show than say Chelsea, there is room to move around whether you are building a garden or just visiting. There are loads of excellent nurseries selling plants, food stalls, Arts and Crafts and every sort of garden sundry you can imagine. Including fibreglass gorillas and massage chairs.
This year will be fun especially as Joe and I are joined by Cleve West. We will be trying Botanical Art, more flower arranging, interviewing designers, grilling nurserymen (not literally) and generally jollying around.
See you there.
I am listening to the theme from The Sweeney: quite why, I do not really know.
The picture is of a slightly vulgar Arum.
Two years ago I wrote a very informative post about digging wells in a post apocalyptic world.
Last year I was in Guernsey.

She Skipped Happily Through The Ironmongery Department

Whizzy busy this week but things are beginning to fall quietly into place without bloodshed or disaster, although I did drop a large slab of dead tree on my hand yesterday. It still throbs slightly but I am being fearfully brave. I spent yesterday in the sunshine cutting hazel branches as plant supports while listening to an excellent podcast about the History of Rome: a combination of activities that I heartily recommend to you all.
Went to London today for an important Three Men Went To Mow summit meeting. We had suddenly realised that we have live appearances looming at both Grand Designs Live (May 3rd) and at the marvellous Malvern Spring Show (May 6th-8th – which, as Michelle’s relentless counter keeps telling me is now only forty-five days away). We also need to make a special film for the RHS Chelsea Flower Show website. So, after, convening at Joe’s gaff we now have some pretty nifty content sketched out for your entertainment and education.
Other happenings:
I have a nasty case of writer’s block. I am trying very hard to rattle out a piece for a publication that will remain nameless (I don’t want them to go off me) and it is as if I am plucking every phrase from a thick bed of treacle. So I decided to come here and drivel for a bit: it is odd how easy it is to write this blog where nobody is trying to give me any guidance or anything. I can just rattle along and the words flow like olive oil, usually I could go on for ages (sometimes I do) as one thought just merges into another: writing to time and to subject is sometimes sticky.(i)
Three Men Went To Mow have a shiny website. (ii) I was built by my esteemed colleague Mr Cleve West and is a depository for all the 3 Men films, news about live appearances etc. There is a particularly good picture of Joe and I with Rolf Harris of which we are singularly proud. This year we will be endeavouring to have our photograph taken with as many random stars of light entertainment as possible: in particular Gloria Hunniford and Bruce Forsyth. We will also sneak in occasional extra films that will only be available there rather than on YouTube. The first one is up now and I thought I could probably get away with showing it here as well.
On my recent visit to Wisley (documented here and commented on, I notice, by various people who were not on the guest list: one managed, by force of will and possibly witchcraft, to make one of our number stub his toe) I could not help but be impressed by the prominently displayed book selection which, you will notice, includes my entire literary oeuvre – or, as it is singular, it should probably be oeuf. I could not help but notice that the Award Winning author and photographer’s book was conspicuously absent. I did run down a single copy in the end holding down a faulty cistern cover in the staff lavatories.
Matthew Appleby seems to be on a roll in his latest HW Blog I am running UKIP and in the previous one I was cuddling up to Peter Sutcliffe, The Krays and Robert Mugabe. Still, I suppose it makes him happy and if it were any funnier I might laugh. And he does have a remarkably fine looking baby

By the way, does anybody want a part time job? I have need of an assistant to prevent myself from getting snowed under. Jobs include drawing, Vectorworks wrangling, plant hunting, organising etc. It would be good if you lived quite close. In return I will give you some money and the health benefits of my beaming smile. I am as yet unsure how many days or how often.
I am listening to Kids by Ed Harcourt.
This time last year I was lecturing in Edinburgh and communing with Penguins.
The picture is of one of the large bolts that support Hammersmith Bridge.
(i) You will be pleased to know that I have now cracked it and it has been dispatched.
(ii) According to The Garden Monkey it looks like a cut price Gay dating site. Which seems a tiny bit unfair: I would have thought we were at least Grade 2. She Skipped Happily Through The Ironmongery Department Monday, 22 March 2010

Sand On The Toes Of A Wallaby

I am feeling a trifle besieged and it is entirely my own fault. Every year I spend the winter not worrying about things because I have got plenty of time. The, suddenly, it is March and the sun is warm and I no longer have any time at all and everything has to be done RIGHT NOW. No, not after that biscuit but RIGHT NOW THIS MINUTE…

So, I am swamped with plant orders, lake people, pavers, tree planting teams, deer fences, nursery delivery vans and planting plans that I should have completed a month ago but which are still loafing around in my head instead of on a piece of paper.

So I may not write very much this time which will come as a relief to many.

Apart from all this chaos I had two days visiting a very lovely site in Cornwall. It is a long drive but this time I seemed to collect a bus load of slightly deranged people from Twitter who accompanied me all the way (many of you will have no idea what I mean but, don’t worry, it isn’t vital) there. In gratitude for your company and because there was no ice cream, I give you a short film starring the sea at Falmouth and a black dog of indeterminate breed.

I delivered a lecture to a very small part of the population of Surrey at the behest of the wonderful Penny Snell who is chairman of the National Gardens Scheme and who organises monthly lectures with lunch. The title was Contemporary Country Gardens but I am very bad at sticking to the particular subject and tend to wander off in different directions. I think it was roughly to the point and they went away happy.

I have also been to London to do stuff and was struck (not for the first time) by an odd phenomenon. Now, I have never been particularly sturdy-more wiry if you are feeling polite or spindly if you are not. (I was about 7 stone (i) in my early twenties- with yellow hair due to too much Sun in (ii) and lemon juice). Anyway, there is a tenuous reason why I am telling you this. It is to do with the shape of the bald heads of large men when viewed from behind. When walking between underground trains I found it fascinating. They are part potato, part expressively angry baby face and part itchy rhinoceros.  I understand the urge to shave the whole head if you begin to go a bit bald, especially if you are after a hard-man look but if your head looks like a brussels sprout then really those are the times when a toupee is worth the investment: or at the very least a hat. However, I did not think it would be a terribly wise move to tap any of those gentlemen on the shoulder to share this theory so it is likely to remain unresearched.

We went to see Crazy Heart which is highly recommended: Jeff Bridges is fab. Maggie Gyllenhaal is great. One of the faintly interesting side issues is the standard of motel the poor chap has to occupy. I have been in some pretty appalling hotels in my time, I have even written about them (i) at least twice. I also stayed in a very nasty motel in San Francisco once that had very ornate furniture, a bed that shook if you fed it a quarter and filthy windows. My only other American motel experience was in Miami and ended in a man trying to mug me with a ball point pen (ii). I felt for Jeff.

I must do something useful now rather than rambling on – especially as I promised you short and sharp and have failed to deliver on my promise. An experience to which, as the election gets closer, we should all get accustomed.

I am listening to Bungee by Adam Green. The photograph is of  a Crocus. Actually two Crocii planted slightly too close together.

1. For the benefit of loitering Americans: No, I don’t know many pounds that is: maths was never my bag. There are either 14 or 16 pounds in a stone, I think, although I am sure that scientific types (or those who can be bothered to Google it) can help.
2. Sun-In was a liquid that gave you blonde highlights if used correctly. If you tipped the whole bottle on your head then your hair looked like lemon curd and shocked elderly relatives.

(iii) There is a photograph missing from that blog post: it was of a large notice saying “Do Not Smoke In Bed”. there was ample evidence that this generally sound advice had not been universally followed.

(iv) Remind me to give you details another day: also about the man who tried to hold me up in Paris using a chopstick.

Formal Notice of Possible Euthanasia

If I might deliver a warning to anybody to likes to loaf about here….

I am considering killing off this blog.

It is really only a clone of my main blog (which is here) that I set up when Apple was being a bit arsey.

Anyway, they now appear to be behaving themselves again and that one is much, much simpler to deal with than this one.

Would anybody mind?

I am listening to Got ‘Til It’s Gone by Janet Jackson

The picture is of sunrise and vapour trails

She Played KerPlunk With The Bones Of Her Rivals

 

After all that glamorous air kissing, award receiving and general spiffiness last week things have returned more or less to a precarious normality. Even though the loos at the  Royal Lancaster are not a patch on the Savoy, there is not even an uniformed attendant hovering with towels and clothes brush. If it was a better hotel then I would be campaigning for it to be renamed the Roy Lancaster. The main problem is that it is on the wrong side of Hyde Park: where, according to my Grandfather, people used to keep their mistresses.

My office is freezing cold and the windows are being sporadically whipped by flurries of sleet and icy rain. I sit here wearing a number of layers and with a gas fire pointed strategically at my extremities. The main problem is that when we built this house we ran out of readies and had to economise on various aspects. One of which was to cut out about a third of the radiators. As a result we have a delightfully warm kitchen and an electric blanket and in the winter we scurry from one to the other through icy halls and frosty corridors. 

I have been confined to the office most of the week as I find myself behind in both writing and drawing. I really should rustling around with sharpened pencils and sheets of paper rather than writing this. My only excursions were to set out plants in a small but charming garden in Oxford and a trip to a shoulder specialist – one of the by-products of the onrush of decrepitude. The shoulder chap stuck cortisone into my rotator cuffs (or close, anyway) which was not nearly as horrific as I expected. I had visions of long needles and the sickening crunch of grazed tendon but was pleasantly surprised.

Apart from that I have done a lot of rushing back and forth to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford where my Dad has just had a brain tumour removed and is feeling a bit rough. The offending object was about the size of a satsuma: seems very weird that there should be enough room in one’s head for such a thing: especially his head which, like Jeeves’, positively bulges with braininess.

For those of you with time on their hands you could always watch Gardeners World this Friday which is a collation of a whole lot of garden visits re-edited into one cheap and easy programme. It will include snoops around Alys Fowler’s garden, a fumble through Toby Buckland’s passages, a wander around the palatial premises of Cleve West and a bumble through Blackpitts in June. so, if bored at 8:30 on Friday then BBC2 is the place to be: thank goodness we don’t have to compete with Strictly.

Last year I was doing Green With Envy in Clacton, details here.

I am listening to Mercedes Benz by Janis Joplin. The picture is the petal of an Hemerocallis Golden Chimes.

Happy Thanksgiving to all you lot over there: may your turkeys be pleasantly basted and your various pies heave with pumpkins. 

Dull Technical note: I noticed when tralumphing around my Statistic counter the other day  that many of you still link here via the old .mac address which, for some reason, does weird things to the comment layer. The deal is that Apple (whom I love dearly and will forgive almost anything: sad but true) had a shake up a few months ago and shifted all their stuff to a new entity called .me (bloody silly name).  As a result everything went a bit tits up. That seems to be behind us now and you will find that all problems can be avoided by entering this website as http://web.me.com/blackpittsgarden/Site_2/Blog/Blog.html on all your RSS feeds, links or whatever method you might use to come here. My only concern is the convenience of you, the dear public. (Well, maybe not my only concern but it is undoubtedly scribbled somewhere on the back of the same fag packet). Suffice to say that if you wish to comment on this blog and find yourself unable so to do, them check you have .me not .mac. End of technical note.

His Tongue Was Not Just Tied But Windsor Knotted

 

Good day from the award winning Blogging from Blackpitts.

Yesterday was the Garden Media Guild Awards lunch: a beano which I have always rather enjoyed (and which I have described previously here). The form is a lot of short conversations and a fair bit of kissing: which (as almost everybody in the very small planetary conglomeration that is professional garden writing is worth kissing) is a pretty good way to spend a long afternoon. Nigel Colborn has already dissected the menu here so I need not go into that part of the proceedings. As with most of these things one doesn’t really notice what you are eating because there is too much gassing and chatting going on: especially if are lucky enough, as I was, to be sitting next to Carol Klein  and the pleasantly pregnant Kay Maguire. We are then all brought to order by the boss, Aunty Planty (aka: Valerie McBride-Munro who is a rather foxy cross between ringmaster and nanny).

The awards were amusingly presented by Andy McIndoe from Hilliers and, for the curious, the full list is available here. There were some great recipients in particular the delicious Andrea Jones was Photographer of the Year. She was the first photographer ever to venture into one of my gardens and is really clever. She was then whisked off to live in Scotland hugger mugger with a load of sheep and her porridge munching husband, Alasdair. The racy cosmopolitan set around Kew mourned for hours. I never realised until now how she has a slight look of Sarah Palin about her – although much more attractive and with less reliance on creationism (says he hastily).

Also Roy Lancaster who won Best Journalist. There is an almost universal weakening of the knees at his approach such is his wisdom, enthusiasm and demeanour of general chirpiness. Mind you Joe Swift was squeezing his face as if he was a chubby baby which I am not certain is the absolutely correct way of treating a national treasure.Would you do that to Dame Judi Dench or even  Len Goodman? I think not.

Best television was Rachel de Thame’s mooch around the cottage garden. I’m afraid I missed it at the time but it looked charming – as did Rachel though I have no idea who the bald bloke standing next to her is, he may be one of the cloakroom attendants.

Best Magazine went to Gardeners’ World who, of course, I love dearly and not only because they (a) give me lots of work – I should actually be finishing something off for them right now instead of writing this and (b) because they invited me to this binge in the first place but also for lots of other reasons that will, I am sure, come to me at some moment. While I wait for the muse to strike here is a picture of a clutch of them.

Anyway, congratulations and love to all concerned.

The Award?..Ahh……..

No, you did not mishear and I am not exaggerating: I have won a real live award. Not a charming (though hideous) virtual award like the Arte y Pico Award sweetly given to me by the Manic Kate and the Happy Mouffetard or the coveted Fork ‘n Monkey award but a real life one that can be hung on the wall and sporadically dusted.

The Garden Media Guild have seen fit to give me the Digital Media Blog Award – a category that unexpectedly materialised without anybody knowing – which comes with a cheque for £250 so a result all round. It all came as a bit of a shock. There was I slipping into a bit of a post prandial dream when the nominations were announced (Jane Perrone, The BBC Chelsea Blog and Me). Loud applause and a rather startled JA-S caught in a spotlight. I then made a slightly fumbling speech, trousered the proffered envelope and bob’s yer uncle (although, actually judging by Bob Sweet’s expression in this picture one rather hopes he is somebody else’s).

I should, of course, have spoken eloquently about how this was a breakthrough for new media and blogging is the future (and not just digitally removing shaved carrot from one’s navel). How no household should be without one and that we should all rise up and cast conventional print into the burning fiery furnace. But, when the moment came,  all such stuff trickled from my mind like cocaine through a colander so I didn’t. 

However, I will say a big thank you to all concerned and for you lot for reading what I write. Your presence and comments are greatly appreciated by all except my bank manager who would rather I did more things for which I was paid better. Also huge thank you to those other bloggers out there who make me laugh. 

I am listening to Let The Good Times Roll by Shirley and Lee. The picture is of Carol Klein’s shoes (cunning photographed by the gorgeous Lila Das Gupta.)

With Nothing but A Tub Of Cauliflower Puree She Ventured Out

 

My apologies for the lack of attention. I have spent the last few days laid low with some annoying virus thing that has left me feeling wan and lethargic. Hence lack of bloggage and general lack of enthusiasm for life great riches.

The constant drizzle has not helped a lot as every paving stone and plant has dripped with water and, apart from the occasional flash of sky, all has been generally dreich (an excellent Scots word that means exactly what it sounds like: other good Scots words include Brosie-faced = fat faced, Abstraklous = obstreperous, Glabber = clay or mud and Hutcheon = hedgehog. There are, of course, lots more: most of them impossible to say while smiling.)

On the positive side I have succeeded, while lying in my bed, in watching two old St Trinians’ Films: The Belles of St Trinians and The Great St Trinian’s Train Robbery – which I vividly remember first seeing at school in 1968. (An old boy used to come in occasionally with what seemed like an enormous projector and show films – the other two I remember were Dirk Bogarde in A Tale of Two Cities  and North West Frontier.) I also packed in The Ladykillers  (orginal version), Brewsters Millions (the sixth version made of the same story) and The Wild Bunch (a film of which I am very fond although the similarities between Robert Ryan and William Holden’s moustaches leads to occasional confusion as to which one is which.)

One more day of illness and I would have had to wheel in the big guns The Wild Geese and The Karate Kid  which are my great comfort films in times of stress, trouble or a desire not to think much. I have writtenb about both films before but, in order to save time there is a reference to both films in one post here – when I was responding to being tagged by the divine Kate.

When I am too decrepit to garden any more, I shall lie in an extraordinarily comfortable chair watching films – old and new – and I will be happy. I will also probably eat quite a lot of cake.

Anyway am feeling perkier now so should be back on track very soon.

I am listening to Kooks by David Bowie. The picture is of a Teazle.

Two years ago I was thinking about Mud, Petitions and Eyes. Three entries that did not attract a single comment: such wasted words. It was lonely over here in those days – in the three months September, October and November 2006 I got four comments. One of which was a criticism, one a sympathetic word from Joe Swift, one was my own and the last wasn’t registered until September 2008. 

On The Bridge At Teatime With Her Boots On Backwards

 

Most of you will be aware of Amanda Thomsen’s Kiss My Aster blog. If not then you are missing a pippin. She has an excellent mixture of tat, nonsense, books, plants and eloquent drivel. All the elements of a perfect blog. 

She lives in Indiana and  is married to a chap called Kiss My Aspen. I assume that they will have children called Kiss My Asphodeline (who will have a melodic singing voice), Kiss My Aspidistra (who will be a keen pilot),  Kiss My Asystasia (who will be a ballroom dancing champion) and  Kiss My Askidiosperma (who will get thrown out of High School for dyeing his hair an inappropriate colour and snogging a Lithuanian exchange student during algebra.)

She also guest blogged at the Monkeyhouse the other day about Master Gardeners. An idea that I got quite excited about – as did Nigel Colborn who, I hope you realise, is not only the proprietor of Silvertreedaze but also the Vice-Chairman of the RHS Council: un grand fromage mais aussi un bon oeuf  (a bit of French that makes even Claire at the Ecospot seem fluent). Lets hope something interesting happens.

Anyway. She made a list of punk rock related plants the other day made me think what a very simple way that was to fill a post. 

I considered posting this as a comment on her blog but then decided that I might as well hog it and post it here – I hope that I have bigged her up sufficiently in the previous paragraphs to stop her suing for plagiarism (not only that but as, for some weird reason, she cannot comment on this blog then technology has effectively disenfranchised her *). My top ten list is of bands/musicians connected to garden pests:

1: The Bollweevils – punk band from Chicago

2: Kid Slug – recently defunct punk band from London

3: Aggressive Snail Attack – Croatian Band

4: The Aphid – track by The Fall

5: Let’s Pretend We’re Bunny Rabbits – track by The Magnetic Fields

6: The Groundhogs – 1960s British Blues Band

7: Adam and the Ants – British band **

8: Deer Stop – track by Goldfrapp

9: Life Like Weeds – track by Modest Mouse

10: Rat Scabies – drummer in the Damned

11: Poisoning Pigeons In The Park – track by Tom Lehrer

Please feel free to add anything else: there is lots more out there. You will notice that my top ten list goes to eleven: this is yet another Spinal Tap tribute.

*Those still having trouble commenting I urge you to make sure you are logging into a  .me not a .mac address. The Monkey changed his entry point yesterday and was miraculously cured. Hallejulah!

**I used to follow Adam and the Ants around in 1977-78 before they went all Prince Charmingy. There was a fair bit of leather and  only song I can remember was called Deutsche Girls. Jordan was their manager and used to scowl grumpily from the wings: I don’t think she approved of the gross and sweaty mass of spitting, posturing humanity, and who can blame her? She later starred as Amyl Nitrate in Derek Jarman’s dire film Jubilee. She is curently working as  veterinary nurse and breeds Burmese cats.

I am listening to A Soldier’s Tale by The Good,The Bad and The Queen.

The picture is of an Acanthus at Hatfield House.