If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!The Evening Standard: grammar’s not an issue. Looks like spelling could do with some work, though.

Apart from decorating the dining room (and the less said about that, the better), Sunday was a day of garden maintenance. The vegetables had reached the point where they needed some serious attention, which was duly given.
For starters, the first two potato crops were in grave danger of turned into a swampy mulch by a […]

Saturday saw us head to France. I’ve not been since last September, so my language was a little bit mangled, but as I only had to use it in the restaurant and we all got what we wanted to eat anyway, I think I got away with it.
We took Le Shuttle, or Eurotunnel or whatever […]

Kylie’s dressing room
Kylie Minogue really is tiny. Everyone who knows her says she is, but it’s not until you see her clothes that you realise quite how tiny she is.
We went to see Kylie - The Exhbition at the V&A, where two large rooms have been given over to displaying a selection from her vast […]

Visit London has grassed over Trafalgar Square. It’s really quite lovely. A bit damp where the fountains are being caught in the wind and blown onto the turf, but quite lovely. So much nicer than the usual grey slabs, that are temporarily hidden underneath.
Of course, London is filled with parks, squares and gardens, but there […]

The garden is really getting carried away with itself now. For the first few weeks it all seemed to be nice and controlled and refined, with little bits of growth here and there. Shoots, hints of green, few enough leaves for each new one to still be an excitement. Now it’s a race between me […]

I know what you’re thinking. I went trans-Atlantic for the weekend and this is the latest weapon in Fortress America’s armoury (no pun intended). Well I didn’t. I wouldn’t. Instead it was the Friskomatic on Southwold Pier (’prepare to be frisked like you’ve never been frisked before’).
It’s part of the Under the Pier Show which […]

Health and Safety can really spoil your enjoyment of the day’s first brew. My mug this morning:

I’ve never been left unmoved by a Bryson book. Mother Tongue was fascinating. Down Under, awe inspiring. A Short History of Nearly Everything, depressing.
And Lost Continent, which I’ve just finished… boring.
It’s not Bryson’s fault. He wrote a good book, he made me laugh, he reminded me of the fortnight I spent driving solo through the […]

‘If the customer is an extremely strict vegetarian, then we are sorry the products are no longer suitable, but a less strict vegetarian should enjoy our chocolate,’ said Paul Goalby, corporate affairs manager for Masterfoods.Source: BBC News
Masterfoods has gone temporarily insane. Actually, I suspect it’s a less than temporary measure, as it’s a cost-saver, but […]