Hello, friends. Super hot weather to come over the early part of the week and at the moment (Saturday afternoon) in glorious east Devon it’s low cloud hanging over the wood on the hill drifting slowly back and forth, no breeze, and a fair bit of humidity. The week has been showery, and cool at times, but pleasant enough. The new car arrived on Tuesday. It’s lovely but a 10 year advance in technology on our old one has left us astonished and, occasionally, a little nervous. It says ‘Hello, June’ when I start the ignition. It doesn’t have a key, just a push button starter (this is progress?). There is a computer screen as big as the local cinema screen on the centre console. It kindly lets me know if I exceed the speed limit, or stray out of my lane, or get too close to the car in front. I think all this is fairly standard stuff now, but my trusty old car didn’t do it. It will park itself if I want it to. It reminds me not to leave a person or an animal in the car when I stop the engine (???). It mirrors my phone home screen. It tells me how many miles I can go on the fuel left in the tank and where the nearest filling station is. It has something called ‘transparent bonnet’ (I have no idea what that is). It feels, at the moment, very busy indeed. But if I ignore all that it drives like a dream. Smooth, seamless gear changes (it’s automatic), reassuring brakes, quiet. I guess I’ll get used to it over time, but right now, I do miss my old war horse a bit.
On Saturday night I watched the Prince’s Trust concert from 1986. Oh my, who are today’s equivalent of these artists? I guess every decade has its finest, but these seem to have been around forever. It was a joy to wax nostalgic alongside Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler, Tina Turner, Bryan Adams, Paul Young, GEORGE MICHAEL, Rod Stewart, Phil Collins, Peter Gabriel, Joan Armatrading, Elton John and others. And especially that guy who is always playing percussion at these things and always looks like he’s having the time of his life, the inimitable Ray Cooper. Forty years ago. And an awful lot of them still putting it out there (if they’re not dead, RIP). The only fly in the ointment, for me, was the appearance of Paul McCartney. Don’t hate me, but I can’t stand him. Yes, yes, I know all the things, but there’s just something about his manner—swaggery, self-important, do-you-know-who-I-am kind of thing—nope, not for me. Plus he has that ridiculously small nose.
I’ve been toiling in the garden. The backyard has suffered quite a lot while we have been concentrating on the new beds at the front. Consequently the large raised bed has sneakily grown a crop of those tall yellow dandelion-y things plus a serious crop of willow herb. I’ve spent two days pulling them up one at a time to make sure I got all the roots, and in the process discovered a pot with a flowering ‘Ballerina’ rose in it, three pots of crocosmia that I started from corms last year, a pot of tigridia, and two potato plants. These I have rescued and watered and put on one side (not the potato plants). Once the promised searing heat diminishes next week I shall transfer them all into the garden proper. A robin came to help and stayed close by until I’d finished, so friendly and cheerful. And you know that thing ‘When robins appear, loved ones are near’? Well, I always say ‘Hello, John’ to my brother just in case. I know, I know, I’m a rational, unsentimental woman, but I can’t help it. A wren also came for a look but didn’t stay, and a chaffinch trilled away for most of the time. It was hard work, but pleasant in its own way—and certainly satisfying. I’ve just discovered (after a bit of weed research) that the tall, dandelion-y thing is a Sow-thistle, and I just know it’s one of those ‘one year seeding, seven years weeding’ things. Sigh.
The roses are almost over. For most of them it’s their first year so we shouldn’t expect too much. The second year ones in the bigger side garden are still flowering. Hurrah for deadheading! The nepeta we put in is just huge, even though it’s meant to be ‘Walker’s Low’ and I think will be split for next year. Our kniphophia is also enjoying the weather. I’ve no idea of the variety but it’s one of the bigger ones and is covered in flowers which last for ages, and plenty more to come. I am very pleased with the new border at the front. It is beautiful and the plant choices seemed to have worked well. In the pic below the red splashes are achillea ‘Terracotta’ and have really added something to the whole. The hardy geranium is a really vigorous lovely—I think it might be Ann Folkard—it scrambles, flowers for months and is the most wonderful colour. I’m not sure of the name of the hosta but it’s doing rather well too.
Not much reading this week - I’ve started another Ann Bridge novel in the Julia Probyn series, The Malady in Madeira. I enjoy these, but at number 8 out of 9 I think Bridge was slightly running out of ideas for Julia to show her derring-do. This one is Russian spy ships off the coast of Madeira (sounds a teensy bit familiar) and an MI6 man in danger of being compromised by his stupid, loose-tongued wife. Julia, who has been widowed between book 7 and book 8, comes to the rescue, spotting ships and transistors and Cold War plots before giving said wife the sharp edge of her tongue. There was also a rather startling passage where she gives the two annoying children of her hostess a resounding slap. Hostess entirely unperturbed suggests she repeat the slap if they continue to be annoying. Ah, child discipline lessons from the 1960s.
Against my better judgement I started watching BBC serial, Two Weeks In August. A less than gripping premise—a group of three friends from university days and their respective partners have a reunion holiday in a villa in Greece. Not my sort of thing at all. There are kids, a nanny (this sounds a bit goat oriented, and believe me it is…), a whole pile of simmering resentment, mismatched financial backgrounds, and personalities that most of us would rather stick pins in our eyes than spend ten minutes with, let alone a holiday. But, but, but. After the first episode I thought I probably wouldn’t continue because they were such a collection of selfish, unlikeable, pretentious, dopey, stupid, mendacious, manipulative individuals…but Jessica Raine as Zoe—and this is the Jessica Raine show, make no mistake—hooked me right in there. She gives us a tour de force of a woman emotionally disintegrating before our eyes: she’s angry, wild, despairing, hysterical, full of hate, resentful, revengeful, liberated, hallucinatory, shamed, in love, out of love, all writ large on that incredibly mobile face. And that’s what kept me watching. As it (and she) spiralled completely out of control—blackly comedic, social satire, emotional disaster after emotional disaster—I couldn’t stop watching. Throw in the fabulous Dolly Wells as one half of a weird and dangerous ex-pat couple who give Gods and Monsters parties where ANYTHING goes, add in the frequent appearance (to Zoe) of Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos and to be honest, how could I not be enthralled? Seriously, it would be easy to dismiss this as nonsense, but honestly? I think it’s the best crazy thing I’ve seen in a long time. Watch out for the goat.
All done for this week. Take care and I’ll write again soon. x
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