Counting my blessings...

...goodness but the list is long! Having dug myself into a pit of despair yesterday (you know, the kind where you sit on the chair of doom to find a spring sticking through the upholstery of misery and your cup of tea tastes like it's got fish in it), a whole fleet of guardian angels came to my rescue. The phone rang, just as I was about to succumb to the mind-numbing distractions of rubbish afternoon TV. It was Vera en France, ready with 'gee up' girly chat. There would have been coffee and cake if we'd still lived next door to each other but as it was she took me on a virtual reality trip of her caravan awning where, as she said 'ils sont plus de yogurt pots mais ne pas de seedlings.' She then proceeded to call me a witch because my seedlings are blossoming (literally in the case of the strawberries).

'I don't think witchery comes into it,' I said, glad that we are able to hurl insults at each other without taking offence.
'Maybe not,' she said darkly, 'but from my end, I think an excess of donkey dung might.'

We agreed that donkey dung is probably too strong to raise seedlings in and Vera has now gained permission from her Head Gardener aka Lester to get some potting compost instead. Just to give the poor blighters a chance.

And then Andy came home, bearing a bunch of flowers and two cartons of Ben and Jerry's ice-cream - Chocolate Fudge Brownie and Caramel Chew Chew in case anyone from B & J's is reading this and wants to bung me a couple of freebies for the advertising.
'I thought you seemed sad this morning,' he said.

What a guy!

And then, at lunchtime today when I stopped writing for a spot of tea and toast (yes! I have been writing ALL morning, thank heavens. Had a bit of inspiration for Indigo Antfarm and another 2,000 words were born), I picked up a couple of messages of support from Moira and Olly telling me to keep on keeping on and saying how entertaining they find my blog. Thank you both for your kind words and for being insane enough to understand what I'm talking about. I mean, sometimes even I haven't a clue what's going on at Much Malarkey Manor. You are clearly very talented and highly discerning people!!

So, here is the score...

...my blessings are many...Andy (who is ONCE AGAIN trying to read 'A la Recherche du Temps Perdu'. Will he EVER learn????), Chris and Heather, my friends both here and abroad, my cats (furry) and chickens (eggy), my health, my time to spend as I wish as a writer/ gardener/baker of cakery/ singer of songery, my dubious imagination and my generally reliable sense of humour...

...there are bluebells appearing in the bee garden, the magnolia looks beautiful, my new lavender has a flower sprig on it and all the foxgloves are growing save one which has been dug up and pooped on by the local cats...

...the greenhouse is full to bursting with veg plants and flower plants and we shall dine well on home-grown stuff this season...

... I've managed to avoid kicking the bucket of nettle beer that is fermenting in the 'conservatory'...

...new grass IS GROWING on the mud flat that is our back garden ('but we've got our beady chicken eyes on it,' say the hens, 'if only we could escape from Cluckinghen Palace....)....

...I AM a writer!

And as for tomorrow? Well, I am going to go to march to the London Book Fayre with samples of my writing tucked under my arm and I am going to try and foist them on as many people as possible whether they like it or not. If I can get away with kidnapping an agent or tying myself to the trouser leg of a publisher, I will.

And failing that, I shall suggest to Andy that we buy some fat chips and barbacue sauce and eat them sitting next to the Thames and he can try to convince me once more that London is lovely.