And it's goodnight from him...

Heather texted in high excitement last night, from some bar at the Edinburgh Festival where she is currently ensconsed doing some sound and lighting malarkey in exchange for free bed and board.

'I'm in a bar,' she said, 'standing next to Ronnie Corbett! Ha!!'

Not sure what the 'ha!!' was in aid of, but I suspect it was some kind of genetic celebratory chant , because I am known to emit the occasional 'ha!!' in moments of triumph, too.

I don't know why, but my immediate concern was that she would try and pat him on the head. I sent her a text saying 'Hurrah! Do not pat him,' and Andy suggested she ask him for a job.

The evening continued to be punctuated with celebrity-spotting texts, including Mike McShane (who's lost a lot of weight and now sports a 'cute little pointy white beard'(????)), and some actor from 'The Wire,' who I've never heard of, because I don't watch aforesaid programme. Number One Daughter, it seems, is having a whale of a time north of the border.

I've always liked Ronnie Corbett. He always seems to be very polite, very gentlemanly, very well turned out. Unlike me, who has been hedge wrestling all morning and look like, well, I've been hedge wrestling all morning. I'm covered in smudges of green and there is a whiff of chlorophyll about me. But the front hedge looks much neater now, and hopefully that will be the last good cut it will need before winter. Where first thing this morning the hedge looked like Bob Geldof, it now resembles Ronnie Corbett.

Part of the hedge wrestling involved tackling some fairly hefty wodges of bind weed. I don't know where it's all come from this year, but we've been plagued by the flipping stuff. This wouldn't be a bad thing if, for example, bind weed was favoured by the chickens as a light side salad. But it isn't. They have studiously ignored the stuff that has wound its way up the honeysuckle I planted on the boundary of Cluckinghen Palace.

'We can't eat bind weed,' said Miggins, when I asked her about it. 'It's way too common for our palette. Now pass me that slug.'

In fact, the only garden weeds the chickens will deign to eat are dandelions, and at a push, groundsel.
'But birds are supposed to love grounsel,' I said.
'Birds are supposed to do many things,' said Mrs Slocombe, who is off lay at mo because she is moulting,'but we are trend buckers, as well you know.'

And now, because hedge-wrestling and bind weed ju-jitsu have rendered my arms all achey and wobbly, and I have absolutely no idea where this blog is going because when I emerged from 'neath the part of the hedge that is by the front window I banged my head on the window sill and it bloomin' hurt and made me feel sick and stupid for about 10 minutes, I am going to have a slump and a read.