Sparkling Snowdrops, Batman!

I was talking to my botanical uncle about snowdrops the other day, in the context of bigging up our welsh garden. Turns out that my paternal grandmother put in all sorts of exciting things but he reckons that quite a lot have faded away – and anything that has any susceptibility to slugs just gets munched and won’t bulk up.

Anyway, we have a niceish spread of Galanthus nivalis ,and some others which I have been told are probably G. elwesii (they have bigger, greyer leaves, apparently) although my uncle suggested they could just be from a different population of G nivalis, snowdrops being a heterogeneous bunch. I will go and have a closer look in the spring, but the flowering times are certainly different. I would like to get some interesting ones, but at the same time it would be a bit daft to splash out on slug food. We shall see.

I had quite a party week last week, with the annual Garden Media Guild Awards in London. It has been blogged to death, so I will sum it up as glittering cast of celebrities and the gardening somebodies, lots of deserving people honoured for their work and a nice lunch followed by a slightly riotous time in the pub.

I had a good time sitting next to Christine Walkden and Chris Baines (we chatted about music promotion and folk rock) and I was shortlisted for both the Environmental Award for a piece called Tomorrow Never Dies about the Millennium Seed Bank in Amateur Gardening and the Plants and Well Being award for a piece on the gardening charity Thrive, published in Berkshire and Buckinghamshire Life. I like a glamorous ‘do’ and my ambition to go as a ‘Beguiling Horticulturalist’ (see ‘Adventures in Floristry’) went pretty well – well, people were very nice about my dress, which was, if I say so myself modestly awesome. (James A-S says I win the 'most sparkly' award hands down, but to be fair I did suggest it as a category).

The previous weekend my partner and I were invited to a party entitled ‘A Day at the Races and a Night as a Rock Star’ by our most excellent neighbours. Chris went as Axl Rose which was jolly effective. I like a man in eyeliner. I went as my own bad rock self – which turned out to be controversial. A matter of semantics, hanging on how you interpret ‘come as a rock star’, and they decided that I fell somewhere on a line between Lily Allen and Bjork. Hmmm. Apparently it was an outfit that Noel Fielding would also have gone for. (‘I DIDN’T say you looked like Noel Fielding, darling!...’). Trilby, goth T-shirt, velvet jacket with integral feather boa, boots...maybe not too far off, in truth. (If anyone wants me to hang around on Never Mind the Buzzcocks and take the mickey out of Jedward, you know where I am).

A jolly evening spent in the company of Slash, Ozzy, Marilyn (Monroe, not Manson), ZZ Top, Janis Joplin and half of Kiss. We followed a decent rendition of ‘Sweet Child of Mine’ from the boys, with ‘Cover of the Rolling Stone’ by Dr Hook which seemed to be fitting and culminated spectacularly with a kid doing a power slide that took out the speakers.

So Beguiling Horticulturist, perhaps. Rock Horticulturist? Quite convincing, actually. Not the same thing as a Rock Gardener though. No.

Metamorphosis

Writing a book is often likened to having a baby. And with some justification. There is the giddy conception and whirlwind of excitement, then the warm glow of a contract signed. It then the process starts to lag and become heavier; sweetmeats are deployed to maintain performance – pregnancy, like literature, is an endurance sport. My new book, Published by Green Books, 22nd September 2016 Finally, fat and fecund with promise the manuscript is delivered to the publisher, for supervision and medical intervention if necessary. And, finally, the screaming and anguish suddenly stops. The Author's desk (the buns have already been eaten) And here is where the process differs. After months of to-ing and fro-ing, deliberations about nuanced argument and tone of voice, followed by concerns about stacking words in a column and balanced captions, it is confiscated. They just take it away. To put it another way, it is like watching caterpillars. They eat and eat and eat and ...

Adventures in Floristry

Ingredients for a bouquet Back in the summer I went on a floristry course to Green and Gorgeous in Oxfordshire. Historically, I have not been at all keen on formal floristry. It seemed rigid and stuffy, coming up with arrangements that had names like ‘Orchid and Sphagnum on a Tortured Twig’. But at G&G they laid my demons to rest with an intensive day learning how to make fashionable naturalistic bouquets. Since then I have had little need to use these dark arts, but as the autumn colours intensified the floristry bug intensified too. Venturing out with the secateurs I acquired Pyracantha berries, bronze and gold forsythia leaves, soft grey goldenrod seedheads (cunningly stabilised with a blast of extreme-hold hairspray to stop the seeds dropping off), and some Sedum flowers. I bought some Physalis and cellophane from Lulu Flowers round the corner – where they also gave me a quick refresher in wrapping them for travel. So, with much garden wire and raffia, I assemb...

The Essential Apocalypse Skillset

Let me tell you a story. Several years ago, I was painting the bathroom of a house in Bristol. The window was open and it was a pleasant sort of day and people were wandering past. Around about four o’clock I heard a couple of sets of feet come down the hill and then stop. “Look, cherries!” said one voice (female, mid to late teens). “No, I don’t think they are. They can’t be.” Said the other, doubtfully (ditto). “Well, they look like cherries. Let’s try them!” “No, they are probably berries. Completely different. Some of them are not red, they are blackish. They are probably poisonous.” “Oh. Yes, I suppose so.” (disappointed) The feet moved on. I looked out of the bathroom window at the large and heavily laden cherry tree leaning over the wall of the garden opposite and wondered what the world was coming to. Red Sky in the Morning, Shepherds Warning ((c) N Slade) I am actually still wondering. When my grandfather was a child, he and his brothers (and a dog) ...

Electric Green

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