Green...Green...Green...Green...Green...Green...Green...Green...........RED!

The waiting is finally over. You've been fully grown for a while. An age in fact. You've teased me agonisingly, like thoughts of Nobbly Bobbly ice lollies at 10.30pm when the Co-op's shut. But now the teasing is over. You are ready.

My first red tomato of the season. After 4 months of nurturing, coaxing and pleading you have finally come good. You are the super hero of my crop. The other tomatoes are mere mortals – still pissing about in the 'Green' lounge. They may well be trying hard and,Lord, the sun has been-a-shining-a-plenty, but they haven't even come close to your majesty. So red. So plump. So perfect.

And your prize? An evening spent in the five star accommodation that is my stomach. Breakfast to be served between 8 and 10am with checkout time being 11, unless of course I have a chicken dansak tonight, in which case you may well have to be out before breakfast.

Man Flu Over The Cuckoo's Nest

Been ill all week. Because men are no longer allowed to have flu I'll simply call it SSS (Shivers 'n' Snot Syndrome).

There's a rumour going round these parts that I caught this bug from a 3am swim in the lake whilst off my titties at a festival last weekend. Balderdash! I appeared on BBC South Today on Monday denying these accusations but you know what rumours are like – just won't go away.

Such are the joys of a liberated Friday that even being ill can't quash my happiness. I'm just going to 'enjoy' being ill. Lying back on a chaise-longue, wrapped up in blankets, reading Paulo Coelho whilst supping on home-made broth. I'll stare out of the window listening to the cuckoos going crazy outside or simply indulge in watching Deborah Meaden in 'Celebrity Onion Chopping' on BBC iPlayer.

And every so often I'll place the back of my hand on my forehead in a kind of Dickensian/Romeo 'Oh, Whoa is me' kind of way. At 6.25pm maybe a hot bath with bubbles, candles and joss-sticks, followed by a glass of medicinal vino and an art-house film about a kidnapped Wallaby.

Wilderness Festival 2011

The badgers are coming down the hill,
banging on drums
Badger beats!
We sway to their rhythms,
in the hollow
Raising pints of cider triumphantly aloft

The badgers are coming down the hill,
slowly yet surely
Twisting and turning,
bouncing and bobbing
As if on a wave
about to break

The badgers are coming down the hill
Naughty badgers!
Mischievous
like Arthur Daley in Minder,
or Sooty's friend Sweep
or Howard Marx
But not like Frankenstein
For he was evil rather than mischievous

A Statement From My Lawyer

Today, Friday August 5th 2011, my client, Adrian Alessandro Lancini, worked.

A full day.

Mr Lancini didn't have any work in Monday to Thursday this week. In fact he has had little work over the last month, 'July The Quiet', as I have poetically renamed it.

He was offered work today and due to these exceptional circumstances he accepted. The price of ale and saffron isn't what it used to be and scientific evidence still shows that money doesn't grow on trees.

Mr Lancini, or myself on his behalf, will not be making any further comments about this matter.

Yours Sincerely
Walter Spaston-Blythe
Lawyer