Tales from my handbag

I don’t want to boast but I am abundant in my back garden. My tomatoes are heavy on the vine and my butternut squash is filling out nicely. However, all is not as it should be; at night I have a prowler – a squirrel who has been filling his flea-ridden body with MY tomatoes. What gets me is that he/she/they, don’t eat a whole tomato and move on, oh no; they have a furtive nibble here, a quick chomp there and sometimes, just for fun, they might indulge in a bit of skinning – just because they can!  ‘It’s not a bloody buffet’, I shriek, chasing the hairy burglars down my garden path. I thought squirrels ate nuts but it seems during these economically challenging times, animals are expanding their gastro repertoires.  This summer, for example, I had wood lice eating my strawberries – and my pet dog Blackie used to eat Nivea Cream. But that’s another story…

Alleluia. The worst time of the year has passed and it was bearable. The highlights: I didn’t make anyone cry. That’s it. The rest is a blur. So here I am back in snowy Brighton trying to get back to normal. I’ve made my annual pilgrimage to Freak Street and the Marie Curie Emporium of Clothes that People have Died in. This year I was proud to donate a bag of lavender fragranced nicky nacky noos and assorted bath bombs. Nice if you’re 90 but I’m not. Thanks anyway. I have two New Year’s Resolutions: a. at the risk of encouraging rats, I will feed the birds in my garden. b. I will expand my vegetable repertoire to incorporate Pak Choi, broccoli and butternut squash . c. I will stop obsessing about expanding my vegetable repertoire. d. I will take inspiration from Harold Pinter’s passing to finish my play.  That’s it. Over and out.