Produce...

...as in the noun, not the verb, and we are suddenly very busy with the fruits of our labours which is timely because the Village Show is but a week away.

I have started a slow read of a real pearl of a book... The Seasons : A Celebration of the English Year by Nick Groom. Published in hardback as The Seasons : An Elegy for the Passing of the Year, (and how did I miss it) there has clearly been a more optimistic change of emphasis 'twixt then and the paperback, due for publication on September 4th, but highly and temptingly visible in Waterstones, Plymouth over a month ago when I bought mine.

The fragmentation of English tradition and customs is made clear, but one thing Nick Groom urges the reader to do is to take part in whatever may be happening in their locality in order to help re-establish and preserve these events as occasions for local communities...

'I do admire the Scots, Welsh and Irish for their independence of mind and culture within the larger identities of the UK and Europe, and I rue the extent to which the English, whoever we may be in the first decades of the twenty-first century, have allowed our bountiful harvest home of traditions to become subsumed and dissolved within the Union.'

Nick Groom (who lives down here in the Shire) goes on to make a point which had never really occurred to me...

'We may not have our own parliament yet - a political anomaly for which there can be no justification - but we do have our own seasonal culture of the year...'

I had to think hard about that.

Of course we have our own parliament I thought...what's all that in Westminster, but of course its not only ours, its everyone else's as well, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, yet they have their own parliaments too, and each seems empowered to address and support strong cultural connections within their countries.

It could be argued that perhaps we've gone all wishy-washy and vague on our traditions here in multi-cultural England and it will be interesting to see the results of the referendum for Scottish independence in two week's time. Politics aside (which I don't do here) the practical repercussions of a 'Yes' vote would be enormous...I can't quite get my head around the notion of the weather forecast stopping north of Hadrian's Wall for starters, I always like to see what's happening in Orkney.

Anyway in the interests of community, and having taken a year off last year, next weekend we will all be entering the Village Show again.

The Tinker is doing the flower classes, Bookhound is on the fruit and veg plus chutney (a previous winner no less) and I am on handicrafts and ...wait for it...cookery. Yes I am making the set recipe, this year gingerbread, as well as a victoria sponge and maybe the cheese scones; I can't tell you how courageous this will seem when you see the farmhouse kitchen competition. But it's the taking part that counts isn't it...

Currently we need all prayers to ascend to the Patron Saint of Vegetables for this single aubergine to hold tight for a little longer...

We have been talking to it and stuffing it full of 'food' all summer, like a mother fattening up a baby, fretting over whether it is too dry, or too wet, and though not unblemished we can only hope a nice polish sorts it out, and everyone else's looks worse. It does have a soft bed of basil to cushion its fall should it tumble prematurely...we are all living in dread of being the one who accidentally knocks it off.

But look, while I have been lavishing attention on that one, over in the corner another variety that I had given up for lost suddenly goes into production..

Beautiful glossy and perfect and I have barely spoken to it.

Likewise the peppers, currently looking quite good...

The Cape Gooseberries are doing fine having been very easy and a lot of fun to grow..

...and may be entered in the Any Other Fruit class once we have decided how to exhibit them...closed and sealed, or with the leaves opened, we have a little stash ripening but we can't stop eating them, which was the point of growing them I suppose..


The melons are not going to be big enough because we should have sacrificed one for the benefit of the other, but couldn't bear to, so we are just enjoying watching them grow in their net curtain supporting sling...

and the tomatoes need to get a wriggle on..

We have suffered with something called blossom end rot...you seriously don't want blossom end rot, it makes grown men cry.

Courgettes everywhere, turn your back and they have gone to marrows..

The runner beans are in glut mode and I have frozen pounds and pounds of them, hopefully we can find six straight ones...

Meanwhile over in Tinker's Cott the dahlia and chrysanthemum beds are clearly benefiting from that early addition of something called Zoo Poo. Rather than buy an elephant we went and bought a couple of bags of excrement, and ignoring the smell it seems to have worked wonders. I'll do flowers in another post.

So tell me, how's the produce over your way...