Randomness, redux

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

Coherent thought is scattered to the four winds, so today is a return to the randomness. You were all so kind about it last time.

1. Yesterday, for a work thing, I got to talk to a blogger I admire, In Real Life. IRL, baby. I was in a state of high excitement. I fear I may have babbled. Blogging is such a paradoxically intimate medium that I start to regard the bloggers I read regularly as people I actually know. As a result, I wasted no time on small talk, but went straight to personal revelation. It was nought to sixty in seven seconds. I think I might have over-shared. I had mild angst afterwards, but it was such a pleasure to put a voice to the writing, and she could not have been kinder as I waffled on.

 

2. A few days ago, my neighbour very kindly found a gentleman to buy my battered old motor. It had over a hundred thousand miles on the clock, a suspicion of rust, and a torn skirt, due to the fact that I drove it over a large rock down by the Spey by mistake. (Even though it was a saloon, I treated it like a landrover, and thought nothing of taking it across fields and over rutted tracks.) Also, the steering wheel started to vibrate when it went over forty miles an hour. It had done me yeoman's service, but I feared no one would want it in such condition. It turned out, by a miracle, that the nice fellow from the next village north adored old cars, and knew how to fix them, so there was cash in hand and a great deal of mutual delight.

I wanted to buy my neighbour a nice bottle of vodka, his chosen drink, as a thank you, so I went down to the shop.

'What have you got that is special?' I said to the young man behind the counter.

'Is it for a lady?' he said.

'No, a man,' I said. 'But why do you ask?'

'Well,' he said. 'There is this pink vodka, specially for women.'

I paused to put my feminist hat on. The young man was smiling, proffering the ghastly bottle, with no idea what he had unleashed.

'Pink?' I said, in the manner of Lady Bracknell. 'PINK?'

'It's for the ladies,' he said, still not quite understanding.

'Oh yes,' I said. 'Because we are all biologically programmed to like pink, every last one of us. That really is the way to get my money; patronise me until my ears fall off.'

'It's called Pinky,' he said, helpfully. He was laughing now, I could not tell whether because he thought me funny, or was in an advanced state of terror.

'Do women actually fall for that?' I said.

'I think some do,' he said.

'It's a betrayal of the sisterhood,' I said, furiously.

Luckily I found some delightful Polish Bison grass vodka, in a very chic bottle, to take my mind off it.

'You've got to love the Poles,' I said.

'Yes,' said the young man. 'You do.' He seemed very relieved that I had stopped shouting.

But really: PINK vodka for the ladies. I'd like to have been present at that development meeting.

 

3. It astonishes me what a difference planting a plant makes. I put in some astrantias and roses and salvias yesterday. They looked perfectly fine in their pots, but after only one day in the actual ground they have stretched and unfurled and luxuriated. Their leaves are greener and their flowers more vivid. I have pretty good soil; lots of fat, happy worms, always a good sign. But I did not feed them, or put on compost or bone meal; I just dug them into the ground and gave them some water and now they look as if they are in the plant equivalent of a five star resort.

 

4. I am slightly alarmed that it is July. I am still secretly convinced it is actually the end of May.

 

5. Sarah went to interview a man called Carlos Acosta yesterday. I wondered why she was interviewing a footballer. It turns out he is a very famous ballet dancer, and every woman in Britain except for me knows about him, because he is the sexy sex in human form. Apparently women actually squeal when they hear his name. If they can put down their pink vodka for a moment, that is. I can't work out how embarrassed I should be that I have absolutely no idea who he is.

 

I'm afraid the pictures of the day are all canine, all the time, because there was some lovely sun yesterday, and my old ladies looked so gorgeous in it, that I cannot resist:

 

And here is a bonus shot of my favourite new flower, in honour of Miss Gertrude Stein, who said: 'a rose is a rose is a rose is a rose'. No one may ever have said a truer thing.

Did you ever see anything more perfect? I can hardly believe it is real.

Have a happy random First of July.