Chiswick House

Chiswick House gardens have reopened after a GBP12m refurb so Curly and I went along to have a look. It is an amazing house and park, but to be honest the gardens are not quite ready yet, though they will look amazing when they're done. In the meantime though, the walled garden is not open to the public, there's not too much in the conservatory, and the Italian garden is not yet mature. Still, it was a nice day and I've never been to Chiswick before, apart from driving through on the way to Heathrow. It's an odd place, it hardly feels like London, a bit like Wimbledon, you feel like you're further out in the country. And it's always fun to hang out with Curly, she's so funny and switched on and loveable.

Went to Neal's Nurseries in the afternoon and bought lots of plants for the big empty bed in the garden - some lovely grasses and bluey-silvery things and intense dark-red flowering things and some tall white flowers that the bees seem to like. Perhaps I should try to remember the names of all these plants, but they don't exactly trip off the tongue. The tall white things are antirrhinum(?) I think and one of the grasses was a stipa and the reddish-brownish one was a kind of sedge. Well, I stuck all the labels next to them, so I'm sure they'll eventually sink into my memory.

The wretched boiler seems to have stopped working. Someone's coming on Monday to look at it. In the meantime, I am dying for a bath. Showers are just not the same.

Watched Mongrels on iPlayer last night. I should NOT have watched it with the girls, it is far too rude. I've got a crush on the fox Nelson, even though he is only a puppet, because he has such a lovely posh voice.

We've got the Talkers coming round for a barbie today. Well, she talks (about herself). The rest of us just listen.

Got a penalty charge for going into the Congestion zone, even though our car is a hybrid one, because LSS forgot to renew the registration with tfl. I am not best pleased.