The Dragonfly

This afternoon we visited Elizabeth at The Firs.  I delivered the prints for the summer exhibition and we telephoned her framer to discuss framing my pictures. We had hoped to get down to gardening, but all felt pretty lethargic because it was still rather hot and humid.  We did get some watering and treating of diseased heuchera done; some pruning of wisteria; and some pondering.  After the several weeks’ heat-wave everything was looking rather autumnal.

I have written several times about Oddie’s penchant for snaffling my chair.  A dog is one thing, but a dragonfly is something else.  Our visitor calmy took up its position, mandibles munching away, refusing to budge until it was ready. Adam’s GCSE dragon kept a watchful eye on its enormous living relative.  I have never seen such a large specimen before.  What I’ve always thought of as a dragonfly has simply been a small blue damselfly.

The plan was for Elizabeth, Danni, and Andy to join us for an Eastern Nights meal in Thornhill.  There was some delay as my niece and her boyfriend were delayed by a traffic accident and a heath fire.  While the rest of us sat in the garden waiting for them, a member of the next generation of The Firs robins hopped around us, following in the clawsteps of our companion of last summer.

The curries were of the usual high standard at our favourite Hampshire Indian restaurant.  Bangla, Cobra, and Coke were drunk.  Danni took a photograph of what she termed the three wise monkeys.