Peony flowers - now you seem them, now you don't

For years I have been meaning to take some photos of our Peony flowers. We were fortunate to inherit a couple of Peony plants when we moved house 20 years ago. The flowers are deep red and exceptionally beautiful. However, you have to be quick to see them - they usually die off within a few days.

So today, blessed with that bank of time given only to retired councillors and normal people, I took this photo of the first Peony flower of this season.

I also planted four tomato plants ('Gardener's delight') and a couple of melon plantlings.

Sub-text of this posting: My Election Detox Therapy (EDT) is working very well, thank you!

The attraction of newts as relief from politics

During a brief break from delivering today, I found myself peering down into our small pond at the numerous tadpoles and couple of newts there. It does amaze me that a small pond in a garden surrounded by six foot fences, can somehow generate such life. I found it a marvellous bit of therapy, as relief from pounding the pavements.

I can understand why Ken Livingstone enjoys keeping newts.