Wish I was here...

Postcard courtesy of The John Hinde Collection

...but I'm at home in London. However, I am away – kind of, as I'm taking a blog holiday for the rest of August. 

Among other things (like getting finishing painting the door-frames I began four years ago, getting some pictures framed that have been waiting about three years, and picking up an eBay wardrobe from Dartford) I shall be working on

Egg-head stationery from the School of Life

I have never been to London's School of Life, and though mildly pretentious and Alain de Botton-y as it is, I am always drawn to its unusual philosophical seminars and events, in theory at least if not in practice (yet).

Indeed, some of them are more than intellectually diverting: right now, the summer school is hosting How to Find a Job You Love – though plain old How to Find a Job might get

Seventies gardens

This was possibly both the most excellent and the most impractical garden furniture invention of the 1970s.

So unsuited to British weather – think of the mould and rust potential – but so garishly, decadantly glamorous. All that's missing is an artificially tinted drink in a tall plastic glass with a curly straw, a dainty bowl of Skips to snack on, a wafty house-coat with massive batwing sleeves

Shipping forecast fondness

The British fondness for Radio 4's Shipping Forecast is a comforting thing.

And thanks to E. Annie Proulx, even American readers (and I know there are a lot of you) will know what I'm on about. It's why this tiny little pin dish – depicting the evocatively named sea regions surrounding the British Isles – is pretty much my favourite thing in daily use in my house.



It's a bit knackered, and