greetings from Blackspot Manor

Jolly ho, what? Just popped by to announce that the first rose of summer is icumen in. Yes it looks a bit frightful, but the famed blackspot virus for which the ancestral home is named has been having its naughty old way with the dainty buds. We enjoy 'em while we can, eh? Gather ye rosebuds while ye may and all that. Splendid philosophies, those romantic poets.






We would invite you out for a spot of tea and the odd buttered crumpet, but Flysome the butler is having another spell of megrims and this always leaves everything at sixes and sevens. Just yesterday he served watercress sandwiches cut on the diagonal, if you can imagine it. It's SO difficult to get good help these days.





It was very kind of you to ask about Sir Jack . The old boy dodders around much the same as ever. His eyesight is getting more feeble, but I'm convinced that he has navigated exclusively by sense of smell these last seven years as it is. He shows no sign of dying and I'm quite resigned to the fact that if I'm ever to come into the inheritance I'll have to do away with the old dear. And how could I ever do that when, no matter how brusque he has been with others, in his dealings with me he has always been a wooly baa-lamb with fur lined booties on?



Last, but certainly not least, cousin Floribunda and her cronie that American Loie Fuller (who is no better than she should be if you ask me) were practicing their "interpretive dancing" in the shrubbery when it seems that they were taken by an azalea. All we found were some scraps of gauze. Although loathe to create a spectacle for the locals, we are seriously considering alerting the constabulary. Do you think we should?

Now tell me all about that handsome sweetheart of yours. Has he taken you to the latest exhibition at the Tate? And really, do you think you'll be able to bring him up to scratch by September? Tell all, dearie! Ta cheery pip, eh?