Blumenfest!

Just a sample of the delights on show at the Orchid Festival at Kew Gardens, that Madam Arcati, John-John and I trolled off to see on Sunday.

It was, as planned, the perfect way to end my holiday (the Madam was already back at work after our trip to Spain), even if the arrangements were a bit discomfiting in comparison to previous visits - we had to queue in the cold for our ticketed timeslot, much of the Princess of Wales Conservatory (where the event is hosted) was roped-off so we couldn't meander past some of our fave specimens as usual, and in general it all felt a bit like being ushered along a conveyor-belt.

Albeit a very beautiful, colourful and floral one!

Here's something - ahem - appropriate to accompany this floral display, from one of our favourite German eccentrics Fraulein Nina Hagen [who has a milestone birthday coming up next month, so I doubt this will be the last we hear of her]!

Nina Hagen - Blumen für die Damen

I love the looks of shock on the audience's faces...

It's centr- I -fugal motion

Madam Arcati, John-John and I are off to see the annual Orchid Festival at Kew Gardens this afternoon! A welcome break from the grey dankness that continues to envelop us (despite a brief sunny respite yesterday afternoon), and a jolly way to end my fortnight's leave, methinks...

Speaking of jolly - here's our "house band" here at Dolores Delargo Towers, superbly improving (as is their wont) a somewhat forgotten hit from 26 years ago [the year Shawn Mendes, Chappell Roan, Google, the iMac and - erm - Windows 98 were born]:

Postmodern Jukebox ft. Tatum Langley - This Kiss (Faith Hill vintage “Doris Day” style cover)

That mispronunciation still annoys me, decades later.

Meanwhile, at Kew Gardens today...

...we had horrendous, stormy downpours!

It was dry in the Palm House.

The Spring collection

It's been a hectic few days!

On Saturday, a smattering of "Our Gang" gathered for the first time in ages at The Perseverance pub off Great Ormond Street for another "Film Club" evening, then on Easter Sunday Madam Arcati and I took Baby Steve and Houseboy Alex to Kew Gardens (a first for Steve, and Alex hadn't been since he was a little kid) to see it in its Spring magnificence!

No sooner did we get back home, but I was off with them back to Braintree - and spent a happy (if miserably wet and windy) couple of days touring the numerous garden centres and nurseries up and down the county. I came back last night on National Express (in total it took four hours from being dropped off at the airport to getting home!), laden with a haul of twenty-seven new plants - 22 of them fuchsias! Phew.

How about a little selection of newer music that has caught my ear of late, to ease the aches and pains..?

Let's start out a bit classy, shall we, with a first-time collaboration between two favourite vocalists here at Dolores Delargo Towers:

Jake Shears and Neil Tennant - Rent (Live at BBC Radio 2 Piano Room)

Time to crank it up a little, with this jolly little number:

Jason Mraz - I Feel Like Dancing

Miss Ware says "it's time to shake it 'til the pearls fall", and who are we to argue?

Jessie Ware - Pearls

Could this one sound more Eighties if it tried?

Purple Disco Machine x Kungs - Substitution

Dame Sophie of the Ellis-Bextors' recent single from her new album Hana is a joy:

Sophie Ellis-Bextor - Breaking the Circle

Speaking of joy, this is one I've brought back with me from Braintree, where we certainly did whoop with joy when we discovered it!

Todrick Hall - Sorry Barbie

As ever, dear reader, let me know your thoughts...

The delightful scent of Spring

Madam Arcati and I went again yesterday to Kew Gardens, to take full advantage of this beautiful early spring: to catch the magnificent magnolias in full bloom and the fruit trees in blossom, before the seasonal gales blow them all away. One tree in particular (above) has a captivating scent - Pyrus calleryana, commonly known as the Callery pear.

From Vice magazine:

This pretty, floral tree somewhat resembles the cherry blossom. Its five-petalled flowers are dainty and white. If they could talk, I imagine they'd say, "come and have a picnic under us!"

Wrong.

The Callery pear smells like ... semen. At the University of California, Santa Barbara, they want you to know that it smells like human male semen, to be sure. So many people have called it the "semen tree" that it warranted an entry in Urban Dictionary, aptly defined as the odour of "used sex rags."

We had a sniff, and moved on. The old, old story.

[I have, inevitably, featured this unusual tree before]

Jane plays with Willi, Willi is happy again

A wealth of colour on display at the Orchid Festival at Kew Gardens yesterday

Sharing a birthday as he does with a mish-mash of "names" such as Kim Novak, Stockard Channing, George Segal, Peter Tork, Oliver Reed, Robbie Williams, Jerry Springer, Simon Schama, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Peter Hook of New Order, Joyce DiDonato, Emanuel Ungaro, Kevin Bloody Wilson and Sonia, another of our fave artists Mr Peter Gabriel blows out 70 candles on his cake today.



To my surprise, in almost thirteen years of this very blog, I have never featured the man (nor his extraordinary stage costumes) nor his music before! To make up for that, here are just a few hits from his memorable (and decades-long) back-catalogue - from when he left Genesis in the 1970s to his commercial breakthrough in the 1980s:

Peter Gabriel - Solsbury Hill

Peter Gabriel - Sledgehammer

Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush - Don't Give Up

...and my personal fave:

Peter Gabriel - Games Without Frontiers

Jeux sans frontières
Jeux sans frontières
Jeux sans frontières

Hans plays with Lottie, Lottie plays with Jane
Jane plays with Willi, Willi is happy again
Suki plays with Leo, Sacha plays with Britt
Adolf builds a bonfire, Enrico plays with it

Whistling tunes we hide in the dunes by the seaside
Whistling tunes we're kissing baboons in the jungle

It's a knockout

If looks could kill,
They probably will
In games without frontiers
War without tears

Games without frontiers
War without tears

Jeux sans frontières
Jeux sans frontières
Jeux sans frontières

Andre has a red flag, Chiang Ching's is blue
They all have hills to fly them on except for Lin Tai Yu
Dressing up in costumes, playing silly games
Hiding out in tree-tops shouting out rude names

Whistling tunes we hide in the dunes by the seaside
Whistling tunes we piss on the goons in the jungle

It's a knockout

If looks could kill,
They probably will
In games without frontiers
War without tears

Games without frontiers
War without tears

Jeux sans frontières

Many happy returns, Peter Brian Gabriel (born 13 February 1950)

Urban Jungle

We had a lovely afternoon exploring the exotic beauty of our beloved Kew Gardens on Sunday...

It's a Jungle Sometimes

Foliage photos from our visit to the world heritage treasure Kew Gardens last Friday.

Not bad for South London on the first day of March..!

Meanwhile, at Kew Gardens

Camellia


Rhododendron nobleanum


Magnolia sprengeri 'Diva'


Orchid Festival


Scilla and ferns


Tropaeolum tricolor

Such joy.

Spring, Sara and sequins

Magnolia flowers, Kew Gardens, yesterday

Two things to celebrate today - the arrival of Spring (at last) in the UK and the fact that had she lived, the utterly magnificent Señorita Sara Montiel would have celebrated her 86th birthday.

On this Tacky Music Monday, let us pay due homage to the sheer campness of this extraordinary lady with a suitably OTT video of hers, replete with her pink-clad safety gays - she's Super Sara!

Sara Montiel - Super Sara

We miss her.

Have a good week, folks!

Sara Montiel (10th March 1928 – 8th April 2013)

A previous tribute to La Leyenda