Needles All Over the Place

Our biggest sunflower is putting on quite a show, with four flower heads and more on the way farther down the stalk. I've discovered if I precisely position the flower and the phone, I can pretty much block out the defunct satellite dish behind it!

We've had a couple of interesting dog-walking days around here. As I walked Bailey through the nearby housing estate early Friday morning, a man came up to me carrying a small child on his shoulders. He was perturbed because there were a couple of drug-users on the nearby playground, where he'd planned to take his kid. "Needles all over the place!" he said. He told me he'd called the police and was just waiting for them to show up.

I looked through the fence and sure enough, a man and woman were entwined on the ground beneath the swing set, completely oblivious to the world. I kept walking but looped back again several minutes later and the police were there, with medical debris strewn on the ground and the man in handcuffs. The woman was sitting on a swing, smoking. I can't verify the presence of needles but I wouldn't be surprised.

So that was a little slice of urban life.

And then yesterday, as we walked through the cemetery, the "Jambalaya" woman was back, along with what appeared to be several family members. They'd set up some lawn chairs and were blasting a new soundtrack: "Take Me Home, Country Roads," "Red Sails in the Sunset" and "Ghost Riders in the Sky." (Which seems kind of appropriate for a cemetery.) I Shazammed one of the songs and it turned out to be a recording by an Irish duo, Foster & Allen -- who also do a version of "Jambalaya," so perhaps we're being treated to their entire greatest hits album.

I suppose if you don't have a garden, hanging out in the cemetery and listening to music is a good option for a summer day.

Bailey loves to play tug-of-war with her blanket.

I'm enjoying filmmaker Derek Jarman's later diaries, collected in a book called "Smiling in Slow Motion." You may remember I read his book "Modern Nature" several years ago -- his earlier diary entries largely about gardening at Prospect Cottage, his house on the shingle beach at Dungeness -- and even visited the garden soon after. "Smiling" is ultimately going to be a sadder book, detailing his period of decline before his death from AIDS in 1994. But while he mentions medical issues he so far hasn't dwelled on them, and the diary is full of gossipy observations about his friends and fellow show-business luminaries, not all of them complimentary. Jarman was a fierce critic of the sort of bland, corporate inclusion fostered by many gay rights organizations -- he called himself "queer" and lived a libertine life, and I love his rebellious energy.

Plus, he's so funny. On a flight from Berlin in 1992, he wrote: "I can't believe this, they've put a baby in the seat next to me! I cough and splutter and say loudly to HB, ' My AIDS is playing up today.' In alarm, the entire family relocate."