This oppressive Government is beneath contempt. Wimbledon can go ahead with full crowds but kids are seeing school proms and parties scrapped along with sports days, end of term plays, concerts, Brownie and Scout camps, residential courses. There will be no singing or dancing at my wife’s cousin’s wedding as it finally goes ahead at the 4th time of asking but in pubs and stadia across the country folks will sing, dance, not just sit at tables of six as they watch the Euros. Of course, at the G7 folks broke all of the silly rules in place as VIPs can’t catch covid. There is no logic in any of this it is just mean and oppressive. And masks?

It is not an attic at all. It is a small room built into the oldest part of the house whose door faces you as you enter the utility room. So it is a larder.  The brickwork you see in the second photo is one of the reasons the Welsh Hovel is listed. It is the old brick and oak beam exterior. Sadly this brickwork was repointed with concrete so when one of my ships comes in, at some stage, I shall get that repointed with lime mortar to restore it to its original beauty in full. Anyhow, back to what Joshua calls his attic.

I kid you not. This is the best ice cream I have ever tasted. Substituting home-made elderflower cordial for 5/6 of the milk added to the cream, sugar and vanilla essence I then added in some elderflowers, parted from their stalks by Joshua, and into the ice cream maker it went. In the freezer overnight, what Joshua and I tasted for breakfast was simply divine as you can see below. Perfect for taste and texture with that added crunch from the soft flowers.

IKEA has become the latest firm to respond to woke snowflake tantrums and to pull its adverts from the little watched news channel GB News. It says that Andrew Neil’s channel does not share its “humanistic” values without being able to cite one instance from its 60 hours on air of why this is the case.  As well as being a betrayal of free speech this is rank hypocrisy from a company operating four stores in Saudi Arabia.

At first lockdown was to flatten the curve, then it was to save the NHS – the envy of the fucking world. Now it is to achieve what? To try to eradicate what is only the 30th most common cause of death. Let’s go back to the NHS and a killer chart showing bed usage.

Che Guevara was the “hero” of the Cuban civil war whose face adorns T shirts of the naive across this globe. He would have been 93 today and folks like Union boss Howard Beckett are rushing to praise him, showing their complete ignorance of history, as you can see below. The left often hates history. Facts can be awkward. So Howard celebrates with the late Che showing solidary with other victims of racism, homophobia, transpobia, etc, etc. Er…

It seems that on the other side of the river from the Welsh hovel, the plague – now with a 99.9% survival rate – is again raging among the English infidels. Cheshire East and West, I cannot remember which is which, are now designated zones for surge testing. It is not that they are awash with cases. Whole parishes, including the one on the other side of the Dee where Joshua attends nursery, are deemed white zones, that is to say almost no or no current cases. Incidentally, is that not a bit racist in suggesting white is good and er….

Yes, as you can see below, notwithstanding badgers, slugs and birds, we have our first strawberry from the patch I created on badger hill. I picked it yesterday while weeding and after snapping this photo ate it. It was superb. And there are many, many more coming up just behind. Strawberry ice cream for Joshua and me this weekend!

Grossly overpaid BBC star reporter Jon Sopel, the man so famously called out as a purveyor of fake news by Donald Trump, went abroad today and had his passport stamped. And he was so shocked he tweeted about it. Really? Why is he shocked by that? One senses that little Jon is not quite over the dirty plebs voting the wrong way on Brexit. Diddums.

I should be the ideal target for Andrew Neil’s new GB News which launched last night. I am right of centre, think the BBC is a disgrace, Channel 4 is fake news and that ITV is woke nonsense whose reporting of Trump should have been an imprisonable offence. And for that reason gave up on TV news a while back. But I did not watch GB News last night. And I doubt I ever will. Despite its celebrating winning the ratings war, here’s a secret: I am far from alone. Here are the stats GB News is celebrating:

I have now had a chance to quiz brick pointer Johnny about the snake he spotted here at the Welsh Hovel. Johnny said he had never seen a snake in real life before so, after it hissed at him then slithered away, he gave pursuit. Only after work on Saturday did he go on the internet to find out what sort of snake it was.

Okay it is not anything too extravagant but some jolly decent radishes from Joshua’s part of the garden and some lettuce from my part produce our first 100% homegrown dish. The oil came from the Greek Hovel so the only cheat is a touch of bought vinegar but this is almost self-sufficiency.

I need 200ml of the stuff to make elderflower ice cream so on Saturday I went picking elderflower, wading through grass, nettles and weeds in the top meadow which are almost as tall as me, in order to get to the bush by the churchard. Twenty five heads went into a pot with the zest from four lemons onto which I poured 1.5 litres of boiling water and left it to stand overnight, under a tea towel.

The most famous person in these parts, apart from my cat who starred on Panorama’s Neil Woodford special and has been receiving fan mail ever since, is Eleanor Farr, aka Miss North West Charity girl. And she wants us all to give money to help her plant trees. Her green shite maths is off this planet.

It is all bottled up now. The smaller bottles are cordial, the beer bottles beer, the glass at the front is beer. Joshua and I have both sampled the cordial, diluted with water, and it is pretty good. Meanwhile, the beer is fizzy and like a sour and yeasty lager. The cost of making all that lies in front of you is under a quid and the cordial will keep us going for months. What you see is minus two bottles of each which I handed to neighbours today on my way to pick up elderflowers which will soon become cordial, champagne and ice cream. Watch this space.