Spraznikom: today is Nauryz as celebrated in Kazakhstan. Nauryz is the new year celebration that coincides with the Spring Equinox. In fact this gives rise to one of the good reasons to spend some time in Kazakhstan: three or four new year parties. 31 December, 7 January, 22 March and another one that I've forgotten. Anyway, to the millions of people from all over Kazakhstan, enjoy the day. I believe this is also a festival for all Muslims: let's hope for a happy day for everyone, despite the goings on in Iraq. DW

A question from a regular of mine caused the cobwebs of my economic knowledge to become firmly lodged so I hie'd me off to a library in search of the very simple answer. I found the answer I was looking for quite quickly and felt the walk in justified more than just a five minute read. So I looked at the Oxford English Disctionary, full version, letter 'F'. I bet you didn't know that the word flat occupies about three pages in the OED. It does! In Who's Who 2002 there is only one person called Utting and there are no Duncan Williamsons. David Beckham is there and so is that dunderhead chef Anthony Worrall Thompson ... he has hundreds of names all in a row and I was a bit surprised to find that he's older than I am. Debrett's Peerage is a fountain of knowledge and you can read about such luminaries as Jeffrey Archer and his appalling attempts at dressing up his schlastic attainments: a minor public school in Somerset and Brasenose College Oxford: it doesn't say that he was at Oxford for only a year and that he was on a sports not an academic scholarship. Peter Carrington is still there and there are Lords Spiritual by the dozen. There are Lords and Ladies that most of us never have and never will hear about. Since 1952 Phil the Greek (the Duke of Edinburgh to the rest of us) has been granted precedence over all men in the realm including, I was surprised to read, the Heir Apparent: that's Charles. That three feathered emblem that Charles carries around with him is nothing, apparently, to do with being Prince of Wales: they are not the Prince of Wales' feathers, it is the emblem of the Heir Apparent. That book costs £250 by the way and I am sure Abingdon is riddled with people who are fighting over themselves to read this mighty tome rather than the 10 - 30 other books that could have been bought for the same amount of money. DW

Some of the seeds I planted just over a week ago have germinated and I'm like a child when I see that. Childish enthusiasm will step aside when we start eating these plants! Aaaaargh! Planted loads more seeds last night to: herbs, climbers and flowers. Watch this space in June or July when I take some pictures. Sorry, they'll be here!!! DW

I went to Birmingham on Saturday to the Education Show: an exhibition for teachers to meet suppliers, government departments and each other! Three huge halls at the NEC filled with stalls that had all sorts of things on display. I came away with three carrier bags filled with booklets, papers and CD ROMS. I met a few people but I have to confess that the event didn't meet all of of my expectations. Never mind, I got a few ideas that could surface here in a while! The drive up was cold: really cold weather. The drive back was sweltering as the sun had broken through the mist and was boiling me half to death. I took a walk to Tesco on Saturday evening and had done the same the night before: 20 - 30 minute round trip including shopping. Then today, Sunday, Mrs W and I went to the garden centre to buy another cherry tree as our existing tree needed a cross pollinator ... now it's got one! We bought a peach tree too, plus an Azalea and some flower seeds. Cost a fortune and then Dima and I had to do some digging and moving. Mrs W, who's serioulsy into Feng Shui, was working on the positioning of the trees to bring out the auspicious and that meant digging up and transplanting three plants and then planting the three new trees/bush. Dima did much of the work, including spraying yours truly with ice cold water as we watered our new plants in. Half way through the digging we came across a major obstacle and big brick ... obstacle turned out to be a large piece of wood that took us ages to shift. Having identified it as wood, having thought that it was stone because of its colour and the sound the spade made when hitting it, Dima announced that it was probably a coffin or buried treasure. Of course it was neither! We came across half bricks and other stones, too that made or lives so much more interesting. We did a good job overall and the Spring and summer should help us to reap our rewards. Last year was disappointing as three of our then four fruit trees were hit by pests and didn't produce anything like anything decent ... the cherries blossomed madly but couldn't be pollinated, of course. I was also filled with glee when I spotted that some of the rocket seeds I planted last Sunday have germinated! Hooray! There you are, more slop and I'm kerry packered with all this digging and walking. DW