The V&A's Fabric of India exhibition starts with an 'Oooohh,' as the first thing you see when you walk in is this enormous summer floorspread that must have been like sitting in a field of poppies. If I hadn't managed to lose the notes I took on my way home, I'd tell you all about dyes made from chay root bark and pomegranate husks, luscious reds and golden yellows, shimmering cloths of gold and silver and muslins so fine you could surely pass them through a wedding ring. I was aching to touch and stroke and throw bolts of fabric over my shoulder. Less interested in the contemporary designs towards the end; the zip-up sari does not seem an improvement in elegance on the original. I'm sure I'll be going back for a second look but it was a real treat today with hardly anybody there. The shiny trimmings on this dress fabric are jewel beetles' wings. 

I wasn't going to ... but of course I did, as soon as I noticed it was down to £9-something on Amazon. Had to be done? Even though I've probably only made about two recipes from Vol 2? Feeling a bit silly as I'd resisted the Honey&Co baking book which I actually wanted more.

I like a big, fat book for autumn evenings, something to get lost in, a page-turner that's not too challenging after a wallow in Downton Abbey.
And although I don't normally care for sequels and prequels (unless they're as good as Longbourn, a rare exception),  I did enjoy Nelly Dean, the housekeeper's tale that fills in the gaps in Wuthering Heights. (You really do need to read the original first, or you'll get your Cathies in a twist. The story takes the form of a letter from Nelly to the former tenant Mr Lockwood and as she has already told him the story of Cathy and Heathcliff and the other inhabitants of Wuthering Heights, she isn't repeating herself - so you do need to know who's who. Alison Case is a professor of literature and she's assuming you've done your homework!)
This is Nelly and Hindley's story - and Nelly leaves the torrid lovers to get on with it off-stage. (If you  have ever felt impatient with grand passions on the moors, you might actually prefer this.)
Nelly is a battered child who comes to live at Wuthering Heights, sharing the childhood of the other children but not quite part of the family. It's ages since I last read WH; I'm sure I thought Nelly was boring, holding up the action when all I was interested in was smouldering passion. (It really is the perfect escapist novel for teenage girls.) But Nelly has her own secrets and passions ...
To be honest, you'll guess them well before the end but it's still an enjoyable read. I could have done with a whole lot less of the pages and pages of breast-feeding - but I'm not the maternal type. (Now I think of it, the only novel I can think of with so much action at the breast is Enid Bagnold's The Squire who was far too much of a Smug Sainted Mummy for me.)

Improvised comedy isn't really me. I used to hate Whose Line Is It Anyway? because they all looked so pleased with themselves. But this improvised musical was really clever.
Tonight was show no 619 and it was a love story (sort of) set in Marks and Spencer's in 1894, when the purveyors of Percy Pigs received a visit from Prime Minister Gladstone ... so, yes, it was topical.
The musical references, I'm afraid, passed me by ... I heard other older members of the audience muttering about this on the way home. It's no good referencing Dreamgirls and The Book of Mormon ...  we need Oklahoma and Guys and Dolls. (When did musicals stop having proper songs?)
But it was clever. A musical made up on the spot from suggestions shouted out by the audience. Tonight M&S Percy Pigs. Tomorrow it will be something entirely different.

It has been the most delightful weekend of golden, sunshiney autumn and this is where I was yesterday -

At a museum started by two elderly sisters ...

 In the old village school beside the duck pond in the artists' village of Ditchling.

 I was rather taken by these curtains for the Festival Hall dyed with madder, blackberry tips, indigo and weld. 

And wondered whether I'd be too precious ever to use a garden roller carved by Eric Gill.

I was very pleased to come across Tirzah Garwood's The Crocodile. Having a healthy schoolgirl appetite myself, despite having enjoyed a large breakfast (bacon, egg, sausage, mushrooms, black pudding and fried bread), I was by now just about ready for coffee and a large slice of carrot cake.

Later, in the afternoon, I strolled through an English vineyard, wished for the umpteenth time that I hadn't managed to kill off the grapevine in my garden - and enjoyed a sip of this.

This week's bunch of gladioli, bought so tightly in bud that it was hard to guess their colour, turns out to be exactly the same shade as my collection of old orange Penguins.
For some reason, this pleases me greatly.
(Pink flowers usually go on the other side by the Persephone shelf.)
Matching books and flowers...
I am expecting a visit from Homes and Gardens magazine any day now.

It is Open House weekend. Forward planning not being my strong point, it was lunchtime before I looked at the brochure - so that's why I had to stay local and visit this suburban Versailles. It's six years old, built by a Polish millionaire as a tribute to his grandmother who was inconsolable after the loss of the family palace back home.
What can you say ... if you've got it, flaunt it. There's some pictures here. (Poky kitchen - but look at that fridge!) Somewhere underneath the bling there is what I imagine must have been a perfectly nice Arts and Crafts house in keeping with the rest of the street.
The owner is a balletomane and recently took up ballet in his 60s. He has danced excerpts from Swan Lake in his gilded salon, we were told on the tour - by a member of staff who has mastered the art of keeping a straight-ish face - clad in white tights, and partnered by a prima ballerina. (Cue: distressed looks from British visitors, especially the men, as it will take some time to expunge this image.)
It did make me think of Hyacinth Bucket's candlelit soirées.