Driving

Can I just say, and it's my blog so I can, that the 300 miles I drove yesterday, Nailsea to Birmingham to Broadway to Birmingham to Nailsea, were the worst summer all-day driving conditions I have ever experienced. Not a glint of blue sky. Not a sign of rain stopping at all. Two hold ups on the motorway for accidents. Whilst showing my mother round Snowshill Manor a bird shat on my head and in the context of the day's driving that didn't seem so bad. Mum fired a lamb and mint sausage across the National Trust tea rooms in an over-enthusiastic piece of cutlery use and compared to the day's driving it wasn't even embarrassing.

Charles Wade would have got on well with my Mum. He compiled a collection now reduced by the National Trust to 22,000 pieces and only bought the Manor so he could house it. He lived in the outbuildings. Mum is an equally avid clutterer.

Wade collected anything. Samurai armour bought off the local plumber, bicycles, toys, musical instruments. All there and unlabelled; Wade didn't like labelling. My Mum would have taught him not to throw away back copies of the Daily Telegraph though. 'So much interesting reading.'

Anyone feeling cluttered and overpowered by material possessions should go to Snowshill. Their home will, unless they are very eccentric, feel roomy on return.

We had a Parochial Church Council meeting in Nailsea last night. By comparison with the day's driving it was a breeze.