The world from my window

On Sunday morning, there are two sheep sauntering in a very confident manner down the street. Unfazed by the local peloton of cyclists zooming past in formation, the sheep look right, look left and then look right again before crossing the main road, heading in the direction of Lyme Regis. They'll be corralled in a garden soon, way before they have the chance to place their towels out on the sand or frolic about with buckets and spades. Their adventure will probably be over within minutes. But they're out there, giving it a go. I am out here too, with two little girls laden with sweets from the village shop, each one far exceeding their £2 allowance, Young children are canny like that. They knew I'd lose count once the liquorice bootlaces and fried egg candies started going in the basket at speed. There were just too many figures to add up in my head. Unlike the sheep or indeed their grandmother, who got a grade three CSE in maths three times (even with private tu...

On a balmy summer night, we pootle down to Lyme Regis and manage to find a space in the car park near the Cobb. We don't want to be late because we understand a certain gentleman is due to arrive, along with a small band of supporters. We're here to see Monmouth , the Lyme Regis community play and we want to be in on the action, right at the start. You see it was here, in June 1685, that the Duke of Monmouth landed, intent on gathering a rebel army along the way to seize the throne from his unpopular uncle, James II. The Monmouth Rebellion, which I've written about before , led to the last battle on English soil, some thirty four years after the English Civil War.  It could have worked but, for many reasons, it didn't. It was a sad episode in our history. And the bloody aftermath was shocking, with the notorious Judge Jeffreys ordering men to be hanged, drawn and quartered, left, right and centre, their remains displayed around villages and towns to act as a war...

On the first day of the New Year, brave souls in fancy dress head for the sea at Lyme Regis in the now traditional ‘Lyme Lunge’, organised by the local Rotary Club, in aid of Macmillan Cancer Support. ‘Dip into the balmy waters of Lyme Bay,’ the promotional material states. You can almost hear the  Cadbury’s Caramel bunny doing the voiceover . But it’s cold in that there ocean. My brother swims about six strokes and then he’s out, like a flying fish. Rather him than me. Go to A Dorset Year for more. That's about it. Love Maddie x

I woke up this morning, drooling on my pillow like Patsy from  Ab Fab . My hair was sticking up on one side and a trail of clothes led to the bed. I can't find my coat and I hope it's still in the pub. Some weeks ago, Ding Dong Daddy asked me to help him out with the disco in the pub on New Year's Eve. It wasn't exactly like this, but not dissimilar. All afternoon, Ding Dong Daddy and I worked in separate houses, putting our playlists together. Messages pinged back and forth, a conversation on Twitter included Caitlin Moran , the writer Marian Keyes favourited one of my tweets and the violinist with the Smashing Pumpkins  and I had a bit of joshing on Facebook. Things could only get better... Well, Ding Dong Daddy and I played back-to-back. I sneaked in Siouxsie and the Banshees, followed Tom Jones with Tom Jones, peaked too early with The Monkees, got back in the game with Lady and Sing It Back and then emptied the dance floor with James Brown's T...

Last night, I went to the Marine Theatre at Lyme Regis to see Guy Masterson's show Under Milk Wood . It was a wonderful one-man encapsulation of the comedy, sadness and lyrical beauty of Dylan Thomas's radio play. The dreams and nightmares of ordinary people in a small town, wishes that will never come true and memories of the long-dead. It is a book I remember well from school, where we read it in class and I was always cast as Polly Garter, with her dress up over her head having babies. It has been in and out and around my brain for years: 'And before you let the sun in, mind it wipes its shoes.' My own Enchanted Village is a bit like Llareggub, with its own versions of Ocky Milkman, Dai Bread and his two wives, No Good Boyo, the Ogmore-Pritchards, Organ Morgan, Willy Nilly the postman (he knows the contents of all the letters he delivers) and the long-suffering Mr Pugh, who fantasises about murdering his dreadful wife. As I write this, Mr Grigg has just popped next ...

It is overcast here today in the village. Little pockets of sunshine occasionally break through the clouds. The trees gently rustle in memory of the great winds that blew through them over the weekend. A cow wails like a whale along the ridge above the allotments. Despite a distinctly unpromising start, there has been plenty going on. Given the choice between a barn dance open to all and sundry at the Boden ranch and an invitation-only chilly, chilli barbecue at the Logginses, Mr Grigg and I plumped for the latter. Up at the Loggins abode the conversation inevitably turned to logs. Mr Grigg has come up with the ingenious idea of following the power cables to scoop up the spoils left by the electricity board tree fellers. A veil of boredom suddenly fell over the women's faces. A sleepy Sheepwashlet face nearly landed in the semifreddo . Mrs Darling Loggins glared at her husband. 'Can we talk about something else other than bloody logs? When we go to bed at night you even read ...

A group of us is thinking about pooling some of our resources and investing in a communal boat. A boat, at a time when the credit crunch is biting hard and we are all meant to be pulling in our horns because nearly all of us are feeling the pinch. So what better time to get a boat, when prices are low and everyone is fed up? Especially when the village is so near the sea. Near enough, but not so near that we get tangled up with day trippers and second homers. The reason for this possibility is that we suddenly have an opportunity. And we're not sure what to do with it. Some years ago, when Mr Grigg was having a Howard's Way moment, he put his name down for a mooring at Lyme Regis . This is the place made famous by fossil collector Mary Anning, in Jane Austen's novel Persuasion and John Fowles's The French Lieutenant's Woman. The place where ichthyosaur skeletons were discovered, where Austen's heroine Louisa Musgrove dramatically banged her head because of her...