The world from my window

We sat in our seats, the lights went down and there was not a whirr to be heard. At the opening night of our very own Lush Places cinema in the village hall, we had a few shorts, including the Happy video I made with a friend last year. And then it was the turn of Effie Gray, a beautiful film made by Emma Thompson, featuring a great, mainly British cast, and based on the true story of the ill-fated marriage of Victorian art critic John Ruskin. The ladies in the audience, in particular, were gripped by this tale, even though nothing much really happened. 'It was miserable and too long,' said one of the men. 'Aren't you glad you're not married to someone like that?' said a husband to his wife in the front row. But it was a hit as far as being the first film of our community cinema was concerned, despite the man behind the scenes (and behind the stage curtain like the Wizard of Oz)  poking his head out from the side of the roll-down screen as the st...

A nation holds its collective breath as one half of the country is gripped by Royal Wedding fever and the other decides to use the extra day off work to go shopping. It’s a bit like that in The Enchanted Village. There will be those of us who will ignore all the fuss this Friday and instead climb up to Bluebell Hill. Our souls will vacuum up the carpet of loveliness in between the beech trees. And then we'll gaze out from the Scots pine to the sublime view across vale and sea. I’d like to think that would be me: free spirit, free thinker and not even a conservative with a small ‘c’. But that’ll be the Sheepwash household then. A family of principles and no time for tosh. And then there will be others, like the Griggs, the Bancrofts, the Champagne-Charlies and the Putters who will be rah-rah-rah-ing it in the village hall in the afternoon. We’ll have bunting, union flags and jelly and ice cream. We’ll drink from pretty teacups collected by the elfin Tuppence, using teapots ...

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's back to the future as we prepare to leave Singapore for dear old England, if the gale-force winds allow us to land. Singapore: clean, spacious, well-managed, traffic-flowing, entertainment island, party- until-you-drop, old buildings like Raffles, new buildings that look like spaceships, Chinatown, Little India, black pepper crabs, smiling natives, tourist buses, river boat cruises and the gorgeous taste and smells and colours of all that food. Plenty of Singapore noodles but no time for a Singapore Sling at Raffles, Pondside, as your English double, Mrs Bancroft got there first. However, a trip to Vancouver - maybe to visit the Canadian rellies - could be on the cards... It's been an amazing trip and we're not home yet. That's about it Love Maddie x