Sunbearable

But this chronic allergy of mine was not the deciding factor in not making the trek to the seaside at the weekend. None of us, frankly, could face the hassle - which, bottom line, means being stuck in jams for what seems like days.

So instead of hours on the road we spent 20 minutes driving to a picturesque village with a huge communal green incorporating a cricket pitch and a babbling brook that finds its way under a medieval arched bridge over a ford which has been concreted to make it passable for traffic.

The adults took it in turns to watch the cricket, wade in the water with the kids or doze under a massive oak tree - ideal spot for someone with a sun allergy.

More good news came in the shape of a succession of white van men. Yes, that might sound like the other sort of news at first, but these buffoons took it on themselves to hurtle through the axle-deep ford as though they were Lewis Hamilton in order to produce waist-high spray to drench the assembled kids and watching minders. Brilliant.

I couldn't help but think that kids have been doing this on sunny days for hundreds of years. But we have the advantage of idiots in white vans. That's progress for you.

More good news from the weekend. We made the pilgrimage to watch Fraser Hooper, arguably the best clown in the world, just as I said we would last time I wrote about him. Both Jessica and Rebecca loved being called up on stage to help with bits of business, and I became part of a four-strong team of no-longer-young, no-longer-slim blokes who lost a tug of war to a tiny girl of about five. Brilliant.

Great cold coffee concoction at Starbucks (I won't hear a word against them) and we acquired another ukulele from the music shop next door.

Today brought more glorious sun and some really bad news. The heat meant that many waiting mothers at the infants school gates were all doing this strappy top and skimpy skirts thing. It wasn't the pipe cleaner white legs and exposed flesh that disturbed me. I've been on nodding acquaintance with many of these women for quite a while now, some of them lovely people, and some of them with obvious wit and intelligence. But it was only today that I noticed the extraordinary number of them who sport tattoos. I've never seen these ladies so exposed, you see, and, dear old fashioned thing that I am, I found some of the Amy Winehouse-style body art on display depressing and disfiguring.

Is this a generational thing? I can't help but wonder what I'd have thought if my mum had had a snake tattoo curled round her upper arm. But - and this shows my age as well - she never had to wait outside my infants school to take me home. I walked home with my friends.

Am I wrong about tattoos? To me there's no ooh, just a lot of tat.