calendar girl...

I try not to swear.

I try to be articulate and use interesting and creative English when I speak and write.

But sometimes there are just moments in this life when no other words except certain expletives will make the grade.

And so it was just before Christmas when I was doing a bit of pressie shopping...

Picture the scene - a busy shop, a large queue which seemed to be moving at a snails pace with myself around the middle of the throng. My back hurt, I was tired of being pushed about, shoved and tutted at as if I was continually in everyone else's way and all I wanted to do was purchase the book I was queuing with (Wild Gourmets) and go home.

To pass the time, my eyes wandered around the shop, the fellow peed off shoppers and the surrounding 'impulse buys' which were stacked around the tills. They finally rested on a calendar called 'Grow it'.

I found this calendar particularly amusing as it had a wonderful picture of an elderly gent in his back garden veg patch, surrounded by his wares - but wearing a vest, a flat cap and smoking a cigarette. From the colours in the photos I guestimated the photo as originating from the 60's.

'Ha - that is priceless', I exclaimed to my companion, as I spun the calendar over to see what other dated health faux pas were contained inside.

My eyes scanned once more and rested on August.

'Bloody hell - that's my sodding garden'.

A few heads turned. A few eyebrows raised. I stared intently at the image representing the month of August 2010.

It was an image of my first ever show garden staged at the NEC in 2008 - a contemporary vegetable garden based on the 'reduce, reuse, recycle' mantra. Oh, and a recipe for something using courgettes.

Of course, I duly purchased one for the press file (resisting the urge to buy one for everyone I knew - yes - I was that excited) and scurried out of the shop.

Now, I knew nothing about this calendar, and it was pure chance that I picked it up and had a gander. There were no credits for the photos on the sleeves either, so I will never know who took the photo (it was not one of mine - I did check).

So there you go - I can officially call myself a Calendar Girl.