Flowers And Worries

Talking of flowers, they were looking wonderful down my way this morning, being, like the leaves, edged with frost - and I can also report that a goldfinch (perhaps the same one I noted in a post last summer) was singing fit to bust, writes Carshalton rhapsodist Nige. However, one or two things that I caught on the news last night are worrying me. It seems the French have suddenly been infected by sanity - you wouldn't think it, seeing the unfolding chaos on the nation's transport system, but it seems the public have moved behind Sarko and, for a wonder, against the unions. Polls show 70/80 percent want the unions to back down, take their medicine and be grateful. This unheard-of development suggests that, just maybe, France is going to go the way of the rest of the world, and thereby, perhaps, become more like it. Domage... And then there was a ghastly young auctioneer, having just flogged Hugh Grant's Warhol (I think), declaring with unblinking certainty that there will be 'no end' to the boom in contemporary art prices. This cannot be true, as a moment's thought confirms, but the truth is that Old Master art is now seriously underpriced (as is good antique furniture). My tip to anyone with real money - buy Old Masters, buy good furniture, and, of course, buy property in frost-rimmed, bird-haunted Carshalton. You won't be sorry.