Not something I thought I would ever do but on Tuesday I was honoured to be invited to a Garden Party at Buckingham Palace – along with a few thousand others! Not sure who all of the Royal party were but the Queen, Prince Philip (on his 93rd birthday) and Kate were the star turns.  We were organised in ‘avenues’ so that they could walk between the crowd.  Tea was a couple of crustless sandwiches – yes there was a cucumber one, with mint – and small pastries. Whilst the food was as expected I was a little disappointed with the gardens – apart from the huge lawn the planted areas were nothing special , but then again I’m not the greatest gardener.

The grumpy old man in me had to have a moan about the ladies outfits – a large number of old-fashioned big prints on view, still at least the charity shops will have made a few quid!

Do you believe in coincidences? Eating lunch in the St James Theatre restaurant we discovered that the people sitting next to us were also going to the party (not that surprising) but they were from Ipswich too – Westerfield Road.

Forever the optimist – was I the only one with an umbrella?