10 days ago the world was still brown. We'd had rain - actually quite a lot of it at the end of July - but nothing seemed to have changed much. The lawn was still like coir matting and even the deep-rooted weeds were looking tired. And then almost imperceptibly the world started to change; just a hint on Wednesday, the merest suggestion on Thursday and then by Friday, green re-entered our dry world.
Curiously some of the first signs were not acvtually grass, but in the dust and gravel along the side of Norfolk's rural roads where grain spilled by contractor's trailers, having first provided a feast for the wood pigeons, burst into unexpected life. And now just a few days on the verges are definitely turning green - you can almost see them growing.
As for the lawns, even though we know - and are always told - not to water them as they will recover in September, this year did seem to be stretching our belief. But the grass is growing - and we're still in August. What a wonderful thing!
