Exhausted but on a high

Here is fortnight-old sketch of Walberswick viewed from Southwold because I am too exhausted to produce something newer with the upheaval of getting my house ‘exhibition ready’. The private view was a resounding success. You couldn’t move for visitors and fisticuffs nearly broke out over ‘Mr King’s Cattle’. Fellow blogger and poet Glyn arrived early having kept within the spirit of ‘sketchercise’ and walked the two or three miles from St Albans station. People kept coming in waves and our final very welcome visitor of the evening was art supremo and über-blogger Katherine Tyrrel. Today (the first official day of the show) lots more people came and the day was hugely entertaining. My father arrived with friends from Northamptonshire as soon as the doors were open. Anyone who arrived after that couldn’t get to see any pictures until after they had been button-holed by Dad finding out which part of the world they came from and recounting anecdotes of his experiences of their homeland. So we had everything and anything including him demonstrating to our new next-door neighbours his facility in speaking Swahili. My old school friend Fiona arrived around lunch and having shared a room with me at boarding school was gobsmacked at how tidy my house was. (Tee hee little does she know). We had a lovely hour or so together. Then in the afternoon more friends arrived and to my delight I met one of my favourite bloggers, Judith in the flesh for the first time. I hope she enjoyed my friend Ruth’s demonstration of a headstand in the middle of the ‘gallery’ as much as I did. I’ve had such a wonderful time that when Robin arrived back from a long day out he thought I’d been on the sherry when in fact all that’s passed my lips are a few cups of tea. To see how the house looked before the hordes arrived (and before I’d rushed out to buy the requisite ‘gallery opening’ flowers) have a look at Flo’s virtual tour.