I am in denial this evening, trying to keep my head above water after a first day back at work fraught with problems and danger! While I’ve been away, lots of my stuff has encountered unexpected ‘challenges’ that have been waiting for a fortnight for me to sort out…..oh dear.

So, I’ve decided the best way to combat gloom in the face of adversity is to do supper that is 100% home grown – except for salt, pepper and oil – even the oil has only travelled from Devon to grace our plates! At least from this I can glean a bit of smugness even if it’s a relatively small bit.

We’re having tortilla – eggs, onions and potatoes from the garden, tomato and red onion salad with basil and chilli, also all from the garden. It’s a crap growing season but I’m still going to eek it out as much as I can. I do still have a few things going on in the veg patch and the sunshine of the last couple of weeks has helped without doubt.

Within a couple of days, I expect to be cropping ripe sweet red peppers – how cool will that be in this terrible summer?

These tomatoes are a miracle based on my mentor, Geoff Hamilton’s advice – he said I could spray my tomatoes with copper fungicide and still be organic, so I have and I’ve got a crop now that’s looking lovely instead of a greenhouse full of dead vines. I am basically as chuffed as ninepence about it.

Interestingly I’ve had no blossom end rot this year and am putting it down to regular watering, both in terms of volume and timing – my sexy new irrigation system is really fab.

So, I’ve picked them, washed them and the ones that are not in the salad will be cooked down tomorrow into sauce for another day. I don’t suppose this is a ‘giant leap for mankind’ but it’s good enough for me.

Hee hee, I've done better than last year with my toms - today a year ago, I was washing pots after my last bout of blight.