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This feels like one of those absolute masterpiece albums that I should be familiar with. I’ve got a lot of catching up to do when it comes to my jazz noodlings. The early start with So What is, of course, exemplary. I have to confess that my introduction to this song was via good old Smiley Culture on the Absolute Beginners double soundtrack. Oh dear.

What I love about Miles is that you can never really tell if it’s a live album or not. This is a complement. The playing and arrangement are simply magnificent. This feels like it could equally have been a drawn-out recording process, such is the perfection captured in the live environment.

One play in and this already feels like a classic to me. I do very much enjoy exploring and discovering new jazz as I continue with my quest for knowledge.

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Yet more bloody tomatoes. Or more to the point, not so bloody red tomatoes, but yellow tomatoes.

Tomatoes are the new courgettes, right? They’re coming out of our arses, so to speak, right now.

The heat of the past few days helped to deliver these. We still weren’t quite sure if they were ripe or not. What shade of yellow do you need to pick a tomato?

But the heat had loosened them from the stems of the plant. This is nature’s way of saying get these down yer neck ASAP.

I did have the brainwave of making some tomato sauce out of them. Would it still be tomato sauce if it was yellow? Perhaps I should make mustard?

To be honest I haven’t really thought this one through.

Allotment life, innit.

The bass playing on this album is phenomenal, as you might expect. At first I thought it was a trombone, but nope, it’s Bruce plugging away and getting some extraordinary lush heavy sounds out of his bass. It’s also a very soulful album. All that guitar heaviness puts me right off Cream. Songs for a Tailor is a sound with some soul and emotion that I can get behind.

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We’re getting quite close to allotment BUMPER season here. Most of the growing has been done. The Estuary Wilds sun is working its magic, and then some. Everything seems to be exploding and growing at a tremendous pace these days.

I wouldn’t go as far as saying we have a fully rounded meal on show, but we’re getting close to self efficiency. Good luck in surviving on a meal of courgettes and tomatoes. That will be interesting if nothing else the following morning.

Don’t be fooled by the colour of the tomatoes. You say tomato, I say tomatoe, etc. These are yellow toms. They have proved a little problematic in that we’re not quite sure as to which shade of yellow signifies full ripeness. We didn’t want to take any chances, and so picked them a little early.

Meanwhile In Courgette News: loads of them. Bloody loads of them. Keep those courgette fritters coming. It’s my staple diet as we enter the hazy days of August.

Also coming up in August is the WAGA Show, also known as the Wivenhoe Allotment and Garden Association Show. Think the Lambeth Country Show without the vegetables shaped as penises. Although having carefully scrutinised the competition rules, there’s nothing overtly in there saying that you can’t enter a vegetable shaped like a penis. That will liven the stiffs up, etc.

I’m not sure what we’re going to enter. Artwork is even an option. I might dig out some of my CSE Grade 3 art from the loft and pass it off as one of my 2026 originals.

Estuary life, in it.

I’m not a fan of these confessional life story type albums. It’s the narrative as told by those wanting to write their own history. Sure, hip hop needs that bravado but there are two sides to every story. The beats and delivery are as tight as you’d expect. I wanted a bit more joy, a bit more happiness. I think that was lacking in the 2Pac story.

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Tom Waits, Small Change. You couldn’t get away with an album cover like that these days.

I never know when to start with Tom Waits. The trick is just to dive in, strap yourself down and be taken along for the ride. You can’t get all muso-obsessive in understanding what he’s done and where he’s going.

Small Change is no different. It starts with what I call the Waltzing Matilda song, which isn’t even Waltzing Matilda. He then starts to ramble as his bottle becomes increasingly empty.

I won’t call it a masterpiece but then I don’t want musical perfection from Tom Waits. It’s more about the mood. Small Change provides this.

Fella can sing, blue eyed soul and all that. But he ain’t no rapper. It just doesn’t speak to me. It’s not part of my world. I felt like I was only one step away from wearing a dumbass stupid MAGA cap.

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Falling Standards: How Evgeny Lebedev saved - then sank - London’s newspaper

Cracking read on the fall of a once proud title.

To Wivenhoe Town Cricket Club! …on Saturday afternoon. It was another hot and steamy one - and that was just the inner workings of my mind, having had to carry out the walk of shame back to the co-op, complaining that I’d been overcharged.

No worries. The perfect cool down and come down was a walk over to the cricket club, where the second eleven team were taking on their stiff counterparts from Worlington.

We rocked up fashionably late with the away team on 70 for 2 in the 20th over.

I can never resist the opportunity to snap away and capture different angles of anything I see. This led to a bit of an embarrassing incident when the ump called me out for a bit of movement behind the bowler’s arm. Apologies fella.

As ever, the outfield was bone dry. It looked an absolute replica of what Surrey had to contend with playing a supposedly ‘home’ match at Guildford yesterday. Saturday was not an afternoon for diving around on the Wivenhoe boundary.

We took our place on a couple of deck chairs just to the right of the pavilion. I was in the sun, largeing it up, whilst my cricketing partner opted for the shade. I soon dozed off and missed the first wicket for Wivenhoe since arriving.

I was wide awake however for a fantastic catch by a Wivenhoe player standing at square. He managed to control the ball, but unfortunately took a knock on the head when coming crash down on the rock hard outfield. Easy, fella.

The big lad bowling medium pace for Wivenhoe with a funny run up then bowled the other big lad for Worlington.

The big lad with a funny run up had the most amazing hop, skip and a jump approach to his bowling. It was almost impossible to second guess what would follow.

What actually did follow was a very sheepish young fella strolling up to the crease for Worlington. The poor young kid was clean bowled first ball. Ta for coming, etc.

Another young kid then followed. Unfortunately he was caught behind, leaving the visitors in all sorts of trouble on 159 for 8 in the 35th over.

Another clean bowled action followed. The poor old Worlington No. 7 looked pretty much stranded as he was rapidly running out of partners at the wicket.

A little more dozing off followed and a few more wickets also tumbled. I was awake to see a fantastic catch after an initial fumble from a Wivenhoe player, leaving Worlington 169 all out.

Ah, but what about the return innings from Wivenhoe, I hear you ask?

I’m afraid the Crap Match Report will have to live up to its name. I had domestic duties back at base and had to bugger off.

A decent few hours or so.

To the Table of Dreams! …on Saturday morning. The town and the public playing field were absolutely deserted. I suspect this was a combination of the holiday season and the fourth incoming heat wave of the summer.

Phew, what a scorcher, etc.

We pressed on with our usual corner to corner warm up. The forehands were working out well, not so the backhands. I soon got bored and gave out the command to throw for serves.

My playing partner got incredibly lucky with a couple of shots which graced the edge of the table with the finest of margins. If I was being picky then I would make her play these again.

The wind picked up slightly. It was nothing to be chilled about. It was a most warm Estuary Wilds wind that just added to this sultry atmosphere.

A young kid made his way down a path on a scooter. He smiled as he went past us and gave out an incredibly friendly “Have a nice day.” Same to you, little ankle biter.

I did experiment with some spin. This was completely ridiculous. It involved standing about 3 or even possibly 4 m away from the table and playing my usual spin serve. It worked for the first time, with the ball stopping dead on the other side of the table.

Further experimentations failed badly. It led to a 3-2 defeat.