WHERE? WHAT? HOW?

One that those of you with weekend tickets really won't want to miss. 

HCPFS: ANY GOOD GOSSIP?

• Peter Seabrook is officially a skip diver. He told an anonymous informant that he'd had "thirteen canes" out of a HCPFS skip earlier in the week and they "already had beans growing up them."
• Press Day was hit by a typhoon and many exhibitors were left in three inches of water. The culprit was apparently Royal Palaces, who won't let the RHS use the solid marquees from Chelsea cos they don't look nice enough.
• Cleve West dished the dirt on his problem allotmenteers: they sound like they are from hell. In a bad way. 
• A certain well-shedded lady is soon to have a blog of her own once more. We rejoice in this news.
• Helen Yemm seen arriving for the Gala looking extremely lovely, in the company of a handsome gentleman...
• James A-S has got a Highgrove umbrella. How tippety-top class is that man?
• Paolo Arrigo of Seeds of Italy proved himself to be a chip off the old block, charming all the ladies in the Growing Tastes Marquee by getting them to "smell" his "soap". Just go and ask. 
• Rob Brydon took his baby in a push chair, and was reported to be "smaller" than Guerilla Gardener Richard Reynolds "would have thought". He also didn't want to buy a lavender bag. 
• The fairy tale image that heads this post is the Forest Squared, in Conceptual gardens. 
• I am listening to Snoop Dogg 10 Lil Crips, it's the only way to recover. 

SOMETHING FOR THE HOPELESSLY OVER-AMBITIOUS

Well there's good news and bad news. The good news is there's still plenty of plants for those of us greedily aiming to one day own National Collections. The bad news is I don't want to do any of those ones. 

HAMPTON COURT SHED SHOW 2

On the other hand, these, from the Museum of Garden History's stand, were also incredibly cute. 

They're in the Plant Heritage Marquee. The one on the right, which is supposed to be seventies, even has a space hopper. Woo!

HAMPTON COURT PALACE SHED SHOW

It's officially Shed Week! I know because Jamie Theakston and Emma B were going on about it this morning on Heart breakfast show. No, I don't know why I was listening to that. Maybe I was hoping for sentimental reasons to hear some vintage S Club. 

In tribute to everyone involved, especially Alex (whose love I badly want to buy) and Esther (whose crayola shed brings many admiring glances) I would like to present to you my Number 1 Hampton Court shed choice, as backed up by some small boys from a local primary school. 

It's an "Authentic Arctic Shed", so don't go thinking it's just some rubbish from Homebase. They're called "Kotas" by the Sami, who take them down and put them up again a number of times a year. They are also, according to the importers, incredibly warm because of the way they're insulated and due to the central stove. 

Apparently you can seat 16 adults, and sleep six. The small boy standing nearest to me said, "Wow, I could have that as my house." And he was correct. Though I suspect he would technically need his parents' permission. 

DEATH PLUNGE PLANTS HIGHLIGHT PLIGHT OF NEGLECTED CONTAINERS

Two window boxes of petunias and begonias are tonight recovering in a secret location after spending the day threatening to jump from a precarious ledge at the summit of Northfields' famous "The Plough" boozer.

 The police were called just after 11am when a passer-by phoned to say she'd seen "a couple of absolutely desperate looking containers" on the roof, from a nearby bus. 

Climbing equipment including a seventeen foot ladder was required, but fortunately the force were able to negotiate the safe descent of all concerned. 

Although there has as yet been no official statement, an insider spoke exclusively to us here at Baklava Shed: "There's a lot of alienation amongst these kind of container plants. They work hard all year, and then when it comes to official recognition from judges at shows like Hampton Court, they completely miss out. I think the begonias in particular had become quite depressed about the situation."

A spokesman for the Begonia Defence Association agreed. "I wouldn't be surprised if we see more and more of this kind of thing. It's very sad, but I think a lot of window box plants and container plants in general feel very undervalued and marginalised. They are often totally ignored all summer while owners fuss over their more exotic plants - getting underfed and watered whilst flowering their socks off. You can see how it would lead to misery, really."

Some nearby pelargoniums, however, were more sceptical about the flowers' motives. "You know petunias and begonias," they told BSC last night, "We don't like to be mean, but they are just very, very attention-seeking."

IT'S FLOWERS, JIM, BUT NOT AS WE KNOW THEM

I don't know if anyone else reading this shares my love of Cy Twombly, so I'm just going to plunge right in. 

I've always really liked very, very abstract art. I laughed all the way through Yasmina Reza's play because I could imagine being the person who bought a completely white painting because they just loved it. I've made pilgrimages to odd parts of the world, like Marfa, Texas, and Dia Beacon, N.Y., to see this stuff. 

But now at Tate Modern in London we have a new show by the man I'd nominate as the greatest flower painter of the century. If you are thinking along the lines of those seventeenth century Dutch masters, think again. Cy Twombly's paintings are more about the idea of flowers: the way they move in a wind, captured in a very different way to those immaculate Dutchmen.

The same goal in the end though. Finding out what the essence of a flower is, and setting it down on paper - or in this case, giant ten foot canvases. 

I thought it was beautiful. And inspiring. This painting here seemed to me to be all about dahlias and their funny pink spikiness. Instead of flowers at a single, idealised moment, these flowers are coming apart, losing petals in a breeze, tattered and real. 

There was nothing in the show that felt to me that it could have come from any other painter. Everything is unmistakably Twombly-ish. It made me think about what I'd felt was missing at Broughton (sorry to keep going on about it). The unmistakable sense that the maker is strongly present in the artwork. With Cy, whether you'd travel continents to see more or would happily chuck the lot in the bin, you never doubt that presence for a minute.