God it's hot!! and I'm all for tons of sunshine, but when the temperature keeps going over 100 it's enough to make a Brit long for rain. It's over a month since we've had a proper downpour - but I do have a secret weapon.

Ever heard of a cobber, you lot stuck in Greece and Majorca oh and Colorado go and get one now!!

It's a damn clever device that I first saw in LV 2 weeks ago but silly me I looked at it and thought "well that's not going to work" and didn't buy one. I ended up ordering one off the internet after I'd done a little research. These things come from the Aussies - who are pretty cool at keeping cool in the heat. Think scarf with gel inserts - you soak the gel so it swells up and then you wear the thing around your neck - the cobber cools the major arteries either side of your neck and so lowers core temperature - not dangerously so - but enough to keep you cool in a heatwave. Since Friday when mine arrived I've hardly taken it off when outdoors (word of warning DON'T wear it indoors if you have air-conditioning)

Over the weekend I've been fighting the battle of the bind weed. They call it Morning Glory over here (!!) - english term for penis standing to attention when men wake up - bind weed sounds far more insidious. This stuff is horrible it not only sucks the water away from the roses or other plants that need it - it strangles them. I've got scratches all over my forearms from having to pull this stuff out of the middle of rose bushes - painful but worth it. It doesn't help that E the renter next door lets his Dandelions and Bind Weed run riot in his grass.

On a much lighter note - we went to see Johnny English on Friday night - hysterically funny. They've basically extended the Barclaycard ads from the 80's and made them into a film (including Boff). Loads of in-jokes - we even heard Chris Tarrant doing the breakfast show and Trevor MacDonald reading the news. But the bit that made me nearly fall off my seat was the car chase - ever since they bought speed cameras to UK (they don't make the roads safer they just make the local authorities richer) I've wanted to blow one up with a missile - priceless! Oh and I've finally broken into Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - the tree guy was supposed to come yesterday so I had to stay by the phone - JK Rowling is a genius - don't want to finish it but on the other hand can't wait to.