We’re having one helluva Spring here. The tree full of blossom above promises a glut of cherries by early June; but being a glutton, this is the kind of excess with which I can deal effortlessly. Our resident red squirrel is back – and he seems to have found a mate. We had our doubts about him last year. But his early interest in the fruit and nut trees this Spring suggests that he may be planning a family.

Most things previously thought dead are pushing out of warmer soil. The perpetual celery (not really celery, bit it tastes like a smoked version of it) has revived, the sorrel has recovered, and as always the mint that seemed so delicate when planted is now threatening to take over the world.

Best of all, a dry stick of a thing in the herb patch – I can’t remember what it is – has green bits coming through. It is a citronelle perennial (lemon taste) I’d given up for dead, but by some miracle the stone has been rolled back and It Is Risen.

In recognition of all this urgent sap, Jan has bought a couple of tomato plants. As things sprout, I know that it’s time to go to a good veg market and buy a tray of lettuces. The temptation to buy hundreds of the buggers is almost overwhelming, but we’ve learned the hard way to stagger the salad planting – otherwise the feeding of the 5000 becomes a cinch, which is a bit of a bind if there’s only the two of you.

With the bursting of Spring comes the opening of the supper party season. We had our first of the year last night. Driving over to Nigel and Charlotte is always a pleasure, because dinner at their tumbledown manor house always contains at least one major surprise. The house has many historic features going for it, but the one that impresses me most is that it was the location for the Dudley Moore Tesco commercial about chickens.

A meal in this ancient domain is usually multilingual, and this occasion was no exception. Overlaid on French speaking Germans were Ulster folk, Welsh (my old lady) and Nigel himself, who wanders from one language to another in a way that challenges my desire to insult him in all of them. There is no enmity in this casual rudeness: he has a go at my doom-laden prose, and I drink as much of his excellent wine as possible. Last night he wanted to keep his best ’88 St Emilion for the cheese, but I specified it from the word go.

During the meal, the few minutes spent discussing British political madness gave way quickly to how it is that the French seem to have managed to get everything in the EU flowing their way. The Ulster lady on my left related how (whatever one’s profession is, and despite EU rules about free access to employment) there are always reasons why it is difficult bordering on impossible to practice as a foreigner in France. All of us having suffered from this at some point or another, I felt able to observe that the Germans in particular were feeling less and less willing to tolerate French selfishness. Our German guest – despite being a confirmed francophile – concurred. The French may yet pay a terrible price for their intransigence in the end.

The problem facing all other EU members is that the French have the nicest country, the most equitable weather, the most cheeses, the best wines, the nicest restaurants, the longest lunch-hours, and the emptiest autoroutes. How long the other 26 nations will go along with French arrogance in return for this remains to be seen. In the meantime, nature continues to behave in the way it always has, producing abundance in the knowledge that one unexpected thing or another might wipe it out.