Merry Wives

Oh I've been looking forward to this for ages! Tonight we're going with some friends to one of the productions in the Cambridge Shakespeare Festival - The Merry Wives of Windsor. The festival lasts for a few weeks and the plays are all performed in the university's college gardens. Merry Wives will be in the Fellows' Garden at King's College, usually out-of-bounds to the hoi-polloi! I just love a bit of outdoor Shakespeare, there's something even more magical about the story unfolding as the evening falls.

Though now I think about it, there was the occasion, a July night, when things weren't quite so idyllic. We went to see A Midsummer Night's Dream in our local park - little fairy creatures were lolling in the branches of lantern-lit trees, scattering us with petals as we strolled towards the amphitheatre, full of anticipation and excitement for the evening ahead.

Unfortunately the wind suddenly got up. Just as Oberon was transporting us with,

I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,

Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,

Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine
There sleeps Titania .....

I let out a blood-curdling Lady Macbeth-type scream as the No Smoking sign flew through the air and struck me a fierce blow on the head.

Don't worry, I've checked the weather forecast - the omens are good for a calm evening.

What are you doing this weekend? Enjoy yourselves, whatever it is!