Pop!

Sometimes I do think champagne lacks class when it comes to opening time. All that loud popping, the froth eruptions, the giggles. It's OK if you've just won the Grand Prix and you're already a mess, I guess, but in the morning at least I much prefer the silent symphony of the first poppy of the season popping its cork.

At last, after weeks of promise, of poppy pinching to hold the orchestra back until everyone was ready, the first poppy of the season flips its lid.

Disshevilled at first, the newly hatched bloom stretches its crepe paper petals to catch the light. But it's a cloudy day and the opening is leisurely, as if it has just woken from a long, curled-up sleep.

By mid-afternoon it's getting into the swing of things, opening up its radar dish to collect the signals from heaven. Huey is pleased.

Many of the others are still lagging behind, but sprinkled with the early morning dew they look willing enough. Hold on, I'm coming!

Just a single spot of colour gives a hint that this punk is ready to rock. If poppies were people I always think by the look of their spiky punk hairdos that they'd also wear a safety pin through their nose and listen to Johnny Rotten or The Saints.

Anyway, the good news is that Pammy's poppy patch is back in business for another winter of vases colourfully filled with the simplest, prettiest flowers from the garden.