Paola in Milan tells me I’m mentioned and pictured in the July/August issue of L’Uomo Vogue, being the Italian menswear version of Vogue. The article in question is about dandyism, and they asked me to send press photos a month or so ago. I’d better find a London stockist.
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Last weekend the new tent arrived. Jen C allowed me to put it up in her Highgate back garden, by way of a trial run. Thank goodness she did: she and her boyfriend Chris understood the thing’s demon geometry far better than I could. I know more or less how it fits together now. Once you get the inner compartment connected to the outer flysheet, and the knee bone connected to the ankle bone, the instructions say it’s okay to leave them like this, forever conjoined in tent-based bliss. To take the tent down, you just extract the poles and pegs and roll this dual skin up, and off you saunter. Come festival day – when I’ll be camping by myself – the poles go back in and the whole thing supposedly springs into shape easily. Well, we shall see. There may be wailing ahead.
I was intrigued to hear about the new biodegradable tent pegs available at this year’s Glastonbury, and went to Millets in Kensington High St to buy some for myself. It does seem like one of those ridiculously obvious ideas. If metal tent pegs are left in the ground, particularly with their heads snapped off to a vicious spike, they’re a clear hazard to hoof, foot and soil. The biodegradable pegs, made from potato starch, are not only lighter to carry and flexible enough to avoid spearing a passing cow, but if left in the ground they eventually break down entirely. As would I.
So I tested the green pegs (coloured green, to ram the point home in both senses) in Jen’s garden. Their jagged shape does make them much better at anchoring than their metal counterparts, but it takes far more force to shove them into the ground and pull them out afterwards. And if you’re not careful, the top of the pegs can snap off in the process. I had to leave one such decapitated specimen in Jen’s garden. ‘It’s okay, it’s flexible and biodegradable,’ I blushed feebly, attempting to pull the thing out.
I tried a few metal pegs alongside the green ones, and they were much easier to use, with less grunting and no snapping, and could be pulled out with no fuss. But then again, there were no other tents around, the soil was soft, and I could easily see all the pegs I’d put in. Solution? I’m taking two packs of the green ones, with a few metal ones on standby.
