Free Planet Janet in Orbit by Dyan Sheldon

practically vibrating with spiders (which you’re not allowed to kill, of course). Also, it’s totally filthy (apparently Robert doesn’t just want to save the whale, he wants to save dirt and cobwebs as well!). I can appreciate the idea of getting back to Nature (it is a common theme in music, literature and art, after all), but if we got any further back we’d be in a cave.
    The primitive living conditions aren’t the WORST OF IT though!! The worst of it are the Hotspur progenies. Exhaustion rendered them pretty quiet last night, but today they’re wide awake. If there’d been a crystal ball handy at their births, the parent Hotspurs would have been totally justified in drowning them straight off if you ask me. I have NEVER come across such totally obnoxious children – and you will remember that I am related by blood to Justin Bandry and live next door to Jupiter (who was banned for life from the local swimming pool because he pushed a little girl in when he was only four). Marcella’s not even a teenager yet, but she looks older than I do (here is ABSOLUTE proof that children are growing up too fast nowadays, just like the magazines say!). She
never
stops talking. Either she’s banging on about herself ( ME ! ME ! ME ! and I ! I ! I !) or she’s criticizing everyone else (esp. her father). Lucrezia’s nine and totally demented. One minute she’s laughing and skipping about like she’s been hitting the organic white wine and the next she’s transformed herself into the Monster That Ate Wales . The only positive thing I can say about Lucrezia is that she’s refusing to talk to anyone but her father – and she only shouts at him. (In my humble opinion, Buskin’ Bob should spend LESS time saving the planet and MORE time looking after his children.) I tried to discuss this with the MC but all she’d say was that Marcella’s just at that age (I said, “What? ELEVEN ?”) and Lucrezia has problems (which is like saying the army has a couple of guns).
    Buskin’ Bob and the MC went out to look for birds in the rain. The Hotspurettes wouldn’t go. I wouldn’t go either, but I didn’t get a chance to refuse. It was assumed that I’d stay in the hut with them (childminder or what?!!). Since there’s no TV – even if we had electricity – I went to find a book. Other people leave mysteries and bestsellers in their country homes for imprisoned guests, but not Buskin’ Bob. It’s all stuff about politics, etc.! Found something called
No Logo
. I thought it might be a novel set in the fashion industry, but it isn’t. Apparently it’s “a convincing analysis of the superbrand”. Started to read it anyway, since it’s the only book he has that doesn’t give me a headache just seeing the title.

SUNDAY 26 AUGUST
    Question: What’s WORSE than being stuck in the Wilds of Wales in a primitive shack with NO ELECTRICITY and two of the most IRKSOME children ever born?
    Answer: Being stuck in the Wilds of Wales in a primitive shack with NO ELECTRICITY and two of the most IRKSOME children ever born and having to sit round the fireplace every night singing “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?”!!!

MONDAY 27 AUGUST
    Robert’s book is actually pretty interesting. It says at one time it cost Nike $5 to make shoes it then sold for at least a hundred. And that’s not all!!! Nike once paid a mega-famous basketball player $20 MILLION to advertise their gear – which was more than it paid ALL its workers in Indonesia in the same year! That is a bit off, isn’t it? This is obviously an example of the injustices Nan was banging on about. Must ask her if she’s read this book. (It could solve the problem of what to get her for Christmas. I reckon she’s probably got enough candles by now, and Robert’s copy’s in pretty good nick. I’m sure he’ll never miss it – not when he’s got global warming and starving Third World farmers and all those political prisoners to worry about.)

TUESDAY 28 AUGUST
    Lucrezia