English summer days

Today's weather has continually changed character, raining one moment, sun shining the next - and sometimes raining through sunny spells. The cloudscapes have been utterly amazing; skies I would never tire of painting if I were an artist (although I might die of frustration at not being able to capture them adequately!)
In the run up to the Jools gig at the Larmer Tree Festival, I wouldn't have put money on our chances of staying dry - but we were blessed with a bright, breezy afternoon and evening.
Such fabulous grounds - this 'grande arch' not the only interesting piece of whimsy. In one folly, full-size figures modelled and dressed as an elderly vicar and his wife, clutching festival programmes in their fabric fists. Amid the trees, multi-coloured hammocks strung in quiet clearings. Along pathways, mini-avenues of roomy tents with a plethora of healing practitioners enticing festival-goers into their opulent interiors.
An alternative marketplace with stalls selling the usual fare, an artists' corner, beer tents and a separate 'snacksville' area. Brightly coloured lanterns promised a magical effect after dusk - although it was magical in dappled sunlight,too.
In daylight, the main stage somehow benignly innocent of the energy about to erupt... which I only managed to fix digitally as blurry dark shots whose foregrounds are filled with people's backs...
Jools always puts on a brilliant performance. There are many things in this world which transport me to another dimension, and a Jools gig is one of them (though, to be fair, two and a half hours of dancing is likely to create altered perception without Mr Holland et al). Interestingly, the opportunity to see him often coincides with important transitions in my life - which will add to the intensity of the experience...
But it's not simply the music - which is always superb - or the line up (guests included Lulu and Ruby Turner this time), but the passion and verve with which he inhabits showmanship as well as music.
At the Larmer Tree gig, mirror balls in the trees played with the light beams to decorate the leaf canopy, and peacocks called through the night...
Wonderful.
Home about 2am, and since then, time feels like sand in my fingers, as if I overspent from my pleasure bank and am somehow repaying with interest...