AN EASTER BUNNY BOILER

Oh to be in England, now that April's here. I spent my rehab week back in Blighty, visiting friends and marvelling at the beauty of the English countryside in spring: lambs gambolling in the fields, daffodils in bloom - I marvelled for hours, stuck between junctions 6 and 10 of the M1 where the traffic was at a virtual standstill due to road-widening works.

I went into therapy to cure my blogging addiction. Retail therapy. I swept through M&S, Boots, W.H.Smith, Virgin Megastore, John Lewis, New Look and Sainsbury's like a locust. My Belgian Visa card went into meltdown and I had to resort to the spare. I met Vi Hornblower for lunch in Debenham's, where we took the weight off our credit cards over a couple of sundried tomato and goat's cheese filo tarts, washed down with an iced frappuccino and a freshly-squeezed cranberry and passionfruit smoothie. Gosh, it seems centuries ago we used to meet for a cup of tea and a buttered scone.

I spent a couple of days in London, and managed to squeeze in a trip to the Zoo where the new Gorilla Kingdom had just opened. It's terribly stylish, I think Lawrence Llewellyn-Bowen had something to do with the interior, as the residents didn't look too impressed. I gazed with wonder at the large silverback alpha male, who stared back impassively. He appeared to wink. Probably just a tic. However, I nearly had apoplexy when he vaulted the fence, loped up to me on his knuckles and shook my hand politely.

"Lady Daphne, I presume?" he inquired in a surprisingly posh voice. I don't know why, but you'd rather expect a gorilla to sound a bit like Phil Mitchell, wouldn't you? Gorilla Bananas (for it was he) introduced himself. He was in London on monkey business, and had recognized my trademark fruit basket hat, which he advised me to remove before the other gorillas mistook it for breakfast. When I had recovered from the shock of meeting the Great Ape in the flesh, I invited him for tea. He is certainly a most eloquent animal, and I was charmed by his delightful manners and the way he crooked his opposable thumb when he drank his tea.

I returned to Brussels to a rabbit stew bubbling away merrily on the stove, in the form of a comment on my last post from an old hoofer I worked with in Paris many moons ago in my previous incarnation as a dancer. I used to be a little coy about my former artistic career, for fear of Harold finding out, but now I don't have to worry. Or so I thought. Bette Noire claims to have seen my late husband in Milton Keynes, at the wheel of an Audi TT! A beige one, I shouldn't be surprised. I cannot believe my beloved Harold would have done a Lord Lucan. And to find out he might still be alive, just as I was coming to the end of the traditional African mourning period and was looking forward to wearing French knickers again. The shock has been so great that I fell from grace. I lapsed. I had to resort to a stronger crutch than chocolate. I am a fallen woman.

Readers, I am blogging again.