13 DECEMBER 2008, Page 71

A. Spare his feelings and yourself any power struggles by

telling the man the white lie that you have bought the property because the garden so closely replicates in size and positioning another garden — make up a name such as ‘Heavenland’ — where your husband was very happy as a child and it is your ambition to recreate that garden as accurately as possible. Every time he then tries to introduce something which offends your own sensibilities you can invoke the name of the mythical perfect garden and say, ‘Oh, what a shame we can’t have that. But they never had it at Heavenland!’ Q. Can you shed any light on a song called ‘The Nicky Haslam Calypso’ which does not seem to be in the charts, but everyone is talking about?

A.L., Fordingbridge