Unable to watch TV in daylight, finding closure in a drama series, adapting gardening practices due to climate change, a preference for pyjama-clad relaxation, and acquiring an exotic animal license. Stifyn Parri has discovered a lot about himself this season.

I’ve discovered something really weird about myself. I can’t sit and watch telly in daylight! What’s that about? This means that all summer I won’t be able to catch up with all those recordings that I’ve collected. By the time the sun has finally gone down at the end of a very long day, it’s time for me to go up. I seem to have a tendency to stash vast amounts of drama series, reality shows and documentaries for winter, like a squirrel with its nuts.

I’ve been ridiculously tentative about watching the last ever episode of Succession, stupidly hoping to make it last forever, I suppose. However, for the last week or so, I have had very intention of finally pressing play. I even, at one point, wrote it on my to-do list, once and for all, before I completely forgot the series’ plot. I worried that even the reminder at the beginning of every episode would fail to trigger a memory of any plot-lane what so ever. To cut a long story short, it actually happened last night. I forced myself to finally watch the last episode, and sat there transfixed. I had to wait for darkness, though, before I could actually have the confidence to commit to pushing the play button. Anyway, I loved it, and now can close that chapter in my head, make room for something else and move on. But, move on to what? Who knows? I’ll have to look at my list. I’m one of these people who makes a note in my phone of recommended programmes and films to watch, but that list is now longer than the A470, and will probably stretch to Scotland by the time the nights get shorter this mid-autumn.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. I do love the summer, and its light evenings. It means I have more time to spend in my favourite room- the garden. The summers seems to be getting hotter and hotter, don’t they? My garden got absolutely baked, if not fried last year, as if someone, up there, turned the heat up to full whack!

This year my garden has been like a pizza oven, where some things have thrived and others looked like they’ve been blowtorched. My future husband, Monty Don, claims we need to rethink how we plant in our gardens as the weather gets more and more extreme due to global warming. I imagine that if last summer is anything to go by, I will be growing banana by next year, just before I adopt a couple of giraffes, half a dozen pelicans, and an occasional zebra.

Meanwhile, back in reality, there is something else I’ve discovered about myself. I’m loving my own company. I don’t know about you, but since the lockdowns, whenever some gathering or event is cancelled, I am filled with absolute joy. In my younger days I would have been devastated, but now it’s “yippee, get ya PJs on” and chill.

Surprisingly, embracing solitude can be a source of contentment. So, as I water the garden, dreaming of adopting exotic animals, and preparing to clear out my entertainment library- no more episodes of Come Dine with Me or Succession for me- I’m looking forward to the unpredictable, the hilarious, and the joyous with open arms, knowing that life is meant to be lived, celebrated, and savoured- both in the company of others and in the delight embrace of solitude.

Have a great end of summer, you lovely lot, and speak to you in the autumn, when it’ll be time to fall in love, once again, with my log burner. Forgive me, Monty.