1. Now on twitter at mattapple1

Best people following so far are Ben Fogle. The TV fop tweets: “Cor. Just chased four burglers [sic] from my garden while they were trying to break in to my house. Police everywhere.”

Alys Fowler tweets: “One-Armed Farmer Reveals The Most Over-Looked Secret That Grows You Mouth-Watering Organic Tomatoes http://gurlx.com/uei”

Ben Goldacre tweets: “I have been writing about this since 2000 and 3: nice to see govt and Daily Mail catch up tho http://bit.ly/7hgiwG”

Landscape man Matthew Wilson tweets: “To [sic] snowy Lincolnshire to film the first day of the second series of 'Landscape Man'. V exciting, if a little parky.”

Cleve West tweets: “Rained here during the night...ice skating anyone?”

Guerrilla gardener Richard Reynolds tweets: “More guerrilla Christmas tree decorating reported in the Daily Telegraph with a picture from Wimbledon Common. http://tinyurl.com/ybem8rv

I attempted to start a Rage Against the Machine style Christmas viral campaign to fill the media with pics of guerrilla garlanded (can you see what I did there) street trees. Very few of the gardening media tarts took any notice. Oh well, maybe a sleeper for next year.

2. This is some of my feedback from guerrilla garlanding requests: Huh, fat chance around here. A couple of years ago Weston Super Mare took down their tree because they couldn’t stop it being vandalized. Obviously to have done anything about the vandals would have infringed their human liberties so this was the only course open to the council. The preferable alternative of  stringing the little thugs up to the top of the tree as a substitute for the fairy could  be seen as politically  incorrect, however since the fairy is usually female (even in Weston)  such an action could be seen as a welcome blow for sexual equality. Please could you get a ruling from Harriet Harman on this.

Also... Why not go and decorate one yourselves, and film it? Make a great fun video, plus could go viral...

3. Monty Don has been hard at work listing what gardening gifts to buy. All men like a blade apparently. http://alturl.com/fuvf

4. Lookalikes: HTA's David Gwyther and 'my name is' Michael Caine.

5. http://alturl.com/ckbz

Some new stats on building over back gardens, a story that has been dead during the housebuilding recession.

6. http://alturl.com/95do

Sister mag Regen goes on about ministerial departments paying too much for plants.

7. Talking of politicians, Peter Mandelson said:  “If you ask me where in 15 or 20 years’ time I’d like to be, it will be probably on a farm somewhere close to the land, getting up early in the morning.  I want to be able to grow my own food.  Look after my own farm animals, worry about the weather and get the timing of my harvest right.”

8. And Michael Heseltine says he blames himself for explosion in the number of magpies there are in the UK now because of his 1981 Wildlife and Countryside Act making it illegal to cull ‘nuisance birds’ without a licence. Parakeets are in for the reverse fate with new laws to allow their shooting.

9. Eden Project is organising another Big Lunch on 18.7.10. Maybe garden centres will cash in more this time as consultant John Connel suggested they might have in 2009, when one million had street parties to celebrate homegrown/local/community etc.

10. Kirstie Allsopp. A mole tells me her director kept repeating ‘more chat’ when filming Homemade Christmas. Kirstie says she was too tired to talk. She’d be nice really if not knackered, says my mole.

11. Diarmuid Gavin is on Celebrity Come Dine With Me Christmas Special on 22/12 C4 8.30pm with David Gest, Sherrie Hewson and Hannah Waterman. Daily Telegraph associate Tim Richardson asked where is he now in recent DT annual gardening review, naming DG as a ‘faller’ in his trends chart. Well, he will get more viewers for this than any gardening programme in 2009. Except Chelsea Flower Show, where DG is due to return in 2010.

12. Maxine Hardcastle claims in court she has been attached by former Playboy glamour model Louise Glover. http://alturl.com/tfv2. Maxine is the daughter of ‘19’ musician Paul Hardcastle, one of the two number one artists I have interviewed. The other is Kim Wilde. Where is she now? Merry Xmas everyone!

Latest from Daily Telegraph on climate change in Cumbria, garden gossip and reindeer's rights: http://alturl.com/q46t.

Lookalikes (and soundalikes): Garden Media Guild lifetime achievement winner Peter Beales and Garden Industry Manufacturers Association ex-president Peter Field.

From the press:

1. We’re in Private Eye ‘In the Back’ this week  - for the right reasons. We’ve been reporting that the University of  Warwick is closing Wellesbourne research station. HW quoted as blaming Defra for years of cuts to research funding, but saying Warwick was showing a complete disregard for a prime facility it was gifted at a knock down price. Investigative journalism at its finest.

2. “Tuta Absoluta sounds like an Austin Powers love interest, but it’s clearly going to be yet another source of heartbreak for the tomato grower.” From www.soilman. http://alturl.com/wxdp

3. Latest from Garden News Dec 8. Xmas trees are running short. Also, veg seed sales boom. It’s now 70 veg/30 ornamental. Dec 15. Poinsettia sales set to reach 4m.

4. Nick Herbert, Tory shadow environmental minister is after vegetarian Labour counterparts Hilary Benn and Jim Fitzpatrick by attacking meat-free Mondays. Are we meant I become part time vegetarians or vegans? And why single out meat? Asia’s paddy fields emit the same amount of methane as the livestock industry. It seems doubtful that a campaign for rice-free Tuesdays will be next (Independent). He will soon be in charge of the environment.

5. What’s it’s like to work at World Duty Free (Retail Week)

What is the world duty free ethos?

Relaxed intensity with a can-do attitude.

What sets you apart?

It’s a great place to work, has excellent employee engagement and we ork in partnership with all our key stakeholders.

How do you strive to retain your staff?

We live our company values-customers, passion, teamwork, respect.

6. Oliver Peyton (Telegraph) Looking after a garden is depressingly hard work but I’m very into gardening porn. My wife says that if anything arrives by post, she won’t accept it. I’m always making very expensive mistakes.

7. Alan Titchmarsh is ‘mid range (average appeal) according to the BBC. Kate Humble and Jimmy Doherty and the Hairy Bikers have top tier highly valued appeal, while Chris Packham is on his way up and worth investment says a list drawn up by an executive at BBC Knowledge, which makes documentaries and factual programmes.

8. Mephedrone is the new hot drug for clubbers. It’s a ‘plant food’ ‘and costs £10 a gram off the internet. You dance like a nutter and jabber like a fool apparently. http://alturl.com/jbd2. The weird thing is that mephedrone is not a plant food. In Britain, any substance sold for human consumption has to be licensed or subject to rigorous safety checks. So unscrupulous dealers market Mephedrone somewhat bizarrely as a plant fertiliser. In fact, Mephedrone (full chemical name: 4- Methylmethcathinone) is a stimulant described as 'two molecular tweaks away' from pure ecstasy.  'It is never used in any products that people would use to fertilise plants,' said a spokesman for the European Fertiliser Manufacturers' Association. In other words, you might as well give your plants cocaine or heroin as Mephedrone. Nevertheless, words such as 'plant food' and 'plant snacks' are used in all the websites selling Mephedrone. We found at least 30 websites in a few minutes.

 9. Christmas fun: http://www.bicton.ac.uk/christmas09.html

10. Rare praise: Re: your blog 'Climate change in Cumbria; annual gong show; reindeers' rights' on Telegraph website. I am dismayed to hear that '...I'm worried though because I've been told by fellow hacks that what I write is indiscreet' - Please ignore the hacks and continue writing your blogs (both DT and Hort Week) as all at www.qualitygardentools.com are readers. What would have happened in Nixon's America if Bernstein & Woodward of the Washington Post had decided to be discreet when 'Deep Throat' told them about Watergate?

Maybe the gardening world is not quite the same, but we all enjoy your blogs anyway. There is far too much boring 'my favourite hobby is eating baked beans' journalism in the horticultural world and too many hacks just re-hashing old articles (their own and other peoples) - so keep up the good work and ignore the others!

12. The RHS has apologised to members after a leaflet the gardening charity issued drew complaints because it shows a Muscari grape hyacinth instead of native bluebells and states that cowslips are a woodland flower rather than a meadow plant. RHS Hyde Hall in Essex issued 40,000 leaflets asking for donations to plant 35,000 trees costing £100,000 at the site over the next seven years. But the leaflet had two “basic” errors of gardening knowledge. RHS head of press Lynn Beddoe said: “We are very obviously aware of the mistakes. They are not something the RHS takes lightly because we pride ourselves on knowing our plants. The head of development was very apologetic. This was down to a printing process error with a stock shot not thoroughly proofed. We only received a handful of letters pointing out the errors. We apologised and explained.”

Garden Media Guild awards last week.  This picture speaks 1,000 words.

1. Geoff Whiten is new GMG chairman. Each person on stage got a very literal song to accompany them, eg outgoing chair Valerie McBride-Munro had 'Valerie' by Amy Winehouse. Whiten got 'Hi Ho Silver Lining'. Because he has a grey beard? He's a silverback? He often wins silver at Chelsea?

2. Whiten has asked GMG committee member Martyn Cox to set some long overdue judging standards for next year.

3. Coxy was seen late at night arm wrestling Gardener's World staff in the Master Gunner pub near the venue after the awards. He was winning. No-one went to the official after 'party' event. I had to leave early to babysit. But not before...

4. James Wong spoke to me in the Master Gunner. A nice guy. Won an award for his Grow Your Own Drugs. I said he'd won Cox's much talked about alternative awards most fanciable male because my colleague Magda Ibrahim had voted multiply. Said we'd checked his ethnobotany credentials and they stood up, disappointingly. Wong looked a little bemused.

5. The GMG awards are now run by a little-known magazine. Rather like Rodney Bewes running the Oscars. Or more like a Brookside extra running the Welsh Baftas.

6. When James Alexander-Sinclair won blog of the year he expounded the virtues of blogging as the way ahead. Amateur Gardening's Tim Rumball exclaimed loudly-'bollocks'. JAS does make most of his cash from picture-led features in national gardening mags.

7. Alys Fowler said I always wear bad shoes. I took one off and showed her the vegetarian shoe label. Alys was fishing for compliments about her secondhand orange suede cowboy jacket. Got none from me, other than 'it smells of death'. Mark Gregory said I was chatting her up. Peter Dawson was in checks. At least he didn't have his Mickey Mouse sweatshirt on.

8. Kris Collins won trade writer of the year for a piece in HW. His baby is due next week too.

9. Most popular winners-Wong, Mark Diacono from River Cottage, Wesley Kerr.

10. Most shocking-Carol Warters for a PR stunt on world leaders getting sent some seed packets. Jackie Bennett -an unlikely best columnist. Ken Crowther, not bad sex award but best local radio. The clip played: Essex lady. "I've got a terrible mole problem. They dig up my lawn and I've tried everything blah blah blah." Ken: "They are a difficult problem. There's not much you can do." If this was the best bit then it begs the question...

11. Another radio clip-"What should I plant at this time of year?" Answer: "Look in a seed catalogue or your local garden centre." Thanks. Does gardening work on radio?

12. Lose friends and alienate award. http://alturl.com/cbbw. Victoria's Backyard blog said I should have won an award and that papers used my story, only The Independent didn't, or something. I said the Indie is too skint to pay for it's own stories or for writers to write them, thinking Victoria was a standard gardening blogger who didn't know about this stuff. Seems she is night editor for the Independent. Oops.

13. Newsround's John Craven was there and took a gong. For a piece on bees. Or beez as he calls them-his teeth don't fit. I asked Craven if I could present the new Kid's Countryfile.

14. Alan Titchmarsh (on stage to collect best young garden hack), Joe Swift (presenter Andy McIndoe (who gave me the lowdown on the give her an ironing board for xmas story) made a gag about Patch Magic and GroSure for baldness), Alys Fowler, Toby Buckland (won green award for TV peat piece in which you could see producers operating strings attached to Buckland's anorak hood), Eric Robson (a Cumbrian hero)-they were all there. but no Carol Klein, who usually is good fun. The afternoon event climaxed with Peter Beales winning a lifetime acheivement award and was presented with a David Austin bouquet.

15. Seriously, I've been asked to give input on how to improve the awards. This is what I told the organisers.

3. The awards should not be run by a magazine. This year it was like Rodney Bewes running the Oscars. Or an extra from Brookside running the Welsh Baftas. Stop me if you think you've heard this one before.

5. Supporting material was not sent to judges. So if a story reaches national/international prominence and the entrant shows this, it should be considered. The context of a piece needs to be considered by judges, especially if the judges don’t know the context and influence a piece has, as they don’t seem to.

This year's judges: But who judged what?

Matthew Appleby alternative gardening awards 2009/10-bests and worsts. I wasn’t going to bother but someone (ie one person) asked me if I was going to after last year’s piece. So here goes.

1. News story of the year-Chelsea Flower Show downturn-hits zeitgeist of recession in City.

2. Worst news story of the year-Alan Titchmarsh Wikipedia site says he is writing a guide to the Karma Sutra.

3. TV show of the year-None. This was the year gardening took a year off TV. Everyone took a year off.

4. Newcomer of the year. TV-wise -no-one. Expect better in 2010. Matthew Wilson, Monty Don, Alys Fowler new series. Oh yeah, newcomer-see above William Appleby.

5. TV presenter of the year-Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall (Landshare, GYO, popular). 2^nd-Nigel Slater (BBC1, allotments, nice).

5 1/2. Lookalikes-Adam Frost and Ronnie O'Sullivan.

6. Departure of the year. Inga Grimsey (and 80 RHS staff). Fred Whitsey. Hurrans garden centres.

7. Comeback of the year-Rosemary Edwards rescuing Gardener’s World. Nicholas Marshall at Wyevale garden centres.

8. Worst TV of the year. Gardener’s World what’s hot and what’s not. Funniest TV: Alys Fowler making a guinea pig hutch on GW.

9. Party of the year-Tapas seven RHS lunch for journalists who wrote only nice things this year. Most sociable people-Tim Edwards, Andrew Richardson, Andy McIndoe, Carol Paris.

10. Disappointment of the year-Future Gardens. And the gardening hacks (ie most of them) who bigged it up without question.

And the next top 10. Ok 11.

1. Issue of the year-food security
2. Non-issue of the year. GM/peat-both never took off
3. Worst columnist-Ben Fogle's Sunday Telegraph country diary. Fogle typically will write wrote how roadkill is a terrible thing for the countryside when of course it shows healthy animal populations. Zoe Williams – I’m not scared of vegetables apart from celeriac. Basil is alive. 'If we were prepared to eat goat's milk by the 1940s, you have to ask, did we really need to have that huge war?' http://alturl.com/big5
4. Book of the year-The Alternative Kitchen Garden, Emma Cooper.
5. Bad sex literary prize-Radio Essex gardening presenter Ken Crowther’s ‘Two Weeks in Nice’ Apprentice gardeners Jack and Nick are on their first holiday away from their parents. They experience the gastronomic, horticultural and feminine delights of St Tropez and Nice.
6. Strop of the year. GW producer for having nickname revealed. BBC Chelsea presenter for having salary revealed. National Trust person on peat-free. Trade body person on trade show. Dozens by me. Bridges built now though.
7. Event of the year-Chelsea, Glee. Both unexpectedly good.
8. Best columnist. Seabrook.
9. New talent-me at Daily Telegraph.
10. Industry fun figure-Monty Don “I cry all the time, most recently when I realised the housemartins had gone away”. London Evening Standard's Pattie Barron announced a fab new collaboration with the RHS with a long PR quote from Inga Grimsey…on the day Inga resigned. Also talked about her 'London loam'. Lives in Brighton.
11. Lifetime achievement – Jim McColl