I am on a train speeding through the Swedish countryside en route to yet another tough assignment. I am going to write an article about Scandinavia’s first nudist B&B for The Times (www.hyltebergagard.se). I have covered (being the operative word) some weird and wonderful things during my journalistic career but this promises to be one of the more unusual.

Packing was tricky. “Why the bag?” was Rupert’s first question. I cannot begin to imagine what it’s going to be like. Will I be able to have a normal conversation with a total stranger while he is naked? Will I be able to stop myself from looking ‘down there’? Is looking ‘down there’ encouraged or frowned upon? What about my own ‘down there’? How will I cope with people who’s names I don’t even know casually assessing it. Whatever else, it’s not an ideal time to have a bad hair day - anywhere.

The weather in Sweden has been amazing for once. But despite that Leonardo asked me this morning why it is always cold. “Because we’re in Sweden,” I told him. There was a slight pause. “Then why are we here?” he said.

This is a fair question and one that I can only answer with the excuse that having been born here and lived here for several years, there is something that draws me back again and again. Luckily Rupert seems quite taken with it, although he is now also sick of meatballs.

Which brings me neatly back to the theme of the day. “I have one ball with my willie,” Leonardo told me proudly yesterday. “Yes,” I replied. “And one day you will have two balls, like Daddy.” He looked at me rather questioningly and then asked; “Yes, but will they be tennis balls?”

Here’s hoping they won’t, and more crucially that any balls I happen to catch a glimpse of during this assignment are not enough to put me off my breakfast. Bed, Breakfast and Balls. It could catch on….

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

I would like to give you all an insight into my hard working life. Rupert and I are in St Tropez at the chicest hotel in town, Byblos, which has been the best address in St Tropez since 1967 when Mick Jagger married Bianca on a terrace here. Guests include Brigitte Bardot, George Clooney and, er, my husband and I.

We are on a most gruelling schedule. Here is the itinerary for today:

Breakfast at leisure

Free time to explore St Tropez

1.00pm Lunch by the pool

18.00 Spa treatment

19.30 Cocktails and dinner at B bar.

I think you will agree that this is far too much to expect a person to do in just one day and support me in my letter of complaint to the National Union of Journalists.

As if this isn’t enough, tomorrow they expect us to go for lunch at Club 55. We will no doubt be forced to eat and drink for several hours while watching the waves gently lap the shore and spotting celebrities in exile from the Cannes Film Festival.

Is there no end to our suffering?

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

In order to break into journalism in England I was forced to become a financial journalist on leaving university. This was not, as you can imagine, my natural environment. I worked for the gripping title ‘Trade Finance Magazine’ which shortly after I joined became ‘Project and Trade Finance Magazine’. You can imagine my relief. I am still unsure of the difference between the two.

Anyway, for ten years I struggled on, despite an inauspicious start. I got back from my first ever meeting to find my editor fielding a call from the person I had interviewed who had called to ask her why she had sent “this bimbo who knows less than nothing about trade finance” to interview him.

Finally I gave up journalism altogether, only to reinvent myself as the Sunday Times French Mistress and lifestyle journalist years later.

I have now broken into French journalism which is extremely exciting. Barring the obvious problem that I am unable to write French I think it will go swimmingly. I am a columnist (which is rather like going straight in at number one) for a magazine called Santé.

My first column is Me and my foot cream. I feel I have finally found my level….

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a piece for the Guardian’s book blog about how the literary heroes of our youth never change. For example, I was in love with Heathcliff and Darcy when I was 16 and I probably still will be when I’m 60.

Spurred on by Rupert’s dismay that the children watch such rubbish compared with the stuff we grew up on, I ordered the three original Star Wars films. What a treat. We watched all three in rapid succession, it was fabulous, an inter-galactic feast.

I was mad about the films when they first came out and have not seen them since. It was amazing how much I remembered from almost thirty years ago and how the music still gives me goose-bumps.

But something has changed. Back then I was madly in love with Luke Skywalker. He was the first love of my life. I thought he was totally gorgeous. I doubted any other man could ever compare with him and his light-sabre.

Now he reminds me of Leo and I would rather cook him a plate of pasta than go on a date with him. As an Irish friend of mine put it; “It’s all about Han Solo now.”

But the scary thing is that even he looks too young and fresh-faced to really get excited about. So while our literary heroes might remain constant, men in films do not. Do you remember, for example, the first time you saw Gone with the Wind thinking how OLD Rhett Butler looked? Now he looks younger than me. I think I will stick to books.

On another note, I have made it into Private Eye, the satirical magazine read by the media in England and feared by the politicians. This is an extremely exciting moment (even more exciting than being reunited with CP30). The subject of the article is Zoe Williams’ vitriolic attack on me and her basic errors (see blog below One book better than two?). She is made to look like a fool which she thoroughly deserves, not least for calling me a ‘no-mark’. Something I thoroughly object to being called by someone I have never heard of.

Here is the text of the Private Eye article:

Guardian columnist Zoe Williams found herself very exercised recently by what she called “a small but seemingly quite flourishing eddy of publishing” encouraging British women to emulate their Gallic counterparts.

“Let’s try Two Lipsticks and a Lover. This is by Helena Frith Powell, who is English rather than French, but - praise be to God - met a Frenchwoman once, who told her what one needed to achieve Frenchness…This no-mark Frith Powell, and when I say I am amazed, I am not being hyperbolic, this really does amaze me - managed to string her observations about the French into another book, All You Need to be Impossibly French.

This would be a fair observation, but for three things: firstly, that Frith Powell is half-Italian and half-Swedish; secondly, that she may have met rather more than one Frenchwoman, having lived in the Languedoc region for the past eight years; and thirdly, she has only written one book on the topic, All You Need to be Impossibly French being the name of the US edition of Two Lipsticks and a Lover.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

When I was a little girl dreaming of becoming a journalist I would look at my stepfather’s Sunday Times and wonder if one day I might be good enough to write for it. It seemed an unobtainable aim, but I imagined reporting from trouble-spots around the world, one of the bravest and best foreign correspondents the Sunday Times had ever known.

As some of you may know, I do write for the Sunday Times, I have a column about living in France called The French Mistress. But this weekend there was a special surprise for me. On page two there is a list their top writers in the Sunday Times with pictures. There among the likes of Michael Portillo, Christina Lamb and Marie Colvin was moi. So it’s official, I am a top writer. I was terribly excited by this, despite the fact that while Lamb was reporting from Zimbabwe and Colvin’s dispatch came from Basra I was writing about, er, Botox.

But do not underestimate the dangers of botox, get it wrong and your eyebrows droop. Not a good look. Even Mugabe is unlikely to do that to you.

Obviously next week I’ll be reporting on matching underwear from Afghanistan.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

I have finally made it into the Guardian newspaper, twice in a week. I wrote a blog about romantic literary heroes that don’t age, then appeared in a piece in today’s lifestyle section. Today’s article is not flattering (read it here if you can be bothered, it goes on a bit). The writer, someone I’ve never heard of called Zoe Williams, clearly loathes and detests me. This is not unusual in a Guardian writer. She says she is ‘amazed’ by me, calling me a ‘no-mark’. What’s that exactly? I can only assume that she is referring to my wrinkle-free complexion, something I am rather pleased about. She goes on to insist that she cannot believe how I managed to string out my observations about French women into one book, let alone two.

It was around here that I got confused. I know I write books with more regularity than most people have their eye-brows plucked, but can I really have missed one? What is this second book about French women?

It was then I twigged: Ms Williams is referring to the US edition of Two Lipsticks and a Lover, called All you need to be Impossibly French. How unfortunate. It is one thing writing a vehement attack on someone, but to get such a basic fact wrong is rather, well, sloppy.

Ms Williams has every right to refuse to take care of herself (as she so proudly states that she does) but she should really take more care in her research. Moreover, she is guilty of missing the point of my one book about Frenchwomen. It is not that I think that Frenchwomen are a superior race, nor do I think that English women should be condemned for not looking good. However, I do think that one can both look good and be intelligent; it is these two qualities that one should strive for. I said in the book that I thought that English women had a stronger sense of sisterhood and I would always rather go out with a group of them than a group of French women.

If Ms Williams had bothered to read one of the books - rather than thinking they were two separate books - she would have learnt this. But maybe she was too busy stroking her goatee to care!

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

OK, so who was it? Which one of you is responsible for the following letter?

Hi Helena.

Best…
Richard

This email ranks alongside those ‘I’m a Nigerian prince and want to give you all my money’ or ‘my name is Jonny Wilkinson and I have been secretly in love with you since I spotted you in the crowd at the Marseille Velodrome’ style mails.

My husband maintains he has never heard of Richard and that it wasn’t him. Most of my friends are too lazy or busy to pull a stunt like this. Maybe it was my step-children in revenge for my column about how spoiled their generation is? Maybe Leonardo is a precocious internet user? But the only celebs he knows are Spiderman and Peter Pan.

Whoever it was, I didn’t fall for it. As if I would be seen dead next to Trinny and Suzannah. I mean, puhleeaaase.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008

It was the American journalist and critic George John Nathan who said “I drink to make other people more interesting.” I would like to add to that. I drink to make myself more interesting. Last night I was so intent on not making a fool of myself and/or waking up with a hangover that instead of piling into the champagne at the Sunday Times Christmas party I drank water.

God I was boring. I could hardly bear to hear myself speak. What happened to the entertaining, witty girl about town I am convinced I am? She was a sober shell of her former self.

There has to be a happy balance. Just enough drink to make you and others interesting but not too much. I am going to spend the rest of the week trying to find that balance and will report back.

Meanwhile I can tell you that the absolute highlight of the evening was meeting fellow bloggers Wife in the North and Rachel from North London. They were great. I only hope I didn’t bore them too much in my sober state. And Pat Cash the tennis player was there. He told me he is now on the “oldie” circuit. He claims to be all of 31. It’s enough to make you reach for a drink…..

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2007

We have just come back from Venice where we were invited to the launch of a joint venture between the estate agents Savills and a local company called Views on Venice. We stayed in a penthouse apartment overlooking the Grand Canal. The weather was amazing, sunny and warm, and we walked for hours on end, discovering parts of Venice that I have never seen before.

Another thing I discovered is what I most miss about living in England. I thought it was M & S or Waitrose or Bendick’s Bittermints. It’s not. It’s the girls. We went out for dinner Monday night after the launch party. There was the Savills PR girl Fiona, Rupert, three other female journalists from The Standard, the Mail on Sunday and Country Life (did you know by the way that it comes out weekly? Amazing, I can’t think what they find to write about. Apparently they have a dog of the week column now, is that animals or women I wonder?) and me.

Anyway, we sat down to dinner, ordered vast amounts of wine and had such fun. Having lived in France for seven years I have forgotten that all women are not forever counting calories and refusing to drink more than one half glass of wine. These women wouldn’t drink any less than half a bottle each. And OK you might wake up with a hangover, but all the laughing you’ve done must counterbalance the health threat of the alcohol.

English women are great. They are feisty, fun-loving, generous, warm and just fab company. Even Rupert, who was severely out-numbered, had a good time. I cannot imagine a group of French women having such a riot, and they certainly wouldn’t have drunk their way through four bottles of wine. Topics of conversation ranged from journalism (and how crap it can be, but then you do get to go on trips like this), children, men (and how crap they can be, except for Rupert, obviously) and whether to give up your maiden name when you get married. No is the answer.

Had I been out with a bunch of French women, I may have woken up feeling more clear-headed than I did on Tuesday morning, but where’s the fun in that?

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2007

OK, so we lost, but it’s only a game.

You have my permission to kill anyone who says that. It’s not only a game, it’s the WORLD CUP and we lost, rather unfairly I think. I was in a bar full of French people supporting South Africa. Helllooooo??? Aren’t we all Europeans together? Apparently not. But we were gallant and Jonny was glorious. Percy Montgomerie doesn’t stand a chance. And what was that fall into the camera all about? “That’s Percy,” said a friend of mine who was watching with me. “He sees a camera and he throws himself at it.”

I propose a knighthood for Jonny and a permanent statue in Trafalgar Square. I will be designing a fountain with a vast statue of Jonny in the middle for our garden.

My scoop in today’s Sunday Times didn’t make it to the international edition but you can read it here. You can also read my seminal piece about Jonny in the news pages (since when was the fact that we all love Jonny “news”?). Someone at the paper put some stupid joke about the Aussies and All Blacks in the middle of my text which they got wrong, making me look like one of those awful women who talk about rugby but know nothing. Which of course I am. And they messed about with our scoop, making up some drivel about a lavender garden and cutting out the brilliant neighbour completely. I can see why people hate journalists. But as I have experienced this weekend, it’s often the editors or subs that make stuff up, not us.

Meanwhile I am pleased to report that Olivia is showing signs of becoming a true French woman. She sent her first text to me today. “Olivia + Quentin,” it read. “Darling,” I said. “How sweet, your first ever text. I’ll keep it forever.”

“Don’t keep it forever,” she responded. “I might get another boyfriend.”

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2007