Tree surgery; clutch; comedy snippets

Have been wrangling for some time over what to do with the conifer in the garden that has been growing with splendid enthusiasm into next door’s garden. At the time Ray planted it looked like a brown, awkwardly-shaped overgrown twig, and I recall joking that it looked dead. Ray maintained that it was still alive and needless to say he turned out to be right; it has since then grown into a healthy-looking, shapely green specimen - but, as it was planted close to the boundary with number 51, a big part of the healthy-looking green portion had started growing into their garden and was starting to look in danger of twining itself around their children's trampoline. Ruth toyed with the idea of chopping it down, but I was too sentimental to allow this so we ended up doing an amateur piece of tree surgery, with her lopping off the portion that was growing into next door, while to prevent it falling into next door I tugged on a piece of twine tied around its trunk. We can be hired for larger jobs.

Since the New Year our cheery if slightly too laid-back electrician Chris has completed another few bits of work in the house, including a bizarrely-positioned shaver socket (at an informal debrief, Ruth and I agreed that we really should have decided beforehand where it was going to go. Bet the people featured in Living Etc never make that sort of mistake) and, most noticeably, an enormous red pendant lamp that Ruth bought from Heal's, to replace the more modest white pendant lamp that I had installed last year, but which didn't give out enough light. The new lamp certainly gives out more, albeit red, light - what with the red walls, not sure how this might look to the people who back on to our house.

Chris also disconnected the socket set into the kitchen chimney breast, in preparation for probable removal of the chimney breast at some point to create more space in the kitchen - though given our record so far with house refurbishment, it could be a while before that happens. A man from Aqua-King came to service our boiler on 11 April and asked cheerily (or possibly slightly mockingly) after the progress of bedroom 3. Ruth has concluded that our favoured tradesmen now know us too well and that we must move.

Sudden problems changing gear a couple of weeks ago resulted in having to fork out just short of £400 for a new clutch. I had been hoping that all that was needed was a top up with a bit of gearbox oil, but no such luck apparently. I am inclined to trust Anglos as they have on a couple of occasions investigated potential problems that turned out to be false alarms and not charged me for the labour, so didn't dispute their diagnosis. When I went to collect the car, Shelley, one half of the duo that owns the garage, announced "That was broken!". I know, I replied, the mechanic phoned me earlier. No, literally broken, she advised me; apparently the clutch plate had a crack all down it and had actually broken apart in the mechanic's hands when he removed it. A necessary repair then. Now pondering whether I change gear particularly roughly.

Travelodge living during the weeks continues. Had a cold a couple of weeks back and didn't fancy cold food - an exciting combo of cheese and oatcakes – for my dinner, so perused Waitrose for ‘just add water’ snacks. Picked up an Ainsley Harriott version of Cup-a-Soup (acceptable) and two products by itsu, a noodle pot (wouldn’t do it again) and a pack of miso soups (haven’t tried yet). This week I was moderately organised and managed to make some dinners (stir-fried tofu and noodles) in advance which I boxed up and am storing in the office fridge. Have to eat them cold, but it's an improvement on oatcakes.

Flicking through a ‘Toys R Us’ catalogue/supplement that arrived with the local free paper a couple of weekends ago, I was struck – in addition to being struck by the nauseating pinkness that still identifies the ‘toys for little girls’ pages – by the scatological nature of some of the toys on offer these days. As Exhibit A, Baby Born’s ‘Interactive Potty’ – when you sit the doll on the potty and press the button, you get to hear ‘funny tinkling sounds or her passing gas’. Excellent. As Exhibit B, ‘Barbie Potty Pets’, featuring Barbie armed with poop-a-scoop and cat litter tray. I suppose the second could be regarded as vaguely educational in the sense of familiarising kids with the requirements of real life pets. Not sure about the first; that may just be gross.

Spent most of the Easter weekend at Mum and Dad's. Went for a pleasant solitary walk on the Saturday afternoon while Ruth did some weekend work for her current contract. The rest of the family came on the Sunday for a roast lamb lunch followed later by a Betty Crocker carrot cake and a batch of chocolate brownies, to celebrate Hannah's birthday on the Monday. Here she is blowing out a couple of candles, intently watched by Nia and Bertie.

Continuing the intermittent theme of absurd job titles: the OU is currently advertising for a Scrum Master. I am aware that Scrum is a project management framework, but this still sounds ridiculous. My friend Helen, who works in software testing, was part of a team a while back that had Scrum imposed on them, and it all sounded a bit of a nightmare. Essentially it seemed to involve everyone having to have a bash at everyone else's jobs. Wikipedia has a detailed entry on Scrum, currently including this charmingly incomprehensible paragraph:

Ruth and I paid our by now annual visit to the Reading Contemporary Art Fair on Sunday morning - unusually, she didn't buy anything, but I fell for a pair of Alce Harfield paintings that had been reduced in price and are the perfect shape for our stairwell. I already have one of her paintings, so it's perhaps a bit excessive, but I think that's all our wall space used up anyway. Among the artists displaying their work, possibly the weirdest display was Myung Nam An's porcelain eyes (postcard right).

Made the mistake of standing too long by one display of animal sculptures made with a slightly sentimental back-of-Sunday-supplement look and had one of the maker's leaflets thrust into my hand. Scoffed later at this insert which offers to create a lasting memory of your pet from its ashes.


Victoria has recently discovered a character listed on the OU staff list under the name ‘Warrior-Princess Meridian’. We pondered that we haven’t seen anyone around campus who looks as though they’re called that (imagining someone in a flowing cloak with perhaps a sword and spurs - but she’s probably a grey-haired lady in sensible trousers and a rucksack; there are quite a number of these at the OU). Assume that she must have changed her name via deed poll, unless she's the child of Wiccan priestess parents or similar.

RIP Expedit; theatre; glazing

Again backtracking a bit … spent Ruth’s birthday on 3 January firstly driving over to Aldbourne to visit Ruth’s Granny Box and to take her a gift of a battery-powered Mini Aquarium, which Ruth was forced to snatch away from Granny’s eager hands as it turned out to have the wrong sort of batteries. We had lunch in the Bear at Hungerford, recently taken over by Old English Inns – the bar area is pretty much the same, though it has been enlarged at the expense of the dead posh ladies’ toilets; there are, obviously, new ladies’ toilets sited elsewhere, but we agreed they’re not quite as posh as they were before. After this we attempted to go for a walk I’d identified around the Savernake Forest, but couldn’t find the recommended starting point, so after several false starts parked just inside the main gates off the A4 and walked a way down the Grand Avenue. We didn’t have a map with us – strange move on my part, as I am usually well equipped with maps – so were forced to retrace steps. In the evening we went for a birthday dinner at Myalacarte – I can’t now remember what we ate, but it was very nice.

Heavy winds brought down the last of the big Cedar of Lebanon trees on the OU’s campus in February, which was a bit sad. Estates published this bulletin on the intranet, a bit late so I suspect they’d been contacted by a few distraught members of staff. It was one of a pair, the other of which blew over some time last year. Not sure whether they’d just reached the end of their lives, though a colleague did speculate that they’d been victims of replacing buildings which had created a gap/wind tunnel in a critical place.

Met Helen at Tate Modern on 22 February for a long overdue catch-up. In addition to changing jobs since we last met, Helen has become engaged to a chap she met eight months ago at a speed-dating event. The exhibits on offer in the galleries we looked in included this Richard Serra piece ‘Trip Hammer’ in a gallery themed ‘Energy and Process’. My introduction to Richard Serra was on a visit to Tate (Britain, as it is now) with Mum many years ago when we encountered two vast blocks in the main entrance hall which we assumed were plinths waiting to have new artworks displayed on them. In fact they themselves turned out to be the display, another Serra artwork. We later saw another exhibition of his work at the Serpentine Gallery, consisting of rooms with some walls painted black and some white.

Ah, Expedit. Felt a pang of sadness at IKEA discontinuing its iconic Expedit range. Apparently I was in good company: this piece, titled ‘Ikea has killed off Expedit, leaving me sad, angry and confused’ was swiftly followed by this piece, titled ‘The people who mourn for discontinued Ikea lines’. Feeling the need to stock up, I sneaked a visit to IKEA on 26 February and purchased two white 2x2 Expedit units, along with a few of the storage boxes to go in them. Behind me in the queue was a man also purchasing two of the 2x2 units – I thought I might have seen him brush a tear from the corner of his eye, but can’t be sure. My 4x4 Expedit unit is now residing in the dining room of the house, although Ruth doesn’t think it goes – but she is, of course, wrong.

Went for tea with Claire on 2 March and what was intended to be a walk along the Thames – the original plan of a walk to Sonning had had to be abandoned due to continuing extreme sogginess of terrain, but we managed a brief walk once she had lent me Chris’ wellingtons. The walk was curtailed by the unfortunate discovery that Claire’s sister’s boyfriend Martin’s boat, a ramshackle Dutch barge named Mad Meg which is moored by the Horseshoe Bridge at Kennet Mouth, appeared to have been boarded and robbed. Claire had evidently been keeping an informal eye on it while Martin was on a six-week work trip to New Zealand, but it had evidently been tampered with shortly before as apparently Claire had already reported it to the police. We had to spend quite a while standing by the boat while Claire first called Martin’s friend Dave, who turned up to look it over, and then phoned the police to update the crime report. Dave’s theory was that others were attempting to take possession of it, and pointed the finger at the resident of a boat moored on the opposite bank, who is evidently known to the local boating community. While sympathetic, I thought it unfortunate that the boat was moored in such a vulnerable position and is sufficiently dilapidated as to look abandoned. Hopefully it can be done up a bit at some point in the future.

Went with Liz on 5 March to hear the Ben Westlake Trio perform at one of the OU’s free lunchtime chamber music concerts in St Michael’s Church, the deconsecrated church on the Walton Hall campus. The three young chaps, two studying at the Royal Academy of Music and one at the Royal Northern College of Music, played a three-part programme beginning, to my delight, with Mozart’s ‘Kegelstatt’ Trio, which I’ve loved since studying it as part of my O-level Music course. They followed that with Schumann’s ‘Märchenerzählungen’ and then four of Max Bruch’s ‘Eight Pieces’. I had no familiarity with either of the latter; indeed this entry on Max Bruch notes that he is not primarily known for chamber music but that his "Eight Pieces for Clarinet, Viola and Piano" are occasionally heard as it’s a relatively rare combination of instruments. A pleasant one though. The young pianist, Tyler Hay, also gave stirring performances of a couple of short Chopin pieces.

Theatre trip on 7 March to see Blithe Spirit at the Gielgud – Ruth booked the tickets a while back as she is a big Angela Lansbury fan and wanted the chance to see the old girl return to the London stage. She was indeed entertaining, though I’m probably in agreement with this review. A large part of the audience were evidently there solely to see AL, and laughed and cheered loudly at practically her every utterance – including a request to pass the cucumber sandwiches, which I wasn’t sure was intended to be particularly funny – which became irritating after a while, given that there were other actors on stage. Couldn’t quite decide what I thought of the play – it was good, particularly Janie Dee as Ruth, though some of the humour was lost on me and I couldn’t decide what to make of the ending. It was my first exposure to Noel Coward, though, so possibly I just wasn't sure what it was all about. We had another lovely pre-theatre dinner at Browns on St Martin's Lane.

Made a mid-March visit to Mum and Dad and admired their new kitchen. We went for a walk along the Usk on the Saturday followed by a nice lunch at the Grofield Inn in Abergavenny. In the evening Dad lit the chimenea they inherited with the house and we sat outside for a while, though it did get a little chilly. Lovely sunset though.


Anglian have finally carried out the work we agreed with them a few months back, replacing the three single-glazed windows at the rear of the house with double-glazed units, and replacing the dining room window with a fully glazed French door. Here are 'before and after' pictures of the window in the toilet, with new extractor fan squeezed in top left, the only spot the electrician could find to put it.

The French door had been the subject of some dispute between Ruth and me for a while, with me quite liking the idea but not thinking that it constituted essential works, given strapped finances, and also wary of the impact it would have on the furnishing options for the dining room, which are already quite limited given the presence of doors in three corners (now four). Also was vaguely overcome by sentiment for the old dining room window, given that it was part of the Victorian house – though actually only the surround and the sill; the original sash window was long gone before I moved in.

The job was slightly plagued by misfortune - during the fitting of the windows, one of the fitters injured himself and later had to go to hospital, resulting in the door fitting being rescheduled for a few days later; on said day, Ruth had a call to say the van had broken down and they couldn’t come; Ruth then started a new contract in the interim and wasn’t able to be at home, so it had to be rearranged for a few weeks’ later to give me time to arrange to be at home. I duly arranged to be at home on Monday and Tuesday last week; had a call around 10:00am on Monday to say that one of the fitters had called in sick and they weren’t going to be able to come. Wasn’t best pleased as I’d taken a day’s leave, though in fairness the hapless woman on the phone was very apologetic. After a bit of arranging and some alternately threatening and emotional-sounding noises on my part, they agreed to send out a two-man team the following day who would definitely, we were assured, be able to complete the job in one day. Indeed they did, quite impressively.

Met up with Ray for supper at the Global Café on Tuesday last week (day of the French door fitting) as he had got a whim while in Reading with Emma recently to go there again. Don't often go these days as Ruth isn't a fan of the food, so a rare treat. Ray finished up with what was billed as an 'Ethiopian coffee', which certainly arrived in an attractive pot with two little cups, but smelled and tasted disappointingly like Nescafe.

Given recent lack of success at the job-getting game, was cheered a couple of Fridays ago to receive this (above right). Well, who wouldn't be. I did indeed have a paper published in RPCE in 2012, though the tone of the email suggested more that the author was about to either offer to be my wife or to deposit their life savings in my bank account.

Burglary; Christmas; floods

Reasonably poor start to the New Year when I returned to my MK flat on 4 January to discover a scene of devastation in the ground floor bedroom. Trauma at discovering that pretty much all my electronic goods were missing was mitigated by the flood of relief at knowing that I’d backed up my data (on two removable hard drives and via Dropbox – am nothing if not anally retentive), and by the fact that my laptop and Galaxy Tab had escaped the thief’s clutches as I’d taken them away with me for the Christmas break. The mess in the bedroom was such that it was initially difficult to figure out what else had been taken, but it turned out later to be quite a lot of jewellery, plus a variety of miscellaneous items.

Discovered a card from Thames Valley Police on the doormat, noting that they had had to secure the property after a break-in (indeed one of the large panes of glass in the bedroom window had been boarded up – I didn’t notice initially) and urging me to get in touch with them. Duly did; spoke to PC Poulton of Milton Keynes’ CID and was half-surprised when he said he’d be with me within the hour. Not sure where I had got the idea that police don’t assign any urgency to attending burglary scenes, but I stand humbled. The young chap did indeed arrive (depressing realisation that all professionals are going to start increasingly seeming young from now on) and took a statement detailing my discovery of the scene and descriptions of the things that I was aware had been taken. (I think I had always assumed that victims were asked to compose their own statements in manner of a timed essay, but in fact the police write them for you – you just answer their questions.) He confirmed that – amazingly luckily for me, and I gathered relatively unusually – police had recovered most of my property following a tip-off, and it was in custody at MK police station.

A couple of forensic officers also turned up and proceeded to do a thorough evidence check of the bedroom and living area, which turns out to involve covering surfaces in a filthy black substance which is a devil to then get off. Also, I have now officially had my fingerprints taken – I think they assured me that they would be destroyed after the evidence gathering, but I wasn’t attending too much to that – trauma at being burgled alternating with excitement at being at an actual crime scene with real police. Ruth also arrived, having offloaded the rabbits through some sleight-of-hand and done a mercy dash up to MK, and as I decided I couldn’t face clearing up the bedroom, we booked a late room in the Jurys Inn and retreated there (v. nice, and room quite a bargain at £49). We also had a comfort dinner at Browns around the corner, which was entirely unnecessary. Returned to Old Groveway on the Sunday and Ruth insisted on tackling the bedroom by herself, which was noble as there was shattered glass everywhere.

Mention-worthy things NOT taken: the now-old laser printer I acquired on permanent loan from Ray’s dad – perhaps the thief anticipated difficulty in being able to download the drivers for it?; my bicycle, which was out on the patio and although the wheel was locked to the frame with a D-lock, the bike itself wasn’t actually secured to anything – it is, though, extremely heavy; the garnet cross handed down from a relative which is probably the most valuable piece of jewellery I own – a bit puzzling, this, as the thieves did take a number of obviously worthless pieces of jewellery including a collection of Girl Guide pins. Pointless things taken (though perhaps one shouldn’t ponder the logic): a small carrier bag full of postcards I have collected over the years, none of them of any monetary value; an old Motorola flip-up phone which I keep partly because I always thought it was cute and partly because it contains texts of sentimental value, and a business card holder engraved with my name (ghastly present from a training provider I worked with in my last job). The theft of the Mesh desktop PC Ray and I bought together in 2005 was also fairly pointless, though admittedly the thief probably didn’t realise its age, increasingly slow functioning and possibly failing hard drive. The thief (or thieves) also took my new DVD of The Hobbit, which I was a bit upset about as I’d only watched it once.

Ruth and I presented ourselves at Milton Keynes police station the following Monday for what turned out to be a three hour session of identifying and describing my stolen property. We were taken down to the basement property store where I identified the larger items, and then retreated to an interview room where I was shown all the smaller items in turn, in their evidence bags, which semi-obscured them, and in some cases asked to give more detailed descriptions. The session did reveal the absence of my platinum wedding band from the little wooden box I had been keeping it in since Ray and I separated – but as it’s the only thing so far that I am aware has not been recovered, I should no doubt consider myself lucky. On a lighter note: my attempts to describe a few of the postcards in the collection mentioned above had Ruth scoffing afterwards at my struggle to avoid mentioning that the collection contained a number of nudes, and instead focusing on trying to describe Constantin Brancusi’s Fish and John Everett Millais’ Autumn Leaves. Not sure whether my offer to spell ‘Millais’ constituted Plebgate-esque assumptions vis à vis the police, but the DS did appear to appreciate help with spelling it.

As a result of the burglary, I requested early release from my tenancy at Old Groveway and, to cut a bit of a story short, managed to check out of the property and hand back the keys on 24 January. The bulk of my stuff was shifted thanks to Bruce of Bruce Wilkinson Despatch, who was charmingly helpful and efficient, though could do with being a little less tactile if he wants his business to take off and beat the competition from cheap Polish drivers, which he told us about at some length. Was quite sad to say goodbye to Christina at no 12 Old Groveway, aka Stray Cat Lady, and Tony and Susannah at no 11, as they were all unfailingly friendly and pleasant during the time I was there.

Made (hopefully) my final visit to MK police station on 31 January, to give something called an ‘emotional impact’ statement and also, more importantly in my view, collect my property from the police property store. PC Poulton helpfully retrieved it from the basement – reappeared panting under the weight of a laden trolley; possibly I had more stuff recovered than is usually the case – and nobly pushed the trolley out to my car and helped me load up.

Did submit a claim on my contents insurance – my first, I think – for the value of my wedding ring plus the cost of some underwear and bedlinen that had broken glass trodden into it, and for my DVD player, which is working but is making a grinding noise it wasn’t making before. The Mesh, perversely, is still working, or at least, working as well as it was prior to the theft – am frankly impressed that it appears to have survived not only being stolen but also languishing in a police station basement for a month. Here it is in its evidence bag (right). Given that my data is safe, this was almost disappointing as it would have been a tempting opportunity to claim the cost of a new PC. I suppose I could have done that anyway, if I were the type of person to commit insurance fraud which, obviously, I’m not.

Indecision over what to do as regards accommodation has resulted in my currently being resident Monday to Thursday in Travelodges in and around Milton Keynes. Am not keen to take out another tenancy because of the expense and the requirement to commit to at least six months. Briefly considered taking a room in someone’s house, though I hate the idea, and did actually go and view a room in a new-build detached house in Greensand View in Woburn Sands. The landlady Sally seemed lovely, and we had quite an amiable chat over a cup of tea, but on reflection afterwards decided that I couldn’t face living in someone else’s house on an open-ended basis – possibly too old and have had my own place for too long. Also she has a dog and dogs, generally, smell, whatever dog owners may claim to the contrary.

Back to Travelodges. Travelodges are fine – indeed, Ray and I once took a week’s road trip around England in the early 1990s based entirely on staying at them, though it has to be said we were fairly young at the time. Think we started off at Scotch Corner, from memory, and worked our way back down south – forget all of them, but certainly took in Chesterfield and finished up with Wheatley. For whatever reason, it was a trip that I omitted to take any photographs of, so it exists only in my memory now, but it was nice.

Refurbed room at MK Central

Travelodge Shenley Church End

As there are various Travelodges in the vicinity of MK, have been alternating between three of them so far according to which has the cheapest rooms. This week am at the Travelodge Buckingham, an OK establishment next to a Shell garage on the A421, with a 24-hour Tesco opposite. Last week was at the Travelodge MK Central, which is in the process of undergoing a refurb and I lucked out with one of their redecorated rooms, featuring a snazzy new bed, luxury after the series of fairly saggy mattresses I’ve put up with over the last few weeks. Spent the week prior at the Travelodge MK Shenley Church End, a tired-looking former Innkeepers Lodge that’s in need of a refurb and updating to Travelodge branding, but does have the friendliest staff of the three.

A few non-burglary related highlights of the last couple of months:

Two unsuccessful job interviews, one for a job at the University of the Arts London, which I didn't particularly want anyway, and one for a job at the University of Surrey, which I did. But hey, I'm not bitter. And I did get to take a particularly windblown almost-selfie outside Guildford Cathedral, which I donated a pound to as it's apparently in need of asbestos removing from its roof.

Christmas, obviously. Ruth and I had a pre-Christmas trip to London on 22 December, to look at festive things. Surprisingly, started with lunch at Pizza Hut on Oxford Street; I hadn’t eaten in Pizza Hut for years, though they were a standard meal out destination when I was with my boyfriend Andy in the early 1990s and in the early days with Ray. Not sure Ruth had ever eaten in one, as she is highbrow about such places, but she was actually quite complimentary about the pizza. Their salad bars are still as indifferent as I remember them. Took in various shops’ Christmas displays, including Heal’s (naturally civilised) and Fortnum and Mason – the latter was a bloody bunfight, though Ruth managed to take a number of photos of posh wreaths. I think we refrained from buying anything, though I've blanked out a good bit of it. Stoked up briefly pre-Fortnums with tea at Richoux, a few doors down Piccadilly. After escaping from Fortnums only slightly battered, we walked back to Oxford Street and caught a bus back to Paddington.

Spent Christmas Eve and Christmas Day at Ruth’s aunt’s house in Lambourn. Although she’d kept everyone guessing until Christmas Eve, Ruth’s mother also turned up, bringing her dog Muffin. For some reason – perhaps a kind desire to keep me amused – Mrs Spence tasked me with sorting out her magazine rack, so I spent a while sorting back issues of The Field, Wiltshire Life and The People’s Friend. On Christmas morning we took Muffin out for a walk, before returning to the house to help prepare veg. Lunch was a splendid joint of beef - first time I’ve had beef for Christmas lunch, but as I’ve never been able to get excited about turkey, it was a very welcome change. This photo of Ruth’s aunt carving shows off its divinely still-pink interior. We spent the afternoon/early evening watching Call the Midwife followed by Downton Abbey – I think I dozed off during the latter, but don’t think I was the only one, despite the excitement of the whole Maggie Smith/Shirley MacLaine set-to. Certainly Ruth’s mum appeared to doze through most of it, with Muffin sitting bolt upright on her lap in some sort of bizarre small guard dog scenario.

On Boxing Day we drove down to Abergavenny to see my parents, Dave, Hazel and Nia, and went for a stroll around Linda Vista Gardens before returning to the house to open more presents, via a drink at the Hen & Chickens. Even though Dave kindly worked out how to set up the timer on my camera so that we could all be in the photo, the photo without me in it was much better.

Finally, for now, flooding. The Thames has reached higher levels this January than I’ve ever seen it before, flooding Christchurch Meadows right up to Gosbrook Road. None of the area in the picture is usually under water, though boats on the Thames are visible in the far distance. Claire's birthday drinks at the Jolly Anglers on 8 February were enlivened by the Kennet rising quite a bit during the course of the evening and the landlord having a supply of sandbags brought into the pub. Luckily it didn't rise as much as feared and we weren't forced to spend the night. The B478 Playhatch Road at Sonning Eye has been closed on and off for weeks now due to floods washing away part of the road, resulting in the closure of Sonning Bridge, an eighteenth-century brick arch bridge that forms a single-carriageway Thames crossing that’s an important cut-through for motorists wishing to cross the river. Apparently the poor old bridge carries 16,000 cars a day. There have been mutterings for years about a possible alternative Thames crossing between Reading and Henley (currently Sonning is the only one) but nothing has come of it as yet. I would feel sorry for the residents of Sonning, if they weren’t so rich.

TBC ....

Comedy; grave; Hobbit

Waitrose’s Christmas drinks catalogue published this photo and caption this year, with a complete lack of irony. The top caption relates to a photo that I snipped off; the bottom one reads ‘Xander helps Helen shell the quails’ eggs’, and relates to an article on Helen Someone or other (possibly a buyer for Waitrose, or possibly an organic chutney-maker supported by her stockbroker hubby) burbling on about how she has a very traditional Christmas (yawn) and involves her three children, including the unfortunately-named Xander, in festive preparations.

Received the usual warning via the OU’s Go Green programme to switch off all unnecessary electrical equipment over the Christmas period (though it did end with a slightly panic-stricken footnote about not going overboard and switching off servers or fridges). The OU’s Go Green programme is fronted by a Great Crested Newt called Neville, the thinking presumably being that cute talking animals are just the thing to achieve buy-in from fully grown adults.

Comedy outing to South Street Arts on 6 January to see Roisin Conaty, a comic I hadn’t thought I was familiar with, though realised from part of her routine that I’ve heard snippets of her on Radio 4 (a rather good joke about how raising the price of cigarettes won’t stop people smoking, but will just mean that poor people stop buying fruit). Very enjoyable show, enhanced by a funny supporting set from Jen Brister. Met Claire at the Global Café prior to the show – lovely as I hadn’t been there in ages, due to not living in Reading during the weeks. Glad to find that Tutu’s Ethiopian Kitchen is still surviving. Claire appeared to have slightly sold out – given our previous anti-diet rants – by going on a low-carb diet. She had indeed lost quite a bit of weight, but I can’t contemplate the thought of giving up bread.

Amused on meeting up with Helen, Ruth and Ali before the show to learn that Ali had recently had a spell of being Mother Christmas – and subsequently a postmistress elf – at some local Winter Wonderland. She didn’t appear to have lasted very long, and was full of tales of slave labour and minimum wage.

Mum stayed over on 13 December after an afternoon at an exhibition at the Museum of London. On the Saturday morning we wandered up to St Peter’s Church to have a potter around its Christmas Market, before meeting Ruth at the Alto Lounge for lunch. In the churchyard, Mum was interested in the memorial to William Crawshay II, a South Wales ironmaster who later retired to Caversham Park.

Went for our Information Office Christmas lunch on Thursday at The Crooked Billet at Newton Longville. Nice pub and food was pretty good, though its concession to the season was pretty minimal, leading Victoria to ask the waitress in somewhat aggrieved fashion as we were leaving why we hadn’t had any crackers. I found myself sitting next to Nick, our director, which always creates an initial pressure to make polite conversation, but in fact Nick was happy to outline his plans for his forthcoming retirement.

Returned to Reading on Thursday evening for our Christmas Book Group meeting at Claire’s. As I think I’ve missed the previous three meetings, partly because of the travel inconvenience and partly because I’ve been a bit off reading, I was determined to make this one, and had actually managed to finish the book, J K Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy. Bloody good read, I thought, and was a bit disappointed at the dismissive attitude of most of the others who’d managed to finish it. Some of the disparaging comment seemed essentially to stem from the fact that JKR has had the effrontery to write something that isn’t Harry Potter, and the rest seemed to relate to the characters not being likeable. Um, no, but that’s probably real life for you. Currently considering joining a different book group that’s actually capable of having objective discussions.

With the impending release of the second instalment of Peter Jackson’s version of The Hobbit, Ray and I reminded ourselves of the content of Part 1 on Wednesday evening, as I purchased the extended edition DVD on its release in November. Some of the extra bits were enjoyable, particularly the additional scenes in Rivendell, partly because I am extremely partial to Hugo Weaving’s portrayal of Master Elrond (not ‘Lord’ – that’s a cinematic invention). It’s possibly not strictly in the spirit of Tolkien canon, as I seem to recall it being implied in the books that Elrond is a kind and reasonably gentle chap, whereas Weaving’s Elrond is not someone you would push too far in an argument, but all the same. We’ve booked tickets to see Part 2 next Monday afternoon.

A complicated business, booking cinema tickets these days – while trying to avoid the HFR (high frame rate) version of The Hobbit, as I wasn’t too sure about this last time, I was surprised to also be offered the choice of filtering on ‘Autism Friendly’ films. I didn’t look up quite what this meant, but the mind boggles.

Finally forced myself this morning to try out Roni’s Hand Car Wash on the V8 at Peartree Bridge, which several people at the OU have recommended. Quite an operation, and certainly not just a couple of blokes with sponges: you pull up to the first set of chaps who hose the worst of the dirt off your car (quite a lot of it, in my case), then pull a bit further on where you’re soaped, then you drive your car on to a small turntable where it’s turned 90 degrees for you to drive in to a more traditional car wash arrangement, which hoses you off. During this stage you make your choice of service from the card handed to you. Then you drive out to the final set of chaps, who polish and buff your car – and do the inside of it, depending on the service you choose – while you’re sent inside to the waiting room. All quite impressive, and a bargain at £10 for cleaning both inside and out.

Wandered along at 5pm to Simpson church to see the switching on of the lights on the tree that was planted by the church in November. Quite sweet, though I didn't stick around for the sing-song that was evidently pending afterwards.

Post-war loveliness; blue chicken; walk

Went with Ray to the ‘Brutal and Beautiful’ exhibition on 23 November at English Heritage’s Quadriga Gallery inside the Wellington Arch. The exhibition was very interesting and nicely done, focusing on listed post-war buildings, and is apparently one of a series of exhibitions to mark the centenary of the 1913 Ancient Monuments Act. It included various interesting short films, including architect Peter Aldington talking about his three beautiful houses at Haddenham, one of which he evidently still lives in.

I had never guessed that the Wellington Arch contained a gallery space – the space is over three floors but is really pretty tiny, so it was lucky that it wasn’t very crowded. In the first exhibition room, there’s a bit of history about the arch and the story of the various statues that have adorned the top of it, including the statue of Wellington on horseback which was apparently mercilessly lampooned at the time as being disproportionate (and was later moved to Aldershot, perhaps as some sort of punishment) before being replaced by the current Quadriga. We went out onto each of the two terraces and had a gander at the view.

Photos of the day here. We started the day by walking to the branch of Carluccio’s on Westbourne Grove for breakfast, then down across Hyde Park; after visiting the Arch we walked down via Belgrave Square to the King’s Road where we had lunch at Mori. Then Ray caught a taxi back to Paddington as he had a late afternoon appointment to get some work done on the van, and I nipped in to Peter Jones to use the facilities, before catching a v. convenient bus (am rapidly becoming a convert to buses over tubes) heading up via Tottenham Court Road. In the event I didn’t get that far, as I couldn’t resist getting off the bus in Trafalgar Square to photograph the super blue chicken – or the blue cock, as it is more directly called in this article.

Met Ruth in Heal’s and we had tea in the very civilised Heal’s Quarter Café and a brief discussion of the term 'Fitzrovia', which Ruth had evidently though was some sort of made-up word in manner of Narnia. Then proceeded down to Leicester Square, as Ruth fancied seeing a film but had kindly tried to cater to my lukewarm attitude towards going to the cinema by picking out a couple of films that she thought might be my cup of tea. We ended up seeing Le Week-End, which is well done though difficult to watch in parts; Guardian review here.

Slightly horrified by the crowds outside the Odeon, before realising that they were nearly all there to see the sequel to The Hunger Games. Le Week-End was showing in the tiny Screen 2 of the Odeon Mezzanine, next door. We followed up the film with dinner at the nearby branch of Café Rouge in Irving Street.

Received a texted photo from Ray last week of the Vile Cardoon, now excised from our garden and planted in the garden of Ray’s employer Laurence, who has apparently given Ray carte blanche to plant what he likes. Although it may have been pruned to a stump at the moment, have warned Ray that it grows like the blazes and will need hacking back within a fortnight.

Enticed Ruth out for another walk on Sunday (she is getting better at this), this time from Whitchurch back to Caversham via the path through the Hardwick Estate and Mapledurham. It was only as we got off the train at Pangbourne that I remembered that Whitchurch Bridge is closed for repairs until next year, but luckily there's been a temporary structure erected for pedestrians. The walk took in some ponies, a field of alpacas at Bozedown Farm and a vegetable stall with an honesty box, where Ruth bought some muddy sprouts that she then shoved into my rucksack. We followed it with another late lunch at The Griffin.

The walk took in two atmospheric gates which I was compelled to photograph: the mossy but splendid gates at the eastern end of the Hardwick Estate (left), and this rusty gate on The Warren in Caversham (above right), which must at one time have led into someone's garden, presumably, but which is now just standing by itself.

The article on Hardwick linked above claims that 'indeed there is strong circumstantial evidence pointing to Toad Hall being Hardwick House'. Sometimes wish that the half-dozen or so houses in the Thames Valley that claim this would get together and settle it with a fight.