In days of Old, when Knights were bold...Almost...

I heard a sound today that propelled me straight back to 1965.  A sound I thought lost in the movement of time.  From out in the street, the regular jangling chime of someone ringing a handbell to alert us indoors to their presence - and there he was: the Rag and Bone man of my childhood. Well, not the EXACT one, of course, because he was a Methusela to my 5 year old self, but a Rag and Bone Man, nevertheless.  I didn't think any still existed, but they obviously do. Upgraded to a slow-moving flatbed, rather than the horse-drawn cart of yesteryear, but out there, ringing the bell and collecting scrap metal. He had a load stowed, the modern-day Totter; I could see a fridge up there and some other bits and bobs of scrap.  Do they still collect bones as well and pay cash in hand for a newspaper-wrapped parcel? Who knows. If mine weren't already spoken for by my fanatical compost-making husband, I'd have been out there with a bagful finding out.

I remember being sent out by my Grandmother to exchange bones or other small items for warm copper pennies from the leather pouch slung across the Rag and Bone Man's shoulder.  His cart seemed so high up in the air, and his horse so big; we'd take carrots and feed them to the horse whilst the Man loaded up, or stopped for a chat if we had nothing to give him.  Grandad (or someone else, if Grandad was slow off the mark) would go out later and pick up the droppings from the roadway - lovely for the garden - and FREE!

Then I got to thinking, there are so many things like this that have disappeared into the past; the Corona Man, who delivered dimpled bottles of  Dandelion and Burdock and Cream Soda to the door in wooden crates, the Wilkins' Man, who brought sticky and mostly forbidden shop-cakes in great big shallow wooden trays; the Coal Man, in his dark green truck and his sooty clothes, cap and head strap, coming to deliver hessian sacks of coal and coke to Nan's house; the Milkie, in his long white coat and smart peaked hat, bringing daily fresh milk in glass bottles; Mr Brander the butcher.  He always wore a fine straw boater and a navy and white striped apron and he had a moustache of such overwhelming magnitude that 'Big John' Brander, his very large and darkly handsome son, paled into weedy insignificance when in the same room.  Then there was weaselly Mr Moolie the Rent Man, with his little pile of brown rent books, his stubby pencil and a satchel for the money; the Pools Man, from whose company you might win a tidy fortune for predicting the results of football matches and the overly-obsequious Man from The Pru, who walked the streets on a weekly basis collecting tiny insurance premiums against the cost of your eventual burial - he had a satchel, too; they all did, the weekly collectors.  Sixpence here, thruppence there, a penny for this one and a shilling for him, all descendants of the tallymen, Uncles and mountebanks of yore and a Godsend for the weekly-paid...

f + c (+ ts/m) + ( π ) + mbr = av/nw (i). Q.E.D

And so it went. On Friday, too pooped to cook and the Boy went out in the rain and trawled for sustenance, coming back home with fish and chips of epic proportions.  It makes a BIG change for us to eat takeaway of any sort, so it was a real treat.  There's something quite decadent for us in sitting down to eat food that I haven't made, but we do have a spectacularly good Chippery in the village, and it doesn't hurt now and again to spend a few quid on something good.  I still haven't found a good local place to actually go OUT to to dine and spend my money in, but the hunt goes on.  As eating out is a very rare occurrence, I need to know that our hard-earned cash isn't going to be wasted on gunge masquerading as fayne dayning.  I'm often disappointed and not a little cross at what passes for acceptable fodder in restaurants these days.  I'm saddened that other people either don't notice how badly food is prepared and served, or that they just don't have any expectation that it could be better. It's really NOT that difficult.  We usually save our dining out experiences for Belgium where, it has to be said, the food (even in tiny out-of-the-way establishments) is always excellent in both quality and price.

In between showers we dropped down into Bugville to shop.  It didn't take long, mercifully.  The quicker we can get in and out the better, quite frankly, especially on a Saturday afternoon when there seem to be more mutants per square inch than at any other time.  It had to be done, though - there was a Sunday curry to be prepared and no coconut milk in the house.  I had a Beef Rendang on my mind...

And also π... (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9Hjrs6WQ8M)

Now, call me a Philistine if you will, but I couldn't get on with the book.  I don't know what it is about books written with a sub-continent subject matter, but me and they, they just don't mix.  This is the person who will read cereal boxes in desperate moments but apart from one notable exception ('A Fine Balance' by Rohinton Mistry), lent to me by N when I lived in Bruges, the 'Indian sub-Continent novel' has completely passed me by.  Hand on heart, I tried at least 10 times to get into Vikram Seth's 'A Suitable Boy' to no avail.  Other people rave about it, so either they're a) cleverer than me or b) lying.  I suggest the latter.  Emperor's New Clothes, anyone?  So, anyway, I read the overwhelmingly glowing reviews for π, I listened to the radio interviews about π, I purchased π  (both in hard copy AND Kindle version) and STILL couldn't get into it. Indian sub-Continent, see?  And then, I saw that a film was in production. And, in due course, that film was released to great acclaim, and lo, it was to be shown at the Picturedrome cinema (http://www.picturedromebognor.com/) for a mere £3.00 on Sunday.  Bearing in mind that I've recently watched the Emperor stroll past unclad to the soundtrack of The Glums, I was in two minds about going.  An Indian boy, adrift in a lifeboat in the Pacific, accompanied merely by his wits, a gaff-hook, a broken-legged (then dead) zebra and a Bengal tiger called Richard Parker?  I was thinking π x arse-squared.  And actually, it was, but only because a female Hagrid and her equally gigantic offspring were sat directly in front of us and me and the Boy spent the entire time leaning heavily one one buttock in order to see round them.  The fillum itself was delightful.  It took all the useful bits, packaged them up into a beautiful whole and sent out the essence of the novel into the popcorn-scented room that is Screen 2. We loved it.  On the way home, I tried to explain to the Boy just why I couldn't get on with the book.  It might have had something to do with all the extraneous stuff: 25% or so Kindle reading and I was still in Pondicherry Zoo having animals described to me in minute detail.  A mere 10 minutes of the film and Ang Lee had condensed the necessary stuff (why Pi was called Pi, the lessons of 'not feeding the tiger', the weaving in of all the 'Gods' and the religious stuff ) into a few lines of dialogue.  Perfection.  Go see it.  It's a beautiful film and the CGI is extraordinary.  If you didn't know it wasn't possible, that tiger in the prow is REAL.  Truly.

And the Beef Rendang supper wasn't too shabby, either.  A big plateful of mixed bhajis, yoghurt, mint and cucumber dip, mango chutney and a carrot and toasted cumin salad with spiced poppadoms, followed by beef rendang, buttered Basmati and Peshwari naan.  A little 'mixed up', curry-wise (the Rendang's Malaysian, not Indian), but who cares? I made it, we ate it, it was good.  And then, when we thought the weekend goodies were all done and dusted, my very clever Boy managed, by virtue of his lightning-fast reflexes, to score us two tickets to see Counting Crows http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bSTWIlQ-MA&list=ALBTKoXRg38BD7Q7Jvb077w22BBNBr4Qu8 at the Apollo in London in April - HOW GREAT IS THAT????

We are lucky, lucky monkeys...

Doin' the Madison...

Avenue thing.  Yes, finally, we've started the marathon viewing experience that is the three-series box set of 'Mad Men', courtesy of a 'loan' from my friend Mrs G.

There's little of interest in the evening television schedules at present, so we sat ourselves down last evening after supper and had an initial four-hour straight immersion in the world of 1960s advertising, with additional and heroic amounts of passive smoking, cocktail imbibing and casual misogyny.  I had to remind myself, as LP Hartley wrote, that 'the past is a foreign country: they do things differently there', although I had similar experiences when I first went out to work in the 1970s and I'm sure, in some places, those sort of shenanigans still happen. Not the smoking these days, obviously, but back then I remember smoking at my desk AND when seeing clients; it was just the norm.  But how wonderfully evocative is the series? The scripts are sharp, the characters believable and the set and clothes...oh, just...fabulous!  Two and a half series to go and we are already addicted. Roger Sterling...mmmmmmm! That's me of course, not The Boy, in case you were wondering...

There's a horrid, raw chill in the air today; the sort of rawness that gets right into your bones and flays the skin from your cheeks, especially when riding a bike along the Promenade. But the shopping doesn't do itself, so off I went.  I had both panniers full of stuff for the charity shop - I'm getting very, very good at this 'clearing out' lark now - and, following a serious wardrobe collapsing incident over the weekend, so is Himself.  Our rule here, at the Anderson Shelter, is 'one thing in, one thing out' on all purchases.  It concentrates the mind somewhat, when purchasing, because you have to not only consider the purchase, but also what you are going to 'let go' when you get the item home.  Now, I'm good at this, but the Boy has had rather a lot of purchasing without letting go over the last few months and this led to a rather spectacular rail fail.  I hung one feather-light and newly ironed shirt on the rail and the whole bloody lot fell down, knocking my rail completely off in the process.  Cue swearing of magnitude, recriminations, huffing, stomping and other general sounds of annoyance.  It's mended now, of course, as he's a fine DIYer is the Boy, and his rail is as pristine as a rail can be.  All those 'slightly small' trousers and 'snuggish' shirts are gone, along with a bag of bric-a-brac, to be sold to benefit the orphans in Eastern Europe.  My smugness knows no bounds.

And now, before another 'Mad Men' marathon, I'm off to the kitchen.  There is a plethora of leftovers out there, just begging to be turned into some sort of supper dish - the home-made sausage and chestnut pastry roll might take a bit of incorporating into something edible, but the rest of it should do nicely.  I have cold, stuffed turkey, basil, some passata and loads of veggies.  Maybe... if I denude the sausage/chestnut roll, break it up and mix with chunks of turkey, make a sauce with the passata...hmmm...some sort of pasta bake, maybe...who knows? I also have cream and cream cheese...yes. A pasta bake is looking like a distinct possibility...

The Play's The Thing...

Sitting here at my desk in the dining room, watching the day disappear and become gloomier and wetter by the minute.  The weather is still dismal; cold, bleak and sleety, but there's lovely music on Classic FM and I have a huge mug of Ceylon tea and a piece of freshly-baked Westmoreland Peppercake to hand.

Thursday was the second highlight of last week, after La Boheme on Tuesday. The Boy and I went to see Pinero's 'The Magistrate', broadcast on a live feed from the National Theatre.  Imaginative stage set, based on Edwardian pop-up books, strange, slightly menacing chorus and one of those farces that you just know would have been ruined had an amateur drama group been performing it.  There's a very fine line, when performing farce, between giving a 'stagy' performance and overacting to a painful degree.  It's a very physical play, with lots of jumping about, hiding under tables and behind sofas and the cast were wonderful.  The pre-Christmas reviews were slightly on the snotty side, but we really enjoyed it: it was a light, fluffy and amusing confection and perfect for a cold winter evening - especially when accompanied by bags of Revels and a nice hot cup of tea. Here's the link if you want to read about it - http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/shows/the-magistrate

The National Theatre and Royal Opera House are really pushing the 'live feed' productions at present and that's a perfectly splendid thing.  Tickets for the live theatre are expensive even before you factor in train fares or petrol and parking costs.  We pay a maximum of £15.00 for our tickets, we can usually get to the cinema by bike for nothing and the large screen experience shows the action of a play or an opera right up close and personal.  There is no unheard nuance in the narrative and certainly, seeing the action from the most advantageous camera angles means that nothing is missed in expression or glance.  Besides that, we're keen to keep this local cinema active.  The owners have done lots of good work recently, renewing seating and sound systems, upgrading the loos and, best of all, returning the larger room downstairs to the decor and colours of its heyday.  They've hung original 30s and 40s posters on the walls, advertising what look like terrible B (or even C) movies of the time - all heaving bosoms,  Marcel waves and slightly sinister moustaches with improbable backgrounds and CAPITALISED, OVERLY DRAMATIC TEXT WITH VAST EXCLAMATION MARKS.  We love going there - not least because to watch a blockbuster film costs a mere £2.50 weekdays and £3.00 at weekends, but because they are LICENCED!  Of course, in a situation reminiscent of a film, the evil local council of Bugville want to build a (hiss! BOOOO!) multiplex cinema along the seafront, despite vociferous local opposition.  We will do what we can to prevent it, but I'd imagine, like the building of a vast new supermarket recently, it's already a done deal amongst our greasy- palmed local politicians...public consultation my arse...

Here it is, look - it's a sweet place. https://plus.google.com/107507942182834703694/photos?hl=en  and it deserves to be saved.

In other news, the Boy spent a large part of Saturday wielding drainrods in the garden.  He is my hero, both for saving us heaps of cash and for not giving up against huge...um...'odds'.

Che gelida manina...or 'You should have worn thicker gloves'...

Mimi and I had the same problem today - our tiny hands were frozen.  Stupid glove choice on my part, rather than fatal chest complaint, it has to be said, but it got me thinking.  La Boheme is a lovely opera, with a simple story to tell; poor student has a chance encounter with a beautiful but dying neighbour, falls madly in love but drives her away with false accusations.  It ends badly, as do most operas. So far, so tragic.  It's always had a place in my heart, though, trite as it is - I lost my opera virginity with it, more years ago than I care to remember.  It was my 'Pretty Woman'  moment and I was forever ruined, although Richard Gere was conspicuous by his absence that evening, I seem to remember.  Anyway, I digress.

It struck me last evening, as I watched the rather splendid live feed production from Covent Garden, just exactly how many times Puccini mentions tiny hands in the course of the performance - in a filmed production, you see much more of the action AND hear more than you would watching from the stalls in a theatre - and I fell to thinking, was a 'tiny hand' (frozen or otherwise) actually  some sort of Victorian code for something else?  And then I couldn't get it out of my head.  'What-ho, Lord Cedric! Seen the new filly at the bar? SPLENDID... tiny hands...if you get my drift...'  or 'Of course, she's not the sort for marrying, though.  Tiny frozen hands, what, what!'...I had visions of evening-suited Victorian gentlemen attending performances and having to make 'adjustments' to their clothing every time 'tiny frozen hands' were mentioned.

Taking this a little further, it all seems to fit.  Much is made of Mimi's 'tiny frozen hands'.  One could make allowances for her being sick unto death with the consumption or be kind and think 'Cold hands, warm heart' but, in actuality, she's a wee bit on the mercenary side.  She agrees to have supper with Rodolfo with indecent haste after their first meeting, AND cons him into shelling out for new a pink bonnet on the way to the restaurant, even though he's poorer than the poorest church mouse.  Despite the bonnet, she eventually leaves him, goes over to the Musetta side (now there's a trollop to be reckoned with!) and takes up with some Count with a shiny carriage, and this after she hears Rodolfo saying how much he loves her and her tiny hands, but that he's too poor to look after her properly and that she's going to die.  Rodolfo's STILL singing the praises of her tiny hands at this point.  THEN, when the coughing all gets too much and it's bloody red hanky time, Mimi re-appears, having begged Musetta to bring her back to die in Rodolfo's shabby garret.    He's STILL singing about the merits of her tiny frozen hands.  She's singing about her tiny frozen hands as she slumps breathlessly pale on the rag-strewn bed.  Someone even goes out to buy her (and I can't believe I'm writing this) a MUFF to put her tiny frozen hands into whilst she coughs herself to death.  It has to be a metaphor for something else - either that, or I'm just not the opera-loving, face-value sentimentalist that I was.  Whatever. Maybe I'd just overdosed on Revels...  

Anyway - you can watch a spiffy recording of the 'Tiny Frozen Hand' song here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOKM9cHpttY if you've a  mind to.   Hidden meaning or not, it's STILL a fantastic piece of music and it was a perfectly splendid evening in the company of another woman's husband; mine was at home with a bottle of wine and 'The Expendables'. 

A day in the 'office'...

and my mind is overwhelmed with Allotment fees, filing, money transfers and general administrative gruesomeness.  The only saving grace has been a second open tab linked to Facebook, where today I've been educated into the delights of Willy Tea Taylor, his gigantic beard and his wonderful songs, a splendid piece of critique from the Independent about the new 'Les Mis' film and the design for  a new Girl Scout cookie; such are the vagaries of connections from far and wide.

I find these random postings a veritable daily cornucopia of interest.  Facebook per se is a terrible thing, a stealer of productive time, a repository for reams of utter dross, a place of potential pitfalls.  On the other hand, it is a way into places I've never been, ideas I've not heard about, things I've not seen and an introduction to people who begin as casual  acquaintances and turn into friends.  It gives me a daily dose of reality, a laugh or two, sometimes makes me gasp in horror or purse my lips in disapproval; occasionally, I get so angry that I have to turn off for a couple of days but, on the whole, it's been a Godsend.  In the last couple of years, things have, in parts, been fairly close to the wire for The Boy and me.  Money was short, and work was elusive.  We cut back on pretty much everything, hunkered down and became hermits.  Facebook became the paupers' means of communication.  We're not the sort of folks who spend what we don't have, so going out into the World wasn't an option; the World had to come to us.  And so it did.

I feel thankful on a daily basis for the friends I made, the ideas I considered, the things I learnt.  Blessings counted for today...oh, and a final one - an unexpected treat this evening.  I'm off out with a friend to see the 'live feed' of La Boheme from the Sydney Opera House.  Things have certainly improved...

http://youtu.be/6SIGEWqF9-E

There's snow business like snow business...

And the first snowfall of the year made the untidy grounds of the garden look almost magical.  Shame that underneath the blanket of pristine whiteness lurks a jungle of tangled dead stuff, left over from the last time that Bayleaf deployed anything approaching a gardening tool out there, so busy has he been with the allotment.  Still, I expect he'll get round to it in the Spring - hopefully before we disappear forever under a blanket of ivy and assorted weeds.

The verandah is still hanging in there despite the weight of the snow on the very broken glass- hanging being the operative word.  We are currently propped up with the frame of a UPVC door.  It looks bizarre, but does the job, pending enough money to tear down the thoroughly rotten and sagging existing structure and replace it with a shiny new one.  We spent the last tranche of considerable bunce on a massive holiday to the US of A in the Autumn.  We took off our sensible heads for a change and decided that we'd be a long time dead, so we might as well live a little whilst we could. So we lived a lot, travelling in Texas and California and having a thoroughly splendid time with friends old and new and spent the lot on boots, burgers and Margaritas. As my Nan would have said 'There's no pockets in a shroud' and, speaking of which, I almost had the chance to test out that statement for truth today.

The tax forms were due at the accountants in Bugville today, so I braved the snow and cycled down there.  All well and good it was, not too slippy even on the back roads and the fields along the lane looked lovely.  'Lalala, pretty, pretty snow', sang my inner self as I pootled along. 'OUCH! WTF WAS THAT???' shouted my outer self as I was hit in the back by a snowball thrown from a passing car and wobbled dangerously near to the front wheels of the passing 67 bus.  And, bugger me, if not a minute or two later, the same thing happened again, close to a  moving flatbed truck.

I just wish that people would show a bit more consideration.  Don't get me wrong, a snowball fight is a wonderful thing, but a snowball travelling  towards you at speed when you're balancing on two wheels isn't.  Still, I'm alive to tell the tale, and there will be lovely things for supper and the Boy will be home later, so blessings are counted for today.