Category Archives: Uncategorized

Vegetables get together

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Princess with no pea, but a small racing car

Started the week by picking up my oversized trophy for winning the second division Dons chess tournament last year. I had forgotten about it until Greg said it was waiting for me, and this seemed an opportune week to get it from the club, so that I could impress my grandchildren. It worked quite well, which is what is nice about grandchildren – especially ours, of course.

I seem to remember a short intervention by the piano tuner on Tuesday, but the next major event was driving down to Caddington on Wednesday to see David and the grandchildren. We stayed overnight after having a go on Oliver’s new Scalextric, then brought Oliver and Amy back to Norwich on Thursday. We called at Waitrose and then Auntie Ethel’s, then had lunch before going to the Puppet Theatre. Not exactly what I had expected (a puppet show), but some superb storytelling by the Storybox Theatre’s Rod Burnett. Ok, there were a few puppets involved, but not the traditional kind. It was called The Pea, the Bean and the Enormous Turnip, and the children loved it. I was impressed too. Afterwards Oliver (with a little help from Amy) created his own show with some impressive scene changes and lighting, not to mention script. At last – a used wine box with a useful function.

Yesterday we took the children up to John Lewis’s for clothes shopping. Amy bought a lovely fairy princess dress (part of her birthday present) and some shoes, among other things. Oliver said he wanted an electric guitar for Christmas. Hmmm. Afterwards we ate in the cafeteria, and Dot spilled quite a lot of milk, but did not break anything. In the evening at Prezzo’s, after David arrived, the waitress broke a glass quite spectacularly, but didn’t spill anything. Hope they never get together. In between these two events, the children – with help from Dot – created spectacular dens in the garden.

Today David and the children left early to travel north and meet Vicky at the Leicester East services on the M1, from where the children would travel on to a Hallowe’en party at Nottingham, with David returning to Caddington. Dot and I had our hair cut by Linda and listened to Norwich City getting a last-gasp draw with Blackburn at Carrow Road (3-3).

From Iolanthe to Nonington

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Dot in new top outside Farthingales.

A long weekend – at least if you measure it in miles. Total: just under 500. It started on Friday, as so many weekends do. Rob picked up the completed Paston poetry book, Another Country, on CD to take it to the printers. I have heard nothing since, so I assume that all was well with it.

Dot had been at Dickleburgh in the morning, so there was bit of a rush at lunchtime. We eventually left at about 2.30pm for Banbury, and after negotiating a hold-up in Riverside, we enjoyed a trouble-free journey. I was particularly impressed by the new junction of the A421 and the M1, which had been complete chaos last time we were in the vicinity. Got a bit lost in Banbury, but arrived at the Riches’ abode before 5.30pm. Fred was already rehearsing for his role as Lord Chancellor in Iolanthe, so we had tea with Sue and Marjorie, Fred’s sister, with her husband Pat, who had also travelled from Norfolk for the evening’s performance.

I love Gilbert and Sullivan, so Iolanthe, in Banbury School theatre, was a treat, despite the heat. Really good performance by the local operatic society, and Fred was excellent: really good acting and a great performance of a couple of difficult songs.

On Saturday we headed south on the M40, then anti-clockwise round the M25, stopping for a very acceptable lunch (fish and chips for me) at Clacket Lane services, where a girl called Donna was holding the restaurant together (and probably not getting paid much for it). Good service should be much better rewarded. Dot bought a kind of furry top and we headed ever south-eastwards, taking the M26 and M20, before switching to the M2 and A2. Dot had driven to Banbury, and I drove this time: it was again a very pleasant journey in glorious autumn sunshine.

We found our way to the tiny village of Nonington and our B&B establishment, a beautiful old house called Farthingales, run by a very solicitous guy called Peter. Nonington is the home of Pat and Barry Clayton, and we were there for their ruby wedding celebration that evening in the village hall. We walked from Farthingales in the sun to the village hall down a country lane and decided that maybe we’d take the car in the evening, though I couldn’t see where we’d park. I needn’t have worried: cars lined the narrow village street, and we joined them.

It was an enjoyable do, with some good music – mainly from a duo on guitar and accordion singing 6os songs. Much better than it sounds. Lots of family and neighbours present, of course: the only people we knew apart from Pat and Barry were Rob and Sue Bushell, with whom we sat and talked (when we could hear each other). Nice curry and some free wine. The B&B was really nice, with a huge private lounge-cum-dining room, and the breakfast yesterday was first-class.

An easy journey up the M2 and M20 got us on to the A20 without touching the M25, and we arrived at the Hendersons’ in Eltham at around 10.40am, which meant we could see Maryta’s sister and brother and their spouses before they left with Maryta’s father, Joe. They had stayed the night after a party the previous night for Maryta’s 60th. Unfortunately Joe and Holly had left even earlier. We had lunch with Paul and Maryta and looked though a book on the school to mark its centenary on the Eltham site – partly designed by Maryta. The book, that is. Not the site. We left for home when Paul took Maryta to work and arrived before 6pm. Happily the Humax had recorded Norwich City’s epic 1-1 draw at Liverpool. Watched what is allegedly the last episode ever of Spooks.

This morning the accountant has been here with Dot and Barbara.

Resolving discrepancies in the Gospels

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Amy much earlier; today she is seven!

What a lovely day! A bright, crisp blue sky, it’s Amy’s seventh birthday, I’ve hung out the washing and Another Country is complete. David sent me the final PDF this morning, and I have burned it on to a CD ready for Rob to pick up tomorrow. Nice to meet a deadline – thanks to David, who has really made the book look good. We shall have to make him an honorary Paston trustee…

The temperature has certainly dropped, but when the sun it shining it’s hardly noticeable. All right, it is noticeable, but not objectionable. Quite marked in the evenings, though, and we’ve been out the last three evenings. On Monday we went to the Cathedral to hear a lecture by Cambridge Professor Colin Humphreys, who has done some in-depth research on the events of Easter week, resolving apparent discrepancies in the Gospels. Fascinating stuff: he has established that the Last Supper was on the Wednesday and the Crucifixion on the Friday, with much of the Thursday taken up with the trial. The actual date of the Crucifixion was April 3, AD 33 – at 9am. None of this may seem to matter much, but it is encouraging to see that apparent discrepancies can be resolved if you accept the rather obvious fact that people writing at the time knew more about how things worked at the time than we do. A key factor in this is that different calendars were in use, for example. Prof Humphreys is a scientist, and he was assisted in his work by an astro-physicist, among others. His book is called The Mystery of the Last Supper.

The lecture was very good, but even more entertaining were the attempts made beforehand to get the technology working. At one stage nine cathedral clergy and lay people were clustered round, trying to make a laptop communicate with a projector. It proved beyond them until a young lad in jeans came forward and solved it almost instantly. He should get a cathedral post – a canon, perhaps.

On the Tuesday our group met at the Archers’ house on the other side of the city. We gave Ian a lift, and I walked up to his house (about a mile) to give myself some exercise. Invigorating. David cooked jacket potatoes, Vick supplied sublime pears in cider, and Bridget took the evening off at the theatre with David Essex. Some people have no idea…

Last night we were at the Cathedral again – this time in the lovely Westron Room at the Hostry – to hear poet Anthony Thwaite speak about the King James version with special relevance to poetry. Some interesting stuff, much of it autobiographical, but he rather marred his argument by comparing the KJV with the New English Bible all the time and not mentioning (till questions) the NIV, which is a far better modern translation. The NEB, in fact, is pretty awful, and the Dean, who was in the audience, pointed out afterwards that it was not used in the Cathedral at all. The Dean also made some good points about the importance of using language that was familiar to the audience. I have the feeling that my mother or one of her friends knew Mr Thwaite some time in the past (he is 81), but I didn’t pursue it.

Fieldwalking: too many explanations

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The starting line, with one person hanging back...

Autumn is on its way: chillier times forecast for the rest of this week. But we’ve been fortunate over the last few days, when we’ve had a lot of sun and warmish weather. The Paston poetry book is on its way to being completed. I have got just about everything to David, and I’m pretty excited about the way it’s looking. It’s involved quite a lot of work, but it should be worth it. After delivering early versions on CD to Rob and Lucy, I took one to UEA to give to Caroline on Thursday, had a chat with her about it, and in the evening we were able to duscuss her reactions (and everyone else’s) at the Paston trustees’ meeting.

That set me up nicely for a visit to Coventry on the Friday, with Phil driving. Really easy journey over there in glorious weather, and the meeting went well, all of us agreeing on maintaining the status quo. Andrew again seemed very well; we took him to buy some jeans at Matalan afterwards, and then for a very good meal at Fridays, followed by a trip down Memory Lane – the lane in this case involving Beanfield Avenue, The Chesils and certain parts of north Coventry which I did not know before or during our visit there. Yes, we got lost – but not seriously, and Andrew was actually able to guide us back towards the end. He was in good form.

During the trip we just avoided a nasty accident when a car pulled out in front of us: Phil managed to avoid both the car and a crowd of women on the nearside pavement, which was quite an achievement. Later, as we were about to enter the M6, another car shot round from our left and in front of us. The slower the speed limits, the crazier the drivers. Happily, Joy was praying for us. The journey home was not bad, though we had to detour around Elveden as usual.

On Saturday Dot and I went fieldwalking in Paston as part of the latest project. I suspected this might not be my cup of tea, and it wasn’t – but I’m glad we gave it a go. It was another lovely day, and it would have been nice to spend longer than the ten minutes or so that we devoted to actually finding artefacts. Richard Hoggett, who was in charge, was if anything too thorough in his preparation and said the same things several times. But a lot of it was interesting. On the whole, though, I am not all that enthused by bits of things from a long time ago: there always seems to me to be too many possible explanations for things being what and where they are, and the ones settled on are too random. (Dot managed to listen to the Norwich City game while fieldwalking: we beat Swansea 3-1.)

Sunday was a quieter day after another child-friendly communion service, though we did manage to lock ourselves out of the hall after Elizabeth bolted the kitchen door and the Yale-operated main door slammed shut. Had to fetch the Yale key from the vicarage , but no real problem.

The band played on

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An eagle, not a griffin

It’s a soggy October midweek, and I’m just back from Paston, having delivered a CD containing the Paston poetry book file to Lucy, and dropping another off at Rob Knee’s house in North Walsham. A third will go to Caroline at the UEA tomorrow. Meanwhile David is having a look at it to see what he can do to improve it. I’ve already mistaken a spread eagle for a griffin, so that was a good catch (Lucy). Bit nervous about how it’s all going to come together, especially as Lucy doesn’t seem to be able to find the ISBN numbers she has lying around somewhere.

Spent most of Monday and part of yesterday putting the book together, which proved a bit easier than I had anticipated. Had time to clear up some leaves yesterday afternoon, and in the evening we nearly went to the cinema, but H predictably turned up for our Tuesday Group, not having picked up the cancellation message: she was going to come to the cinema with us, but she walked so slowly that we put her on a bus instead and went home to watch three episodes of Battlestar Galactica. I know it doesn’t make an awful lot of sense, but it did at the time. Rather like the query to a wire payment via Lloyds to America for one of our church speakers: it took them eight days to realise there was a problem (which I think we’ve just sorted). Taking eight days to spot a problem doesn’t make much sense either.

Sunday was our big day: it marked my out-of-church debut as a singer in a band, all miked up and with spotlights and everything. The band was Dot (violin), Phil (guitar) and myself (vocals and guitar), and we performed three of my songs – Man in the mask; As soon as it stops raining; and The band played on – at the Seagull Theatre in Lowestoft  as part of their regular “New Words, Fresh Voices” event. I had taken part in this as a poet, but thought I’d give the singing a go after Ian Fosten, the owner and compere, pleaded for more music. Predictably, there was only one poet on Sunday: the rest was music. I didn’t feel we were outshone: the first two songs went really well, and Dot and Phil were really pleased to have done it. As was I, of course. Our band doesn’t have name, but Phil suggested Normal for Norfolk! He is keen to do more, which has to be good.

I’m now feeling better after getting really tired at the end of last week, when an awful lot seemed to be going on – a lot of it on the computer (poetry book) and preparing songs for Sunday, as well as writing a new song which we didn’t use! On Thursday there was a meeting at Dragon Hall about the November Paston event, as a result of which I now have a fairly clear idea about what’s happening when. Except the children’s art/poetry workshop, but I have connected Annette with Sarah to discuss this between them. I’m not usually that good at delegation, so something of a result.

In the afternoon Hilary and I went to Bridges – which is now on Magdalen Road, and not Charing Cross, as I thought – to pick up a bag of Adrian’s poetry books which were going to be thrown out. I’ve had a look at a few but been rather disappointed so far.

Friday was also busy. Dot and I had lunch with the Kibbles at Prezzos, which was very pleasant, but it overlapped slightly with the visit of Rob Knee to make some decisions about the Paston book. Worked out all right, though, and Rob and I were pretty much of one mind, which was good.

Have arranged to see David and the grandchildren over half-term; so that’s pretty exciting. Now to decide what to get Amy for her birthday.

Encounter with a songwriter

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Andy Martin, of Astral Void, by the Bure at Oxnead Hall

October dawned very warm and sunny, but is now showing signs of slipping into autumn: a cooler feel to the weather, leaves on the ground, a strongish wind, and snow forecast for Scotland. Still quite pleasant, though, and it was very warm for Dot’s Dutch trip, which went well on the whole: it was quite a major event, and their workshops were full. The journey also passed almost without incident, if you overlook their not being able to find the car at Stansted when they got back – a purely temporary aberration.

I have been working hard on a couple of books: finishing off the Norfolk poems book – Words in a Landscape – with David, and getting the material together for Another Country – our next Paston publication. This comes to a head on Friday, when I meet with Rob Knee to decide what it will look like. The artists have suddenly come up with material, so the decisions may be harder than predicted.

Readers will I am sure be delighted and astonished in equal measure to hear that the rogue Humax has been working perfectly for several days. And Dropbox has finished its mammoth uploading of my picture files. Quite a relief.

Went to a concert at St Andrew’s Hall on Saturday. Vicki Ellis was on piccolo in the first two pieces and sat out the third with us. Apparently Dvorak has little use for piccolos. Nice to see her and her parents. Nick and Jan Miller were also there. Aunt E has been proving difficult over the last few days, calling out all and sundry, sometimes several at once. Dot has been out there today and was there yesterday too. E was not strong enough to make the planned visit to North Walsham with Dot yesterday, so I went instead, and had a rather nice meal with Dot’s mother’s cousin Sheila, her daughter Teresa, Teresa’s daughter Anna, and Anna’s son Harry (aged 18 months and very keen on tomatoes). That’s four generations in one room. Teresa (our bridesmaid 43 years ago) made a rather lovely raspberry-flavoured, crispy pastry dessert with almonds to round it all off, the only downside being that I then had to make a meal for the Tuesday Group while Dot went to the Nafpht annual meeting at the Ram, Tivetshall. Didn’t really feel hungry. Don’t know why.

On the way home from North Walsham we stopped to look at the church and hall at Oxnead (Paston connection), and encountered a young musician who was looking for the river so that he could get some songwriting inspiration. We walked down to the Bure with him and had a chat about the Pastons and other things. Turned out he was Andy Martin, guitarist and singer for Norwich-based band Astral Void, who I tracked down on the internet afterwards. Interesting.

On Sunday afternoon I decided to go over to Horsford to catch the end of the Norfolk Chess Championships. Glad I did: always get a warm welcome from chess people, and there were a couple of interesting games and anecdotes. In the end Mike Gough won by boring Mervyn Hughes into making a mistake, thus depriving Charlie Fry of his first overall victory. Watched a fascinating win by Dave Hall over Ron Hughes and was pleased to say I saw the winning moves in advance. Always easier when you’re watching.

Separate countries

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From quite sunny, we progress to extremely sunny, and hot with it. Reminds me of our two weeks in Canada earlier this year. Coincidentally we had dinner last night with two of our Canadian friends – Karol and Pete Walpole – at the new, expanded home of Anne and Philip Robinson, who are just home from another holiday, this time in Crete.

Now Dot has left me: she should be arriving at Stansted airport about now en route to Eindhoven and eventually Hilversum in Holland, where she and Barbara will deliver a couple of P4C workshops tomorrow. I may be wrong, but I think this will be the first time Dot and I have been in separate countries since we were married. The last couple of days have been taken up largely with making sure that Dot knows what she’s taking and is taking it. Hope that worked out all right. Meanwhile, I am thinking about doing my tax return. Eventually, I may even do it.

The other item at the top of my to-do list is the forthcoming Paston poetry book, provisionally named Another Country. We’re aiming at 30 pages of A5, with some art – assuming we can persuade the artists to produce something. If not, it will be with photographs. At the moment e-mails are flying backwards and forwards in an attempt to decide who will pay what towards production costs, and who will receive any profits. Using the word “profits” very loosely. I am going to be putting most of it together. I also need to write a couple of poems, the introduction and some notes.

Our Humax, which has been acting very strangely – recording things it wasn’t asked to, not recording what it should, labelling recordings wrongly and duplicating this that and the other – has suddenly gone very quiet after it seized up and I rebooted it. Suddenly all the recorded programmes disappeared, and it seems to be recording things correctly again. Can this last? I hope so, because I’ve cancelled Ryan (Mr Hometech Solutions) who was going to come and have a look at it. In other news on the technology front, Dropbox seems to have nearly finished uploading my picture files. It has started forecasting the end of the operation in hours instead of days – currently 41 hours.

Amid all the Euro-preparations, Dot and I dropped in at Ethika on Timberhill on Tuesday to view Annette’s new fashion collaboration. Looks good. Teri was also there. Dot bought a bag and a hat, the latter from someone other than Annette.

Angels in the roof

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The weathervane designed by J S Cotman on Knapton Church

We’re in the midst of some quite summery weather, with only a slight edge to the wind to suggest that we’re coming into autumn. Yesterday I led a group of four (Rob, Caroline, Kit, Dot Cobley) on the walk from Pigney’s Wood and up the Green Lane (Paston’s Way) into Knapton. Stayed a while at Knapton Church, trying to work out why Knapton was never mentioned by the Pastons – and failing. Lovely angels in the hammerbeam roof. Very little Pastony to see on the walk, but we did have time to discuss our forthcoming book of poetry, which I have proposed we call Another Country, though we probably won’t. We’ve set ourselves a deadline of a fortnight to gather all the material, which is ambitious but essential.

In the evening it was Peter and Joan’s golden wedding at Park Farm. Happily they were both able to get there, despite looking frail. Even Aunt E made it, delivered by her helper Melissa, and it was a pleasant evening. Spent much of it talking to Angela and Vicki, and even ventured a dance with Dot.

Dot did a church school inspection on Thursday at Brisley, and so didn’t get back in time to accompany me to the private view for Martin Laurance’s exhibition at the Theatre Royal. It was the collection of paintings he did on Orford Ness, for which I think he was sponsored by the National Trust. Rather a bleak setting, but he does bleak rather well, especially with his surprising splashes of unusual colour. Really like his work, but resisted the temptation to buy. Pity he’s moving to Kent. Spoke to Hilary Mellon and Rupert, who’s just been diagnosed with diabetes. Elspeth R was there but pretended not to see me again. Don’t know what’s going on there.

While on the subject of the Theatre Royal, we attended a production of Madness of George III on Monday that was absolutely superb. David Haig played him brilliantly and got a standing ovation.  The play itself was compelling, mixing tragedy and humour intelligently.

In other news, I’ve just finished my sermon for tomorrow and have booked to see Adam Cohen at the UEA in November. I have also finished Sam’s novel – prompted by a plea for feedback – and responded. Apparently I was the first of his readers to do so.

 

 

Shower of the day

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Still keeping busy in mildish, dryish weather, but there is an autumnal feel to the air. Spent Friday and Saturday assisting Dot with organising the James Finley speaker’s event at St Luke’s – ie keeping 150 people happy and comfortable, with hot drinks and biscuits available, plus rearranging furniture, buying many litres of milk and pounds of biscuits and trying to work out what’s going on. It all went well: JF peaked in the first session, which was a brilliantly poetic, broad-brush look at mysticism. But his subsequent stuff was also good, and there was a very nice feel to it all. The volunteers got on well as usual.

In contrast, there were very few people at Communion yesterday, and I also found myself doing a solo on guitar when Dot was grabbed to deliver (that can’t be the right word) the Cup.  Oh, I think it’s administer. I could go back and change it, but I’m on a roll. In the afternoon we went to the cemetery at North Walsham, timing our arrival precisely to coincide with the only shower of the day, which stopped as we drove off. Had a cup of tea with Jessie, who looked well. In the evening we picked up JF (remember him?) from St Julian’s and took him to Nicholas’s, where we all had dinner: lamb foll0wed by blackberry and apple pie, all expertly cooked by NV. Is there no end to his talents? JF is a pleasant and gentle grandfather who lives in Santa Monica, but still thinks a shirt and trousers (sorry, pants) is the right choice for a Norfolk September evening. Worth thinking about.

My Twitter account got hacked last night, so I have been fielding emails and tweets from people telling me so: this will no doubt continue, although I changed the password first thing this morning and switched it on Facebook too, just in case. David helped with putting all my photos in Dropbox, a process which I have been informed by Dropbox will take 23 days. I feel they may be exaggerating. I hope they are.

Miraculous appearance of icons

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The Bure at Stokesby

Took a brief step back into the chess world on Monday, when we had a club night featuring rapid games in a kind of mini-tournament, played in the bar. I did well in the first two games, beating Steve Crane and a new guy who gave me a piece early on, but after a bye I came back with two losses – one on time in a winning position against Steve Moore and the other against my bête noir, Terry Glover, where I just miscalculated. That meant I missed out on the semi-finals, but I did have a couple of friendlies against strong players – Jeff Dawson and Jim McAvoy – both of which I won. So +4-2: pretty good for me. Apologies to any readers who don’t play chess.

On the same day we learnt that C had gone into Hellesdon – no surprise, as she’d been deteriorating alarmingly and had become fiercely paranoid – but sad all the same. Dot had been round to see her earlier and had spoken to the social services people who were there to assess her. This has happened to her before, and we expect her to recover enough to come out of hospital in a few months.

Strong wind on Monday,  but it’s been quite pleasant since then. On Tuesday I went out to see Lucy, who is in a particularly bad way after her recent rather lengthy hospital visit. She has so many things wrong with her that the consultants can’t pin down the causes. She is still determined to carry on with the Paston Heritage Society, and we had a longish talk about various aspects of the Pastons, in which I am getting more and more interested, but she was clearly very tired and in pain.

Yesterday I spent ages putting words and pictures on to the new Paston website – “ages” because I couldn’t work out how to insert the images to accompany an article. In the end I asked Robin, who created the site, and he sent lengthy instructions. But what it all boiled down to was that although I could do lots of stuff on the site using Safari, it wasn’t showing me the key icons for inserting images. So I switched to Firefox, and they miraculously appeared. It was pretty easy then. I still had several attempts at resizing a picture I’d been sent before I could get it looking sharp enough. They way I did it (in case I forget and look back at this) was to put the picture into iPhoto, export it as a small picture and then upload it on to the site. Seems straightforward, but there are so many other possibilities…

Anyway by 3.45pm I was determined to get out of the house. Dot was due back from Bradwell shortly, but I couldn’t wait, and in fact passed her on the single-carriageway section of the A47 near Burlingham. I pulled in and phoned her, but she decided to carry on when I said I was going to Mautby (home of Margaret, who married John Paston somewhere around 1440 and wrote many of the Paston letters). I don’t think I’d ever been to Mautby, which is off to the right of the road running from Acle to Caister. It’s pretty much on the edge of the Bure marshes and has a nice old church where Margaret was buried. Unfortunately the south aisle, where she was buried, collapsed some time ago; so there is no trace of any memorial. I drove around a bit and walked a little before deciding that Hall Farm was all that was left of Mautby Hall. The current buildings are almost invisible from the road.

So I drove home, stopping briefly at Stokesby, which has a delightful riverside pull-in and pub. Spoke to a woman from North Yorkshire who was sitting on a boat in the evening sun and was envious that we had “all this on our doorstep”. I said we quite liked North Yorkshire.

Today Dot is at a Diocesan House meeting and I have been up to clean mum and dad’s grave: not a very thorough job, but it looks much nicer.