Monthly Archives: November 2010

Out into the snow and ice

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In the wilds of Epping Forest, with Kristine and David Coomes and Dot on a bridge over a stream

We were a bit hesitant about travelling to London to visit the Coomes in their Leyton retreat. Not that we didn’t want to – indeed we had been trying to get there, past a record number of postponements on both sides, for over a year. But in Norwich there was a good covering of snow – enough to entice the police into closing the hilly and therefore slippery Rose Lane into the city. However, I had it on good authority that the snow disappeared south of Norwich and there was none in London: even better, there was no further snow forecast for Norfolk until after we were due to return. So we went, just after 10am on Saturday.

The roads were not easy as far as Attleborough, which kept our speed well down, but after that the snow disappeared and the roads were clear. Despite detailed directions from David we managed to go wrong after leaving the M11 and had to ring up to find out where we were – but it turned out that we were very close, so no real problem. On the way back the roads were clear until we reached Norwich (after a comfort stop early on the A11), and we got up our hill quite easily, though there was snow and ice on it.

Had a great weekend, which included a first-class Indian meal in South Woodford at the expense of our hosts and a cold but really good walk in Epping Forest on the Sunday morning. In between lots of interesting talk and a constant stream of tempting food and drink. As usual I succumbed to temptation and had too much of both, resulting in an acid reflux problem during the night. Still, there is no pleasure without pain. Or is there? Discuss.

This morning we have more snow, but as I write the sky is blue and we are about to go outside and rearrange the cars, putting the MX5 in the garage to keep it warm. I should mention that for some reason our Humax decided not to record one or two things over the weekend, which made us doubly thankful that we were able to watch Norwich thrash Ipswich 4-1 on television at the Coomes’.

HIgh price of levelled lights

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Dot with the chest relocated to the garage. Quite a lot of captions rejected there.

Approaching the end of November and very wintry – apparently the earliest snow for 17 years. Not too much of it here – it barely settles and then disappears – but lots in the north (eg Scarborough) and our usual haunts in Scotland are badly hit. Still a bit uncertain how our journey to London will go tomorrow; according to the forecast, we should be all right if we can get out of Norfolk.

Enjoyed our lunch on Tuesday with Lucy and her friends, which showed signs of going on into the evening, but we had to go to the supermarket and then Tuesday Group at the Archers; so we left around 4pm. No time to call in at the garage, but we did that the next day after a visit to the tip to deposit some failed electrical items. Discovered a new automatic light leveller would cost £340: the service guy at the garage was as shocked as we were, and he’s booked the car in next week to see if some other method can be found of fixing it. Meanwhile, of course, no problem with it. We’ll see what happens on the way back from London on Sunday, after our much-postponed visit to the Coomes’.

We went to see 100-year-old Phyllis on same day and shared Communion with her, her daughter Janet, Nicholas and Elvira, in her little flat at Doughty’s Hospital while it poured with rain outside. Later, with exquisite timing, had our hair cut. Yesterday I went into the city and tried to get some sense out of the O2 shop regarding switching my old mobile phone data to my new one, including the number. Had three attempts and wasn’t happy with what they said, so I’ve decided to use the number that came with the iPhone. Now have to let everyone know, but as the people who actually ring me on my mobile can be counted on the toes of one foot, this shouldn’t be too arduous. For anyone who’s interested, the new number is 07543 804041.

Today our new unit for the hi-fi was delivered, and Dot has spent much of the day, with some help from me, rearranging and tidying up the house. The living room certainly looks good. Discovered loads of David’s old school and college stuff (including a monitor) in the old chest which is now relocated in the garage.

The long good birthday

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An iPhone picture of birthday girl Dot at her desk

I was expecting some editing work to do this morning, but it hasn’t arrived, so instead I’m bringing my blog up to date. Winter is fast approaching, with snow forecast for the end of the week. We are about to venture into a no doubt chilly North Norfolk for lunch with Lucy and a couple of her friends who want to know about Ambient Wonder. We are not experts on AW, but will do our best!

The past few days have centred on Dot’s birthday, which “began” last Friday (see previous post). In the evening we went to the Norfolk Mead at Coltishall with Anne and Philip. Excellent meal and ambience, though a trifle on the pricey side. Still, well worth it. My car lights started playing up again on the way there, and I guess I’m going to have to call in at the garage later today. The auto-levelling system isn’t working properly. Sometimes it’s OK; sometimes it isn’t. Just what you want: an intermittent fault that won’t be happening when we reach the engineers.

In view of the slight risk of dodgy lights, we took Dot’s MX5 to Caddington for the weekend and had good journeys each way. Lovely birthday meals both days: Amy had made some buns, and Oliver had bought Dot some chocolate. David gave her a Kindle, which she is already much absorbed in. On Saturday afternoon the Coomes family came over; it was good to see them again. The children all get on very well. We returned home when David left to take the children to Aylesbury – just after 3pm on the Sunday.

Monday was Dot’s actual birthday. In addition to the bracelet, I bought her the book of the radio series, A History of the World in 100 Objects , a sizeable tome which she seemed very pleased with. It weighs several hundred Kindles. To celebrate her birthday further, we bought some more furniture from Gary’s Pine – this time an oak unit to hold our record player and a small table to hold a plant. From St Giles Street we hurtled to the Ruschcutters for a lovely lunch, made even better by the free birthday bottle of wine. From there things quietened down a bit, though the aerial man arrived just after 2pm to fix the connection to out bedroom TV. Will probably have him back in the new year to sort out a switch to bedroom digital!

On a technical note, Dot was overwhelmed by the number of birthday wishes she received via Facebook. Impressive.

Changes in the living room

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Jill Cann (left), mother of the skirting board man. You never know when these pictures are going to come in useful.

Dot’s birthday is on the horizon, and for reasons too obvious to mention, she had her present three days early – and wore it to Dipples open day champagne-and-canape-fest at lunchtime. It’s a rather nice bracelet. She will be wearing it again tonight as we dine at the Norfolk Mead with the Robinsons. It’s seemed a long day, partly because much of it has been spent shifting furniture around following the arrival of our new TV unit, which looks very good. It was especially satisfying that I managed all the wire reconnections without anything not working. Yet.

The living room now looks rather nice, as Phil acknowledged when he dropped a package off for Dot earlier. A little more shifting around (though not much) when the skirting board man arrived to look at what needed to be done to fix the base of the walls following the removal of the skirting heating. He turned out to be a former pupil of Dot’s and the son of one of the Tuckswood teaching assistants, Jill Cann.

Yesterday was even longer. The man who installed the radiators arrived just after 8am and was here till very late afternoon. He was extremely conscientious and careful, which is what you want form a central heating engineer. It’s fantastic to have some real heat in the living room, even though we had to get through a cold day to get it. To be honest it could have been a lot worse, and we didn’t even resort to an electric fire. It was very still and not too cold. I went our for a walk in the morning for an hour or so and sat on St James Hill (while composing a poem) without feeling in the least uncomfortable.

Glorious autumn – for one day only

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Stormy sky above Aldeburgh last weekend

Decided to go to Coventry on Wednesday, because it was forecast to be the only half-decent day this week. Didn’t start out too well, but in Coventry after a good drive the sun was shining and everything was glorious autumn. Andrew was in good form, and Julia came over to The Langleys to have a chat with us while I was there (I had remembered to phone her while en route, and fortunately she was free). The house seemed in better nick, especially Andrew’s room. After Julia left, Andrew and I went to Friday’s for a steak lunch. He had a gigantic sundae intended for two. Afterwards got some petrol and checked the tyres, which were strangely very low on one side. It may be that this was the cause of a problem with the automatic levelling of the headlights, because when I was on the way home, halfway across the Fens, the levelling suddenly sorted itself out, and has been OK ever since *touches wood*.

Journey back was not good. The A14 was solid after the A1: I realised just in time and turned north up the A1 before skirting north of Huntingdon and reaching the A141. There was another hold-up at Chatteris (heavy traffic at roundabout), but I thought I was making good progress when I reached Nordelph to find that the road to Downham Market was arbitrarily shut. No advance warning. Using my vast knowledge of the area 😉 I eventually located the totally unsigned alternative route via Barroway Drove.

Weather took a nose-dive on Thursday, with high winds and rain, but I managed to get to Paston in the evening for a trustees’ meeting. Slightly nervous journey home because wind was very strong, but no problem. Earlier Dot had become trapped in the Longwater shopping complex after the southern bypass was closed by an accident and traffic was gridlocked on the exit road into Norwich. It took more than an hour to clear, but fortunately Dot spotted that she could get back on to the bypass instead of travelling into Norwich, as most drivers were doing.

Today still very windy but dry, and I walked into the city to buy Dot’s birthday present, plus a couple of books, while she took the car for a valeting by some non-English and therefore very hardworking guys off Aylsham road. Great job!  She then had a meeting with head teacher friends in the city, and I went to Morrisons to restock an empty fridge. When Dot got home she was excited by a piece of furniture, so we drove up, caught its owners just before they shut up shop and bought it. It is a corner unit in oak which will hold our television and a few other things. It will be delivered next Friday. A bargain, I have to say. Well, I don’t, but I will. As I had just paid our house insurance for the year, it turned out to be an expensive day.

Wintry weekend at Aldeburgh

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Dot at Hidden Cottage, our three-night base in Aldeburgh

Our weekend at Aldeburgh started badly. Just before I was due to pick up Dot from her team-building day at the King of Hearts it started raining hard, and it kept on going. Very slow journey as it got dark, and a car warning light came on – later revealed by the manual to be a problem with the auto-levelling of the lights. At the cottage we couldn’t open the key safe and had to call the owner out while we waited in the rain. The central heating was also set too low, but I managed to sort that out.

After tea (I had brought some food) we went to a reading at the Jubilee Hall which was brilliant: J O Morgan, who won the festival prize last year and has a Dylan-Thomas-like storytelling style, only Scottish; Matthew Caley, who could have made a living as a comedian if he hadn’t been such a good poet; and Don Paterson, the well-known Scot. The next day I bought a book by Caley and got him to sign it.

Back at the cottage I thought I’d lost the rest of the tickets and so after an extensive but fruitless search had my second bad night’s sleep in a row. The following morning, while we were barely conscious and the rain had stopped, Dot found them in the bottom of the cold bag. Dragged ourselves to the Jubilee Hall to hear a discussion on a poet’s toolkit chaired by Don Paterson and featuring Bill Manhire, Marie Howe and Lars Gustafsson. Again very good and quite inspiring. On the way there we had run into Caroline Gilfillan and afterwards also Kaaren Whitney, who we met at the Lowestoft reading. Had morning snack at 152, just off the High Street and bought bread. Had a late bath and returned to the fray at a lunchtime session led by John Irons on the difficulties of translating poetry: as a musician he was very concerned with getting the pulse right, but I wondered if the precision of the words wasn’t equally important. Good stuff, though.

Afterwards we queued to lunch at the Golden Galleon fish and chip shop, then bought me a couple of Fat Face sweaters before booking in for supper on Sunday at the famed Brudenell Hotel and embarking on a walk along the top of the sea wall, then inland and home (about 2 miles). Took lots of photos in bright late afternoon sunlight. Later watched F1 practice on TV and the football results: late equaliser from the Canaries.

The evening session after tea (Dot had bought food while I was in the bath) was another reading featuring John Glenday, who was excellent; Dorianne Laux, who was OK; and Bernard Kops, who was a Jewish one-off, ranging between brilliant and annoying. Caroline was also present, but we declined the opportunity of another session and walked home, watching some Battlestar Galactica before bed. Good night’s sleep at last.

Woke quite late. To Jubilee Hall again: rained as we were about to go in, happily delayed because Dot had persuaded me to buy another sweater on the way. Lecture by Don Paterson on Frost: bit esoteric but worth hearing, though DP is not a natural speaker. His God-is-not-there philosophy is a bit intrusive, unless of course you agree with him. Coffee afterwards, followed by drop-in at Peter Pears gallery for exhibition – OK, but not sparkling. Ominous grey clouds and occasional rain.

Later went for a walk to the Martello Tower and beyond: very cold and windy; even the fishermen were giving up and walking on to Orford Ness to dry out. However, the sun broke through as we returned to watch F1 from Brazil. Not quite the result we wanted. To Brudenell Hotel for evening meal: very good without being superb. Shrimps, wood pigeon, duck, brûlée and a very nice Shiraz. Watched two more episodes of Battlestar Galactica, then a bit more football before bed. Two more results we didn’t want: Liverpool winning and Arsenal losing.

Not a great night, but redeemed sleeplessness by writing a couple of poems. Next morning the wind had greatly increased: pretty much a gale, with sea hurtling in at Gunton, north of Lowestoft, where I found myself eating a sandwich in the car after dropping Dot off at Corton school. A good view of it, first from the clifftop road and then from a potholed car park at the end of the promenade with the narrowest entrance (between threatening concrete blocks) that you are likely to find anywhere. Earlier I had popped into Lowestoft, where I bought said sandwich.

Picked up Dot from the school around 1.30pm and after a quick return to the seafront drove back to Norwich. As we approached the rain started again. The house was very cold, because I’d turned the heating off in case of a repeat of the pump sticking. So we unpacked to warm ourselves up and then watched a bit of TV before I played a chess game against Terry Glover at the club. He has a jinx on me. I played a really good game and then managed to lose on time when he stirred up some slight complication which I could have avoided. When my flag fell – without my even realising it was close – I still had a won position. Naturally I had another bad night.

Unsticking the pump

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The Thames at Henley, from a couple of weeks back

Feeling shattered this morning after a terrible night. Dot woke me in the early hours to say the central heating had failed to switch off again: I managed to unstick the pump valve by hitting it (yes, that is the approved method), but by then I was too awake to go back to sleep, and very little sleep followed at all, despite a busy day yesterday.

I had taken an hour to get out to Paston after getting stuck behind a very slow-moving convoy of agricultural vehicles on a road (Salhouse-Wroxham) where there was no alternative route. Went on and on, and when there was an alternative, leaving Wroxham, I found myself in tiny lanes behind another vehicle (a car this time) travelling less than 20mph! I was not in a good mood by the time I arrived for the Paston Heritage Society trustees’ meeting (Lucy, Jo and me), which lasted for nearly two hours. Journey back was much easier, but after a brief meal I was out again, this time with Dot, to the First Thursdays Ambient Wonder meeting at the Workshop cafe. Can’t pretend I enjoyed this – noisy discussions are not my forte – but Dot had a good time, I think. This morning she is at a Diocesan team-building meeting at the King of Hearts, where I delivered her shortly after 9am. When I pick her up at about 3.30pm, we will be off for a weekend at Aldeburgh. Feel more like a weekend in bed.

British Summer Time is over, and the weather turned wintry immediately, though it’s now milder. Dark early evenings are not much fun. On the bright side, David came up on Monday and stayed the night. He went to two meetings – one with NAfPHT and one with Howard’s company to chat about making a website tender. (I have been doing more work for Howard too.) David not only gave me his old iPhone as a late birthday present but kindly queued up at the O2 shop to sort out a sim card for me. I am now technologically at the cutting edge, or at least slightly nearer to it. Sadly I was pre-booked for a chess match at Lowestoft on the Monday evening, so I had to leave mother and son alone together, which I’m sure was nice for them. Despite knowing Lowestoft quite well, I managed to get lost while trying to find the venue and arrived late; on the plus side I won the game, and we drew the match 2-2.

Last weekend Dot and I took sandwiches to church and ate them with a cup of tea before shooting off to Wroxham to visit her Uncle Frank, who seemed physically in quite good shape. Afterwards we took Jessie home and stayed for tea and delicious mince pies. You don’t get shortcrust pastry like that just anywhere.