Tag Archives: annette

Entertained extravagantly

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Birthday girl Annette at sunny Dunwich

I’m writing this as I await the arrival of the gas man – an appointment pinpointed at between 8am and 1pm. It is Andrew’s birthday. Hopefully his presents will have arrived, and I will phone him later.

Again, it has been a busy week. After mentioning that the meal for our last Tuesday Group would be cold because we were both too shattered post-holiday to cook, the Archers and Vicky both volunteered to bring food. In the end we had a curry prepared by Vicky and a nice evening. Tonight’s has been cancelled because we’re going to West Runton to see Fred and Sue.

On Wednesday I had my last session with Sharon. My shoulder is not completely better, but it is much improved. Quite enjoyed a bit of physiotherapy, and I shall miss it.

We were entertained lavishly twice last week: on Friday by the Greens – an evening meal in their garden with Claire and Phil, followed by tea and coffee upstairs in their unique house. Food and wine were in plentiful supply, as was the conversation. A lovely evening.

The following day we were at Dunwich, where we helped Annette celebrate her 50th birthday at the Cliff House holiday park, which is a lot better than it sounds and which her family and friends seemed to have taken over. Annette had a beautiful cottage, others were in tents, and the celebration centred on her mother’s large wooden chalet where, again, food and drink were abundant.

We eventually located the latter by the Liverpool accents and eventually Annette’s distinctive laugh. Guests included Caroline, Martin Laurance and Teri.

Another big day on Sunday. I was preaching at church, and this was followed by a rehearsal for our visit to the Seagull in the evening. In the afternoon we called in to see Phil and Joy with some Scottish marmalade, and updated them on Andrew. The performance at the Seagull went quite well – especially the first half, when we did my new song, The Rolling Hills of Pakefield, and The Man in the Mask. In the second half we did Feels Like I’m Falling Apart, which was fine, and the full version of Bernadette, which was probably too long. However, we got a good response, and I read a couple of poems too. As you will have guessed, the number of performers was not the highest.

Yesterday saw the culmination of house-cleaning and rearranging, thanks to my wife’s almost limitless energy (I suspect she is siphoning off some of mine). I did arouse myself in the afternoon to paint our two gates and was quite pleased with the result. They also survived a thunderstorm a couple of hours later, following which we went to Morrisons to replenish our fast diminishing food supply.

Big Day survives winter’s tail

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Jessie cuts the cake

The snow is still with us, though it has stopped falling from the sky for a while. Some intrepid guy has spread sand on Aspland Road up to halfway, so there is no problem reaching the top. In fact we have been able to reach the top right through the current cold spell – though admittedly we haven’t been out much in the car.

Yesterday we did, though – because it was the Big Day, Jessie’s 80th, and a gathering had been scheduled to take place at the Wayford Bridge Inn for lunch. There had been a lot of snow late on Sunday, and I was a bit worried about emerging in view of the whiteness of the road; I took it very, very slowly down and reached the bottom with no problem. After that it was plain sailing. We picked Jude up from her house on Riverside Road, and the main roads in the county were more or less clear.

In fact the roads were so clear that, much to Jessie’s delight (and ours), David made a last-minute decision to come from Caddington and arrived in time – before some people who had come from North Walsham! The only person who didn’t make it, I think, was a friend who couldn’t get out of her drive in Acle. The Wayford Bridge Inn was excellent: staff very attentive and a first-class meal. I had one of the best steaks I’ve had for a very long time.

Amazing

There were 14 of us – Jessie; Dot, David and myself; Janet and Ray with Judy and her husband from St Albans; Roger, Liz and Philip; Jude; and George and Fiona. Afterwards David returned to Caddington and arrived in time for his swimming lesson in the evening. The rest of us went back to Jessie’s for the amazing cake that was our present to her – baked, of course, by the equally amazing Marion Sturgeon from Alburgh.

We headed for home just before 6pm, as it started to snow slightly. No real problems getting back. After we dropped Jude I was about to turn into Aspland Road when I noticed a car doing a three-point turn (!!) so continued right up Prince of Wales Road and turned round to approach from the other – and preferable – direction. This time a car was stuck two thirds of the way up; so I reversed to the bottom, and when he had finished slithering around and being pushed to the side of the road, I took a run at it and made the top easily.

Since last Thursday we had two lots of visitors who were not deterred by the weather: on Thursday the Kibbles and on Saturday the Robinsons, who decided to park outside the sorting office and walk through. Not necessarily a good idea: Philip fell over while pushing a car that was sliding around while turning at the top and coming to rest in the gutter (the car, not Philip). He was OK, though, and we had a good evening: Dot cooked some delicious steak and ale.

On Sunday we emerged for church and had no real problems, arriving very early – but not before Geoff Saunders, who was leading the service. Eventually we had 17, which is pretty good and no different from a normal Sunday, though it was quite  treacherous underfoot. Afterwards Dot and I parked near Fye Bridge and walked up to Mandells Gallery for Martin Laurance’s private view. Brilliant exhibition as always; we almost bought a painting, but by the time we got round to it, someone else had bought it. Damn spot.

Spoke briefly to Martin and at greater length to his partner Val; then to Annette and Mike, and Rupert. Several familiar faces from the Norfolk art world. Martin is quite interested in collaborating on some poetry-and-art project, which would be great if it came off. Have spoken to several people about possible book projects recently, but nothing definite. Still, it’s good to have irons in the fire. The tanka collaboration continues.

Meanwhile, Lucy has managed to fall over in the snow and injure her shoulder, as if she didn’t have enough problems. She is in hospital at Cromer, and so Rob and I have to represent her at the Norfolk Record Office on Thursday, which means I shall have to cancel a doctor’s appointment. Annoying, when they are so hard to come by. At present I am trying to make up my mind whether to have a Tuesday Group meeting tonight. No snow is forecast for today, so it should be possible, but there is still a lot of snow up here, and if certain people fell over, we would never be able to get them up again.

 

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.

Dog replaced by budgerigar

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Another avant garde, innovative, not to say derivative, bit of camera work at the Bergh Apton sculpture trail

Doesn’t time fly? And so much happening… Last Friday, for instance, it rained quite a bit. We had excellent lunch with the Higbees at Newton Flotman, made a quick visit to Diocesan House to pick up documents for Dot, and then made for Bungay in the evening. There was a private view at the Cork Brick gallery : Annette and two other women, Diane Griffiths and  Georgina somebody.  The theme was animals, so not really my cup of tea, though Mike’s incidental drawing of a horse was stunning. Annette had some interesting new ideas as well, and Diane had some pretty nifty book work on show – particularly liked one called Book of Salt. Martin and his girlfriend were there, and we spoke for a while to Jane West (McClintock), who writes poetry and is from Norwich.

Down in Suffolk again on Saturday, when we were invited at short notice by June W to an early pizza supper (home made) at Beccles. Preferred the crumble afterwards, and the budgerigar – though the latter was not part of the meal. It appears to have replaced a dog, which has to be good. June seemed on good form, though she deteriorates markedly when you speak to her on the phone, as I did a few minutes ago. She has an appointment with the gynaecologist, which is a good thing: she has been trying to speak to one for ages.

On Sunday I preached a Pentecost sermon and Dot led the prayers at short notice. I had forgotten to mention to her that she was on the rota. In the afternoon we went out into the chilly, soggy  winds of North East Norfolk and took flowers to the cemetery (it was the anniversary of Dot’s mum’s death). Afterwards we visited Judith Rand at Bacton: she is recovering from a double bypass-plus operation. She showed us around her impressive Great Barn house, which would be worth well over a million if it was not in Bacton but Blakeney. Still couldn’t believe it when she said she didn’t think she’d get more than £400,000; she will be selling soon because she can’t look after it on her own, especially now. Afterwards called in at Jessie’s, where we found Roger waiting for his evening meal. Still managed to fit in a cup of tea, but we were home before 6pm.

Monday’s weather was much improved – quite warm, in fact. I called in to see Kathleen. She looks very frail but seemed pleased to see me. She finds it hard to talk and can’t hear easily, so it was bit hard going, but I was very pleased to be there. Read to her a bit from the Bible at her request. Am now involved at Paul’s request in getting him power of attorney. Earlier I bought Dot a new printer, as the wi-fi is so erratic on the one we have. After consulting David, we now have two printers, both connected by wire to their respective computers. That should sort it out. There are times when advancing technology is just not worth the bother.

Yesterday I returned to 12 The Close, where I had tried unsuccessfully to pick up some library lecture tickets the day before. It turned out that I should have been picking them up from the Cathedral Estates Office, and not Friends of the Cathedral, as I had assumed. Well, which would you have guessed if you just had the address? Tuesday Group in the evening featured a rejuvenated C, who had experienced a big improvement after we prayed for her the previous week. Today I have had a high number of phone calls, all from real people and relevant to life as we know it. Exhilarating.

Calm, warm and hardly anybody

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Dot
Dot on the railway bridge at Whitlingham Lane, Thorpe.

Sad news from Coventry this morning: Andrew became progressively worse over the weekend and had to be taken into hospital this morning. Can’t say this came as a huge surprise after seeing him on Friday, but sad nevertheless.

We had a quiet weekend in his absence. Dot and I went for a walk down on the Thorpe side of Whitlingham on Saturday afternoon: calm, warm, and hardly anybody about beside the river and  across the meadow. The next day, however, she had succumbed to a cold that had been creeping up on her and stayed in bed with a very bad throat and cough while I went and led the service at church. Pentecost! Matt’s first stab at preaching, and he was very good.

Annette in wig
Annette tries on a wig found in one of Rupert's boxes

In the afternoon I went to Bally for Open Studios – pretty much a must, as the artists have all had sudden notice to quit by mid-June. End of an era. Excellent main exhibition, but few people there: it was very hot, and I guess many of the potential attendees were on the beach. Spoke to Rupert and Shirley, then Martin Laurance – provisionally buying a painting of his – but spent most of time being shown round the exhibition by Annette. Some good new stuff from her, and if she spent as much time praising her own pictures as she did extolling the virtues of others, she might sell more. Such a nice girl.

Towards the end of yesterday the weather started to turn cooler, but not until after I walked into the city to pay in a couple of cheques. In the evening I drew my final chess game of the season after getting an advantage but not making it count. My 50% tournament score means I stay in the second division next season, though I keep wondering whether to give chess a rest. Dot stayed in bed most of yesterday, but has got up this morning, saying she feels much better. Had a call from Riding Lights theatre company yesterday asking if I knew anyone who could put up some of their troupe who are coming to Norwich next month. We’re going on holiday at the crucial time, but I’ve put out feelers. Nobody has grasped one yet.

Art and curry

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Dot and Annette look at one of Ali's books at the Orford Ness exhibition.
Dot and Annette look at one of Ali's books at the Orford Ness exhibition.

Severe weather turned out not to be as severe in Norfolk as elsewhere, so we were able to travel south on Saturday, first to pick up Annette and Mike from Burston, near Diss, and then to proceed onwards to Aldeburgh. There had been heavy rain overnight, and it was certainly pretty windy, but no real problem until we almost got back to Burston, when we picked up a small but persistent branch underneath the car. I extracted it later by torchlight. The journey down through Suffolk was easy enough, and it was nice to return to Aldeburgh so soon. We were there to see the Orford Ness 2009 exhibition, in which friend Martin Laurance was exhibiting, He and his friend Ali Hollingsworth were part of the Stone Eye group, who had been given unusual access to Orford Ness by the National Trust in order to respond to it artistically. The result was an impressive exhibition – some brilliant paintings from Martin, and some quiet different but also fine work from Ali, who also makes books, combining words and pictures. Martin and Ali were invigilating, and we had quite a chat with them both. The show was in the Peter Pears gallery, which was totally transformed from when we saw it as part of the Poetry Festival: now open, airy and perfect for showing the work.

We drove back in the dark, but the rain had eased until it had almost stopped, and the wind has also dropped. Had curry with Mike and Annette and a long talk to the accompaniment of Leonard Cohen. Tried to persuade them to join Twitter, but don’t think I got very far. Annette showed us some of her new work, and so did Mike. His drawings are absolutely brilliant. If there were any justice, he would be making loads of money. Got back to Norwich earlier than I’d expected because I was going by the clock on their DVD recorder, which was still BST. Still, that was probably a Good Thing. Quiet day today after a good Holy Communion this morning. Music seemed to go well.

10 January 2009

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Just been putting together a mixture of old and new pictures for a photo book for A Ethel’s birthday as a surprise (unless she reads this, which is pretty unlikely, as she doesn’t have a computer and wouldn’t know what to do with one if she had). This picture features her and U Ted together with Dot and David, and a little bit of me. Must be around 1980, I should think – perhaps earlier. Dot and I had to research some old albums, which was interesting: quite a number of unidentified people emerged. The process was interrupted (a) by problems with the printer, which I think have now been fixed after many abortive attempts and (b) by an unexpected visit from Joe and Birgit, who got a puncture on the way and eventually stayed for lunch. They bought us a bottle of pear liqueur from Germany, which was very welcome though stronger than I remembered it. I’m not sure “though” is the right word.

Very cold today – a couple of degree below zero – so no real desire to go out. Yesterday I helped Annette take the Paston book to the Millennium Library (meeting Lisa there), where it has a display cabinet to itself. The cabinet was embarrassingly big, actually, but one of the librarians managed to find some relevant books to make the display look half-decent, and they also printed out an information sheet I provided – on disc because our printer had just “broken”. The breaking turned out to be a blessing in disguise (pretty heavy disguise, it must be said), because they printed it out at A3, which made it look almost professional on a stand in the cabinet. I could not have done that.

The printer “breaking” occurred at a difficult moment, because Sue and Roger Eagle were here discussing philosophy for children with Dot at what sounded a pretty deep level. While I lured Dot away to look at the printer I gave them some mini-baguettes which I’d bought from Budgens on the way back from the dentist’s, together with some cheese, a few crisps and a cup of tea – all in a huge rush because I was late to meet Annette. Aargh! It worked out all right in the end, though. Annette came back for a warm drink (she had been working at freezing Bally) and I put off my visit to the post office to retrieve an undelivered piece of mail. Dot then returned her to Bally and went to the supermarket while I caught up with various stuff.

Dot is now printing out some stuff for her P4C visit to Terrington St Clement on Monday. She’s been very busy over the past few days, and Norwich City have just lost again, which doesn’t help.

1 February 2008

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Two roses in front of quite a lot of thorns. Amy and Dot walking the Whitlingham path last weekend. Today the weather has been sunny but bitterly cold, and snow is apparently on the way. Yesterday was extremely wintry, with sleet and high winds, but I managed to get into a break between the showers, and bussed up to get Andrew’s money.

Today I drove down to Annette’s then – after picking up her car from a “garage” in the middle of several fields at the end of a track, and after she then taxed it – she drove us to Colchester to pick up the PVM from The Minories. We were given a hand to transport it to the car via Rupert’s trolley. The Minories is being abandoned because its lease has come to an end, and the spectacular new building isn’t finished yet. The PVM made a measly £27 during its six-week stay, and I didn’t sell any books.

Had a chat with Annette about the future of InPrint. The feeling generally seems to be that we may be heading for a looser group with less ongoing commitment. But we’ll see at the meeting tomorrow. Sadly, I seem to be getting a cold, which is not helpful.

On Tuesday I went by train to Hull to assess the four reporters at the Hull Daily Mail. Weather was quite good both days – especially so on the way back, and the trains were amazingly prompt. Going up I had one change at Grantham, which was about as good as it gets. Coming back earlier than I had anticipated, I had to change three times, at Doncaster, Peterborough and Ely. All trains were pretty full, especially the Stansted Express (Peterborough-Ely). Best run was Doncaster-Peterborough on the very fast National Express to King’s Cross. These are very frequent, quite luxurious and make you realise what you’re missing living on an outcrop like Norfolk.

I was favourably impressed by Hull Trains – clean and modern – and by the station staff. I went to the inquiry desk to ask where I had to change on the way back, and the clerk quickly (very quickly: I had hardly finished talking) produced a slip of paper with all the details very clearly set out. At the Pumpkin buffet on the station the woman in charge was also highly efficient and clear about what was on offer. The Ibis Hotel was good too, though basic. Had fish and chips in the evening which was excellent, as was the continental breakfast. What they offered generally was limited but quite sufficient, and just the job, really.

The trainees did very well, and three of the four just have to complete their shorthand to finish their NVQs. Sadly, this may not be as easy as they think it will be. The date of my next visit has been left open.