Tag Archives: london

Obviously I can’t reveal who did it

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We like to catch these new shows early.
We like to catch these new shows early.

Another busy period. I started writing this on a train to London on Monday, where we went to catch The Mousetrap, which is a kind of role reversal, I guess. Reverting to chronological order…

Last Tuesday was Amy’s 11th birthday, Dot was in Hull and I was in the city, paying in cheques and buying Amy a silver Parker pen. In the afternoon I went to a PHS trustees’ meeting at Rob’s, after which I dropped in a thankyou card to Jessie, thanking her for the meal on Sunday.

After a brief lull on Wednesday, Dot and I drove to Coventry on Thursday to see Andrew, who’s still in hospital at the Caludon Centre. We were with him for just under an hour. He seemed pretty disengaged and under strain, but I’ve seen him a lot worse.

We then drove on to Caddington, arriving in time for a quick meal and a handover of Amy’s presents before David went to his history group. We then played Dixit using Amy’s new extension cards – a great game!

On Friday I roused myself to go with David to take Oliver to school in Aylesbury, leaving at 7.30am. Oliver read all the way, finishing off A Cuckoo’s Egg – a story of computer hacking that I read many years ago and have forgotten. Later Dot and I took Amy to St Alban’s for some shopping and a meal at Jamie’s. Amy didn’t really like what she ordered but didn’t make a fuss: she’s very considerate. We got her some bread to supplement her sauce, which she did like. Got back to Caddington as David was leaving to fetch Oliver.

We drove home at 6pm because we’d agreed to feed Ellie’s guinea pigs (before we knew about our Coventry/Caddington trip). Got back at 8 despite dire warnings from our satnav about a major hold-up. Happily it melted away just in time.

Bit of a kerfuffle at church on Saturday when Stuart got worried about hirers (a church plant) making too much noise at the hall. Called in to check on the way to Cromer, but nothing was happening. Got worse later, apparently. Ran into Phyllis and vicar David, who had rushed down from the Enneagram session check what all the fuss was about. Conflicting reports about what happened next, but apparently one local resident was very upset, and since then storing of excess equipment has proved impossible to handle; so they’re probably going up to St Luke’s. Good luck, St Luke’s.

At the Cromer History event I saw re-enactors Diana and Lisa, as well as Peter. Small hall, lots of people – even more earlier, it seems. Very wet day.

On Sunday after church we went to the Hendersons’ for lunch, which was delicious, and heard about Uganda. At home, saw some of US Grand Prix, but too tired (because of putting clocks back) to see the end. However, it came to my attention that Hamilton won and is world champion again. When we eventually saw the highlights yesterday, it turned out to be quite exciting.

London worked out well. The hotel (hub by Premier Inn in St Martin’s Lane, was extraordinary: lots of technology but not much space. Our room was tiny, taken up mainly by the bed, but everything worked well and of course you don’t go to a London hotel to stay in the room. Comfortable and clean, anyway. We went for a walk and took in some of the National Gallery before heading to Brown’s for a pre-theatre meal, where I was extremely impressed both by the efficiency and by the quality of the food.

The Mousetrap was fun: well-acted first half especially, though the second act was barely credible. Obviously I can’t tell you who did it. Interesting theatre in that you walked straight off the street across about ten yards of entrance hall and into the dress circle. Very good seats; the ice cream was good too. Not sure why three large people left at the interval. Maybe they were uncomfortable, but surely you’d want to know who did it.

Not a great night’s sleep, but my fault, not the bed’s. We went up the road to eat. for breakfast because Dot wanted a croissant. I had sandwiches. After that we went to the National Portrait Gallery and saw quite a few portraits, notably several of those used by Simon Schama in his TV series, which was interesting. After that we checked out from the hotel and took a tube, catching the 12.30 from Liverpool Street, which was pretty good going.

As coming down, we were in first class, and this time Dot didn’t spill her coffee. We were home by just after 2.30pm, and too tired to do much. However, we did take our old TV and DVD player round to a guy in Churchill Road, who seemed appreciative.

This morning was miserable, and I got wet checking the car tyres (still not happy with them). Later we went to Morrisons and bought much food. Traffic was horrendous. I walked home and got back about a quarter of an hour before Dot. Spent quite a lot of time on writing three pieces for Parish Pump, on Slavery, Refugees and In Flanders Fields.

Sands of time singing

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Josephine with Paul in 2008
Josephine with Paul in 2008

A cold few days, but happily my feeling of impending doom last Friday turned out to be a false alarm – either that or my precautions took effect. Either way, I was well enough to travel to Pinkys at Halesworth  to read three poems for the assembled throng. Well, maybe not a throng, but it felt like one, because the room was full. More than 20 people, and all aching to read.

Got a good reception, but not quite as good as that for a youngish guy new to the scene who performed in Luke Wright fashion and almost as well. His name is Oliver; so of course I looked on him favourably and complimented him.

The next day we braved a sprinkling of snow as we left and drove to London to see the Coomes, where we continued a hectic day by enjoying a large lunch, then travelling by car and tube to Lambeth to see a painting  exhibition at the Imperial War Museum. Some new names to me, and some excellent stuff among others not so exciting. Particularly liked a guy called Nevinson. Also a superb large canvas by John Singer Sargent.

We lingered so long here that we had to continue straight to the Indian restaurant we normally visit, without returning home. Thanks to the large lunch already mentioned, I was not feeling particularly hungry, but the food was quite reasonable.

On the Sunday Dot and I went with Kristine to Mass at the local RC church while David stayed at home and mused on life, the universe and everything. Afterwards we had another largish lunch, rejecting the opportunity to go shopping in favour of starting back for Norwich while it was still light, in view of the forecast of snow in Norfolk. In fact the journey was quite easy, and no snow materialised at all.

One reason I had been nervous was my fear of not being able to get back to Norwich for the funeral on Monday of my Aunt Josephine, who died on December 30 at the age of 99. I had arranged to take my uncle Paul (91) to the burial at Cringleford at 10.30am, followed by a thanksgiving service at Hethersett Methodist Church at 11.30pm, with refreshments. Paul managed to keep track of what was going on, and sang enthusiastically, particularly the (very) old favourite, The sands of time are sinking, which I had to admit I enjoyed too.

Phil, Birgit and Dot were there too, with Joe joining us for the thanksgiving service. While getting more sugar for Paul (he took five spoonfuls in his tea), I ran into Melanie Cook, a homeopathist and nutritionist who had helped me some years ago and who is really nice. We introduced her to Birgit, who is having a lot of problems with various obscure afflictions and could probably benefit from a more holistic approach than is afforded by the NHS.

Yesterday Dot was quite busy, and so I had a good opportunity to get things done. Needless to say, I didn’t. But I did walk up to the sorting office and then the Rosary in what seemed the coldest weather for a long time. Not unpleasant, just very cold.

Today we await the arrival of Linda to cut our hair, having already been out to North Walsham to help Jessie celebrate her birthday with a selection of sausage rolls and mince pies (supplied by her, of course). I gave her a copy of my Iona book: we also popped one through Teresa’s door. She had requested one via Facebook.

Houghton Hall visited

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Anna and Dot leave Skyscape at Houghton Hall
Anna and Dot leave Skyscape in the grounds of Houghton Hall

The weather continues warm, but the dryness isn’t what it was. In fact, sometimes the dryness is wet – as yesterday, when after having our hair cut we stayed indoors most of the day and moped, especially after Norwich City FC, replete with new stars, managed to lose 1-0 to Hull after Hull had been reduced to ten men for two-thirds of the match. Nevertheless, we have tickets for Tuesday’s game against Bury, captained by Dot’s cousin Gareth. Adrian and Clarissa are coming over.

It had poured during Friday night, and it even rained a bit when we took Anna on Thursday to Houghton Hall Revisited: a major Norfolk event of the year, running for several months. The idea is to show off pictures sold by Britain’s first prime minister and Houghton Hall owner Sir Robert Walpole to Catherine the Great in the 18th century – now lent back to the hall by Russia and replaced (mainly) where they originally hung.

Houghton Hall is a beautiful building in a stunning setting, but while some of the pictures were impressive, many of them weren’t. However, we really enjoyed the visit – a brief account of which can be found here.

Dot had spent the day in London on Wednesday, accompanied by her friend Anne. They travelled first class and ate in two rather nice restaurants. Dot also bought a hat for an upcoming family wedding. Meanwhile I frittered away much of the time but did manage to get some work done, largely my sermon for today.

On Friday, after Dot had managed to get an appointment at the doctor’s for a few routine matters, we eventually entertained Joe and Birgit to lunch. They both seemed on good form, with Birgit looking much better than recent reports had suggested. She looked very good indeed, in fact, and we had a lovely evening – some of it out in the garden.

Catching the start of a blizzard

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Narnia-like view at the top of the road. That witch again…

Woke up this morning to bright sunshine and a temperature of -11C. Between us we had three meetings today, all of which have been cancelled, largely because of the travel problems. It hasn’t snowed in Norwich today, but more is apparently on the way. We have had a fair wedge of it, but things were quiet as we set off for London on Saturday morning, and the roads were good.

Arrived at the Coomes’ residence in Leyton about 12.30 as scheduled and spent much of the hours before evening eating and drinking. Then we went out for a meal – our third visit to Baharat at Woodford, where we had a good Indian meal. On Sunday we went to Tate Britain for a noon start to see the Pre-Raphaelites. It was an excellent exhibition, though a bit crowded, possibly because it was the last day – though you had to book in advance. On the way out we saw Howard waiting to go in.

Afterwards we had a snack at Pimlico Village, an unpretentious cafe, before making our way home by Tube. It was very cold out. We had a meal in and stayed the night, so that Dot could do Philosophy at a nearby school the next day.

David and Kristine left by 7am, but we woke much later to find a smattering of snow on the ground. Because of a very bad forecast, I was uncertain what to do, but eventually I left shortly after 1pm and took the M11 – a good decision, because although it was snowing all the way up, it wasn’t lying on the ground, and I made good progress. After Newmarket the snow stopped and the roads were dry. I arrived in Norwich not long after 3pm and went to Morrisons for a bit of shopping and some petrol.

Meanwhile Barbara had arrived to pick up Dot, and their session at the school went very well. They too decided on the M11 and had an even better experience than me, stopping at the Services for something to eat while I had steak at home. I was intending to meet them at Scole, but by this time it had been snowing hard in Norwich for some while. Nevertheless I set out mid-evening for Scole, but the roads were treacherous, and it was snowing so hard it was difficult to see the edges of the road. So after making it on to the southern bypass and the A140 roundabout, I decided to turn back. Right decision, I think.

Dot and Barbara saw no snow until they reached Scole, but it then started and there was quite a lot on the road, so the last section to Metfield was the hardest. Dot stayed the night, of course. I was going to pick her up the next day, which dawned bright and cold, but it transpired that Barbara was coming in to Norwich for a course at Wensum Lodge; so Dot came with her. Unfortunately they were just late enough to catch the start of a huge blizzard. I waited for them at Morrisons, but because they had been held up Barbara drove straight to Wensum Lodge, so I drove there, transferring Dot’s stuff to our car before driving home.

That was the tricky bit. The roads were covered with snow, and it was coming down very hard indeed. II followed a guy who was all over the place, but we eventually made it to the bottom of our road. As I turned in I saw a van parked in the middle of the road, but I plugged on, and happily he pulled into the side as I approached, and surprisingly we just reached our driveway. After all that, we spent the rest of the day slumped on the sofa catching up on TV programmes we had missed.

Today we did venture out, walking to Morrisons to pick up a few items. We almost went by car, but just as we were scraping it, an ambulance decided to park at the bottom, blocking the main bit of road. Apparently if you’re an emergency vehicle you can do that, even if you don’t need to. Anyway, it worked out all right, despite the slipperiness of the pavements. Since we got back Dot has been cleaning the house and I’ve been catching up on e-mails, tanka-writing and blogging, among other things. Time passes quickly when it’s cold and white outside.

Walking in uncharted territory

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A less than brilliant picture of Dot and Kristine crossing London Bridge in late afternoon

Surprisingly, I finished Amy’s story shortly after my last post: it all came to me in a flash, just before Tuesday Group. I posted it off the next day, together with the last Little story in booklet form. I’ve also managed to write nearly two poems for Ian Fosten, so things are looking up. However, I’ve not been feeling good for a while: intermittent bursts of feeling quite peculiar, involving head and stomach and chills. Have managed to keep going with paracetamol, and much of the time I’m OK. But it keeps coming back. Not for long, I hope.

Happily Dot’s dizziness has gone. We suspect that the doctor got rid of it when she did the famous manoeuvre early last week. When Dot returned on Friday, she did it again and found that the revealing eye-fluttering had gone and she was OK – just in time for a full weekend, that started with a meal at the Robinsons in their shiny new reconstructed house.

I see I have got all out of order here. Back to Wednesday, when we had our hair done and I went to the dentist for a filling, then headed straight to Jessie’s with Dot. Last of the mince pies – or so I thought. The following day we depended on the weather forecast and were rewarded. Despite a heavy grey sky and some rain we drove to Bodham, where we had a drink at the Red Hart before heading off across the fields to Baconsthorpe Castle on one of the Coast Partnership’s trial walks. The sky quickly cleared and became bright blue, which compensated for the chill in the air.

At the castle we managed to go wrong –  mainly because we’d been there before and didn’t read the directions very carefully. We reached the village by the wrong path and headed into uncharted territory – uncharted by us or the Coast Partnership, that is. We couldn’t make sense of the instructions, but relied on our sense of direction and found an alternative footpath that took us back to the castle, where it became apparent what had happened. Now on the right track, we proceeded wearily back to Bodham – 5-6 miles in all.

We spent the weekend with David and Kristine, arriving just before noon at Leyton after a smooth journey. Kristine produced a delicious Spanish crumble with chorizo sausages that would probably have been enough for the rest of the day; however, we went to Baharat Indian restaurant in the evening and had another large meal. In between, we took the tube to Bank, discovered the Northern Line was shut and spent some time walking in Bank station before we could find the way out on to the street. (Several other people were having the same problem – signs were hopeless.) Eventually we made it out and walked past Monument and across London Bridge before visiting a bookstore near David’s office.

Lovely area of London that we hadn’t visited before. We proceeded on to Tower Bridge and had tea/coffee in a busy place much frequented by David before heading for home by crossing Tower Bridge and catching the tube outside the Tower of London. Lovely day, and a beautiful, busy evening. Didn’t sleep all that well, however.

The next day we drove up to Spellbrook Three Horseshoes and experienced the slowest service anywhere in the world (possibly). Arriving just before 1pm, we met Phil, Jane, Lydia and Alistair, and then David, who had driven up from Caddington. It reached 2.30pm before our main course was served. We abandoned the potential dessert and drove to Phil Coomes’ house for Christmas cake and mince pie.

Today was Frank Mason’s funeral, and David had another long drive to arrive in good time to get to St Faith’s Crematorium with us. Nice service: afterwards most of the attendees joined Jessie and Roger at Elm Tree Farm for refreshments. Teresa was there, as were all the usual suspects. Afterwards we drove David back to ours for his return journey before joining Jessie and Liz at Roger’s for a chat and the odd drink. Later Liz left for another appointment (her daughter’s birthday celebration, I think), and the four of us ended up at Oaklands Hotel for a carvery. That wasn’t our intention, but the “proper” restaurant opened an hour later than its website promised. Nice rhubarb crumble to finish. Pretty tired now.

A significant centenary

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My mother in untypical pose on our Lea Francis on holiday in Devon, not long before my father died

My mother was born 100 years ago today, in Eaton village, just outside Norwich. She remembered seeing “the first car go up Eaton hill” and lived through huge changes – most significant of which for her was the early death of her husband at the age of 42, leaving her with three small boys to bring up. It triggered her move back from Coventry to Norwich (I preceded her by six weeks, staying with our former neighbours in Brian Avenue so that I could start school in the city).

Her father was a gardener. She was a teacher and lived to the age of 82. She was a very dutiful mother but in a way never got over her husband’s death. At home she was always there, and I appreciate most of all her decision not to oppose my going to London to live and work, though it would have been easy to put moral pressure on me to stay. I never asked her why.

Sadly she didn’t live to see her great-grandchildren, but she would have loved them as much as we all do. Dot and I went to Caddington on Wednesday – a beautifully sunny drive – to watch Oliver perform in his school concert (he led out the boys’ choir), to help put up the Christmas decorations and to have supper with David while they went to karate. Amy’s reading is coming on really well. We drove back quite late: I’m sure there’s something wrong with the car headlights, but I don’t know what. Today Dot has taken my car to Bradwell (near Yarmouth) for interviewing, so I hope she’s not too late back.

She spent Saturday in London with Anne, and thankfully a poor weather outlook turned out to be quite wrong. They went to the Degas exhibition at the Royal Academy, had lunch at Fortnum and Mason’s and then did a little shopping before catching the 21.30 train back. They got very cheap tickets – so cheap that they travelled first class, as befits first-class women.

The next evening we went to the Seagull again and I read half a dozen poems, as well as presenting a brown envelope that I hope contained a cheque to Lynn Mummery, the winner of the Two Valleys poetry competition, which I had judged. I was pleased to discover that she was quite a new writer, and I encouraged her to come to the next Seagull extravaganza in a couple of months’ time. We shall see.

The gas man cameth on Tuesday to service our central heating. He was a chatty guy who left his torch behind, but before that he checked all our radiators, fixed a couple of the valves that had broken and revealed how I could get the radiators in the living room warmer by shutting off a valve in the bedroom. You learn something new every day. He also replaced a pump in the airing cupboard which I believed had a sticking valve. I now suspect he may have replaced the wrong one, but hey, what can you do?

Off to the surgery in a minute to get my blood tested following a visit to the doctor last week. I’ve just finished seven days of antibiotics and was feeling quite good till I stopped taking them. Oddly, though, I think this may be a coincidence. I hope the blood will reveal something significant (but something that can be easily put right).

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’.

Shots and nuts

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Mileham Castle, in mid-Norfolk. That's nearly all of it, not counting the grass.
Mileham Castle, in mid-Norfolk. That's nearly all of it, not counting the grass.

Dot disappeared for the day about 07.40 and has only just arrived in London.  She has not been on the train all day (it could happen), but the train she did catch from Diss arrived in London about an hour late. Hopefully by now (19.15) she should be in the meeting in Piccadilly. Why did she catch the train from Diss? Because she spent most of the day at Garboldisham with Sue Eagle, delivering some Philosophy. Went very well, apparently. She got to Diss in loads of time, but the train was so late that she caught the one before it, which was so late that it was later than the one she should have caught. Are you following this? Makes you really want to use public transport, doesn’t it? It’s not that things go wrong, it’s that whoever is in charge is so useless at putting them right. [On the plus side, the train bringing them home was on time, and the day was a big success.]

Meanwhile, as it was such a sunny and crisp day (after an appallingly wet day yesterday), I drove out to mid-Norfolk, where I intended to find a ruined church near Litcham. I started walking up a farm track, but shots were fired, and I retreated. The shots probably weren’t fired at me, but it’s so easy to get mistaken for a pheasant. I then drove up a farm track in the hope of catching a glimpse of the ruins, but without success. So I nipped along the road to Mileham, where I eventually located the castle. Not exactly visitor-friendly. Nowhere to park, and no signs. However I tracked it down and spent about half an hour walking round, over, through and across it. It’s so much of a ruin that there’s barely a square metre of flint wall remaining. Well, maybe a bit more than that, but not much. Largely grass, trees and undergrowth, though I did see a rabbit and an awful lot of animal traces. The B1145 is quite a pleasant road. Pity you have to go out of Norwich on the Fakenham road to get to it: the part that goes through Taverham and Drayton has now been reduced to 30mph, which is so difficult to keep to that I nearly had two accidents because I kept looking at my speedometer. Whoever decides these limits is totally nuts.

29 June 2007

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Two intrepid climbers near the summit of the previously unclimbed Mount Shingle, on the North Norfolk coast, during their trek across the uncharted Cley Marshes – known in some quarters as the Empty Miles. This was a two-woman expedition, totally unsupported except for the cameraman, his friend and the occasional coffee and ice cream.

Happily they survived to tell the tale. A similarly dangerous expedition was in fact undertaken by one of them, with her husband (me) only four days later, when we left Norwich on the 10am train for Liverpool Street, followed by a taxi drive through unmapped road works to the Tate Gallery on Millbank. Good food at the Tate: after it, we went round the Hockney/Turner exhibition, which was pretty amazing. I really think late Turner (1830-50) is just about as good as you can get. Wonderful use of light, amazing composition, and the feeling that you’re looking into another dimension. Rilke said beauty was as much of terror as we are able to bear; if so, this is right where awe, terror and beauty meet. Even the ones that were barely started were marvellous.

We followed this by visiting the The Way We Are photographic exhibition, which was £6 each (concessions) more than the other one. Turner is free!! Nevertheless some remarkable pictures here, mixed in with some rather average ones. It’s amazing how some of the pioneer photographers overcame technical difficulties to produce really artistic, poignant pictures.

We returned to the West End by bus. The driver was unable to “find” £1 change for our £5. Past the Houses of Parliament, where there was hectic media activity: a lesser event today was the abdication of Blair and the coronation of Brown as Prime Minister. Plenty of anti-war protesters also there, and in Whitehall. Very, very slow progress down Whitehall to Trafalgar Square. When we heard today that a potential car bomb had brought traffic in the area to a standstill, we wondered how anyone had noticed.

We walked up St Martin’s Lane and had a meal in Med Kitchen: a superb rib-eye steak for me – one of the best I can remember eating. Green beans and chips. Dot had a salmon fishcake, which was also excellent, and we shared fries. Both of us had creme brulee to follow. We were going to walk up to Tottenham Court Road, but the sky went black and water started falling from the sky, so we doubled back and went into Leicester Square Tube Station, where the guy in the ticket office had no interest whatsoever in his job, talking to colleagues and doing other things while a queue built up. We had no alternative but to wait. It reminded me of Italy.

Had a bit of a wait for the train home, but all went smoothly, although it got colder and colder.

Yesterday we went to Reepham for a hair cut. I went for a walk but failed to find my cousin Barbara’s house, so will have to check the name. Afterwards we had lunch in the old station – excellent – and then went to check on the dinosaur park in case the weather at the weekend is good enough to take the children there. Afterwards back by country lanes to the A47. Brief break, then Dot went off in my car to Park Farm and I took her car for a service, then walked home (about three miles). Dot went to visit her aunt, then to Gillingham in the evening as a governor.

Today, after I finished my page for next Monday, we started by picking up the car. Weather still very showery, as it has been for days, when it’s not been solid rain. I left Dot to pay and drove back into city, where I called at Prospect House with Aunt E’s ad, then paid in some cheques. Brief visit home, then went to to UEA to see a production by Eugenia’s translation group, which turned out to be a half-hour of sketches based on Molly Bloom’s monologue in Ulysses. Surprisingly well done. I don’t know what I had been expecting, but it was fascinating and very clever in parts.

Afterwards called in at Morrison’s for a big shop for the weekend: our family are coming up to see us. Dot now has her head down working on a school report.

Oh, I forgot. On Tuesday I finally tracked down my cousin Jon, who was staying at a caravan park at Ludham in his rather luxurious motor home. It was the first time I had met him for many, many years, and I had never met his wife Dorothy before, although they have been married for 46 years. They live in Axminster, Devon.

I can only conclude that all Dorothys are something special, because she was lovely. Had a really good 90 minutes or so there, talking about family history and getting some details for the family tree (I gave Jon a printout of what I have so far). Then rushed back home (beating highways authority plans to prevent anyone entering the city by blocking roads and causing general congestion, which I am sad to say is ongoing today), just in time to meet Ruth K, with whom I’m doing a song recital / poetry reading for charity in November. Guess who’s doing the song recital aspect of it. Worked a few things out. In the evening went to Ed’s for the Tuesday meal while Dot finished her previous report.