Tag Archives: mirrors

24 January 2009

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Just for the record, the scene outside our house when I discovered the wing mirrors had been smashed up. Our next-door neighbour, Mary, came round yesterday and said she had heard something at the same time. She was very sympathetic. Dot told her about our plan to invite neighbours round, so it’s beginning to look as if we’ll have to get our fingers out and set a date. The last few days have been very wintry – two of them extremely wet too. I seized on a bright moment about 4pm yesterday to do a walk of just over a mile that included two stiff climbs. To my surprise I managed Gas Hill with no real problem and without stopping, so my energy must be back. At the time Dot was in Ipswich at a Philosophy for Children meeting: she went by train after discovering it was only £8.50 return.

I’ve spent quite a long time preparing my sermon for tomorrow on the conversion of St Paul, mainly because I kept discovering interesting things about him – for instance, why he changed his name. As usual I got far too much material, and it’s a bit long. Dot says it can’t be too long, but she’s just being nice. Spent some time today photocopying some material she got from Ipswich.

We’ve seen the Bob Dylan film, I’m Not There, which I got for Christmas from my son, and it was fascinating. Not easy, but really interesting followinig the director’s train of thought. Cate Blanchett was brilliant in her impersonation of Dylan.

21 January 2009

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Beautiful day, but cold. To celebrate Jessie’s birthday, she took her niece Dot and me, with her son Roger and her friends Janet and Ray, to Elderton Lodge for lunch. Lovely setting: deer in the park, folly in the distance. Meal was delicious: I had game and duck terrine, followed by game casserole with short crust pastry and a fantastic Eton mess dessert. The wine was good too. Afterwards we repaired to North Walsham, where I had another cup of tea and Jessie (pictured) tried to make us eat even more – unsuccessfully, in my case. Left just after five to pick up my car from the garage, where it was having its wing mirrors replaced.

You may wonder why it was having its wing mirrors replaced. I woke on Monday morning, after winning a long chess game the previous night, and found both mirrors smashed, and bits scattered around the path and road. As I was taking pictures Sam, who lives at Number 15 and has a two-year-old called Ellie, told me she had seen a gang of five youths running up the road at 1.30am and kicking all the cars, then wrenching off my wing mirrors. She yelled at them, but they just made a rude gesture at her and ran off. I reported it to the police and had my fingerprints taken for elimination purposes (I had handled the pieces from the wing mirrors). I believe the police have also spoken to Sam. Obviously they dusted the pieces for fingerprints as well, but I’m not optimistic. I rang the garage and discovered the mirrors would cost £260 to replace. As I have a £250 excess on my insurance, it was clearly a waste of time making a claim. So the vandals owe me £260. Fat chance. Tonight the car is in the drive. It is only six months since it was badly damaged by vandals climbing over it and denting it.

I’ve made entries to several competitions – mostly poems but also a short play and a short short story. These range from Kent through Wales and Ireland to Scotland, so I am casting my net wide. I’ve also entered the annual Norwich Writers’ Circle poetry competition. Well, you have to give it a go. Today we picked up the printing for Dot’s workshop next week. All looked very good until we noticed that a number of apostrophes hadn’t printed. As it was done through PDF files, I can’t understand how this could have happened, but Dot will give them a ring tomorrow. It’s not a complete disaster, because it’s easy enough to insert the apostrophes without making a mess, but it would be tedious. Dot is working extremely hard on her Philosophy material and had another two people sign up for her workshop today.

Through a Genes Reunited contact I have discovered that my mother’s grandfather and great-grandfather came from Sussex. Her grandfather, Charles Brown, lived in Brighton and then moved to Cambridgeshire, where he was head gardener at Hall Lodge, Milton, and married a local woman. My mother’s father was also a gardener, so I guess the skill was handed down. Her great-grandfather, Henry, was an agricultural labourer. So many agricultural labourers in my family tree… All ploughing the same furrow.