gratuitous picture of poppet eviscerating a plushie

When I first got the Botox injections a few weeks ago I didn’t get much respite because of a long standing neck pain. Once they started tailing off, though, I started my GRAND PLAN of coming off as much medication as humanly possible. Last summer my plan was to just enjoy being pain free (or more or less anyway) for the summer, but this time round it’s all about becoming as strong as possible before the next change of seasons. The botox should allow me to do more stuff without having to take triptans, so when I go on holiday in a coupla weeks I will be swimming every day for a kick off.

The grand plan is all about getting as well as possible on as few drugs as possible. I can’t know if the PhD proposal was successful, but if it was then I need to be well enough to read, think, write, and travel. To do this I think I might try to spend some of the winter abroad, but obvs I can only do that if I get the grant freeing me from UK soil. I know they want the person to start in July, so nowhere near enough time for grant applications, but I might be able to make that work for me by starting off being part time. Given that so few people manage a PhD within 3 years, that can’t be the worst idea, and they can’t expect me to go full time if I don’t get the money to do that.

There are other things too… This flat is kind of tight. I love it here, but I am looking at two bedroom flats to swap with because I’d really like a separate place to work. I know a lot of it will be me looking at books and me looking at a laptop, but I work in a different way when I am writing than most people do. I don’t think linearly and like to print out and look at what I am doing on the floor or on a wall, cut it up, move it around, physically and this takes time and space. I need to be able to go away from it and come back to it, and I don’t want to live with it all the time either. This might not be an issue straight away, but I have started looking anyway. I am also considering modifications of the flat I am already in… after all, it costs a bloody fortune to move if you are not ‘able’ and if you own more than just clothes and books. However, for the right space and location I’d move again for sure.

If I don’t get this PhD I might apply for another. I didn’t set out to apply for one, but if I am well enough to do this kind of a thing, or at least to start it, then I probably should, given the state of the nation… it’s not a great time to be on benefits if there’s an option – and a 9 – 5 certainly isn’t on the cards for me even with Botox.

So there you have it. Nearly finished watching Prison Break, which is all I am up to most of today. Thank goodness for telly.

I am a 50 year old unmarried woman. I live in Tottenham, on the Ferry Lane Estate. I have a garden flat which backs on to the River Lea. I will have lived here two years  come September, having spent the last 20 years in the east end. I have a dog, a rescued staffordshire bull terrier called Poppet. I am not working. I was a lecturer in art and design for 12 years. I became too ill to work 10 years ago. I have fibromyalgia and chronic migraine. I have started having Botox injections for the migraine, and that is partially successful. I am working on reducing medication and have applied to do a PhD. Yesterday I wrote to volunteer to teach meditation on a weekly basis. Botox is not expected to reduce migraine much, but to enable the person to lead a fuller life. I have paid for treatments so far, but my GP is applying to the Primary Care Trust to pay for continued treatments. At £2000 a year, it is quite a lot for a person on a low income to pay. NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence) have recommended the treatment, so applying to have it paid for is a bit of a test case.

***

I woke up at about 6. I have just stopped taking Quetiapine so that might be why. I have substituted a melatonin supplement, but I don’t know if it’s helping or not. It’s supposed to be good for migraine, so I’m trying it for three months. I got time release ones, which might have been a mistake, since I don’t mind waking up early, I just mind fighting my duvet for hours before I go to sleep. It’s day two of the new regime. Actually, I did get to sleep easily, but that might have been because I took a diazepam for my aching neck, since that is a precursor to migraine.

Back to today. It’s 8.30 right now, and although I did Mass Observation last year I didn’t even know it was on until I was reading facebook and someone else mentioned it. When I woke up I took my stomach med, to protect myself from subsequent pain killers, then turned the hot blanket on and cuddled my dog and fell back asleep for a bit. Half 7 I got up and made tea for myself and Ten who was sleeping in the other room. I start the day with my emails and facebook, and now we’re going to listen to something on iPlayer and have a little snooze.

10.00 Well, so much for snoozing through the blah blah blah of a R4 offering – we listened to a dramatisation of Sam Pepys’ diary entries about the fire of London. Although I have read it, I didn’t remember all the conspiracy theory stuff – immediately, despite the start of the fire known to be an accident, theories abounded about it being started by the Dutch, the French, and the Papists, along with the year, 1666, being interpreted as the 666 of the apocalypse. Nothing changes, does it? My main memories of reading it were about how he buried his Parmesan cheese in the garden and took some of his possessions to Bethnal Green for safe keeping.

Ten’s gone out now, with the dog, who was extremely patient, considering I usually take her out at half 9. I’ve had my porridge and a coffee, but am exhausted, suddenly, so happily gave the walk up to Ten. I am running my bath, which he will have after me. I will have to have reduced screen time today since my eyes are aching.

12.00 So much for less screen time. I’ve had my bath, but basically spent the past couple of hours looking at twitter and playing WWF (words with friends). Need to dry my hair now and get dressed. Ten’s getting ready to go home. He spends about half the week here.

14.05 Had lunch, bacon, brie, salad leaves, garlic, oil, followed by raspberries, blackberries and cream. Between inactivity with the fibro, tackling the IBS with a low oxalate diet and the medication I am on I have ended up doing the Atkins diet. It’s not cheap, but then again, buying an entire new wardrobe isn’t cheap either. Low carbs suits the migraine, at least. After that I would have liked a lie down but Poppet was wandering round hopefully with a ball in her mouth, and since Ten was leaving I thought I might as well get it done even though it was quite early for an afternoon outing. We went to the park and played. It’s been too hot to play during the day lately, but today is cool and windy. A neighbour got me involved in a dispute he was having with his upstairs neighbour over a BBQ – I had to leave them to it.

Back on the bed now, for a little rest and an episode of Prison Break. I like long series with a long story arc because I can’t always read and don’t have much energy. I also listen to radio plays and audio books a lot, since my eyes often ache, and it’s tricky to watch TV with a migraine, too.

16.00 In between watching parts of episodes I have hoovered the bedroom, emptied the dishwasher, emptied the washing machine and loaded the dryer. I wouldn’t be able to do these sorts of chores all at once, but pacing it with lying down gets me moving around and gives me enough rest in between times.

18.00 I’ve done most of the hoovering. Dying to take medication, my head keeps threatening migraine, but so far so good, today. Next up, I have to make something to eat, then I can take meds.

18.30 Done now. Had the most boring meal that I am eating right now. I don’t have much energy to cook, so keep prawns in the freezer. One pack steamed is enough to get by on as an emergency meal. I am also having some pure cocoa in water as a treat because I feel headachey and sorry for myself. It won’t be long til I ‘officially’ go to bed – but I will have to take the dog on her last pee walk first, and I will leave that as long as possible.

20.00 Dog walked, exhausted, bed.

Sent to the Mass Observation Archive 13/05/2013

ETA Last year’s here.

i’m too sexy for my super kingsized bed

Considering that when we first got him he slept on my neck, yep. I’d say he’s growing up to be quite the long leggedy hunk. I’m chuffed that Ryan chose to keep the name. He still looks very Hectory to me.

***

My current TV obsession is Prison Break. I don’t know who it was who turned me on to it, one of the Kirsties, perhaps? Anyway, it’s GREAT. It comprises of several series, it has a long story arc, it has eye candy and it has SCIENCEY ‘what have we learned?’ stuff.

“pretty” has to take his top off because, spoiler – his tattoo is a map!

…So that justifies his toplessness and we needn’t think of ourselves as OGLING. (Which we clearly are).

Like Breaking Bad, Prison Break involves problem solving. From BB we learn that some acids will corrode a body and metal but not plastic, and from PB we learn how good at problem solving engineers are. And sexy, clearly they are sexy.

***

I realize that I have been a bit AWOL. I’ve been a bit ill and a bit busy, and today I had my final important deadline – the resubmission of the PhD proposal. Because I’d been so ill and also dealing with the vile ESA paperwork (application for this year and appeal tribunal for last year both at once) I had failed to notice how quickly my PhD deadline was coming up. In the middle of a massive migraine yesterday I was looking it up and when I saw it was TODAY I thought I’d really messed up and that it would be impossible to do anything productive with it. Today, though, I  have spent all day reading the chapter the supervisor asked me to read, skitiching a reference to it into the proposal, looking at the proposal with fresh eyes and totally reorganizing it, murdering a few darlings, adding a bit of explanation, and finally sent it off.

I am now completely exhausted and await my dinner which is being crafted as we speak by Ten. Which is just as well, because I am ALL OUT of spoons.

***

OOh wait! Also, I made a tumblr the other day elaine4queen.tumblr.com/day/2013/5/03

i rather think i would be better off dreaming poppet’s dreams. my actual dreams tend to be rather anxious, which i don’t think hers are. hers are about snoofling about and chasing things.

The trouble with expecting to be well soon, but not being well now is that there is very little I can actually do. I am walking the dog, eating, pottering about, and spending ridiculous amounts of time on the internet looking on Homeswapper for possible swaps. You’d think that I  would have had enough of moving house after all the horror of last time, and it is a BIT stupid to try and second guess how well I am going to be and what I am going to be doing with all the wellness.

It started with the usual thing of going to Brighton and thinking I must go back on Homeswapper and move here, when, in reality, I think I really just like visiting. Just like lots of other people do. Visiting, and catching up with friends, looking at the sea, thinking how nice it would be to live at the seaside, and then going home again. To my home, which, incidentally is something like 10 meters from a river. A perfectly good river. Anyroads. Anyroads, instead of mooning around searching Brighton, I have been looking within London, and mainly within 5 miles of Shoreditch, which I think we can agree *is* the centre of London now.

The other thing is, though, is that there are quite a few people looking to downsize. I don’t know if this has been spurred by the bedroom tax or not, but there are a good few two, and even three, bedroom properties on. Listen to me! “Properties” like I was an estate agent or something. Anyway, what with the possibility/probability of a PhD in the offing I am becoming rather aware that this flat hasn’t got quite enough elbow room for my liking. The big compromise would be giving up the garden, and even more than that, probably, the river.

***

ganesh. never saw a shrink for what happened to his head

You know Ganesh? Well, did you know how he got his head? I didn’t. I assumed that he just came that way, because Hindu stuff is kind of magicky and a god with an elephant’s head seems just as reasonable as all the rest of it. Anyway, it turns out he wasn’t born that way. Probably to the relief of his mother.

When I went to the British Museum the other week, and went on a short tour of discovering just how exquisite my back pain can be, we stopped off at Ganesh and the chap who was giving us the tour told us how he came to be the way he is. It turns out that Shiva had been away for a really long time. And I mean a REALLY long time. His wife probably could have stepped out on him, I mean I guess she had to be pretty special to be married to a top god like that, so she probably could have had as many flings as she liked. And he was away a LONG time. So he comes back and sees this fit young lad hanging around. Rather assuming he was being cuckolded he cut the lad’s head off with a sword. Turns out that he was in fact DRN DRN DRRRRRN!!!!! his own son!

Being a god, he could probably have just put the head back on and everything would have been fine. But in his grief he apparently decided it would be best if the next creature he saw would provide the new head. Happily, considering what other creatures there are in the world, the first sentient being he came across was an elephant. So there you are! Ganesh always had something to talk about at dinner parties. How’s that for a teenage angst story?

***

So, back to me. Thursday I get botoxed again, so I can start attacking the massive list of stuff I have to do. Not least of which is to do some reading and rewriting for the PhD application. And then what? I don’t know. I mean, I have plenty of short term tasks to do, but I am not used to being able to have plans, so this thing about wanting to move again could just be part of wanting control over my life in some way, or it could be the sensible next step, if I am really going to write. I do know that I need a great deal of focus and quite a lot of space to write. I don’t write in a very linear way – I get all my ideas down then I print them off and look at them on the floor and rearrange them like that before editing. One time I gave a paper at a conference which was literally a scroll of sellotaped together sections – but I’d done a rewrite after printing and didn’t have another chance to tidy things up before the conference, so I went in with a piece of paper several feet long.

It is nice having a garden, though. Oh, I don’t know…

i’ve been instagrammmed! like a modern person (thanks julie!)

And on my trip I had my hair cut, my photograph taken, and lots of visitors – OK I am bored with that game now, as are you. Sorry. Anyway, the upshot is that having had my hair cut for the first time since the crazy Russians did it back in Bethnal Green, I felt I was perhaps presentable enough to get a mug shot taken that I could use across social media platforms. I had thought perhaps my friend Grace might do it, since she has a good eye, but the visit was busy and I didn’t grab the moment. Howevs, before we left I asked Julie to do it, because she also has a good eye… and she is all about the Instagrammings so between that and the sunshiny paintings in her living room I have had to do a total redesign here at elaine4queen, since everything before was all pale and light and now I have all the vividry a person could ask for. So, hence the kind of teal background, and the sunset garden – mine, by the way, so properly mirroring the welcome to The Hermitage’s actual location on the Tottenham Riviera. What do you think? Do you miss the picture of Poppet’s feet?

We were there to take the sea air (by which I mean visit friends) and look after Diva, the little ancient staffie. In a previous visit there had been small beasts in a cage in the garden, but it seems they have met their demise. During the previous visit Poppet had to be banned from the garden because she obsessed with the damn things, and even then she spent half the visit hanging out an upstairs window hankering after them. She still thought they were there so was dancing around barking… which gave Ten an idea.

crate training?

Poor Poppet, she seemed confused. Even after inspecting the inside of the enclosure she was still not entirely convinced that they wouldn’t be back and kept checking. This enclosure, by the way, is something which I like very much. It’s called an Eglu and is a designer chicken home. If you click through you can see how fancy, there is a little video. Until I became aware of the Eglu I had had no interest in chicken keeping, but who wouldn’t want to keep chickens if they had one of these?

Lastly and leastly, I came back to a PACKAGE. In it was a HOODIE. I have never knowingly had a hoodie before, and I am enjoying it immensely. This one is a bit fashion and the zip goes all the way up. So I could go about with my face entirely covered. Maybe cut eye holes.

ready to do all the crimes

here i am reading in the bath – while utterly doomed (probably taken by Hazel McQueen)

I have actually met someone who was part of the 80′s “boom” – he worked in the City and made money. It is perhaps telling that when we watched Slumdog Millionaire together he was visibly shaken and upset – somehow he had managed to make it to mid adulthood without seeing anything remotely disturbing.

I digress. Although the UK never did consumerism quite the same way the US did, my parents were both working class kids who did well at school and my dad did some engineering training, and they both worked in offices. They met, married, and bought a semi detached home. My mum gave up work and had babies and we had new and quite nice furniture. My mum left my dad around ’71 when I was nineish and we left for Scotland and a life of fairly seriously penury. Although my mum worked she didn’t make much money and we often ate rather badly. When I left school jobs were scarce and Thatcher had just come into power. Higher Education was free, and if you were from a sufficiently poor background you got a full grant. I literally went to art school because there was nothing else to do. It was probably one of the least worst things I could have done at the time, although unlike my then boyfriend, who came from a very different background to me, and went off to work for the Guardian, I never had any expectations of getting any work on the back of my degree. Which was probably just as well because although I did hooch up a career out of it, it took a while. I finished art school in the mid 80′s and went back to Scotland, and onto my second government work programme. (The first had the dismal advertising of a badge that declared “Youth Opportunities Programme – It’s Going To Work!”) (it wasn’t, and it didn’t).

Then I did something fairly sensible – a teaching certificate. And I volunteered to teach at the art school for free to get my hours. I got the gig, and was subsequently given more hours and pay, which was awesome. But I knew I wouldn’t get more work there, and there were only four art schools in Scotland, so I left for London where there were and are hundreds of art courses. Only I went via Australia, which I didn’t really have the money for, so when I got back I had to get out of debt, and I made props for a living, mostly for West End theatre.

When Tony Blair got in in ’94 I was part the way through the MA which was to get me started on my teaching career. Like today, amid glee all around, I was non plussed. When Blair got in he literally stepped over the corpse of John Smith, who was a man I had some faith in. While Labour being in power gave me that felt sense of a lift from the grey defeatism of Thatcherism and it’s petering out under Major, I was never a fan of Blair. “Whoever you vote for the government always gets in” was never truer. And today I know people on the left are celebrating, but really celebrating what? The woman was unable to influence policy for years due to her deteriorating brain function, and not only that, her death and probable near “state” funeral might give rise to a surge in love of all things conservative.  I don’t want to be too much of a doomy gloomy, but really, the next few weeks will be murder in broadcasting and newsprint – neither of which I have direct contact with, but facebook and twitter had the story immediately, of course, and the hysteria either way won’t die down until well after the funeral. Spin doctor, Jo Moor said that 9/11 was a “Good day to bury bad news” and I think the extraordinary suffering caused by the recent cuts to benefits and the health service and legal representation (goodbye Legal Aid) which would have been the top stories for weeks to come will now be buried by ‘reaction pieces’ to the life, death, and funeral of Margaret Thatcher.

a break between bouts of fight club

There’s been ALL THE DRAMA with the Hector adoption. A couple came to see him and they were really keen and really nice, but they both worked full time. I did think this was a bit ambitious of All Dogs Matter since Hector screamed the place down at the vets, and not because of the snippy snip. He doesn’t mind going next door to Steve’s, but he does cry if I go out, and they had said they would want to take special care of his separation anxiety. Turned out there had been a bit of miscommunication, so the couple were sadly disinvited from adopting him. Better for him, but they really loved him and will be terribly disappointed. I am glad it wasn’t up to me to tell them.

They do have someone more appropriate lined up, but I’d rather they went with my neighbour, Brian, who has a staffie, Max, who likes Hector. He is retired and he takes Max massive walks every day. He says he is keen, but even if he phones today the guy who ADM like is coming to see him TOMORROW so there’d have to be something go wrong for him not to want him, I guess, and this guy does sound good… I suppose there’s another doggie who Brian and Max might like. Considering every time they post on facebook I repost with oohs and aahs, so they’re not short of lovely dogs.

***

In travel news, my friend Lottie has asked me if I would like to go on holiday with her and her sister and her sister’s kiddo. Why, yes, I would like to go stay in a lovely villa in Spain paid for by their dad, I most certainly would. As you know I am BRILLIANT at Spanish having bothered to learn “bathroom” for our previous trip, and managed very well with just that and mime. I think it helped that we were in deepest Spain, and I was twice the height of everyone else and blonde. I was probably like a cross between Boris Johnson and Big Bird to them.

Suddenly I remembered my passport had run out and I’d failed to fill in the form for a new one, so I got to it last night, and threw in a pair of photobooth photos with the application. It was only this morning that I thought that the likelyhood was that these photos were even older than my last 10 year passport so I’d better get some new ones done. I opened the envelope and retrieved the ridiculously young me photos and prepared to meet my face in the mirror. I haven’t worn make up for a really long time, but photo booth photos bleach your face out anyway, and since I have near invisible eyebrows and a pale face I though’t I’d better do some colouring in. Just as well, too, since the photos came out rather bleached anyway.

not a serial killer, just not allowed to smile for passport photos

Imagine if I’d gone up there bare faced? I’d have looked like a balloon in a wig.

***

On the 11th I go to the Headache Clinic at the Neuro Hospital. IF they bestow me regular botox I could be looking at having a significantly different prognosis. Also, going into the summer, if it’s anything like last year, I should at least get three decent months. Last year I just needed a break and I took it. This year, knowing that it would be forwardable, I would first of all be into dropping as much medication as possible (already started, CHECK) and dietary reform (already started, LIKE A BOSS). The problem with dietary reform is everything you aren’t going to eat any more becomes super beguiling. Even stuff you didn’t like before. One time I knew someone who was on remand in prison. Edgy, I know. Anyway, he craved pork pies, which, he said he never liked normally. Now that’s me, only without the prisony bit.

It was billed as  ”An Evening With” and pitched at a general audience so I didn’t expect it to be anything I hadn’t heard before, and it wasn’t. It was more like going to see a supergroup and hearing their old standards or a well loved comedian and hearing beloved punch lines. The familiarity of his words left me  just noticing how he structured the talk a lot of the time – and it was pretty much what anyone would do – an overview of mindfulness, a led meditation, further elucidations, a couple of poems, and then Q&A. Just with a much bigger audience than usual. I liked the way that, with a show of hands at various points in the talk he managed to make nearly a thousand people feel like a group, but the content was nothing new. You can hear a version of what he said by going on youtube and watching pretty much any of his videos. He’s good, but the main thing about him is that he did a good thing. Thirty five years ago he stripped down buddhist practices for a secular audience and brought the world MBSR (mindfulness based stress reduction).

part of the audience – he said there were 1000 people there, i thought 800, either way though, not a small crowd

So, what did I get for my £15 and my journey several hours out of my comfort zone? (I NEVER go out – not in the evening, it’s not a thing. I am in bed by 7pm most nights and asleep easily by 10.)

Mainly, I got uncomfortable. Yes, yes, it was physically uncomfortable, this was the Quaker’s gaff, and not a theatre, but it was more than that. I started feeling something I used to, in my more physically trim days, call ‘yoga rage’.

I loved yoga. I used to go two or three times a week. I’d done swimming, and then tai chi, and eventually I pitched up at yoga, which is something I always thought I would like, and I did. It’s nice and stretchy. I still do a tiny amount at home, but I do have to be careful. I digress.

At one point in my yoga journey I used to go to an excellent class in Brighton with my friend Nic. Jim Tarran still teaches, indeed he has his own school. He is brilliant. He keeps you in poses for bloody ages so you have to do loads of internal work. It’s a bit boot camp, but in a different way to, say, ashtanga or bikram. Anyway, the first time we went, we were standing still with our eyes shut following his instructions and he went silent and then said “What is yoga?”

Afterwards we giggled about it, because Nic said he nearly answered, which would have been WRONG because it was rhetorical, and it was something he was going to talk about while we stood there, fire in our muscles, working to stand straight and relax at the same time. Oh, and breathe, you have to breathe as well. Anyway, we were hooked, and there being the two of us, naturally we discussed him ad nauseum and all aspects of the classes as we went along. We also did impersonations of him, which I know were funny at the time, but I don’t remember all the catch phrases now. What emerged over the weeks was that we discovered in ourselves something we dubbed ‘yoga rage’ which was a feeling which arose when we were trying to be all OM about it all, and someone, some one would do something annoying.

They might breathe funny or very loudly in what sounded like a showy offy way or be annoyingly keen (not like us, no no, just because we were early and at the front and LOVED him, that didn’t make us annoyingly keen, not one bit of it) or grunt, or fart, or, and there was this one time when this person INCENSED us by doing the poses all wrong because he was clearly a dancer and he was being a poser. And wrong. He was doing it wrong.

Like every other detail of the class we discussed this at length. The thing about yoga rage that differs from road rage or any other kind of rage is that you absolutely know you are wrong while you are doing it. It’s an aspect of what buddhists call dukkha – or ordinary everyday suffering. Not special suffering. Just normal. Normal unfair irritation with people whose breathing, farting, or yoga style is none of our damn business and makes no impact on how we do our own yoga.

Here we are, in a hall filling with people who are passionate enough about mindfulness to buy tickets and turn up and sit uncomfortably for hours and I am irritable as hell and I am super aware of it. Annoying bloody people wanting us to budge up. Annoying people who probably bought their tickets way after we did sitting in the comfortable seats. Annoying lovey dovey couple fondling each other – GET A ROOM!

All of these people irritated me twice as much as they would have done in any other room for any other speaker or performance or whatever because I was super aware that he was going to talk about KINDNESS and as a meditator I am trying to be kind. In thought and deed. And failing.

It wasn’t all like that, but the feeling spiked up now and then and I just had to accept it. As JKZ said in his talk “The present moment is the curriculum”. And it was. And it is.

My friend Al joked on the way in about ‘taking a moment to arrive’ which is a cliche in mindfulness/meditation circles, for the very good reason that we are often not fully present, so it’s a useful tool to bring people’s attention to their own experience in the moment. We snorted a bit when he instructed us to arrive in the room.

So that was nice.

Still taking the piss.

But what was even more amazebobs was that the double room I had reserved for myself turned out to be a tiny pretend apartment! I didn’t have my camera with me, but I’ve taken some pictures with my phone.

My pretend apartment even had a tiny hall OF MY OWN

Having read books set in Paris, I have often felt that were I suddenly a BIZILLIONAIRE for no particular reason, I would like to live in a hotel.

Although it was actually rather cold, it was furnished and decorated in rather a lovely way.

I didn’t think I would need to take any chargers with me, so my visit was characterized by a series of power failures as my various devices died. The “smart” phone was the first to go, but luckily I had my old phone with me (with an audiobook on it) so I swapped out the sim cards. The B&B was advertised as “having” WIFI. In as much as I got a signal for a few seconds every hour or so, it did indeed “have” WIFI. I did have a bit of telly on my netbook, so it wasn’t a total waste of time bringing it, but I was rather surprised to see that die fairly swiftly, too. I was left, then, with my ebook (with Back Story by David Mitchell on it) my old phone, and the telly and radio in the bedroom. For lots of reasons I don’t really like watching tv when I am traveling – in any case, I don’t watch it live when I am at home, either. I did, however listen to the radio.

hello, this is the olden days. sit on a hard chair and keep your back straight

It’s such a pleasure to listen to Radio 4 on an old timey radio. Given that R4 is stuck in a time warp anyway, it seems most fitting to listen to it on a device such as this.

If  I was staying longer, or if I had run out of reading I could have chosen from any of these orange spined Penguin books.

They struck me as being like an artwork Robert Rauschenberg might have made in tribute to Mark Rothko while visiting Piet Mondrian. Except it’s full of books, most of which I either have read or would happily read.

The ‘apartment’ had a little sitting room, but I didn’t really use it. I spent most of my time indoors in bed drinking various teas, and, of an evening, sachets of miso soup.

While I was packing for the trip it started snowing, so I chucked out my smart clothes and bundled dark coloured jumpers and trousers into my suitcase. I even wore my Yaktrax, which are coiled metal grips for walking in snow. Although it was really cold when I got there and it did snow a little, there was no need for ice trudging gear.

Having a room for two nights did seem a bit excessive just to go to a funeral I could have done in a day, but I did like the sensation of being cosseted in my own little world with no DORGS jumping all over me. When traveling abroad, there is usually a little form for you to fill in where you have to write the ‘purpose’ of your trip. This has always confused me, but I did have a little moment of existential angst, which was allayed entirely by the trip indeed HAVING a purpose. I arrived mid afternoon, and went out and bought soup, chocolate, and a hot water bottle, and basically went to bed at 6. Considering I’d woken up at 3.30 the previous morning and not got back to sleep, this was pretty useful. I listened to an entire audio book about Elizabeth I. It was rather dull, but there was one stand out moment in her life which I’d not read or heard of before. Once, when a lady’s maid botched serving her food she took revenge for the slight by STABBING HER IN THE HAND!

Jeez!

So, the next day I was fairly bright, and after scoffing the “breakfast” of the B&B package – a plate of egg, bacon, sausage, mushroom and tomato I was fit to face the day. I went back to Cambridge to meet my dad at the station, and we got a cab to the crematorium. We had both been super early and we ended up getting there far too early, so we sat and chatted. I thought I would be all stoic, since Pat’s death could hardly be described as tragic, but as soon as I saw my cousins, her daughters I started to weep, and I really didn’t stop until afterwards. My dad, being the codger that he is, declined to come to the wake, and got a cab back to the station. It’s kind of weird seeing my family en masse since we don’t normally meet up, but it was actually pretty nice. My cousin Diana had just been on Radio 4 on a show called Saturday Live which is a long, magazine style programme. It features something they call ‘sound sculpture’ and my cousin Diana was on it talking about the noise our Nana’s shears made as she cut out a pattern. It’s awfully good. You might be able to listen to it here since the BBC seem less parsimonious about radio programmes than tv online. She’s on from 15.27 to 20.09.

At some point I was offered a lift back to Ely, which I gratefully accepted, and although I had eaten all the chocolate I did have my miso soup and an apple so didn’t have to leave my room once I’d got back, and I again put myself to bed more or less immediately. The first night I was very keen to shut myself in with as much warmth as possible, so I’d shut the shutters and the curtain, but this time I left it all open and woke to the sunrise which was pretty.

My morning baths were hot and deep. Here’s my fancy little bathroom.

cast iron bath from days of yore. not very long but super deep

I got up at farmer o’clock again, and ran my bath, listening to a programme I like to call “Men Arguing” but which is in fact called “The Today Programme” (wait – it isn’t – it’s called “Today” but apparently people call it The Today Programme. Bloody PEOPLE! Always messing things up). I don’t usually listen to it because it does that thing of telling you the same news over and over again in a panic inducing way, but I quite liked doing it that morning just for the oddity of it.

I’d been asked over in the morning to spend some time with the girls, but I’d thought that sounded rather ambitious, and when it was chucking out time at the B&B I rang but my cousin’s phone was off. She phoned me back, but I was already on the train home – they had indeed stayed up til 3 in the morning drinking and reminiscing.

ridiculously awful photo i took as i was leaving

Pat’s ashes are going to be dug into my uncle’s grave with a rosebush on her birthday in August. He was buried with a bottle of good red and a Jane Austin book. I like to think he read the book while he was waiting and saved the wine to share with Pattie Poos. Mind you, a theory was mooted that she might have smuggled a crate of Baileys in with her in her coffin, so perhaps he woudn’t have to share.

1916: Edward Johnston’s hand-drawn alphabet for the Underground

NINETEEN SIXTEEN this was designed in! Not even the 30s, which is what it looks like to me. So lovely. I have to say I am not overly interested in typography or signage – to the point that I very much got someone else to teach it when I was running m’course. Nevertheless, I do appreciate how very modern this lettering is – predating Bayer’s Bauhaus typeface by nine years.

Which, of course, I do like as well. I wonder if, having been brought up in London, I am predisposed to love the underground lettering and signage? I mean, I can see that the Paris metro is pretty, but I feel an actual love for the LU. While we are musing, I wonder if I would feel less attached to London if the signage was changed? Not that they’d EVER do that. There would be uproar.

When I bought a typewriter to write my dissertation (it cost the same to buy an electric typewriter as to pay someone to type it out for you, what people did in the OLDEN DAYS, YO) I chose courier but as soon as I had my first computer, a classic mac (second hand) it was helvetica for me, and then ariel after that. Sans serif looks better on a screen.

***

I have today on my own with the dogs. After a few days on my own at the beginning of the Hectorium I had to beg Ten to come back and help me, because it was all too horribly much. However, the dogs have largely settled down together, and Hector is nearly completely house trained, so it’s easier to be on my own with them. I am enjoying a quiet, non fighty spell on the bed while I write this. Soon there will be feeding time, and then a walk, and then I will be exhausted and only want to watch tv.

***

Since last we met, dear reader, my beloved auntie Pat has died. Here I am with her at my cousin’s wedding nearly three years ago.

me and patty poo

The good thing is that she wasn’t particularly ill. She was old, and quite disabled, but had just been to Spain and enjoyed herself ogling at men’s legs and drinking ‘something naughty’ in the sunshine, so there is nothing to be sad about really, except that I liked her. For a while I spent a fair bit of time with her, too. She was cared for at home, and would go into respite care every few weeks for a few days. I went to visit her there and would bring her a flask of gin & tonic or a film to watch or whatever. There was one time I found a ginko leaf on the ground on my way to see her. I gave her the leaf and told her all I know about the ginko tree – it is so old that it has no parasites, so the leaves are always pristine, it is known as the ‘memory tree’ and people take ginko to improve their memories. When I left she said ‘thank you for the leaf’ and I know she meant it. She was the sort of person who would prefer a leaf and a story to any amount of fancy flowers.

Makes me think of the Brian Patten poem ‘A blade of Grass’

You ask for a poem.
I offer you a blade of grass.
You say it is not good enough.
You ask for a poem.

I say this blade of grass will do.
It has dressed itself in frost,
It is more immediate
Than any image of my making.

You say it is not a poem,
It is a blade of grass and grass
Is not quite good enough.
I offer you a blade of grass.

You are indignant.
You say it is too easy to offer grass.
It is absurd.
Anyone can offer a blade of grass.

You ask for a poem.
And so I write you a tragedy about
How a blade of grass
Becomes more and more difficult to offer,

And about how as you grow older
A blade of grass
Becomes more difficult to accept.

Which is one way of saying that despite her chronological age – 86, I think – she was never ever old. We shared a love of the tv series The Camomile Lawn which we had both seen so many times we could quote virtually the whole script. The series was, unfortunately, taped rather than filmed, so the visual quality is awful, but the whole series is on youtube, and the sound has cleaned up nicely.

I love the soundtrack which is a variation on Ravel’s string quartet. I had it as a ring tone for ages.