Once tea was poured and pleasantries were over, talking began. I was round at Martha’s and on that particular morning our discussion naturally turned to the previous night’s final of Strictly Come Dancing and to its winner, the drummer Harry Judd. ‘Strictly’ is not everyone’s favourite programme but Martha and I are devotees and in…
Marching on
The protest march last Saturday was my umpteenth. There was chanting, banner waving and ululation as my wife and I walked slowly through the centre of London from Temple, along the Embankment and up to the Treasury where we stopped for the speeches. We were protesting about the excessive burden borne by women in the…
Aladdin’s cave
For visitors to London a traditional, albeit quirky, tourist attraction is the food hall at Harrods. In Moscow the equivalent would be the vaulted galleries at GUM; in Paris, perhaps the magnificent glass and steel dome at Galleries Lafayette. At the other extreme and again in Paris, there is the basement of BHV, formally known…
Trials and tribulations
We were invited to attend the public ‘defence’ of a PhD thesis one afternoon in Paris. Unlike in the UK, in France and indeed in most other mainland European countries, universities hold the oral component of the PhD exam (the ‘viva’) in public. With preliminary assessments by the examiners, coupled with careful oversight by the…
Just pretending
Right up to my teenage years reciting a poem out loud or acting in the school play were essentially impossible. Learning lines was difficult enough but even if the words were memorised, the presence of an audience would strike me dumb. Performance and I were incompatible. Similarly, pretence and deceit were an anathema. One of…
Short back and torture
I reckon I have had my hair cut every 6-8 weeks since I was four, which makes last week’s my 500th. The trouble is that I have disliked each and every one, finding them at best unpleasant and at worst, plain horrible. I have nothing against barbers, I just don’t like keeping still and I'm not…
Labour of love
Our back garden had a problem. As soon as it rained the earth by the scullery door became all mud and puddles. After three years of inertia we decided to lay a paved path, edged on one side by a row of stones to restrain the herb garden, and on the other by a wall.…
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