It was John’s turn to choose and my turn to pay. We had arranged the date some weeks before, so when the Sunday came around and I still hadn’t received joining instructions from John, I wondered – by SMS in John’s direction – whether the evening was still on.
Leave it with me…
…said John, followed not all that long after by a message that read:
Brat.
A bit harsh on my character, I thought. I was only trying, politely, to confirm the arrangements.
But John didn’t mean “brat” as an assessment of my character, he meant BRAT Restaurant in Shoreditch, a high-class Basque food place.
John’s follow up messages clarified the arrangements and suggested that we meet an hour before the restaurant booking, as he had secured a cocktail booking at The Umbrella Workshop, an interesting cross between a shop, a tastings venue and a bar, hidden away in an old workshop alley not far from BRAT.
Here’s John trying to look like a serious cocktail drinker in The Umbrella WorkshopI’m hopeless with pre-meal drinks these days, so I went for a soft version
Superb cocktails, both the alcoholic and the non-alcoholic ones. I’d quite like to try the alcoholic cocktails there, perhaps one day after taking some food without any other form of alcohol.
I did taste John’s cocktail – an exotic and really quite amazing variation on an old fashioned. This place really does, seriously do cocktails. It is very small and very friendly. Further, if you like ska, rock steady and reggae, then the play list will be for you.
Then on to BRAT. Super place, located above the Smoking Goat. Here is a link to the sample menu, which is similar to the menu we saw on our evening there.
The place is renowned for its large sharing turbot dish, but we eschewed that one in favour of trying several different things. The helpful waitress recommended four starters and two mains plus sides to share, which was spot on.
We started with:
Fresh Chorizo
Spider Crab Toast
Young Leeks, Walnut & Fresh Cheese
Velvet Crab Soup
I cannot eat walnuts, but John really fancied the leek & walnut dish. Soup doesn’t share easily, so we agreed to go for two sharing options plus a bespoke starter each.
For mains and sides, we had:
Brill ‘pil-pil’ with Cockles
John Dory
Smoked Potatoes;
Wood Roasted Greens.
All of the above dishes were amazingly good. John and I debated at length whether we thought the brill or the John Dory the better dish. Both were exquisite and quite different in style. The brill dish slightly spicy, the John Dory more citrus-tangy.
The headline photo shows John with the spider crab toast.
Here’s me attacking the velvet crab soup
We also shared a bottle of Basque wine: Gorrondona, Txakoli de Getaria, Pais Basco, Spain 2020. It complemented the food well.
With thanks to John Random for several pictures, not least this one: me with Noel Christopher– Caroline is also there, trying to hide in the corner of this picture
Given that Ivan Shakespeare Memorial dinners are principally gatherings of comedy writers, they have not been much of a laughing matter of late, with many of our number having departed permanently. Indeed John Random pondered various re-namings this time:
Ivan Shakespeare Debbie Barham Nick R. Thomas Gerry Goddin Mike Hodd Chris Stanton Memorial Dinner
or
“Ivan to Stanton Memorial Dinner”
Yet plenty of us still survive to dine, chat and play silly quizzes. A dozen or so of us gathered this time.
Random gets busy with his camera phone while Barry looks on and……Hugh Ryecroft shows off the new trophy: The Hoddy
Following the departure of Mike Hodd, we toasted our patriarch and played an extra quiz for the above magnificent new trophy: The Hoddy, provided by Mark Keegan, who set the seminal Hoddy Quiz. Professional quiz dude Hugh Ryecroft took that trophy.
Hugh couldn’t win the regular annual Ivan Shakespeare Trophy, as he won it last year and set that quiz this year. Bit of a busman’s holiday for Hugh, setting quizzes for Ivan Shakespeare dinners. Still, it was Keith Wickham who took that magnificent prize, which will no doubt grace his trophy cabinet for most of 2023:
Wickham lands the big one
I was close, but no cigar on both quizzes, in particular one of them on which i only missed out by a couple of points.
But of course all were winners, as it was such a heart-warming and convivial evening, as indeed it always is.
Was that Keith’s classic James Mason impression making me laugh?
Violets & Fatt Pundit With Mark Ellicott, Simon Jacobs & John White, 17 October 2022
For some reason we were all being too grown up to take photos, but this was a special get together reuniting people who had all known each other at Keele for one reason or another.
In particular the musical aspects intrigued Simon Jacobs, who wondered out loud to me why I hadn’t set up a get-together with Mark.
Simon, in 2019, trying to make a silk purse out of my (then) sow’s ear voice
Actually, John said something similar when I shared my Mark correspondence with him when we met up in the summer. I had no excuse, so I felt duty bound to act.
John questioning my judgement with his eyes and body language, August 2022
I played tennis at Lord’s – a draw at singles seeing as you were going to ask – before hot-footing it (via the flat) to Soho.
I arrived at Violet’s, grabbing a table – just inside but suitably quasi-open to the street – about five minutes before Simon arrived. From that vantage point, we observed Mark walk straight past us and then four or five minutes later he returned having got as confused as everyone else by the Berwick Street door-numbering. John arrived fashionably but not ridiculously last.
We had a good chat and a drink at Violet’s before heading a block or two up the road to Fatt Pundit, where the food was excellent and the chat got even better.
A few comedy moments with the sweet waitress whose high-pitched voice is possibly in a register that none of us, given our advancing years, could hear. But the menu was pretty-much self-explanatory, so a mixture of sign language, reading the menu and common sense allowed us to order a cracking good meal.
It was a really enjoyable four-way catch up.
Goldmine With Rohan Candappa & David Wellbrook, 18 October 2022
It was basically a “barbeque meats challenge” based on my assertion that the Queensway specialists therein, especially Goldmine, are better than those in Chinatown.
It turned into a small-scale Alleyn’s School alum thing. David Wellbrook, being Wellbrook, needed to join in the challenge, not least because Queensway is an alma mater of his where he attended the University of Romance (his wife used to live there when they were courting).
We tucked into plenty of barbeque meats, diverting briefly at the start and end of the lunchtime feast for some dim sum, just in the interests of science.
At school Rohan Candappa was always known as Candy, so it was with great mirth and merriment that David spotted “Candy World” across the street.
For those who don’t like to click and/or who don’t want all the tennis detail – here is an extract:
“It’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall,” said your intrepid reporter to Carl Snitcher, having braved the 3.5 mile high-pass journey from Notting to Primrose Hill in just over 35 minutes.
“There’s a bad moon on the rise,” agreed Carl, gnomically.
We arrived at a rain-soaked Hampton Court Palace in the nick of time; just as well, as your intemporal reporter was playing in the first rubber. Some might argue that our arrival was actually “worse than two”, but a more substantial discrepancy soon revealed itself; the marker’s sheet was showing a lesser handicap for the Dedanists than the sheet that James McDermott & I had been sent.
In order to avoid a major diplomatic incident, James & I acquiesced to the lesser handicap, yet still somehow contrived to win our rubber, albeit narrowly…
McDermott hitting, me watching
On finally staggering away from the court, your incognizant reporter picked up a message that the Prime Minister had resigned. “That’s the second Liz whose expiration has been announced while I was on the real tennis court in the space of six weeks”, I mused, having been informed of the late Queen’s demise by Tony Friend while I was on the Lord’s court.
I thought I might be the tidings-bringer this time, only to discover that most of the group had learnt the demise of Liz Truss some 45 minutes earlier.
Anyway, this was no time to ponder the fate of shambolic politicians – it was time to tuck into the pies before they too were to become a footnote in history. A positive footnote in the case of the pies of course – once again a delicious choice of • Chicken Ham & Leek; • Steak & Ale.
Bread and cheese (yes please) and two species of yummy desert that self-discipline allowed me to avoid, along with the jolly wines on offer…
Pictures by Tony Friend
There’s no better way to lift the spirits on a gloomy, worrisome day than a day of pastance with Dedanists and Hamsters. Symbolically, as the nation’s political shenanigans moved on to its new phase, the heavy clouds and rain of the morning had lifted to reveal a gorgeously bright, sunny evening as we all left.
“So foul and fair a day I have not seen”, said Carl, gnomically, as I dropped him home.
For several months prior, we had eagerly awaited our joint birthday celebration trip. We had long since abandoned the idea of having a party for the joint 60th, deciding instead to celebrate, as we have done several times before, as a group of four.
Prequel: Dinner With John At Dai Chi, Soho, 11 August 2022
Every great epic movie or three has at least one prequel these days. In any case, John and I felt that we are so out of practice with fine dining, we simply owed it to ourselves and to the girls to have a rehearsal in London earlier in the month.
That miso aubergine and gooseberry dish was to die for…or to Dai Chi for I should say.It was all so good
A very enjoyable evening indeed. Or, as we put it to the girls solemnly, “we had indeed done our boot camp training to prepare for the culinary trials to come later in the month”.
The First Afternoon & Evening At Whatley Manor, 24 August 2022
Whatley’s up, doc?
The girls had done a magnificent job of conspiring ahead of this trip. John and I knew that something…some things…were on their planning boards, but felt we owed it to them and to ourselves to just go with the flow.
As it turned out, the first “event” for me and John was a “surprise” visit to the spa, where we enjoyed a glass of wine in a hot tub prior to full body massages.
The hot tub had so many buttons and knobs it took us most of the half hour to work out how to operate the thing. Once we had sunk our glasses of wine and soaked in the tub for that much time, we were both a bit dazed and confused. John almost forgot his glasses and I almost forgot my flip-flops. Considering that neither of us had more than one or two incidentals about our person, that was a pretty high forgetfulness rate.
The massages were excellent (the place has a top notch spa) which got both of us into thoroughly relaxed mode.
But I was not so relaxed as simply to buy the idea that Whatley Manor is a 17th century building, as one of the receptionists had suggested. In fact the building is mostly 19th century and the “mock Tudor” extension is 20th century. Worse yet, the place was originally called Twatley Manor. Hats off to the marketing folk who thought that Whatley Manor would sell better as a name.
it’s a lovely manor, whatever it’s called and whenever it was built
John and I enjoyed the late afternoon sunshine after our massages while the girls were too polite to come and find us, but soon we were reunited and got ready for the “easy-peasy” Grey’s Brasserie meal we had arranged for the first night.
John went for steak & fat-frittesMandy & I both went for the pork. Mandy’s plate colour-co-ordinated with her rose wineJanie went for the duck – it was all delicious grub, oh yes it was
In honour of my mate Philip The Bold, Duke of Burgundy, we treated ourselves to a bottle of Domaine Faiveley Mercurey La Framboisière 2019 that first night and jolly gluggable it was too.
John had begged Mandy not to arrange cake and “happy birthday singing” in a public place – thank goodness – so Mandy & Janie had conspired to arrange cake and an opportunity for “happy birthday singing” in a private place – in the living room mezzanine of John & Mandy’s suite:
Did we ask for this?So symbolic – 60 illuminated by two candles
The cake was seriously yummy death by chocolate.
Day Two – During The Day, 25 August 2022
Blowing out my own candle
The chocolate cake desert had perhaps been overkill, as we had each been given a mini chocolate cake and candle which Janie and I enjoyed as a pre-breakfast treat the next morning.
Breakfast was of course excellent – we went full English that first morning – then we realised that the scheduled good weather for our trip was being interrupted by a couple of hours of drizzle and rain. I suggested that we defer our scheduled walk until that was over – about 12:30.
We walked from the hotel – across Easton Grey bridge (over the Avon) around to Foxley and then on to Malmesbury. I’ll let the photos tell the tale of this charming walk.
Easton Grey BridgeChecking the cricket score from Old Trafford, not weather or directionsThe local moofia came over to greet usThen the Foxley longhorns let us know what they thought tooFoxley ChurchJohn can see an excellent long cut back to the manor – Mandy and I talk him out of it.A brush with an emu at a farm just outside MalmesburyAlpaca and hen at the same farmOutskirts of MalmesburyThe Old Bell Hotel, Malmesbury, possibly the oldest in EnglandRefreshments in the Old BellThen a wander around Malmesbury Abbey
We wandered around the town, thought about walking home, then called for a cab when we realised that we wanted to be fit and awake for our big dinner tonight.
The Big Dinner At Whatley Manor, 25 August 2022
Drinks before dinner
We won’t talk about John’s “poking himself between the eyes” incident before he came down to dinner, because that would be unkind, especially as he didn’t even need to confess to it given that his specs covered the tiny gash. I tried the concussion test on John, which he failed, but we concluded that he’d fail it under any circumstances, so that was OK.
After drinks in the lounge, head chef Ricki Weston (above) invited us into the kitchen for our first few nibbles and a chat.
Is that all?John & I listening intently to the descriptions of the first two nibblesJanie wandered deeper into the kitchen with her camera-phone
Then we sat down at table for the rest of the nibbles and the main dishes. At this juncture, it was out with the camera phones big time. We weren’t going to eat the hell out of this feast – oh no – we were going to photograph the hell out of it.
We all staggered back to our rooms after a wonderful evening.
The Morning After And Home, 26 August 2022
We’d had a wonderful time. We were all suffering a little the next morning, having become unaccustomed to long evenings of eating and drinking.
We mostly went a bit lighter on breakfast, although John still went for bacon and black pudding, claiming it to be lighter than my cereal and yoghurt!
After breakfast and check out, we met up in the grounds and strolled around those before heading home.
OK, so birthdays are meaningless milestones of decay…
…but there’s nothing meaningless about enduring friendships. We’d had such a great time – it was so special to spend that much prime time celebrating the birthdays with close friends.
If you want to see all the pictures – trigger warning – there are more than 250 of them – the Flickr link here and below takes you to all of them:
…asked Rohan, while we were messaging each other to make the arrangements for a lunchtime meet up.
Is the sky blue, is the Pope a Catholic, do bears shit in the woods and is a pig’s arse pork?
…I felt like replying, but instead I sent Rohan a link to the Ogblog piece about my first ever dim sum experience, so long ago it was before I had even met Rohan…whom I met when we started Alleyn’s School in September 1973:
In that case, let’s meet at 12:30 in the middle of Gerrard Street.
Great, I thought, this will be my first visit to Chinatown for years and I miss the place.
My childhood memory of trying dim sum for the first time must be my favourite anecdote about dim sum in Chinatown, but I do have another treasured memory on that topic.
In the mid to late 1990s, while working with the late, great Professor Mike Smith, we found ourselves nearby and decided to continue our discussions over a dim sum lunch. Studying an extensive card, I wondered whether Mike had ever tried duck tongues – a dish I had tried before (I think in Hong Kong) and rather liked. Mike said he was up for anything and thus we ordered, amongst several other things, a portion of tongues.
Mike Smith, normally calm
On tasting the anatine delicacy, Mike freaked out.
Oh my God – they’ve got bones in their tongues! Ducks have bones in their tongues! Uggh.
Even after we agreed that the bone-like core of the duck’s tongue was probably hard cartilage rather than bone, Mike was too discombobulated by the discovery to eat any more of that dish…
…which, to anyone who knew Mike well, proves that he was seriously discombobulated. Indeed, Mike told the “dim sum discovery that ducks have bones in their tongues” story to anyone who’d listen for ages after the event.
Returning to 2022, I wondered whether Rohan had chickened out (or should I say ducked out) of picking a venue, but it turned out he had a specific venue in mind all along: New Loon Fung. As we entered, I was pretty sure this was the same venue as the Mike Smith tongue incident all those years ago. Seeing duck tongues on the menu pretty much confirmed my theory – you don’t see those on the menu in many dim sum places in London.
I told Rohan the story. Of course he agreed we needed to order some, along with the several other things we both wanted to try.
Perhaps the waiters had a sense of foreboding about non-Chinese people ordering a delicacy so quintessentially Chinese as duck tongues. The restaurant was heaving by the time we placed our order, almost exclusively with people who were visibly Chinese or at least of Chinese origin.
We asked a couple of times for the tongues, once it was clear that all our other dishes had long since been delivered. Eventually our portion came:
Duck got your tongue, Rohan? He sure doesn’t look 100% sure
We “toasted” Mike, each of us with a tongue on our chopsticks, Rohan tried that one tongue, then he deferred the rest of the plate to me, leaving me in a similar position, plate of tongues-wise, as I had been in 25 or so years ago with Mike Smith.
I’m old enough and ugly enough now that I don’t do anything I don’t want to do…
…said Rohan, when I pressed the point, just to be sure he wasn’t simply deferring my chosen delicacy out of politeness.
I guess I might be on my own in the matter of liking the duck tongues dish – I recall Janie not much liking it either.
Rohan and I chatted about many things, including how most of the eateries we knew from the old days had gone from Chinatown – New Loon Fung being a rare perennial. I think it was known as Dragon Phoenix “back in the day”, but it looks and feels like the same place of old.
After parting company with Rohan, I took a stroll around Chinatown, confirming that most of my old haunts had vanished.
Strangely and most coincidentally, I got an e-mail from Michael Mainelli about 48 hours later asking me if I could recommend a place in Chinatown for him and the family to go to after a show – all the places he remembered had closed down since his last visit.
I was able to provide some helpful advice. Really I should put the time from my afternoon off onto my timesheet as R&D for the business. Only joking, only joking.
Janie and I were so pleased to be invited to this Crisis event – a thank you to us 2021/22 Crisis At Christmas volunteers. I wrote up much of our volunteering experience at the time – click here or below.
Our extended volunteering for several weeks into January was unfortunately foreshortened (although only by one shift) when I tested positive for Covid after what should have been our penultimate shift. Which meant we hadn’t had a chance to say goodbye properly to several colleagues.
Reunited with Tracie & Connie
Further, we had heard such great things about the outcomes from this year’s Christmas initiative, we were keen to learn whether the new delivery model would be repeated in 2022.
Tristia and Matt express thanks and bring positive news ahead of 2021
Janie and I wondered whether we might also run into Kathy & Caroline from FoodCycle at this event, as we knew that both of them do Crisis, although we hadn’t shifted with either of them at Christmas. Almost as soon as the speeches finished, those two sought us out:
Caroline & Kathy “soughting” me outNot sure what Mike just said, but no-one, least of all Mike, seems pleased in that instant It wasn’t all bearded, long-haired, bright-shirt-wearing hunks named Ian
We had a very enjoyable time. Afterwards, Janie and I treated ourselves to a shawarma supper takeaway from Ranoush. It would have been rude to walk past the place on the way home, after all.
A Prize Dinner – Kitchen At Holmes, 29 July 2022
Free to choose whatever we want
Back in the mists of time – before we did our 2021 Crisis at Christmas volunteering, I went to a really charming Baker Street Quarter Partnership event, which was, in part, a fundraiser for Marylebone FoodCycle…
…and won a dinner for two courtesy of Kitchen At Holmes in the fundraising raffle.
Janie and I had not got around to booking that evening, as I pointed out every now and then when I stumbled across the envelope/voucher in my in-tray. We agreed that we really shouldn’t push the “valid until November 2022” deadline and that a summer Friday evening out rather than in would be a treat for us.
This meal certainly was that.
Please explain the difference between chanterelles and girolles, Genaro.“It’s like this…”
Genaro looked after us extremely well throughout the meal.
The food looked amazing and tasted just as good. We photographed the food like a couple of youngsters.
In fact, if it is culinary eye candy you are after, you can click the link below and see all the foodie pics we took:
Janie started with the lamb kofte, depicted above, while I started with a tuna tartare dish. Janie then moved on to fish – sea bass, while I enjoyed a veal steak. The chunky chips were a delight for us to share, as were the carrots & purple potties, also depicted above.
Of course a raffle is all luck but, as the organisers said at the Baker Street Quarter Partnership do all those months ago, it was really nice to have FoodCycle volunteers win one of the high-end raffle prizes
Our deserts – we sort of feel we got our just ones
So many events postponed and cancelled before Christmas. Then Janie and I spent the Christmas period doing Crisis and stuff. Then, just around the time I was supposed to start doing nice stuff again, towards the end of January, I went down with the mildest of mild doses of Covid, requiring me to isolate again and cancel out my social engagements.
I was really looking forward to seeing John for the evening. He had chosen a new restaurant that has had rave reviews: Zahter. It read and sounded wonderful. Here’s a link to the website.
But so used to cancelation had I become, that, around 16:30, rather than simply looking forward to spending the evening with John, I became convinced that John would call any second to cancel the evening.
But no cancelation call was forthcoming so I off I set to Foubert’s Place; a location I hadn’t visited in years…OK, I’ve barely visited any Central London locations in years…but in the matter of this location, many, many years.
The service was excellent – explaining the menu – from which we chose a selection of cold and hot mezes to share, rather than choosing any main dishes.
We tried:
Atom – a chilli yoghurt dip – a bit spicy for my taste these days;
Fava – a broadbean based dip very much to my taste;
Karides Guvec – tiger prawns in garlic butter;
Manti – meatballs which they kindly did for us without the walnuts.
A quick look at the Liberty clock on the way home, although it sadly was not an appropriate time to see the movement of the moving bits, unless we were willing to wait around for quarter of an hour or so…which we were not.
At the beginning of November, life seemed to be almost getting back to normal. Lots of real tennis in convivial circumstances for a start,
Thursday 4 November 2021 – MCC Real Tennis Skills Night
For my sins, I have inherited, from John (“Johnny”) Whiting, the role of “match manager” for the popular skills nights at Lord’s. A few years ago, on hearing John and the professionals discussing the amount of organising the event needs on the night, I made the schoolboy error of offering to help next time. John saw the offer of help as an opportunity to step down; frankly, Johnny had done it for so many years, who can blame him?
Fortunately for me, Johnny had left comprehensive instructions and spreadsheets rendering the event almost fool-proof, as long as there are a couple of pros who know what they are doing to make the event run smoothly on the court, which, of course, it did.
Alternatively, if anything ever goes awry with the MCC site link, a scrape of the report can be found here.
Naturally, skills night is as much an exercise in conviviality as it is an exercise in tennis court skills.
However, the assembled throng did have to listen to me waffling on about prizes and the like:
Thanks again to Giles Stogdon for this photo
A Week Of Tennis & Dining Out 6 to 12 November 2021
Quite a week. Janie and I went to Simon Jacobs place for dinner on 6th, where he cooked a delicious soup followed by chicken & mushroom pie. Lots of chat about music and that sort of thing. No photos on this occasion but there are photos from our previous visit, before lockdown 2.0:
I played a fair bit of tennis that week, not least a ridiculous 24 hours during which I played an hour of real tennis singles on the Tuesday evening, two hours of modern tennis on the Wednesday morning (part singles, part doubles), then a match, representing MCC against Middlesex University on the Wednesday, which ended up being another two-and-a-half hours of doubles. No wonder I served a couple of double-faults at the end of my second rubber on the Wednesday evening. Again, no photos from the match this time, but here’s a report with pictures and videos from the most recent equivalent home fixture – a couple of years ago:
On Thursday 11th, I went to the office for the first time (other than for a team meeting) in more than 18 months. Then I met up with Johnboy – initially in “Ye [sic] Old Mitre” (it really should read “þe Old Mitre”, you know) and then on to Chettinad Restaurant (my choice), as I thought a high-quality Indian meal would be a good way for us to “get back on the bike” of dining out. The food was very good.
It had been a really long while since John and I had met up for a simple restaurant meal – our last few gatherings had either been at homes, the four of us or the four of us at homes. This Yauatcha meal might have been the previous one:
Then on the Friday I was evicted from this year’s MCC singles tournament for feeble-handicappers in the Round of 16. I don’t think I’ll try tournament singles again. I love playing singles more than doubles on a friendly basis but doubles makes more sense at my level for matches and tournaments.
Tennis At All Sorts Of Levels, Performances Of Various Kinds & A Bit Of A Boost, 15 to 29 November 2021
On 15 November I spent a very jolly afternoon at The Queen’s Club watching real tennis played by real players; The British Open 2021.
I saw Neil Mackenzie take on Matthieu Sarlangue, then Zac Eadle challenge Nick Howell, then finally (and most excitingly, a five setter) Edmund Kay against Darren Long. Here is a link to the draw/results on the T&RA website. If by any chance that link doesn’t work, I have scraped the file to here.
I spent much of the afternoon & evening with my friend/adversary Graham Findlay with whom, by chance, I was due to battle with myself that very Thursday. I was thus able to reciprocate the coffee and cake Graham kindly treated me to at Queen’s with a light bite in The Lord’s Tavern after our battle on the Thursday, before I went home to perform my latest ThreadMash piece – click here or below.
Janie and I had an afternoon of adventure on the Friday, having our Covid vaccinations boosted (we don’t get out much these days – all such matters need noting).
Picture actually from first vax
Most people reported a sore arm and aches. We both got the aches but strangely my arm did not feel at all sore at the vaccination site and I was able to play lawners lefty-righty all weekend.
A quieter week followed. I continued to play some doubles in partnership with Andrew Hinds, in preparation for our R16 match – this we did Tuesday 16th and Monday 22 November.
… star in Little Women at The Park Theatre on the Thursday, but sadly our performance needed to be cancelled due to cast illness (not Lydia) that day, so we’ll miss the run now.
On Monday 29th, Andrew Hinds (depicted wooden-spoon-wielding, left, in the photo below) and I won a place in the quarter finals of the feeble-handicappers’ doubles tournament.
With thanks to Tony Friend for this photo From skills night
Due to competitor/court availability (or lack thereof) before the seasonal break, that means that we shall still be in the 2021/22 tournament into the New Year – the equivalent of getting to week two of a grand slam lawn tennis tournament – but in a very slightly less-elevated way.
We thought it would be a good idea to have a meal together after the Trustees meeting this time. We have been gathering now since 2017 planning non-turf pitch and net facilities for London’s parks, without ever breaking bread together…until this evening.
The Three Cranes location in the City worked well for me, giving me the opportunity to clear some work at the office (yes, believe it or not I did also do some work in this event-filled week) before the Trustees meeting at the Three Cranes, which was followed by the joyous meal and libations.
This evening was an excellent opportunity to all get to know each other a bit better. Not just we Trustees, but also the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) people who have been working tirelessly on our intiiative (and participation cricket more generally), plus Ed Griffiths and his team who have been doing so much wonderful pro bono work on behalf of the LCT over the years.
One of many good thoughts that emerged from the evening is that we still haven’t actually watched any professional cricket together; we’re hoping to put that right during the 2020 season.
A very enjoyable evening.
Ivan Shakespeare Memorial Dinner & Trophy Match, Spaghetti House Holborn, Thursday 12 December 2019
One NewsRevue alum who, sadly, only just made it a few months beyond the 20th anniverary of that show was Ivan Shakespeare. We “Class Of ’92” types who were NewsRevue contemporaries of Ivan meet on an irregular occasional basis, three or four times a year, to keep in touch with each other, eat, trade jokes, share bizarre quizzes and also to remember Ivan. We’ve been doing that since mid 2000, a few months after Ivan died.
In the seasonal version of our gathering, the stakes increase markedly and we play one of the quizzes for The Ivan Shakespeare Memorial Trophy. I am proud to be the donor of the original Memorial Trophy, which was first contested in 2002, about 18 months after the dinners started.
It’s a bit like The Ashes, but for comedy writers rather than for cricketers.
Much like The Ashes, the trophy is a thing of exquisite gimcrackness; it’s absence of taste simply has to be seen to be believed:
Observant readers will see that I won that trophy once; in 2004Some real names from the world of quizzing on there: Hugh Ryecroft for one, Barry Grossman being another.
The problem is, unlike The Ashes, the trophy is inscribed with the winner’s name each year…
…and the original trophy is running out of sensible places for the embazoning of the winner’s name…
…OK, there never were sensible places for the emblazoning, but now we are even running out of silly places to inscribe.
The solution: a new trophy. Acquired through the sort of tenacity that only Graham Robertson could possibly deploy – an eBay purchase which he needed to make twice because the first eBay vendor of tasteless out-of-date royal gimcrack merchandise took Graham’s money and did a runner.
The assembled alums at our new spiritual venue, The Spaghetti House in Holborn, decreed that Mark Keegan, who won the original trophy three times, should become “steward-for-life” of the original trophy.
Mark Keegan, delighted with his original trophy. Graham Robertson looks on, enviously.Barry Grossman shows off the new trophy……then wears one for the team by winning the new trophy this year
As usual I came quite close but no cigar for me in the trophy stakes since 2004. Barry Grossman scooped the glittering prize this year – with sincere commiserations to Barry – he could have been an also-ran, but instead…
It wasn’t all quizzes and trophies; oh no, no, no, no, no, no no. There was plenty of time for eating, drinking, topical humour and some sense-of-irony-sapping politics on what was, after all, an election night.
Moving swiftly on from the will-to-live-depleting topics back to the humour section, John Random produced another set of personalised Christmas crackers this year, based on the BBC Radio 4 programme In Our Time with Melvyn Bragg.
My cracker contained a note posing the intriguing question:
What do you call a deer with no eyes?
Frankly, I had no idea and would gladly have said, “no idea”, but for the answer provided, which instead said, in Braggian tones:
With me to discuss what you call a deer with no eyes, I have Ian Harris, Professor of Mammalian Opthalmology at Gresham College and author of In Darkness Let me Dwell – and Professor Jonny Hurst from the University of Manchester, author of Champagne Super Over: Oasis In Popular Culture.
There is sort-of a tradition in recent years for at least one person’s order to go horribly wrong at the festive dinner. This year it Barry Grossman who suffered the indignity of being brought his main at starter time and a starter-sized portion of his chosen main at main course time. The nice waiter did his best to sort things out.
Ironically, Barry went on to win the quiz, as did Jonny Hurst in 2017 when it was his turn to be the brunt of the ritual service humiliation – in those days at Cafe Rogues in Holborn not far from the scene of this year’s crime. That year, 2017, John Random’s personalised crackers had been based on the Moral Maze. He likes his thinky-Radio-4 programmes, does our John.
Anyway, the night of 12 December 2019 will surely be remembered as a great night for NewsRevue alums…and Tories…ironically.
Z/Yen Seasonal Lunch, The Old Bailey, Friday 13 December 2019
Z/Yen team gathered in the Alderman & Sheriff’s apartment
In the world of crime fiction, criminals have a regular, unfortunate tendancy; returning to the scene of the crime. Whether that is true in the real world or not I have no idea. Nor do I have the faintest idea what that point might have to do with this section of this piece.
Anyway, just three days after the Z/Yen Alumni function at The Old Bailey, the current Z/Yen team regrouped in that astonishing building for the staff seasonal lunch.
On this occasion we found ourselves in the smaller function room, used daily for the judges pre-luncheon drinks, after enjoying our pre-lunch drinks in Michael and Elisabeth’s apartment. Once again Sean, their footman, proved his skills as a photographer – thanks Sean.
The meal was a very good one; smoked trout fillet, followed by a posh duck dish, followed by an apple tart-like desert.
The wines tasted suspiciously like those excellent wines we’d enjoyed earlier in the week and seemed suspiciously well food-matched for the lunch, thanks to the combined skills of Gordon Clunie and (in all modesty) me.
Linda produced one of her fiendish seasonal quizzes – let’s not even talk about how badly Simon Mills and I did as a so-called team on that one.
Secret Santa visited (I got some baritone ukulele strings) and Santa also brought everyone a small box of super posh chocolates.
Then the traditional Z/Yen seasonal sing song. Being exceptionally woke for a boomer, I again recycled a previous effort this year, cunningly adding a topical reference ensuring that no-one would realise that it was recycled…
…unless they looked at the copyright years and/or version numbers and/or read this piece. Here is the 2019 version of The 12 Days Of Z/Yen Training. Excellent, was the performance, especially the “Five Forces” motif, which brought tears to my eyes each time around.
It is a fascinating musical phenomenon that this particular song works in so many different keys: C, C#, B, D, D#, A, E, G#, G, F & F#…all at the same time…at least, it did that afternoon.
After the formalities, plenty of informalities with some additional quizzing, singing, chatting and libations until it was chucking out time at The Old Bailey.
Chucking out time at The Old Bailey on a Friday afternoon works remarkably quickly and effectively:
You are welcome to stay on downstairs if you wish…but no-one will be here with the keys to your cell until Monday morning…
…everyone scarpers sharpish at that juncture.
Some ventured on for more libations at a local hostelry, but after five events in five days, all I could think about was getting home and lying down for a good few hours.
I chose The Pembroke very carefully. I dug out my trusty slide rule, compass, protractor and set squares…
…concluding that this place was approximately equidistant between my place and Simon’s…
…it was also one of those places I’d heard good things about and was keen to try.
Everything went according to plan; I turned up a couple of minutes after the appointed hour and Simon turned up shortly after that.
I bet you put some effort into choosing this place on the grounds of its equidistance…
…said Simon. I nodded.
Thing is, I forgot to mention last time I saw you, but I have finally got round to commissioning that work on my house I’ve been talking about for years…so I am currently living with my mum in Pinner.
I’m not surprised Simon didn’t mention the “staying with mum” business on that occasion; it’s not a very rock’n’roll existence, is it? Even if temporary and in sensible circumstances. Even with Simon’s lovely mum.
We spent a bit of time bemoaning the whole “builders in the house” business.
The food was good, the staff were attentive without being overly-so. They had acquiesced to my request for a corner table, not that the place was too full anyway, but that back corner is away from the bar, which is a bit nosiy there.
All very satisfactory.
But the funny thing was, that once Simon had told me that he was living with his mum, he seemed somewhat reverted, somehow boyish compared with his usual self.
Still crazy after all these years
Example. Simon was describing his mother’s house, which is not the house I remember Simon & Sue growing up in; their folks moved to a different house in the 1980s.
Simon described the garden as big. Seriously big. He then went to Google Earth to try locating the garden so I could see it.
At one point, when I wondered why Simon was looking at the Google Earth globe, Simon asserted that his mum’s garden is the only structure of human construction, other than the Great Wall Of China, that can be seen from outer space. Perhaps that assertion was meant to be exaggeration for effect, rather than an attempt to hoodwink me.
In the end, Simon failed to locate his mum’s garden on Google Earth…I mean, it can’t be that big then, can it?
So we discussed other things. Such as the political omnishambles that is the general election.
We also discussed Simon’s latest cracking single, which I had been honoured to hear in preview and is due to be released on the Friday after our get together…
…which is today, now that I am writing this up, so I can share the charming video and song with you:
Cool sound, coming from a self-confessed “old bloke” who still lives with his mum…
…Ok, is temporarily living with his mum while making even more cool studio space for himself and Timothy in his house.
Anyway, we had a very enjoyable evening, as always. I was surprised at how late it was by the time we toddled towards Earls Court, from whence I went the two stops back to my place and Simon…schlepped all the way to Pinner.
