…naturally we needed to chow down well. We returned to the Italian restaurant, Il Mare, where I chose the local barracuda fish done in a similar style to the tuna Daisy had tried the previous time, while Daisy tried the lobster spaghetti. Il Mare preceded these delights with a very tasteful-looking and tasty amuse-gueule. Food porn photos – here they come:
Janie insisted on rounding off the meal with some almond chocolate cake. Who was I to refuse the offer to taste it?
We interrupt this food-oriented posting to remind readers that we were playing tennis for an hour every morning – activity which I preceded with 20 minutes in the well-appointed and well-equipped gym.
Also to say that we had two more wonderful therapies towards the end of our stay, in the caring hands of Oka and Lily:
Back to food. On 11th, we returned to Verala for our penultimate visit there. On this occasion, we wanted to try the Japanese fusion aspect of the place. The restaurant manager had reassured us about the intense international standard food safety procedures they followed to ensure that raw fish was safe even in that hot climate and a culture unaccustomed to such delicacies.
The night of the 12th, we returned to Il Mare for the last time. I fancied the giant prawns Italian style and Daisy fancied trying the chicken, declaring herself to be “seafooded out”.
Both dishes were delicious.
For our last meal, we returned to Verala one final time. We wanted to try some of the other Asian fusion style dishes, both rice-based and noodle based. But we started with the outstanding Sake Kani salad we had enjoyed so much on our first night.
And we couldn’t leave without trying the highly recommended chocolate sticky toffee pudding. That would have been rude.
Not wanting to be rude…
That last one was a relatively early dinner for us. We had an early start the next morning for our flights home.
If you want to see the whole album of pictures from this holiday – more than 150 of them – click here or below:
We didn’t much notice the wildlife all around us for the first couple of days. Then we started to spot photo opportunities as we walked around…then, it seemed, the wildlife was hell bent on visiting us in our beautiful villa, so close as we were to the lagoon that transcends the Anantara Peace Haven Resort.
6th and 7th January this mighty peacock visited us from the roof of the next door villa
Actually, I think it was the fact that the next door villa was empty after the first couple of days that started to score us so many visitors. The peacocks were especially keen visitors.
Janie also started spotting creatures on her way to the tennis court just before 8:00 in the morning. This black giant squirrel on 7th January, for example.
But we didn’t need to leave our villa to see squirrels – although we didn’t get visitations from the giant ones.
I named this one Secret Squirrel, as their rapid movements made it really hard for me to snap them
Not just squirrels – also mongeese. This little fella came to visit us in our own garden:
Access through the pool drainage system: “simples”.
Soon Janie and I were competing to get the best pictures of these majestic creatures. This one of mine from the comfort of my own lounger…
…this one of Janie’s in the field beside the tennis court, where this particular peacock. whom we named “Showoff” resided.
“Why did we name him Showoff?”, I hear many a reader cry. I finally managed to catch him in action on our last day. I suppose this photo of a peacock display is that species’ equivalent of a dick pic.
Look at me!In the interests of balance, here is a picture Janie took of a peahen.
We saw some wonderful creatures on our afternoon at Mama’s kitchen, as some of the bird species clearly like to hang out on the rice paddy field.
You egret!Red-wattled Lapwing
But the stars of the show were the grey langurs. Janie started spotting them in the mornings near our villa when she was coming down for tennis. She absolutely hit paydirt on our penultimate full day, a few villa doors down from ours:
I thought that the pictures she took that morning were just stunning. Two of the best above. I even forgave her for being late for tennis as a result:
Primates: male (above), female (below), possibly a pair? Or even a right pair.
Meanwhile the housekeeping staff tried to make us laugh with their towel art of wildlife. Here are the best two examples:
On our very last day, almost as if to say goodbye to us, the family of grey langurs came and stopped by on the next door roof and then our villa. That’s when I managed to snap “The Thinker”.
I also attempted some video, which I have yet to assess. Frankly I think it should almost all…or perhaps even all…end up on the metaphorical cutting room floor. Attenborough I ain’t.
It really was a treat to see so much wildlife in such close proximity to us.
Reading pre-release while on holiday in Sri Lanka…tough job…
Before launching into a review of Gun Barrel Polka by David Seidel, I need to declare three material facts.
Firstly, David is a friend whom I have known for more than a quarter of a century. We did some work together, back in the day, and have even collaborated over writing some comedy. I take full responsibility for the worst excesses of our lyrics for “Casablanca The Musical”, not least “I Only Have Heils For You” and “The Ougadougou Choo Choo”. But I digress, not least because Gun Barrel Polka is far from comedy.
Secondly, Gun Barrel Polka is really not my kind of novel. I explained that to David, having read the synopsis, to which he said, “please read it and review it anyway, if you are willing to do so”, which of course I am.
Thirdly, I read Gun Barrel Polka while on holiday in Sri Lanka, mixing and matching the screen reading required with some physical book reading, which I find much easier on my eyes in bright light. The physical novels I read alongside Gun Barrel Polka were:
Rabbit Redux by John Updike;
Sabbath’s Theater by Philip Roth.
The juxtaposition of my choice of physical book novels with reading Gun Barrel Polka is interesting but also might lead to unfair comparisons. I don’t suppose that David Seidel is aspiring to Pulitzer Prizes and National Book Awards for fiction…just yet.
However, Gun Barrel Polka has several characteristics in common with the fiction of those two great writers. Set in the USA of today, Gun Barrel Polka explores several modern political and social tensions. Seidel does this in a similar manner to Updike’s juxtaposition of Harry ‘Rabbit’ Angstrom in several political eras across the Rabbit novels. Philip Roth also places his characters in societal context – especially in his later novels – Roth arguably piloted his migration to that political style in Sabbath’s Theater – especially Mickey Sabbath’s 1960s human rights / freedom of speech back story.
In Gun Barrel Polka, the narrative line takes us through several acts of random gun violence…plus more shooting that occurs as unintended consequences of attempts to reduce gun violence. At times in the novel, the killing and misery that ensues seems like a procession, such that the reader might even become numb to it. The final act of Hamlet came to my mind at one point, as the body count mounted.
The “random acts of loving kindness” promised in the synopsis seems, to me, less random and in many cases self-serving. The central characters are nearly all lawyers, which possibly explains the procedural and calculating ways in which they try to address their issues – both political and personal. If you want to read about random acts of ardour or random acts of lasciviousness, better you stick with Updike and Roth. I was oft reminded, while reading Gun Barrel Polka, of the wonderful Jackson Browne song, Lawyers In Love. If you are ready for a musical interlude, enjoy this embed.
The elephant in the room, for Gun Barrel Polka, is of course, James Madison’s Second Amendment to the United States Constitution: the right to bear arms. This piece of late 18th century US law, borrowed from English Common Law of the late 17th century, has been the source of much consternation in the USA in modern times, since random mass shootings became commonplace.
For me, by far the most interesting aspect of Gun Barrel Polka is the internal politics within and between US States when the fictional politicians and legal civil servants of Vermont try to mitigate the worst excesses of the Second Amendment. The scary part…and the part that especially rang true to me…was the almost complete inability for the Democrat and Republican political machines to communicate with each other, let alone collaborate and/or formulate bipartisan solutions to problems.
David Seidel hails originally from Canada, a nation that has similar levels of gun ownership to that in the USA yet somehow seems able to keep gun violence to much lower levels. In Gun Barrel Polka, David explores the profound societal and political flaws in the USA currently. The novel succeeds in illustrating those flaws, exploring, beyond the Second Amendment alone, the complex issues around gun ownership and gun laws.
Gun Barrel Polka is not a great novel, but it is a fascinating and important read for anyone who is intrigued by modern US society.
Gun Barrel Polka, David Seidel, Ace of Swords, 2026, ISBN 978-1834320052.For Amazon, click here – other book seller sources are available.
…so great the success that those well worn shirts are starting to look well worn…we resolved to procure some replacements.
But Galle & Tangalle are not the same place. Prashan thought we only had a few choices near the resort and suspected that Tangalle itself might not offer the pure linen quality we wanted.
He recommended Smart Buy, a mere five minute walk down the road. There were two problems with our plan to visit that one. Firstly, we set off after breakfast, during the mad dogs & Englishmen hours. Janie started to melt about three minutes into our five minute walk. Secondly, and existentially for our mission, the place was inexplicably closed on a Saturday. Frankly, it looked closed down.
More research was needed, as all we succeeded in getting locally was a couple of (admittedly super smart looking) white linen shirts. We wanted bold colours.
In the end, we hired a tuk-tuk later in the day (when it was far less hot) and went to Sanu Cool Fashion in Tangalle which, contrary to Prashan’s fears, had a super selection of really good quality short-sleeved shirts. Not all were of the quality I wanted, we needed to rummage and reject some, but plenty were.
Janie and I disagreed on some of the colours. Janie really liked the dark, deep blue (see headline picture) whereas I was more attracted by the louder colours, which are more likely to raise comments and eyebrows in places like the Lord’s pavilion.
The obvious answer was to buy several, including Janie’s and my picks of colour. Not only the three depicted but three green ones too. Lord knows I’ve paid some dues, getting through, Tangalle up in blue. 😉
We were very keen to try our hands at cooking in Mama’s Kitchen and chose this middle day of our break for that purpose.
Still we played tennis first thing and then took some breakfast in the normal way, but rather than enjoy the wonders of our villa, we set off at 12:20 for the rudimentary location, just beyond the rice paddy field, where “Mama”, assisted by one of the chefs and Manju, would teach us how to cook Sri Lankan style food.
Prashan thoughtfully escorted us across the paddy field to Mama’s hut
While I am quite familiar with Southern Asian cuisine and have experimented with Sri Lankan cooking before, this was a more comprehensive tour d’horizon of the art. An entire multi-dish meal (our lunch) needed to be prepared form scratch.
Where do I begin?
Mama and chef explained, demonstrated and taught. Manju translated.
If in doubt, adopt a cheffy face and posture, then have a slurp.
It’s only coconut milk
Now look what we’ve done!
Janie in particular took a shine to the salad, Gotukola Sambol, for which I have added a BBC Food link which includes alternative ingredients which might help back at home. Mukunuwenna Mallum is a similar, warm salad, the recipe for which was one of a couple of dozen recipes that Manju forwarded to us after the event.
All the more satisfying because we helped to cook the lunchA very enjoyable event – wader go! (Red-wattled Lapwing to be precise).
Thoroughly exhausted from our efforts, we relaxed for the rest of the afternoon – in my case reading and in Janie’s case having a facial in the spa. We subsequently had a simple room service supper before retiring at the end of that day.
A very special and memorable part of this holiday.
…but, admittedly, quite a lot of it was about the grub!
We quickly slipped into the type of institutionalised (in a good way) mode that wonderful places such as the Anantara Peace Haven encourage in their guests. Through our agents, Healing Holidays – click here for our itinerary, we had pre-arranged to play tennis at 8:00 every morning.
That flipping backhand of hers!
The temperature even at 8:00 was a bit hot for Janie – even I felt it on the more humid days. Add to that the bouncy surface that neutralised Janie’s fiendish slice…the conditions suited me more than Janie.
We’d also pre-booked, for the first day, the 5th, a body scrub treatment (to prepare our skin for sun) and a consultation at the spa. Here’s the list of treatments we had in those first few days:
5th – 30 minute body scrub and consultation with Ayurvedic doctor
7th – Pinda Sweda (Ayurvedic hot pouches treatment) followed by 45 minute meditation class
8th – head and neck massage.
The spa was superb. Janie and I were mostly treated by Oka (me) and Lily (Janie), who were excellent practitioners. Meditation was with Vinod. We arranged some more treatments for the second half of our stay.
We had a pool villa, which we made our home for much of the day, most days. The small pool didn’t offer much length for swimming, but it was great for foot-dangling while reading.
I’ll write some more about the reading and the local wildlife (much of which would stop by at our villa, so we didn’t much need to go look for it) in a separate article or two.
Because you, dear reader, came to this article to learn some more about the grub, didn’t you?
On the first evening, 4 January, we ate in the Verala Asian restaurant. Janie can be seen digging in to the giant lagoon prawn dish…
…and we also ordered some Thai style regular prawns, Goong Pad Med Mamuang – so there! Meals in that restaurant are prefaced with a delicious welcome soup, based around coconut milk with spices and either lentils or rice. Janie has the recipes for future reference!
On the second evening, we dined in the main restaurant, as there was an opportunity to try an array of Sir Lankan style dishes. We were particularly taken with a spicy lamb which the chef was cutting from the bone for the diners, but we also tried some small tasters of other Sri Lankan dishes. I particularly like the traditional yellow rice with Sri Lankan dishes and the local daal was very tasty indeed to my taste.
Janie’s only complaint was that I look too serious…or even miserable…in her dinner-time photos. I tried to explain to her that “concentrating on my food” and/or “being super tired in the evening after a day of excessive relaxation is normal and even, possibly, to be encouraged.
On the third evening, 6 January, we returned to the main restaurant (for the last time) for the seafood buffet. We’re not really buffet people, but we did fancy trying the array of seafood available. We tried prawns in more than one style and particularly enjoyed the local fish, barramundi, roasted in a Sri Lankan style.
Concentrating/tiring, not miserable…
On the fourth evening, 7 January, we tried Il Mare, the Italian restaurant, which was really excellent. I went for a seafood pasta (Linguine ai frutti di mare), while Janie went for local tuna steak with mash (180g Bistecca di tonno).
My pasta dish in particular lent itself to the food porn photo treatment:
I was tired/concentrating, not bored, not miserable. Janie lifted her pose performance, showing off her choice of tiramisu, also to demonstrate how posing with food porn photos should be done.
Our fifth meal, 8 January, saw us return to the impressive Verala – not for the last time either.
Despite having sworn, when we were in Portland Maine, just three months earlier, that we were through with wrestling large shellfish…
…we decided to attempt it again, as we had happy memories of Hikkaduwa crab from our previous times in Sri Lanka.
Fish cake starters might have lulled us into a false sense of security, as might the choice of “easy access” lagoon prawns again, to accompany the crab.
The Sri Lankan crab curry was hard work but was just about worth the wrestle. We did swear “never again”, again, though. Our exhaustion exacerbated by the unfortunate “lock out” from our villa, as the batteries in our door lock failed between locking up for dinner and trying to return after dinner. The problem was easily fixed, but not before we walked all the way to reception to report the problem. Walking off such a dinner is probably not such a bad idea, but a better idea if done willingly and with expectation!
We had a busy day ahead of us the next day, as we had booked a lunch time cookery session at Mama’s Kitchen, which I’ll describe and illustrate in the next episode.
Janie (Daisy) & I decided we needed a complete rest break after the circus that was much of 2025. Through our favourite agents for this sort of thing, Healing Holidays, who arranged our most recent previous rest cure for us…crikey…nine blithering years ago…
The 2026 Tangalle trip had no cricket planned and indeed no cricket ensued. I did, however, on the day of departure from London, head to my health club in the morning, as the weather was icy, making the idea of tennis with Daisy too reckless, even for us. Towards the end of my workout, I spotted a gentleman who looked uncannily like Virat Kohli up on the mezzanine. When he descended to my level, a closer look confirmed that he WAS Virat Kohli.
In the good old days, Alex Bowden (King Cricket) would have cherished this small moment in his “cricketer spotted” column.
But icy London felt positively warm compared with our seats on SriLankan Airlines. Nothing the steward-folk tried to do to the air conditioning made much difference where we were sitting. We resorted to coats, scarves and (in my case) even my beany.
We’d had a relatively event free check in, although Janie had her hand luggage singled out for a comprehensive search for the second time in a row. She’s hoping to avoid the metaphorical hat trick ball next time. Formalities at Colombo were a breeze compared with equivalent formalities at Boston Logan a few months ago.
We got to Anantara in Tangalle before 16:00 which was good timing. Our host Prashan showed us around and took us to our villa. We arranged a late dinner in Verala – the Asian/fusion restaurant. That’s where Janie’s enormous prawn comes in:
I won’t write up too much about this holiday but there are some good “food porn” pictures (only some are food porn/prawn pictures) and wildlife pics too.
Here are the six follow-up pieces – each can be clicked through from here or by clicking the next piece button at the bottom of each piece:
The Banksy Limitless exhibition collects a large number of Banksy works, plus other works inspired by Banksy, in a pop-up gallery in South Kensington, ironically on the site of a former Christies auction house.
The Cous Cous Club is a gathering of Alleyn’s Old Boys from the mid to late 1970s – most of whom I have therefore known for over 50 years at the time of writing. In fact many of us have been gathering occasionally and informally in this way for decades.
It was one of Rohan Candappa’s ideas to name and brand a well established thing that previously had no sense of brand identity. Rohan used to be in advertising, but now does this sort of thing in his spare time.
I missed the inaugural meeting of the Cous Cous Club at Souk back in early autumn. I was in the USA, talking at the International Tennis Hall of Fame about events 150 years ago, at another of my clubs, that led to the codification of tennis into the modern game as we know it:
Still, despite the fact that I might easily confuse CCC and MCC in future conversations, Rohan invited me to join the Cous Cous Club for its first Christmas dinner and naturally I said “yes please”.
I was the first to arrive at the restaurant. Most of the party had gathered at a nearby hostelry for a pre-dinner drink, whereas I was coming hot foot from a prior engagement.
My earlier appointment had been a meeting with Professor Tim Connell, to plan my slot at the Gresham Society soirée, which this time will be in mid January rather than during the pre Christmas mêlée. I usually grace the soirée with late medieval music…sometimes more genuine than other times:
As the Cous Cous Club was on my mind, I teased Tim with the notion that I was planning, for Gresham Society, a sing-along of very, very old songs: Slade, Sweet, T-Rex, Rod…
But once I realised that Tim was close to tears and/or apoplexy at this thought, I showed him the early 17th century material, with a Gresham College connection, which I actually have in mind for the soirée sing-along. Tim then cheered up and calmed down.
Anyway, point is, as first to arrive at Souk, I got to chat with the charming and friendly waiter who was to be our main host for the evening. When I explained to him what the Cous Cous Club was, and the antiquity of our shared experience, the waiter was quite blown away. I suspect that young waiter has been on the planet for less half the time we Alleyn’s Old Boys have known each other.
No pressure…
…I said to the waiter, who just beamed, knowing that he and his colleagues would be able to cope with whatever collective curve balls our group of old boys might throw at them.
Then the main gang turned up from the pub, followed by a trickle of late-comers.
So who was there?…
…I hear multiple readers cry. Let’s call the register. This is school, after all, even if it is 50+ years on:
Nick Wahla
Rohan Candappa
Claire Brooke
Paul Driscoll
Simon Ryan
Andy Feeley
Dave Leach
Steve Butterworth
Perry Harley
John Eltham
Me (obvs).
Rohan provided each of us with a fez…apart from John Eltham who, always one of the keenest scouts, had brought his own. Rohan also awarded me my Cous Cous Club membership badge, which felt a bit like being inducted into The Tufty Club, but without first having to cross the road safely.
There were a couple of notable absences, not least Lisa Pavlovsky and Dave Wellbrook. That led, naturally, to those absent friends getting the hardest time of the evening. That might seem unfair, as they had no opportunity on the night to defend themselves, but life isn’t fair. The fact that life isn’t fair is a lesson you learn early at the very best schools. You also learn it at Alleyn’s. And you especially learn that lesson at the Cous Cous Club.
Claire Brooke had come all the way from Harrogate for the evening. Rohan felt, with some justification, that a wrong from the first gathering needed to be put right.
At the early Autumn inaugural Cous Cous Club gathering, Rohan had awarded Lisa Pavlovsky with a trophy recognising her as the first female House Captain at Alleyn’s School.
Lisa, awarded, beaming, early autumn 2025. Photo “borrowed” from Facebook.
But soon after that first event, it emerged that Claire Brooke had been the first female House Captain, albeit a joint one, the previous year. Rohan felt obliged to put matters right:
Claire, beaming, with her revenge trophy, awarded by Rohan, December 2025
Chat soon turned to sport and tales of derring-do gone by. As usual, John Eltham and Nigel Boatswain reminded me about my infeasibly successful/lucky stint in goal against them (Cribbs v Duttons) although the exact details of that story keep changing in people’s memories.
Exciting news, gang – I have actually found a diary reference to that glorious day on the football pitch, which might well be my only such diary entry in all the years I kept diaries. To be Ogblogged in the fullness of time – watch that space.
Then there was reference to the question “who was the youngest grandfather”, as Andy Feeley has recently become one of those. My arithmetical brain worked out that Dave Leach must have first become a grandfather when he was younger than Andy Feeley is now…which I think is right…but apparently that wasn’t the question. Andy Feeley was the youngest person in the room who is now a grandfather.
My confusion was deemed to be Wellbrookian, which turned the conversation to thoughts of Dave Wellbrook and why he wasn’t with us.
Has the lurgy…
…was as close to a polite answer as we got.
Dave Unwellbrook, then…
…I bet no-one had ever made that joke before.
Talk then naturally turned to Wellbrook’s recent treading of the boards, which several (braver than me) Cous Cous Club members had witnessed.
Wellbrook’s self-image, from Facebook. Is this acting, the method or something entirely other?
Nick Wahla’s review was an absolute classic. I paraphrase:
Wellbrook was very much himself in that performance, but he occasionally lapsed into real acting.
Praise indeed. Nick – you really should turn your hand to being a theatre critic.
Out of nowhere, Perry Harley related a story to me about him meeting Mungo Jerry while on holiday in Bournemouth. Perry wondered whether I remembered any Mungo Jerry songs other than “In the Summertime”.
Off the top of my head, I mentioned “Alright Alright Alright” and “Long Legged Woman Dressed In Black”, which raised much mirth and some scepticism too.
It was hard to disabuse Perry and friends of the scepticism, as neither Perry nor I could get our smartphones to connect to the outside world.
Strange how my memory instantly dredged up these tunes and lyrics from that era, way back when we all first met.
Rohan shot a short clip of video that evening, which I can share with you, dear, long-suffering readers:
I wondered, on seeing that clip, whether I might now, after all these years, be even more gobby than Nick Wahla. Now THERE’S a thought.
Yet, I was hugely honoured to read, on Facebook, that Rich Davies – who is hiding in Canada, blaming a little bit of slightly inclement weather for his absence from the evening – had awarded me the Golden Camel for looking the most Moroccan amongst us. That might have had something to do with the fact that I was the last to remove my fez hat.
Anyway, in case it isn’t clear by now, it was great to see everyone and I’m pretty sure we all had a great time.
Thanks, Rohan, for being such a stalwart organiser of great get-togethers. Much appreciated. And so well branded.
Colin clinched the china after strivin’ for the Ivan, the beaker for the burlesque is the cup snuck by Chalice…
London Cricket Trust Dinner At Soutine, 9 December 2025
This is the second time we’ve had our London Cricket Trust Christmas dinner at Soutine after our last Board meeting of the year.
Smug and self-satisfied we are not, but we are now able to boast 118 non-turf pitch installations and 21 net system installations completed since we started seven years ago. “Way to go”, as our transatlantic friends might put it, but this is a transformational number of facilities in parks around London that would otherwise have been without.
Chris Whitaker, Ed Griffiths, Ian Moore, Sophie Kent and I enjoyed the meal and the company.
Dedanists’ Society Lunch, Lemonia, 11 December 2025
These images from the Dedanists’ Society website, depicting the lunch last year
Always a highlight of the festive season, this gathering of dedicated realists provided an opportunity to talk real tennis, in contrast with my activities earlier in the week which were about cricket.
Hard ball doesn’t get much harder than this. I tried to be suitably abstemious, or at least minimally lubricated, as I also had an evening engagement that evening…
The Ivan Shakespeare Memorial Dinner, Goodge Street Spaghetti House, 11 December 2025
A slightly depleted gang gathered for the traditional seasonal Ivan Shakespeare Memorial Dinner, which has, for decades now, included a form of quizzing for the Ivan Shakespeare Memorial Trophy. More recently, since the demise of NewsRevue founder and mentor Mike Hodd, we also play for a Mike Hodd memorial trophy. I won “the Hoddy” last year, which meant that it was my job to come up with a suitable game/quiz for this year’s contest.
The gang for dinner this year comprised me, John Random, Barry Grossman, Hugh Ryecroft, Chalice Am Bergris, Mark Keegan and Colin Stutt.
Barry Grossman started the game proceedings with the Ivan Shakespeare Trophy quiz. I did rather badly and Colin Stutt did rather well.
Then it was my turn to curate a game/quiz for the Hoddy. Below is the game.
Any reader should feel free to write in, ianlharris@gmail.com, and I’ll gladly mark your questions. No pressure, but Chalice scored eight-and-a-half, which was a joint top score, winning by dint of the humour bonus on one of her questions.
It’s not all about quizzes and awards, of course. Heaven forbid. The chat at dinner was lively and witty as always.
Z/Yen Seasonal Lunch, Watermen’s Hall, 12 December 2025
After a hearty hit on the tennis court at Lord’s and an even stouter Board Meeting at King William Street, the Z/Yen throng retired to Watermen’s Hall for seasonal lunch and festivities.
Secret Santa did his best to liven up the post lunch activities, despite certain seemingly intelligent folk strangely finding the idea of Secret Santa hard to understand…not mentioning any names, Bob Pay.
Then quizzing and singing. As part of Z/Yen’s journey towards net zero…in this case zero effort more than necessary…the Z/Yen seasonal quiz bore more than a passing resemblance to the Hoddy one depicted above…apart from the title and Z/Yen logos where the pictures of Mike Hodd are shown above.
Readers are as welcome to have a go and send in your questions for the Z/Yen quiz as you were for the Mike Hodd one. No pressure, but the combined forces of Juliet and Charlotte managed a most impressive nine. Questions that were too clever for their own good did not find favour with the judge, which was a bit of a disadvantage for the more-propellor-headed attendees.
As a further lurch in the direction of net zero (excess effort), I also road tested the idea of getting a random bunch of people to sing Jacobean songs, which worked almost as well with Z/Yen as it seems to be working with the real tennis community on skills nights. But that’s another story. As (will be) the attempt to get Gresham Society people singing in that manner.
Suffice it to say that the Z/Yen community was so motivated by the “We Be Three Poor Mariners” song that they danced around the Watermen’s table while singing it. Apt, I suppose, at Watermen’s.
