The County Ground Hove is a lovely setting for cricket, so Janie and I couldn’t resist the timing of Middlesex’s away match there this season, despite it overlapping with Day 5 of the Lord’s test and a need to be back in London later that week.
So, I arranged three nights in Brighton with a view to seeing most of Day Two and the remainder of the county match, plus an opportunity to visit cousins Sidney & Joan on the Tuesday, plus the likelihood of a bit of spare time in Brighton for once.
That likelihood of spare time was exacerbated while Janie and I sat at Lord’s watching the test match on the Sunday, by Middlesex’s rude ejection from the batting crease at Hove, en masse, for 75 in a mere 130 balls.
Daisy’s role as a visiting totem for Middlesex victories and/or close finishes is becoming a distant memory.
Still, we arrived at The County Ground Hove on Monday around 12:15/12:30, following the traditional difficult packing exercise (Daisy) and roadwork-enhanced drive (on this occasion, me).
John Barclay seemed genuinely chuffed when I told him how much I enjoyed reading that book.
John Barclay (furthest left, facing) and others at lunch
We also met Marilyn Smith, Middlesex’s new Board member.
Marilyn and Me
It turns out that Marilyn lives in Brentford and used to bring her son, Ramon, when he was very young, to the very Boston Manor tennis courts where Daisy and I play each week. She knows Linda Massey (of Friends of Boston Manor fame) very well.
Indeed, when we told Linda a few days later that we had spent some time with Marilyn in Hove, Linda pointed out to us, on the wall of the Boston Manor pavilion cafe, a picture that a very young Ramon had drawn for her, many years ago, as a thank you:
Monday was a glorious day for cricket at Hove, albeit not a glorious day’s play for Middlesex, who were coming very much second by stumps on that day.
Members seating areaPublic seating area
We had been well fed and well watered on the Monday, but still, after checking in and settling in to our AirBnB cottage, the old Toll Cottage on the junction of Regency Square and Russell Square, we thought we’d try the Regency Tavern across the way from our digs. I fancied a drink as I had stayed dry all day and, after all, how big a portion could the pie, mash, peas and gravy possibly be at that price? Massive, basically.
We wouldn’t get steak and kidney, if this match was playing in Sydney
We should have shared one between the two of us. Except it was yummy so we both made serious headway into our portions.
Tuesday morning, we walked (or should I say waddled) to The County Ground. Another glorious weather day.
Daisy, questioning all the “balls on the head” incidents that had occurred at Lord’s a few days earlier, asked Mike Selvey if he approved of such intimidatory bowling.
Selv and Me, both trying to do the “there’s no such thing as a dumb question” bit when tackling Daisy’s enquiry about short-pitched bowling.
Daisy had more success with her penetrating questions about corruption in cricket (and sport generally) from the previous day, as John Abbott brought her some interesting reading in partial answer to her questions on that subject:
We had a super sit-down lunch of casseroled chicken on the Tuesday; a different vibe from the less formal (but also excellent) buffet on the Monday. The hospitality at Hove is superb, both in terms of the catering and the friendly people.
We had a very interesting chat about television rights and national administration of football (about which I know almost nothing) and cricket (about which Ray claimed to know little). Ray is clearly a Sussex CCC fan as well as a Seagulls grandee. Based on his football experience, Ray had some fascinating opinions on how the new Hundred tournament might work…or not work.
Janie and I had arranged to visit cousin Sidney and Joan for tea that day, so we left The County Ground once Middlesex were bowled out a second time, which conveniently coincided with the umpires calling tea.
The result of the match wasn’t much in doubt; nor was there much doubt that the match would end that evening while we were at Sidney & Joan’s house, which is conveniently located half way between The County Ground and our AirBnB cottage.
Nevertheless, as we left, a friendly steward, James, asked if we were returning tomorrow. I explained that I didn’t think there’d be any cricket left in the match by then, but that we would return if there was. James then asked if we were coming to the T20 match on Thursday. I explained that we were Middlesex guests and that Middlesex were playing a T20 match at home on Thursday. “Come here anyway”, said James, “it’s nice to have you two here”. Now THAT’S welcoming stewarding!
It took us little more than 10 minutes stroll through Hove to get to Sidney and Joan’s house. There we enjoyed some tea and wonderful cake produced by a local baker who, it seems, produces really delicious home-made delicacies to order for local folk such as Sidney and Joan.
Sidney and Joan also cracked a bottle of wine to help the conversation flow. At one point Sidney noticed me look at one of the notifications that popped up on my screen, documenting Middlesex’s inevitable defeat.
Keeping in touch with the office?, asked Sidney.
No, just keeping in touch with the cricket score at Hove, I replied. Sorry, I can’t help myself.
Should’ve guessed, said Sidney with a smile.
It’s always a pleasure to see Sidney and Joan. After a couple of hours, we said our goodbyes, then Janie and I strolled back to our little toll cottage.
We only had one problem with hiring the Toll Cottage; we couldn’t work out how to take tolls from the passers-by, although we can see which window we should use and where the toll gate should be erected. But should we collect a farthing or a ha’penny from each passer-by?
Flummoxed by even the most basic questions with regard to our sinecure, we decided on an early night instead. We had plans for a busy day exploring Brighton the next day, now we knew there was to be no cricket.
Mike Hodd (see headline picture) is one of the founders of the show, was a mainstay at our writers meetings in the 1990s and is a fairly regular attendee at Ivan Shakespeare dinners.
For some reason, Mike roped me into liaising with Emma and Shannon at the Canal Cafe to help pull together the 40th anniversary event.
I take very little credit for the superb evening that ensued, but I did contribute some archival material and I did stitch up some NewsRevue alums by gathering names and serial numbers through the e-mail connections.
I also suggested that the event include a smoker, in line with a tradition we had back in the 1990s of having after show parties at which we performed party pieces. Mike particularly liked that idea so it simply had to happen.
But the organisation of the event was really down to Emma, Shannon and the team who did a cracking job.
First up was a pre show drinks reception, at which some of us (encouraged to dress up), looked like this:
Barry Grossman, Colin Stutt and Me.
Then we watched the current show. An excellent troupe comprising Dorothea Jones, Brendan Mageean, Gabrielle De Saumarez and Rhys Tees under Tim MacArthur’s directorship.
Before the smoker, Shannon and the team played us a wonderful 40th anniversary video compilation of pictures and video clips from across the decades. Here is that very vid:
I was proud to have supplied some of the clippings contained therein and moved to see the video and ponder on just what 40 years of a show really means.
Then the smoker. I was really delighted that current/recent cast and crew joined in the idea and chipped in with their own party pieces, which were very entertaining.
From our own “Class of ’92, there were several contributions, captured pictorially by Graham Robertson, with thanks to him for the following pics.
Mike Hodd made two excellent contributions to the smoker;
a very amusing stand up set in which he somehow managed to extract humour from Parkinson’s disease. I shall never again be able to dissociate in my mind the film Fatal Attraction from the affliction fecal impaction;
a slow build routine in which he was an auctioneer trying to fob off some utter tat as masterpieces. Great fun.
Gerry Goddin
Gerry Goddin performed an audience participation routine in which we joined in a song about “mutton dressed as lamb” to the tune of Knees Up Mother Brown. Gerry dealt with my heckling so masterfully that some people thought the heckles had been planted; they had not.
Barry Grossman
Barry performed a stand up comedy routine with masterful poise. I thought we were all supposed to be writers who cannot perform.
I wanted to celebrate one of my classic songs from 1992; the second of mine to be performed in the show but a perennial:
Chris Stanton was the performer who made my debut contributions to NewsRevue such a success in 1992. He too was at this party and performed a couple of classics brilliantly well; A Loan Again and also John Random’s classic 0898 song. No photo of the Chris’s performance as yet – unless Graham finds one of those amongst his collection.
Jonny Hurst also celebrated John Random’s ouevre with a rendition of the wonderful “Tell Laura A Liver”.
This was in part done to honour John Random’s recent selfless act to donate a kidney out of pure altruism to an anonymous recipient. To complete the honouring of that extraordinary good deed, Jonny and I jointly segued the liver song into a visceral medley including a specific piece we put together to honour John’s donation:
WHO DO YOU THINK GOT YOUR KIDNEY, MR RANDOM?
(Lyric to the Tune of “Who Do You think You Are Kidding, Mr Hitler?”)
THE MAIN REFRAIN
Who do you think got your kidney, Mr Random? Since your organ donation? Was it a girl for to stop her renal pain? Was it a boy who can take the piss again? So who do you think got your kidney, Mr Random? Now that you’ve gone down to one?
FIRST MIDDLE EIGHT
Mr Burns – he came to town The age of twenty-one He did assume a nom de plume And took the name Random.
FIRST REPRISE
So who do you think got your kidney, Mr Random? Now that you’ve gone down to one?
SECOND MIDDLE EIGHT
Mr Burns did not return With kidney number one But kept his sense of humour… (pause) …And is ready with his pun.
SECOND REPRISE
So who do you think got your kidney, Mr Random? Now that you’ve gone down to one?
It was a great party, it was a terrific show and it was a superb smoker. A truly memorable event to celebrate 40 years of a wonderful show.
As John Random said in his preamble to the smoker, NewsRevue has initiated so many careers and transformed so many lives over those decades. And for those of us who have formed enduring friendships, it is hard to express our gratitude to Mike Hodd and those who have kept the NewsRevue torch burning week in week out for forty years and counting.
I wanted to go up to North London Cricket Club to take a look at one of Middlesex CCC’s participation programmes. I wanted a bit more context around my work with London Cricket Trust, in part to inform my decision making and in part to inform any further media stuff I might be doing about it, possibly some as early as next week.
Picture borrowed from the North London Cricket Club website – click the picture to see the site.
Katie Berry thought the Wilf Slack Cup at North London Cricket Club would be a good example and I thought that 15 August, a date that I had put aside for the August Z/Yen Board meeting, an event that tends not to happen due to holidays and indeed was not going to happen, was a very good date for me to make such a visit.
Weather wise it turned out to be an excellent choice, sandwiched between two very wet Lord’s test match days. Work-wise it wasn’t quite so ideal, as a few things came up that needed my attention and I needed to deal with those ahead of going to Lord’s for a soaking the next day.
Still, I got to North London around 12:40 and was able to stay for a little under two hours, looked after by Pete Jones who is a key fellow in Middlesex’s participation team. He was able to give me a lot of useful context to the work we are doing and planning to do through the London Cricket Trust. We were also, usefully, joined by Mohammed from the ECB’s participation and growth team who also had some useful and interesting context to give me about such participation programmes in other parts of the country, as well as London.
Considering that the tournament was for 14-17 year olds of mixed ability and experience – ranging from some of the better colt players from strong clubs to young enthusiasts who were perhaps getting their first experience of playing hard ball cricket on a full sized cricket pitch, I thought the standard was pretty high.
I was a bit regretful that I couldn’t stick around and watch the tournament pan out for the afternoon – it was a glorious day for hanging around cricket – but I did need to get home and get some work done. Indeed, I got so deep into one or two tasks, I ended up rushing in the end to get out the door in time for the Streatham BBYO reunion gathering at Imperial China.
There was a coincidental connection between these two noteworthy, North London and then South London, activities of the day. The 14-17 year old age band of the Wilf Slack Cup coincides almost exactly with my age during the Streatham BBYO years and both of those activities were linked to the two “Mission Implausible” challenges that I had assumed at the last reunion gathering in May.
The first of those challenges was to provide cricket facilities for Mark Phillips’s school, Deptford Green. I must admit at this juncture that I rather set this challenge up when I found out that Mark was the Head Teacher at that school, as I was pretty sure that we were imminently due to put a London Cricket Trust Non-Turf Pitch into Deptford Park. What I hadn’t known, in May, was that we would also be able to get one of the greatest cricketers of all time, AB DeVillers, to open the facility for us in July.
The second challenge was to track down Barry Freedman after all these years. This I failed to achieve through the BBYO Facebook network but succeeded in doing through the Kim and Micky connection. It’s not what you know…as they say.
Woddi, Terri and Barry (sounds like a group of England cricketers and their nicknames), from way back then (1979).
I thought we might be a little short of people for the 8-person table I had booked, but I needn’t have worried. Sandra and Mark had both said yes but were demonstrably both abroad right up until the last minute. Still they both – almost AB DeVilliers-like, hot-footed it from their vacation to our event.
I did a shout-out on the BBYO Facebook group. Terri got in touch and hoped to come along and try to replicate the above picture, but sadly in the end couldn’t make it. Simon Ordever wanted to pick up an age-old rivalry between supporters of Crystal Palace (Eagles) and supporters of Brighton FC (Seagulls), but sadly he now lives on the West Coast of the USA. That is a bit of a schlep for one meal.
Fortunately, Paul Dewinter was able to pick up the mantle for the Seagulls community, attending (as he has done before) as a “Friend of Streatham”. Paul possibly didn’t realise that he would be up against the combined forces of Barry, Linda and Liza in the Eagles department. I think Paul held out for a 0-0 draw despite being two men down.
Clockwise from me: Paul, Andrea, Sandra, Linda, Barry, Liza, Mark. Many thanks to the waiter whose photographic skills were surprisingly good considering his polite reluctance to accept the task.
It had been great to speak with Barry again when I called him some weeks ago and likewise it was great to see him again along with the group. Hopefully Barry will be able to join us again at the (now traditional) May gatherings. I find it very enjoyable spending time with everyone in the group. The years just seem to fall away when our group gets together, as I have said in reports of several previous gatherings, which have been happening since 2014.
It was a lovely ending to a busy but largely enjoyable day.
‘Tis a day to remember my dad, who would have reached his 100th birthday today, had he lived a further 12 years and a few days.
I have very few pictures of dad when he was little, but I love this one:
Dad, Grandma Anne & Uncle Michael
As a baby and small boy, he grew up in the slums of Fitzrovia. People think of the East End of London as being the overcrowded part where the immigrant communities lived, but there was a West End equivalent which was (to some extent still is) the centre for the rag trade in London.
I’ll write a bit more about that elsewhere, but suffice it to say here that the Harris family migrated to South West London in the early 1930s, where they established themselves on Clapham Common North Side and became pillars of the South West London Jewish Community known as Bolingbroke.
Dad’s Army
As a young man dad served in the Second World war in the Ordnance Corps, mostly working on photography, cinematography and poster design. I’d like to write up some of his stories from that era at some point, but not for this piece.
Dad and Mum at Northside, early to mid 1950s
He went back to art school after the war (Central) but met my mum in the early 1950s and realised that he’d need a proper job if he was going to settle down with mum.
He and his older brother Alec went into a joint venture around photography, which landed dad with Photo Mart on St John’s Hill in Battersea:
With Uncle Alec’s financial acumen and dad’s understanding of photography and cinematography, this turned out to be a reasonably good idea.
Below is mum’s favourite photo of the two of them, so woe betide me if I omit the one below, I think from 1958, the same holiday as Dad’s cinematic masterpiece, shot in Standard 8mm, also below.
Then I Came Along
My earliest Ogblog pieces about dad revolve around the wonderful recordings he made of him reading stories to me. As a small child I used to listen to these over and over. I have many, but so far have only uploaded a couple of samples:
I haven’t yet organised many of the family holiday films and photos onto Ogblog, but they are there if you can be bothered to delve through my Flickr account…
People do look at this stuff. A researcher spotted Dad slapping on the sun tan oil, a clip I filmed in La Manga 1976, which resulted in me earning quite a few bob while dad was immortalised as a meme, in this advert for Visa.
No researcher has yet picked up this shot of dad being differently silly in Brighton the following year, 1977
Dad was one of the most placid fellows you are ever likely to meet. His friends often described him as laid back. Mum, a different personality, reflected that if he laid back any further, dad would probably fall over.
Dad retired in the spring of 1986 and at first found retirement hard, until he returned to the world of art and largely lost himself in there. He produced some excellent work, much of which is stored in the Noddyland attic and some of which adorns our walls.
Dad’s 80th do at the house in Woodfield Avenue
So auspicious was dad’s 80th birthday, 11 August 1999, that we were able to organise a total eclipse of the sun as well as a birthday party at Woodfield Avenue for him. Now THAT’S impressive, no?
One of the last good pics I have of dad, Golden Wedding, November 2005
I could write lots more about dad- I shall write lots more on Ogblog about him, but shall do so in the context of the stuff I shall be writing up at the time. Dad wouldn’t have wanted me to go to too much trouble writing this up, simply because it would have been his 100th birthday today. He was that sort of dad.
Of late, I have been immersing myself in writing up the journal and some impression pieces about my visit to Mauritius, which was 40 years ago exactly. Devotees of Ogblog (i.e.subscribers) might well be aware of this; others not so.
Ahead of his latest visit, John Random e-mailed to say several things, including this about one of those journal pieces:
A Jew Hunt in Port Louis reminds me of something not very interesting I must tell you about next Thursday.
I had felt quite frustrated about the above piece since I realised that my mother had not only thrown away my article about the resulting great story I discovered once I hunted down the mystery man in Port Louis, but that she had also thrown away my journal notes for 10 and 11 August 1979, as part of the same inadvertently vandalistic act, in the name of “clearing out rubbish”.
Putting that to one side, John and I had a pleasant lunch and did some more fiddling around with his archive of writings. Less progress this session than the previous session, but the previous session had yielded plenty of unexpectedly retrievable data from his old collection. Actually even this day’s session seems to have yielded more than I thought it would.
Then I raised the matter of John’s “Jew Hunt anecdote”.
Oh, it’s nothing really. It’s just that, 20 or so years ago, Jenny and I went to a Mauritian community event in South-East London. There was a bookstall at that event, where I looked at a book called The Mauritian Shekel. It looked really interesting but in the end I didn’t buy it. Your headline, “A Jew Hunt In Port Louis” reminded me of that book.
I nearly left it at that, but my curiosity had been sparked, so I asked John if he remembered what the book was about.
It was a fascinating true story from the time of the Second World War, about a large ship full of Jewish refugees from Central Europe, who had been turned away in Palestine and who were eventually given refuge on Mauritius…
“Hold on!”, I yelled. “THAT’s the story the mystery Jewish man told me in Port Louis. THAT’s the very story I’m desperately trying to recall. The Mauritian Shekel, did you say?”…
…it might not have been cheap, but it was available as a rare second hand book on Amazon:
So the book is on its way and I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to reconstruct my missing article/story from it.
At about 17:00, John went off in the direction of the Proms while I went off in the direction of Lord’s. I bagsyed some seats for me and Jez Horne in the Warner Stand, then went for a quick meeting with Katie Berry for a briefing on participation cricket in Middlesex.
Jez messaged me to say he thought he was a little delayed but should only miss an over or so. In the end, he arrived just in time for the start of the match.
It was good to catch up with Jez again. I hope we can catch up again when Janie and I are in Hove and he also intends to join the Z/Yen party at the Hampshire game in a couple of week’s time.
This Middlesex v Surrey match always has some real frisson to it, though, being a local derby. More often than not we Middlesex fans end up disappointed at this fixture, but of late Middlesex have been doing better and tonight demonstrated that improvement.
AB deVilliers and Eoin Morgan were scintillating with the bat; Steve Finn magnificent with the ball.
We left the arrangements for this get together pretty open-ended in the planning. Debbi & Graeme were flying in from Australia that very day, with only a few days in London and really only the one slot, this very day, which worked for us all.
As things turned out, they landed and got to Central London so very early in the morning, that not even the “mates arrangement” at their hotel could get them in to a room THAT early.
So we made a last minute arrangement for them to visit me in Clanricarde Gardens at breakfast-time, while they waited for a room.
We’re a bit dishevelled, straight off the journey from Melbourne, not least 17 hours non-stop flight from Perth…
…said Debbi. So I made a special effort not to hevel myself, just to put my visitors at ease, you understand. Mum would have been horrified by my admitting family visitors without doing something to my hair, but that’s a barber’s daughter for you.
My grandma, Beatrice, with grandpa, Lew. Beatrice and Debbi’s grandpa were siblings
Debbi, Graeme and I had a very pleasant chat about lots of stuff, including Part One of the life story discussion and a fair deal about sport. Graeme is a psychologist with particular interests in organisational and sports psychology. We also talked a fair bit about University life, as they both work in that sector.
We agreed that we’d meet for dinner at 8:00. It was my job to choose the venue. Graeme suggested that I use a swathe of psychometric tests on the staff of possible venues in order to select the authoritatively most suitable place in the vicinity. I think that might have been what he said. Perhaps he said, “don’t…”
Anyway, we parted company, I did some Googling and then I went off to Queen’s to play The Mighty Snitch at real tennis. I told Snitch that I’d had a session with sports psychologist earlier that morning, which was true in a way. We had a good game. Snitch thought I’d played well and wondered what secrets the sports psychologist had passed on to me. I explained that, if I told Snitch those secrets, I wouldn’t have one over him any more. Snitch understood.
On the way back from Queen’s, I used my own style of selection process by looking at, going in and smelling the Scarsdale Tavern. I also talked to the staff. They seemed friendly and relaxed about my booking. I liked the look, vibe and smell of the place. I held off on deploying psychometric tests and booked a table there and then.
When I returned to The Scarsdale several hours later, on foot, arriving just before the appointed hour, I was warmly greeted by a member of staff and told that they had put aside a quiet table by the fireplace for us, which sounded very considerate.
I waited for Debbi and Graeme.
Fortunately, I decided to check my messages and things while I waited – not least to see if they had been delayed or mislaid. But what I found was a Facebook posting by Debbi, claiming that THEY were waiting for ME in The Scarsdale Tavern, adorned with the following photo:
Recognising the main restaurant part, I popped through to the other side of the Tavern to find them. We switched to the quieter side, which was indeed more suitable for a chat and a meal.
We had a very enjoyable meal and managed Part Two of the life story discussion. Janie phoned in for a while.
…we agreed a wager of £1, with the loser donating that sum to their favourite charity, which might mean (if neither Australia nor England win the title) that both of us are £1 down and charity as much as £2 up at the end of it all. Nail-biting stuff. An ironic postscript is that fate has conspired to pair England with Australia for a semi-final at Edgbaston this time around, next week on 11 July.
But I digress.
I decided to walk Debbi and Graeme back to their hotel – not because they need chaperoning, but because it was such a beautiful evening and that gave us an additional 10-15 minutes to chat.
I was most impressed to see that they were staying at Ellen Terry‘s place, so I took the above photo. Debbi and Graeme were underwhelmed by this fact, as the name of that great Victorian actress meant nothing to them. And there was me thinking that Debbi & Graeme are Victorians?
The hotel was just around the corner from the flat where American cousins Joni and Hal lived during their short sojourn to London in the late 1980’s. I walked around the corner to survey Courtfield Gardens, the next garden square along, before calling a cab home.
A very enjoyable evening.
Postscript
When I told Janie that Graeme was a sports psychologist who had imparted the secret of success upon me, she positively quaked and naturally succumbed to my superior mental strength when we played tennis (modern variety) on the Saturday.
Janie wondered what secrets Graeme had passed on to me. I explained that, if I told her those secrets, I wouldn’t have one over her any more. Janie understood. By which I mean, I guess she understood that there are no such secrets for me. Janie levelled the match on Sunday.
Janie and I had hot tickets for a Royal Court preview on the evening of 29 June, but when Jo insisted that the cyber party she and Sheyda were to be throwing would only be getting started by the time we got to Tottenham Hale “no earlier than 23:00”, the idea of us going on to the party after theatre was very much on.
Only problem was, the party was a cyber party and Kim was very insistent that we do our bit by dressing up.
…but we got it done in the end, with just a few thumbs up and comments from the Royal Court bar flies who saw us leave.
Janie was convinced that we’d get stopped by the police driving through North London dressed like cyber-creeps, but my guess is that, in some of the neighbourhoods we drove through, we looked totally in place.
Taking excessive chances though, we drove past Pentonville Prison:
That’s me, trying to look normalMy cyber-moll took a selfie while on vehicle look-out duty
Once we got to the right postcode (thank you, Mr Waze) it still took us a while to find the venue…until we saw some vaguely-cyber-looking people waving at us from the distance.
We donned our cyber-lights and practised our cyber-moves a little before entering the fray.
Ah, there they all are. Cyber-Daisy with Cyber-Kim, Cyber-Millie and Cyber-Becky
It was a steamy hot evening, so most people spent plenty of time hydrating (and dehydrating) with liquids, but we were up for plenty of dancing.
Young people in search of instruction should study these movesThere’s Cyber-MickyCyber-Jo wondering where her brother, Cyber-Max might be?Ah!Cyber-Sheyda briefly addressed the throng
By about 1:00, we felt a little spent, dance-moves-wise and decided to retire from all forms of cyber-dancing while we were still on top.
I thought that I had been a big hit with the girls and that my cyber-moll in particular would be in awe of me, but unfortunately she found true love elsewhere that evening:
Size isn’t everything, you know.
Still, we both had a super time and I’m sure Cyber-Daisy must be happy with her new chap. As one of the gang explained to me, as I disconsolately left the venue
That new chap doesn’t answer back as much as you do, Cyber-Ged!
If you want to browse all of the photos we took that night, the link below takes you to a Flickr album with the whole lot of them:
Photo of me on the East Court at The Queen’s Club with opponents (from a previous occasion) airbrushed out
Exile. The humiliation of it. Condemned to the role of real tennis supplicants for several weeks while the forces of global domination (cricket branch) took over Lord’s for the world cup.
We Lord’s real tennis players know how to suffer, so many of us have taken up the very generous offer of The Queen’s Club to play there for most of our weeks of exile. I say most, because the first of our wandering weeks coincided with The Queen’s Club ATP tournament for the modern variety of tennis.
But on this day, with the help of the kind professionals at Queen’s, three of us came in search of doubles practice. At one point, I think it was the day before, Ben Ronaldson e-mailed me to say he was having trouble finding us a fourth, but by the time I got to my e-mails he had e-mailed again to say that he had found us a suitable player.
So, Dominic (my doubles partner for this year’s Lord’s tournament) and Bill were joined by Chrissie for a two hour doubles slot. Ben said when I arrived:
I think this should be quite well matched. Try playing level and see what happens.
What happened was a five set epic. Dominic and I started strongly, with him facing Bill and me facing Chrissie. We won the first set 6-2. We tried the alternative server/receiver pairing on the next set, which led to Bill and Chrissie winning that set 2-6.
Dominic and I chose to persevere with the pairing of me facing Bill and Dominic facing Chrissie for the third set. We managed to turn things around and won that close set 6-4. We tried reversing again for the fourth, only to lose that set 1-6. Despite that loss, we chose to stick with that Ian facing Chrissie, Dominic facing Bill for the start of the fifth set; a set we didn’t expect to finish as we were now about 110 minutes into our two-hour slot.
But no-one came along to use the East Court at the end of our slot. Our sole (mostly sleeping) spectator from most of the match had been replaced by a keen scout who was 30 minutes early for his West Court contest. He encouraged us to continue. Or should I simply say that the crowd, as one, was baying for more and urging the metaphorical umpire not to suspend play.
So we saw through the whole of the fifth set, which turned out to be a cracker. Dominic and I got to 5-3 up, only to lose the next two games which (in real tennis, unlike the modern variety) leads to sudden death on the final game which was, as it happened, me and Chrissie doing the serving/receiving.
Somehow, at 2-sets-all, five-games-all, 30-30, with me on serve, I managed to conjure a couple of good-‘uns to seal the match. 6-2, 2-6, 6-4, 1-6, 6-5. Did that matter? Not really. Except that Dominic and I are trying to learn how to play as a pair, so the constant scoreboard pressure and trying to perform as a pair in that circumstance was just what we needed.
Great fun. Nearly two-and-a-half-hours in the end and oh boy did I feel it later in the day.
Coincidentally, much like my Keele experience described above, I developed a slight cold that evening which left me a bit husky for the next couple of days. That was not ideal preparation for a jam with DJ, except that DJ rather liked the variation it gave to my vocal range, despite that variation seeming, to me, rather restrictive.
Ged “Husky” Ladd sings sea shanties?
Still, DJ and I tried a few new ideas, sang a few of our favourites and had a good chat and a good meal. There are far worse ways to spend an evening even when you are a little husky.
Two very enjoyable activities with people who make excellent company.
In many ways the smaller number is a shame, but it was nice, on this occasion, to have a single conversation between a group of five of us. I felt I had a proper catch up with everyone who was there this year, whereas sometimes I feel I didn’t really get to speak with some of the attendees.
Booking Bill’s is an interesting, different experience each time now. This time they seemed happy to take my booking for a largish group of people (I’d estimated eight) many weeks in advance, but I did get a shock when I was sent a reminder in late April for our 30 April booking. I checked my original e-mail from Bill’s and was relieved to see that it correctly said 30 May. I quickly got on the blower to Bill’s. Something about computer systems going awry, but not to worry, we were booked in for 30 May.
The booking all worked fine on the night. Even our reduced numbers proved non-problematic, as Bill’s had pushed two tables together for us and were able to recycle one of those tables when our last minute reduced numbers came to light.
We reminisced, perhaps a little more than usual. I think I might have got a half-confession out of Linda about the 1978 apple pie bed incident:
Linda’s guard, most unusually, must have been down, perhaps as a result of her having had a cocktail earlier in the evening before arriving at Bill’s.
Linda, Liza, Mark and Sandra all work in education and/or care professions, so I found myself a fascinated listener to a conversation about several sign languages and their diverse educational benefits.
When I discovered that Mark is now back in London, at Deptford Green School, I initiated a conversation about non-turf cricket pitches and my Trustee role at the London Cricket Trust…
…Mark agreed that it would be most helpful to his school if there were to be cricket facilities in Deptford Park. I said I’d see what I can do.
Then we returned to our reminiscing and concluded that we’d all like to see many of our old BBYO friends again, but in particular we should try to track down Barry Freedman who was, in so many ways, the driving energy behind our group in the early years.
I’m not quite sure how I got nominated and voted onto the non-existent committee in the role of “Tracking Down Barry Freedman Officer”, as I don’t recall leaving the table or the conversation at that stage of the evening.
My friends assured me that the instructions for my mission, should I choose to accept it (not that I could refuse it, seeing as I’d been elected nem con, in absentia), had been provided on a tape recording which, together with the tape recorder, had now mysteriously evaporated:
My friends wished me luck.
I said I’d see what I can do.
As usual, it was a really enjoyable evening with a great bunch of people whose company I enjoy with renewed relish at these annual gatherings. But the next gathering might need to be sooner than usual, if I can pull off an implausible mission.
Is a selfie with loads of people in it a groupie? If so, thanks to Mark Phillips for the groupie.
Postscript: Did I pull off the implausible missions? You bet your sweet & sour balls and your white cricket balls I did:
The question “where do I begin?” in the matter of a love story is, I suggest, a rather uninteresting question. Almost all love stories start when the lovers meet. OK, the story might have a short preamble to set the scene, such as the almighty punch-up at the start of Romeo and Juliet, but basically love stories start when the lovers meet. Simples.
So before I
begin the short love story I have prepared for you, I want to explore two variants
of the “where do I begin?” question:
Firstly – where did “where do I begin?” begin, in
the context of the film Love Story.
Secondly, I
want to explore the question, where…or
rather when…does love begin?”, which I think is a rather more intriguing
question. My attempted answer also informs the rather regular style of love
story with which I shall briefly conclude.
So, where did “where do I begin?” begin?
Francis Lai
had written a score for the movie Love Story, including the tune Theme From Love Story.
The Paramount
Movie people felt that the Theme needed a lyric and commissioned Carl Sigman, a top lyricist
at the time, to turn that theme tune into a song.
Sigman initially
wrote a schmaltzy lyric summarizing the love story depicted in the film, with
lines such as:
“So when Jenny came” and
“Suddenly was gone”…
…you get the
picture. But Robert Evans,
the larger than life producer of Love Story, hated Sigman’s original attempt at
the lyric; in particular fretting that the “Jenny came” line was suggestive.
According to Sigman’s
son, the great lyricist was furious at being asked to rewrite the lyric, throwing
a bit of a hissy and threatening to withdraw from the project. But the next
day, when Sigman had calmed down, he told his wife that he would try again. But,
“where do I begin?”, Sigman asked. “That’ll do”, or words to that effect, replied
Mrs Sigman. Thus, at least apocryphally, the famous line and song title was
born.
But the
question I really want to explore before I tell you my little love story is where…or rather when…does love begin?”
I believe that
people tend to rewrite their personal romantic histories somewhat, often
attributing a “love at first sight” narrative to, for example, the story of
meeting one’s life partner. But that attribution is made with the benefit of
hindsight.
Let me
illustrate my point with a slightly less emotive example. Falling in love with
a house.
I quite often tell the tale of my viewing our house in West Acton, at the behest of my then girlfriend, now wife, Janie, who had already seen it. I reckon I had been inside for no more than 30 to 40 seconds before I concluded that I could imagine Janie living out the rest of her life in that house, possibly with me in it too. In the vernacular, I fell in love with our house at first sight. We bought the house. Janie and I love that house. Noddyland, we call it.
The Noddyland Threshold
But supposing
the Noddyland house story had not panned out as it did. My offer might have
been rejected or the survey might have found an insurmountable problem with
that house. Or we might have been guzumped by David Wellbrook or some such
person who knows a fine house at a sensible price when he sees one.
Janie and I
would have resumed our search for a house and we’d no doubt have found another;
we might have liked or even loved that other house…
…but I would
not have looked back on my initial visit to Noddyland as a “love at first sight”
story. We might have mused about whether we’d have been happier “at that one we
liked the look of but didn’t get”. We would not have used the term “love” about
that house at all.
My point is
that the love comes later. We tend to back-fill the story in hindsight and
imagine the love to have come much sooner than it really did.
Returning to the question of romantic love, I wonder where or when that love genuinely begins. My view on this matter has changed as I have got older. Back in the days of my very early fumblings in the late 1970s, for example The Story Of Fuzz in my inaugural TheadMash piece…
…I don’t think I thought of those escapades as love stories of any kind.
But soon
after that, once I had started having “proper, long-term relationships”…I’m
talking weeks here or even occasionally months…I considered those adventures to
be “my love life.” Rollercoaster emotions would ensue; elation at the onset or
when a romantic setback was overcome; heartache when things went awry,
especially when the upshot was that I had been dumped. I know it’s hard to believe,
folks, but one or two foolish young women made that mistake and paid the
ultimate price of losing their once-in-a-lifetime opportunity with me.
But when I
look back on those short-lived, early efforts now, I find it hard to recognize many
if any of the characteristics of a love story in those tales. At the time, of
course, I thought I was falling in and out of love. But with the benefit of a
more seasoned perspective, those stories are merely a good source for comedic
interludes or nostalgia-drenched asides…
Those early
entanglements are too fleeting and (I regret having to confess) sometimes too
entangled with each other to make true romantic copy.
Contrast that
sort of juvenile jumble with…
…David
Wellbrook’s superb recitation at ThreadMash 2, about his good lady’s near death
experience and David’s intimate account of his own reaction to it. Now that
piece was not written as a love story, it was written as a piece on the theme
of “lost and found”. Yet it was, I would argue, a profound and heartfelt personal
love story. I wouldn’t attempt to emulate or better it as a love story.
But it did
get me thinking about a couple of near-death experiences Janie and I went
through, particularly the first of them.
The incident was
many years ago, in the mid 1990s, when Janie and I had been together for fewer
than three years.
Janie and I went
over to my business partner Michael and his then girlfriend (now wife)
Elisabeth’s place for a Saturday evening meal that May Bank Holiday. Both Janie
and I experienced quite severe indigestion that night; a state we attributed to
Elisabeth’s solidly-Germanic, Sauerbraten style of
cooking, combined with perhaps a tad too much alcohol to wash down the heavy
food. But whereas my biliousness passed as the Sunday progressed, Janie became increasingly
poorly and doubled up with pain in her innards.
To cut a long
and painful story short, by the night of Bank Holiday Monday, I was convinced
that the locum doctor’s relatively casual attitude to a woman doubled up with
increasing pain was insufficient and took Janie to A&E, where they
immediately diagnosed (correctly) acute pancreatitis caused by a rogue
gallstone.
As I left
Janie in the care of the kind doctor, the youngster (yes, even when I was still
a mere 33 years old, the night-duty house doctor in A&E looked like a
youngster) took me aside. He warned me that, although they thought they had
everything under control and that the odds were in Janie’s favour, he was duty
bound to warn me how serious pancreatitis can be and that Janie might not survive
the ordeal.
I drove home, alone, with that “might not survive” thought and the strains of Miserlou by Dick Dale & His Del-Tones on the radio…
…well it was 1995 when Pulp Fiction was all the rage. I can no longer hear that tune without thinking of that lonely drive home.
But the incident
brought the romantic truth home to me; Janie wasn’t just the girl that I had
been going out with for longer now than any of my previous girlfriends – nearly
three whole years. It made me realize that I really did love Janie.
In fact it made me realize that I had recognized that fact a year earlier, when I discussed the idea of me setting up business with Michael. I had said to Janie that the venture was a big risk…
…the dangers of Michael and Elisabeth’s notorious cooking for a start…that’s an unfair joke that should not be repeated or put in print (apart from the Ogblog version of this piece 😉 )…
…the venture was a big risk because we’d be taking on indebtedness and if the business went wrong I’d have to give up my flat and have little or no money for quite a while. Janie had simply said that it wasn’t really a big risk because she still had a job and a flat and that we’d get by. It was then that I knew that she loved me and that I also loved her and that she and I were committed to help each other through life’s journey for the foreseeable future.
To me, THAT is truly the stuff of “where love begins”.
Extract From Tchaikovsky Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture
As for the more simple, “where do I begin?” love story; I suppose I should now tell you the story of how Janie and I met.
We met in
August 1992 at one of Kim and Micky’s parties; Kim being Janie’s best friend.
In some ways
it is odd that Janie’s and my path hadn’t crossed before, through Kim &
Micky. I had known Kim, through holiday jobs and stuff, since I was a youngster.
In the late 1980s, when I got to know Kim & Micky socially, I would see
them a few times a year at dinner or lunch parties. But I guess they saw Janie
and me as part of different circles. In any case, we were both otherwise
attached most of the time during those years.
Anyway, Janie
and I chatted quite a lot during the party and ended up as part of a smaller
group that was still around into the early evening, at which point Kim
suggested that we all go across the square and play tennis.
I had just
started playing tennis again, rather tentatively, following a particularly
nasty back injury. Goodness only knows how useless I was after quite a few
drinks at the party. But most of us had been drinking quite heavily, so I don’t
suppose the quality of the tennis was very high. I do recall thinking that
Janie was pretty good at tennis. It probably helped that she was the only sober
person among us.
Janie had
mentioned several times that she had driven to the party in her car and
therefore wasn’t drinking. After the
tennis, I asked her if she could drop me at a tube station. She said that she
would, but that she wasn’t prepared to go out of her way and that the only tube
station she’d be passing was Hanger Lane. That was ideal for me, as Hanger Lane
and Notting Hill Gate are on the same line.
Janie and I
chatted some more on the fifteen minute car journey.
Janie said
that she liked poetry.
When she
stopped the car to drop me off, I asked Janie for her telephone number.
Janie said
no.
In order to
get out of the car with my dignity intact, I took from my wallet one of those
sticky labels with my name, address and telephone number on it. I stuck the
label on her steering wheel, saying, “in that case, you can have my address and
telephone number”.
Janie thanked
me and said that she would write me a poem.
I’m still
waiting for the poem.
While preparing
this TheadMash piece, I asked Janie if she wanted to apologise for her terse refusal
that first evening and for the continued absence of my poem, some 27 years
later.
“No”,
said Janie, “love means never having to say you’re sorry”. Who could argue with
that sentiment in the matter of love story.
In
any case, Janie assures me that the poem is coming; she never set a specific
date for its production. It might end up being my epitaph.
I
look forward to that.
Meanwhile,
if this short account has left you wondering how on earth Janie and I got it
together after her initial rejection…
…well,
that’s another story or two – not for ThreadMash.
But those yarns will be linked to the Ogblog version of this piece. They involve ossobuco…
Postscript 1: For Those Readers Who Like Their Stories Circular/Complete
I realised after completing my first pass on this piece that Robert Evans, the producer who sent Carl Sigman back to the drawing board to write the “Where Do I Begin?” lyric, was the subject of a play Janie and I saw a couple of years ago; The Kid Stays In The Picture…
