Random Jottings

Round Up - Diaries and a Bagpuss

As mentioned in my previous post, I am doing a round up of books I have had on the go for the past few months.  Sometimes I find that I dip in and out of books and then get a bit lackadaisical and get distracted and do other things, so in the last couple of weeks I have sat down and finished books I have had scattered around the flat and am now embarking on a Round Up of same. 

First up, The Country Diaries, a Year in the British Countryside edited by Alan Taylor.   I make no   apologies for 'dipping' in and out of this book because, as the title suggests, this is in diary form throughout a calendar year and I suppose I ought to keep it by my bedside and read each month as it happens.  A quick glance at January reveals quotes from Virginia Woolf, John Fowles, James Lee-Milne and Francis Kilvert.  One of the best quotes though is from our Natyonal Treasure, Alan Bennett:

"Ring Mr Redhead, the coal merchant in Ingleton. 'Hello Mr Redhead, this is Alan Bennett, I'm wanting some coal'    'Goodness me, I am consorting with higher beings!'

Last time I rang Mr Redhead he said 'Well, I don't care how celebrated you are, you'll never be a patch on your dad'

Wonderful.

This book is really quite delicious, beautifully produced and each month has a wood cut illustration which I love.  I was going to pass this onto a friend, but in fact I have decided that it will stay on my bedside table to be read throughout the year.  There are too many gems in here to take in all at once.

Second on the table, Seeing Things by Oliver Postgate

To me Oliver Postgate will be enshrined in immortality as the creator of Bagpuss, a children's television programme which our entire family would sit down and watch many years ago.  Both my daughters were enchanted by this creation which has recently been voted one of the Most Popular TV shows of all time and quite rightly so.  As well as Bagpuss sitting in this shabby and cluttered old shop, there were a family of mice and one afternoon they rowed down a flight of stairs singing 'Row, row row your boat, gently down the stream, merrily merrily merrily life is but a dream'. The combination of their squeaky voices and the  singing reduced us all to hysterics.  I cannot explain why and I just thought it might have been a particular moment, but years later when I saw it again, I had the same reaction as did my children.

Though he is mainly known for this creation as well as Ivor the Engine, Noggin the Nog and The Clangers, it is his early life that is so fascinating.  Born to North London parents, both committed socialists, Oliver came into contact with people who were involved in the forming of the early Labour movement, his maternal grandfather, George Lansbury, being one time leader of the Labour Party.  When war broke out Oliver was a conscientious objector and later post-war, travelled to Germany as a driver for a relief team.

A thoughtful and gentle man with strong principles, Oliver died in December 2008.  Please check out this link to the BBC obituary for this lovely kind man, and see the short video on his creations.  Compared to today's sophisticated and computer generated programmes, they may appear rather crude and amateur, but they have charm and warmth and I found a tear welling up when I looked at this.  It brought back so many happy memories, and those mice - they are still there!

"Bagpuss, dear Bagpuss, old fat furry cat-puss,
Wake up and look at this thing that I bring,
Wake up, be bright, be golden and light,
Bagpuss, oh hear what I sing..."

And blessings upon the joys of the internet as I have discovered the full opening of Bagpuss here on You tube - do watch and reach for the tissues.  Sheer magic.

Both these lovely books were sent to me by Canongate who have a marvelously eclectic mix of titles as you can see if you check out their website here.  About 18 months ago they sent me a copy of Jane Austen: how she conquered the world,  which was another gem and then just before Christmas last year, a thud on my doormat brought me Simon's Cat - reviewed here.  Anybody who has seen these brilliant and funny cartoons on You Tube (yes them again) will need no introduction to this feline who obviously rules Simon with a paw of iron.  

Read and laughed and loved, but I am sure Canongate will not mind that I passed this book onto a friend of mine.  He has a cat and his name is Simon......(and you can check him out at Stuck in a Book for yes, it is he).

My television - part deux and a round up

Well it is Friday, we have just had a bitter East wind sweep across Colchester and a rather vicious snow storm. Luckily none of it landed but the temperature has dropped and it is very cold indeed.

Before I tell you more about my television (I know, I know, be patient), just to say that I am still a book reviewer and will be writing about my recent round up of titles which I have had patiently awaiting my attention for some time.  I have had books on the go since before Christmas, by my bed, on my coffee table and other places I will not mention, and have been reading and dipping into them over a period of two months.  I have spent the last week finally rounding them all up, finishing them and organising my thoughts on same.  I have said before on Random that while there are occasions when I simply find a book unreadable, I just leave it and do not diss it here - we all have different reading tastes.  I usually only write about books I have really loved and enjoyed and that is the aim of my blog.  However, after reading The Children's Room by A S Byatt I ventured a slightly less than enthusiastic review and was pleased with the fascinating responses I received.  I have decided in future that if I, personally, find a book difficult or not to my taste I will air these views, temperately I might add, and not just rave about books to the exclusion of all else.  There have been a few on here that I have been less than enthusiastic about, but most of my reviews are favourable.  After four years of reading and writing for Random I now feel perhaps I can flex my muscles a bit and, also, not feel quite so inadequate as a reviewer.  Anyway, we shall see..

OK My television - problem persisted so decided to visit a small firm in Colchetser, Levett & Ward.  They have been around for years, no huge showroom, no website, just what looks like a shack on the London Road with limited parking space and no glossy entrance.  But, they were just what I was looking for - I knew if I went in there I would not be faced with a smirking twelve year old looking pityingly at me and telling me my TV was kaput and I needed a new one.  Armed with the information from the Helpful Man of a Certain Age who I spoke to in Ipswich, I went in armed with my remote for the DVD and the TV.  The gentleman I spoke to (another Helpful Man of a Certain Age steeped in TV folklore) tested both of them and said they were fine.  We then exhaustively discussed all the possibilities and he said that he was quite happy to look at the TV, they have a workshop out the back and that he would give me an honest opinion on its state.

By the way, did you know that as all modern TVs are digital and are computerized, when we are asleep at night with the TV turned off, even if you have switched it right off and not on standby, It Never Sleeps?  Updates to systems are run while we are asleep and we know nothing about it.....   I find that rather spooky and when I told him how my tv had switched itself back on in the middle of the night, he said yep it was scary but that is what accounted for it.  Now did any of the whizz kids I spoke to earlier know this? Of course not.

So resigned to the fact my TV was seriously mental, when he suddenly said 'Do you have any other remotes at all?'   I have one for my stereo and told him so and he then told me that it might be emitting a signal which was confusing the TV.  But I point it to the stereo in the corner, nowhere near the TV says I, makes no difference the signal is probably bouncing off the walls and affecting the TV.says he  Then it occurred to me that I have moved my stereo and radio around in the last few weeks and whereas before it was within reach and I used to switch it off and on manually, since the move I have used the remote.

Leapt into the Batmobile and drove home at warp speed and when I got indoors I tried the television. Still dreadful and hopping around and being difficult so I picked up the stereo remote, sitting there looking sooo innocent and with no guile whatsoever and took out the batteries. POW!!!  The picture on my TV steadied, the channels staid put, all is OK and the DVD works properly.

I sat down totally gob smacked.  I have tested the TV since and all is fine and so the stereo remote is now battery free and in a draw and will remain there - permanently.  I simply cannot believe that that is what all the trouble was and it has now confirmed my opinion even more, that the lack of serious customer service in the electrical trade is endemic.  All the information I have received came from two men, both in their fifties who were trained electricians and TV engineers and who knew exactly how a TV worked and what could cause problems - nobody else I spoke to had the faintest idea.

If I need anything in the future, I know where I will be going - it will be Levett & Ward and I am about to send them an email with my thanks.  They have saved me a fortune with their half hour chat and good advice that I received from them this morning.

There are times when small is beautiful.

My Television

I want to tell you all about my television.  Now I admit that this sounds boring but I think I have a weird television (no comments in the back row please...) and want to tell you all about it.  

Last week I switched it off one night and went to bed and half an hour later just as I was dozing off was jerked awake pretty quickly by the sound of music from my living room.  I rushed through and found that my television set had turned itself back on, yes back on! Every horror film I had ever seen relating to evil spirits and TV came back to me so I switched off, and this time did not leave it on standby which I had done by accident.

Next day switched on to check the weather or something, turned off, five minutes later it turned itself back on.  My friend Rosemary was around on Saturday night and we were watching the latest Harry Potter DVD and I got up to make a cup of tea and the dvd went off and we were watching the football on BBC1.  Managed to get it sorted but I did wonder what on earth was happening.

It has got worse and now when I turn the TV on it hops backwards and forwards between stations like a drunk on a spree and never stays on one channel for more than 30 seconds.  The only way I can get it to work is if I switch it on at the TV itself and choose the channel in the good old fashioned way.  BUT and here is where I had an inkling of what might be wrong, once the TV is up and running if I get up quickly and walk away POW off it goes again.  Ah ha thinks I, there is something wrong with the sensor on the TV.  So I decided to be very cunning....

I managed to get the TV up and running and then I laid on my stomach and crawled backwards across the living room floor and slithered onto my sofa without disturbing any gamma ray and was able to watch my programme. Ah ha got you I thought triumphantly and then forgot, jumped off the sofa to go and make a cup of tea and, yes you have guessed it, suddenly I was watching some dog show or similar and then recoiling in horror, I watched as it switched to the channel where they sell you cheap tacky jewellery.

I decided to call the store where I bought it and speak to an 'expert'.  The first man I spoke to said I obviously had got a poltergeist in my set and was immediately convulsed by his wit. When I failed to respond to this cretinous remark, put me through to the Man who Repairs TVs and Will Know what is Wrong.  HAH!!!   He seemed totally stunned by this, had no idea what to do at all and did that familiar indrawn breath, whistling through the teeth, ooooh this sounds bad kind of response to which I told him he should be glad he was on the end of a phone and that I was not standing in front of him.

Well, to cut a long story short I have two Men coming round Saturday morning to check that perhaps the settings are up the creek, reset the factory settings and then retune for me and see if that will do the trick. I have a sneaky feeling it will not but let us not repine.  Failing that it will have to go to repair and I know that means it will vanish into a work shop in Glasgow/Land's End/the Shetland Isles or somewhere as far away from Colchester as possible,  and I will be lucky to get it back before Christmas this year.   I was warned the screen might be at fault and if so, then I would be looking at about £200 plus VAT and guess what it would be cheaper to get a new one.  Gosh what a surprise.

Well today I was in Ipswich with the Aged Parent and popped into a TV store just to check out the price of a replacement should it be needed and up pops a very nice helpful man (middle aged and full of wisdom and TV knowledge) and I had a chat with him and told him what was going on. AHA, says he, check your remote.  Sometimes the buttons that one presses, which are usually of a soft material, can get caught at the back and this sends a continuous signal to the television and that might be the problem.   When I told him that I had not been told this by the Expert  I had consulted his response was How old was he?  Said I had only spoken to him on the phone but he sounded about 9.  Well, he says, I would check your remote and then take it into the store and get them to check it. He told me he would have done it but not driving all the way to Ipswich for that though if the nerd at my Colchester store cannot do it, then I may very well.

Got home tonight, and got out my trusty screwdriver and prised up each button on my remote for the TV and also the remote for the DVD and, yes, it works.  It is bouncing about a bit but another prod with the screwdriver and I have the TV remote control working now, which I could not before.  So it would appear that this gentleman is right and armed with his advice I will troll into Colchester tomorrow and have my remote checked and looked at.  If it needs replacing then it will cost about £20 - rather cheaper than buying a new television.

I do wonder sometimes about our consumer society and the lack of knowledge when one has this sort of problem.   I also wonder what I would have looked like if anybody could have seen me crawling on my belly across the floor like some member of the SAS trying to avoid sniper fire....

'sigh'

Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women

I have loved the books of Louisa May Alcott all my reading life and had the luck and joy to visit Orchard House in Concord some years ago and posted about it here.  To my utter dismay I lost my film with all my photos (this was pre-digital) and was so upset and angry.  Nothing for it but to revisit one day...

I was really looking forward to reading this excellent biography by Harriet Reisen on Sunday, but l found I had to leave posting about it until today as I had to let my simmering rage and fury die away before I could rationally think about it.  The reason for my fury?  Two words - Bronson Alcott. This man whose mind was on higher things would have let his family starve if it had not been for friends and relatives.   'God will provide' Bronson would say grandly when his family were living off bread and water and apples and cold and hungry.  This utterly selfish man who was revered by his disciples and friends (Emerson being one in particular) is a man of 'sound and fury signifying nothing' and my apologies to Mr Shakespeare for pinching his quote, but it is totally suited to this selfish transcendentalist.

I suppose part of my fury is because we know that Louisa May Alcott is Jo March who, alongside Anne of Green Gables, must be one of the most loved characters in all fiction.  Brave, loyal, true, wishing she were a boy, feeling stifled by her womanhood, determined to be independent and make her way in the world, Jo/Louisa is a leading member of Victorian women who worked themselves into illness and death in order to support their families.   Odd that women were not allowed to go out to work and yet were allowed to kill themselves at home by writing to exhaustion.  The list is pretty long including Lucy Maud Montgomery, Mrs Oliphant, May Sinclair, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Edith Wharton and the subject of this biography.

I have been a fan of Louisa May Alcott since I first read Little Women when I was about twelve. Yes, we all know that the most famous opening line in all literature is deemed to be 'It is a truth universally acknowledged...' but I think 'Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents'  follows it pretty close.  The opening chapter of Little Women with the March family unable to afford presents and living in poverty is straight out of reality, and the visit on Christmas morning to the poor family, the Hummels, also real.  Abby Alcott, Bronson's wife and the original 'Marmee' also spent long hours when living in Boston, looking after the poor and needy until her health broke down.   This was to earn money to feed her children while her husband visited his friends, went on lecture tours and wrote (badly).  Husband and wife loved each other all their lives and Mrs Alcott defended him stoutly, even when writing begging letters to friends and relatives to ask for help.  Her brother, in particular, supported them constantly even though he did ask 'I have to go out to work, why can't he?'   Indeed....

In Little Women, Mr March is away as a chaplain during the Civil War.  This spruced up portrait of a good man is based on Bronson, but Louisa May makes sure he is out of the way for most of the book and it is the strong women that she concentrates on.  Of course, we all know that Meg, Jo, Amy and Beth were the Alcott daughters, Anna, Louisa, May and LIzzie and this is what makes this biography so fascinating. As with reading LM Montgomery's journals and recognising so many real incidents in her books, so on my re-reading of Little Women which I did as soon as I finished the Reisen book,  and what I found really fascinating is the original 'Laurie' who all her readers wanted Jo to marry.   It appears he is based on a young Polish man Louisa met while travelling. She and her companion were staying at Vevey when Ladislaw Wisniewski arrived, a tall stranger "with a thin intelligent face and the charmingly polite manners of a foreigner".    Louisa responded to his charms though in her journal she told herself she loved him like a mother (he was in his early twenties, she in her late thirties), though he acted nothing like a son. She called him Laddie "it was impossible for anyone to long resist his pleading eyes".

They became close and later met in Paris. There was speculation about Louisa and Laddie after her death "Did she ever have a love affair?  We never knew but how could such a nature so imaginative, romantic and passionate escape it?"   We can never know for sure but Louisa's connection with Laddie continued through a sporadic correspondence. He married and had children and settled in Paris.  After Little Women was published Louisa acknowledged him as the model for Laurie.   There is no picture of him in existence so we will have to turn to Little Women for a description "Curly black hair, brown skin, big black eyes, long nose, nice teeth, little hands and feet and as tall as I am, very polite for a boy and altogether jolly". This is Jo speaking so we can be pretty certain that this is how Laddie looked when he and Louisa first met.

After their meeting in Paris there is a journal entry beginning "a little romance with Laddie", something else written which was later scratched out so forcibly that she tore the paper. Over the tattered area she wrote "couldn't be"

Oh I do hope she had her romance, I really do.

A totally absorbing biography which kept me pinned to the sofa all Sunday afternoon. I found myself  crying at the end when I read of her death.  Louisa worn out and her health had totally broken down with the strain of nursing her mother, then her father who had a stroke, and being the mainstay of the family and taking on the upbringing of her sister May's daughter. May died in paris shortly after giving birth.   Bronson Alcott, with his usual impeccable timing died just before Louisa and Anna had to leave Louisa's sickroom and prepare for his funeral. 'Sometime the next morning, 6 March 1888, Louisa died. She did not know that her father had died two days before. There was no one by her side"

So sad and this book is a marvellous telling of her life and to be recommended.  There is one glaring error in it however, that really took me by surprise.  When talking about Little Men, Harriet Reisen refers to the now married Jo's two children as Daisy and Demi.  Not so, these were the children of Meg and John Brooke. Jo's children were Rob and Teddy and I am really surprised no eagle eyed editor spotted this before going to print though I am pretty sure they will have been told by now....

Going on my list for Book of the Year 2010.

A Surprise in Cambridge

I posted twice yesterday, once on Random Jottings and once on Random Music, so am taking a rest today from serious reviewing.  I have the Biography of LM Alcott to write about which is going to take me some time as I have so much to say, and after reading that spent today curled up a la Jo March, not in her garrett in Orchard House in Concord, but on my sofa reading Little Women and An Old Fashioned Girl.  Years since I read them and now viewing them with the knowledge gained from the biography, loved them all over again.

So, as I like to keep my daily visitors interested with something to read or look at, I am showing you some photographs I took last summer on a visit to Cambridge.  Some building work going on and look at the illustrations on the fencing closing it in.  All by Quentin Blake and all quite wonderful.  What a simply brilliant idea.  I thought you might like to see them.

 

Aren't they simply gorgeous?  I remember well reading Mr Magnolia to my two girls when they were small and loved the illustrations; ditto the Wild Washerwomen and he also used to illustrate the Roald Dahl stories.  I wonder what the City of Cambridge will do with these when the work is completed?  Do hope they find somewhere to keep them so that visitors can come and view.

So that is my post for today.  Bit of a cheat I know, but the mind is not too alert today....

End of the week

And I am very glad to reach the end of this week which has been a very emotional one for me as you will all know by now on learning that my daughter Kathryn is going to Australia, probably in about six months time.  We have had a long talk about it all and she veered between elation and panic and happiness and tears which is to be expected and as I spent some time calming her down, this also had the same effect on me.   I have been very touched and grateful at all the lovely messages I have had both on and off blog and I know I have said thank you once already, but am saying it again now.

Reading The Children's Book by AS Byatt certainly needed concentration and also took my mind off the forthcoming separation and, once again, I was very grateful and interested to receive all the comments on this author and to realise that I am not alone in my opinion.  

This morning I finished a biography of Louisa May Alcott which I find riveting and I will post about it later in the week when I have calmed down somewhat as my reaction to Bronson Alcott's selfishness, disregard and neglect of his family was one of rage and fury.   But more of that later...

My friend Rosemary came round last night and I cooked supper (chicken pieces baked in the oven with roasted vegetables and baked apples for dessert), and then we sat with our feet up watching the DVD of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Price which is a very dark film indeedccompared to the earlier Potter movies.  Michale Gambon is marvellous as Dumbledore, much better than Richard Harris IMHO, and of course Alan Rickman is just superb as Snape and in this movie had more to do and was totally mesmerising.  Can't wait to see the final film as the Battle of Hogwarts is going to be a stunner.

Then coffee with my mum this morning, a  bit of the Australian Open on telly after lunch, writing this with a cup of tea and then Dancing on Ice this evening.  Just call me Renaissance Woman.

Oh and please do nip over to Random Music to see what I think of a new tv programmer Popstar to Operastar which I think is without doubt the worst programme on television..........ever.  Here is the link.

The Children's Book - A S Byatt

I first discovered A S Byatt about eight years ago when somebody gave me Possession to read.  I was on holiday in Mexico at the time and remember picking it up one day and becoming totally absorbed in it and for three days was more or less incommunicado as I became engulfed in the 'life' of a Victorian poet who felt so real that I had to check that this was indeed a fictionalised character.  The fact that A S Byatt created a whole slew of Victorian poetry as well gave it a further sense of reality.   However, I remember vividly how I felt when I had finished this book - exhausted with my senses somewhat jaded - rather like eating too much chocolate and longing for a piece of cheese; too much Wagner and needing Mozart.  An odd feeling, too much satiation.

I left her for a while and then tried another of her titles, The Virgin in the Garden, and half way through the book almost gave up as the same sense of exhaustion came over me.  I felt I was being asked to work  too hard. Does that sound silly?   I am prepared to concentrate and give a book my full attention but somehow there was a feeling that I could not slack off, I was allowed no relaxation and I felt that the author was parading her full artillery of knowledge and intellect.  I finished this book but felt that I did not want to read any more of this author.

But then along comes The Children's Book which sounded so fascinating and interesting from the reviews I had read and, shallow though this makes me appear, the cover was so beautiful it made me want to pick up the book and stroke it.    Chatto & Windus sent me a copy and I looked at it and felt daunted and had to leave it until now before I could read it.  When I receive a book by such a well known and appreciated writer such as A S Byatt, garlanded with praise and prizes, I feel very unworthy and slightly ashamed that I am even essaying a review (Margaret Atwood makes me feel the same way) and I do not flatter myself that any words of mine will make an iota of difference to sales, and so I shied away for awhile.  But, when publishers are kind enough to send me review copies, I think it is a bit mean spirited and ungrateful not to have a crack at it at least.

My apologies for this long preamble, but I wanted to give you a sense of my feelings when I finally opened this up at page one.  It starts promisingly - a young boy, Philip, is hiding in the depths of the new Victoria and Albert Museum, he has run away from the Potteries and poverty and is drawn to the Museum by the beauty of its treasures.   Philip is discovered by the son of the curator and a friend of his, the son of Olive Wellwood a famous writer who sweeps down on him and takes him into her home.

So far so good.  But then I felt the weariness of spirit come over me once more when we reach the family home in Romney Marsh where a midsummer party is taking place.  Suddenly I was assaulted on all sides by an overwhelming picture of beauty, colour, fantasy and the feeling that all the action is fey and feverish.  I found myself almost reeling under the impact of the prose:

"Philip's lantern with its painted flame and smoke and elegant sinister forms, had been given a place of honour in a herbaceous border standing on a terracotta pillar. As its candle burned down, it wavered and flared then it had fallen into the surrounding vegetation which was a mixture of ferns, bracken, fennel and poppies, both the great silky Shirley poppies and self sown wild ones. It was a very  English piece of semi-wildness,  at the centre of which was a clump of pampas grass including last year's growth which was dry and burned fiercely, with  crackle.  Poppies shrivelled in the heat, there was a smell of roasting fennel. Sparks rose against the curtain of the dark and tiny floating tissues of blackened leaves and seeds." 

and so on and so on paragraph after paragraph, page after page.  I began to feel overwhelmed by the bombardment of information about German puppeteers, potters, painters and artists on all side in this, to me, tenuous and gaudy world.   Half way through, I just wearied and started skipping wanting to know where the narrative was leading and when some shape to the plot would appear.

I managed to stagger through to the end, stagger being the operative word and by the time I had read the last page and closed the book, the same feeling of claustrophobia that I felt after Possession had taken hold of me and I felt restless and slightly headachey.  I really do not know why A S Byatt affects me this way and have been trying to puzzle it out but cannot come to any reasonable conclusion.

I feel this is a somewhat inadequate response to a book which seems to have been heaped with superlatives on all sides, so I am putting some links to other reviews here - those of the Great and the Good, the heavy weight reviewers so you can see what they say.  So check out the Telegraph, the New Statesman and the Guardian.

Makes me feel somewhat better to read these and to see that some of the points I have made, or my feelings I have tried to express, are also mirrored in these  reviews.  More succinct and to the point, but still the same.  One Amazon reviewer summed it up beautifully:  "But my abiding impression is of a book that stands up in the centre of a stage like a little girl in a pink party dress, saying ,look at me, see how clever I am".

To sum up, I feel both overwhelmed and underwhelmed by The Children's Book, if that is possible,  and can only say that you must read it and make up your own mind.  I don't think, sadly, that I will try any more books by this author. Sometimes you just have to know when you're beaten...

The day after Tuesday

I know that thousands of you around the world (well, a few...) are all agog and atwitter waiting to hear my finely honed views on AS Byatt and I am sorry but today has been one of those days.  For a start, when I got up this morning it was to find I had lost all internet access and a note appeared on my screen to contact my ISP.  Oh how I hate seeing those words as you just know a frustrating and irritating time is ahead of you and so it proved.

Got through and I was told by the usual disembodied voice that they had 'heavy' traffic and all 'agents (agents?  For heaven's sake is it hardly NCIS...) are busy'.  So I put the phone on loudspeaker and wait knowing that pointless hanging up as I will just go the back of the queue.  And I wait, and I have a shower, and I wait, and I get dressed and I wait and I have my breakfast and then HOORAY I get put through - and guess what I hear?  A recorded voice saying 'we are aware that some of our customers are suffering a lack of network connection. We are aware of this and are working on it.  If your call is in regard to another query please hold on to be transferred to an agent'.

OK now will somebody please tell me why they did not put that message on the message service BEFORE being told to hold on?  Fifteen minutes of my time, interspersed every thirty seconds by somebody saying, Please wait, your call is important to us,  when it is clearly nothing of the sort. 

So first thing I did when back on line was to send them an absolute stinker of an email...

Just to keep my hand in you understand.

Back tomorrow - fingers crossed.

The day after Monday

All sorts of things going on today, including seeing my mother and telling her the news. She was delighted and told me when I started to wobble again, that I just had to get on with it, I had gone to Australia myself, my sister had gone to America and she had had to deal with it so I must as well.  At 97 my mum knows what she is talking about so I am doing as I am told!

So just a quick post today and will be back tomorrow with my thoughts on A S Byatt, but in the meantime may I just say a big Thank you to all you lovely people out there who have left comments on Random and those of you who have emailed me offblog as well with your support and encouragement. Many of you have family scattered around the world so your experiences are helping me enormously.

At Christmas Kathryn and I were chatting and she told me that I tended to be a tad cynical - she is right. I have had experiences that have made me this way, but one thing I have come to realise as I get older, is that despite what we read in the newspapers and see on the TV, there are an awful lot of good, kind people in this world and though my little problem does not amount to a hill of beans compared to those being suffered elsewhere, it is real to me and you have all helped me so much.

Thank you one and all.

Mixed feelings on a Monday

Was going to sit down today and write all about The Children's Book and my feelings about it but news arrived this morning that has made everything else seem insignificant.  My gorgeous wonderful elder daughter, Kathryn, received a phone call when she arrived at work, to say that she had been successful in her job interview before Christmas.  

While totally delighted for her, I have such mixed emotions as the job is in Sydney, Australia.  While I am incredibly proud of her and happy and know that she deserves this as she has worked so hard, I am feeling totally wobbly about it all and if I think about it too much, I find myself weeping.  I lived and worked in Sydney many years ago now and simply loved it and I know that Kathryn will fit in with the life style there beautifully and will also love it.  She has to commit for four years, but realistically I have to face up to the fact that once there, she will not come back.   So, I will have one daughter on the other side of the world and one here, with my new grandchild due in six weeks, and I feel divided and torn.

So, as I have now attended coaching sessions in my new job with the UK Coaching Partnership, and have also been a guinea pig in the past for students, I sat myself down and had a think and coached myself and have come up with a Plan.  I am always better when I know what I am doing and I have rationalised the move and have written down the following:

• first of all by reminding myself that Kathryn has lived in Leeds for the past 13 years so I only see her four or five times a year anyway and it is not as if she lived next door and popped in all the time which would be much harder to face.
• Then we have email, mobile phones and Skype (which I shall get) and communications are so much better. Air fares are not too bad and Australia is no longer viewed as the ends of the earth. When I went back in the 70s communication was by air mail letter and you did not phone as it was so expensive.  I can call friends in New York and chat for half an hour and it is cheaper than calling either of my children on their mobiles in the UK. So sure Oz will be the same.
• Australia is familiar to me and a country I love so when I visit, and I will, I know I can manage and will be able to look after myself and explore while Kathryn is at work, as she will not be able to be with me all the time.  I fully intend to stay a couple of months when I do go.
• The Defence of the Ashes takes place next year in Australia and Kathryn has already checked out the dates when the English team will be in Sydney and so that is a date already.   
• I belong to an on line book group and have been for five years and we have Australian members to we can have a meet up in person which will be great.
• I have also been on line and tracked down a nice apartment to rent, just round the corner from where I used to live on Bondhi Beach. It has a balcony and overlooks the sea.
• Kathryn will not be going until July/August and we are going to fit a trip in to Bruges before then and that will be fun also.

So there you have it.  I will be doing research over the coming months re expenses, flights etc etc and will have a great trip to look forward to.  I have been wanting to get back to Oz for years and now I have the perfect reason to do so.  I am all organised and good to go.

But I am still sitting here all wobbly......