The nice thing about this time of year is the chance to
reflect and take stock. In most ways it
has been an uneventful year, though not without its highlights and sad moments. In the summer we received the shocking news
that an old BT France colleague had been killed in a road accident on the
Thai-Cambodian border. I worked with
Etienne in Paris in the early 1990s, and had got back in contact via Facebook
only this year: we’d planned to connect in Paris at some point. Too late now: carpe diem. Through the same medium, we’re in touch with another
colleague, Martin and his wife Patricia, who live a couple of hours from us in
the Languedoc. We’ve also got back in touch with another colleague, also
called Martin, and his wife Kath. My old boss and his wife, Adam and Oona, came to lunch
one day in the summer. Martyn too has
been in touch with ex-colleagues this year.
Patrick, has moved with his family from Brixton to the other end of town,
and another, Barbara and her husband, parked their vast camper van in the village
in the summer, spending a bit of time with us.
But the big news is the arrival of my first great
nephew, Thomas, of whom more anon: here he is with two of his great-uncles.
We potter away at our hobbies: Martyn’s model railways
progress apace: there’s usually some adjustment going on in the Swiss landscape
up in the loft, and the studio in France now includes a dollop of SE England in
1/160 scale. He’s also giving a lot of
administrative help to his cousin who runs a care home nearby: we were also
drafted in to redecorate a room for her back in the spring.
I draw and paint when the spirit moves me, and have
turned out a few pot-boilers over the year.
I’m more than half way through my bench ‘career’, and spend rather a lot
of time on Magistrates’ Association work – rather more, in fact than on the
‘job’ itself these days, or so it seems.
The usual Annual Ramblings columns follow.
The Garden
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| The Justice of the Peace |
Successes and failures in just about equal measure this
year in the garden. Our new rose has
settled in well. Launched last year to
mark the 650th anniversary of the beakdom, it turns out to be strong
and a prolific bloomer. Similarly,
cosmos grown from seed have done well, and we grew cherry plum tomatoes in pots with great
success (just as well, given the seed price!).
Our seedling rudbeckias were disappointing, though, and not one of the
New Guinea impatiens cuttings made it into bloom. We have fewer leylandii than we had this time
last year – the hedge has gone from between our drive and next door’s, and we
had another tree cut down this autumn. We
might get brave and have the hedge at the back taken out – we’d gain about 3
metres of garden – but to achieve anything in the space thus gained, we’d
probably have to import a lot of soil, and the shady plot would probably not be
all that productive. The phalaenopsis we
were given a while back has not only survived but put out a new flower shoot
this year. The hippeastrum, on the other
hand, turned its toes up, and left in the municipal brown bin.
Wheels
The VW grumbles along as before, as does the Egg, which
is rising 5 years old. The depreciation
curve on the latter is flattening out now, so we’ll probably keep it so long as
it stays reliable. I grizzle at the
garage once in a while about the transmission noise from the VW, and they
always respond ‘they all do that, sir’.
But in all other respects it is so good that I can forgive it that one fault. It had a little misunderstanding with a
French wall in July, so needed the tailgate dressed out and re-sprayed. I took the opportunity to have the tinsel
left off when they put it together again.
It was fixed locally, cheaply and very promptly, and looks better.
We were persuaded to rent a Chevrolet Captiva in France
in the autumn, having booked something Mégane sized. Mistake.
OK, it had leather seats, four-wheel drive and an automatic box, but it
was a miserable brute to drive. The
seats had absolutely no lateral support, the gearbox was an old-fashioned
slush-pump job and hung on to the gears for far too long, even on the ‘eco’
setting.
On our travels, we made a lot of use of public
transport in Germany and Switzerland, using tourist passes. One day in Switzerland, we used 3 trams, 7
trains, a boat and a bus. And we took a
train from Berlin to Hamburg that continued by ferry across the Fehmarn Belt into Denmark. Less impressed by the UK system, though I
make much use of my old-geezer passes.
Arrivals
Celia and Andy joined us in France for a few days in the
summer: a birthday trip for Celia, and a chance for us to thank them for
minding the house while we’ve been away.
We did a lot of the familiar trips together: to the seaside, mountains
and the Canal du Midi. Their arrival in
Toulouse was a bit like a French farce: there was a lengthy delay in getting
their bags delivered to the carousel, and every so often one of them would
appear as the doors to customs swung open, just to let us know that they were
still there, and still waiting. Perfect
house guests, I should add.
Mihaela, Roger and Rara passed through in August, while
we were away. They had rented a gite up
the road from us, so just dropped in to collect Rara’s cot, which is parked on
our landing. They took down and put away
the laundry we’d left hanging in July, however!
In northern climes, we had frequent visits from our part-time
pet mallards, who raised a small family this year, perhaps consequent on
activities we noticed on the pond. Sad
to report that only two ducklings appear to have survived: cats, foxes, jays
and magpies will have had the rest, I suppose.
Food and Drink
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| Restaurant Louis, Neukölln |
As a glance at our profiles readily reveals, we are not
missing at meal times. In my planning of
the Germany jaunt, I happened on a place in Berlin that boasts the largest
schnitzel of the Federal capital. The
doggy bags and tin foil arrived unbidden when we’d capitulated about a third
the way through them, and we got two further meals and a sandwich out of
them. Very friendly place: they’d to
send out for more meat after we’d ordered, and plied us with brandy while we
waited.
We found numerous bonnes adresses in Germany, but
scored out a lot in France. It’s
shocking to discover how French catering has declined lately. Fast food joints used to be a refreshing
surprise: more recently they have disappointed, and many middle-of-the-road
restaurants are now disappointing. As
for Switzerland, don’t eat on lake steamers unless you have far more money than
taste.
Back here, we have a dwindling supply of marmalade
under the stairs, but a couple of bottles of sloe gin are coming along nicely. New recipes: poached haddock for a
digestively-challenged lunch guest.
Onions, carrots, celery and vermouth in the poaching liquid; onions and
carrots in the accompanying mash. Rillons de porc – a Hugh F-W recipe: look it
up. Delia’s baked trout with crème
fraîche and chives. And Martyn’s and
Celia’s delicious and subtly different fish pies.
Clan
Anna and Richard have a fine son, Thomas James, who
arrived in the small hours of Fathers’ Day: I had a call from the proud
Grandpapa around breakfast time, and we got to see Tom a couple of weeks
later. He appears to be thriving – well,
he would, wouldn’t he?
Martyn’s niece Nina has remarried: we were there
to share the day with her and Stephen in Rochester. My cousin’s daughter Ceri too has remarried, and we learn that she and Paul are now expecting
a daughter. Nephew Nel and I play word
games together on facebook. Beware: he’s
damn’ good!
Arts
’ve battled my way through the Booker
shortlist again this year, but am wondering whether it’s worth the expense and
effort. My favourite was The Garden of Evening Mists.
I have since read the same author’s first novel The Gift of Rain. We shall
see much more of Tan Twen Eng, I hope. Ms Mantel’s winner was a deserving one. Mr Self’s Umbrella
was an equally deserving loser, yet it’s his book, for all the affectation of
his narrative technique, that sticks in my mind. I think it was that that brought my Kindle to
its knees, forcing me to buy a new one.
I did get a bit of discount, fortunately.
We’ve been to a few live events this year. An excellent piano recital by Charlie Felter
on an upright in the hall over the changing rooms in Lagrasse, and a deafening
organ grind, the programme of which was made up of, we thought, deservedly
obscure pieces. In Disgustedville, we’ve
seen impressive performances of Calendar
Girls and Chicago and a concert
of Saint-Saëns and Poulenc pieces for orchestra and organ.
I keep slapping paint about, and occasionally manage to
capture the loose style that I prefer. It
doesn’t work often, but I think I got it in this one. I do most of my stuff in acrylics, preferably on canvas, but sometimes also on paper, which is far too absorbent until it has had a coat or two of gesso. Most recently, I've been fiddling about with water colours again, but really lack the discipline and delicacy of touch to use the medium well.
Departures
Having grown up in the 1960s, the building of the Berlin Wall and the confrontation of
tanks in the Friedrichstraβe stick in the mind.
Some years ago, I returned briefly to Berlin, and since then have been
longing to go back for a longer visit.
This year we took the chance to take a tour in Germany, spending three
nights in Berlin and one in Hamburg.
Excellent experience. Part of the
rationale was to visit the huge model railway layouts in each city, and we
weren’t disappointed! Loxx in Berlin is
already impressive, but Miniaturwunderland in Hamburg is worth the journey,
even if you aren’t interested in model railways. The sheer scale of the thing is impressive,
and the detail and humorous touches are a delight.
In
Berlin, we took a free guided tour of the Reichstag building, and don’t
hesitate to recommend it. You have to
book in advance, though, so make sure you check in on the web site a couple of
weeks before you go. I think we did a
third of the things we’d planned to do, so we may return. The flat we rented in the former Soviet
sector was inexpensive and superb. It
was only when we got home that we discovered that it was built on the site of
the Führerbunker, hence the guided tours that stopped from time to time below
our living room window. Looking further
out, the huge Tiergarten park dominated the horizon, and a little closer in was
the vast memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe. Between the two is the monument to homosexual
victims of the Nazis, who were recognised only decades later.
Oddly
enough, we’ve been to Lagrasse several times this year. We finally got round to re-decorating the
guest room, which has been nagging me ever since I bought the place in
1998. The ceiling paper was sagging, the
wallpaper was tasteless and applied over drips of cement and plaster, and the paintwork was
that tired putty colour that tends to prevail in those parts. Well, the job was a nightmare, and took about
10 days. We had to take off several
layers of wallpaper, and scrape the distemper off every square centimetre of the
ceiling. Then we had to fill the many
cracks and fissures in the plaster. We’d
hoped to put paint on the plaster, but part of the wall was badly stained from
what must have been a cracked stovepipe, so we had to paper the walls with a
robust German vinyl before painting.
We’ll see in a year or so whether that and a coat of size will be enough
to keep the tar in its place.
I’ve already touched on our visit to Switzerland, which
came as a welcome refresher after the
Lagrasse chores. Pam and Geoff once
again kindly let us use not only their spare flat in Berne, but also their
garage (they being in Scotland at the time), and the car remained there until
we left. We’d bought Swiss rail passes,
which allow travel on just about everything for four days in a given fourteen,
and we set ourselves some testing itineraries.
It’ll be a few years before the Gotthard base tunnel opens, so in the meantime
you can still enjoy the amazing climbs and spiral tunnels. The new tunnel will
allow a few more utterly relaxing hours in Lugano, of course.
I think the day I enjoyed most was the one we spent in
old haunts around Zürich. I’d never
lingered in Schaffhausen, so we picked up a walking tour leaflet at the station
and had a nice amble round the decorated buildings of the old town. Train N°3 of the day took us to the Rhine
falls, where an even more dramatic viewing platform has been built since I was
last there in the late 1990s. (So too
has a rather depressing tourist building.)
From there we ambled on three more trains down through the much
under-rated Zürcher Oberland to Rapperswil, where we took the steamer back to
Zürich, there to get a train back to Berne.
Another day, we rode down to Flüelen, and caught the
steamer back up to Luzern. Lovely views,
even though it was hazy. At various
points we met other steamers and motor vessels, and even an ancient steam
dinghy. The exuberant blowing of
whistles just confirmed how delightfully zany the Swiss can be, for all the
correctness that I must admit to finding almost as attractive.
We wish you all the best for the forthcoming festive
hostilities, and as good a 2013 as the increasingly feckless coalition allows.
Martyn & David
