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Lucy’s column for August 19.
Wardlo…1
He was, once upon a time, the picture of sartorial elegance – all Daniel Hechter suits and silk ties. But then, he had an image to keep up, in the heady word of telly, and the cutting edge of PR.
But retirement does something to a man, and the slob emerges – in his case, the vagrant, though I’ve seen better dressed tramps wandering our streets. He’s happiest in the sort of holey jumpers and stained slacks which most men wouldn’t even consider wearing to dig the allotment.
His trouble is, he won’t throw anything away. Shirts with frayed cuffs and collars will always "come in handy". Flares, and the sort of lapels once sported by spivs and comedian Max Miller, could, according to himself, make a come-back. And he’ll be ahead of fashion. The aforementioned sweaters are his comfort zone. (His favourite, one of those emblazoned with that little alligator logo which once spelled the height of cool, I bought for my late son, Matthew, in 1984).
And then, there’s his anorak. Well, there are two of these cazzy, but decidedly un-smart, garments which spend entire winters on his back, and summers lurking in the cubby-hole at the top of the cellar steps. One is a woolly creature, several sizes too big, and there’s a paper-clip where the zip-pull should be. The other is just a nasty grey thing, all elastic waist and poacher’s pockets, which could have come from the wardrobe department of Last of the Summer Wine. Which it may well have done, since he once had access to the wardrobe sales at Central TV, when they produced light entertainment programmes there, and once came home with a frilly shirt with the late Bob Monkhouse’s name stamped across the collar, and a pair of shoes belonging to Lionel Blair.
Suffice to say, the shoes didn’t make him dance any better, probably because they nipped his toes. And the shirt went the way of all singed nylon frills – okay, I confess, I did it on purpose. It’s tough enough ironing straight bits, so I’m blessed if I’m expected to faff with frilly bits.
Right now, I’m sitting here with a smug grin on my chops. I’ve just done a major purge on his closet. Shirts, trousers, moth-eaten woollies, several threadbare jackets, even what I recall was his wedding suit – and we’ve been married 37 years – were dumped in bin-bags awaiting a trip to the recycling plant at Raynesway. Oh, I had the decency to tell him. Which was perhaps my downfall.
Because that self-satisfied smile has just turned to egg on my face. As I dragged him, kicking and screaming, from the vision of what must be the neatest hanging space in Littleover, proud as Punch about my major effort on his behalf, he threw an almighty wobbly. The bags were retrieved, everything strewn across the kitchen floor, and you’ve guessed it, half the stuff is back, cluttering up those imaginatively colour-co-ordinated rails. The rest, he’s carted off to the charity shop, screeching : "If I can’t have them, they’ll be snapped up by somebody else."
Heaven help us, what more does a man of his age need other than a selection of half-decent shirts, trousers of every hue, two Daks jackets – they never date, apparently, and if they’re never worn, don’t wear out – a funeral suit, and a second one which will take him to weddings, christenings, and any other event which cries out for a tie? It’s not as if we spend our time swanning off to soirees, or cruising into the sunset with the ship’s captain’s table beckoning.
Besides which, I’d kept back a ganzy, gruesome enough to garden in. And those anoraks are still mouldering in the cubby. There are some things even I daren’t dump!
end
Tuesday 19 August 2008
Tuesday 12 August 2008
Camping Horrors
Lucy’s column for August 12.
Camplo…1
We’ve had some rum holidays in our time.
We once joined forces with my sister’s family to rent a cottage in the wilds of Wales, advertised in the Sunday Times, no less, so it should be posh. But nothing prepared us for a flock of sheep dancing on the roof at regular intervals – the house was built into the rain-swept hillside – nor for the bath, standing on bricks in the kitchen, ferns cascading from the ceiling, and a family of toads under the wonky floor-boards.
The two cars both left bits of their under-belly on the mile-long track up to this sparsely-furnished shack – we found the "complete with telly" under a tea-cosy - and the one channel we could summon showed wall-to-wall Eisteddfod. Worse still, we were in a North Wales "dry" county, so our Sunday lunchtime drink was scuppered. Desperation drove us to join the not-so-dry Conservative Club for the day, totally at odds with the old man’s left-wing leanings, but needs must when the devil drives.
And it was North Wales which set the scene for our next adventure, this time a family-run hotel recommended to us by our late friend and colleague, Alan Smith. The setting was exquisite, the food and facilities excellent. But it turned out to be not so much "family" as "familiar", as the old-retainer odd-job-man, who doubled as a waiter and bottle-upper, took a shine to himself. He served him last at every meal to keep him in the dining room, and leapt out at him from nooks and crannies along the bedroom corridors.
After a few days, the better half made his excuses and left me and the kids to our car-less fate. But he was soon replaced by the next victim to book in. And Willy – for that was his name – took us under his wing, drove us to the beach every day, and provided free picnics.
But perhaps my worst experience was a fortnight in France, under canvas.
He’d borrowed the all-singing, all-dancing, tent, complete with zipped-in bedrooms and spring-loaded poles, from the landlord of a Burton pub. All went well at the demonstration in the pub function room, and the contraption folded up into a dinky little bag. But come the hour – around midnight, in the unfamiliar surroundings of a cricket-infested French site, with two tired and fractious kids, one with a broken arm in plaster, and a wife having a bad hair day – he couldn’t hack it.
The French and German happy campers, well practised in the art of giving rough-living a sophisticated edge, were relaxed as newts, ready to crawl into their little home-from-home which came complete with fridges, dining tables, even the odd vase of flowers, as we sat in the middle of our little patch, surrounded by bits of tent, primus stove, washing-up bowl, and bags of tinned stew and spaghetti hoops, which was to be our diet for the forseeable future. But it must be said, in the spirit of united nations, they came to our rescue and completed in two minutes, the puzzle he’d fought with for two hours.
I cried for the entire two-week ordeal. And we never did get that tent back into its package.
Our kids wallow in the carry-on-camping scene, and have the pop-up caravan contraption from a trailer down to a fine art, from Scotland to Spain. And according to reports, the credit squeeze is tempting more and more families to follow this economical holiday route, with equipment sales up six per cent. Oh, I like the fresh air. It’s the hard earth, cold showers, 3 am trek to the loo, cacophony of copulating crickets, beastly bugs, and dearth of electric sockets, which put me off joining you all.
end
Camplo…1
We’ve had some rum holidays in our time.
We once joined forces with my sister’s family to rent a cottage in the wilds of Wales, advertised in the Sunday Times, no less, so it should be posh. But nothing prepared us for a flock of sheep dancing on the roof at regular intervals – the house was built into the rain-swept hillside – nor for the bath, standing on bricks in the kitchen, ferns cascading from the ceiling, and a family of toads under the wonky floor-boards.
The two cars both left bits of their under-belly on the mile-long track up to this sparsely-furnished shack – we found the "complete with telly" under a tea-cosy - and the one channel we could summon showed wall-to-wall Eisteddfod. Worse still, we were in a North Wales "dry" county, so our Sunday lunchtime drink was scuppered. Desperation drove us to join the not-so-dry Conservative Club for the day, totally at odds with the old man’s left-wing leanings, but needs must when the devil drives.
And it was North Wales which set the scene for our next adventure, this time a family-run hotel recommended to us by our late friend and colleague, Alan Smith. The setting was exquisite, the food and facilities excellent. But it turned out to be not so much "family" as "familiar", as the old-retainer odd-job-man, who doubled as a waiter and bottle-upper, took a shine to himself. He served him last at every meal to keep him in the dining room, and leapt out at him from nooks and crannies along the bedroom corridors.
After a few days, the better half made his excuses and left me and the kids to our car-less fate. But he was soon replaced by the next victim to book in. And Willy – for that was his name – took us under his wing, drove us to the beach every day, and provided free picnics.
But perhaps my worst experience was a fortnight in France, under canvas.
He’d borrowed the all-singing, all-dancing, tent, complete with zipped-in bedrooms and spring-loaded poles, from the landlord of a Burton pub. All went well at the demonstration in the pub function room, and the contraption folded up into a dinky little bag. But come the hour – around midnight, in the unfamiliar surroundings of a cricket-infested French site, with two tired and fractious kids, one with a broken arm in plaster, and a wife having a bad hair day – he couldn’t hack it.
The French and German happy campers, well practised in the art of giving rough-living a sophisticated edge, were relaxed as newts, ready to crawl into their little home-from-home which came complete with fridges, dining tables, even the odd vase of flowers, as we sat in the middle of our little patch, surrounded by bits of tent, primus stove, washing-up bowl, and bags of tinned stew and spaghetti hoops, which was to be our diet for the forseeable future. But it must be said, in the spirit of united nations, they came to our rescue and completed in two minutes, the puzzle he’d fought with for two hours.
I cried for the entire two-week ordeal. And we never did get that tent back into its package.
Our kids wallow in the carry-on-camping scene, and have the pop-up caravan contraption from a trailer down to a fine art, from Scotland to Spain. And according to reports, the credit squeeze is tempting more and more families to follow this economical holiday route, with equipment sales up six per cent. Oh, I like the fresh air. It’s the hard earth, cold showers, 3 am trek to the loo, cacophony of copulating crickets, beastly bugs, and dearth of electric sockets, which put me off joining you all.
end
Tuesday 5 August 2008
DiY
Lucy’s column for August 5th.
Homelo..1
Following his anti-sun, sea, sand and sangria revelations last week, when he invaded this column to set himself up as the bore of the Balearics, I have to admit that the old man has come good.
I came home from my ten-day extension – as he left Palma, the gels swooped in, and whoopee, did we party – to find the following : a garden which was lopped, chopped, watered and weeded; a garage bereft of any signs of our hoarding past; new soffits and fascia on aforementioned "sod the car – it’s storage we need" dumping unit, set off with a dinky little diamond-shaped bling-y thing-y; and an order in place for new garage doors.
And, yippee, there’s a brand new roof on the kitchen extension, to replace the leaking glass one, a move which has been number one on my nagging list for at least four years, and to which he was forced to succumb when he woke up one morning to a floating feline, watery Whiskas, distressed dishwasher, and the door-mat squelching in the region of the sink. The RubberBond roofing system – sounds a bit kinky, that - was quickly and efficiently installed courtesy of Aquarite Roofing Ltd, and proprietor Ian Hudson was round with his battens, boards and bonding before the old man could say "bail-out bucket".
Oh, and there’s a set of shiny new taps, drip-free and without the scruffy, raggy lagging round the joint, which has graced the kitchen sink for nigh on a year.
As me and my mates – Lil Bancroft, Rose and Lisa Kennedy, and Debbie Kitchen - wallowed in over 80 degrees in the shade – and there wasn’t much shade – he got what he’d craved during his week-long moan-fest of itching, scratching, sighing, sweating, in the relentless sun. He got rain. Buckets of it. And I got results.
Whether it was a sudden rush of blood to the head, or a twinge of conscience because he’d been such a holiday pooper, is anybody’s guess, but – and I never thought I’d ever say this – he’s a little star. Because the frenzied activity hasn’t stopped there. He’s created what could laughingly be called an arbour, out of a flowering shrub which grew so big for its roots it became an eye-poking health hazard, and trimmed one hedge within an inch of its life so that, if I jump up and down, I can see what the neighbours are barbecuing (and note that they’ve got a posh new shed – now there’s a thought).
Mind you, I’ve had to suffer for his art. He’s so proud of his DiY and gardening exploits that every five minutes he drags me outside, insisting I look at his handiwork. Down to a half-inch tack, he’s made sure I’ve noted every nail and screw, brush stroke, sheet of hardboard, clump of soil, and bead of sweat of this master-toiling. And each and every visitor passing through our portals do so at their peril. They suffer the same fate.
There is quite a lot more on my "do-it-before-I’m-too-old-to-appreciate-it" wish list which I hesitate to mention, but, hey, in for a penny, in for another pound of flesh : one of those driveways, with fancy bricks decorating the edges? A hot tub? A sun-trap patio where the wheely bins currently stand? A transformation of the hovel in which I now sit, which quadruples as an office, laundry room, freezer centre, and cat’s en suite?
Timing is of the essence. I’m off on my hols again soon, and have promised not to drag him along. Perhaps a whinge the week before I go might do the trick. In the meantime, though, I’ll settle for a tap which actually stops running when it’s turned off, and a water-proof roof, which is rubbery.
end
Homelo..1
Following his anti-sun, sea, sand and sangria revelations last week, when he invaded this column to set himself up as the bore of the Balearics, I have to admit that the old man has come good.
I came home from my ten-day extension – as he left Palma, the gels swooped in, and whoopee, did we party – to find the following : a garden which was lopped, chopped, watered and weeded; a garage bereft of any signs of our hoarding past; new soffits and fascia on aforementioned "sod the car – it’s storage we need" dumping unit, set off with a dinky little diamond-shaped bling-y thing-y; and an order in place for new garage doors.
And, yippee, there’s a brand new roof on the kitchen extension, to replace the leaking glass one, a move which has been number one on my nagging list for at least four years, and to which he was forced to succumb when he woke up one morning to a floating feline, watery Whiskas, distressed dishwasher, and the door-mat squelching in the region of the sink. The RubberBond roofing system – sounds a bit kinky, that - was quickly and efficiently installed courtesy of Aquarite Roofing Ltd, and proprietor Ian Hudson was round with his battens, boards and bonding before the old man could say "bail-out bucket".
Oh, and there’s a set of shiny new taps, drip-free and without the scruffy, raggy lagging round the joint, which has graced the kitchen sink for nigh on a year.
As me and my mates – Lil Bancroft, Rose and Lisa Kennedy, and Debbie Kitchen - wallowed in over 80 degrees in the shade – and there wasn’t much shade – he got what he’d craved during his week-long moan-fest of itching, scratching, sighing, sweating, in the relentless sun. He got rain. Buckets of it. And I got results.
Whether it was a sudden rush of blood to the head, or a twinge of conscience because he’d been such a holiday pooper, is anybody’s guess, but – and I never thought I’d ever say this – he’s a little star. Because the frenzied activity hasn’t stopped there. He’s created what could laughingly be called an arbour, out of a flowering shrub which grew so big for its roots it became an eye-poking health hazard, and trimmed one hedge within an inch of its life so that, if I jump up and down, I can see what the neighbours are barbecuing (and note that they’ve got a posh new shed – now there’s a thought).
Mind you, I’ve had to suffer for his art. He’s so proud of his DiY and gardening exploits that every five minutes he drags me outside, insisting I look at his handiwork. Down to a half-inch tack, he’s made sure I’ve noted every nail and screw, brush stroke, sheet of hardboard, clump of soil, and bead of sweat of this master-toiling. And each and every visitor passing through our portals do so at their peril. They suffer the same fate.
There is quite a lot more on my "do-it-before-I’m-too-old-to-appreciate-it" wish list which I hesitate to mention, but, hey, in for a penny, in for another pound of flesh : one of those driveways, with fancy bricks decorating the edges? A hot tub? A sun-trap patio where the wheely bins currently stand? A transformation of the hovel in which I now sit, which quadruples as an office, laundry room, freezer centre, and cat’s en suite?
Timing is of the essence. I’m off on my hols again soon, and have promised not to drag him along. Perhaps a whinge the week before I go might do the trick. In the meantime, though, I’ll settle for a tap which actually stops running when it’s turned off, and a water-proof roof, which is rubbery.
end
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