Christmas 2001

41 Albion St
Stratton,
Cirencester,
Gloucs.
GL7 2HT
U.K.

30.11.01.

Hi folks!
I have noticed that changes in the climate can be detected by the tide marks on sheep in the Windrush valley, for as the old country saying goes, ‘ When a sheep be under water, ye field be flooded.’ Every morning as I join the happy commuter throng being sucked in towards the black hole that is Oxford (and coughed out again every evening - obviously incompatible with the peace & tranquility(!) of the dreaming spires), I check for tide marks - well, you never know, what if winter arrives without me noticing.....

......which brings me to the story of the stag & duck murderer - could be a good name for a pub....or perhaps not.... As I was a wandering ‘cross hill and vale (well, the car was), one dark (but not stormy) night, brain cells dulled by the everyday story of country folk drifting across the aether, a ghostly flash of white passed quickly before my eyes!....an hallucination brought on by Joe & Eddie Grundy’s ghost walk, perhaps? Perhaps not! As I saw the belated look of fear in his eyes, I realized that there was no way I could avoid hitting this huge, magnificent beast.....As he disappeared into the bushes and I surveyed the tangled & twisted wreckage and shattered glass, I rather hoped the car had come off worse!

.......A month later, car all straightened out, wandering (slightly more cautiously) along the same stretch of road, ahead of me.....a ghostly flash of white before my eyes.......aaaarrrrgggghhhh!!!! Nerve cells jangling!! Adrenaline & cortisol flooding my whole being!! Not again! Phew! She made it! Yes, folks, it was a doe, a deer, a female deer, this time. One has the feeling of being jinxed, especially when on holiday this year, we nearly had a run in with an enormous wild boar......! Many is the time also on that same stretch of road when ducks of the mainly male variety, seem to feel a pressing need to commit suicide under my wheels.....why me God! Aaaaarrgghh!! I can’t cope!! They’re all ganging up on me!! Sob! Cackle! Cackle! Oh, do take her away someone! This is all getting much too silly! Ahem! What this letter needs is more seriousness...hmmm...

Ah Autumn! time of mists and mellow fruitfulness, or floods and frosts, depending on your state of poetic romanticism, OR the time of the great filling in of the UCAS form! Being contrary souls, the teenage (or teenage-like) inhabitants of this household have both decided to attempt to persuade various universities to take them on at the same time. Oh the expense! Much wringing of hands! Poverty staring us in the face! Gulp!! BUT, heh! heh! we do get rid of them! FREEDOM AT LAST!!! Now DO calm down, Joy, they will be back! Tamsin wants to sing for her living, and is applying for Popular Music courses at various ex polytechnics, which are falling over themselves to offer such courses, now that it has been recognized that Popular Music makes pots of filthy lucre for the country, is flavour of the month with the kids, and ties in with the government’s aim of getting more kids to go into higher education. Neat, huh! Rupert’s aim has always been to do Sound / Music Technology, but unfortunately so do many other wannabees, so where he will get in and at what level remains to be seen, especially as his enthusiasm for the enterprise is somewhat luke-warm. He and some of his more business-minded friends were thinking of starting a small business instead, (running a recording studio, what else!) but since none of them have any money, this could be a slight handicap. At the moment he’s being employed by his old college as a part-time music technology technician (20 hours per week), and making up the readies by a part-time cleaning job, also at the college. Better the devil you know.....!

Earlier in the year, a flash of light scorched the old brain cells, and set in motion a train of events that is, even as I speak, driving me yet more crazy (is this possible, I hear you say, hasn’t she been locked away yet?). For this, folks, is the year of the virtual conservatory.......It will exist soon, I know it....! Honestly, you have to believe me...! I didn’t dream it all up...! BUT....there is a fine line between VIRTUAL and REALITY.....! Cackle!......Several sets of plans later, umpteen sets of measurements, and a similar number of surveyors, six months later, and STILL they cannot get the distance right from one side of the yard to the other! Soon yet another surveyor is due to arrive.....ho! hum!...we keep telling them the answer, but we are merely laymen and know nothing. Oh the frustration! Much banging of heads against walls! Scream!! We live in hope that by NEXT Christmas it may be built (we were told originally that we would have it by THIS Christmas....boy! were we naive?). We thought it would be a great place to stash heaps of young noisy persons in, while us oldish knackered beings could inhabit the comfy place, but at this rate the problem could go away before it arrives. Tamsin is still hoping to hold her 18th birthday bash in it....well....!

In the middle of all this we decided to go to France again. This time we decided to try EuroStar (surprisingly comfortable & quick), followed by Motorail from Calais to Narbonne (surprisingly uncomfortable but quicker than driving). Upon arrival at the Calais Motorail terminal, one has to go through an utterly confusing process, which only makes sense once you can sit back and think about it, but which at the time just serves to irritate and you wondered why you bothered! Yes, you can take your car + top box on the train, but first you must take your exceedingly full top box off the top of your car (they of course stand around watching you struggle!), placing everything that was in it inside the car, minus anything you might require on the journey. After this there is an unseemly rush towards the café, where you must stock up on food for the journey (there is no food or drink sold on the train!). Old hands know the ropes, since these are the ones at the front of the queue who’ve stocked up on all the special picnic orders (of which there is a limited supply, only you don’t realize this at the time!). So when you amble over to the counter with your limited French and not knowing quite what is going on, you have to buy anything they have that looks like real food, because they’re trying to herd you on to the train a whole hour before the train is due to leave! This is so that the station staff can play dodgems with your car, whilst you’re safely on board out of their way! After finding your compartment, and thinking, by gum! isn’t it pokey, God knows how we would’ve managed if there had been six of us!, an awful realization dawns that you’re to be trapped in this compartment (uncomfortable couchettes + blankets + pillows) for the next 14 hours, which makes going to the loo the most exciting part of the journey! Actually, the most exciting(!) part was when the conductor banged on our door by mistake in the middle of the night, shouting in French, thinking we wanted to get off at the next stop! Groan! Luckily, Rupert remembered enough French to tell him it wasn’t us, and stiffly we turned over to try to sleep (joke!)....

...A sleepless night later, at 10-30 a.m. we finally arrived at Narbonne. All around us were hollow-eyed zombies with rumbling stomachs, gathered in the corridor, one thought in their minds.... breakfast! Must have coffee! We all wandered around the station muttering, until......Suddenly the train from Hamburg arrived & all these Germans rushed over to a waiting bus (they obviously knew something we didn’t!), and only then did we realize that we had to be taken by bus, a whole 100 metres, to our waiting breakfast! Croissants and coffee disappeared in unseemly haste! Gradually, we all felt human enough to begin the whole rigmarole of placing everything in the top box again, after having first located it, and fixed it back on again (again, no help, AND only the driver allowed - naughty children!). Never again!!! I prefer driving any day!

After this, things could only get better....the warmth....the beautiful mountain scenery (and we even saw a wedding party en route - very excitable people leaning out of cars , tooting & shouting at everyone - very different culture - great fun!). Our gîte was in the Parc Naturel du Haut Langedoc, in the tiny village of Colombière-sur-Orb (where the spiders live!!??! - actually a scorpion - but more of this later!). The gîte was very old, part of a typical mediaeval village layout - all the houses crammed together in a small space, about 3-4 feet wide alleys, i ïnhabited mostly by foreigners it seemed. A very friendly Danish couple seemed to be doing endless D.I.Y. just two cottages down, and strangely did their barbequeing outside their front door in the alley (quite eccentric we thought, since they did have a large patio around the back!). Our gîte required a certain agility.... Leading down to the bathroom and our bedroom, there were perilously steep steps (actually a ladder!) specially designed to fit into a very tight space and you either placed your feet in exactly the right position on each step or you bounced down on your bum! bump! ouch! bump! ouch! bump! ouch! It was possible to get there by going out of the front door and in at the back.... We had a patio across the lane, with hammock and barbeque, accessible by going down one set of steps and up another, or by just leaping across if you happen to be Rupert. Hanging over the hammock was a vine, complete with ripe grapes.....mmmm! very evocative! Unfortunately, the ants took exception to any interloper and took to defending their territory with great ferocity.....at the end of the holiday ankles were ringed by interesting patterns of red dots...itch! itch! scratch! scratch! Wildlife in the gîte was plentiful...every morning came the feeling that one had just been something’s main meal of the day...’Aaarrrggghhh!!! I’ll never be able to show my legs in public again’ was a familiar refrain. And then there was the scorpion......gulp!! One night whilst settling down into a wine-induced torpor, a sudden scream rent the air...’Dad, quick, there’s a scorpion on my bed!!’ No doubt memories were stirring of the scorpion sting received in Zimbabwe many years ago, and whilst trying to raise enough brain cells into action, Bob slowly dragged himself out of bed! ‘Quick, Dad!’ Finally, the top of the stairs was reached, a glass was obtained, and......it was a tiny little thing, with sweet little pincers waving around in the air...if you annoyed it from the safety of the other side of the glass! It was a bit slow, but the next morning , when the sun had warmed it, it was really lively and got quite angry if we teased it! Tisk! Tisk! We let it go and it scuttled into a crevasse, muttering ‘ What a night I’ve had! (Think Alice in Wonderland!)

Having touched upon the stunning mountain scenery, I have to mention the walks around the local gorges. As far as our local gorge was concerned, I was knackered before we had left the confines of Colombière! This was a pleasant day’s outing really, until we got to the last bit! Onwards the intrepid Irvings battled, hacking our way through scrub, up the side of the mountain, glad of the shade from the trees, hating the per-twang as yet another branch hit you in the face, being overtaken by yet another hiker determined to make it to the youth hostel before lunch (nightfall is surely good enough!). We were told that walking is undertaken with ruthless determination round here....no room for slackers then.....better give up now!! Settling down to eat our meagre rations, trying to avoid being trampled to death in the rush, averting our eyes from the withering looks, the snorts of derision.....REAL hikers don’t need to STOP to eat....must press on....only another 50 miles before nightfall!! Once we arrived at the top, after staggering our way past the hermit’s hovel (lucky hermit), the youth hostel (lucky youths), and The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (not quite!), the view was big, it was VERY big, in fact, it was HUGE!! It was also very windy, and the only way we could hear ourselves think, was to huddle behind a rock. At this point, Rupert was overtaken by the wild beauty of it all, and had the romantic notion that he just had to listen to Bjork on his Walkman, whilst precariously balancing on a rock at the top-most point over the head of the valley...it was a LONG way down. The view over the plain towards the Pyrenees was stunning. Eventually, we came to a part of the path which was a pre-historic trackway, and had been improved(?) by the Romans. This IMPROVEMENT involved building a series of zig-zags down the side of the mountain, presumably to ease the transport of supplies over the mountain pass, but it was SO BORING!!!! (we were in the trees - not even any view) and SO tiring! Tamsin raced ahead, and by the time we caught up with her an hour later, she’d certainly had more excitement(!) than the rest of us, having been bitten by a dog, and had spent some time sitting in someone’s house, having a stilted conversation in French and English with the owner’s daughter, and was more than a little shaken by the whole episode. There was no way of avoiding this dog, which had taken up residence in the middle of the path which went past a settlement, between people’s houses. It had backed Tamsin into a corner, and had just sunk its teeth into her knee (luckily only grazing her) when its owner appeared...phew! thought Tamsin, just in time! I suppose when you live on a public footpath, you worry about intruders.....Boy, were we ready for the cup of tea that day! Trouble was, who was going to make it......! ‘Out of my way!’...’I got to the sofa first!’ Kick! Gouge! Thump! (if only we had the energy!) Flop! Steam! Steam! (pongy feet!!).

The most-walked or most-viewed gorge in the area, depending on your mode of transport, is the Gorge d’Heric. We had conned the kids into yet another walk by telling them about the little train that took you half-way up the mountain, from whence it was only a short walk to the top....however!...the best laid plans of mice and men....! We drove to the little village, parked our car, saw ‘le petit train’, BUT...it had been grounded! A notice pinned to the side informed us that the village mayor had stopped the train until further notice for environmental reasons (too much erosion of the mountain-side), putting half a dozen people out of work (a lot in one village). The kids groaned, but we assured them that the track was good AND there was a café at the top! bribe! bribe! Walking was pleasant, the views good, and every other rock in the tinkling river contained yet another frying body, nude or otherwise! sizzle! sizzle! The café was a thriving business in a tiny hamlet at the head of the gorge - and when I say tiny, I mean about 3 houses, one of which was the café, with another being a gîte! It was a delightful, lonely spot, apart from the constant tramp of walkers past your front door. After purchasing a pot of EXTREMELY local honey (‘Hello bees!’), we looked at the guidebook - ‘Bardou, oh that’s just down the path’. It must be mentioned at this point that there were NO CONTOURS on this map!!! One hour later......‘We’re lost!’...‘Why did we have to come on this walk, anyway?’ Moan! Moan! Accusations abounded, moods darkened, would we ever see a cup of tea again!! Little did the intrepid band know that a cup of tea was many hours tramp away!!! ......‘Hark!’ ‘The hills are alive with the sound of music!’ and not a Julie Andrews in sight. Was this an hallucination brought on by tea-deprivation? No, we really had reached the musical village of Bardou. We had heard tales of this place, occasionally brought back by similar tea-deprived beings, but now we had seen it for ourselves. Oh, joy! Oh, rapture! Pied piper-like, we followed the occasional snatches of singing, until the village appeared....no tea though!

To understand why Bardou had entered the consciousness, we must transport you back, gentle reader, to a few nights earlier, when we went to a concert in the spa town of Lamalou-les-bains. There seemed to be a season of concerts given by many different choirs, chamber musicians, even complete orchestras, at several small towns in the vicinity, and they (the bands, that is!) nearly all seemed to be called Bardou. How could all these musicians come from one small mountain village? The story is that the whole village was bought by a rich German, who now brings lots of aspiring musicians over from Germany, lets them stay in the houses in the village, where they practice in the newly renovated village hall. Of course, because there is only one road into the village, they don’t disturb anyone when they practice, the musicians get used to playing in front of audiences, and the audience gets in free - everyone benefits! Before every piece of music, there were explanations in French & German, which taxed the old brain cells somewhat....!

A wrong turning, much cursing, blame attributed, a tiring 10 kilometre hike, and a further 3 tea-less hours later, an ice-cream parlour hove into view!?! Since it was getting dark and late in the day - Britain, this was not! Would anyone ever speak to me again? ........sniff! sniff! sigh!

Rehabilitation was finally complete a couple of days later..... Doing the English version of the sizzling on a rock, which involves keeping your hat on (think ‘The Full Monty’!). Ah, a picnic with a difference - think waterfall, think cool mountain stream, think hot, hot sun, think lots of red wine (sigh!) and most importantly, think NO RAIN!!....and only one swimming costume between us!! (Tamsin wasn’t about to share....anyway, it might’ve been a bit tight!). We have some interesting photos of Rupert throwing himself into the water, and the water instantly rejecting him....’Oh, my God, it’s f...ing freezing!’ Chortle! Chortle! Guffaw! As for the rest of us....’I’ve got my toe used to it!’ ‘No! Aaaarrrggghhh!! I’ve got cramp!!’ Later......standing under the refreshing waterfall without a care in the world(?)....and we’ve got the pictures to prove it!! Actually, it was great fun - in a grit-your-teeth sort of way!

And now...Bob’s bits! (partially!)

What of the non-sweat-inducing, non-blister-growing bits of the hol???? The heat drove us underground to look at up-market rocks (actually aragonite - nice pretty crystals - Joy) in peculiar colours and shapes, described in deeply-accented French ba t’local gurl, all in a very convoluted cave. The Joy drove us to strange building sites filled with unfinished edifices that people called Romans had more-or-less put up years ago and then just left... like the aqueduct (Pont du Gard) that was supposed to take water to the city of Nîmes but they had just forgotten to join it up to the canal, and as for the distribution system in the town, that was a right mess and wouldn’t ever work... Sometimes, we were allowed to relax in cafés but mostly it was “just this one last art gallery” or “Oh look! a jolly little labyrinthine mediaeval town to get lost in!” (‘With lots of yummy expensive shops!’ - Joy & Tamsin - ‘Great market for HUGE trousers!’ - Rupert - ‘Ouch! my wallet’ - Bob). Oh, I have to mention Pézenas pies - or ‘Clive Pies’ - though probably unmentionable for us vegetarians since they contain meat (yeuch! wash yo mouth out!). The mediaeval town in question, Pézenas, is well known for these cotton-reel-shaped pies, which were so cute looking, we were forced to try them, just for once, even though we’re vegetarian (gulp! guilty feelings abound!). Apparently, when Clive of India passed through the town, presumably on his way back from India, he had to convalesce in Pézenas, and was so grateful to the townsfolk for making him feel so welcome, that he gave them this recipe for spicey fruity pies (does this sound familiar?). They are rather like the mediaeval version of our mince pies, but taken to India and back again! ‘Clive Pies’ are made from mutton with spices and lemon zest, and apparently you can now buy them in Market Drayton, which was Clive’s home town, and twinned with Pézenas. So now you know!!......Or, on the other hand, devotees of ‘The Food Programme’ on Radio 4 will already know.....in which case ignore this!

In this letter, you’re supposed to put all these ! and ?s everywhere. So, if you’ll excuse me a moment, I’ll just ?!!!!????!!!!???. Ah, good, got them off my chest. For me, Bob, this year has seen quite a change of life style, being pushed out of the door at Blackwells when they ran out of money and being dropped into the curious world of the the global homeworker. Yes, folks, I sit in a tiny, junk-laden room in the Cotswolds, and people in China, Hungary and Texas ring me up when the smooth flow of data in and out of the Nokia mobile phone empire is interrupted. Sometimes, I have to drive to those thrilling and lively towns, Banbury and Bracknell. Mostly, I plod upstairs ..... It could be more exciting... I don’t actually work for Nokia, I work for a company called Exel that looks after stuff for Nokia. It is a curious organization that does almost nothing itself, except manage the other companies to which it has ‘out-sourced’ (yeuch!) everything. All calculated to make me feel part of, err, nothing. They do pay fairly well and mostly leave me alone to get on with things, but the things that they leave me to get on with are terminally boring. Moan! moan! gripe! groan!

Late news extra! - Tamsin has got a conditional place at Dartington School of Arts to do Contemporary Music Performance. She has been up to Manchester Metropolitan, but heard nothing yet. Rupert has only just heard about an interview at Thames Valley University to do Music Technology. Excitement all round for us parents - freedom at last! I must conclude this letter as it’s now my birthday - the big FIVE ZERO - and I have to find out what it means for my brain cells! Mad! Total madness! Cackle! Cackle!

To all of you still with us, have a Merry Christmas & New Year.

Lots of luv

Joy, Bob, Rupert & Tamsin.

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