It’s a funny thing but this time last week I was in South Africa in Pretoria East Hospital sitting with my Dad who was attached to a remarkably noisy array of machines some of which blinked, some gurgled and some which went ‘ding’ like the number 57 bus to Highbury circa 1970. I suppose ‘funny’ isn’t the right word. There is nothing funny about a father who has VERY nearly died from complications arising from serious infection and multiple myeloma […]
Flying High
Okay, it wasn’t ‘crack. It was acid. And the thing is that we had just been talking about Mandrax … I best be a little bit clearer. Last weekend my friend and I were yakking away. She turns 90 in September and wants to go white water rafting. (She also wouldn’t mind going for a spin in a race car at Silverstone if you’re offering… she was one speedy driver pre the whole bindness/ageness malarkey.) She was annoyed that now […]
A’ Shaving Grace!
Grace had to go for an overnight to London last week for a hospital check up. Nothing serious we hope – results next week and I’ll let you know. In the meantime she has come back very glossy, fit and happy but with a rather odd shaved bit on her side and tum where she had been strapped to a heart monitor. ‘Couldn’t they have shaved in a logo…given her a ‘Nike flash’? My friend asks peering over a deceptively […]
Brief blog from Vicarage
I am in Radstock at what will be my sister’s new vicarage and have been here for a full week rattling around whilst she is away on silent retreat. …Silent if you allow the odd sneaky text that is. (Do you think Jesus would have been a ‘lol’, smiley face texter? Wonder if there is an emoticon symbol for ‘amen’? 🙂 or ‘I cast you into hell you demon’ 🙁 ) Its not the most handsome frontage but it is […]
Other Soldiers
Miriam Makeba has died this week after performing in an anti Mafia concert in Italy at the age of 76. (Just so you know it was a heart attack not a ‘hit’.) She was an incredibly gifted singer crossing from Afro jazz and blues to folk and beyond. She is single handedly responsible for that bloody song ‘Maliaka’ but we forgive her that for all the other gorgeous stuff she did. At my boarding schools I stockpiled tapes of […]