Having a Nice Day.......

Curmudgeon.  That's my word for today.  Definition: an old person often in a bad mood, a surly bad-tempered person.  It began with the garage first thing this morning.  A gum chewing child with a beautifully painted rose-red cupid's bow looked up from her keyboard to stare blankly at me.  I've brought the car in for servicing, I explained.  She reached behind her and brought out a form.  Just sign that, she said.  I scanned the sheet and noticed that I had to answer Yes or No to the question, Have you been offered a free pre-service inspection? I needed some guidance.  Have I? I asked.  She stared blankly, still chewing.  Just put yes, she said.  So you just offered me it? I checked.  Just put yes, she said, so I did.  She asked for a contact number. I'd already had a text reminding me about the service so I said I thought they had it already.  It'll be in the computer, she said.  I gave her my mobile number.

After walking into town, I had a little browse around the shops.  Noticing that winter boots were starting to appear, I had a look in one of the shoe shops.  No sooner had I stepped inside when a gnome-like middle-aged man with a desperately cheery manner bounced into my personal space and said he liked my shoes.  Yes, I had bought them there some time ago.  I expressed a wish to browse, but he followed me across to the boot display.  There was a pair - knee-high, black leather, which I liked, so I asked to try them in my size.  He sent his pale teenage assistant off to find them in the recesses of the shop while engaging me in light conversation about the store's new look.  I hadn't really noticed, except that most of the seating had been removed.  I sat down in a rather cramped corner to try on the boots.  Mr Cheery knelt down beside me, looking encouraging, leaving me momentarily to pick up a money off voucher, which was thrust into my hand.  Meantime, I was having trouble with the boots.  They fitted my feet, but the inside calf zip wouldn't do up. Let me try, he cried, forcing the fastener up, catching my flesh.  Please, no, I said. They don't fit.  Ah, he said, I see what the problem is, studying the buckled straps on the outside of the legs, These are too tight. And handed one to the pale girl while he struggled with the other boot. This made no difference.  I said I would just leave it for now, but he tried another tack.  Maybe I needed a bigger size?  I had slipped the voucher into my bag just in case he asked for it back.  I put my shoes back on and started for the door, the air heavy with disappointment, theirs, not mine. It's early days for boots; I'll keep looking, but maybe not there. (Actually, I have to confess to owning quite a lot of boots, including my favourite red Fly pair in my profile picture.)

And how is your day going? chirps the robotic smiling girl in the coffee shop before taking my order. I am so bad at responding to that kind of greeting, generally mumbling (as I did today) that it's all right.....On ordering a chocolate tiffin bar and an Americano, she congratulates me on my choice and says they are just what I need to get my day off to a good start.  I mutter that my day started hours ago and move to the area where other customers are collecting coffees.  Not there, says another less robotic girl, stay where you are.  So I did.

I don't think shopping and using various services used to be such a minefield of etiquette.  In California, yes, I got used to:  How are YOU today? and Have a nice day! But here in Scotland, I'm used to being treated in a less personal, but maybe more genuine way.   I like being able to browse in shops without being questioned about my buying intentions as soon as I walk inside.  Maybe it is a generational thing.  But then there is so much I love about NOW.  On-line shopping.  Shopping malls that stay open till 10 at night.  All the stuff you can buy in a supermarket, from light bulbs to socks.

Anyone else feeling curmudgeonly?  Isn't it a great word!  Just to balance things out a bit, the car was ready on time, freshly washed AND they sent a video of the mechanic talking us through the up on the ramp inspection.  Brilliant!

Having a Nice Day.......

Curmudgeon.  That's my word for today.  Definition: an old person often in a bad mood, a surly bad-tempered person.  It began with the garage first thing this morning.  A gum chewing child with a beautifully painted rose-red cupid's bow looked up from her keyboard to stare blankly at me.  I've brought the car in for servicing, I explained.  She reached behind her and brought out a form.  Just sign that, she said.  I scanned the sheet and noticed that I had to answer Yes or No to the question, Have you been offered a free pre-service inspection? I needed some guidance.  Have I? I asked.  She stared blankly, still chewing.  Just put yes, she said.  So you just offered me it? I checked.  Just put yes, she said, so I did.  She asked for a contact number. I'd already had a text reminding me about the service so I said I thought they had it already.  It'll be in the computer, she said.  I gave her my mobile number.

After walking into town, I had a little browse around the shops.  Noticing that winter boots were starting to appear, I had a look in one of the shoe shops.  No sooner had I stepped inside when a gnome-like middle-aged man with a desperately cheery manner bounced into my personal space and said he liked my shoes.  Yes, I had bought them there some time ago.  I expressed a wish to browse, but he followed me across to the boot display.  There was a pair - knee-high, black leather, which I liked, so I asked to try them in my size.  He sent his pale teenage assistant off to find them in the recesses of the shop while engaging me in light conversation about the store's new look.  I hadn't really noticed, except that most of the seating had been removed.  I sat down in a rather cramped corner to try on the boots.  Mr Cheery knelt down beside me, looking encouraging, leaving me momentarily to pick up a money off voucher, which was thrust into my hand.  Meantime, I was having trouble with the boots.  They fitted my feet, but the inside calf zip wouldn't do up. Let me try, he cried, forcing the fastener up, catching my flesh.  Please, no, I said. They don't fit.  Ah, he said, I see what the problem is, studying the buckled straps on the outside of the legs, These are too tight. And handed one to the pale girl while he struggled with the other boot. This made no difference.  I said I would just leave it for now, but he tried another tack.  Maybe I needed a bigger size?  I had slipped the voucher into my bag just in case he asked for it back.  I put my shoes back on and started for the door, the air heavy with disappointment, theirs, not mine. It's early days for boots; I'll keep looking, but maybe not there. (Actually, I have to confess to owning quite a lot of boots, including my favourite red Fly pair in my profile picture.)

And how is your day going? chirps the robotic smiling girl in the coffee shop before taking my order. I am so bad at responding to that kind of greeting, generally mumbling (as I did today) that it's all right.....On ordering a chocolate tiffin bar and an Americano, she congratulates me on my choice and says they are just what I need to get my day off to a good start.  I mutter that my day started hours ago and move to the area where other customers are collecting coffees.  Not there, says another less robotic girl, stay where you are.  So I did.

I don't think shopping and using various services used to be such a minefield of etiquette.  In California, yes, I got used to:  How are YOU today? and Have a nice day! But here in Scotland, I'm used to being treated in a less personal, but maybe more genuine way.   I like being able to browse in shops without being questioned about my buying intentions as soon as I walk inside.  Maybe it is a generational thing.  But then there is so much I love about NOW.  On-line shopping.  Shopping malls that stay open till 10 at night.  All the stuff you can buy in a supermarket, from light bulbs to socks.

Anyone else feeling curmudgeonly?  Isn't it a great word!  Just to balance things out a bit, the car was ready on time, freshly washed AND they sent a video of the mechanic talking us through the up on the ramp inspection.  Brilliant!

Music and Silence

Djembes and Dun-duns

After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.

Aldous Huxley

Daphne Oxenford, Listen with Mother presenter

Some of my earliest memories are of music.  My mother was a singer and had a song for every occasion: The sun has got his hat on, Oh what a beautiful morning, I've got a little list. She sang in the local operatic society, so as soon as the new production was decided, we all learned the songs;  Three little maids from school, When a merry maiden marries, A wandering minstrel I. In the years before television, the wireless was almost always on - Listen with mother had Eileen Browne singing beautiful RP arrangements of traditional nursery rhymes like I had a little nut tree and Three Little Kittens (I still remember all the words); Children's Favourites on a Saturday morning had songs like The Laughing policeman, The Runaway Train and, best of all, Sparky's Magic Piano.  I loved the concept of just running my fingers over the keys and producing wonderful melodies.  My mother and my younger sister played the piano and I had lessons for a while but somehow didn't make the commitment to practise.  I have had several shots at learning as an adult, but I seem to have a lot of hang-ups about it.

Tommy Steele

I found a ukeleIe in the house with an instruction book from the 1930s, bought strings and taught myself to play a few chords. Aged nine, I would do my impersonation of Tommy Steele Singing' the Blues to anyone who would listen. Later I acquired a guitar and played well enough to entertain small children when I ran a playgroup, and had a brief flirtation with the harmonica, inflicting it on my husband on a holiday in rural France.  I greatly admire a friend my age who has taken up the violin in retirement;  she practises diligently, goes to lessons and plays in two traditional music groups. Having been told by my mother that I wasn't a singer, I took up choral singing in 1996 and really struggled at first with sight reading, especially as the first piece I tackled was Bach's B Minor Mass, as a second soprano.  My musical sister made me tapes of my part for practice and I got there in the end.  I now sing in our local choir and find that singing drives out other concerns and makes me feel good.

Still looking for the right instrument, I remembered I had bought a djembe from my African teacher, taking masterclasses at a drumming festival in Foix years ago. Unplayed and neglected, its goatskin had split. A Google search found a drumming group in a nearby town.  The teacher fitted a new skin to my drum and

I've been playing since January. I love it!  No music to read, the rhythm and sound of the drums is all-embracing and it's great to make music in a supportive group. I'm also loving singing to my toddler grandson, taking him along to a Bookbugs session at the library where we're learning new songs and rhymes.

Music and Silence

Djembes and Dun-duns

After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.

Aldous Huxley

Daphne Oxenford, Listen with Mother presenter

Some of my earliest memories are of music.  My mother was a singer and had a song for every occasion: The sun has got his hat on, Oh what a beautiful morning, I've got a little list. She sang in the local operatic society, so as soon as the new production was decided, we all learned the songs;  Three little maids from school, When a merry maiden marries, A wandering minstrel I. In the years before television, the wireless was almost always on - Listen with mother had Eileen Browne singing beautiful RP arrangements of traditional nursery rhymes like I had a little nut tree and Three Little Kittens (I still remember all the words); Children's Favourites on a Saturday morning had songs like The Laughing policeman, The Runaway Train and, best of all, Sparky's Magic Piano.  I loved the concept of just running my fingers over the keys and producing wonderful melodies.  My mother and my younger sister played the piano and I had lessons for a while but somehow didn't make the commitment to practise.  I have had several shots at learning as an adult, but I seem to have a lot of hang-ups about it.

Tommy Steele

I found a ukeleIe in the house with an instruction book from the 1930s, bought strings and taught myself to play a few chords. Aged nine, I would do my impersonation of Tommy Steele Singing' the Blues to anyone who would listen. Later I acquired a guitar and played well enough to entertain small children when I ran a playgroup, and had a brief flirtation with the harmonica, inflicting it on my husband on a holiday in rural France.  I greatly admire a friend my age who has taken up the violin in retirement;  she practises diligently, goes to lessons and plays in two traditional music groups. Having been told by my mother that I wasn't a singer, I took up choral singing in 1996 and really struggled at first with sight reading, especially as the first piece I tackled was Bach's B Minor Mass, as a second soprano.  My musical sister made me tapes of my part for practice and I got there in the end.  I now sing in our local choir and find that singing drives out other concerns and makes me feel good.

Still looking for the right instrument, I remembered I had bought a djembe from my African teacher, taking masterclasses at a drumming festival in Foix years ago. Unplayed and neglected, its goatskin had split. A Google search found a drumming group in a nearby town.  The teacher fitted a new skin to my drum and

I've been playing since January. I love it!  No music to read, the rhythm and sound of the drums is all-embracing and it's great to make music in a supportive group. I'm also loving singing to my toddler grandson, taking him along to a Bookbugs session at the library where we're learning new songs and rhymes.

A Country Wedding

Like a scene from Thomas Hardy, green hills and fields all around, sitting on straw bales, we wait for the bride to arrive.­­­ The guest sitting next to me reveals that he has seventeen umbrellas in the boot of his car. Most of us have wellies as alternative footwear, but the sun is shining and the sky is reliably blue.  The Beatles’ All you need is love plays and we turn to see a little group in fuchsia pink, violet and shimmery turquoise, flowers in their hair and in their hands, tripping through the newly mown grass – the bride, bridesmaids and three little flower girls, with the farmer (the bride’s father) in shorts, followed by an excited collie.



The ceremony is simple and moving. We all sing Annie’s Song, bringing tears to my eyes, and the bride’s six year old daughter reads her own poem, another emotional moment.

The groom wears a kilt and Doc Martens; his four year old son, a mini-version of his dad, proudly produces the rings from his sporran. The registrar explains that this marriage had to wait until the children came along and were old enough to take part.  It makes complete sense – the relationship tried and tested, a home established.  The wedding guests are mostly families with young children and babies, playing in the farmhouse garden outside the marquee.  It is a group celebration of love and friendship, informal and spontaneous.

The bride gives a dramatic Address to the Cake, the little girls sing and dance.  Later, the groom’s band play and we all dance till late.  We need rituals to mark important times in our lives and this one was perfectly staged to suit this family. (I couldn't help contrasting it with the BBC series Don’t Tell the Bride, where the groom plans what he thinks will be the bride’s dream day, often looking more like a nightmare!)  As we leave the lights behind to search for our car in the dense blackness of the country night, I feel a new optimism for the future and a belief (or at least a suspension of disbelief) in love and marriage.

   

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 [EK1]title

A Country Wedding

Like a scene from Thomas Hardy, green hills and fields all around, sitting on straw bales, we wait for the bride to arrive.­­­ The guest sitting next to me reveals that he has seventeen umbrellas in the boot of his car. Most of us have wellies as alternative footwear, but the sun is shining and the sky is reliably blue.  The Beatles’ All you need is love plays and we turn to see a little group in fuchsia pink, violet and shimmery turquoise, flowers in their hair and in their hands, tripping through the newly mown grass – the bride, bridesmaids and three little flower girls, with the farmer (the bride’s father) in shorts, followed by an excited collie.



The ceremony is simple and moving. We all sing Annie’s Song, bringing tears to my eyes, and the bride’s six year old daughter reads her own poem, another emotional moment.

The groom wears a kilt and Doc Martens; his four year old son, a mini-version of his dad, proudly produces the rings from his sporran. The registrar explains that this marriage had to wait until the children came along and were old enough to take part.  It makes complete sense – the relationship tried and tested, a home established.  The wedding guests are mostly families with young children and babies, playing in the farmhouse garden outside the marquee.  It is a group celebration of love and friendship, informal and spontaneous.

The bride gives a dramatic Address to the Cake, the little girls sing and dance.  Later, the groom’s band play and we all dance till late.  We need rituals to mark important times in our lives and this one was perfectly staged to suit this family. (I couldn't help contrasting it with the BBC series Don’t Tell the Bride, where the groom plans what he thinks will be the bride’s dream day, often looking more like a nightmare!)  As we leave the lights behind to search for our car in the dense blackness of the country night, I feel a new optimism for the future and a belief (or at least a suspension of disbelief) in love and marriage.

   

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 [EK1]title

"Take no heed of her- she reads a lot of books." Jasper Fforde

Reading. I've been hooked on books since the first one I remember aged three, the Disney Alice in Wonderland, which I found in my little suitcase when I was left at my aunt's house.  My mother had gone away to have my baby sister and I spent hours during two long weeks in a very quiet house with high door handles puzzling over the words on the page.  Just over a year later, I started school and found the key which broke the code.

When I was seven, my father took me to join the public library which had a dedicated children's section with both fiction and reference libraries.  I chose Enid Blyton's Blue Fairy Book, read it and took it back two days later.  I was allowed to get the tram, not the bus, there and back, alone; the fare was a halfpenny each way.  I was frustrated by only being allowed one ticket, as I always saw other books I wanted to borrow.As no-one suggested what I should read, I devoured all of Blyton's books then simply worked my way round from Alcott to Wynne-Jones. One day I took my book home, read it, got straight back on the tram to return it only to be told I couldn't borrow another book on the same day. My solution in the school holidays was to choose two books, read one in the library, then take the other one out.  By the time I was eleven, I had read nearly all the fiction in the children's library.  I was also reading my way through all the books at home, my mother's collection of classics introducing me to the heady romance of Lorna Doone and the creeping unease of Wuthering Heights. I also devoured my grandmother's weekly copies of Tit-Bits, full of saucy cartoons and blue jokes.

Frustrated, I found an old library ticket of my mother's and ventured into the vastness of the adult library. As the ticket was out of date, I was given a form for my mother to complete.  She did this and, to my great delight, I was given three tickets to a whole new world of books. No-one ever checked on what I was reading.  Looking back, some of it was pretty unsuitable, but I learned a lot..  Secondary school meant access to the school library and more discoveries.  I found M.R. James' Ghost Stories of an Antiquary and the works of Edgar Allan Poe.  I read these in school in daylight as they were much too scary to take home.

Over the years, I've read every day, whenever and wherever possible, greatly helped now by technology.  With my Kindle and the phone app, I don't have to lug a book around with me, but I still love a real book.  In situations where a book or Kindle can't be read (ironing. cooking, driving....), I listen to audio books, often chosen for length. Martin Chuzzlewit is an impressive 39 hours.  

I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that my current listening is the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy.  It is basically Mills & Boon with some 'kinky fuckery' (quote from book). I felt I should know what all the fuss was about. I'm quite bored with it but will carry on to the end.  I almost always finish books, no matter how bad. I've also just read Go Set a Watchman, by Harper Lee - not an amazing book in its own right, but an illuminating addition to her famous To Kill a Mockingbird.

What do you read?  Are you an e-book fan or wedded to proper books? What about threatened library closures?  Comment or email - I'd like to hear from you.