Today I expected to be on James Miller’s church sculpture treasure hunt in Northants. It is a perfect day to linger in cool church interiors and picnic on salmon rolls washed down with gin and wine. But I will not be cheated entirely and will conduct my own sculpture tour.
No sign of swifts over London but the Red Arrows did fly past this morning and I glimpsed a woodpecker on Wimbledon Common. When I was a child thrushes were common but I’ve only just realised they are rarer these days.
When I was at uni, as the young say, I looked forward to seeing Jeeves in London. It was launched in 1975 and with Andrew Lloyd Webber’s music, Plum’s wit and a helping hand from Alan Ayckbourn was a sure bet to run longer than The Mousetrap.
The explorer, Robin Hanbury-Tenison, was on the front page of The Times yesterday. He caught Covid-19 on a skiing holiday and nearly lost his life. Thanks be to God, he is at home with his wife in Devon and will celebrate his 84th birthday tomorrow.
As a tourist you may have had brekker at the Café de Flore. The service was abominable, l’addition astronomic but on holiday it’s worth it to sit in the sun, read a newspaper and watch people. Inevitably, then you will walk down the Rue du Bac towards the Seine.
To understand, “get”, the title you must pronounce “live” to rhyme with “jive” not “sieve”. It’s the silliest idea since that opera performed in four helicopters that cropped up three years ago in A Flying Soloist.
The very name, Trieste, is redolent of sadness: I’m thinking of Françoise Sagan’s novel. I went for a Ryanair weekend in 2008 and, to avoid repetition, you can read about it in a post misleadingly titled Tahiti .
Now the birds are loving lockdown. An uxorious pair of Great Tits eat peanuts from a feeder in the garden unfazed by us. The falcons nesting aloft Charing Cross Hospital laid three eggs. One has hatched and it seems probable that the others will not.