On Tuesday I had a simple luncheon comprising egg mayonnaise with a sliver of smoked salmon, cold salmon and devilled kidneys. I have now re-read Abbie and Arthur (much the better of the two Abbie books.)
I have a fiendishly difficult quiz for you today. Here is a list of men (clue: no women) and I simply want you to guess which one of them has this alphabet soup after his name, KT, GCVO, GBE, CB, TD, PC and what these ten men have in common.
Monday morning and I’m out of the house early to give the cleaner a free rein to wreak the havoc that seems necessary to have a house that doesn’t give the appearance of being lived in by a smelly, old tramp.
Where to Havana? The bandstand built in 1869 for Kensington Gardens was moved to Hyde Park in 1886 and still has concerts. On Sunday Here to Havana were doing their stuff.
My fiction is arranged alphabetically by author, like many bookshops. Between Raymond Chandler and GK Chesterton are two slim volumes by Dane Chandos. Have you read him or even heard of him?
He was born in London in 1913 but brought up in Paris where his father was correspondent for the Daily Herald. A degree in Mathematics from the Sorbonne gives no clue as to the direction his life took.
On Wednesday evening Matt Monro was crooning “on days like these … “ Where was I? No trumpets, no foie gras but I was in heaven. Gentlemen in England now a-bed shall think themselves accurs’d they were not at Opera Holland Park on 1st August which in fact is not St Crispin’s Day (25th October).
What does London mean to you? A place to live, a place to work, a place to visit? Noisy, polluted, overcrowded? Spacious parks, world-class museums, music, theatre, shopping and restaurants? On Tuesday evening I sought the opinion of two people who, like me, came to live in London.
I cannot remember if I had an Irish Post Office savings account; I imagine I did. For sure my mother opened a British PO savings account for me on Eton High Street in 1967.
“It’s brain,” I said: “pure brain! What do you do to get like that Jeeves? I believe you must eat a lot of fish, or something. Do you eat a lot of fish, Jeeves?” “No sir.” (My Man Jeeves, PG Wodehouse)