under another sun

A morning of action. Got up early, and sent off the first two parts of Gordon Road , to Long Poem Magazine. Then had breakfast with Lorraine, looking at my mail, which included the last two copies of the Sampler One from Mariscat with a nice note from Hamish the editor. Another letter told me how to claim my state pension, and my replacement Lamy pen arrived.   Had a good morning's work. Lorraine off to see Pat and Maureen, and brought them back for lunch. Then Lorraine went to the dentist, with Maureen as they both had appointments. I went for a long walk this afternoon, taking some photos with my proper camera. Spoke to Beth briefly, who'd seen the midwife today. All well.  Home, and Pat and Maureen in the garden. Maureen told me very sweetly that the best thing that ever happened was Lorraine and I meeting each other.  Later Lorraine and I mooched down to the seafront again, stopping at Osbourne's fish and chips en route. We ate fish and shared chips in the evening sun...

Another beautiful sunny day. I did some writing in the morning, and Lorraine machined some curtains, made bread and played piano among other things.  The afternoon given over to driving over to the tip, with lots of stuff from the garage. House-poo done, we went around to see Beth and James and had coffee in her back garden as jackdaws chuckled, and Mickey the cat zoomed about. Beth doing well, but very keen to have the baby, given that the due date was Monday and it's now Sunday.  Home again, and we worked more in the garage. I built another shelving unit, and Lorraine did gardening of all kinds while I got to work with a rubber hammer, and had percussive fun bashing the metal. This done, I cooked and we had dinner watching the film Conclave , a drama about the politics of electing a Pope. Rather interesting movie, and we both liked it. Below shelving units. Assembled rather well even if I say so myself. We have two more of them, and we are going to put everything on them. Be...

Up after not a great night's sleep. It was still hot after the thunder moved on, and my idea of drinking rum and coke when I got home didn't help either. A leisurely breakfast, and then Lorraine and I went to the garage and worked again at the huge task of sorting it all out. It was good to have a day at home to do this. I built, with Lorraine's help two large metal shelving units from an outfit called Big Dug, like assembling a Meccano set, and took the motley collection of cupboards etc down, and Lorraine and I dragged things about, and Lorraine put things in storage boxes. Now we have a garage full of the new things plus all the old things. But it felt like progress. And I always am pleased with myself when I can do something practical without making a hash of it. Lunch outside too. All well.  We decided to watch Forrest Gump this evening, one of Lorraine's pals expressing amazement that we'd not seen it. I had my reservations, but Tom Hanks did an excellent job ...

Up early and wanting to write this morning. Lorraine scampering to be with Maureen when she took a medical call.  Writing some bits and pieces, and seeing if Gordon Road can be built into my bigger collection and so on. Wrote to Mariscat recently asking for more copies of the Sampler , but they are able to send me only two copies. This suggests the print run was minimal. It does mean that if I put some of the poems from that into a fuller MS most people won't have seen them. Then off to the gym, where I did quite an enthusiastic session on the cross trainer, but the weight machines were all clogged up with geezers, so I cut my losses and sloped home in the heat.  Lorraine and I had a rather idyllic afternoon, lounging outside under the big parasol.  Rebooting tonight. We met Helen and Andy, Matthew and Andy for a drink. Just as I was sitting down the Tobster called. He's secured a pied-à-terre in Toronto for when he resumes teaching.  After a couple of burgers and a...

To Hampstead with Mum today. Finished Epitaph for a Spy by Eric Ambler. Outside my usual reading ambit, but fun nevertheless. A really easy journey for me, though Mum's train had to be taken out of service. I met her at Hampstead station and toddled all the way down Flask Walk, round the back of a school full of children in the playground demonstrating their healthy lungs. Into The Old White Bear which is one of our new haunts. In the Old White Bear a table full of posh theological students nearby, the most valuable wearing red trousers and a wide brimmed hat. Being God focused clearly not irreconcilable with being a dandified fop -- which I liked. Mum and I were talking about art, and I was reminding her of painting and artwork she did when she was younger and we were living in Neasden, for example a tall totem pole made out of vertebrae, a nail picture of the sun and moon and swirling stars. I remember her hammering many nails into an old door and spraying gold and silver onto i...

Morning and lying in bed I could hear a clear peeping from a baby gull or two on the roof.   Beth update: she is feeling fine and the baby will come in its own time. A day of making further changes to Gordon Road , then I sent it off to Robin, who agreed to have a squint at it for me. A van parked in our drive and a man offloaded a pallet of self assembly metal shelving units. I said I wanted them out the back, and he said that he wasn't insured for that, and we were lucky he put it on our drive and not on the street. There was a brief free exchange of ideas, but there was not much I could do about it. Turned out once Lorraine looked at all the stuff that had been delivered, there was a bit missing, which will come at another time. I used my trolley and took it all through the garden to the garage in half an hour. The hateful gull fortunately not around to fly at me while I did so. Lorraine came back from going to her personal trainer and seeing Penny. She did some gardening, I lur...

Up and doing last bits on Gordon Road this morning, I want to make it good, but I don't want to tweak it to death. Then I took myself off just after noon to the gym, and did a fairly decent workout there. Lorraine brought Pat and Maureen back to sit in the back garden, and Beth came too. Today was her due date but she's relaxed about it, and doesn't want to get into the mindset that the baby is somehow late.  I prepped a little bit for the reading, had a catnap and a shower. Robin came to collect me, but only after Maureen had told me off for having dirty glasses, and cleaned them for me. Took some tupperware with food in it, and Robin parked on the little bridge in the middle of Arundel, and we had a sort of picnic on a little green by the river looking at black headed gulls, and a man with a very old dog. I had forgot to pack a fork, but felt a wave of love for Lorraine as I opened it up to find she'd packed one. Robin and I walked through the streets of Arundel, whic...

The gull on the roof still giving me dog's abuse whenever I set foot outside the house. Lorraine heard some peeping noises of a baby gull this morning, however.  Lorraine and I went off to Brighton this evening to see a movie called The Salt Path , with Jason Isaacs and Gillian Anderson at the Duke of York's. Nice to be in the cinema, and we quite enjoyed the film, which had the protagonists walking the coastal path in Cornwall and Devon, in bleak circumstances. They had been made homeless, had no money, and the husband had been diagnosed with a rare brain disease. It all ends well though. Gillian Anderson is very watchable even when looking bleak. After we went to the Shahi, where we'd not been for a long time together. Lorraine, especially, given a Queen's welcome by one of the staff who still remembered our orders. Felt happy to be in there again. Lots of memories in that restaurant. Home on the train.  Gillian Anderson in The Salt Path. And a cucumber flower.

A free day. Rainy but nice. Rain dodged in the garden this morning. And spent time in the garage, organising things and beginning the project to clear it out and store things properly. We ordered some racks and so on for the garage to bring efficiency and order to the chaos. Dog's abuse from the gull on the roof, who dives at me especially and shrieks at me from the moment I walk out into the garden. The gull also had a go at Brian, yarping horribly at him, and flying at him.   In the evening we rain dodged down to Gino's just around the corner. I had booked tickets for us at the Duke of York's cinema, but luckily Lorraine had discovered that I'd actually booked it for tomorrow instead like a numpty. A lovely pizza and salad at Gino's however. And it felt fun for just the two of us to be going out.  Below, Lorraine is the poster girl for volunteering locally.  Andrew contacted me the other day, saying that my wife was all over the internet. Also bees in a purple pop...

Up early and at my desk. This morning I finally finished the second draft of Gordon Road . Almost done now. The next draft will only be a matter of polishing punctuation, the poem's form and upgrading the occasional word. Allowed myself a measure of cheer about it.   Had breakfast with Lorraine we often do Wordle over our boiled eggs in the morning. Sometimes, when there's more time Lorraine also does Murdle which is a logic game when you work out who a murderer was. I've been struggling with Wordle this week. Yesterday the word was DATUM and I didn't get it. Lorraine did. She is better at Worldle than me I think.  Silwia comes for three hours on Friday morning to clean and she is very sweet. She talks to Brian a lot, and she and Lorraine hug when she comes in, and she curtseys sometimes which I don't think I've seen anyone else do in real life. She seems a little bit nervous of me, probably I am typing in my study Jack Nicholson in The Shining when she's he...

Another busy seeming day. Up and off to drawing class in the morning. Our model today was a woman from Mumbai. Adele and I were chatting in the break about how much more fun it felt to draw people who aren't skinny and perfect looking. My own drawings all curates eggs, but I did do one in the two minute poses at the beginning that I quite liked. We always start with these quick poses and I inevitably make a hash of them. Then home, a bit of faffing about, then it was time for the Understory. However as Robin sent me the podcast at exactly the same moment as the Understory session started. My manners were terrible for my fellow poets, I was eating noodles, had prepared nothing and had to make my excuses after an hour. To do some editing and blurb writing. We managed to get the podcast, featuring Robin's interview with Erica McAlpine. The second I'd finished this, a quick change and into the car with Robin. We drove to Crawley where there was a presentation and a bit of a par...

A great night's sleep. Tidied the kitchen, made breakfast, then prepared for a recording with Robin, discussing poetry about vampires, John Keats, Hope Mirrlees, and Father's Day. All went well and we had some fun. The publisher's publicist wrote to me about the Vampire book, wondering if we could delay covering it till a bit later in the year, but it was already done by then.  I am going to be a last minute replacement reader, in a poetry reading in Arundel with Robin next Monday, which is Beth's due date. Then I sloped off to Pomegranate to meet Lorraine and Pat and Maureen for an early lunch. Maureen ended up giving me half hers, luckily she had the same,  sourdough bread with smashed avocado with smoked salmon sprinkled with seeds and chilli flakes. Actually a prefect little lunch. Maureen always takes her hearing aid out in the cafe, so we communicate with her by pulling faces and bellowing. Then back home to work on Gordon Road -- a really good session and made a ...

Lorraine off this morning to take Pat and Maureen to a celebration of life, for Pat's cousin Tony, who I met only once many years ago, in the Isle of Sheppy. They stayed overnight to make things easier. So I had the day to myself. I went to the gym, then in the afternoon went to Lewes. Charlotte was having a birthday party for local poet pals. Twelve guests in all, including mutual pals Robin, SJB, Stephen Bone and Janet Sutherland. I'd never been to Charlotte's place before. I met a poet with purple hair lost like me, and we found our way to the door, was let in by Pete, Charlotte's husband, and climbed up a flight of stairs, then outside, up a zigzag path in the garden and then found ourselves on the top of a mound, overlooking all of Lewes and the downs beyond. A rather magical place that can only be accessed through Charlotte's house. It was there we all read a poem (except Robin) and had a poetic altogethery time.   There was an immediate calamity however. Ther...