under another sun

Second day of Lorraine's holiday, and lots of business to be done. I got up early and worked for a couple of hours quite productively on the book before we zoomed into town. The most important business of the day was to go to Brighton Town Hall to talk to the registrars and officially book our wedding, show birth certificates, passports, divorce papers and so on. Also had a separate interview to make sure it was not going to be a fake marriage. We also went to the venue for the reception and booked that sucker, then stopped in at the printers to get the wee invite printed. Also managed to look at a few hotels to get an idea of prices for potential guests. In The Ship Hotel we let a lady go before us at reception, a lovely older Welsh lady who was asking for a Bible in her room, as she had left her one at home. Also looked at wedding bands in windows, but by then I was getting a nosebleed and as there is so much choice in the Old Lanes it made me feel like my head was exploding....

To Lewes this morning, Lorraine looking in fabric shops and I found myself looking at buttons, and marvelling at their variety. Lewes itself swarming with traditional Morris dancers, both men and women, dancing in the streets, and in carparks. Lots of people with jingling clothes in town. The women seemed very springy doing it, even though many of them were not in the first flush of youth. The men as usual fairly comical, with beer mats tucked into their hats, and the evidence of its enjoyment wobbling over their belts. Both L and I fell into a heavy snooze in the afternoon. I woke up and sensibly went to The Basketmakers, for round two of my birthday celebrations. Here I met Matt, and we were soon joined by Wayne and Jonathan, and Wayne's cousin and his partner. We then went off to the Brighton Tavern, for more beers. All good fun. My plan A was to leave to join Lorraine and Rosie, who was celebrating her birthday today, however this play went, highly-enjoyably, astray. Matt t...

Free from desire The new year sees me feeling pleasingly Buddhist about things. I'm not fixated on outcomes - the idea that you'll only be happy if x happens. My fervent hope is that I can just continue what I've been doing for another year. My resolutions are few: simply to focus on the work at hand, and to be the best Peter Kenny I can be. After travelling back from London, I was still Lemsipping and snuffling. I decided to at least go, with Lorraine, to Battle of Trafalgar. This is, after all, is but a spit away. There I bumped into two of my neighbours, Mark and Hilary. I've never properly spoken to them before, but it turns out they are both extremely nice. Mark is an accomplished trombonist I've often heard rehearsing, and Hilary a teacher, who often teaches music. We all seemed to have quite a bit to say to one another. Time slipped past and the new year stole upon us over a pint of Harvey's bitter. And nothing wrong with that. New Year's day was spen...

A Gnome at the feet of Giants Reading more about the root chakra at lunchtime, and I think I need to open mine up. And one of the ways to open it up, I discover, is to hug trees and imagine their roots. Perhaps I shall steal off tomorrow lunchtime for a quick cuddle with a conifer in the graveyard. Nothing eccentric about that is there? No sir. There was a free folk CD with Mojo magazine last month called The Quiet Revolution . I don't know much about folk music, as it seems perilously close to Morris Dancing. And waving hankies and brandishing sticks at one another while dancing like white people is an offence against nature. Anyway, there was track by someone called Davy Graham on it who was, I've learnt, a guitarist trailblazer in the sixties. The CD features an amazing, previously unreleased, track called Blues Raga , which was recorded in 1967. This reminds me slightly of some of Alice Coltrane's work. And as its name suggests, the tune is a bit like a raga, but played...