under another sun

A bit of business admin. Lorraine off to London to enjoy meeting Sam at the Royal Festival Hall. Sam staying with his dad for a few days.  A message to Carl whose birthday it was.  I did some of my own writing this morning, and had some productive thoughts. Made off this afternoon, to Brighton where I met Anton in the garden of the Batty for a few cheery beers and a couple of games of Bones and a good deal of talking. Followed by more of both in The French Horn, where we had a raclette , and did finicky heating of cheese and bits of meat on little plug in raclette grills which ticks lots of boxes for a finickmeister like Anton.  A cheery afternoon and early evening. Rolled down the hill for an absolute final in the Batty before I zoomed home. But only to find the train stopped at Newhaven, and I had to catch a bus from there to get home. Surprised to find a poem I wrote in the 80s quoted by the Priaulx Library on facebook -- also featuring Richard of course. One must take...

 Lorraine and I off on the train to Brighton at lunchtime. Walked down through town to meet Penny and Steve in Mowgli, a restaurant with good quality Indian street food. We had things like bhel puri and gunpowder chicken, and home lamb curry, sat on seats with ropes for backs. Some seemed to be actual swings. A savage price for beer, but luckily I only had the smallest bottle of  Cobra I'd ever seen. Interested by Steve telling us about the paper he is delivering in Japan about synthetic rubies discovered in a sunken ship called the SS Persia -- sunk without warning by a dastardly U-boat in the Mediterranean in 1915.  After lunch, and fond farewells, Lorraine and I walked up towards the station, through the back alleys and my old Twitten, Camden Terrace. We went to the Batty, where we met Anton for a bitterly contested three-way game of bones, and a few beers. The Batty on the brink of change, the regulars fear for it.  Lorraine and I sloped home to cheese on toast. ...

Dem bones Mondays. Don't you just love 'em. Got up extra early to go to the dentist, but dismally worming trains meant I was still miles from London when the appointment was due. Got to work late too, grinding teeth, for the two and a half hours of my journey. Once at the office, managed to skid on a piece of cardboard which slid only a matter of four or five inches, but I managed to jerk my back. Now I can't turn my neck and have made an appointment with the back cracker. When not brooding about spines, and their treachery, I generally enjoyed thinking about skeletons. Planning another skeleton monologue as I like them, and Joan cleverly likes them too. Home and sated a desire for cheese and onion sandwiches. Must be craving calcium.