October 16

16th Oct 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ 1 Comment

Woken at 3am to a swishing sound accompanied by the occasional thud, I turn on the light to see “The Writer” apparently playing tennis in the bedroom. My sleeping eyes gradually open to focus on him leaping as though to retrieve a ball and stretching high into the corner of the room in a serving motion. As I drag myself into a sitting position, I hear him muttering “Damn thing” under his breath as he jumps. Waking slowly, I run through the possibilities in my mind. Maybe he’s sleep-jumping? Perhaps he’s dreaming he’s Roger Federer, or Novak Djokovic – can’t remember which one he hates – and, anyway, would he be dreaming about the one he hates or the one he likes? Perhaps he’s gone mad? Perhaps he’s decided he no longer likes the bedroom decor and he’s trying to smash it up? Perhaps he’s decided he’s not getting enough exercise during Lockdown?

It takes a while for me to register that his racquet is bright orange and another while to remember the battery-operated fly- fryer that generally sits, unused, in a forgotten cupboard. The idea is that you swipe at the offending creature and enjoy the sizzle if you hit it. (Yes, yes, I know – not at all PC)

When “The Writer” regains his breath, he assures me there is a mosquito in the room that has not only been whining in his ear but has bitten him several times on his hand. He flourishes his injured hand at me, on which I can see not a blemish.

I agree with him in what I hope is a calming voice, that of course there is a mosquito in the bedroom in mid-October – and persuade him back to bed where he lies motionless and rigid, clutching the racquet, and straining every sinew to hear the creature’s return. In the morning, he once again swears he was severely attacked in the night and, to prove it, shoves his hand – on which there continues to be not a mark – under my nose for verification. I disappoint.

**************************************

Tod and Trish returned from Scotland recently, having been far more daring than us in boarding a train to get there. Hard to believe we have not been on a single form of transport for 7 months. Perhaps we will be awarded a prize for non-existent carbon footprint.

Trish sent this wonderful pic of Tod planting Snowdrops .

And hope she told him that if he’s looking for the pot of gold, he’s in the wrong place.

******************************.

“By sudden blasts or slow decline

Our social comforts drop away“

[Samuel Johnson on the death of Dr. Robert Levet]

When – if – we ever come out of this Lockdown, our life will have changed immeasurably. Walking down Eastcastle St. yesterday, we were shocked to see that one of our favourite restaurants has fallen victim to Covid. Ethos was a vegetarian restaurant, displaying its succulent salads on marble plinths like precious jewels in a jewellers window. There is nothing like it that we know of and, given that preparing such a variety of salads for one meal, or even many meals, is utterly beyond me, it will be greatly missed.

Hard to believe that a restaurant that was impossible to get into before Lockdown, with queues for its fabulous Sunday brunch, is no more. Its demise has made us almost as sad as the loss of Patisserie Valerie in Old Compton St., where we regularly enjoyed poached eggs on toast and luscious pastries in the atmosphere of original Bohemian Soho.

Patti Val’s, as some aficionados called it – though never us – was started in the 1920’s by the Belgian Madame Valerie and the Soho Branch was the first of what became an Empire. It was also the one wrecked by a bomb during the second world war. Undaunted, Madame Valerie just opened a new cafe nearby. This chain was not a Covid victim. What wiped out the last of the European-style cafes was described as “potentially fraudulent, accounting irregularities and therefore a potential material misstatement of the company’s accounts”.

The cafes of Europe, cosy, warm, conducive to languorous conversation and unhealthy lashings of cream have been replaced, in London at least, by American-style coffee chains, cold, efficient and, despite the occasional couch or armchair, conducive to grabbing one’s drink and leaving as soon as possible.

October 8

8th Oct 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ 2 Comments

If, like me, you find it hard to distinguish one day from the next during this weird semi-lockdown, let me share with you how I know it’s Thursday.

I know it’s Thursday because that’s the day this seemingly ordinary box arrives outside our door. I’ve always admired in American movies, the way gifts arrive in boxes whose satin ribbons have to be untied by the recipient. It looks so lavishly decadent and it’s not a packaging device we seem to favour in this country. This box gives me a glimpse of this excitement as I untie the string inside.

And there they are, Freddie’s Flowers, laid end- to -end with the utmost care. I now have a routine – take the flowers out, lay them gently on the floor and prop up the box against the landing wall ready for collection next Thursday.

The bunch looks thin and unlikely to make much of a display but I remember Freddie’s assurance that the flowers come direct from the grower so will take a while to get going.

In the kitchen, I gently release the flower heads from their protective ‘hairnets.Next comes the fun of choosing the vase. I’ve learned over the years how different the same flowers can look depending on the height, width and ornamentation of the vase. I prefer clear glass so you can see the stems and my absolute favourite was a triangular vase from Heal’s made by Krosno in Poland, which broke 6 years ago and, though I look for it almost weekly on Ebay, the only time it has cropped up was in Australia and, despite the seller being kind enough to get a postage quote for me, I felt the £110 cost of sending it was out of the question for a vase costing £6. secondhand!

One day I’ll find it.

Ever a market man, my husband likes what he calls “A big flash” from his flowers and as this weekly delivery is a gift from him, I resist my usual impulse to cut them short and display them in a jug as though carelessly gathered from some nearby woodland. Instead, I arrange them elegantly according to Freddie’s wonderful leaflet which tells you the name of each flower as well as including a drawing of each, some poetically- written history or fact and a diagram of how best to arrange them. (I have to admit I usually go off piste as far as arranging goes but I love knowing how a professional would do it. And I adore the drawings. They’ve even caused me to learn the names of some of the more unusual flowers which I have never done in years of loving them.)

Tall and straight, they sit on the sideboard in the kitchen (I don’t take them upstairs, since when we’re up there we tend to gaze only at the TV, whereas life, conversation, planning, worrying, cooking, eating, take place in the kitchen and I prefer to have their beauty where we can see it.

Gradually, gradually, as the week wears on, the flowers evolve from thin, stiff stalks into a dense, brilliant, blowsy burst of colour.

“The writer”, who, though meticulous in his observations on the page, notices absolutely nothing about his own environment, has miraculously begun to see and to enjoy flowers without my having to point them out. (I do still have to remind him it’s hot in his room and to open a window or take off a sweater or that he’s shivering at his desk unaware that the icy gale blowing through his study window might have something to do with it and could even be prevented).

Many of the stems are still fresh when the next Thursday’s bunch is due and one of my favourite tasks is rescuing those that are hanging on and making them look entirely different by cutting them down or transferring them to a different-shaped vase.

“The writer” ordered this indulgent treat for me when he realised that we were likely to be more or less locked down for a further 6 months, that darkness and rain were in prospect and gloom was likely to descend on us both. It was an inspired thought and I was and remain thrilled by it.

PS: Despite all appearances to the contrary, I’m not an employee of Freddie’s Flowers – just a fan!

September 29

29th Sep 202030th Sep 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ 1 Comment

Harriet the plastic hawk has done her job. She ensured the pigeons kept their distance, terrified, presumably, by her fearsome swaying in the breeze. We produced a good tomato crop, watered and cherished for the first time by “The Writer, and the plants are now looking sadly dishevelled and brown. The remaining fruits are green and hard and unlikely to ripen, so that signals it’s time for one of my favourite activities: Gleaming lass jars are sterilising in the oven. (When I first made chutney, I was baffled by the debate on line as to whether it was more hygienic to bake jars in the oven or pour boiling water into them. Taking no chances with the lives of the friends who will receive them, I decided to do both).

One great thing about Lockdown is that I have the time to really look and appreciate things in a way I never used to. BL(before Lockdown), each task had to be completed in a rush in order to move on to the next. Lockdown days seem twice the length so I can actually pause to enjoy the jewel-like tomatoes glowing in the colander.

Every time I chop or peel onions, I think of our beautiful Stephen Jacobson painting of onions arranged on their plinths like a platoon awaiting inspection. Today, I actually pause before chopping to go and look at the painting, admire the weight and heft and calm of the onions, the coolness of their skins and their unruly tops neatly bandaged so as not to draw the eye of the competition judge or the painting’s viewer from the voluptuousness of their curves.

The recipe I use is by Nigel Slater, the only cookery writer I can follow. He tells the reader what the texture of a dish should be, what colour, how hard or soft, what he likes about its flavour. You can taste the dish in his prose before you make it His recipes are worth reading for the sumptuous writing and his memoir, Toast, is a treat. The only cavil I have about this chutney recipe is the huge amount of work involved for the minuscule outcome:

Yes. folks, that’s it!

And I’ve always found that simply doubling the recipe doesn’t work. I will have to make time to cook another batch before I can get to the most fun part of this project – designing the labels.

September 20th

26th Sep 202026th Sep 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ Leave a comment

Sad, sad. Our period of near-ish normality is over. Covid infections in Central London are rising rapidly and I suspect we’ll be in full Lockdown again before long.

Despite the new rules about mask-wearing, those serving in shops and restaurants round here, if they weren’t wearing masks before, are still not, risking the £200 fine. The NHS Covid app. downloaded yesterday, tells me we are at “Medium” risk level in Soho and pulses away, assuring me it is “active and scanning”. So far, it seems to have encountered nothing untoward.

On our walk to St. Jame’s park, we become aware of massed police vans, full and obviously waiting for something to happen.

On our way back, a rally is coalescing in Trafalgar Square.

Although it’s billed as Anti-Lockdown, it’s a rag-bag of protestors, some of whom will surely be surprised to find themselves hugger-mugger with those whose views are anathema to them. What does the advocate of Bitcoin share with the man telling us Jesus will save us, for example? Calls for the jailing of Bill Gates and Matt Hancock intermingle with ernest, muttered conversation about world conspiracy . The police, most of whom have not been wearing masks over the past weeks as they patrol the Soho streets are now wearing them as a badge of affiliation with the law and, as they banter good-naturedly with protestors, they are seemingly unfazed by those nearby carrying banners protesting against “Gestapo Policing.”

False statistics -and no doubt some real ones- vie with crazy predictions. It’s a Covid carnival, ignorance is King and nuance is the first casualty.

Resting against the wall before entering the fray, one woman carries her clear and uncompromising message on a banner obviously too heavy to carry for long. Not for her sophisticated slogans. or the subtleties of statistics………

So far, the crowd is small and calm. We will have to wait to watch tonight’s news to discover whether it stays that way.

As we leave the square, I glance at my NHS Covid app, expecting it to be bleeping ( or whatever it does) to tell me I have been close to any number of infected people – but it is still quietly pulsing its pastoral shade of green – and then I remember, none of these protesters will have succumbed to the tyranny of downloading it.

September 11

11th Sep 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ Leave a comment

So shocking to walk round the centre of London right now. Everywhere Sale Boards are going up and shops are closing down. We walked down New Bond St. yesterday and found one of London’s most luxurious and fashionable shopping Streets unfashionably dotted with vacant premises.

There is really no comment to make except, possibly, to add that the chalk board outside Scribbler in Wardour St. says it all:

I leave you with one bright note:

The Rolling Stones shop has just opened at number 9 Carnaby St. – a defiant vote for life after Covid.

September 2

2nd Sep 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ Leave a comment

Bicycle-envy is what I’m currently suffering. Not because I long for the wind (and fumes) through my hair, or because I actually want to go anywhere, but because I came upon this Bicycle Repair Station yesterday – sorry, DELUXE Bicycle Repair Station. New things seem to keep popping up in London these days without warning or publicity.

As far as I can tell, not being and never having been, a cyclist, you hoist your bike up onto the two knobs at the top, which leaves you free to get to grips with the shiny new tools hanging below.

The tools look so exciting, I’m left wondering what else I could repair, not owning a bike. Do I have anything with tyres that need pumping up?

Anyway, it looks like a brilliant thing and maybe they’re all over the city and all over the country and every cyclist knows they’re there but I’ve never seen one and I thought you might not have, either.

I also came upon this lady, surrounded by pigeons.She was happily feeding them and happy for me to take her photo but didn’t fancy telling me why she was there, so left me to wonder: Is she lonely? Did she have a bird that died, leaving her sad and longing for avian company?, Does she fear the pigeons might starve? Is she a countess, fallen on hard times, used to the ballrooms of Vienna and now reduced to the society of pigeons?

I walked on, leaving her with her contentment and me with my phantasies.

August 27

27th Aug 202027th Aug 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ Leave a comment

These two famous optical illusions about change of perspective represent what happened to my husband and me today on our regular walk in St. Janes’s Park.

As we stroll, we notice up ahead, an elderly gentleman with a small, white dog on a lead, stoop to peer at something behind a bench. The writer is curious as to what he has found and approaches him – at a suitable social distance, of course-to see what is occupying him so intently.

“Oh”, he says,”I was just looking at the inscription on the back of this bench. I always read them when I pass”.

And, with that, our regular walk shifts its perspective.

“The writer’ and I both love memorial benches. He, in particular, has written about them often and will stand, lost, in front of one, reading and conjuring up the life of the person who inspired such touching emotion or occasionally, depressing mawkishness. However, neither of us has seen a dedication on the back of a bench. We’re used to coming across them on neat little metal plaques on the front and had no idea there were any in this park where we spend so much time. We retrace our steps, this time walking on the grass not the path, and, sure enough, there they are, not etched into flimsy metal squares but carved deeply into the wood itself.

“In memory of Valery Yermolaev 18.4.1946- 08.08.2001, who lived in Russia, made movies and loved London more than any other city in the world.”

When I get home and consult Google, his filmography tells me Valery worked on Goldeneye as well as Onegin, Crime and Punishment and Leaving Lenin but I can find no photograph or anything more about the Russian man who loved London so much. Why did he love it? Would he liked to have lived here instead of Russia? Did he sit here, in this park, wishing he could stay? Alessanda Kapp (below) and the other members of the Kapp family whose Italian names decorate several of the benches lining the path along the lake, remain a mystery. The internet yields no portrait or life story’ I guess they loved London, too, else why the bench here in the city’s heart?

My husband suggests a visit to the little park in which I have placed a memorial bench to my mother. She and I would sit here so often, gazing at the flowerbeds and soaking up the sun and I was overcome with nostalgia watching the bench’s installation on a crisp October day. It means more to me than her gravestone ever will because a bench has life: people argue on benches, speak words of love on them, rest when they’re weary, tie their dogs to the arms, watch toddlers play around the legs, eat their sandwiches on them and lose themselves in their books. I look forward to the day when the lightness of its bright, new wood has dimmed to grey, lichens have added green and it has become the favourite meeting place of another mother and her daughter.

August 25th

25th Aug 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ 1 Comment

We decide to be daring and invite Trish and Tod to eat socially distanced lunch on our terrace. We make elaborate plans to get them swiftly through the apartment and outside, which will involve my leaving the front door on the latch and shouting instructions at them from the kitchen on how to proceed. We take an old table out onto the terrace for us to sit at and agree to move the terrace table a suitable distance away for them.

And this is where the problems start: Firstly “The writer” sites the table directly in front of the terrace door, out of which they must step. Getting out will now involve their smashing the door into the table then edging round the ensuing mess to sit down.

I move ‘their’ table closer to ‘our’ table – still at what I regard as a perfectly safe distance.

“The Writer” narrows his eyes and pronounces it “too close”. He drags it further back, thereby ensuring that, once more, no-one can get out of the door.

We drag the table back and forth until we both lose our temper. At this point, I find a tape measure and hurl it onto the ground.

Triumphantly, I discover that where I wanted to put “their” table was exactly 1.5 metres away from the other one. I crow.

“The Writer” announces that he doesn’t care what anyone says, he’s sticking to 2 metres. I sigh, move it to two metres and look forward to shouting scurrilous gossip to our friends at the tops of our voices.

This is when the rain starts and we realise we have to move the whole operation – that is the small, folding table – indoors, this time distancing it from the kitchen table.

“The Writer” takes charge, positions the table to his satisfaction with the aid of the tape measure and stands back, satisfied. That’s the point at which I discover that, because of where he’s put it, I now can’t get to the fridge, the sink, the worktop or the rubbish bin. Since our visitors are kindly bringing most of the food, I need to unpack it, plate it, throw away the wrapping in which they have brought it – all of which necessitates my accessing the very areas he has rendered inaccessible.

We do a bit more manoeuvring, plan to buy smaller chairs and finally reach grumpy agreement.

The doorbell rings and Tod and Trish arrive laden with delicious food, manage to make their way up the hall without touching the sides, take one look at the uncomfortable dining area and say in unison “Oh, I thought we were eating outside”!

We do.

August 18

18th Aug 202023rd Aug 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ 1 Comment

I am completely fascinated by the difference in risk-assessment conclusions reached by different groups of people.

Forget the Government guidelines (Most people have anyway – not one customer wearing a mask in Pret- A – Manger today and barely a foot between Soho’s outside restaurant tables, let alone 1.5 metres. Restaurants where the staff are masked are like hen’s teeth and joggers in the park are still pounding up and breathing moistly into one’s face.) By and large, the young are behaving as though there is no virus but for we who still consider there is danger to be avoided, the difference in the level and type of risk we are prepared to take is not only marked but completely illogical.

For example:

I’ve judged it too risky to go for my eye test or to the dentist, though”The Writer” and I have each been to a GP and a specialist. The GP is unmasked and ungloved, the specialist wears a valved mask, gloves and an apron, takes temperatures at the door of his consulting room and asks his patients also to wear a mask and gloves. We have eaten in a few restaurants but won’t go to one where the staff are not masked. We won’t eat indoors (except once when it rained mid-meal) and we shop for odd items while all major shopping is still delivered and sanitised by us before being allowed through the front door. We would not board a ‘plane and have, so far, avoided taxis, buses and trains.

One couple of friends, horrified at our temerity at eating out and doing the odd bit of shopping , cheerfully boarded a ‘plane to Greece this week, as did another who is diabetic.

One friend has shopped throughout and went by Uber to friends for a birthday lunch at the height of the infection. (The friends had had it but as far as was known, the driver hadn’t).

One friend who had been locked down even more severely than us is now shopping and his wife ,who has not been out since March, recently took the bus and had her hair done, which we have resolutely held out against – to the point where “the writer’s” hair would look quite fetching in a ponytail.

We are still sanitising letters and leaving the cardboard from parcels outside the front door ,while other friends open mail without fear as soon as it drops through the letterbox.

One friend wrote to me scathingly about people who don’t open their front door to greet hardworking delivery people. I had to admit to being one of them, except in the case of Waitrose who demand to see my face in order to gauge whether I am under age for wine deliveries.

We have risked only socially -distanced pic-nics in the park while other friends have had guests for dinner indoors, at either end of the dining room table.

We haven’t attended a single cultural event or cinema, whereas others are enthusiastically visiting art galleries and museums weekly, revelling in their relative emptiness.

We have had pizzas delivered and eaten them out of the unsanitised cardboard boxes at the same time as carefully disinfecting all fruit before it goes into the fridge.

When I began this blog, I compared us all to Alice falling down the rabbit hole – and life does seem to become more illogical every day. The myriad small decisions to be made are exhausting and far more stressful than being locked down. It’s also a battle to hold onto one’s sanity when all around are people in whom we have reposed our trust, making and re-making and un-making insane decisions

It seems to me that we are all developing complex systems by which to live, unique to each individual or household, which combine a modicum of scientific information with a hefty dose of magical thinking. And maybe we are all doomed hold our own particular rituals sacred until there is a good treatment or a vaccine. Or maybe we’ll get bored and, like the young, stop bothering, though that seems unlikely.

All I can say with absolute certainty is that none of us has so far travelled, or has plans to travel, anywhere by car in order to test our eyesight.

July 29

29th Jul 2020 ~ coronet22 ~ Leave a comment

As we walk through Trafalgar Square on our way to St. James’s Park, I catch sight of a posse of men in high viz jackets tending what looks like a huge black plastic bird or ‘plane alighting on the fourth plinth in the square.

I have no idea what’s about to be unveiled or when and have decided not to look it up and spoil the surprise.

It has been a week of surprising and amusing sights

Dame Elizabeth Frink’s Horse and Rider on the corner of and New Bond St., and Burlington Gardens seems to be behaving responsibly. Maybe even the artist wouldn’t mind this harmless accessorising of her work.

In Soho Square, St. Patrick’s Catholic Church is shrouded in sheeting, whether for restoration or simple cleaning, I don’t know but I was touched to see that prayer has been moved outside