Amsterdam

Masterpieces metamorphosed

Les Bonnes by Jean Genet was one of the plays I read at university in the 60s and I’d seen the film version with Glenda Jackson, Susannah York and Vivien Merchant a decade later, so it was with great anticipation that I went with Frances to see what Kip Williams would make of it. After last year’s Picture of Dorian Gray with Sarah Snook we expected screens to play a part. And they did. And how! The filmy curtains initial framing the set gave us the feeling of trangressively entering madame’s boudoir and then the fun began. The role-playing maids of the title act out fantasies of dominating and eventually killing their disdainful mistress.

Quite how the actors managed to use their cameras and select filters to produce the effects on the screens that dominated the background, I’ll never know. Emotional performance while managing tech – the demands are high on acting skills these days! Phia Saban and Lydia Wilson met them with apparent ease. Yerin Ha was a little too camp and age-adjacent for my taste as the draconian madame but it was a great evening’s entertainment. With Kip Williams you learn to accept that things will change – it was billed as ‘a version’ after all.

Before going to the Donmar, I had been to the Dulwich Picture Gallery with Jadwiga to see the exhibition devoted to Anne Ancher, a Danish painter I confess I’d never heard of. Living all her life in the town of Skagen at the extreme northern point of Denmark she was devoted to capturing light in the landscape but especially in portraits and interiors where there were hints of the influence of Vermeer in the lighting effects. She died in her seventies in 1935 and the paintings cover most of her long life. The exhibition runs till March 2026 and is highly recommended not just by me – it got 5 stars in The Guardian.

Next up was a group outing with Frances, Farzana, Richard and me to see Assembled Parties at Hampstead. It’s a blackish comedy written by Richard Greenberg and was a great hit on Broadway in 2013. Set two decades apart in the same apartment of screen star Julie, we find a Jewish family celebrating Christmas with assorted relatives, friends and others. In Act 2 Julie is widowed and has a feel of a Norma Desmond who life has passed by and only survives in her rather less opulent surrounding by the invisible support of others.

Among these is her sister-in-law Faye, superbly played by Tracey-Ann Oberman in scintillating form who gets the best lines and attitude. We all found Julie, as played by Jennifer Westfeldt a little unconvincing but the poignancy of the reduced means and expectations of a once proud family showed through the many laughs that the script also gave us.

Talking of metamorpheses, how do you make a 500+ page 2004 Booker prize-winning novel into a two hour stage play? Fran and I had been to an Almeida insight session earlier at which the answers were clear – get an ace adaptor in Jack Holden and a great director in Michael Grandage. The resulting script clearly had to leave a lot out for those of us familiar with The Line of Beauty, but author Alan Hollinghurst had been involved throughout and the evening gave us a good account of the early days of Thatcherism, the gay scene in the 80s with the spectre of Aids and the class system in full flow. And it did contain some very explicit scenes of sex and drug taking that were so much a part of the source. The lessons of a dangerous era seem not to have been learned – the wealth and class gap is ever wider, tolerance of ‘otherness’ is at a very low ebb again and politics and politicians remain completely out of touch with everyman.

And follow that with another great challenge. How do you bring “one of the most important English-language poems of the 20th century” to the stage? Adrian Dunbar has produced and directed a staging of T S Eliot’s The Waste Land. There’s the full text of the 434 lines of the poem spoken by four actors but it’s interspersed with music by Nick Roth for a jazz quintet and the Guildhall Session Orchestra conducted by John Harle. Added to this melange was some of the earliest colour footage of London which evoked and echoed Eliot’s words about his adopted city such as “Under the brown fog of a winter dawn / A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many / I had not thought death had undone so many.” Hearing Eliot’s complex work recited added greatly to my appreciation of it. The music was an interesting complement, never overlapping with the text and the footage was just stunning. A fascinating hour in the Queen Elizabeth Hall.

I was up bright and early the next morning to drive down to Hatchlands House near Guildford for one of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment’s periodic Friends’ excursions. The house contains the Cobbe Collection which has a staggering array of keyboard instruments owned and played by some of the great composers among them Purcell, Johann Christian Bach, Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Chopin, Mahler and Elgar as well as the piano that Napoleon gave to Josephine. We were conducted through this historical tour by the OAE’s principal keyboard player Steven Devine with added insights from the eponymous collector Alec Cobbe, a little jet lagged after flying in from Ireland that morning. Their shared knowledge and Steven’s keyboard artistry made for an engaging trip and added substantially to my own musical education.

I travelled back in good time to join Frances, Farzana and Richard for a trip to the Pinter Theatre to see the revival of Conor McPherson’s The Weir. Timing was such that we were able to have a pre-theatre dinner in the wonderful Yoshino. Lisa was her usual welcoming self and managed to feed us elegantly as well as the late-arriving Farzana (thoughtless colleagues on Zoom calls!) with food that delighted her on her first visit before we all set off.

It’s a play I’ve seen before – nothing happens in a rural Irish pub, but everything happens in the minds, interplay and scary stories of the four male locals and the incomer Valerie. With Brendan Gleeson and Sean McGinley in the cast it was a super evening of witty dialogue, hidden back stories and brooding atmosphere. Lots of Guinness and scathing references to Harp drinkers – remember Harp?

23 years ago I filmed a studio interview and a gig at the Cavern Club in Liverpool with a young indie singer songwriter Ian Prowse. It was part of a language teaching video series for teenagers in Europe that we did in a yoof magaziney style. Dee and I loved his music and attitude and we remain friends after all this time. So on Saturday I set off for the Half Moon in Putney for a set from his current band Amsterdam. Frances joined me at the pub hot foot from Derby where she’d seen Watford’s first away win for eight months! I settled for the TV experience and was glad I’d conserved my energies as the evening was an all singing all dancing show with the band on top form – standin’ and boppin’ for two hours takes it out of us old uns!

The next day Frances and I and Farzana went to a new venue in London that led to another incredible evening – this time of multi-influenced jazz. HERE at Outernet is beside Centre Point and Tottenham Court Road Station. It’s deep in the basement but we weren’t bothered by noise from the tube. We were enthralled by a brilliant set from Nubya Garcia and her band. Anyone who has read my blogs knows I am a huge fan, following her from her early days in Lewisham pubs. This set – mostly songs from her latest album Odyssey – was supported by visuals on the giant screen at the back of the stage. Nubya herself was in great form with her mix of musical cultures inflecting her music, but with some lovely old school touches like references to My Funny Valentine and other classics in her solos. This lady does jazz. An ever-present in her line up over the years has been Sam Jones on drums. What is it about drummers called Jones? Jo held Count Basie’s band together, Philly Joe was Miles’ and Bill Evans’s favourite, Elvin was inseparable from Coltrane and now there’s this guy Sam whose propulsive and imaginative work takes the band into the stratosphere. Farzana and Fran had to put up with me hustling one of Nubya’s former managers as I’ve quoted Nubya in a pitch for BBPC to the Deptford Literary Festival next year. (I later got her blessing so forgive me!) What a night!

Next up was a theatre road trip. Fatherland by the precocious Nancy Farino who also starred in it, is a journey of discovery between an ominously named father, Winston Smith, and his daughter Joy in a converted school bus to County Mayo to discover some newly discovered heritage. Car seats on wheels and lighting effects neatly deliver the bus to the stage. There’s a great deal of barbed and bitchy banter among the deeper affection and interpolated scenes with father and a solicitor indicate that Winston’s life coaching practice has led to a suicide for which he’s being sued. Joy also lets us into her mind world of fears and fantasies. Nancy Farino has come through the Hampstead Theatre’s Inspire programme. More power to it if it continues to produce work of this quality.

Work of high quality was a trademark for Josef Hadyn. The OAE had been touring a programme of symphonies and a piano concerto through Germany, Switzerland and Italy with Sir Andras Schiff at the keyboard and as conductor (I nearly wrote with the baton but his hands are expressive enough). The did a concert in Udine and I had to wonder whether any of the Pozzo family attended – the Pozzos own both Udinese and Watford football clubs. The last date on this tour was at the Queen Elizabeth Hall.

I like Haydn’s rhythmic impulse, his unpredcitability and his sense of fun and the two symphonies – one from his early period No 39 at the Esterhaza Court and No 102 from his prime in London showed real development of style and technique and were a joy to listen to as was Sir Andras’ performance of the concerto No 11 played on a Walter fortepiano just like one we’d seen at the Cobbe Collection a few days earlier.

Another busy month concluded with BBPC’s last bimonthly poetry meet up of the year at the Whitechapel Gallery which took the form of a review of the year’s activities and an open mic session for a dozen poets to share their own work or read from their favourite poets.

Many of us then went to the nearby Altab Ali Park for the launch of this year’s bijoyphool. This is the Bengali victory flower which has evolved from the British Remembrance Day poppy.

The green and red flower is worn for the first two weeks of December and commemorates the Bengali language wars of 1952, the war of independence of 1971 and the countless citizens who died in them and since. Three of the freedom fighters from the latter war were present in front of a replica of the Shahad Minar matryrs’ memorial in Dhaka. It was a privilege to be asked to say a few words for the local TV chanel about what it meant to be there at this moving ceremony.

The final event of this year’s Season of Bangla Drama was a play Joyontika produced by Trio Arts about post partum depression, a topic little discussed in the community but which affects many women. It was a mixture of drama, dance and polemic with some interesting technical tropes and delivered a powerful message. I was able to catch up with a few friends and indulge in some super spicy biryani to conclude a successful Season – delivered this year with no funding from the Arts Council. All hail to the indefatigable Kazi Ruksana Begum the Arts Development Officer for Tower Hamlets for bringing it all together.

Amsterdam March 2023, News

Culture vultures

So day two of our culture trip dawned with a pleasant buffet breakfast in Cafe Moer and then a twenty-five min ute walk through Vondelpark heading diagonally for the Van Gogh Museum which I’d sensibly prebooked for 11:30, which was of course 10:30 on our body clocks and quite early enough to start the serious part of the day. Vondelpark is a huge green space with lakes and ponds, cycleways and roads and some pedestrian paths but it was our first moment of realising just how profuse and dangerous cyclists are in this city. Add to their sheer numbers the fact that motorised vehicles like scooters and golf buggies also use the cyclepaths and you take your life in your hands every time you cross one. It’s also sometimes difficult to know which is the footpath and which the cycleway.

Vondelpark today and as I saw it with skaters in March 2018.

We arrived slightly early at the Van Gogh Museum to see a sign saying ‘Sold out for today’ so feeling very smug at having booked from the UK in advance, we strolled past the waiting line into the museum. It houses the biggest collection of Van Gogh’s works in the world. We had booked for the special exhibition Choosing Vincent. Portrait of a Family History which made it clear to us why this was the case. Vincent’s sister-in-law was married to Theo for less than two years before he died soon after Vincent. But Jo van Gogh-Bonger and later her son – also Vincent – were largely responsible for promoting Van Gogh’s reputation as a major artist and later establishing the museum which bears his name.

The Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam. Circular entry lobby on the right and the manin collection on the left.

We had time to explore the main collection before and after visiting the fascinating family story which was elegantly curated by getting you to follow a timeline on the floor which led to information panels, personal objects, photographs and paintings. It was staggering to find that at periods of his life he turned out a painting a day. It was also interesting to see how his style varied continually – a carefully painted image with oils thinly applied one day and the next the fervent impastoed brush stokes we generally associate with him. It was then time to head of in search of lunch before the manin event – Vermeer at 14:30. My memory from five years ago failed us so we had quite a roundabout trek to Leidseplein where I remember there being lots of bars. I was shocked when we did get there that so many are now chain operations rather than the local bars I recalled. However we found a very pleasant bar-restaurant under the Casino called Grand Cafe Lido in tribute to its predecessor which had been a landmark in the area since 1937. We had a canalside table (indoors), good beer and food and lots of boating and bird activity on the Singel or Leidsegracht canal (not sure what it’s called at this point).

Our rather damp entry to the Vermeer exhibition at the Rijksmuseum.

But it was well worth it. Again with prebooked tickets we breezed in deposited coats and bag and entered the intimate worlds created by Johannes Vermeer. Having said that, the first thing we see is a View of Delft and Little Street both of which are exterior views of aspects of life in the city. The degree of detail in the characters in each picture is remarkable. You can almost hear the conversations.

The whole exhibition just grew from this simple start. Paintings were elegantly displayed against the dark grey walls. Captions were clear and available from a QR code on my phone and the 28 paintinbgs were all well spaced so although the exhibition is a complete sell out you didn’t feel unduly crowded and had ample time to look at each painting. The most exciting innovation for us was the semicircular barrier at just below waist height around the majority of paintings which meant you could wait briefly for your turn to be one of the six people in the front line with an uninterrupted view. As we moved around it was fascinating to see how the same window, ther same model, the same yellow, fur-edged jacket, a globe and other props from his studio cropped up time and again. It seems that after that early blast of the outdoors he shut himself in his studio and just painted there. One aspect of his work I thought I knew was that subjects were always lit from the left. Quite a shock then to find three lit from the right: Girl with a red hat, Girl with a flute and The Lacemaker.

We took our time and wandered hither and yon, sometimes together sometimes not until we met up the the last room but as we prepared to leave we asked each other ‘Did you see her?” ‘No,’ was the response. We knew the Girl with the Pearl Earring was going back to its usual home the Maritshuis in the hague on 30 March but she should be here still. We retraced our steps, enquired of a guide and did get to admire perhaps, thanks to Tracy Chevalier, his most famous work. And very wonderful it is too. I have been reluctant of late to buy art exhibition catalogues but this was one I had to have and a fine exploration of his work it is. Reproductions of all the paintings but also lots of small detailed views to explore Vermeer’s technique. Many of the paintings were worked on for a lengthy period with evidence of recomposing them with overpainting revealed by x-ray analysis. Worth the trip to Amsterdam? Absolutely and there’s more to come.

As we went down the stairs to the loos at the exit from the exhibition, I noticed white fluffy things whooshing down from ornately plastered ceiling. It was a great installation and from the information desk we managed to elicit that it was by Studio Drift. The web confirmed that it’s called Shylight and there’s a fascinating video of it on their website and on YouTube.

We now had a couple of hours to pass before gpoing to the Concertgebouw for a concert at 8.15 pm. As that would not finish until well after ten, we thought eating first might be a good idea. I remembered finding a great bar to the southwest of the concert hall so we set off in that general direction and happened across a very suitable place. It wasn’t the one I remembered from my last trip – I later discovered that Brasserie van Dam was just one block further west. However the Eetcafé Schotsheuvel did us very well. It was pretty empty when we arrived and we had a beer wondering whether to just have the one and move on before finally deciding to stay and eat. The staff were friendly and became increasingly busy as by the time we left to head back to our concert, the place was heaving with locals – always a good sign. Extremely tasty crab cakes and fries with garlic mayo and a substantial pork rib and a decent bottle of wine saw the time fly by and our decision to stay well justified.

We make our way back to the Concertgebouw and settle into sided balcony seats with a good view of the stage. The concedrt is given by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra which came to major international prominence under Simon Rattle who joined it in 1980 when he was just 25 and made it into a world renowned orchestra during his 18 years as music director. Tonight the baton is in the hands of the young Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla the Lithuanian conductor who became MD at the CBSO in 2016 at the age of 20. So what we were about to hear could be called ‘Simon Rattle’s Tyla-made Army’. Watford fans groan, others ask for an explanation in the comments!

*Concert-Gebouw exterior with excellent gold harp on the roof*

*Julia Hagen with cello and Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla descending theperilous steps to get to the podium*

The concert started with a piece I’d never heard of by Mieczysław Weinberg who was described as Polish-Russian and died in 1996. It was his Sinfonietta No.1 and was a rousing big orchestra number with loads of percussion – a big night for the glockenspiel and tambourine man – vast swathes of brass interspersed with lyrical folk tunes in the strings. It was 20 enjoyable minutes and had something of a film score feel to it. This was followed by the Shostakovich cello concert played by Julia Hagen a rising star according to the Citizens of Beethoven who awarded her the Beethoven Ring for 2022 and others. When I read she plays a cello made in Cremona in 1684, I was fearful of a trip on the lengthy flight of stairs conductor and soloists must use to make a grand applause-filled entrance. It was very well done and conductor and soloist clearly had a strong rapport. At the interval we went out into the bar and picked up a glass of wine at no charge. As Fran pointed out, it means they can get through the interval drinks dispense much more quickly when they are not faffing about with payments. We sat with two Dutch gentlemen who inevitably asked how we were enjoying Brexit. ‘Not!’ was our emphatic reply. They smiled wryly.

The second part of the concert was Prokoviev’s suite from the ballet Romeo and Juliet. It’s a work I know and love and I don’t think I’ve heard it played better than under Grazintye-Tyla here in Amsterdam. So many earworms from the dance of the Montagues and Capulets to the plaintive tune for the young Juliet – I’m still humming it now. After massive rounds of standing ovations we left the hall and knowing our hotel was in a street called Overtoom we boarded – at my insistence – a tram that said it stopped at Overtoom. Only it stopped at the wrong end and Google maps said we were 20 minutes walk from the hotel. I now know that Overtoom is straight as a die for slightly over 1.5 kilometres. So we walked back to the Rijksmuseum and the tram stop at Leidseplein and took the correct tram this time which left us with a mere six minutes walk to the hotel. Moral – swot up on the tram map before you dash onto the first one you see. So an amazing day of varied culture came to an end with a rewarding last glass of wine to round it off.

Malaga and Cadiz 2019

North and South (apologies to Mrs G)

And apologies for random pix – problems transferring from phone to iPad mini that won’t get all my emails! There will be an updated version later (done 03.01.2020)

My word! It’s nearly a year since I last posted on my blog. It’s been a strange year – my first for ages without foreign travel until now, 20 December. Unless of course you count a trip to the Peoples’ Republic of Merseyside as foreign. That’s where this last week began meeting up with friends for a football match, a gig and food, drink and conversation. In fact it was the second trip in just over a month and previously I’d managed to get up to Crosby beach to marvel at the Gormleys following his recent show at the Royal Academy. And on the way back I managed to find a Japanese garden hidden away in Sale.

For this latest visit, I drove up uneventfully on Friday and met up with Richard and Alison for a couple of beers and a fine dinner in Bacaro. Our former favourite tapas bar La Vinya has closed and become something trendier and more expensive but Bacaro served Italian-tinged tapas with a great atmosphere and a good wine list so we had a fun evening. Watford v Liverpool was the 12.30 kick off on Saturday so we met up in Dr Duncan’s for a pint at 11.00 (they told me on the phone they would open as usual at 11 but in fact opened at 10 because of the early kick off), Some of us thought there was time for a second pint but this in fact meant that our bus ride to Anfield took ages and we only just got in to see kick off. Others – Fran and Matt – describe the game and although we lost we all left very encouraged by the improvement we had seen under our third manager of the season.

Many of our travelling Watford Hornets are also fans of Ian Prowse the singer-songwriter who leads the bands Pele and Amsterdam and our match coincided with his annual Liverpool Christmas concert – but that didn’t start until nine so what can you do for six hours in Liverpool? Visit the Tate? The Walker is a fine art gallery or there’s the Beatles Story. But hell no! Liverpool also has some of the finest pubs in the country many of which I was already familiar with and with assistance from Mr Prowse himself and artist Tony Brown, I was able to devise a ten venue pub crawl to occupy the waiting hours. I should say that Ian and Tony, and his wife Lorraine, have been friends since 2002 when Dee and I made a series of educational videos for Teaching Scouse as a Second Language for the publishers Macmillan. Tony provided the studio backdrop and was interviewed about his work. Ian was a studio guest who discussed the Merseyside music scene and played us out at the end of the show. We also filmed his gig at the Cavern for the programme. So nearly twenty years on we are all friends still and have met up at intervals during further filming or football trips to the great city.

Armed with their input we embarked on a walking tour of a varied selection of Liverpool’s boozers at the worst time possible. It’s Saturday afternoon, it’s nearly Christmas and all the pubs are full. However we divert to grab some food then take in the Victorian splendour of the Philharmonic, the bustling fun of Ye Crack and quirky layout of The Pilgrim, the mezzanine melee of Mackenzies whisky bar before descending on one of my favourites The Globe. One regular inquired why on earth I’d brought a pub crawling group to Liverpool’s smallest pub. Because it’s quirky, friendly, keeps its beer well, is close to the centre and has the steeply sloping floor that makes you think you’re half cut before you’ve started. Ah well alright, he said, that’s why I’m here. Tony and Lorraine joined us there and I’m afraid the second stage of the itinerary was abandoned for the next visit as we had at last found somewhere to sit, were with Liverpool friends and enjoying a great atmosphere. After a brief aberration on my part in the Phil, we restricted ourselves to halves and so were still able to stand and enjoy what was to follow.

Then it was a swift walk through Lime Street Station to the O2 Academy for Prowsey’s Christmas Party. After a slight hold up while some technical sound and lighting issues were resolved – well it is rock n roll – Ian and his superb fifteen piece band treated us to two hours of Pele and Amsterdam’s greatest hits with a few well aimed political comments and a joint version with Brian Nash of Frankie Goes to Hollywood fame of their smash hit The Power of Love. The talent on display was stunning, Ian’s writing is always pointed and his melodies so strong that I have had Pele/Amsterdam ear worms all week. Some of us were invited to the after party and lovely though it would have been to spend some time with Ian it was too hip and too loud for an oldie like me so we congratulated him and thanked him for a wonderful evening, group hugged and retired graciously.

Amsterdam gig 12.2019 Sunday found four of us regulars meeting up for brunch. We met at Castle Street Coffee according to the menu but called something quite different on its main signage. This caused some confusion although I thought my description of corner of Castle Street and Dale Street was clear enough – not so when you’re looking for a sign that barely exists. The food and coffee were fine, the vibe laid-back Sunday morning. What it did have was a phenomenon in the loos’ hand-driers. Now you know how they usually emit a blue light along with the whoosh of warm air – well these had pools of red and blue light thus appealing to both halves of the city (for those not familiar with Liverpool football there are bitter rivals: Liverpool play in red; Everton in blue) Great marketing effort we thought.

Pete and Graham departed for Bradford but since Fran was booked on the 18:45 train she kindly agreed to accompany me to Sefton Park for a nostalgic walk and to admire the Palm House newly restored since I was last there. It also featured a ukulele band playing a mixture of carols and standards in an idiosyncratic setlist.

Since Frances had never seen the famous Liverpool waterfront from the opposite bank of the Mersey we whizzed through the tunnel and climbed to the top of the Birkenhead Priory Tower – just about made it that’s a lot of steps up – and while damp, grey and drizzly by now, the view across the river was well worth the trip. We then repaired to what had been my local when I spent six months in Liverpool on the aforementioned English language video shoot and edit, The Excelsior, which remains a proper good old fashioned pub, much to my delight. Next stop so as to be close to the station was another of my personal favourites The Crown Hotel. I was a bit worried because Lorraine had said last night that it had recently been refurbed, but she also added that they’d done it really well. And she was right. It’s cleaner, the panelling looks brighter and the ornate plaster ceiling is still a great place to hunt for the designer’s signature cigar butt trademarks – six of them apparently but Dee and I only ever found five. Fran departed for London and I walked back down Dale Street to sample a new-to-me tapas bar as a possible replacement for La Vinya. However it closed at seven for some strange reason. An alternative presented itself nearby in Mowgli a chic modern Indian restaurant with an exciting menu and dishes served in snazzy stainless steel round tiffin canisters and which are eaten from a metal plate. All very different, very tasty and from the queues as I left, very popular.

Before driving back down on Monday I had arranged to meet Tony and Lorraine for breakfast in The Quarter on Faulkner Street in the elegant Georgian Quarter of the city which is so full of architectural surprises. I retrieved my car from the car park where it had been overnight at the hotel’s discounted rate and proceeded through the centre and up Mount Pleasant to Hope and Faulkner Streets. Now some of these are cobbled, others are potholed but nonetheless I was a bit perturbed by the volume of road noise I was generating. As I parked I saw that the rear offside tyre was as flat as the proverbial. Like a fool I asked the staff if they knew of a local tyre place – which they did – but also suggested that as I was a member I call the AA – doh! At this point Tony and Lorraine arrived and I explained my predicament which slightly dominated our breakfast conversation

But we did manage to have a good catch up before the friendly patrolman arrived. So with farewell hugs and them insisting on picking up the bill, I went out to the car. The AA man told me he used to live round here and that where I had breakfast used to be McCall’s grocery store in his day and he remembered being sent from home to buy a quarter of spam for tea. I love this kind of verbal history and the fact that everybody in the city seem to be so friendly and chatty, examples of which we had in spades during the pub crawl as I had a Watford badge on my polo shirt which was a frequent conversation starter.

The tyre was inflated sufficiently for me to follow the yellow van to a discount tyre yard in Wavertree where he assured me I would get quality tyres at the best price in the city. That may well have been the case but for the fact that when I produced that box labelled “Locking wheel nut” from the glovebox it was empty. We turfed everything out of the car and couldn’t find it anywhere. So I phoned the nearest Toyota main dealer to check whether they had a master key that would resolve the issue. They did, so my kindly tyre folk gave me a further top up blast of air and I set off for Bootle. It took a while to sort out by very efficient Toyota folk but eventually I was on the road back south with a new tyre and a new key on order. I had hoped to do most of the drive in the small amount of daylight mid-December offers but it was already dark by the time I reached the M6 to head south. The rest of the journey was uneventful I’m pleased to say and I was home in time to do some last minute online Christmas shopping, wrap some presents and then make something to eat as breakfast, delicious though it was, had been eight and a half hours ago with only a few mints to keep up the blood sugar during the drive.

The rest of the week has screamed by rather like most of this mad year. I spent a great day at Tate Modern with my friend Jadwiga on Wednesday with a little exhibition viewing in the form of Dora Marr (better photographer than painter in our view since you ask, but good that this showed her to be her own person not just consigned to history as one of Picasso’s women) and lots of tea and coffee drinking (well a little champagne) and conversation before and after. Thursday saw Grandad Santa deliver to the grandchildren who will be in Manchester for Christmas while I’ll be in Malaga and Cadiz. As the flight is at 07:20 I drove up to the Holiday Inn Express at Stansted for the night and a week’s parking.

Standing in pouring rain waiting to climb the steps into the plane I’m quite pleased to be heading off to the south of Spain where the temperature was 21 degrees yesterday so fingers crossed.

I’ve now arrived and it is 21 degrees but grey and drizzly so while I have a balcony with a great view over Malaga I won’t be sipping cava on it today I fear. Also I’ve just had an email ping in with some work for my Dutch agents so I’d better get on with it – holidays have to be paid for after all.