Brothers betrayed by toilet paper

A decade ago rational members of the wider Bonden family urged me and my two brothers to see more of each other. It was, they said, what normal relations did. Thus began a series of orgies at Good Food Guide restaurants all over the country leading to enormous credit-card debt. Last weekend we spent three nights at the remote lodge of a lairdish castle south-west of Oban (ie, in Scotland)

We self-catered our dinners, or rather Sir Hugh did while Brother X (who is not of the blogging community) and I washed up. The place names alone suggest what an alien part of the British Isles we had strayed into: close to an exhilarating cart-track short cut we passed through Ardanstur, Brother X (a long-time yachtist) looked fondly at a Rassy 29 at the Craobh Haven marina, we contemplated but rejected using the ferry to the island of Luing.

We did take the 150 m ferry crossing to a tiny island with the disappointingly anglicised name of Easdale but the disappointment was purely linguistic. In the pub a half-lobster salad cost £13.95 and a salad based on five giant crab claws £6.95.

There were downsides. To Brother X’s outrage we were vouchsafed a mere four or five sheets of toilet paper each – the potential for a genuine anti-social crisis since none of us had brought this normally ignored but ultimately vital commodity. Also Brother X was never able to rest easy about the quality of wine he’d brought. He castigated his Bordeaux as “similar” and refused to be comforted by the excellence of a Meursault and a 2001 Bordeaux with a volatile bouquet that suggested a genuinely mature claret.

More on Prague (its food, beer, text messages, trams, etc) to follow.

Text, with added value

Unlike Rick who came to Casablanca for the waters (Police Chief: But there are no waters here. Rick: I was misinformed.) the BBs came to Prague to hear/see opera and were not misinformed. Good music at half London prices. The initial target of four had to be cut down to Figaro (fine ensemble in small Estates Theatre with limited onstage resources) and Magic Flute (State Opera House; directorial flaws; first-rate Papageno and Pamina). A marionette version of Don Giovanni was avoided, possibly due to prejudice.

In the daytime we were guided electro-magnetically by Julia who enhanced her Prague Polymath status. Discouraged by Sunday crowds at the Castle we accepted her default and stared tranquilly at the handwritten conductor’s score of Beethoven Five in nearby Lobkowski Palace. The following day, as a further antidote to excess humanity, a text (Julia texts as naturally as breathing, but much more quickly) directed us to an all-embracing cliff-top view of the Vltava and an adjacent cemetery containing Dvorak, Smetana, Capek and Neruda.

Tomorrow again, as we stood bemused by a string of cubist Picassos at the National Gallery another text arrived at midday suggesting we lunch at the Bohemian Bagel “just across the road”.

Text-Julia is witty, sympathetic and ever on tap. Real-life, three-dimensional Julia offers fiercely fast conversation driven by enthusiasm over a Wikipedia range. Unsurprisingly polymathic, of course, but she listens with equal intensity and that’s unbeatable. And her husband answered my bedevilled question about Henry James in a couple of gentle and concise sentences. The best holidays are not architecture but people over dinner.

Don't draw it, shout in my ear

Entering the loo of an unfamiliar restaurant or filling station I am often beset with uncertainty: which door for fellas and which for the other lot? I’m a wordsman, proud to know the meaning of riparian - prehistoric man responded to pictures but for me their message is non-immediate. Especially when heavily stylised (see inset).

At 70 mph my doubts become riskier (see above). Because journalists are told to eschew exclamation marks (screamers) I ponder their justification at the roadside when I should be stamping on the brake. The tee-boned car graphic raises the question of verb tense: “Has happened.” or “Will happen” The hare seems fast enough to look after itself. While the car sign is as useful as a warning about oxygen in the air.

But God forbid I should ever have to wrestle with the philosophical implications of the unavailable T-junction. My first interpretation was “Do a U-turn” but does the red diagonal forbid the reverse direction as well? I mention these things on behalf of a dying minority – aged literates.

SUPERIOR SPAM? My new AV software, Kaspersky, has just blocked an attempt by Cambridge University Press to sell me the works of Ruskin. I need to think hard about this.

EBOOK TRIUMPH Plutarch is re-reading GORGON TIMES to check how I’ve responded to his suggestions. He points out, quite gently, that digesting 100,000 words via a computer monitor is not easy. So I’ve loaded the MS on to my Sony ebook reader and posted it to him. He reports it’s now “easier to make notes” suggesting the publishing world may have to wait a little longer for this masterpiece.

Deck the halls... sorry, wrong date

It’s 07.07 am,raining heavily and I’m 75. Given the toping, the motorbiking, the rock-climbing and racketiness of journalism I’m lucky to see that figure. But I don’t warm to what is, in effect, decimal three-quarters. At fifty you are still aspirant Sapient Man, at a hundred you're forgiven toothlessness and witlessness. In between you're a wart on the arse of progress, neither wholly functional nor nobly grizzled.

Dinner is booked at the Hardwick Inn where chips take 24 hours according to the Heston Blumenthal method. But alas, atheists propose and God disposes. Elder daughter and partner trekked heroically by bus across the country and are here. Younger daughter, a powerhouse of organisation and encouragement on such occasions, entered hospital last weekend and saw the knife. Afterwards she agreed her hospital bed would be worth a technological post but the long and short of it is (allowing a cliché is in keeping with the mood) the feasting must be split in two.

I was five when WW2 broke out and my parents sensibly held back on the fatted calf. The tenth-year celebrations - when Gordon Terrace, Idle, Bradford, was freed for democracy - were communal and I saw my first bonfire. Aged twenty I nursed athlete’s foot in a military hospital in the Cameron Highlands in what is now Malaysia. Thirty? Who knows?

I like numbers but they should be allowed to roam freely, not have non-numerical qualities forced upon them. I once reviewed a book that contained a million dots. Certain dots were picked out for significance, but these I ignored. There was more fun in flicking the pages and watching a million accumulate. A hideous song of my youth celebrated A Very Merry Unbirthday to Me. That’s about it.

16.11, same day. Things got better. First via songs. Nina Simone's "I wish I knew", Edith Piaf's "La Marseillaise", and then Ewan McColl's "Wull ye nae come back again?" with the simplest. most direct expression of affection ever set to music: "Better luved ye cannae be."
Plus more antique emotion. From elder daughter: the DVD of "Babette's Feast" and a packet of rum truffles. Seventeen years ago, brought to my knees by defective lungs and almost alone in the house, I watched that movie (again) and visibly cried (again). Granddaughter Bella, then two or three, disturbed by the weeping ancient, brought me a rum truffle. Ten minutes later, another. Et seq.

Learn to love the alphabet again

Know anything about monitors? Here’s the Lamborghini Murciélago of monitors – the Ilyama ProLite E2208HDS, a prematurely opened birthday prezzie from Mrs BB. What’s so special? Its size (22 in.), resolution (1920 x 1080 pixels) and price (£190). It should be standard for camera whiz-kids like Marja-Leena and Lucy since I merely point and shoot. But dullard wordsmiths gain too. Two text pages side by side and much cleaner rendering of typefaces.

HIGH-LEVEL CHAT I enjoy conversation but only with someone who matches my formidable forensic skills. Dr Paul Harris, my GP, meets the spec. I was in there this morning to discuss a skin complaint which he quickly diagnosed and then gave me a run down on its origins. These centre on my DNA’s “very clever” ability to counter the effects of UV light. Old Paul knows what turns me on.

We passed on to another of my failings – hyper-broncho-activity – which has been around for yonks and for which my previous GP admitted he could offer no help. Dr Paul says things have progressed and prescribed an inhaler. However I am to use it properly: the particles (tiny – a mere 2 microns) emerge at high velocity (200 kph) and I must co-ordinate my breathing when inhaling. Talk took in the structure of eye as proof that the Intelligent Design crackpots have got it wrong. I emerged intellectually refreshed.

NOVEL Another counsellor, Dr Plutarch, recommended adding various passages to GORGON TIMES, including an extra chapter. So the MS which I had revised down to 91,900 words now stands at 104,415 words. There’s a frisson on reaching six figures.

Coreopsis has set in, says Dr P

My 387 th post and I note the ebbing away of the blog’s felicity, inventiveness and entertainment value. Proof there is only so much stuff to go around and since September 21 2009 it’s gone to my other mistress. Special pleading? The inbred West Riding whinge? Guilty, m’lud.

Here’s Dr Plutarch reminding me why I need to work harder. “You seem worried, sometimes unnecessarily, about saying the obvious in this book.” It’s true. Would I rather be accused of being obvious or obscure? The latter it seems. Actually it’s “sometimes unnecessarily” that spurs me on.

Dr P again. “I have to admit going to the dictionary (to check ‘obloquy’). Is there a simpler word?” There is, of course. And I should also verify “smarty-boots”.

And again. “X and Y have no children. Is this worth explaining or reflecting upon?” First reaction: I said I’d explained this. Second reaction; On re-reading what I’d written I saw the opening for a useful addition. Third reaction: As a result of writing this useful addition I saw a further opportunity for a 1500-word passage in a new penultimate chapter I have yet to write.

Finally. The need for that new penultimate chapter was suggested by… Dr P!

But don’t get the wrong impression - these are not complaints. I am lucky Dr P is willing to work so hard on my behalf. But that’s as nothing compared with the fact that his suggestions immediately ring a sonorous bell of recognition in me. He’s right. Why then isn’t Dr P writing the book himself? Perhaps his blog commenters should launch a campaign.

So, as I’ve said before the blog suffers. Ars Gratia Artis as the MGM lion still roars.

Seventeen ages of man

A significant age looms within days, but it’s only significant numerically. These are the ones that really matter:
0 Born. A middle-class welcome.
5 Meningitis contracted. Neither dead nor deranged
9 Take easy GS entrance exam. Preserved from life of manual labour.
15 (and 358 days) Join Bradford newspaper. Capable of no other job.
17 Outward Bound Mountain School. Attracted to risk, can’t handle it.
19 RAF; am taught electronics. There’s more to life than reading.
24 Move to London. Out of primordial soup and into light.
25 Married. Start learning to be unselfish (Still learning.)
26 First daughter. Unprepared for fatherhood.
30 Six years in Pennsylvania. Stirrings of communal life.
32 Second daughter. Fatherhood still a mystery.
36 Mother dies. Can’t be; I’m not yet grown-up.
40 First editorship. The train set I’ve always wanted.
52 Buy house in France. It’s the language, stupid.
60 Retired. It crept up on me.
73 Blogging. Social circle widens (Is created?)
74 Resume fifth novel. Race against extinction.

WHERE THE WORK’S DONE This time it’s a seed-cake. My favourite.

NOVEL Plutarch recommends filling in omissions. The revised draft which he read has risen from 91,900 words to 96,840 words and I’m still only halfway through Chapter 9 (out of 22). Also, another chapter will be necessary between 21 and 22.

Unpublished short story (Comes with CD)

Persephone (wealthy, capricious celebrity of unearthly beauty – think Naomi Campbell) taunts Théophile (impoverished intellectual, familiar throughout Western literature – UK casting Richard E. Grant, US casting Stephen Buscemi) to collect extracts that will give her "some idea of classical music”. Keen to immerse her in Quartet for the end of time and Berg’s violin concerto T realises, sadly, the pieces must be accessible, part of a masterpiece, and widely different. One composer per choice.

1. Song, An die Musik. Schubert.
2. Overture, Academic Festival. Brahms.
3. Ballet music, opening theme, Petruschka. Stravinsky.
4. Cello concerto, first movement. Dvorak.
5. Oratorio aria, “He was despised”, Messiah. Handel.
6. Double violin concerto, first movement. Bach
7. Choral song, “Summer is icumen in”, Spring symphony. Britten.
8. Piano concerto no. 4, third movement. Beethoven.
9. Symphony no. 8, Leningrad, second (?) movement. Shostakovich.
10. Operatic trio, first act, Cosi fan tutte. Mozart.

Persephone arrives ninety minutes late for the recital accompanied by Peascod, bass guitarist of Metallica. As Dvorak sounds, the gorgeousness's mobile rings and, Hey!, she’s off to testify about blood diamonds. Peascod nods at Théophile, says “Great tunes, dude. At least you reached track four.” and walks off whistling an accomplished rock version of An die Musik..

Théophile presses the Stop button after track nine and replaces track ten with the Countess’s aria “Porgi, armor,” second act, Figaro.

“Grant, love, that relief to my sorrow, to my sighing
Give me back my treasure or at least let me die.”

Then succumbs to consumption.

NOVEL Trying a new title “A pin’s fee”. Plutarch yet to respond.