Category Archives: Uncategorized

My friend David is a whizz at finding good travel deals.  Who wouldn’t jump at the chance of a £39 return on the Eurostar? Bon, j’ai sauté à l’occasion… Getting up in the dark and cold is never the best thing but as soon as I was at St. Pancras International I could feel the […]

Bonfire night on the 5th November follows fast on the heels of Hallowe’en at the end of October and there are always a few bangs and some stray, early rockets to chase the witches away on their broomsticks. I usually buy packets of coloured ‘haribo’ sweets, which I keep in a bowl by the door […]

Flowers are a great comfort.   They don’t make a noise, they don’t complain, you can come and go as you like because they don’t need you and, most of all, they give unstinting pleasure because they have intrinsic beauty. Flowers are also a bridge between science and art.  Many plants are used in the […]

John promised he would finish his 24/7 report by the end of May, so I kept my counsel and was as quiet as a mouse about having a few days away.  We finally pointed the nose of our old- but- still- stylish- car in the direction of the New Forest at the beginning of July […]

Piccadilly.  Pouring with rain, I struggled to get my umbrella out of an already soaking shopping bag.  I trudged on to Liberty’s via Golden Square.  Breathing a sigh of relief as I arrived but looking like a drowned rat, I began to drip my way upstairs. When I went to put my umbrella back into […]

The first book I read in 2014 was ‘WOLF HALL’, by Hilary Mantel. It’s long and was quite a challenge but I suddenly found myself ‘in step’ with it after about 200 pages.  And, by chance, I started 2015 with another long but ultimately satisfying piece of writing.  ‘THE GOLDFINCH‘ by Donna Tartt. This starts […]

Tintin books have always been a favourite in our house.  I think we must have the whole collection, neatly nibbled around the edges, as they were loved so much! John and I made a foray to Somerset House by the Aldwych to see a small exhibition of Tintin in the New Year.  A new resolution […]

‘There’s an exhibition about Samuel Pepys on in Greenwich’, said my friend, Kate.  Last time I was in Greenwich was last  summer. A place full of grand, light filled spaces – (even though bitingly cold today).  In the summer, I was enchanted by the Cutty Sark, the market, coffee upstairs in Waterstones, the wide roads […]

A family outing.  Our seats were on the first row of the balcony, giving us a stunning view.  The film was ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’, with a live orchestra playing the musical score. Slightly early, so we walked up from South Kensington tube and John said he would show me around Imperial College, where […]

In 2015, I jotted down the title of every film I saw, with a couple of lines to remind me what I liked or didn’t like about them.  Here are a few of the most memorable. I started the year off with GRAVITY in 3D, (George Clooney and Sandra Bullock), thinking it was not my […]