Tag Archives: Sam

FOODELICIOUS WASHBOARD BELEAGURED: November 2025

Ahem, Richard and Marie, from Cholsey in Oxfordshire, where Alli and I lived just after we got married, came to see us for a weekend. It was wonderful to see them after so many years (around 30). We walked around Sheffield Park, looking preternaturally multi-coloured in the wintry sunlight at the height of its autumn […]

CRANE RAMPION BUCOLIC: July 2025

Ahem A proper summer seemed to unfold and express itself haltingly from the first few days of the month, providing some of the hottest days on record in England. The whole country seems to change character for about a month sometime around the beginning of July, when the year turns back on the home straight. […]

FENCE CRUCIATE LOFTICE : January 2025

Ahem Jessie and Jurrat came back from their stay in Luxembourg with Uncle Tank and Auntie Susie, and retook ownership of Jaxon, whom we delivered safe and sound after his five-day stay with us. Jaxon was an entertaining guest. His self-absorption is highly amusing whereas in humans it might become irritating. Alli had been urgently […]

BRIMFUL GOOSE LINGERS: December 2024

Ahem Our Christmas celebrations are different to those of ten and more years ago. Now in our third age, we no longer go to pantomimes but to shows that would once have been fringe but are now mainstream, while the old mainstream is now nostalgia. This year I went with Alli, Jessie, Ella, and Sam […]

WED MOSEYING PAPYRUS: August 2024

Ahem Ella and Sam were formally wed on 24th August in Wadhurst Castle in East Sussex, a glorious culmination of many months of diligence and planning by the couple, aided by close friends and sisters. They designed and organised most of the event themselves after choosing the venue and catering. It was also the confirmation […]

HERON FEGAWI BLUEBELLS: April 2024

Ahem,  A few days after I had, with all due ceremony, carefully poured twenty bright and bushy-tailed goldfish from a large transparent plastic bag into our rejuvenated pond, aware that the fish would be in temporary shock and hiding behind pond foliage for a while, Alli and I slowly began, quite separately, to realise that […]

MUTTLEY POND GLUTEN: March 2024

Lake Wood, March 2024

Ahem, Muttley was one of my childhood heroes (along with Rolf Harris). As an infant TV-watcher, I thought Muttley was a philosophical genius; he could summarise all relevant social discourse into three cardinal responses: a chronic wheezy snigger; a frustrated oath-laden mutter grumble; and impatient agreement by rapid head-nodding while rasping “yeh-yeh-yeh, yeh-yeh-yeh”. It inspires […]

BRIDESMATES BIRIANI BRUNNER: July 2023

Ahem, Jessie, our first-born daughter, and Jurrat, our first son-in-law, made their memorable vows to each other in an unforgettable wedding celebration under a blue cedar tree in the garden of Broad Oaks, following their civil marriage in Brighton last month. Jessie and Jurrat (J2) had between them arranged almost everything about the wedding celebration. […]

FRIENDS REMOTE PRATFALL: February 2023

Ahem, Alli and I went to Brussels on the Eurostar from St Pancras to visit our friends Laurence and Claude and to celebrate Laurence’s 60th birthday with their son Corentin, daughter Ambre, and a large group of mutual friends, many of whom have been constant, close, and regular companions for nearly fifty years. It is […]

PITHIVIER CLAY REFUGEE: January 2023

Ahem, The atrocious rain in the first half of January seemed like a judgment of the gods, restoring a balance disturbed by the absurd heat waves of the summer past. Walks were again mudslides, even on paths that previously had held firm throughout the last few weeks. Local sauntering was less of a pleasure as […]