More of wot I have heard...

Look Where I’ve Ended Up Now by Colum Sands

We saw this Northern Irish singer songwriter at our local folk club and found him very enjoyable. He had the gift of the gab too, telling some interesting tales including one about a song on his new album that came out of a tour to New Zealand and a chance meeting in a Devenport folk club.


Beachcomber’s Windowsill by Stornoway

Terry gave me a spare copy of this album and I am very glad. This is the début album, and boy they are worth looking out for, they a bit like Munford & Sons but more folky.

A Cultural Day in the City...

Benjamin Franklins House


We had a day in London recently and we managed to cram a few things in including a visit to the only surviving home of Benjamin Franklin in the world. The rooms are bare now, but the guide is an actress who interacts with pre-recorded audio and visual presentations in each room to give you a great tour, bring to life much of the history much better than a dry display case could.

Camille Silvy at the National Portrait Gallery

The NPG does a nice thing where they have a late night opening some evenings and even have a small bar in the foyer. We decided to have a quick look at an exhibition of Camille Silvy’s work after we came out of the theatre. The gallery is a great place to pop in quickly and get a fix of culture.

Silvy was a pioneer of early photography and one of the greatest French photographers of the nineteenth century. There were some very interesting pictures that showed a snapshot of life during that period. Some of his experiments with different techniques were interesting too.


Avenue Q at the Wyndham’s Theatre

This adult puppet show is coming to an end in London, so we thought we would catch while we could. It was an absolute hoot, we loved it, never have we seen the like even puppet porn. It had great songs, funny acting, fun stage and a superb production and was very enjoyable.

Local culture...

When We Are Married by JB Priestley at Guildford’s Yvonne Arnaud Theatre


This was a great production of a lovely bedroom farce, everything about it was well done – even the set got an applause as the curtain rose. The company were on the last night in the suburbs before moving into the west-end. The cast included some very familiar names including

Rosemary Ashe, Lynda Baron, Susie Blake, Michele Dotrice, David Horovitch, Roy Hudd, Vincent Brimble, Maureen Lipman, and Simon Rouse

Dance little piggy, dance...

Westcott Gardeners’ Club Ceilidh


The Gardeners’ Club had an event in one of the local halls. They had organised a Ceilidh (Kaylee) band – the Pugwash Band (a couple from the band run the Dorking Folk Club that we frequent).

We had a good night dancing our socks off, though Sue claims I flung her about far too roughly.

Mong’d in Corfu...

We had a short break in Corfu recently, essentially our summer holiday but in autumn. We have friends who moved out there several years ago and renovated a small cottage, living there most of the year.

We were taken on a guided tour of the island and some of the things we saw included: Sunset Beach (where a cliff-top bar is situated and you can have a drink facing the sea - there are also swing seats), Achilleion Palace (a grand old building with an interesting history of pre-war Germany, Nazi occupation, casino and set of a James Bond movie – it also has a very tall and impressive bronze of Achilles), Kalami ( a lovely bay), Vlacherna and Pontikonisi or Mouse Island (iconic views of Corfu and entertainingly just at the end of the runway), birth place of Prince Phillip, home of the Durrell family, home of Nana Mouskouri, Mount Pandokrator (tallest point on the island with a church at the very top and a communications tower in the church yard), Kassiopi (a wonderful coastal town) and Nisaki (near where our friends live and where Sue had the best calamari – ever!)

We spent the evenings drinking way too much, partying into the night playing silly games – like pick a track from Terry’s extensive collection in turn in a multi-DJ style. The earliest we got to bed was 1am, the latest 5am. Mong’d is Terry and Alexis term for being very, very drunk.

Luckily it rained all day on the last day – we all needed the rest.

More of wot I have read...

Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell


This was a very interesting book not just for the narrative but for the unusual writing style. There are six stories that start in the past and proceed through to the future, each partially completed – until you get to the last story in the middle of the book that is whole, each of the other stories is then completed in turn until you get back to the first story. Each story makes reference to the previous one in a continuation but they are quite different stories, written differently in different styles (diary, pulp novel, interview etc.). I liked it very much.


“Souls cross ages like clouds cross skies...


Six interlocking lives – one amazing adventure. In a narrative that circles the globe and reaches from the 19th century to a post-apocalyptic future, David Mitchell erases the boundaries of time, genre and language to offer an enthralling vision of humanity’s will to power, and where it will lead us.”