The House Husband

Another gloomy day, though no rain, just steel grey clouds hanging like a thick coverlet of lead.

I took some more Farnham photos when I went shopping but they were mostly disappointing. I did manage to find the world’s biggest poppy, though. Hope the Chinese don’t see it. If someone Chinese is reading this – it has NOTHING to do with the Opium Wars! Seriously, guys. The link explains it all.

Great big poppy at the Farnham Herald

I also managed a shot of Mirinda’s favourite meringue shop. I have no idea how good they are but can vouch for their almond croissants, which are FANTASTIC!

Maison Blanc - great cakes!

Back home I had a fun day in the garden, (serenaded by the Bell’s Piece Christmas Fayre) raking up the tons of leaves, left covering the grass after the big winds and rain over the last few days. Bell’s Piece is a home for people with disabilities and every now and then they have a fund raising day. They also have a very clear and loud PA system. They are not very far from our house. And so, as I raked, I heard an odd shortened version of Que Sera Sera. Then full versions of such hits as Summer Holiday, Magic Moments, and so on. Interspersed with these hits of the 1840s, were Christmas songs.

I make it sound awful but it was actually quite nice. Though, I have to say, should I ever be flung into one of those places (or anywhere that caters for those whose brains have finally gone over the wall) can whoever sends me make sure I have my iPod with songs from MY youth rather than my father’s loaded on it? I wonder whose taste the music reflects. Apart from the DJ, who is always light and jolly and sounds about 65.

It’s like when we read at FATN and don’t read things because they may be a bit ‘naughty’: Like we are the decency police and think it will upset our listeners. I’d rather not be treated like a child, thank you. Give me everything AND the gravy.

Anyway, I digress…there were a LOT of leaves. To prove it, I piled them under the the gazebo to show you, before delivering them to the leaf trap.

Fallen, raked leaves

Looking at the photo, I’m a bit disappointed because it doesn’t look as big a pile as it actually was. I didn’t count them but I reckon there was around 6 billion of them.

Today was as gorgeous as yesterday was grim. Sun and blue skies, though bitterly cold, made for excellent photo ops. And, as Mirinda claims I do not include enough pictures of our lovely town in my blog, I aim to remedy that.

Here’s the castle as seen looking up Castle Street. As we approach winter, so the trees stop hiding the battlements.

Looking up Castle Street

Next we have the Lion and Lamb. Starbucks is through the left arch and Waitrose is the other side of the arches. I note with horror that the Christmas decorations have already started to appear.

The Lion & Lamb

And speaking of Christmas decorations, the front page of our local paper last week featured, as it’s main front page photograph, the Elphicks Christmas window. Elphicks is our own department store (I’m pretty sure there’s only one). So I thought I’d better include it. It looks as though Santa has dumped the sleigh for this year.

Elphicks Christmas window

Our beautiful church (St Andrew’s) taken from the car park opposite the Maltings. While it looks better from the church yard, the sun wasn’t in the right place and I thought this looked lovely with the other buildings around it.

St Andrew's church

And, finally, Gostrey Meadow with the beautiful willow tree. In the middle of the day, when the weather’s nice, this place is swarming with people and the swings and roundabouts, teeming with toddlers. It’s a favourite with Rafi.

Gostrey Meadow

Tomorrow is supposed to be wet and dreary again so this might be it!

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I finished building the auricula theatre today (it took me most of the day). It’s assembled and painted and presently residing in the shed. Now all I have to do is fix it to the fence. Here’s what it looked like. I used the obelisk to prop it up while I painted.

The auricula theatre - painted but not hung

My dissertation is complete. I submitted it this afternoon. I have to give them two printed copies which I will do tomorrow but that’s it. Finito. My education is complete. It’s such a relief. I would love to say that I’m now bored but I have too many things to catch up on.

Mirinda promised her dad a photo of the new restaurant in the Lion and Lamb so here it is.

Cote Brasserie in Farnham

It is almost opposite the Lion and Lamb restaurant. Last year it was a scrappy bit of brickwork trying to be a garden. Bit of it was a Turkish carpet shop. I think the new building blends in really well with the old.

We sat outside, which was lovely, and had a lovely lunch last Sunday. Alex, who used to work at Starbucks, is now waitressing there.

Highly recommended and we will return.

Left Farnham for Battle as the rain started sprinkling down, a sprinkle which followed me all the way it seemed. A quick change at Waterloo for Waterloo East and I was heading back south. It’s the old spoke thing.

If you imagine London is the centre of a bicycle wheel, all the transport links head in towards it. It could just as easily be any big centre (Manchester, Glasgow, Edinburgh, etc) but London demonstrates it best. What this means is that if you want to travel around the rim, most of the time it’s only possible to go via London. This doesn’t actually apply to Farnham as I could have travelled via Havant and across the bottom to Brighton but this would have meant about six trains and taken about 4 hours. And so I went in to Waterloo and then came back out again. At least I didn’t have to cross London.

And so I found myself on a train heading to Battle (where the tussle happened in 1066) and John’s place, laden with rucksack and netbook, phone and iPod. Looking forward to a jolly good pirating week, I’m listening to a collection of pirate shanties recorded by a few famous rock stars. It’s called Rogue’s Gallery and is definitely putting me in the mood.

So I was first to arrive at John’s. We had a good long chat, catching up, just shooting the breeze, over coffee and then beer, naturally. The rumour was that Lorna, Darren, Bev and Matt would arrive more or less simultaneously. There had been no news from Sean. This is not unusual.

Bev & Matt were next. I’m not sure why but it appears that Matt is not talking to me. He’s gone all sulky. Strange, but then he is, really. It does make things a bit uncomfortable. I did attempt to talk to him a few times but he’s not really up for it so I stopped and just kept being incredibly funny, to force him to laugh. Which didn’t really work.

Lorna and Darren turned up shortly afterwards and, eventually we all sat down to a lovely chilli and sticky rice dinner, expertly prepared by John and accompanied by beer. At some stage we had a text from Sean, saying he’d arrive at 9:30. A while later (at about 9:30) we had another text from Sean saying he’d arrive at 11:30. We decided not to leave him any food and ate it all.

We sat in the lounge listening to a bit of pirate music, eating Lorna’s yummy cake, until Darren was sleepy enough to go to bed. We have to leave the house by 2:30am so the drivers (Darren & John) have to be in bed early. This prompted everyone to retire early as well. I, like a fool, am staying up to work on my dissertation. I shall sleep in the car. I’m very good at that. I am also going to meet Sean at the station. I don’t know why but at least I’ll get some fresh air.

The train arrived slightly early but I was there to meet them and escort them up the very steep hill to John’s place. They were very grateful, if somewhat exhausted. They had a laptop with them. I mention this because Matt has also brought one. Just can’t get away from them! And of course, I have my netbook.

Another glorious day and I’m certain that the organisers of the Farnham Carnival are all delighted. I saw them popping their witches hats into empty car spaces as cars drove off while I went about my shopping morning. Old chaps, generally with beards, wearing hi-viz vests would spring out from behind innocuous looking vehicles, pouncing like clunky panthers, rejoicing as they claimed another parking spot in Castle Street as if they were engaged in a Chess Masters Final in Moscow. It was all very jolly.

Having an awful lot of fun were the chaps weaving the thick gangle of cables up and over door frames, around posts and brackets, splitting off speaker leads, power leads and other leads, as they neared tables. It is this time of the year that these chaps come out and enjoy themselves, playing at being Festival Organisers, Rock ‘n’ Roll Roadies, Truly Cool Guys. It’s a fun departure from their usual jobs as bankers and brokers and bakers and butchers and Totally Uncool Dads.

My favourite cart

It’s why the funfair is up at the park, of course. The carnival. We are not going though. We have much older fish to fry. We are going to where Mirinda has her book club meetings!

OK, that doesn’t sound all that interesting but really, it is. She discusses the books her group read at the home of Edward Knight who, adopted into the Knight family, was actually Edward Austen. His sister was a rather good writer and it was because of him that the rest of his family settled in Chawton and why Cassandra, Jane’s sister, opened a tea shop across the road.

The house isn’t generally open – although Mirinda goes there once a month – so I was very keen to have a look. As well as the house (and it’s superb library) we were promised Regency Dancing, refreshments, insects, Shire horses and the walled rose garden.

I should mention Summer, the new Shire pony born in the spring. Very cute and still a bit wobbly on its massive feet. Claire, you’d have loved it!

Mother and baby

We had a lovely, relaxed afternoon at Chawton House Library, though we didn’t get to see many insects, and drove home the long way, through the lovely countryside around Alton and Odiham.

The weather is hot. Worse is, apparently, due tomorrow.

Apparently it’s National Insect Week.

I am on a very tight deadline to finish my essays for this semester. Of course, I have no-one to blame but myself. I’ve managed a LOT of reading so it’s just a question of getting the words down, I guess. Anyway, that’s what I spent half of today (and most of tonight) doing. The first half was quite different…

I had to go to see our lawyers to identify myself. For the flat buying. Now, we have bought and/or sold 10 properties with them over the last 10 years so you’d think they’d know us by now. I sort of like to imagine that when a new instruction comes in from us, they all say “Look! It’s another one from those two crazy, property indecisive Aussies!” If anyone does say that, it makes no difference. Each time, we have to trundle off to Fleet and tell them who we are.

I also had my yearly check up at the doctor. It happens over here when you have asthma. They need to make sure you know how to use the spray you’ve been using since you were 19. Every year they need to make sure. This used to be a right pain when we were at Haslemere because the doctor was miles away but now it’s a whizz. The doctor is down the end of the road. Brilliant.

On top of that, Mirinda was home yesterday (for book club) so I walked her up to the station this morning first. After waving her train bye bye, I then turned around and walked all the way back again, winding up at the doctor. She measured me, weighed me, tested my breathing, asked me the same questions she asked me last year, made sure I knew how to inhale and then let me go. It was then onto my first bus.

When I was working at Woking, getting to Fleet was quite easy. One train. That was it. I could pop over in my lunch hour. It is a bit of a hike from the station but even so, pretty simple and direct. Now, however, it’s not so simple. Or direct. Of course, there’s no bus from Farnham to Fleet. That would be far too easy. I have to get one to Aldershot then change for the Fleet bus. This wasn’t too bad, I only had a ten minute wait. And then a long trek, winding through the countryside, stopping at awful looking estates, until I was deposited outside the lawyer’s office.

I walked in and told the receptionist why I was there. She took my documents, photocopied them, returned the originals and that was it. I could have been anyone. The whole thing took 5 minutes. I then walked back out to the street ready for ther trip back to Aldershot.

The Fleet bus only comes every hour so it was with a bit of dismay that I realised I had 50 minutes to wait for the next one. Fortunately a nearby Wetherspoons was open so I sat and nursed a lovely pint, read the paper and waited there.

It was then back to Aldershot in order to switch to another bus for Farnham. I had a 15 minute wait this time. I stayed on the bus into Farnham so I could shop for my lunch and dinner then walked home.

I had left home at 7:20am and returned at 12:45pm. If I was a driver, the whole thing would have taken less than an hour! That’s what you get for doing the right thing and being fiercely independent.

It’s days like today that I know why I love living here in Farnham. The sky has been blue, all day, the temperature not high, a light breeze and birds everywhere.

I took the poodles for a long walk around the park today, because it was so beautiful. We passed a young chap (at the age when they do not say ‘hello’), head inside a hoodie, face down, the white cable from his iPod disappearing into his fleece. I thought it was a shame he couldn’t hear the wonderful world around him. The birds were being delightfully raucous, flitting from branches, dragging semi-buried worms to the surface. I was glad I was there to see and hear them. But to be there and to cut myself off from nature’s delights? I could imagine little worse. But I didn’t let his stupidity upset me, I merely chuckled as he scuffed by.

As we reached the highest part of the path, I stopped and looked around. Not a soul for miles. It was like the park belonged to us. I’m not sure about the puppies, but I felt true perfection; a lucky spectator in a world of glory. The greens were greener, the mud less soft, the poodles bouncing and running. What more could there be?

The mud is important. Because of the February drenching we had, everywhere is, more or less, a quagmire. However, the cold nights (rarely getting above zero) have managed to freeze the ground and if we walk around early enough, the girls manage some semblance of clean feet.

Eventually we met another dog walker (the lady with the big white husky-looking dogs) and we exchange pleasantries. She always has one of them on a lead and he exchanged not-so-pleasantries with the poodles. We chuckled, as she chided him for being ‘silly’.

And then there are the crocuses everywhere, starting to appear as spring sidles in. Really, it was one of those mornings. Nothing could ruin the mood and beauty. I really do love it here.