bee – Page 11 – derrickjknight

Downton

We are running out of storage space, so Jackie and I visited David Fergusson’s House Clearance shop in Highcliffe, where we bought three chests of drawers which will be delivered next week. There we met the fascinating proprietor who has an impressive knowledge of art. He is still waiting for that miraculous find, but clearly appreciates and values some of the items he collects. They do not all find their way into his shop. His home must be a treasure trove.
It is not now quite so scary a prospect to accommodate the belongings we then collected from Shelly and Ron’s afterwards. At their home we also met Anthony, their son, Jane their daughter, and her boyfriend Chris. Ron is recovering from his operation on his broken heel. We had an enjoyable chat with welcome mugs of coffee.

Our garden becomes more resplendent as the month proceeds.

Another Camellia is in bloom, as is a tree peony offering shelter to a bee. The elegant weeping birch flickers with dangling new leaves.

After lunch I walked down Downton Lane, taking the footpath off to the right. From the stubbled field alongside, I could see the original hamlet of Downton stretched out along Christchurch Road. Enlarging the picture offers a glimpse of our pale blue washed house centre right.

To the left The Solent sparkled in the distance, and the cloudy smoke from a bonfire blended well with the bulky form of the Isle of Wight.

A solitary rook vied with the seagulls for pickings from a recently ploughed field.

I took the left turn alongside the bluebell wood which also contained wood anemones among many other wild flowers.

After crossing the stream I optimistically diverged from the marked path, turned left through an opening in the barbed wire fence and circumperambulated

a steep grassy field with clumps of gorse at its summit, looking down on

a splendid bluebell bank beside the road.

It soon became apparent that there was no other egress, so I retraced my steps and returned home.
This evening Jackie fed Flo and me (and herself) on Pizza and penne bolognese sprinkled with parmesan cheese. Strawberry jelly and Kelly’s Cornish clotted cream ice cream. I finished the Isla Negra and Jackie drank a little more of her Hoegaarden.
As I post this, I am listening to the ticking of two clocks. One, keeping perfect time, is a battery operated modern one bought by Jackie in one of Morden’s ‘cheapie places’. The other, a splendid reproduction station waiting room clock was given to Jessica and me by Michael when he was seventeen. It still needs a little adjustment to its new environment as it loses a few minutes a day. This is the clock that survived being stolen with the rosewood wine table that stands beneath it.

The Eye Patch

Jackie’s nasturtium leaves are being eaten by minute caterpillars hatched from little yellow butterfly eggs. The sneaky parents laying the eggs on the underside reckon without our eagle-eyed head gardener.

Yesterday’s bee was harvesting a marigold. Today’s perched on a sunflower, confirming my suspicion that these creatures are more attracted to yellow flowers than to anything else.

Jackie drove us to The Firs for a gardening session. On an absolutely sweltering day this was a difficult task. The garden has suffered from months of cold rain, delaying everything; followed by several weeks heatwave making it rather too hot to work and forcing all the tardy growth at once. A Madonna lily that has just about survived these extremes appeared alongside a dried out pot the contents of which, pansies and tulips, haven’t.

Jackie managed a decent amount of potting up whilst I concentrated on weeding, which at times meant grappling with brambles which had a tendency to get their own back. The compost heaps created last year are beginning to look rather inadequate, as the newest one, despite its walls having been raised a bit a week or so ago, is now looking rather mountainous. The pruned brambles are piled up separately for burning.

I have already recorded that Jackie planted more than 100 sweet pea plants. Elizabeth was able to cut a rather good scented display purely for the pleasure of Maureen Allen.

Drinks breaks were welcome. On one, Paul Clarke joined us and, among other things we discussed the open studio planned for later this month, to which his mother will be contributing some items. In discussing the widening of the theme from drums to music in general, and the fact that nostalgia is quite popular at the moment, I suddenly remembered a slide I had taken of Chris about fifty years ago. Complete with Hank Marvin specs, my brother is playing a guitar. That has to be printed for the exhibition.

Fortunately my slide library has assisted my memory. On our return to Minstead I couldn’t wait to retrieve the picture. Under the specs Chris is wearing an eye patch. I cannot remember why this was necessary. It is unlikely he fancied himself as a pirate. The photograph was taken in February 1966, on the day of Jacqueline’s marriage to John Clancy, whose cigarette lights up the background of our parents’ living room at 18 Bernard Gardens, Wimbledon.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s chicken jalfrezi and savoury rice, with trifle to follow. She drank Hoegaarden whilst I began a bottle of Maipo reserva Merlot 2012.

Planted In The i-Mac

Despite there being little sun and a quantity of intermittent rain today, bees were busy harvesting nectar from Jackie’s plants.

This afternoon I walked through Minstead to Football Green; up to and through the grounds of Minstead Lodge; down Seamans Lane and skirted Suters Cottage; to emerge from the forest on Running Hill just below Lower Drive. (Memo to self: if you venture into the open woods in sandals after a couple of days’ rain you will get your feet wet.)

Minstead Lodge’s horses were favoured with fly-sheets. Their companion donkeys were not. Maybe they are not as plagued by the little nippers as are the larger animals.

I moved into 29 Sutherland Place in July 2007. Soon after this, a small child pointed out the camera integral to my i-Mac computer, and that this was a wizard way of taking your own picture. Much fun was had by Oliver and Alice in particular, and many hours were spent playing with the special effects that could be achieved, especially if you were prepared to pull funny faces. On 30th July, Heidi, Oliver, Alice, and I had a very fruitful session. I seem to have cut my chin shaving.

By 15th November 2008, Oliver had become quite proficient. This I discovered some time later when I found a couple of dozen mixed colour, and distorted effect pictures planted in the computer.

By December 2009, Louisa had persuaded me into Skype, and I believe I actually took picture number 23 in the ‘through the ages’ series whilst I was Skyping her. I was certainly speaking with her on the phone.

The coriander garnish decorating Jackie’s tasty savoury rice that she served up with her delicious chicken jalfrezi, accompanied by popadoms and paratas from a little shop in New Milton, was in bloom. That is the result of growing the herb in pots and not using it quickly enough. It does mean we will have plenty of seeds for next year. With my meal I finished the Cotes du Rhone opened a day or so ago.

Have you ever coughed or otherwise breathed in at an awkward moment when eating, and wound up with a pea firmly lodged in a part of your respiratory system? It usually irritates somewhere between the back of your throat and your nostrils, until eventually you blow it out into your handkerchief. Well, I’ll let you know in good time whether mine of this evening is a grain of rice or indeed a pea.

Ron Sveden from Massachusetts once ate a pea that ‘went down the wrong way’. Jackie read out his story from BBC news the other day. It was in August 2010 that he was rushed to hospital with a collapsed lung. He feared cancer until the doctors informed him that he had a pea plant growing inside his lung. If I should be nurturing a paddy field I will report that too.

Mumbai

As I sat down in the London train to which Jackie had delivered me this morning I was greeted by a beaming smile, reminiscent of Tenniel’s Cheshire Cat, from the gentleman diagonally opposite. I knew immediately what I was in for. It only took a few seconds for me to learn that he was travelling to Winchester. I calculated that I could probably tolerate the open, friendly, naive, vulnerable chap’s conversation for the requisite seven minutes. He belonged to a local history society and was bound for an event at Winchester cathedral, the Dean of which he knew personally. He was able to tell me what he had eaten on the last such occasion two years ago. This congenial 73 year old fellow keeps himself active through his interests. As he fished inside his raincoat for his ticket I noticed the tell-tale collection of badges affixed to his jacket lapel.

Soon after my recent acquaintance’s departure, a sleepy bee dropped onto my lapel. I flicked it off. Straight into a blonde woman’s hair. Making an immediate bee-line for that I dashed the creature to the floor with the flat of my hand. The lady was a little surprised. The furry little insect landed beneath a family occupying the seats behind. The father scooped it up with a piece of card, and, with two of his young progeny, one sucking her thumb, in his wake, went off in search of a window. He wasn’t going to find one he could open. Indeed, he didn’t. As he returned he announced that the bee had just changed carriages. I said he had adopted the technique of someone I know, who shall be nameless, with snails which are chucked over the garden fence. This must be an acceptable activity because we saw Alan Titchmarsh do it on his latest garden creation television programme.

From Waterloo I took the tube to Queensway whence I walked to Sutherland Place for the next book-packing session. When this was finished I retraced this journey to Southampton where Jackie was waiting to drive me home.

Queensway’s opening hours and its O2 shop stopped me panicking in 2007. During Jessica’s last months my mobile phone was indispensable. It suddenly packed up on me one evening. I hot-footed it to this shop where it was replaced and I was back in long-distance communication.

I can never pass Whiteley’s department store without thinking of Shirley and Edward. I often wonder whatever happened to them. Edward was the small son, contemporary with Michael, of the Whiteley heiress who was the partner of Ivan who was my friend forty five years ago. Jackie, Michael and I were invited to join them on holiday in Shanklin. On one of our days on the beach, complying with his request, Jackie buried her stepson up to his waist in the sand.

The differing child care practices of the two families proved rather stressful.

Deviating a little on my journey today, I was fortunate to be walking through Leinster Square when a brief storm struck. I was able to shelter on the steps of a grand colonnaded terrace and watch stair rods descend on a rack of Boris’s Bikes. When the rain abated somewhat I saw a swarthy gentleman emerge from a basement flat bearing an armful of new umbrellas packed in cellophane, no doubt intending to take advantage of the weather on some stall somewhere. By then the gutters were flowing with water and evasive action was required to avoid a supplementary shower thrown up by the wheels of buses along Westbourne Grove.

In my post ‘Curry, A Biography’ of 31st October last year I mentioned the reluctance of the proprietor of ‘Star of Bombay’ to alter the city’s name to Mumbai, which, to me, seemed appropriate. I see his mind remains unaltered.

On our way back from Southampton we stopped at Goodies in Netley Marsh for fish and chips. I drank tea and Jackie had diet coke.