Decor

It was 20 years ago this week that Cheryl and I moved into our house, a typical 1930s semi. Last week we had new wooden flooring in the hall and carpeted the stairs and landing. After 20 years we have decorated this house in its entirety. A few rooms have had several remakes but we'd never been able to strip off however many layers of gloss from the stairs and so never decorated the hall, landing, stairs. Well chuffed is what we are, that and bouncing up the stairs on our super new carpet!

In other news the inaugural meeting of a new writing group took place at the Orange Tree in Richmond last Tuesday evening. There were nine of us, quite an amazing number for a group I think. Plus two who weren't able to make it are very likely to join us. And the best part of it is, without exception, there is such a wealth of talent, such a refreshing amount of honesty in the feedback, that we can only continue to learn our craft together in sweet harmony as jonny b. love once sang. Very exciting!

Last, but by no means least, my friend Philip came out of hospital this week. Philip is a gaming buddy and unfortunately is bi-polar. He's had ten good years but in April suffered a huge set-back - brought on by Mr Cameron unsurprisingly - and has been in hospital for two lengthy spells. We played a close game of Bruges, close by my standards anyway as I only lost by about ten points, and it remains a huge favourite of mine. But more importantly it was good to have a chat with Philip in his own flat, and despite him being on his own quite a lot at the present time, I hope he continues his recovery at his own pace. He's an exceedingly bright fellow and I find him most agreeable!

That's my exclamation mark paragraph endings done, another poem's been loaded up. Take care all..

I am troubled by the space between sea and food, I'm sorry!

Poetry

Right. Have added a page to this blog. It's called 'my poetry' under the Outpourings Section. There'll be a poem added every Monday that I remember to do so.

This is me being less than precious about my poems. And having had enough rejection to last a lifetime. To think I might have gotten published in a poetry magazine read by who knows what number of people, darn it!!

Here's a snap from the weekend before last. It's of the Ocean Rooms in Gorleston which was mentioned in my poem 'Bickering in a Caravan'. I couldn't believe it still has the same name some 30 years on from when I last went there..

Carshalton-on-Sea Prep

In the build up to this weekend's poetry reading I was our with Cheryl and Josie visiting Osterley Gardens trying to learn my Suffolk poems by heart. They're not very long and have an easy structure to memorise so it wasn't too bad. We spent quite some time in the scented garden where our next door neighbour works as a volunteer. It was delicious!

Later, as I was finishing off Lowestoft Fish Market for the third time, we neared the Garden House where John Grant, Poet in Residence was seated. He passed us a poetry book and we each opened a page and selected a line for him. Mine came from Matthew Arnold, all three lines were appropriate. He was compiling a line from each visitor and then creating a poem for the day. He had done the same the previous day too.

He was also supposed to be giving a ten minute reading at noon, 2pm and 4pm. Unfortunately, no-one had been around at noon so he had read to himself. He had kept himself busy since being allocated Osterley House as part of the Open House weekend. He had never been before so had throughly enjoyed taking it all in, visiting ahead of the weekend and writing four new poems based on his findings. One of these was all about some of the 250 volunteers who keep the house and gardens in immaculate condition.

Spending a little time online I found that John is part of the Poetry Society's 'Campus' where poets share their work and thoughts. It looks a good site to be part of with a number of different 'groups' you can join to help spread your poetry. In the latest restructuring of my time I have decided to dedicate Wednesday's creative time to poetry and perhaps I will join Campus and see where that may lead.

Now, where was I? Oh yes.. Lowstoff Fesh Marke'.

Barking Up the Wrong Tree

That's the sort of title I like. A good old fashioned saying with a strong image attached to it. It's also the title of a card game that's attempting to get crowdfunding for publication. It's a particularly English game from the Ragnar Brothers who have a good tradition in quirkiness. Have a quick look here: Barking! if you have some time, you'll enjoy the video description of the game if nothing else!

I mentioned yesterday the forthcoming poetry reading I shall be taking part in and thought I should actually give you a little insight into the world of Ivan Shrimpton. He's my fictional character that pens all these Suffolk poems on my behalf. He's probably mid 60s and has managed his life within a small radius of North Suffolk/South Norfolk. He has insights into local events and places as well as trying to keep up with the pace of technology in the 21st Century. He first came to life with this poem:

In The Village That I Live

In the village that I live 

I keep myself to myself,

there’s too many rum old 

busy-bodies already see,

and barely a soul to speak with,

Mrs V who run the store, 

but I don’t like to ask o’ her,

and the vicar, well, 

he’s too like a milkman now,

doing his round all odd days.

In the village that I live 

I keeps good care o’ hedges

do some grass cutting too, 

still grow all me own veg,

’at’s fruit I struggle at, 

have to get it online I do,

bit of a muddle, bit of a mess, 

but I’m getting through

the fifteen nets o’ oranges 

I ordered by mistook.

In the village that I live

’at’s better just me and Fordie,

my West Highland Terror 

as I call the scruffy fellah,

when he gets a going after 

them rabbits and hares

there ain’t no stopping him, 

nor catching him neither!

Mind he can take some persuading 

to shift his arse of an afternoon.

In the village that I live 

there’s no young folk any more,

they up and go, just like that 

once they get the urge,

we us’d to play amongst 

the bales, go beating

and trapping the game, 

but the farms is all different now

all mechanicalised it is, 

I can still drive a tractor though.

That's the standard language version that I read from, using my local knowledge of the accent he'd be talking in. My dissertation covered off my doubts of trying to read dialect for my prospective audience - you, yes you, don't cower away! So, just for comparison's sake, here's the first verse in dialect.

En the Vellege that Oi Lev

En the vellege that oi lev

oi keep mesel’ to mesel’,

there’s too meny rum ol’

busy-bodies already see,

an’ barely a soul ’o speak wev,

Mrs V who run the store,

but oi dun’t loik to ask o’ her,

and the vecar, well,

he’s too loik a melkman now,

doen hes round all odd days.

That's your lot for today.. if Ivan's piqued your interest it's Saturday week, see below for the poster from yesterday.

The Water Poets

My writing is all about the novel you see. Anything else is good practice, and one day I'd like to adapt a novel for the stage I'm sure. Short stories don't often do it for me. I'm just getting into it and it's gone, there's not enough to entertain me as I wish to be entertained. As for flash fiction, it's concise and nowhere near even the start of a scene.

Poetry. Where does that fit in? I did the teenage angsty stuff and courted my wife with it naturally. I read the poets we do at school and enjoyed Keats, Coleridge, not so much Milton or Hardy. I pushed the boat out and got into Wilfred Owen, Yeats and that was about that. Spring forward to Kingston Uni and the poetry is a welcome diversion from academia. I enjoy little forays into using expressions that one simply must not use in a novel. Tutors like my poems, visiting poets too. And such are reputations born I guess. No one is more surprised than me. It's quite fun though!

Having submitted a reasonable number of poems to the right mags I haven't had any published outside of Kingston. No sweat, I'm not trying too hard and certainly am not precious about it. It seems to me that poets spend a fortune on subscriptions, submitting to competitions and the myriad of publications to be featured sometimes and then you might get to produce a pamphlet. Is that it? The first step to poetic success? Blimey. And years later you may be asked to collect your bits and pieces for a collection, and sell it to, what 150 people. You have hit the big time!

One part of it I have shied away from is public readings. The few I have attended have been mixed. I can't take much of it in, I need the poetry to be written down in front of me. I catch an interesting line and the rest of the poem has been and gone. My understanding is poor, seriously it is. I do not get what the poet is saying, trying to say, trying to sound out to me. I enjoyed American poet Michael Surnowski, and Wendy Cope is the loveliest person I think I met amongst the visiting stars! Her down to earth approach, and advice and guidance was thoughtful yet she had strong opinions too; the balance was spot on.

Over the last year though I have spent several wonderful evenings with two poets from Kingston who really are making a name for themselves, Lucy Furlong and Dave Russomano. They have looked at some of my work and offered suggestions aplenty to improve them, their patience is very satisfying! Lucy is a prolific performer and Dave has done more than his fair share too. Lucy recently invited me to join them, and another fascinatingly creative lady, Sarah Dawson, in reciting a few pieces at the Carshalton-on-Sea Festival. So, I've refreshed a couple of Suffolk pieces and will be doing 'Lowestoft Fish Market' and 'Pakefield Beach' in that homely accent. A new piece is under construction for the event and is based around the water tower in Carshalton. I'm actually looking forward to it. Who knows I might even enjoy subjecting an audience to my work, something I never thought I should really do.

You'd be most welcome to come along, hear 'The Water Poets' recite, buy us lots of alcohol, that sort of thing.. we're on from noon on the Saturday, in the rather posh Charles Cryer Theatre, for an hour, don't be late. Whatever else happens, I will not be preforming this:

Dictions

Opinionated;

I should aspire to be,

and in that way 

I will cause a stir, 

perhaps,

or maybe

a little discussion.

So feed me your classics,

your daring radicalism;

‘they create an ambiance, 

a certain I don’t know what’ -

I’ll be damned if I understand them,

can be bothered to either,

at my age, you know?

You get to be more selective,

more reverential about intelligence,

interests and your time.

Hell, I almost killed myself a few years back,

why would I spend whatever I deem to have left

in a state of confusion? 

I have a void, you see.

No, I’ll use up my time

with my lighted memories, 

my dinky desires,

my affected music, 

my gargled words and b movies.

I’ll still explore realms,

self-demotivatedly;

it’s so much more of an adventure

than wading through the recommendations

from people I hardly know,

cannot connect to, 

wouldn’t dream of passing days with

never mind their minds.

Opine opinions, you keep them,

to yourself, for your blogs, your tweets, 

you arse.

New Friends

It has been a tough year for the gerbils, Mr Nibbles and Milky Joe. His Nibs unfortunately contracted a tumour on his stomach, he kept it clean and bits fell off of it and he seemed to be coping well. Milky stopped chewing at wood and so his teeth grew too long making it difficult for him to eat, he lost a lot of weight. We now take him monthly to the vet to have them ground down - ouch! He's back to full fitness thankfully. However, just over a week ago Mr Nibs had a bad day and it had obviously got too big for him on the inside. Poor fellow passed on. Have to say it hit me pretty hard, I miss him, he was cool.

The quandary then was what to do about Milky. He was on his own aged two and could live another couple of years. Gerbils are sociable animals so we decided to try and get him another pal. Research revealed it would be sensible to get him a young male to nurture and that it would take some time to integrate them. Our previous provider had females only so we tried a few of the local Pets-at-Home and came across a solitary 'male'. The member of staff was 99.9% certain it was male although Josie spotted the flowers on the dangling thing in the cage, there were footballs on the empty cage below.

At home we had them in separated parts of the gerbilarium and then let them run about together under supervision for 15-20 minutes for a few days. Until, wouldn't you know it, 0.1% becomes 100% female and Milky Joe thought his luck was in. Poor chap, had to deprive him of that pleasure, did not want a whole new family.

So, it was then what do we know with madam? Returning her seemed harsh, she is pretty and full of character. But then we'd still need a pal for Milky, plus one for her too, oh dear! Pre-loved website had a gerbil breeder just down the M3 in Aldershot. I gave her a call and she was full of info suggesting that it might be as well to get 2 young males for Milky to adopt to avoid more separations down the line. From 2 to 1 to 4 and then 5: easy.

A trip on Sunday saw us meeting prospective chums. Milky was good with all the tiny 6 week olds. We quickly had two selected and ready to join the Horahousehold. Madam had other things on her mind. Maybe she was in heat, perhaps she was pregnant from her time at the shop when they thought she was male? Or just perhaps she's a pyscho gerbil. Whichever it is time should tell but she did not accept any of the prospective friends introduced to her. So she's still alone. We will wait a week, maybe two and then try her again, otherwise she may just have to go it alone poor thing.

We'd originally called her Creamy Baileys but had decided that was a male name and indeed suits one of the new youngsters better so she's also had to go through a deed pole name change. She's now to be known as Precious Lily-White. Milky's other new bud is grey/silver, so he's Old Greg. Here are the boys, in all their glory!

Hey! It's been a while, how ya doin'?

With the endow my studies now fading into the depths of my amnesia it's time to get cracking once again on the blog. One tricky thing about writing a blog is the constant worry about who might be reading it. You know, anyone at all is the immediate concern. And then you move on to those who provide you with an income, how much do you want your life expounded to them? I think the latter has impacted more than anything else on what I write about. Oh well!

So, where the hell am I at the moment then? Been spending time in psychiatric hospital again, visiting a good friend from the Isleworth Boardgamers, Philip. Poor chap is bi-polar and the election toppled him over. More on this in the next few days. Then I've managed to get invited at a poetry event. That some people really consider I have something to say through poetry amazes me, honestly. It's something I enjoy writing but to be thought of as a poet is like telling me I'm an Olympic swimmer just because I used to swim a mile before breakfast three times a week.

I've been concentrating on my novel writing though. And something may just about be coming of that. 'A Good & Useful Life' needs a final rewrite and then I have begun researching literary agents with a view to approaching them with it. The next one, 'Knowing Everyone's Okay' has also been receiving some overdue care and attention although my head's not quite as focused as it needs to be just yet. Soon my dear, soon. Finally, I've been taken on by Surrey County Council's Adult Learning team to teach creative writing twice a week from September. It obviously means I get to use my teaching qualification but much more importantly I can still be immersed in writing. I love that. Have taken a couple more courses at Richmond to help in that respect and it's been a real treat. Lovely to work with Tamsin and have contact with Sue again from our Horse Drawn Mail Coaches Writing Group days as well as being taught by the hugely impressive Susie Lynes - yes that was an adverb used with due consideration and care.

Boardgames have taken a slight back seat due to the writing but at least that's quelled my collection expansion. And on the back of that I have been starting to make inroads into actually playing some of the games piled everywhere around me. 

Music continues to dominate and there'll be more on this in the next few days too. Mew, I'm listening to you. The Unthanks and Annie Eve too. Oh yes indeedy!

Elsewhere the family are still wonderful. Basti is growing up fast now. Is still hooked into his xbox and digital entertainment although dos humour me with the odd foray into gaming. Josie is fighting hard with the world of becoming a teenager and the constant battle with 'friends'. Thankfully she is proud of her school work and no-one could ask for more. She's also a good calming influence on me and I love that. And Mrs Hora packs 48 hours into every day, causing herself so much stress that given a day off she tends to be most unwell. But that's how she lives and I can't see that changing anytime soon. She delivers the most incredible level of personal tutoring you could wish for. The amount of preparation is twice the length of the lesson and she still undersells herself constantly. Confidence woman!!