The weather map shown on television last night was one of those time lapse things which show weather fronts on the move.
Every nasty thing that lurks in the Atlantic seems to make a bee-line for Britain. The edges of the nasty weather fronts hit the north-west corner of Spain and dissipate over the Pyrenees leaving Barcelona with artistic cloud fragments and sun.
That, at least, is the general picture and one which I hold to with passionate intensity.
For the next few days it has to hold good as I am about to pick up the girls from the airport. They have already made enquiries about the availability of parasols on the beach so their intentions are clear, as indeed I hope the skies will be for the duration of their stay. Luckily their predilection for shopping does offer an alternative strategy should the unthinkable happen and rain fall!
The last shelves are now being fitted to the last empty Billy bookcase and that will starkly show the real limitations that are going to have to be faced when I try and fit in the contents of some thirty Pickford boxes in the space for eight. Ho hum! One of life’s little problems. At least this visit will give a pause to my book spreading propensities and perhaps leave a moment for thought and some way of squaring the circle may present itself.
But there are books not yet unpacked that I cannot do without. Really. Where is the rest of my Complete Short Stories of Somerset Maugham? Where is my Firbank biography? Great Expectations? The rest of the Eighteenth Century: Pope, Swift, Smollett, Fielding? I have said that the books will fit and I have also agreed that any new book will mean the jettisoning of an old to compensate for the new, but . . . Well, the story of how I manage to make ends meet in the Battle of the Books (and where is my copy of that?) will be the subject of a future blog.
Our first British visitors have arrived and are settled in. Gwen and Dianne are just about to test the reputed comfort of the new beds. Their faces tomorrow as they prepare for a hard day of sunbathing will tell the true story of their night.
I can also report the safe delivery of a ‘moving in’ present which came with them. It is now in the garden nestling at the base of some truncated oleander trees and winking roguishly as a rather beautifully realized butterfly gently alights on a neighbouring toadstool.
I feel that the more perceptive among you will have worked out what the present was. I feel it adds a touch of class and looks thoroughly at home!
Every nasty thing that lurks in the Atlantic seems to make a bee-line for Britain. The edges of the nasty weather fronts hit the north-west corner of Spain and dissipate over the Pyrenees leaving Barcelona with artistic cloud fragments and sun.
That, at least, is the general picture and one which I hold to with passionate intensity.
For the next few days it has to hold good as I am about to pick up the girls from the airport. They have already made enquiries about the availability of parasols on the beach so their intentions are clear, as indeed I hope the skies will be for the duration of their stay. Luckily their predilection for shopping does offer an alternative strategy should the unthinkable happen and rain fall!
The last shelves are now being fitted to the last empty Billy bookcase and that will starkly show the real limitations that are going to have to be faced when I try and fit in the contents of some thirty Pickford boxes in the space for eight. Ho hum! One of life’s little problems. At least this visit will give a pause to my book spreading propensities and perhaps leave a moment for thought and some way of squaring the circle may present itself.
But there are books not yet unpacked that I cannot do without. Really. Where is the rest of my Complete Short Stories of Somerset Maugham? Where is my Firbank biography? Great Expectations? The rest of the Eighteenth Century: Pope, Swift, Smollett, Fielding? I have said that the books will fit and I have also agreed that any new book will mean the jettisoning of an old to compensate for the new, but . . . Well, the story of how I manage to make ends meet in the Battle of the Books (and where is my copy of that?) will be the subject of a future blog.
Our first British visitors have arrived and are settled in. Gwen and Dianne are just about to test the reputed comfort of the new beds. Their faces tomorrow as they prepare for a hard day of sunbathing will tell the true story of their night.
I can also report the safe delivery of a ‘moving in’ present which came with them. It is now in the garden nestling at the base of some truncated oleander trees and winking roguishly as a rather beautifully realized butterfly gently alights on a neighbouring toadstool.
I feel that the more perceptive among you will have worked out what the present was. I feel it adds a touch of class and looks thoroughly at home!
Thank you Ceri.
No comments:
Post a Comment