Funny old memories

[This is actually the Blog for Monday 20th May]

Back in the 60s there was an excellent series called Mr Rose which had, as I recall, a very catchy title tune which I have totally forgotten but would remember instantly if someone played the first few notes. I think. This series concerned the very unrestful retirement of a Chief Inspector of Police who was constantly called away from his retirement activities and encouraged to solve intractable police problems. The character was played by William Mervyn, a rather avuncular looking cove who made the series worth watching, playing one of those omniscient Holmesian detectives who always made sure the episode ended with a real conclusion!

The series was brought to mind as Claire called in and found me – deadheading the luxuriant vegetation of the garden. How quintessentially Mr Rose! All things considered I think that it would have been more satisfactory if she had brought a tricky problem in education for my unique perception to elucidate.

Or perhaps not.

I think overall I was just pleased that the things that I had read and seen in the wonderful make believe land of the arts actually occur in real life. To think that I have reached the stage in life where my quiet world can be rocked by an interruption in deadheading!

I suppose that deadheading was really displacement activity to take my mind away from the Week of No Return. This is the time when the various checks and searches should come to some sort of conclusion. By the end of the week the provisional-provisional-provisional date for completion should have lost one of those ‘provisionals’ and become a little more real.

This morning the man from Pickfords came to shake his sorrowful head over the mass of possessions that seems to have spontaneously generated itself in the house. I am not the sort of person to carry on a jocose existence living with the minimum of the necessary impedimenta of civilized living. It is bad enough that I have had to make do with Tesco pauper line crockery and the deprivation of my library. It is amazing how life’s little necessities find their way back into a materialistic life! They slip through worm holes in space and time and bank accounts and nestle comfortably in available niches in a house, making it back into a home!

I don’t know whether it is going to be easier or harder to weed out the Things Not Wanted On Voyage this time around. The fact of one relatively small suitcase (no matter how manoeuvrable) and the limited weight allowance of a cheapo flight are going to concentrate the mind wonderfully when the final exit from the country is made.

I think that Toni is right when he asked the carefully calculatedly innocent question of, “Where are you going to store all your books in Spain?” I think in the short term we are going to have to have some sort of local storage. I wonder if Catalonia has the equivalent of Big Yellow Storage. I certainly hope so. It would solve a certain number of pressing problems. This is all in the future.

The very near future, I hope.

Oh yes, and I’ve just remembered the tune from the TV series ‘Mr Rose’ “da da da da diddle dum dum da da da da.”

Funny how things come back to you: I wonder if there is anyone out there who remembers it too.