Culture, Construction & Cleaning

As Lewis Carroll used to say, “I mark this day with a white stone” – any day in the middle of September on which I can sunbathe has got my vote.  The weather is undeniably cooling down and a dip in the pool would be too close to masochism for any degree of pleasure, but it is not raining and visits to the Third Floor are still possible!

I intend to wear shorts until my knees freeze.  I reckon that I might well be able to get to Christmas with exposed legs.  Hypothermia certainly, but my determination to extract every minute of almost fine weather until I am forced to concede that winter is upon us.  It is my main form of occupation!

I have just finished reading “101 Sonnets” Edited by Don Paterson and published by Faber and Faber which I bought in a small book shop in Herne Hill when I went to the UK to attend Stewart’s funeral.

This is an extraordinary collection and selection with old favourites juxtaposed with poets who are not quite as famous as Blake, Shakespeare and Coleridge.  Indeed looking at the index of names of poets at the back of the book I was almost up to double figures of the “unknowns” before I had left the C’s!

Trying to select a single poem which sums up the sense of discovery that the book gives is impossible – there is too much which is thought provoking, disturbing, shocking and unbelievably lovely.  And I am not ashamed of using the last word in the last sentence.

Paterson contributes an informative and stimulating introduction as well as highly personal and opinionated comments on each of the poems tucked away at the back of the book – who, for example, knew that Thomas Hood was “perhaps the only man ever to have been sent to Dundee to improve his health”.  It is impossible to resist information like that!

The “101 Sonnets” cover the history of literature in English and reading them is a true voyage of discovery.  I wholeheartedly recommend this book – and I think that this is one of those books that need to be bought as a real book and not downloaded to an e-reader.  A true delight.

The earlier part of the day was taken up with ferrying Toni to Terrassa to watch his nephew play in a match against Gava (a town which, technically, starts at the end of our road) and then returning to Castelldefels to bring some sense of order to the area around the recent construction works.

By using a combination of various noxious cleaning agents and wire wool I was able to get beneath the sheen of ingrained filth that has been a natural coating of the sink since we arrived.  I have been bitten to buggery and back again by coordinated hordes of mosquitos attempting to retain their murky living quarters but the cleanliness is apparent and even the tap how has a few metallic glints as I have burrowed beneath the patina of rust and residue to reveal the original material.

Some “stuff” has been earmarked for destruction – or at least to be put out in the rubbish where irregular bin persons then come with their bags and hooked sticks and see what is worth salvaging.

At the moment the scavengers are fairly obviously not Spanish; given the embarrassing antics of our government under the inept leadership of Rajoy who seems far more interested in semantics than economic reality, I think that we will see more native-born wandering from bin to bin in the near future.

That winning smile!

My greatest triumph in terms of charm concerned a certain irascible member of the catering staff in my university.  Living in Neuadd Lewis Jones (Lewis Jones Hall) on campus meant that we could have breakfast in College House as long as we arrived to eat it before half past eight in the morning.

Our hate figure was a wizened harridan called Nicky whose grating cry of “Iz gorn ar past eight!” greeted anyone daring to turn up and expect to be fed after the magic time.  I loathed her just like everyone else until she had some sort of Road to Damascus experience – but only concerning my good self!  She would hurl abuse at the other late arrivals but turn to me with a frightening fawning face and (for her) ask me sweetly if I wanted a glass of milk.

To this day I do not know what caused the change in her abrasive personality towards me.  I would like to think that it was because of my irresistible magnetic commanding personality – indeed in latter years I have come to believe this almost as an article of faith.

Nicky remained my single greatest triumph – until today.

Our local bakery boasts an assistant who is to customer service what Tesco is to self-effacement.  She has never been known to smile; she never indulges in small talk and she serves with the sort of resentment that is usually reserved for customers daring to use ticket windows in theatres in the West End.

Even when she was with people she knew, the same sullen expression set her face in its customary humanity free style.  Until today.

Today when I went in to the shop to get the bread I made a little joke and was rewarded not only with a smile but also a positive laugh!  And conversation!  Dialogue rather than silence!  Not that I understood all of it or course, but the tenor was unmistakable. 

Now the key moment will be the next time I go there.  Will there be a remembrance of times past and a cheeky grin play around her set face or will her expression revert to the times before the laugh?

With Nicky the change was absolute and irrevocable; only time will tell if the Unsmiling Baker has responded to the touch of personality changing magic that I have now convinced myself is mine to bestow!

The weather continues resentfully dull with rain in the wind and threatening clouds masking the hills around the town.  The sea is that deep dirty green which is dramatic but depressing.

And I have been bitten again!

I am obviously something which appeals to the autumn mosquito and they wait for the cooler damper weather before filling themselves with the russet fluid they relish.

I am also running out of the “magic” cream that I have discovered this season which does do, for once, what it says on the tube - soothe and heal.  Pity is cannot be applied in industrial quantities to most areas of the world that qualify for a mention in the almost infinitely depressing world news with which I start my day!  Though I wouldn’t do without the news of course: better to know and be downcast than not to know and speculate about Armageddon!

The Eight Bricks (I feel such a structure deserves capitalization, and indeed the definite article) are now partially covered with plaster and the whole structure has been painted.  Tomorrow (Day 5!) might see the sink actually placed on said bricks.  Comment is superfluous.

Today I received information from the Philatelic Bureau about the cost of the first day covers for the Paralympics’ gold winners.

The Post Office was caught out during the Olympics by the success of the whole enterprise.  The idea of issuing a special stamp for each gold medal winner in the Olympics was a good idea.  Painting a pillar-box gold in the winner’s home town or city was positively inspired – and camp!  But did no one in the Philatelic Bureau think about the knock-on demand for stamps for Paralympian gold medal winners too would be overwhelming?

Their initial idea was to produce a couple of sets of special stamps to commemorate the Paralympic Games – a first in philatelic terms as no other country has issued Paralympic stamps – and that would suffice.

Although I missed out on the furore about the Paralympic athletes being treated as second class by not having their own stamps, the Post Office responded by saying that they would issue stamps in exactly the same way as for the Olympians.

This provided the Post Office with a problem.  The 29 gold medal winners, each with their own special issue mean that 2012 is by far the most productive year for new commemorative stamps ever.  With the addition of 34 stamps for the Paralympians you have the equivalent of about eight years of normal issues in a couple of weeks.

Then there is the cost.  As a collector of first day covers I had already signed up to receive as many first day covers as we won golds.  This was, as you can imagine, a major cost then, to keep the collection complete, came the news that there were to be even more issues.

I think that the Post Office solved the cost problem fairly well as it has announced that anyone who bought the whole set of Olympic gold winners via the Philatelic Bureau could have the complete set of Paralympic stamps at a twenty pound discount.  Each discounted set matching the number of sets of Olympic stamps ordered.

For reasons which are not entirely clear, the cost of each first day cover is actually less for overseas customers than it is for collectors living in the United Kingdom. 

As I have had to buy new albums to contain the covers every little helps.

Link

Actual rain!  Distinct drops on the windscreen and then later in the day thunder lightening and vulgar raindrops!  There was some sunshine, but precious little.

It brightened up when I went into Barcelona to meet Suzanne and, after celebratory hugs and kisses we made our way to the culture that was our intended object.

The exhibition in the Caixa Forum was about maps, but this was interpreted fairly generously but, also, also fairly fatuously.  There were a few vaguely interesting exhibits but the general standard was woefully low with amateurish productions surrounded by self-indulgent and aesthetically unattractive items some of which looked as though they had been cobbled together at the last moment to fit into this mish-mash of rubbish.  I didn’t like it.

More stimulating was the visit, after our desultory meander through the exhibition, to the bullring – now converted in true Catalan style into a shopping centre.

To be fair I think that Suzanne and I were more concerned to chat than to extend our artistic vocabulary by visiting third-rate, half-baked, pseudo-artistic tat.

Suzanne is concerned that I visit the museum on the hill and see an exhibition which she describes as beautiful and thought provoking.  I will make the effort.

Our meal was in the bullring and Japanese.  My seafood noodle dish was unexceptional but the green tea tiramisu was more interesting.  Not interesting enough to justify the price but something to muse on.

The meeting was all the more delightful because I could enjoy it without any thought of the morrow, but for Suzanne . . .

We did talk about the start of term, but teacher talk does lose some of its piquancy when one of the couple is talking from memory about a theoretical rather than real experience.  Though I am quite prepared for things to stay in my memory rather than being refreshed by actual experience!

The bricks have had further refinements today and may actually be finished tomorrow when the sink will finally be placed on its handcrafted plinth. 

Possibly.

Little by little

Day 2 of Repairing the Outdoor Sink has seen Toni attempt his first bricklaying with my humble self in the secondary (but vital) role of cement mixer.

I am not necessarily convinced by what one might call the “integrity” of the structure and Toni is now immersed in various self-help videos on YouTube in an effort to perfect his technique.  I am perfectly willing to encourage this as long as I do not have to do anything more taxing that stirring – either cement or tea.

The real irritation of the whole project (apart from the fact that we did not destroy the original structure) is that in the real world of renting in the UK I am convinced that “fair wear and tear” would mean that the landlord is liable to “make good”.  This, as I was so often reminded by David, is not Britain and the rights of Spanish landlords are many and their duties hugely sparse!

Getting anything “done” is always met by the agents telling us that they will ask the landlords.  But they are the landlords as well so the Dickensian subterfuge falls flat each time they try it – but it works for them and they feel that they have to do nothing after the “landlord” (i.e. them) says he is not willing to fork out for, basically, anything.

Therefore, yet again, the self-help approach that means exploring yet another facet of building or house repair that we have not yet come across.

I suspect that the might brick piers that have been constructed which tower four brick high, might well be re-cemented as the thin layer of gooey liquid which was applied to the brick’s surface may be augmented by a more convention dollop of something or other to ensure some sort of stability.

As we had to move a storage shelf thingie to get at the sink, I have been going through the treasures unearthed by the move and throwing most of it out.

I can only assume that the swimming goggles have been breeding, as I have no recollection of purchasing such a multiplicity of swimming aids.

I must admit that I am getting fussier about what goggles are acceptable as virtually all of them seem to let in water unless they are put on so tightly that I imagine that I must look like Marty Feldman by the time I have done my customary twenty minutes.

Those goggles which are most congenial to me are made by Zoggs – a brand that used to be advertised by showing a seal wearing a pair.  I can see the positive reasoning behind such an image but I do find the picture just a little disturbing.

The glasses that I have unearthed - a not inappropriate word given the amount of dust caking their external surfaces- are in all shapes and sizes with just as great a variety of coloured lenses.  I have no intention of being specific about numbers, but just let us say that if I was considering a garage sale then I could have a substantial section of the place set aside for them!

Meanwhile the building work extends itself into a third great day.  Eight bricks!  If Toni and I had been building The Great Wall of China the Barbarian Hordes would have swept past the small sump of bricks that we would have created and swamped China and the rest of the world and we would now be living in a very different place!

However, in this reality I am off to Barcelona tomorrow afternoon to meet one of my ex-colleagues, have a little culture, eat a few tapas, have a discrete drink and try, vainly I fear, not to gloat!