My 12-year-old son loves pubs. Every weekend, and sometimes on school nights, he asks if we can go to the pub. I’m not sure where his enthusiasm comes from. Although pubs are much more tolerant of children than they were when I was young they’re still not great places for a 12 year old to… Continue reading A Boxing Day pub crawl
I enjoy lying in and lazing around on Saturday mornings but a few weeks ago decided to change my lazy ways. For some reason my 10-year-old daughter invariably wakes before 7am on Saturdays and if nobody else is up she spends an hour or two watching children’s TV. One Friday night last month I suggested… Continue reading Marylebone mornings
As a teenager I went to many gigs at the Hammersmith Odeon, and even went to a couple before turning 13. It was the largest cinema in the UK at the time (around 3,500 seats) and the scene of many childhood visits to the pictures, like those recalled in this piece. By the time I… Continue reading Front row seats at the Hammersmith Odeon
My 12 year old son has started swearing. He uses “the F word”, as I will euphemistically call it in this opening paragraph, although it’s spelt out in full further down. As I wrote earlier this year my daughter, who is now 10, has been exposed to plenty of swearing at football matches, but fortunately… Continue reading A joke about children swearing (contains rude words)
For the last few months most of our local streets – not just side streets, but main routes, used by buses and trucks – have had their speed limits reduced to 20mph. When was this announced? I don’t recall anything, locally or nationally, announcing the change. I can understand the new speed limit being imposed… Continue reading Everywhere has gone 20
Back in August we made a brief trip to Exeter Cathedral as we returned to London from our holiday in Devon. Last month I wrote about Westminster Abbey in this piece about Edward the Confessor. Such visits always prompt thoughts of other large churches (cathedrals, abbeys, minsters), the ones that I have visited and the… Continue reading Cathedrals and Missions
30 years ago this week I was at the Dublin Film Festival. As the saying goes (and it’s a saying that I never use), “Been there, done that, got the t-shirt”. I still have it, as you can see here: As I noted in this piece, some people are much more organized than I am,… Continue reading This t-shirt is 30 years old
What a lovely way to spend a Saturday afternoon, lying on the bed watching “The Lady Vanishes”, unquestionably one of my favourite films. It was shown on BBC2 yesterday. My son, who turns 12 next week, was in and out of the bedroom at various times and couldn’t be persuaded to watch the whole thing,… Continue reading “The Lady Vanishes”
The clocks go back this weekend. It means that October is always the longest month of the year. It has 31 days, and an extra hour, on this last weekend of the month. I always recall the equivalent weekend from my second year at university, back in the 1980s. The college library was only open… Continue reading The clocks go back
Today is the Feast of St Edward the Confessor. He was the last king of England who was also a saint. His death in 1066 led to rival claims for the English throne, the Battle of Hastings and, on Christmas Day that year, the coronation of William the Conqueror as king. You might have known… Continue reading Edward the Confessor
