Had a terrifying dream last night that somehow I had ended up sharing a uni flat with Child Two, who is going to start her degree next autumn. How on earth this ever seemed like a good idea, I don’t know, but it rapidly proved to be a Bad Move for all kinds of reasons. …
One of those eeeek moments at the weekend when we found ourselves accidentally watching a gang-rape-and-murder movie, when all we’d really wanted was a nice cuddly feelgood film. You know how it is, someone’s watched one of the suggestions, another isn’t showing at the right time, and before you know it a family is being …
You know how it is, people of the world – you’re going about your business, then suddenly a troublesome blonde will get in the way and attempt to mess your life up. We all know one – someone who thinks they know everything, believes they are better than you and tries to boss you around. …
There was a really interesting piece in the Guardian today by the novelist Barbara Kingsolver, on the effect that her father’s very low expectations of her had – she describes her psyche as being ‘maimed’. As she is a hugely successful writer, with fourteen novels in print, you could hardly say that her father held …
Hope your Bonfire Night went with a bang! We went to the open-air display on Blackheath, one of the last free displays left in London. By the afternoon, the police had blocked off roads and put up metal barriers through the village, which always adds to the sense of anticipation (and annoys motorists). We started …
I’ve been lost in Brideshead Revisited for days, thanks to a new version on my iPlayer. It’s just struck me that a complex novel like Brideshead means completely different things at varying stages of life. It’s as though the book is reading you, not the other way round. I first read it in my early teens, …
They say as one door closes, another opens … well, maybe I’ve accidentally crocheted my own door. I started crocheting a couple of years ago and I’m not even sure if I remember why. My grandmother used to crochet endless circular blankets which I used to snuggle under as a child, and I’m sure that …
It’s going to be Child One’s 21st birthday in a few days and, amid the usual bittersweet ruminations about the passage of time, the blossoming of my lovely daughter (and dwindling of her mother) and all that wistful jazz, I have suddenly realised that the project I’ve been working on, in lacklustre fashion, better be …
Took Child Two to see The Libertine at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket last night. This was partly to bolster her upcoming uni English Lit interviews, since the play’s anti-hero, the Earl of Rochester, was the inspiration for lots of restoration baddies – and partly because it stars the rather lovely Dominic Cooper. You probably remember …
I read the Girl on the Train in hospital, while dipping in and out of general anaesthetics, and I got hopelessly lost with all its shifts in place and perspective. I know that was the whole point of the book, but it left me underwhelmed at the time. So I wasn’t sure whether to see …