Hilary At Home with Bertie

Like me, Bertie doesn’t send Christmas cards but we both like getting them. This is his first, probably only one this year. He thinks the artist has been a little unfair – too much hangdog, hungover look. This is a better likeness.

Published
Categorised as Family, Local

The Splendid and the Vile

Erik Larson may not be familiar to you. I think he is better known in America. At my Thanksgiving picnic-on-a-park-bench that should have been captured by Georges Seurat, my friend the Manhattan banker gave me a present from her sister who serendipitously called in on FaceTime from Boston.

Resistance

Resistance is Owen Sheers’ first novel, published in 1999. Whether his MA from the University of East Anglia in Creative Writing was helpful is debatable. Teaching Creative Writing is oxymoronic – omit first three letters if you wish.

Joy in the Morning

I bring tidings of great joy. Until some twenty years ago DR Harris and Co, est. 1790, chemists and perfumers in St James’s Street, served a pick-me-up to be consumed at the shop counter or to be taken away. Now they have brought it back with a new receipt.

Pirates

The Union Theatre was a favourite when I worked in the City. Handy to walk to and they reliably staged impressive, small- scale musicals.

Seeing Architecture

Almost a decade ago I was in Chicago, en route to San Francisco and Ravenhill, perched high above the Russian River in California.

Tits or Ass?

While you ponder on which you prefer, you can get both at The National Gallery. T and A; Titian and Artemisia.

Published
Categorised as Art

Slightly Bonkers

I try to avoid truisms but we are living through uncertain times not seen since 1940 when, instead of leaving the EU, it looked likely to come to us.