a Miranda sort of day

I kept bumping into Miranda today. I just thought I'd mention it.

First it was on Anji's blog, where she posted about Hilaire Belloc's Tarantella, you know, the one that goes "Do you remember an inn, Miranda?" (By the way, you can hear Mr Belloc reciting it here, if you can bear to watch that extremely creepy animation of his face....)

And then someone on a forum I use linked to Miranda on BBC iPlayer. This is a comedy starring Miranda Hart, who is quite large and, in this show at least, keeps getting mistaken for a transvestite, with hilarious results.

And then Kaptain Kobold, over on Flickr, was getting ready for a trip to Miranda, which is a suburb of Sydney, Australia, which is where KK lives. Australia, that is.

Sometimes things happen in threes. I wonder what it all means?

that Tesco emotion

some folks don't cover their mouths when they cough, y'know

Lordy, I had a little epiphany yesterday. And it happened in Tesco, too.

I'd popped in to get some Baldwin's Sarsaparilla, the soft drink of choice at Schloss Marland, and went hunting for two-for-one offers while I was at it, and the other stuff in the World Foods aisle, which is a useful indicator of who is moving to Bristol from where; the Polish section got quite big a couple of years ago, and is still chugging quietly along although there are now dedicated Polish shops out there. Anyway, so I had to have some Zywiecka sausages. Oh, and some processed cheese with ham in it. The Polish one, not's Tesco's Finest, which does sound a bit off-putting.

And then I used the self-service check-out. And everything scanned and I managed to pay for it and leave without the system freezing up on me and ordering me to wait for assistance, which has happened every damn time I've used these things in the past.

Which was a good thing, because the assistant who was detailed to do that was being harangued by a tall young man with dreadlocks and a Home Counties accent; something to do with carrier bags and packaging. I think he was trying to raise her consciousness. I wonder what he was doing shopping in Tesco in the first place?

Anyway, it was a glorious moment, and even Natty Tarquin couldn't spoil it, though I had to keep looking back as I left to make sure I'd not really messed up somehow.

almost silence

Armistice Day. At eleven o'clock, I pulled down the sash window in the kitchen and leaned out. Big Ben chimed the hour from the radio beside me, and a jay on a chimneypot on the house opposite rasped a response to the chimes. Then after the fifth chime it cocked its tail and dropped into space, unfolding its wings as it went.

Robins singing. The hum of traffic. A door slamming shut.

Then the radio came to life again.

At Newbridge Grammar School, several of the older teachers had fought in the war, though they didn't talk about it. On Armistice Day, Latin Jones, the deputy head, would give a little speech in assembly, about his time in the jungle and his dead comrades, always ending with Binyon's verse from For The Fallen:

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.

Although we knew that war was definitely a Bad Thing, we were (or at least I was) ardent for some desperate glory. Fortunately, probably, that desperate glory eluded me. And now people young enough to be my children are fighting and dying.

Katie's school re-scheduled the minute's silence, as the official one coincided with their break time. So they had it at twelve o'clock, instead, and switched off their monitors for a minute.

getting knocked off the bike

On 30th September, I was knocked off my bike in Clifton. I was turning right into Worcester Road from College Road, and a car that was waiting to emerge from Worcester Road pulled out into me, knocking me off the bike, and injuring me.


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Last week I got a phone call from the Collisions Support Unit, telling me that they were not going to charge the driver with anything, as they had received a witness statement claiming that I had been going too fast, and that I was not signalling, and that I was cutting the corner. None of this is true, so I was really rather upset. I wrote back to them, as follows:

To: Collision Support Unit

Avon and Somerset Constabulary

Re; ROAD TRAFFIC COLLISION Worcester Road junction with College Road, Clifton, Bristol. Time: 12:30 Hours Date: 30^th September 2009

Dear Sir or Madam,

I refer to this incident, when I was knocked from my bicycle and injured, while turning into a side road, by a car emerging from that side road.

I received a phone call from a member of your unit on Wednesday 4^th November, advising me that you did not propose to take action against the driver involved in this incident. I understand that a witness has given his opinion that I was to blame, alleging that:

1. I was riding too fast
2. I was not indicating
3. I was cutting the corner

I am very concerned by this, on the following grounds:

1. In my opinion, I was going at a safe and appropriate speed. What is ‘too fast’, and why did the witness think that I was going ‘too fast’?
2. I was indicating, precisely as described in my statement. As I was about to turn into a junction where a car was waiting to emerge, it would have been foolish of me not to signal my intentions. I am a cyclist, a car driver, and a sometime motorcyclist. I understand the importance of making my intentions clear to other road users. I always indicate before manoeuvring when riding my bicycle.
3. It would have been impossible for me to cut the corner even had I wanted to, as the Ford Galaxy that was waiting at the junction was straddling the white line at the middle of Worcester Road, the side road into which I was turning. The position of the car can be seen in the photograph which I attached to my statement.
4. I understand that the witness in question was working in a house opposite the junction. The house is set back from the road, with a courtyard at the front, and the witness’ large white van was parked in that courtyard. He came across to the scene of the collision, and spent some time talking with the driver; I was sitting on the ground in a dazed condition, and missed what was said. I question how much of the incident he actually saw, and what grounds he had for venturing his opinion that I was at fault.

I appreciate that you are busy, but I feel that I have been wronged. As it seems that I shall be denied the possibility of cross-examining the witness at a hearing, I should be most grateful if you would question him further to clarify what he actually saw, as I am sure that he would not willingly be understood to have said something which is not true.

Yours sincerely,

Drusilla Marland

...well, I heard back from the police this morning; a police officer phoned me and said that they were not going to take the matter any further, as they can't just go around interviewing people who have sent witness statements in, in case it discourages them from doing it, or something. So I (and indeed the police) will never get to ask the mystery man why he said what he said.

a brush with the archivist

More from the Little papers, pulled out of a Clifton skip fifteen years ago. Here's an incident from 1950, which all started with a piece in the Bristol Evening World, a long-defunct newspaper. Well, actually, it all started with the Blitz...

1. Transcript of feature in Evening World 8/9/50

FUNGUS BRUSHER

Historians, like many other writers, are often condemned to a remote, hermit-like existence when getting to grips with their subject. Maybe that is why, among other things, "dust" and "cobwebs" have been traditionally associated with the writing of history.

And now along comes an historian to add another description of his work - "fungus brushing".
Bryan Little who has just completed a 200,000 word book about Bristol, carried a little brush with him every time he examined ancient documents in the City Archives.

"That brush was very necessary," he tells me "because some of the documents were coated with green fungus which had to be cleared before I could read them."
Mr Little has now started a 30,000 word book about C......

2. Letter from the City Archivist

The Council House
Bristol
Archives Department

25th September 1950

Dear Mr Little,

I have just returned from a holiday and have been shown a newspaper report of an interview which you had with a Evening World reporter.

In view of the statements you made concerning the care of the records in this department, I should be glad if you would call to see me at this office.

Yours sincerely,

Elizabeth Ralph

City Archivist.

3. Notes made by Bryan Little (for the interview with the City Archivist?)

No interview given (nor is it stated that it was)

(a small part of an informal talk at lunch)

made it clear that this only applied to a tiny proportion of lesser matter damaged by water in the blitz. Hitler guilty not Council.

All the priceless treasures intact etc

Brush lent not brought on all occasions

Steps now taken to put right

Gratitude

Personal apology to Cttee

Joint statement

would have been easy & fitter

4. Draft of letter to Evening World

The report, in your issue of 8/9/50, of my remarks on the condition of a small proportion of the City Archives, has only just come to my notice. In fairness to those who care so well for Bristol's historic treasures, I would like to make the following points clear by way of exact record and explanation.

The damage, by damp from water necessarily used to combat surrounding fires during air attacks, affected only a tiny fraction of the less important records, and all the widely famed archives of the city are intact. Though inevitable in the conditions that prevailed it reflects in no way on the arrangements made for the storage and preservation of the City's documents; the cause of the trouble lay solely in the war. Ample steps have now been taken to put matters right.

Moreover, it would not be true to say that a brush was taken down on all occasions when I examined old documents. It was unnecessary to use it more than once or twice, and on these occasions it was kindly lent to me by the staff of the archives department to whom I owe a deep debt of gratitude for this and much other vital help.

Betjeman and Bristol

Letters from John Betjeman to Bryan Little, rescued from a skip a few years ago. Click on images to see large.

a bit wild

What would the world be, once bereft
Of wet and of wildness? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wildness and wet;
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.

Leigh Woods, on the Somerset side of the Avon Gorge, can be a bit variable in its wildness. At dawn you may meet the local wildlife, as Geraldine Taylor often has. On Friday around lunchtime, you are more likely to meet a dog walker trogging along behind her labrador with a mobile phone clamped to her head; or a jogger clad in inappropriate lycra; or indeed Brendagh and me, out for a little walk along one of the ostentatiously-waymarked paths. In our case, the Purple Trail (all-ability path, surfaced).



We met a stone. It's Welsh slate, carved with the words AND STONES MOVED SILENTLY ACROSS THE WORLD. It was put there by Alyson Hallet, who got the idea for it when she was up on Cadair Idris, and met an erratic boulder. And, since then, has been dumping carved rocks around the world. I feel ambivalent about this sort of thing; air-freighting rocks, and carving them so that you are imposing your idea upon them and upon the people encountering them, if you see what I mean... I was at Bristol Central Library for a reading by Alyson a couple of years ago, and she seemed very nice; but I wondered how I would feel if I came upon one of her rocks while i was out and about, and finally I did, yesterday. What I got from the experience was a vision of the bureaucracy and machinery of public art behind the positioning of this rock, here, with these words on. So... on the other hand, I really enjoyed finding some of Peter Randall-Page's sculpture embedded in the land around Drewsteignton way, especially with the prospect of a pint of Speckled Hen (or 'funky chicken') at the Drewe Arms afterwards. But that didn't seem to be trying to tell me anything.



It's been a long time since I've been in this part of the woods. There has been a fair bit of woodland management going on, and for the first time I managed to get a clear view of Stokeleigh Camp, an iron age fort which, along with the one on Observatory Hill on the other side of the gorge, dominated the Avon. Last time I'd been to this bit of the woods, you couldn't see the Camp for the trees.

We scrambled over the banks and found that some Devon Red cattle had taken up their night quarters there. They've recently been introduced to the woods. We didn't see them, just the evidence of their passing. As it were.

I commented that there had been talk of clearing the trees from Observatory Hill, too. "It's always the archeologists who want to do that," said Brendagh. "It's like shaved pubes in the porny business".



Walking to the top of the cliff, we heard a buzzard mewing from the treetops. And then a peregrine calling, down in the gorge. Slightly wild, then.