snow walk

Lovely walk in the snow earlier.

The sun broke through and for a time you could feel its warmth.

Now it's night and even though the log fire is as hot as it gets there is still a chill in the room.

The cold makes me feel really sleepy!

views from the bus

Well, my morning at the library was pretty short. When the snow grew really heavy, I was allowed to go home because I had furthest to go--thanks a million guys.

At the bus queue all the talk was of the service being suspended but then an S1 loomed into the top of George Street and a back seat on the top deck is where I've been for the last two-and-a-half hours.

Nice atmosphere on the bus, though. Everyone patient, friendly. That slightly nervous sense of AN adventure too.

The crawl to Botley was SO slow, then we were flying (everything's relative) on the back road to Eynsham (where these pics were taken). Now stuck on A40...

Still, a midwinter chance to chat on Facebook--haven't done that for years, feels like.

Yikes! The snow here is DEEP!

Writing to the accompaniment of Thom Yorke's Harrowdown Hill btw.

views from the bus stop

Two great parties yesterday.

Now on the bus to Witney which is tootling through some distinctly snowy--getting snowier--west Oxfordshire countryside. I'll change at Witney for Oxford. With luck I'll get there in time for a quick coffee at Green's before opening up the Taylor for 10.

Took these pics while waiting at the bus stop at the top of our road in Bampton.

ice flowing, party season, nearly xmas

Spent the weekend in Hay on Wye. It was good to get away for a few days--during term it's Oxford, Oxford. Great city but it's nice to rediscover favourite not-Oxford places.

Saw swans grazing a field of roots on the first day's walking. It was strange how some suddenly started striding into flight and then another group. The line creaked round in a broad circle before a few curved back to the field, landing in almost the same place they'd started from. The others headed off along the river then banked inland, white kites running against the slate sky.

Also saw a broad ribbon of ice flowing down the Wye off the Warren. The slabs were tight-packed up to the weir then a loose and orderly file, save for when one or two got snagged on branches or an islet. In the middle of them one time was a football, looking out of place but cheerful somehow.

The Sunday was beautiful sunshine and clear reviving air.

In Oxford it's party time this week. It's great to catch up with old friends and spend time with colleagues. Wednesday night was the Taylor dinner at the University Club--a warm, lovely evening. Today it's the St Antony's drinks and lunch, followed by the librarian in charge's party at the Taylor. Then... Well then I'm at work tomorrow... Will have to pace myself.

This morning the Nokia shuffle has turned up rather more Star Sailor than is comfortable. I remember one moody winter lying in front of the fire nights and near-drowning in Star Sailor's complimenting melancholy. Well, that was then. Now the music's a bit of pain to be quite honest. And mannered--once you can see how music's done; when it's all just sound and form and no emotion, it's had it. Ah, what's this, Distant Dreamer? Phew!

So, nearly Xmas. So looking forward to the break!

snow, ice, things

The last ten days of freezing conditions have been such a shock. Somehow you don't expect weather like this until after Christmas. The day the big freeze started, I was all set to spend Friday afternoon digging the allotment. I couldn't believe it when I got off the bus back from Oxford and found the ground in Bampton was frozen solid.

One very sad thing has been losing several frogs. We've been melting holes in the ice with a coffee maker before it gets light to let in air and then keeping these ice-free throughout the day. All seemed well till the incredibly severe frost on Thursday night. On Friday morning two frogs were dead and more have died since. I don't understand why. Is it the cold or is it some illness brought on by the cold? Melting holes in the ice like this has worked in past years. You might lose one or two frogs but never this many.

Meanwhile, on a selfish note, I'm hoping that there will be a thaw round Christmas time so we can lift the carrots, swede and parsnips.

Teaching is winding up now and I'm looking forward to a nice break before the mad fortnight of launching the online courses and marking diploma assignments from 10th January...2011. Can't believe it's nearly 2011. For some reason 2011 seems so much further into the 'new' century than 2010.

I was interviewed by the Oxford Times about Invisible and StreetBooks the other day. I don't know whether I said anything interesting--or embarrassing. I just remember feeling numb with cold. Not sure when the piece is coming out.

This morning on the radio there was the usual 'on this day' feature at 5.40 and one of the events was the shooting of John Lennon. I remember driving to Chestall to see Belinda and Radio 1 being wall-to-wall John Lennon songs. It was very cold that year too. It doesn't seem long ago at all. Yikes!

This morning they played this clip from his last interview in which he said how safe he felt walking the New York streets. Maybe they play this clip every year but I don't remember hearing it before.

On Monday it was the Latin American Centre Christmas party. It was great to get together with everyone. Lovely atmosphere, as always. Quite a few parties coming up, which I'm really looking forward to.

lasa report, toronto memories, invisible weeks, initiate

Last weekend I wrote the report on my trip to Canada that is a requirement of the funding. Writing this brought back happy memories of the conference and the city. I'm now posting what are my very last pictures!

I was bowled over by the size of everything in Toronto, whether it was a 'street' like Spadina or my hotel room which was as large as the ground floor of our house. I loved the weird thing in Toronto airport that involved jets of water powering plastic cubes round a glass tank.

But my favourite memory of my last hours in Canada was a fleeting one and there was no time for pictures. I was on the bus from Bloore to Pearson, which was crammed full with people heading for work--at five-thirty on Sunday morning. I dozed for a while and when I woke up we were stopped at some traffic lights and there it was. A sign: Resurrection Road. I wanted to live on a street called that! Number 3, obviously. Frank Egerton, 3 Resurrection Road...

One final memory, though, was waiting for the bus outside the Holiday Inn. This taxi passed then circled back then round again and drew up. The driver asked me if I wanted him to take me to the airport. I asked how much. $60. I said no, he offered $50 then asked me if I knew what the bus fair was. I didn't so he came down to $40. I was tempted but still said no. He drove off. Well, when the bus came the fare was $3.50.

Over the last few weeks I've been doing a lot of teaching and one or two Invisible promotional things. Most fun of all was my talk to Writers in Oxford about digital publishing at the Victoria Arms, Marston. The event was really lovely. It was great to see old friends and the pub has a terrific atmosphere, not to mention excellent beer and food. I did a talk, PowerPoint presentation and reading from Invisible.

To start with, though, it looked like the PowerPoint wasn't going to happen. There was a fancy laptop projector but no screen... Fortunately the pub came to the rescue with a tablecloth.

Tonight I'm off to Blackwell's for the launch of Initiate, the anthology of work by last year's MSt graduates and professional writers associated with the course. I've been on the editorial panel that's been working on the project for just under a year. I can't wait to see the finished book!

demo

As I came out of the Stanford Centre, opposite Magdalen, last week, a stream of good-natured protesters ambled past. They had fluorescent home-made placards with felt tip anti-government and save the arts slogans on them.

I'd not been aware of any protests before apart from the anti-vivisection ones on Parks Road.

Stupid not to think there wouldn't be protests really.

It still surprised me, though, and taking these two photos reminded me of demos years ago, when Mrs T came to power--and before. I remember taking photos of people on Solidarity gatherings in Nottingham city centre when I had aspirations to be a smudger.

There is a feeling of disquiet, which is both unsettling and energising.

jo thoenes, kate saunders, oxford street, kc, stephen

On Thursday I appeared on BBC Oxford's Jo in the Afternoon programme, talking about Invisible and the big chunk of my life that I've lived in Oxford and Oxfordshire.

I was a bit nervous before I entered the studio but was immediately put at my ease by Jo Thoenes. It was fascinating seeing how she produced the programme as it went along while developing the interview and making me feel very much at home.

One of the things we talked about both before and during the interview was an incident years ago when I met the descendant of one of the characters in DH Lawrence's The White Peacock.

My girlfriend at that time was studying English at Nottingham University and I used to visit her a lot when I was studying agriculture at Cirencester. We used to go and explore the places DH Lawrence used in his novels, as described in a lovely little book called The Country of My Heart.

One afternoon we went to a churchyard beside a huge mansion which featured in his first novel. It was really exciting to see things like the flight of steps from church to terrace that were so vivid in the novel (glimpsed by moonlight in the book, if I remember rightly).

Anyway by then the house was a football academy and you couldn't visit, only look at it from the churchyard. When we were there we became aware of a man standing nearby. We got talking to him and he told us that his family used to own the big house. He looked as though he'd fallen on hard times because his clothes were frayed, although he was wearing gold cufflinks with his family crest on them. He invited us back to his 'new' house for tea.

Well, the new house was pretty big too and there were Stubbs paintings on the walls and beautiful furniture. We talked to him and his wife for an hour of so. It turned out that his grandfather had been the squire in The White Peacock. This character had been criticised by Lawrence and his descendant was keen to set the record straight, revealing lots of stories about 'nasty' Mr Lawrence in the process.

Lawrence, incidentally, had particularly objected to the fact that the squire had fenced off the rabbit warrens on the estate and stopped the miners from snaring a free meal.

From what I remember, the rabbits were killed by the gamekeeper and sent by train to London for their meat and fur. I think Lawrence thought this mean-spirited. The squire, like his real-life counterpart, was, of course, the mine-owner.

If you'd like to listen to the interview, it's available on the iPlayer till Wednesday and my piece starts 19 min, 10 sec into the programme: http://bbc.in/9A2nlZ.

I was thrilled that Invisible got a favourable review in the Times yesterday from Kate Saunders. The web version is behind the News International paywall: http://bit.ly/aTBvVt. But the best bit is: "This is Posy Simmonds territory; we're among fretful middle-class types who take themselves very seriously and make an enormous meal of every bit of slap-and-tickle. That these people are bearable company is entirely down to the author's lively wit and acute understanding of the emotional landscape."

Canada seems long ago now, although I have such happy memories of Toronto--including my last supper there at the Duke of York and of Oxford Street (which looked as if it were in... Oxford).

Yesterday, I went to Stephen Wall's memorial service at Keble college chapel. Stephen was the man who interviewed me when I was applying to the college to read English and was my tutor when I was an undergraduate there. I owe him so much. He gave me an opportunity that transformed my life.

The service was secular, as Stephen must have wanted. Family and colleagues talked about their memories of him and read from his fiction and his criticism. I had not realised that one of those who spoke, Val Cunningham, had been one of his first Keble students. Neither did I realise that the brilliant critic Ian Hamilton had also been taught by Stephen. What an influential man Stephen was.

It is appropriate, perhaps, that Posy Simmonds is mentioned in the Times review of Invisble. It was Stephen who introduced me to her work. I remember vividly him telling me about Tesoddit and chuckling.

last of the summer veg

A surprisingly sharp frost this morning.

When I went to the allotment to pull up the bean, courgette and cucumber plants I wasn't expecting to harvest any summer veg. And yet, as the picture above shows, there were some runners and cues left.

That was a lovely surprise.

Carrots looking good although those are pretty much the THREE turnips! Not a good year for turnips, beetroots or swedes (despite lots of watering)--though the parsnips look OK.

Every year's a challenge...