February was a funny month

 According to the BBC weather forecaster this morning March 1st is the first day of spring. Looking out of the window it seems very doubtful. It’s as dull and overcast as it was yesterday, which was, presumably, the last day of winter. For me it is the nadir of the year. I find the short, miserable days of winter difficult to say the very least. And February is definitely the worst month. Winter has already taken it’s toll. It’s weeks and weeks since the, possible, high of Christmas. New Year’s resolutions have either gone by the board, or become part of life. Being retired, there is no necessity to force oneself out of the door to go to work. The golf course has been closed on and off, and , when it is open, the weather makes golf uncomfortable and undesirable. So there is little incentive to leave the house unless there is shopping to do. The result has been that February has been spent mainly indoors! Depressing and not healthy.It hasn’t even been a profitable time. The house doesn’t look any cleaner, and I haven’t read anything particularly productive.

There have been a couple of exceptions. The Roman Museum had another of it’s series of talks about various aspects of ancient Rome. The speaker was Judith Affleck, the guiding light behind my Latin lessons, who is used to teaching a roomful of grammar school boys. She coped magnificently with the audience of grey haired museum volunteers, talking about the influence of women on the emperors. She focused on the most famous two, Livia and Agrippina the Younger, mother of Nero. The picture shows a depiction of the latter appearing to ‘crown’ her son emperor, an amount of power unheard of for women at the time. That was certainly worth making the effort to go out in the cold! Agrippina is one of my favourite ancient women. Boy, did she have balls!

To be fair, I did get out on to the golf course – once! Just nine holes, on my own as a practice, with Paul carrying my bag – bless him! This is the sixteenth hole at Stratford Oaks Golf Club, but not on a miserable day in February! I put this in to remind me what is to come, hopefully, later in the year.

One other good thing last month. Referring back to last month’s blog, I did actually get my tickets for Richard ll. It took 40 minutes to get two tickets,and I had to sit and watch tickets disappear before my eyes as I tried to transfer them to my basket, but I got them. David Tennant, you had better be worth it! For anyone who isn’t a Member of the RST there doesn’t seem much hope of getting anything except those tickets available on the day of performance.

Now that spring is officially here, perhaps things will improve. It’s not so much the basic weather, it’s one’s attitude to it. In February it’s so long since autumn, and so long until spring. Now March is actually here, and it is OFFICIALLY spring, optimism can begin to creep in. There have been walks at Ragley Hall during February, for the snowdrops, but it’s been far too miserable, wet and cold. Perhaps this months, to see the daffodils, will be a better option. Whatever, it must be better than February, surely.

It’s all David Tennant’s fault!

Living so close to Stratford upon Avon we see a lot of the Royal Shakespeare Company productions. I think I have seen almost the entire Shakespeare repertoire in the year’s I’ve lived here. And my absolute favourite play is, without any doubt, Richard ll. The first time I took much notice of it was when I was studying with the Open University a course called Culture and Belief in 16th century Europe. It was the set book for the Shakespeare section. By sheer good luck that was the year the RSC produced the play at The Other Place, with Sam West in the title role.

So when the programme came out for the winter 2013 season, Greg Doran’s first as Director, I was thrilled to see the play amongst the delights in store. The problems I could see, however, rather tempered my delight. The lead role was to be taken by David Tennant, and the play was only in the repertoire for a month. Now I am an Associate Member of the RSC, which gives me, for a moderate fee, a few weeks advance booking. Not as much as a full member, but usually enough. However, knowing from bitter experience the popularity of the aforesaid Mr Tennant, I was not sure if this was going to be enough this time, even though performances don’t start until next October. So I decided to check. I rang the Membership Hotline, only to be told that they were unable to answer because of ‘unprecedented’ demand! So I left a message, and, joy of joys, a delightful person rang me back within the next couple of hours. I was right, memberships were being taken out in vast numbers! Now Full Members can book on-line from 11th February, and Associate Members from 4th March. With a very limited number of performances the chances of any decent seats being left are remote. What might be left are the ‘limited view’ ones, or the Superseats at vast cost.  The price of these is considerably more than the difference in the types of membership. So I bit the bullet and upgraded. David, your performance had better be worth it! In the meantime note to self. Reminder on Calendar to remember to go in and book at 9 o’clock on the morning of 11th February, otherwise it will have all been in vain. The Christmas production this year is to be Wendy and Peter Pan. Must check if grandchildren would like to see it. You can’t go to it without a child in tow!

At least the weather is trying to look up. We had quite a lot of snow, though not as much as other areas of the country. And so far we seem to have managed to avoid flooding with the thaw. This is a decided improvement on other years when the High Street was a river! There has been a huge amount of work put in over the last couple of years, and all credit goes to the people who got it right!                                                                      

Not sure what the bunting was for, but Alcester seems to erect it for any possible occasion!

But the snow did have it’s effect. Last week I was unable to get into Stratford for my Latin class! This week was fine, but it is amazing how much difference missing a week can have. Good news though, the proposed group trip to Rome in October seems to be a runner! The idea is to stay in either a monastery or a convent because they do inexpensive, 3 star equivalent, B & B. Not sure how I will fit in there,but we shall see! Now to persuade Paul to come as well!

Here we go again!

It’s New Year’s Day and time for looking back and looking forward, (hence Janus above!) and the dreaded resolutions! Usually I decide on something really ordinary. Lose weight, get more exercise, save money, that sort of thing. Actually for 2012  I resolved to use my WiiFit machine regularly. And, blow me down, I am still using it! In fact I had great fun this morning boxing! Not a pretty sight, but very effective. This year I was probably going to do more of the same. I certainly need to lose a little weight. My cholesterol is not going to go down (genetic not life-style) and I can’t take statins (nasty reactions) so my specialist has told me to stop worrying about it but just reduce other dangers. I don’t smoke, so that is one plus, and he told me that a glass of wine a day is a positive advantage! I do like that man! So weight is the main problem. Plus exercise of course. So losing weight and perhaps playing a little more golf this year (weather permitting!) is on the list. But these are aspirations rather than resolutions. I should be doing it anyway.

So what am I going to do? Well, it stems from one of my Christmas presents. Paul gave me a copy of Clare Balding’s book My Animals and Other Family. An absolutely cracking read, and one I can wholeheartedly recommend.

(Well, my pictures have decided to place themselves this time. Can’t be bothered to get in a tizz about it. See the rest of this blog!)

In one of the chapters she writes about a teacher who had a profound effect on her, her poetry teacher. She calls her ‘so detached, so self-contained. She made things happen. She read extensively to arrive at an informed opinion so that she could be governed by what she thought of the world, not what others thought about her.’ Clare goes on to say that she wanted to be like that. ‘..to be the subject of the sentence of my life, not the object.’ I like that sentiment. To be in control of what goes on, and not dependent on what other people think of you. My life tends to be pretty well compartmented. I have family, golfing friends, museum friends, classical/OU friends, and rarely do they meet. My actions tend to be geared to the company I am in at any given time. Sometimes I will keep my mouth shut because of the person I am with. For example, I won’t tell my golfing friends I am reading a book about Augustus, but, equally, I may not admit to my classical friends that sometimes my bedtime reading is Georgette Heyer, or a very trashy crime novel! Both are me, just different facets. Reading has two purposes, to inform and educate, and to relax. I like both, but not necessarily at the same time! So this year I have resolved to be me, just me. Not necessarily the person the friend I am with is expecting. That also means that I am not going to get into a tizz about things like techie problems. Not my forte, so don’t worry about it! I always have #2 son to fall back on don’t I Nik?

Talking of Nik, I took him and my two youngest grandchildren to see The Mouse and His Child yesterday. It was as good as it’s reviews, which were brilliant. The RST is very good at children’s productions at Christmas which are a huge improvement on the traditional pantomime. I’ve been taking my grandchildren for years and haven’t come across a turkey yet.

And this morning, on a beautiful sunny day to welcome the 2013, the Crome and West Warwickshire Hunt met in Alcester for the first time in 10 years. Hunting is viewed as  elitist , and only for the landed gentry. Okay the two eldest children of the Marquis of Hertford were in the field, but so were several farmers, the cousin of the local barber, many people who work 9-5 and come out at weekends, and so on. My cousin is the Master, so it can’t be elitist can it! The streets were full of the local population waving and cheering, and our Court Leet were there in force.

A very happy New Year to you all. And may 2013 be all you want it to be. As for me, I am just going to be me, for better or for worse!