Palm Sunday in Salisbury

Tags

Arundells, Babel, Bishop's Stall, Chapter House, Constable, Creme egg, Dom Perignon, Easter, Jobseekers, Julian of Norwich, Living Water, Mammon, Mocha, National Trust, New Sarum, Old Sarum, Palm Sunday, patens, Pontius Pilate, Salisbury, Simnel cake, Ted Heath, University Challenge, Yasser Arafat

A re-blog as it is timely:

I can’t believe that it’s nearly Easter, shivered Carrie.

Quick! let’s go in and bag a table, I said.

Costamuchamoulah cafe was still doing a brisk trade, even on this

grey day.  Amazingly, the smokers were still prepared to sit outside.

We have the routine down to a fine art now: one gets into the queue while

the other nabs a table, much as the disciples snatched a colt.

Yes, Easter’s early this year, I commented, watching a child stuff its face with

a Creme Egg in advance of the Christian calendar.  It’s amazing how such

diminutive creatures can incorporate a whole orb of sickly chocolate fondant

into such a tiny aperture.

I bet they don’t know what Simnel cakes represent, I mused aloud.

What do they stand for? queried Carrie.  Then, seeing my expression, she

added, I’m sure I once knew.

That’s what I say during University Challenge, I replied.

Then I sipped my Mocha, getting a chocolate powder moustache.  You know,

it’s Palm Sunday tomorrow.  Are you going to go to a service? 

Try persuading that lot to get out of bed, she sighed. They used to like to see

the donkey coming into the church, though.  Sometimes they were convinced

that The Dean, giving his dramatised reading, was Pontius Pilate and it scared

them.

Yes, we used to go to Salisbury for the service.  That was when Ted Heath

lived in The Close. In fact..

..you have a poem about it, she smiled.

How did you know?

PALM SUNDAY IN SALISBURY

Polythene wraps New Sarum like an egg.

The sky above The Close is Constable’s.

Cream-robed clergy congregate in cloisters,

bespectacled, brandishing dried gray palms,

under a spire as tall as Babel’s own,

while new choristers mouth All glory, laud

and honour.. without comprehending laud.

The tallest lad hopes that his voice won’t crack.

Girl choristers have not been asked to sing today.

Some miniature Yasser Arafats

in tea-towels and trainers coax an ass

from a spreading cedar into the nave,

where all present pray for its continence.

True blue glass provides a continuo.

Ted Heath’s Jaguar, also blue, is parked

on a reserved space outside Arundells.

What if one should loose its handbrake

and say, The Lord has need of thee this day?

Meanwhile we make intercession for all

unemployed, under and over-employed,

while carefully noting the advertised

champagne breakfast on our service schedule.

Dom Perignon: a foretaste of glory.

The Jobseekers can sip Living Water.

Coffee will be served in the Chapter House

among the exhumed coffin chalices,

patens. The bookshop is doing business

in postcards of Julian of Norwich:

All manner of thing shall be well. Mammon

hasn’t felt stings from His whip of cords-yet.

The head which indicates the Bishop’s stall

has a triple face of circumspection.

The Dean and his ordained wife wear the same

as they stand on repro medieval tiles,

trying not to worry about their lunch.

In the cloisters a chill wind chafes faces.

A chair is overturned, but no tables.

Although we have received the sign of peace,

our palm crosses seem ineffectual.

We stick one on Ted’s windscreen, just in case

his residential permit cuts no ice

with the flaming Being at the Close gate,

who curiously doesn’t wear a badge,

but bears authority from Old Sarum.

He tends to let the backpackers pass through,

like Christians, still bearing their large burdens,

or as camels accessing a needle.

But Tory Faithful have to wait in queues,

backs turned to the Celestial City,

while Peter checks their National Trust cards

and the very stones cry, Glory! Glory!

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Staff Meeting

Tags

acronym, arrythmia, Bourbon biscuit, correcting fluid, Daily Mail, faggots, gender fluid, Hippocratic oath, Jammie Dodger, Jeremy Paxman, libido, testosterone, University Challenge

Augustus Snodbury, Acting Head of St Birinus Middle School, looked out

on his assembled staff.  It was the first meeting of 2014 and he felt

uncomfortable in The Headmaster’s chair, amid so many grumpy men.

He nodded curtly to Geoffrey Poskett, relaying an unspoken message

which underlined the transmission that their coincidental holiday

encounter was, in no way, to imply any kind of partiality or informality

now that they were back in their normal routine.

Yawn! Yawn!  There were the usual parental missives, if not missiles,

informing staff of snowboarding fractures.  Then there were Boys To Be

Discussed.  This provoked an excited background hum and Snod had to

lay down the law firmly:  One of you may buzz, I mean, speak.

The School Calendar had been printed at the end of the previous term,

but was now distributed.  Usually each fixture had to be gone over in fine

tooth detail, but Snod pronounced: Well, you can all read, I suppose, so, in

the manner of Jeremy Paxman at the start of University Challenge, I will just

invite you all to crack on.

He eyed young Milford-Haven who was about to snaffle his own favourite

Bourbon biscuit from the trolley.  However, when the young puppy felt the

elder educator’s gimlet gaze bore into him, he eschewed his first choice

and opted for a Jammie Dodger instead.  Very wise as a future career

move.

No conferring! Snod emphasised.

He glanced at dates for the end of term and mused:  Oh, why does Easter

have to be so late this year?  If it is a moveable feast, then why can’t it

be shunted closer to release us all from scholastic torment?

Nigel Milford-Haven put up his hand.  As John Boothroyd-Smythe’s form

teacher, he felt compelled to put one and all in the picture re/ behavioural

issues and their mitigating causes.  One of these was that B-S’s sister had

apparently ‘come out‘ recently as being gender fluid.

I’ve heard of correcting fluid, remarked ‘old school’ Snodbury, but never the

sexual variety.  Pray, clarify.

Several know-it-alls who had been paying attention at the previous in-

house training on Psychosexual Proclivities and the Learning Process came

to attention and tried to contribute to the allegedly open forum.

One of you may answer! boomed Gus.  Well, fascinating though the subject

promises to be,..His olfactory sense had just radared that the first sitting

of lunch was a possibility.

Who is on Lunch Duty today? he asked.

Poskett, always poised for a hasty getaway, was crouching near the door.

I am, sir!  He bowed his head and fled.  He had known that they would

never get round to the pressing matter on his agenda.  Maybe next week!

he muttered.

A final notice, Snod declared.  The smell of faggots was making him lose

concentration.  You may be wondering how The Headmaster is.  The good

news is that he has not suffered a stroke.  Not even a TIA, to use a medical

acronym.  His wife assures us that he has only been experiencing mild

arrythmia, brought on by an arduous Autumn term, combined with an

overindulgent celebration on Christmas Eve.  And, if you have been reading

The Daily Mail lately, which, God Forbid any member of this illustrious

academic establishment would..

Here the aroma of hot beef olives, to use a more polite culinary term, was

really distracting..

…Where was I?  Oh, yes, apparently the acme of journalistic achievement

has suggested that some men d’un certain age develop irrational anxieties,

heart palpitations and alter their personality through low levels of

testosterone. (He stroked his new leather jacket in a spontaneous gesture

of subliminal self-awareness.)  They can even lose their..

Libido, supplied an earnest Milford-Haven, who was probably the only one

in the staffroom attempting to follow his drift.

Suddenly thirty two pairs of eyes widened and their owners ceased to

dwell on stuffing and onion gravy.

Snod coughed.  Aaagh, whatever! he agreed. Anyway, to cut a long story

short, his wife has persuaded him to combat excessive grumpiness by a

course of hormone injections, which should render him more..

Subservient! Milford-Haven nodded.

Compliant! re-stated Mr Snodbury, glaring at the exhibition of impatience

shown by the Junior Master.  He recognised a desire to conclude proceedings

in the worthy cause of nutrition.  But the boy should know his place.  He had

to restrain himself from awarding the member of staff an order mark and

detention.

So, not a word of this confidential information is to pass beyond these walls,

stressed The Acting Head.  He then had to watch everyone else exiting the

room before himself, which probably meant that he would have to go to the

second sitting in the dining room and there would be no faggots left.

Meanwhile, in a mockery of the Hippocratic oath, The Headmaster’s wife was

discussing her husband’s alarming symptoms in Costamuchamoulah must-

seen cafe, over two lattes, with the GP’s spouse, who was going to relay

the absorbing details to multiple caffeine addicts in the weeks to come.

cafe

Acting Head

Tags

A&E, Acting Head, Bradford on Avon, cook one's goose, Ding dong Merrily on High!, fardels bear, Madeira, redcurrant sauce, St John's Ambulance, University Challenge, wishbone

Augustus Snodbury settled himself into position in the carver chair at

the head of the table.  He had only just made it to Bradford-on-Avon,

his prostate appointment having been cancelled and the queue in the

butcher’s having receded.  He had battled through floods and gales to

bring-not the bacon, but the poultry- to his erstwhile lover’s cottage.

I’ve cooked your goose! Diana announced.

In more ways than one, he mused.  However, he sharpened the knife

and set to, the stupid paper hat falling over his eyes.

Dru held out her plate and it was plenished with succulent breast.

She adjusted her cleavage and leaned back.

That’s plenty! she cautioned.

Diana gave the toast:

Here’s tae us.

Wha’s like us?

Gey few

an’ they’re a’ deid!

Gus and his daughter pulled the wishbone and he won, but

coyly declined to reveal his deepest desire.  Diana observed

privately that it might connote with him having a backbone too.

Wasn’t that the weirdest thing?  Dru announced. At the looks of

incomprehension, she clarified:  I mean seeing that Poskett chap in

the middle of our trip.

Well, I suppose these cultural breaks self-select, her mother

hypothesised.  It’s a niche market.

I wonder how the other poor chap is? continued Dru casually.

Can’t have been much fun being hors-de-combat in the hotel.

Oh, Milford-Haven will be perfectly all right by now, opined Gus.

He’s probably gone off to be looked after by his mother in Cornwall.

Duchy of.

Dru inhaled and some sage and onion stuffing went down the wrong

way. She downed some water as a distraction, in the manner of a shy

University Challenge contestant after he or she has finally answered one

question correctly.

Cornwall, she voiced inwardly.  She fingered the gold harp on its chain.

So, it had been from Nigel after all.  Ding Dong Merrily on High!

The phone interrupted their table talk, ringing insistently.

Typical!  said Diana.  Ignore it!  Let the machine take it.

However, they could hear the rather desperate message, pronounced

by someone who sounded very like the school secretary to Snod, who

happened to be nearest to the handset.

He leapt up, spilling the redcurrant sauce over the antique linen

tablecloth.

Oh do be careful! scowled Diana.

Gus pressed re-play and, to his horror, the tale of tragic woe played itself

out.

Apparently the Headmaster had attended the Midnight Service at his local

parish church and he had keeled over before the seventh Lesson.

At first everyone, including his wife, had thought that he had merely been

prematurely carried away by the spirits of the season, but a member of the

St John’s Ambulance Brigade had detected a tell-tale sign of lopsidedness in

his expression and, before the congregation could snatch a subterfuge

and unmusical breath between ‘verily the sky‘ and ‘is riv’n‘, the Head had

been stretchered out between the pews and was on his way to A&E.

Ashen-faced Augustus sat down on the whoopee cushion.

What’s going to happen?  Dru asked.

Yes, re-formulated Diana.  What’s to be done?

I’m to be Acting Head, replied Gus.  That’s what’s happening

and I wish it wasn’t.  Oh, joy to the world!

Be careful what you wish for! Diana teased, but she wiped her lips with

her napkin when she saw his expression.

Balancing himself by gripping the edge of the table he recited with an

orotundity that matched the profundity of the occasion:

To die, to sleep-

…and by a sleep to say we end

The Heart-ache, and the thousand Natural shocks

That flesh is heir to…’tis a consummation

Devoutly to be wished.

And thus the Native hue of Resolution

iIs sicklied o’er, with the pale cast of Thought,

And enterprises of great pitch and moment

With regard their currents turn awry,

And lose the name of Action..

Dru found herself appalauding, but he continued:

No, who would fardels bear

[I’d rather}..bear those ills

Than fly to others that [I] know not of..

Here!  Diana thrust a glass into his hand.

Have some Madeira, m’dear!

And so the spell was broken, along with his dreams of a

downhill, easy progression towards his retirement.

Palm Sunday in Salisbury

Tags

Arundells, Bruckner, Chapter House, Constable, Creme egg, Dom Perignon, Holy week, Julian of Norwich, Mocha, Old Sarum, Palm Sunday, Pontius Pilate, Salisbury, Simnel cake, Ted Heath, Tower of Babel, University Challenge

I can’t believe that it’s nearly Easter, shivered Carrie.

Quick! let’s go in and bag a table, I said.

Costamuchamoulah cafe was still doing a brisk trade, even on this

grey day.  Amazingly, the smokers were still prepared to sit outside.

We have the routine down to a fine art now: one gets into the queue while

the other nabs a table, much as the disciples snatched a colt.

Yes, Easter’s early this year, I commented, watching a child stuff its face with

a Creme Egg in advance of the Christian calendar.  It’s amazing how such

diminutive creatures can incorporate a whole orb of sickly chocolate fondant

into such a tiny aperture.

I bet they don’t know what Simnel cakes represent, I mused aloud.

What do they stand for? queried Carrie.  Then, seeing my expression, she

added, I’m sure I once knew.

That’s what I say during University Challenge, I replied.

Then I sipped my Mocha, getting a chocolate powder moustache.  You know,

it’s Palm Sunday tomorrow.  Are you going to go to a service? 

Try persuading that lot to get out of bed, she sighed. They used to like to see

the donkey coming into the church, though.  Sometimes they were convinced

that The Dean, giving his dramatised reading, was Pontius Pilate and it scared

them.

Yes, we used to go to Salisbury for the service.  That was when Ted Heath

lived in The Close. In fact..

..you have a poem about it, she smiled.

How did you know?

PALM SUNDAY IN SALISBURY

Polythene wraps New Sarum like an egg.

The sky above The Close is Constable’s.

Cream-robed clergy congregate in cloisters,

bespectacled, brandishing dried gray palms,

under a spire as tall as Babel’s own,

while new choristers mouth All glory, laud

and honour.. without comprehending laud.

The tallest lad hopes that his voice won’t crack.

Girl choristers have not been asked to sing today.

Some miniature Yasser Arafats

in tea-towels and trainers coax an ass

from a spreading cedar into the nave,

where all present pray for its continence.

True blue glass provides a continuo.

Ted Heath’s Jaguar, also blue, is parked

on a reserved space outside Arundells.

What if one should loose its handbrake

and say, The Lord has need of thee this day?

Meanwhile we make intercession for all

unemployed, under and over-employed,

while carefully noting the advertised

champagne breakfast on our service schedule.

Dom Perignon: a foretaste of glory.

The Jobseekers can sip Living Water.

Coffee will be served in the Chapter House

among the exhumed coffin chalices,

patens. The bookshop is doing business

in postcards of Julian of Norwich:

All manner of thing shall be well. Mammon

hasn’t felt stings from His whip of cords-yet.

The head which indicates the Bishop’s stall

has a triple face of circumspection.

The Dean and his ordained wife wear the same

as they stand on repro medieval tiles,

trying not to worry about their lunch.

In the cloisters a chill wind chafes faces.

A chair is overturned, but no tables.

Although we have received the sign of peace,

our palm crosses seem ineffectual.

We stick one on Ted’s windscreen, just in case

his residential permit cuts no ice

with the flaming Being at the Close gate,

who curiously doesn’t wear a badge,

but bears authority from Old Sarum.

He tends to let the backpackers pass through,

like Christians, still bearing their large burdens,

or as camels accessing a needle.

But Tory Faithful have to wait in queues,

backs turned to the Celestial City,

while Peter checks their National Trust cards

and the very stones cry, Glory! Glory!

Adults Only

Tags

Amoxil, Blackberry, Calpol, Facebook, Michelin-starred, Neil Oliver, Nemo Me Impune Lacessit, Peppa Pig, The Liverpool Pathway, Twitter, University Challenge

^{That little minx, Tiger, has no respect for boundaries.  She has also messed up my font}

^{size-help! She ought to be on Facebook or Twitter or some cherub forum.  My blog is for}

^{adults only.  I mean, if you go out for a special meal now-say to a Michelin-starred}

^{restaurant where you will be paying shedloads to be seen eating a smear of quince coulis,}

^{no sooner than you have broken open your walnut brioche than, out of}

^{the corner of your gimlet eye, you will perceive a Sherpa-waiter}

^{carrying a Peppa Pig upholstered high chair, making for a table near to}

^{you and your romantic companion.}

^{A legging-ed Mummy will stride out behind the drudge, looking}

^{neither to the left, nor to the right, clutching the enfant terrible’s}

^{entertainment tablet in one hand and guiding the mini-cyclone with}

^{the other.  She will bear an expression that basically could be}

^{translated as Nemo Me Impune Lacessit. ( I think Neil Oliver accurately}

^{identified that motto on Christmas University Challenge, but}

^{surprisingly didn’t know some of the coastal questions.  Ah well, he was}

^{an archaeologist first and foremost.  But I digress..)}

^{Anyway, the maternal facial expression defies socio-cultural challenge and so bang}

^{goes your £200 treat and on goes the music-emitting tablet.  If you are}

^{lucky, she may not breast-feed no 2, which is lurking in the carrycot,}carted in by a rather

sheepish Daddy.

Mind you, it might not be Daddy; it might be Latest Replacement Carrycot

Transporter.  (What has happened?  The font’s okay now!)

You are just adjusting the air nozzle above you on a long-haul flight,

before you give your undivided to the amusing safety video, when the mother

in front of you, not long out of some job in the city which required a

Blackberry and no common sense, reclines her seat with a thump

and, for some reason, omits to give her wailing offspring a drink

during take-off’s maximum ear pressure.  Has she administered

Calpol, or Amoxil- also known as banana medicine, which my kids

drained in bottlefuls?  Brilliant for sore ears, novitiates to

parenthood. But check with your doctor first, naturally.  A lot of the

profession were prone to dose their own kids up for a bit of flight

harmony. Oh yes, they did..

It’s the same with the supermarket shelves of chocolate goodies

placed strategically at pushchair level, right next to the tills.  Distract

the child, I say.  You used to be able to get sugar-free brick-hard

little crescents of Scandinavian bread that would shatter a

pensioner’s crowns but were ideal for gummy toddlers to suck to a

satisfying mush, just as you rounded the final aisle and came in sight

of the tantalising foil-wrapped temptations.  We ensured that the

rusky saviours were probably gluten-free, so we weren’t all child

haters.  At least, not then.  Knick-knack, paddywack, give the sprog a Bonio.

Seriously, though, it’s not the kid’s fault, is it?  He or she would

probably prefer to be cocooned in a cosy cot with a nice little

routine to follow.  Wouldn’t we all?

Rant over before someone puts me on The Liverpool Pathway.  That

reminds me: I need a drink!

 

 

A Heap of Broken Images

Tags

Alex Salmond, Andy Murray, Bradshaw's Guide, David Dinnie, Edinburgh Military Tattoo, Eurozone, Fifty Shades of Grey, Forth Rail Bridge, Highland games, Iron Brew, Isaac, Lysistrata, Merlot, Michael Portillo, Neil Oliver, New Orleans, Only Connect, Patrick Moore, Perlmutter, Scotland the Brave, The Sun, The Waste Land, Togo, Top Secret, University Challenge, Victoria Coren

Bank Holiday Monday

Someone sent me an attachment this morning which was headed Fifty Shades of Grey for Men.  It was a paint chart.  There is nothing remotely sexual about Elephant’s Breath, I think.

Tropical storm Isaac is heading for New Orleans on the 7^th anniversary of Katrina’s cataclysm.

The geographical feature that is characterised by cataclysm is deluge and not earthquake, as one panellist on University Challenge mistook tonight.

It was an evening of quizzes, with the return of a slightly more overweight Victoria Coren on Only Connect. Watching this programme, I feel like a character in The Waste Land:

I can connect

Nothing with nothing..

Victoria is like Madame Sosostris, the wisest woman in Europe, with a wicked pack of cards.  She apparently loves poker.  She stands by The Wall which is a heap of broken images and :

 uncorseted, her friendly bust

 Gives promise of pneumatic bliss.

I wish that she had retained the Greek letters of the alphabet on the question choice blocks.  These were replaced through attacks on elitism.  Now, if the women of Togo read The Lysistrata, then why the general dumbing down in this country?  After all, the substituted hieroglyphics are just as refined, though pictorially evident, I suppose.  My favourite is horned viper.

Curiously, Victoria’s dresses are becoming tighter and tighter and her fantasies more curious too- she admitted to a desire to find a naked Michael Portillo in her dressing room, seated on a case of Merlot.  The Merlot you could understand… Personally, I would prefer to read Bradshaw through, cover to cover, in a single sitting.  Still, there’s nowt so queer as fowk.

The Edinburgh Military Tattoo was next and the best bit was the drumming cohort from Switzerland, Top Secret.  I looked carefully but our friend, Roger, was not of their number. The second best bit was the mass formation for Scotland the Brave. You can keep all thon fancy film scorey type tunes and I think Alex Salmond would have been pretty annoyed at them playing There’ll Always be an England, unless it conveyed the proviso:  doon there and no’ up here.

The whole evening was devoted to tartan programmes about Highland Games all over the world, in places such as North Carolina. There are more games held worldwide than in Scotia itself.

The only interesting programme was Horizon with its explanation of the infinite expansion of the universe. If Scotland keeps expanding exponentially then it should be good for Pitlochry looms and kiltmakers in general.  As a nation it will grow vaster than empires and more slow, no probably even faster.  However, the programme stressed that we were all in this together and could not go it alone, as multiple galaxies are swallowed.  So, Alex, we need to remain united so that we can fight all the dark matter in the Eurozone and in other global economies together.

A programme on the Highland Games showcased David Dinnie who had been the world’s most renowned athlete in times gone by.  Women used to faint away at the sight of his torso, in much the same way as they do now when they see pictures in The Sun of every Tom, Dick and Harry letting their hair down. (Not.)  Leave the hair business to Neil Oliver, I say.

Anyway, Dinnie used to endorse Iron Brew, as I think it was spelled back then- (Scotland’s other national beverage- made frae girders.)  He looked as if he had licked the Forth Rail Bridge.  Maybe a wee taste of A G Barr’s fizzy drink’s 0.002% ammonium ferric citrate was what Andy Murray had doped himself on before winning Olympic gold.  Aye, Alex Salmond, ye can take the man oot o’ Scotland, but ye cannae tak’ the iron oot o’ his soul.

Alba gu brath!

Tuesday 28^th

My scientific observations seem to be confirming Professor Perlmutter’s Nobel prizewinning research about exponential expansion of the Universe.  I am quite taken with cosmology now.  I noticed a very large, docile dog on a lead at the local Lavender café.  It was very like a lurcher, but much larger.  I asked its owner what breed it was and she said, A fat greyhound.  Also there are all these sightings of lions in Clacton-on-Sea etc which turn out to be large feral cats.  Some can be four foot in length so you could be mistaken for thinking that they are pumas, especially if you have been on the old Merlot for the evening.  Stick to Irn- Bru, I say.  It puts hairs on your chest and dampens down the Portillo fantasies.

Anyway, everything is becoming larger- Patrick Moore, Victoria Coren and the whole Universe.  No wonder I can’t get into my favourite jeans.

© Candia Dixon Stuart and Candiacomesclean.wordpress.com, 2012