I’ve just finished The Dreaming Suburb, which I am ashamed to say is my first attempt at reading anything by R.F. Delderfield who, as well as writing about places I know, is a distant relative and therefore somebody I should have investigated earlier. It’s a domestic saga set between the wars, which makes it sound much less fun than it was. It’s plotty and absorbing, and every so often there’s a beautiful piece of writing that lifts it above the gently engaging story of unassuming folk that it otherwise is. Plus, it’s fun spotting the places I know and reading them described as they were eighty years ago. I was particularly excited about the single mention of Elmers End.
More maths
We’ve got five games to play, all but one of them against sides who are either above us in the table or just a point or two below. With five to play, it’s a bit early for me to don my maths hat and start working out all the possible permutations, but at this stage, and in ninth spot (but only two points behind a play-off position), I think our chances are looking quite low.
However, this will all get much more exciting when it gets down to one or two games to go and I can pore over the paper and work out every possible outcome and – much less accurately – the likelihood of each. Working out out what might happen is one of my favourite parts of the season.
I am suddenly worried that this makes me a very dull person.
Haberdashery
There are some words which are only ever used in the context of retail, and I think we can all just about cope with that: millinery and lingerie may be silly words, but they don’t do anyone any harm, and I can even look for the “feminine hygiene” section in Boots without getting too distressed. But outside a GPs surgery that I passed this morning was a sign saying “Free oral hygiene pack for every new patient”. A free what? Do they mean a toothbrush? Perhaps a toothpaste/mouthwash combination? There’s no way of knowing, and no reason on earth not to have said what they really meant in the first place.
Small pleasures: number 2
…having a lollipop lady help you across the street. This happened to me this morning.
Blackpool
We’re at home to Blackpool tomorrow, following a run of six games without a loss. I had half-made a plan to go, but of my two principal matchgoing buddies one is on holiday and the other would rather go to the pub, and if the weather stays like this I may join him. I will take a small radio with me and listen to the results from there.
Last Saturday’s last-minute equaliser against Sheffield Wednesday was cause for celebration, even though it was a match we should have won. But a draw in which you were losing for most of the game is a good result, just as a draw in which you were winning for most of it is a bad one. And we’re still in with a play-off chance, for now.
Scary playgrounds
Popbitch this week has a link to some scary-looking children’s playgrounds featured on Dark Roasted Blend. The second photo is genuinely terrifying. There’s also a dragon about halfway down which has reminded me that years ago there used to be a hollowed-out dragon in Lewisham shopping centre, which you could clamber around inside. It was great and I want it back.
Winningly weird
London’s Strangest Moments loses points to begin with by being listed on Amazon as “London’s Strangest Tales”, making it almost impossible to find. It also loses points for being badly-written, poorly edited and having no index. But it makes all of that back up – just – by being genuinely engrossing. I kind of wish it had been written by a real writer and published by a real press, but, you know, it’ll do.
Shadders!
Billy Liar is one of my very favourite films, so I wasn’t expecting the book to match up. And it didn’t, because it was even better.
Things, and stuff
The Size of Thoughts: Essays and Other Lumber had me engrossed from the first line and kept me there right up to, but not quite including, the 150-page essay on the word “lumber” that closes the book. Although I got quite excited when I came across the word “lumber-room” in the book I’m currently in the middle of, so some of the relentless enthusiasm must have rubbed off.
Hanging in there
The Kite Runner I began by really enjoying until it seemed to lose its way a bit around three-quarters of the way in, before redeeming itself with a last chapter that was kind of perfect. I have, however, already forgotten most of it.
Glad All Over 