ISLANDS IN THE STREAM

I am not a beach person. I couldn't give a figleaf for the Maldives or St Tropez. The sand gets in my sandwiches and my orifices, I burn in the sun and I have to be careful with seafood. I know how to swim, but if I am forced to do so, I'd much rather it was in a swimming pool, preferably one with a bar in it where I might sip a pina colada between widths, rather than dicing with death in the briny, in which, as W.C.Fields reminded us, fish procreate, humans defecate and which often has a fairly violent nature. Swimming pools don't have sharks in them as a rule.



I do like a good river though. I was born on the banks of Old Father Thames at its most majestic point (Westminster, not the Dartford Crossing) and have always had respect for a Proper River. As I child I caught my first travel bug on the Woolwich Ferry, and spent many a happy summer with cousin Vera at Shiplake, in our jobs as First and Second Mates on Captain Uncle John's Daily Mirror fibreglass dinghy (HMS Ollie Beak), fishing for roach, or in the odd very hot summer swimming in the river.

It seemed a lot bigger then

I misspent a good deal of my youth at the Thames-side taverns of Greenwich, holding Arthur Smith's pint of smooth for him while he recited the naughty bits of T.S.Eliot: "By Richmond I raised my knees, Supine on the floor of a narrow canoe ..... weilala leia, wallala leialala ... ".

I misspent my twenties and a good part of my thirties on, and often under, the bridges of Paris, screaming under the Pont Bir Hakeim fancying I bore a faint resemblance to Maria Schneider, gazing romantically at the Eiffel Tower from the Pont Alexandre III, or cruising up the Seine on a bateau-mouche while Edith Piaf songs warbled from the tannoy. I'm definitely more river than riviera.




A city needs a proper river. I cannot take Brussels seriously as it only has a canal. There was once a river here called the Senne, which was built over. Bits of it emerge in the south of the city, but it's nowt but a trickle, you'd be hard pressed even to call it a stream. A babbling brook, nothing more. Pffft. And they haven't done much with the canal, which in places seems to serve as a rubbish tip. There are no chic canalside restaurants, no pleasant towpaths along which to stroll on a Sunday. Just derelict factories and flats, and once a year a fake beach. Shame on you, Brussels town hall.

Not exactly Amsterdam is it?
Photo: Lieven Soete www.bruxel.org

Next Monday I am setting off on a motoring tour of the Chateaux of the Loire. The Loire is a magnificent river, running for over 1,000 kilometers from the hills of the Ardèche northwards, and then west, to its outflow into the Atlantic at Nantes. It loops and meanders, it has islands and beaches and a great deal of it goes through wine country. I shall be overnighting in Saumur and Chinon, and taking in Bourgueil, Pouilly and Sancerre. Which might be an indication that the Chateaux are not the only focus of my trip.

I shall however keep an eye on the property market with a view to a retirement home...




Happy Easter everyone! Back in two weeks with some lovely photos I hope.




I'm packing my James Blunt CD as we speak.

NUL POINTS

I seem to have started something of a craze. Last night's Strictly Come Dancing Underwater for Sport Relief (they cancelled EastEnders, leaving me in total suspenders about The Crime of The Century) featured "celebrity" couples looking quite fetching in a variation on my gas mask. So I will probably add ballroom dancing to my potential dream catalogue. Can't wait.

It's that time again. With the first rustle of spring, the qualifiers for the 57th Eurovision song contest in Azerbaijan are under way. All participating countries have voted for their song, and who is going to sing it. I can't imagine why they're holding the Eurovision in Ivory Coast which is not even in Europe, but it's probably got something to do with overseas aid.

No-one wants to win Eurovision any more. It costs too much to stage. Ireland is banking on nul points by entering Jedward, the identical twins conjoined at the hair follicles. This could backfire on them. I suspect this sort of lunacy is probably what passes for exotic in Baku. The UK is bowling a googly by wheeling out 75-year-old Engelbert Humperdinck, but they may have underestimated the Azerbaijani love of elderly men in dinner jackets crooning dismal ballads. Engelbert is Big in Azerbaijan. The Russians have gone one better and found a village choir of toothless old peasants to ensure they end up pointless. The Azeris (they hope) will ROFL their AO at the Russian grannies. This could also fall flat. The Azeris could be kinkier than they think.

Thank God Terry Wogan isn't still doing the commentary. I'd love a joint first between the UK and Russia, with a finale sung by Engelbert and the Russian Old Spice Girls.Let's hear it for Deafy, Gummy, Wrinkly, Shaky Khan, Nora Battsky and Posh.

NIGHTFIGHTER

For reasons too boring to go into, my physician has recommended that I change my nocturnal headgear. The pineapple, apparently, is interfering with my sleep patterns. He recommends taking off the fruit bowl at night and donning a fetching little number called a CPAP. Which I think is Russian for Thank God I Already Sleep Alone.

There are various models of mask on the market.

The "Mandy"

The "Britney"

The "Trench Kiss"

The "Bends"



The "Stig"

The "Major Tom"

The "Ganesh"
The "Vader"
(also available in white)

The "Oodie"


The "Hannibal"

And my personal favourite:

The "Chocs Away, Old Girl!"

I'm looking forward to some interesting dreams. Just call me Icewoman.

THE POWER OF SCRABBLE

The power of prayer really works. I found myself praying - to anyone, really - for inspiration for something to stick on this blog to stop it going mouldy, and dear old Tom Joad unwittingly came to the rescue. He has revived his excellent blog Word du Jour - which is a mine of information for etymology freaks - and browsing through it I found this post which I contributed back in January 2010. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away.

Daphne does Dictionaries

Hasbro’s Scrabble Plus computer game is a goldmine for wordsmiths. Its built-in dictionary encompasses American, Australian, South African and Scots dialect, as well as every technical dictionary known to man, and then some I think it just makes up as it goes along. It does allow you to check if you suspect it of cheating. Every fish (of which there are 25,000 in the world), mammal, rock, archaeological term, dance move, cloud formation, generic drug, mathematical term and paint colour in the WORLD is in the Scrabble dictionary. It’s like playing against Stephen Fry.

The Scrabble Nazi, who always manages to sneak up behind me when I am playing against the computer, rails and rants that abbreviations, initials, exclamations, proper nouns, foreign words, slang or acronyms shouldn’t be allowed. And words he has never heard of. According to the Wikipedia definition: “Acronyms or abbreviations, other than those that have been regularized (such as AWOL, RADAR, and SCUBA), are not allowed. Variant spellings, slang or offensive terms, archaic or obsolete terms, and specialized jargon words are allowed if they meet all other criteria for acceptability.” I’m more sanguine. It’s the computer’s game. I have to learn to play by its rules. But that doesn’t mean it always wins…

Aardvark

AA
If you thought Aardvark was the first word in the dictionary, you now stand corrected. It is Aa. Aa (pronounced with two syllables, like ah-ah) is rough cindery lava found in Hawaii. Hawaii being part of the USA, I guess that means all Hawaiian words are acceptable. Does this apply to Native American languages? Of which there are nearly 300 north of Mexico.

AW
This, apparently, is Scots for “all”. Now I don’t mind common Scots words such as “Bampot” or “Gobshite”, but Hasbro seems to take the view that if it’s in print somewhere, it’s a word, and so every mickle word that Rabbi Burns ever put down on paper is fair game.

AY
Ever. Scots, again.

DOH
A deer, a female deer.

ER
Expression of hesitation.

FE
Means the same as fee, don’t argue, it just is.

GI
I got the SN on this one. He thought it was G.I. (as in American soldier) but I knew it was the Japanese word for karate pajamas (being the Word Geek that I am, I once compiled a list of 50 Japanese words that everyone should know). Which brings us to whether a foreign word in common usage is allowed? Computer says hai karate.

LITE
Now I would have bought this if it had said “sugar-free” as in Coke Lite. But it thinks Lite is the opposite of dark. And to compound matters it adds Liten, Liteness, Litenesses, Litening, and Litely. The SN goes purple and hops about with rage, and it sure ain’t English, but I will use it if I get a chance.

NAH
Expression of denial. See NO, NAW.

PARA
This, it says is an abbreviation of Paratrooper. The SN feels that as an abbreviation it therefore should not be allowed. I detect an increasingly anti military tone to his objections.

Paras is also a word

PARAE
A type of fish. You’ll have to take my word on this one.

RAH
A cheer. As in rah rah rah.

QUOP
I had a Q, an O and a blank, and there was a triple word square and a double letter square lined up over a P. It was too tempting not to chance my arm. Q*OP! 72 points! The most I have EVER scored in Scrabble. The Scrabble dictionary said quop was a verb, meaning to throb or pulsate. It turns out it was ONCE used by James Joyce, in Ulysses: ”His heart quopped.” Now just because James Joyce made up a word, does that make it a real word? In which case we can really have some fun. I would tend to agree with the SN on this one, but 72 points – brillig!

ZO
A Tibetan breed of cattle, also spelled ZHO. Now I would have had this down as a proper noun, but who am I to argue with Deep Thought?

It’s a whole new world of words at Hasbro.

SO FAREWELL, THEN .....

Lady B with one of her stable of vintage cars, a 1941 Buick

I first met Lady Carole Banstead one sultry evening in the High Commissioner's garden in Accra, Ghana. It was 2005, and the night of the QBP (Queen's Birthday Party to non-champagne-swigging-diplomats). I had not long been in Ghana, where my husband Harold was posted as some kind of adviser. We were standing around sweating in our finery, our heels sinking into the lawn, clutching our one allocated drink (although I'm sure Her Ladyship had a top-up secreted in her voluminous handbag).

The local chiefs and their entourages had taken over the seating area on the verandah and the High Commission staff and their families were supposed to be acting as hosts, sacrificing the booze, food and chairs to our honoured guests. I was standing near the police band, trying to encourage them to play some Fela Kuti numbers, and chatting to a lovely suited, booted and dreadlocked young Ghanaian chap with a ganja plant motif on his tie - I was saying to him that hopefully the High Commissioner would have taken him for a representative of the Accra Horticultural Society - when Harold bumbled over and invited me to come and be presented to Lady Banstead.



She stood, framed in the light from the bar tent, a tiny figure in a smart and very expensive cocktail dress, unable to move, having become stuck in the lawn. Her radiant smile lit up the African night, and she greeted me graciously and warmly. "I've been so wanting to meet you!" she exclaimed. It was as if she already knew that we were going to become great friends. "Go and get me another large one, will you? I can't bleddywell move." When I asked her what her role at the High Commission was, she just muttered something about being embedded.

We exchanged pleasantries and stood to attention through both national anthems (we didn't really have much choice, as by now we were both stuck in the lawn), before agreeing to "do lunch" soon. We duly met a week or so later at the Golden Tulip Hotel, where we had a delightful lunch on the terrace by the pool. It was a tough life, in the harsh conditions of a diplomatic posting to West Africa. Lady B was on one of her periodic alcohol-free weeks for reasons of weight control, and our conversation was businesslike and friendly. On our second meeting, at a small Lebanese open-air bar in central Accra, she arrived at the appointed hour, knocked back four double vodkas in a row and nearly fell into a ditch on the way to the restaurant.


She became an invaluable friend, particularly during the dark days after Harold's demise. She helped me to organise his funeral and commission a special beer bottle shaped coffin for his last journey. I can now reveal that it was Lady B herself who put me in touch with the cargo ship captain who gave me a lift to Antwerp after the expense of Harold's funeral had ruined me. She had connections everywhere - in the rarified world of Ferrero Rochers that is the diplomatic service, as well as in the shadowy back alleys down by the docks - don't ask me how. Some say she was a secret agent. Some say she was Lord Lucan. All I know is, she was a damn good friend to me.

Some say she even worked for the BBC

As is now common knowledge, I landed on my feet in Brussels. Our contact was sporadic until Lord and Lady Banjo left Africa and returned to their ancestral pile in Milton-on-the-Keynes. Her Ladyship came late in life to the joys of the interwebs, but once I had persuaded her that her cover would not be blown if she joined Facebook, she took to it like a duck to water. Perhaps water is not the most appropriate word in her case. Like Schweppes tonic to Beefeater gin, then. It was a bit like "A star is born". She soon outstripped my paltry number of FB Friends and was brightening the lives of strangers far and wide. Her sunny nature and ready wit managed to travel through the ether and she became an internet sensation.


She had an enormous appetite for everything - adrenaline, as well as alcohol and cigarettes. She had been a qualified dive master during her days in the tropics, in Ghana she attended a high-energy African dance class, and on her return to Blighty she was an assiduous karateka, changing belt colours every week it would seem, roaring up the ranks as fast as Sensei could train her. Her daily visits to the gym were recounted in hilarious detail. Spincycling, step, weights, power walking .... she knew no pain, whereas I renounced my gym membership after two months of gruesome agony - and that was only in the changing rooms.




In her dotage, her faithful old retainer, Bill Casper, assisted her with technicalities such as slicing lemons, while Lord Banjo was away on various fact-finding missions to Libya, Iraq and Afghanistan. When her health started to fail, her young physician, Dr East, was up and down the M1 like a tart's knickers to attend to her every need, such was the devotion inspired by this remarkable woman.

On her penultimate voyage, to the Caribbean on a cruise ship, she was accompanied by Lord Banjo and 100 of her closest friends, and eclipsed the ship's resident celebrity Lionel Blair with her wheelies and spins on the vehicle henceforth to be ever known as a Banjobile. Many an expert has tried, and failed, to work out how she got it to do such versatile tricks.



She was generous to a fault and among the many glasses raised in tribute to her, several of them were filled with the contents of her wine cellar. Although we will miss her, we must feel grateful and honoured that our lives were touched, even if only briefly, by such a remarkable woman. Tributes have poured in from around the world, from friends and admirers, nonentities and celebrities alike.

"We would have been the next Fred and Ginger,"
said a distraught Lionel Blair

Gawd bless her, and all who sailed with her.