Finished At Last!

August 22, 2018March 2, 2020 / fgrtommo / 1 Comment

Those of you following this blog for a while will know that I have been painting the woodwork in our ‘TV Room’ – new shutters, skirting and panelling and the old doors – for the last 8 months. This week, I finally finished!

Long-Suffering Wife (LSW) remains astonished at how long I have taken over this but at least she hasn’t changed her mind about the dark blue colour during the protracted execution and she likes the result. The parts I did towards the end of the exercise are better than the early efforts but it looks alright if you don’t look too closely. We now have to paint the walls. LSW is planning to impress me up by doing those in a matter of a few days. Maybe hiring a professional is a better idea; we’ll see.

Of course, the primary reason why it took so long to complete this apparently simple painting task, apart from my inexperience, was my reluctance to devote more than 1-2 hours a day to the (admittedly intermittent) work. Although I’m still a bit frustrated by the patchiness of the end product, I did enjoy the work overall. I especially liked that I could paint to the rhythm of some of my CDs. I’ve always wanted a job where I could listen to my favourite music at the same time as working, and retirement has enabled that!

Now I have finished, I have to find a productive way of utilising the hours per week that are freed up. No problem; there are plenty of competing options and in any case there are lots of events already in the diary over the next couple months.

For example, the football season has re-started. I plan to attend several Forest Green Rovers (FGR) games, both home and away, in the next few months. While I attended the Cambridge Folk Festival, which I talked about in my last blog post, FGR enhanced my enjoyment by winning their first game. Somehow, the music seemed to sound a lot better once I knew FGR had secured three points!

Since then I have seen three games and we remain unbeaten; a very promising start. I especially enjoyed our win at Swindon who have become local rivals as we have risen and they have fallen (they were in the Premier League just 25 years ago). I enjoyed joining in on the mischievous chants: ‘Premier League to village team/Forest Green’ and ‘Your ground’s too big for you’; it is, as the picture below shows.

Swindon’s Empty Don Rogers Stand During Warm Up Versus FGR – How The Mighty Have Fallen

Between the football commitments, LSWs work and the rush to complete the TV Room paintwork (so I could show it off to weekend visitors from London and then my parents when they visited us), LSW and I have resumed our ‘days out’.

We really enjoyed a trip to East Somerset. We went primarily to see the Alexander Calder exhibition at Hauser & Wirth in Somerset. This was notable for containing a large number of personal, functional items designed and made by Calder alongside a splendid sample of his sculpture and mobiles. It was an excellent exhibition and a visit to Hauser & Wirth, including the adjoining garden, is always a treat.

Piet Oudolf Gardens At Hauser & Wirth

Following a very good lunch at the light and airy Chapel in Bruton, the sun came out and we paid an impromptu visit to Iford Manor Garden. This was a rather unexpected joy. It was an intimate, Italianate garden full of 100 year old mock-Italian buildings adorned with original, imported Italian sculpture and friezes. It adjoined an archetypally English river scene and old, golden manor buildings, and looked wonderful in the sun.

Iford Manor And Gardens

More day trips like this – as well as longer excursions once LSW’s work is on pause – are being planned to fill my retirement itinerary.

Happy Week

April 23, 2018 / fgrtommo / Leave a comment

The last week or so has seen warm temperatures at last. Despite my fears, Forest Green Rovers have had sufficient success on the football field to ensure that a dreaded relegation will almost certainly be avoided. I’ve been able to get started on preparing the vegetable patch and growing seedlings for the garden and managed to fit in another trip to London. It’s been a good time.

Lincoln Fields: Every Green Space In London Fully Occupied When The Sun Comes Out!

There has also been some nostalgia this week. 20 years ago, Boards of Canada, a band producing an evocative brand of psychedelic electronica, released their first studio album called Music Has The Right To Children. I bought the CD soon afterwards and have spent the last 20 years buying their other albums and loving almost every minute of them.

It’s hard to pick a favourite band because there are so many music genres and different music suits different moods and circumstances. But I believe that, at any time over the last 20 years (including today), I would have said Boards of Canada are my favourite band. An example of their sound – with typically off-beat images evoking public service documentaries, childhood and nostalgia is here (Everything You Do Is Balloon).

Boards of Canada are two Scottish brothers who have only produced three more full albums since that first one that got me hooked. To my knowledge, they have never played live. They leave me grasping for more. I therefore jumped at Eldest Son’s (ES’s)suggestion that we go to a jazz interpretation of the Music Has the Right to Children by Byron Wallen’s Gamelan Ensemble at Camden’s Jazz Club in London. It was an excellent event – though inevitably a shadow of the real thing – and so popular that, I understand, a repeat performance is being scheduled.

Byron Wallen’s Gamelan Ensemble Reinterpret Boards of Canada At The Jazz Club, Camden

The gig was a good reason to visit London for a couple of days. I not only spent time with ES – as usual staying in the Barbican flat he rents from us in a very convenient arrangement – but also managed to meet up with Middle Son (MS). I also saw the Sony World Photography Awards Exhibition at Somerset House, which was a huge and incredibly varied array of often remarkable photos, and then the superb, new Monet and Architecture exhibition at the National Gallery.

Sony World Photography Award Winner: Veselin Atanasov

I really enjoyed the Monet exhibition which recalled the Impressionists in London exhibition I saw at Tate Britain last year. Several of individual pictures were stunning, the information provided was just the right level for me (not too much and nothing highfalutin), and the gallery was busy but empty enough that I could see every piece up close. There was a little personal nostalgia here too since the exhibition sponsor was my last employer before retirement.

Monet And Architecture: The Boulevard Des Capucines, Paris

Since returning to Gloucestershire, I have started longer spells of gardening than I managed before Spring truly sprang into life this week. I have also resumed the interminable painting of the TV Room. Both activities have provided moments of humour.

My vegetable patch is adjoined by a field of sheep that have been fed with hay recently because the pasture is so far behind its normal growth levels due to the poor weather. When I appear in the vegetable patch they expect me to feed them and so rush over towards me. One got so enthusiastic that he barged through the fence, jumped over the wall and started munching the weeds in our garden. Fortunately, we managed to guide the sheep back to his field quickly enough to leave us amused by the experience rather than concerned.

Sheep Intruding Into Our Garden

On the painting front, I have recently opened another pot. As I was leaning over it to dip in my brush, my spectacles dropped off directly into the paint. I felt pretty stupid as I fished the drenched, dark blue spectacles out and rinsed them off. Luckily, the paint is water based so, as with the sheep, no harm was done.

Happy week!

Sunny London: Somerset House, Royal Courts of Justice, St Pauls And The 4th Plinth In Trafalgar Square

Spring Or April Fool

April 1, 2018March 2, 2020 / fgrtommo / 4 Comments

One of the toughest things about coming back from South Africa has been readjusting to the English weather (‘you poor things’ I hear you cry!). Long Suffering Wife (LSW) and I were lucky to miss the cold and snow of the ‘Beast from the East’ just as we left. However, we returned in time for the mini version of that icy blast and, for the last week or so, have struggled to avoid the rain.

Stratford Park, Stroud in Early Spring Snow

But today, April Fools Day, is sunny and bright! Is Spring here at last or is this nature’s April Fool prank?

There are many signs of spring. The sheep are back in the field opposite our house and their lambs will soon arrive, tree buds are becoming full and starting to open, the daffodils that survived the weight of the snow last month are out, and the birds are singing more enthusiastically. As we move into April I am hoping that the rain will relent, there will be a sustained return to warmth and that this morning’s brightness is no false promise.

Since our return from South Africa, LSW and I have been planning our next trips abroad – to Paris and Porto in the summer – and getting back into familiar routines. LSW is re-starting her part time garden guide job and resuming her slot in the village shop. I have been walking, reading, catching up on the TV we missed while we were away, supporting Forest Green Rovers Football Club’s struggle to avoid relegation, and (seemingly interminably) painting the TV room woodwork a dark blue. Both before and after our South Africa trip, I have been getting up a bit earlier and walking into Nailsworth before, rather than after, breakfast. That has created space in the routine to do painting in the mornings as well as some afternoons. Progress in the TV room has quickened a bit – though not enough for LSW’s liking – and one end is now done (provided no-one looks too closely).

TV Room Woodwork Painting – About A Third Done And Proud Of It!

Both of us have also started digging in the garden and setting out seed trays but this has been rather tentative given the rain and sodden ground. LSW is excited by a new walled garden she has had designed and built to replace part of our previous car park area. Now she is in the process of inserting the first wave of plants. I am trying to populate our small field with a greater variety of meadow flowers – another long term project I suspect.

The drift back into a routine has been punctuated by a few highlights. On the evening of our return to England LSW and I attended a local event at which George Monbiot, a political and environmental activist, spoke about his latest ideas and book. It was a very well structured and inspiring talk that was full of optimism in the face of what George, and many of us, see as clear political and social dangers. The main message is that we need to defeat the neo-liberalism that dominates today with a new narrative that expounds the value of community, the household and what he calls ‘the commons’ which I understood to be assets owned and managed in common by communities. A lot of this dovetails into thinking around the post-work society that may flow from robotics and other technical developments that eliminate jobs; this is a fascinating area.

Later in the week, LSW and I were both moved more than expected by the Italian, Oscar-winning film Call Me By My Name. It is a gently-paced story of young (homosexual) love with some great acting, excellent music and a direct and important message about parenting. The film was shown at our usually tedious cinema multiplex as part of a promising programme of one off showings of films beyond the normal diet of kids’ movies and action blockbusters; more please!

Then, just before Easter, we ventured out on a rainy trip to Wiltshire and Somerset to visit the Messums Gallery near Tisbury and the Hauser & Wirth outlet and gallery near Bruton. The buildings were more interesting than most of the art but there were some startling pieces and we had a lovely lunch at Hauser & Wirth. Certainly, it was better being out and about in the wet pre-Spring weather than staring at the rain from our back door.

Messums Wiltshire Gallery: Light Installation, Art Space and ‘Nomad Patterns’ by Livia Marin

Spring: no more delay please. Let today be a turning point and hurry up and arrive properly!

Prelude to Spring

January 16, 2018January 17, 2018 / fgrtommo / 1 Comment

One of the enjoyable things about retirement and, consequently, being able to spend to spend far more time out and about in the country, is that I’m noticing the seasons to much a greater extent than before. In the last couple of weeks I have noticed that the late afternoons are starting to get a little brighter (though the mornings seem as dark as they did when Winter set in). I’m not sure I would have noticed this quiet change sitting under the neon in a London office.

The daily walks to Nailsworth are already revealing the first hints that Spring is not too far off. Small birds are singing a little more vigorously. A pair of little egrets has arrived near the lake I walk past. Long Suffering Wife (LSW) has seen dippers and I have seen a yellow hammer. The kingfishers seem more visible and active. Snowdrops are starting to appear in clumps and the local supermarket has started to stock bunches of daffodils – very helpful in supporting my New Year resolution to buy LSW more flowers!

Spring is Coming!

There are few weeks to go before the renewal of Spring really takes hold but, now Christmas and the New Year are past, I can now envision it – and far earlier, I think, than in previous years.

LSW and I plan to short circuit the wait by having a holiday in Cape Town in late February. This idea, and a separate one to spend a few days in Portugal, is not yet fully planned but it’s nice to have the flexibility to be able to think about avoiding the last vestiges of Winter’s cold and grey.

Meanwhile LSW and I are settling back into our domestic routines – punctuated by a very active and pleasant couple of days in London. The trip was primarily to celebrate Eldest Son’s 30^th birthday but also included visits to Tate Modern, the Whitechapel Gallery, a 40^th floor breakfast and dinner for two in one of our favourite restaurants (Morito).

Three Pieces By Ilya Kabakov At The Current Tate Modern Exhibition of His Work (Not Sure Why I Liked It So Much, But I Did)

Either side of the London visit, LSW has been managing transformation of our muddy car park space into a walled garden. I am trying to balance clearing the fridge and freezer of food left over from the Christmas period with the need to lose the half a stone I put on during it. I have also resumed decorating the TV room; the brush strokes have become more rhythmic since I set up some music facilities in the room but are not necessarily delivering higher quality.

We are both striving to keep up to date with several catch-up TV series, stepping up reading, trying out new venues like the rather characterful Stroud Brewery Bar and getting out to see bands (This Is The Kit were marvellous) and cinema (we can now recommend Brad’s Status starring Ben Stiller and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri in which Frances McDormand is remarkable).

This is fun and I think Spring will be better!

First Daffodils of 2018 – An Easy Way to Maintain My Record of Flower Giving!

The Quickening Pace Toward Christmas

December 21, 2017December 31, 2017 / fgrtommo / Leave a comment

In my working life there were, of course, deadlines every week, every day and, often, very hour. I have grown used to not facing them since retiring. Now, the days tend to drift by guided by to do lists with ambiguous or undetermined timelines and I can do what I want, when I want. That’s great. However, the last couple of weeks have seen a quickening of life’s pace, a variety of social events and a few deadlines that have shaken my reverie.

The main imperative has been to complete painting of the window alcoves in the upgraded TV room before arrival of the plumber to install new radiators. My inexperience in decoration led me to be surprised by the need for four coats of paint, day long drying times in between each and sanding down after each intermediate coat; that all created a lead time that left me feeling under significant time pressure. However, I managed to meet the deadline.

This early success (another 90% of the room remains to be decorated!) was despite a brief trip to London to enjoy a catch up with old friends from our time in Kew nearly 20 years ago. We enjoyed a delightful evening party with and then a lovely bagel-based breakfast in two different couples’ houses. Where we stayed overnight was almost directly opposite where we lived for several years.

An even longer standing friend, dating back to LSW’s and my first months in London 40 years ago, visited us in Gloucestershire. We had a few bottles of wine with her, Youngest Son (YS) and his girlfriend. That was sufficient to make the idea of going to the local village disco seem like a good idea. That turned out to be excellent with music expertly sampled from the last 40 years and daft dancing fuelled by inexpensive but powerful cocktails. We had such a laugh! My challenge with the decorating was more than matched by the challenge LSW faced in having to get up at 5am next morning to take YS and girlfriend to the railway station – ouch!

Other events this week have included celebration of the re-opening of the main road between our village of Horsley and the local town of Nailsworth. The closure has been for over 4 months and has been an economic blow for the local pub, The Hog. We had a few drinks there to mark the road re-opening and the end of the ‘rat run’ congestion in the lane outside our house.

I also saw the new Star Wars film with Eldest Son (ES) and YS. I’ve seen all the Star Wars films but I struggle to follow the plot that has run back and forth through them. ES and YS tried to educate me by getting me to re-watch the previous film earlier in the day and their guidance helped. The latest addition to the series is well-made and the formula worked again. It was rare fun to have an outing with two sons.

Amid all this hustle and bustle, dancing and decorating, I have managed a few long walks. The weather has been variable as we have approached the year’s shortest day but retirement offers the chance to get out and about whenever it perks up. I’m very lucky to find myself retired in such a lovely part of England and be able to enjoy it.

Mossy Banks and Big Skies near Horsley

Finally, Happy Christmas to you all. Have a great festive period.

Happy Christmas!

Winter Weather

December 14, 2017 / fgrtommo / 4 Comments

Youngest Son (YS) has just returned from Brisbane, Australia with his girlfriend for three weeks visiting their respective families. It’s lovely to see them again and to have YS stay with us, off and on, for a couple of weeks in between his trips to London, Bristol and Belfast.

The weather has been a bit of a shock for them both though. They swapped temperatures of over 30° in Brisbane for what was, on Tuesday night, -13° and instead of Australian sunshine they got snow, ice then steady rain.

We don’t seem to have had proper snow for a few years and, initially, it is always welcome. It quietens everything and makes even messy areas – like the current building and landscaping works in our garden – look pretty.

YS managed to get his drone up (an essential part of his equipment for his business at Cactus Juice Cinematography) and took some video and pictures. Our hamlet was a picturesque winter scene with a steady fall of snow, whitened trees and happy tobogganers in the field opposite our house.

Drone View of Our Hamlet in Winter

But then, after the initial impact, snow becomes a bit annoying. In part this was because YS had to drive his girlfriend to Bristol so that she could catch an onward flight to Northern Ireland. That was a challenge given the steep roads around us but the village ‘Snow Warden’ had been out gritting and she made it. Others haven’t been so lucky and there have been a few accidents in the area.

A Victim of Black Ice

Back at home, the snow, and its subsequent freezing then melting, highlighted a couple of issues with unplanned permeability of our house. The weight of the snow has also played havoc with the guttering on the shed so the raised vegetable beds are now raised above a big puddle.

Nonetheless, on balance, I think snow is a good thing. It feels like an essential characteristic of winter and a small rebellion against the inevitability of climate change and global warming. Some more snow around Christmas with cold clear days would be ideal (provided it doesn’t mess with the football fixtures!)

Winter View From Our House

Drone View of Sunrise Near Our House

One other impact of the snow, ice and then rain is that it has given me no excuse not to progress painting of our recently upgraded TV room. I can’t remember the last time I did any decorating but it was decades ago. I’m re-learning – the hard way – the need to sequence the process correctly. For example, having carefully put down protective masking tape on the edges to be painted, scraping it off accidentally while sanding down created irritating re-work. But progress is being made and I like the deep blue colour LSW has chosen – a significant departure from her white and grey norm.

A Very Rare Sight of Me Decorating (Applying Undercoat Slowly)

My Retirement Journey

I've Retired! What Next?

Decorating