Adults behaving strangely ..................................

This evening my son informed me that Robbie and I were "weirding him out" by our strange behaviour. No, Robbie wasn't being inappropriately affectionate, he wasn't even talking too much or bouncing about like Tigger. We were both sitting down quietly enjoying the warmth of the fire (it is very cold tonight) and I was reciting poetry to him. I guess that is a bit odd even for us, but while we were out yesterday Robbie pointed out a pub called the Lamplighter and it rekindled a long lost memory for me. When I was a young child I had book of poems by Robert Louis Stevenson called A Child's Garden of Verses and one of my favourite poems from that book was called The  Lamplighter. Once I had started to remember old favourites several more came flooding back to my mind and I wanted to share them with Robbie. Apparently his childhood was devoid of poetry - or to be more accurate he doesn't remember much from his school days! I guess people only remember things that matter to them, Robbie has a very good memory for music, but I don't because most of it passed me by in the first place - I have never really been into music.

Perhaps my son would have been more in his 'comfort zone' if he'd herd us arguing earlier today. It is nice having Robbie working from home or at least it is nice most of the time, but there are times when I wish him many miles away! Today he offered to cook me beans on toast for lunch. I think it was part of his 'cunning plan' because he waited until my food was in front of me and I started eating, then he pounced. He announced that he intended to reorganise the way that we store cutlery. It was difficult for me to respond with my mouth full, but I made my feelings crystal clear. There is no way that he is going to mess with the cutlery, I like things the way they are where I can find them. There is plenty to keep him busy, there are countless things that need changing in this house, but I am not going to let him mess with the kitchen! 

A White Elephant

The son who must not be named had to go to the dentist, so I picked him up from school and drove him to the surgery. Our route took us past a large traffic island and the edge of Abington Park, the traffic island was planted with daffodils and so was a wide slope at the edge of the park. I pointed out that the daffodils were in full bloom and I said that when I see daffodils the words of a poem pop into my head. My son said "yes I know" and he promptly quoted the whole first verse of the Robert Herrick poem To Daffodils. "Fair daffodils, we weep to see you haste away so soon, As yet the early-rising sun has not attained his noon. ...................." He went on to say that he doesn't like daffodils because they flower so briefly and then seem to stand there looking dead for months. I know exactly what he means, daffodils always make me feel sad too and I agree with his sentiments about the display of daffodils in the park. It has a big sign saying "Field of Hope" but he says that it inspires the opposite of hope because the daffodils look dead for most of the year, with just a couple of weeks of colour in early spring. I still find it fascinating when he allows me little glimpses of his 'aspie' thought process, I may only give a passing thought to contradictions such as the field of hope, but such things really trouble him because they don't make sense.


On our way back we somehow got on to the naming of pubs. I told him that I disapproved of the modern trend for changing pub names because the old names often had historical significance. He asked what I meant and I said that The White Elephant was a good example of a pub whose name reflected it's history. He asked if a white elephant had once died there; I glanced across at him because I thought he may be teasing me but he was completely serious. He has always struggled with idioms because he trys to take them literally, but he learnt the meaning of most of the commonly used idioms long ago, so it was a bit of a surprise when I realised that he did not know what a white elephant was. I explained that we use the term white elephant to describe something that has value but is of no practical use and a bit of a burden to the owner. 

The pub in question was built as a rather grand looking hotel in the days when Northampton had a racecourse. I expect they thought that they would build a good business providing accommodation and refreshments for racegoers. However soon after it was built the racing stopped; there were public access rights across the course and a series of accidents between 1901 and 1904 led to the banning of all races. The last race took place on 31st March 1904 and the racecourse became a park (still known as the Racecourse). So Kingsley Park Hotel was left on the extreme edge of town (at that time) without an obvious clientèle. It became known locally as the 'White Elephant' and in due course the name was changed to The White Elephant.

It is odd, a simple trip from the dentist led to discussions about poetry, linguistics and local history. There are many times when that boy has me tearing my hair out, but I treasure these special times when we have interesting conversations. He couldn't resist pushing his luck, as he got out of the car to go back to school he said that I knew so much about 'the olden days' that it sounded as if I remembered them personally - cheeky monkey!

Who am I?

It is such a long time since I last wrote the blog, It is a very strange time for me just now, lots of changes and new things to adjust to as well as a very busy time work wise, so I am struggling to cope with the blog. It isn't just that I struggle to find time for the blog, it is more about finding the right words, some things are too personal for the blog while other things things just seem to be difficult to put into words, but no doubt I will sort it out in time.


In my last post I wrote about Robbie changing the goal posts when we set out to go to York for lunch and ended up in Manchester instead. Some people seemed surprised that I didn't like his alternative suggestions about places to visit, so perhaps it is time that I wrote a little more about myself to explain the things that I like - and the things I don't like!


One of my favourite poems is Warning by Jenny Joseph, if you don't know the poem you can find it here
http://www.netmender.net/glenna/Purple.htm
I am not sure that I want to do some of the things that she mentioned in her poem, but I am enjoying life and I am definitely getting more reckless in my old age. So be warned, I have already started to wear purple!


I am not a hat person, I never have been. I hate people to touch my hair and as far as I am concerned having to go to the hairdressers is torture. The only hats I have ever possessed are riding hats and crash helmets. I take a large hat size and I can still remember the embarrassment of going to buy a new riding hat and telling the assistant my hat size only to be met with disbelief. It was a rather old fashioned shop with several different departments, rather like Grace Brothers in some ways. When the hat that the assistant had selected perched on my head like a pimple he would sigh as if I was doing it on purpose and we would go through the ordeal of trying on a succession of hats in ascending sizes. Finally we would find a hat that fitted and the assistant would grudgingly admit that I was absolutely right about my hat size!
So for me the mere mention of hats evokes feelings of discomfort, humiliation and messed up hair - I hate hats!


I love history, art, poetry and all sorts of other thing and I am passionate about books, I love bookshops of all kinds, but to me second hand bookshops are best of all. I could happily spend a whole day in a bookshop. One of my favourite place to visit is the National portrait gallery, but I loved visiting the National Railway Museum and I am really keen to go back there again.

Cabin Fever

There was very little to get out of bed for this morning, we'd had more snow over night and when I was forced out of bed to trundle off to the bathroom I sprinted back to the warmth the bed without delay. Robbie was sound asleep, sound being the operative word, he was making a noise like Ivor the Engine on a bad day. I tried to ignore it, after all he was at least acting as a giant hot water bottle, but he was spoiling my enjoyment of Radio 4, so I tried a little prod but there was no reaction, so I resorted to a swift pinch. He rolled over and made a sound like an old fashioned growling teddy bear the he resumed the distressed train noises.

Prods and pinches only produced more growling sounds so I had to resort to more drastic action, I started to recite poetry to him! To my surprise he enjoyed it, he didn't even seem daunted when I embarked on the The Pied Piper of Hamelin (perhaps because he didn't know how long it was). I took pity on him and stopped when 'the Mayor and corporation quaked with mighty consternation'. Just to be sure that he didn't doze off again I finished off the poetry with Cargoes, for some reason Robbie burst into a fit of the giggles when we got to the 'Dirty British coaster'. At least he was now wide awake and Ivor the Engine was finally silenced.

I had an important question to ask Robbie, I wanted to know who Brenda is? He had called out her name several times in his sleep. At first he looked puzzled then a look of recognition spread across his face. He announced that she was the daughter of his grandmother's best friend and that she must be about 70. I don't know if I was relieved or terrified, I know he has a bit of a thing for older women but that is a bit scary!

I sent him off to make a cup of tea and to think up a better excuse. He obviously needed a lot of thinking time because he vanished without trace, the tea arrived eventually but the promised bacon sandwich became lunch rather than breakfast! When I asked why I had been abandoned he grudgingly admitted that he had been 'suffering from' Cabin Fever - he 'accidentally' started watching a DVD.

You Can Lead A Horse to Water, but ........ 03.03.07

So far on the blog I have talked mainly about Robbie's interests and the various ways that I get involved in the things he likes. Robbie has also learned to like some of my favourite things too. I have already mentioned Radio 4, he loves it, and despite his initial scepticism he even become an avid Archers fan.

I like art too and Robbie has become interested in some of the artists I like. Robert Lenkiewicz is one of my favourite artists, his work is not always comfortable to look at or to think about, but Robbie has become quite interested in his work. I suspect he is much more comfortable with my other favourite artists, Martin Taylor and Nicholas St John Rosse. I enjoy painting and drawing when I have the time, but Robbie is realistic about his own rather limited artistic abilities.

I enjoy poetry, but I didn't expect Robbie to share my enthusiasm. Oddly enough it has been easier to introduce him to poetry than art. I was sneaky and found all sorts of railway poetry for him, and once he got used to it he was willing to discover other poetry too. One of my favourite poems is Adlestrop by Edward Thomas but I think Robbie prefers John Betjeman. He listens to Poetry Please on Radio 4 and he has been introduced to a variety of styles and voices. You can imagine my disappointment this evening when he announced that his favourite poem is the Tay bridge disaster by William Mc Gonagall - this is one of the worse poems ever written and it doesn't even have brevity to recommend it! I blame Billy Conolly (another one of my heroes) for all thisbecause it was him that introduced Robbie to the Mc Gonagall poem. I suppose there is no accounting for taste!