Riding on the Balmoral

The crew of the steamship Balmoral, which offers trips aboard along the coast here during the summer, are notorious for their cowardice and refusal to put to sea in even the slightest swell. However this year they are also inept, in the extreme. We went to Watchet to join the ship for a cruise round Porlock Bay, and the sea was like a millpond without a ripple or breeze of any sort so even that craven crew could not balk at sailing. Well, they may have balked, but they could not justify refusing to sail, is what I mean. Eager passengers thronged the quayside and the Town Crier arrived in his finery to greet the ship as she (it, actually; only sailors are permitted to refer to ships as 'She', sailors and the pompous or people pretending to be posh) arrived from Wales on the other side of the Severn Sea.

Town Crier speaking to his admirers.

Boat coming in to view round end of quay. Note extreme calmness of waters.

Once it was in the harbour the boat began to perform strange manouevres. It tried to turn round, then stopped half way through and began smashing the pointy end repeatedly into the side of the quay. Then it backed off, as if it was about to have one last try at running at the quay and hoping to break right through and back out into the open sea.

HMSS Balmoral smashing repeatedly into Watchet quay 

Watchet urchins running for cover.

However this is not the way of that crew. They don't much care for life on the open sea. They manouevred on, gave up trying to turn round, and eventually managed to get the boat lined up more or less along the quay. The terrified Welsh passengers disembarked and hastened to safety on dry land, some crossing themselves and some kneeling to kiss the tarmac or perform other, more exotic (Welsh), rituals associated with thanksgiving and deliverance from peril - and all resolving to return to Penarth (where they had come from) by road. 

Shocked passengers vowing never to set sail again from their Welsh fastnesses.

We the daredevil English on the other hand bravely went aboard, the actual sailing of this ship being such a rare occurrence that it was not an opportunity we were prepared to miss, and our fearless race being always keen to look danger in the face and to dismiss it with careless glee. (The crew are not English - not one of them.) 

Brave English queueing up to get on board.

Departure was undertaken in haste, as the tide was not going to be in far enough for long on this treacherous coast where the tidal reach is huge. 

Town Crier waving the boat off.

Due to the bungling crew's time-consuming attempts to make landfall, our advertised 1 and a half-hour cruise was curtailed to a mere 35 mins so we had to make the most of it. The loudspeaker told us we were going as far as the 'Famous Dunster Beach'. This was the first anyone had heard of Dunster Beach being famous. They were just trying to make it sound as if we'd had a meaningful trip. Almost immediately we turned round, and went back to Watchet for another exhilarating attack on the shoreline.

Heading straight back to Watchet without even reaching Porlock Bay.

At Watchet all the town was there on the harbourside to watch our return. I went to stand near the bridge to hear the captain's efforts to moor up in the light of the limited time available, and I must say I was impressed by the calm way he tried everything he could think of to get the boat alongside the quay. I would have freaked out and had a meltdown. Resignedly he would say "Well let's try so-and-so" and the crew would obey. During the docking we backed right out of the harbour to the astonishment and concern of the onlookers, to try coming in again at a different angle. It was marvellous. Well worth the full price we had to pay despite only getting 35 mins instead of 90. They managed to get us all off the ship just in time before the tide could strand them, and then they went off, most likely never to return to the scene.

Deterioration of Wells

Distressing alterations to conditions in Wells greeted us on our return there after an absence of quite a few months. It just goes to show that you must never allow your vigilance to lapse.

1. Our usual parking space had been re-designated as For Permit Holders Only. Very unwelcoming I must say. Going to our habitual second choice of parking space we found that it had been gated off, selfishly and for no reason other than mean-mindedness. Probably in consequence of these occurrences, the Lay-by of Last Resort was also, unprecedentedly, full! We had to hang around waiting for someone to vacate a space, and thus were forced to waste valuable drinking time etc.

2. The moat round the Bishop's Palace, once a beautiful place of clear water teeming with fish, ducks and mermaids, has been allowed to become a revolting soup of filthy water festooned with litter and algae and no sign of dere little ducklings. The only wildlife was the vicious swans which have been permitted to remain.

Not a naiad in sight.

Close-up. Discarded ball floating on moat.

Close-up. Out of date collapsed poster thing defiling the greensward.

Savage killing machines. Last year Archy witnessed the murder of an innocent duck by one of these swans.

3. The Co-op on the High Street has been replaced by a gifts and stationery shop. This meant we had to go to expensive Waitrose to get supplies for our picnic. Actually this was not a bad thing as Waitrose stuff is highly superior and I am not normally allowed it due to the cost.

4. On the Cathedral Green there were zero children doing cartwheels and no toddlers running about chasing the pigeons. This omission detracts from our enjoyment. Also when we got there all the benches were taken so again we had to wait for one to become available. Once we did sit down, the place was overrun with drunken louts drinking beer.

Sots. Admittedly these were US, but the point remains; people were openly boozing on the Green, and no-one came to put a stop to it.

5. Complete dearth of freaks and hippies. Freaks and hippies contribute hugely to the merriment of life for the whole of society. The lack of them saddens us all.

6. Busking population consisted of 2 men blowing tin whistles inexpertly, one of them with recorded background music. Terrible. Buskers should play violins.

7. They have put a 'Donation Station' across the entrance to the Cathedral to try to shame people into paying to go in there. Luckily we know other ways in so got in free. I do enough for the C of E to justify this in my opinion. But this is bound to be the thin end of the wedge and getting in will become more difficult as they will gradually close off all the back doors. The 'donation' will soon become an entry fee of at least £8 per person. Mark my words.

Wells altar frontal. An affront.

Wells ceiling etc. Not an affront.

In conclusion. The people in charge of Wells are ignoring what needs doing around the place such as clearing up the disgusting moat and drunks and addressing the hippie-vacuum, in favour of concentrating on fleecing money out of the public for parking and access to Cathedral. Poor show, Councillors.

Tudor House

In their defence, at least the people described in my previous entry here did not do THIS which has lately come to my attention: Cruel desecration of a fine Tudor manor house.

Here is the worst misplacement of a wood burning stove yet seen. This sort of barbarity is reason enough for all wood burning stoves to be banned utterly and is exactly what I have long feared would begin to happen. How right I was, as usual. Expect the worst and you are generally vindicated soon enough. Oh woe. The spindly-legged table and the armchairs also distress me. 

What has been done to the rest of this house is equally shameful as I shall explain.

Now you would think that given this house as a starting point -

it would be hard to go wrong and make it beastly; but someone's managed it.

Behold, 2 views of the Library. 

Libraries are lovely places and one has to work really quite diligently to make a library in a Tudor house into an uncongenial space. The current owners have done it splendidly. They have installed another inappropriate wood burning stove, the oppressive wallpaper is unsuited to the room, the shelves are cheap and of unsympathetic pale wood and so are the unnecessary 'library steps' (how short are the users of this library?). The shelves obscure part of the window which is most unsatisfactory and I would have had the carpenter take them back out and then leave with a flea in his ear. One likes to be able to glance up from one's book and out of the window across the grounds and to the haha. I don't much like their painting over the wood burning stove and the horse's head on the top shelf with a silly hat on, makes me want to punch someone on the nose. For putting the horse's head on the shelf, and for owning a hat like that in the first place. The sofa should be covered in leather not that silly patchwork. So should the books be bound in leather preferably but you can see that this is the sort of room whose owners have got a lot of Jeffrey Archer books and Joan Collins etc. The ensemble is finished off with an unacceptable chandelier thing. The whole combines to make a thoroughly objectionable room which will do nothing to encourage any children resident to develop a love of reading. You might as well be in a Railway Waiting Room. zero/10.

Next, the kitchen. First of all, no-one puts the sink against a plain wall. One wants to be looking out of the window across the grounds to the haha (see previous paragraph) while doing the washing up. The shelves above the sink zone are ridiculously narrow and things would be constantly falling off them. Fail. I question the wisdom of having that expensive Persian rug in the kitchen where it will certainly get baked beans etc. spilt onto it. This kitchen could be in ANY house as it takes no account whatsoever of the Tudor house in which it stands. Another zero.

I don't know what function this room serves but I hate it anyway. More nasty armchairs, another spindly table, and that stove thing is a gas burner which should not have been allowed across the threshold. Maintaining a steadfast nought out of ten.

Bathroom, featuring another spindly table and another unwise rug placement. These people are out of control. 


Here is the great hall, which is slightly better than some of the other bits. They have got a proper fire going, and the tables while not right for the room are at least not spindly or circular. They seriously need advice though from someone with a bit of knowledge of the period. That mirror above the fireplace is a crime.

The dining zone which has been made to look unwelcoming and cold, like skool.

I don't like this bedroom either. I would change the furnishings, bed, bed position, plants, everything. The table will have to go, so will the armchairs and that cupboard, the dish on the bedside table, the wall lamps. Bye, all of you.

Here the face of Cranmer, who once lived in this house, expresses what he thinks of what has been done to the place.    Deliver us O Lord from the hands of those who would defile our habitation : abate their pride, asswage their malice, and confound their devices, that we, being armed with thy defence, may be preserved evermore from all perils and spindly tables.

Architectural Disgrace

This is repetitive because I have complained on here about one of these articles before, but really, when you see this you will not blame me. No-one could let idiocy of this magnitude pass without comment.

I refer to a feature in the Times' Saturday magazine, in which a ghastly architect showed off his family's house. He actually makes them live in this place; it's not something he inflicted on some foolish client and then gave no further thought to.

Here, you may think, is a highly desirable, well-preserved (unspoilt) cottage of Cotswold stone with pleasing non uPVC windows and stone slate roof. It has (see left side of picture) a monstrous and most unfortunate excrescence attached.

The addition was put on out of spite because the architect could not get permission to demolish the house. "In hindsight," the architect says, "the planning and conservation people were right to refuse permission 'because there were some original wrought-iron features on the windows'." Actually, mate, there were a lot more things than that which would have made demolition a crime against humanity and against the entire Cotswolds. 
So up went the hideous extension, far bigger than the original cottage and totally out of keeping with it. The architect considers the extension to 'blend seamlessly with the surroundings'. Look, and tell me - does this blend in with the surroundings?

No. Of course it doesn't. It is a mortal wound on the surroundings and quite hideous. 

Inside they have furnished it with unsympathetic furniture including ugly village hall style chairs and put offensive so-called art works on the walls.

All completely inappropriate for a gamekeeper's cottage. 
And I disapprove of that mantelpiece thing they have stuck on the bressemer beam over the fireplace.

The architect's wife is an art adviser. See what she puts in her own house, and reflect - is this wise? Do I require this person's advice? Would I value it? The answer, as we all know, is, no.

See what I mean? And they've children living in the house as well. Most unseemly.

Here's the kitchen

with the family bravely smiling through their tears and concealing their amazement and despair. There is miserable plain white melamine everywhere you look, and the architect boasts that they banish all signs of culinary equipment behind white cupboard doors which he designed himself. Fancy!
"Now, what shape shall I choose? ...Yes, I'm going to have rectangular doors... I think I'll make them the same size as the front of the cupboard... gosh it's difficult designing a plain white door."
Apparently that type of decor is John Pawson-like. This surprises me, since I wouldn't have thought one would need any mentor or outside influence in order to come up with such a dull, utilitarian, characterless kitchen.

Still, it's not all been easy for these poor deres - listen to what happened when they tried to make a wild flower meadow... the posh landscape gardener they called in to help them had decided to 'achieve a grassy carpet of white wild flowers'. Silly woman. Sure enough when the wild flowers came up, OH DEAR! they were all sorts of colours! Look, luv, that is what you get with wild flowers. They're WILD. Anyway a whole lot of many-coloured wild flowers is jolly nice and you should be grateful. However, Architect and Mrs Architect viewed the whole incident as a total disaster and really ought to get out more.

Also in the interview the architect was horrid and unchivalrous about his wife - he said that contrary to her claim that she found the place, really he found it; and he railed against her sofa cushions, in the national press. He said the only thing he doesn't like about his beastly house is some sofa cushions that his wife insisted on having. Poor thing, she must have wanted some shred of comfort to solace her in that disagreeable habitat. 
I consider his conduct childish, peevish, and not admirable.

Yet despite his architectural and husbandly misdemeanours he remains totally unrepentant and in my opinion is not fit to practise as an architect at large in the community, or indeed, as a spouse. 

In conclusion, I think you will see why it was impossible to remain silent on this matter.

Beware of the AA

Bad AA! For the thirtieth year in a row it has annoyed me, and this time I can take it no more so I have cancelled my Direct Debit; and I exult in the fact.
Renewing AA breakdown cover every year involved me ringing them up to remonstrate with them about the exorbitant price demanded, and every year till now they have backed down and reduced the price - so I stuck with the brutes. One year when I said "Oy. You want £115 from me, when you are offering the same cover openly in the newspapers for £24. Therefore I am phoning you to ask for a price cut. Every year, this happens. What have you to say on this matter? Why do you not just offer me a fair price to begin with, and save us both the trouble?", the operator told me that it's just their policy and that I must ring them every year to get the premium reduced. What a farce, and calculated to make all the AA's customers hate them. She agreed with me. Poor thing. It's not her fault.

Evidence of the AA's devious machinations.
Top: Join us for £39
Below: Valued special members pay £135.96

THIS year, when the fools sent me my membership renewal demand, by the same post they sent my son a junk mail shot offering him membership for £39 AND they promised to give him a £20 M&S voucher. For my continued membership they wanted £135.96 and nor were they presenting me with any vouchers. Naturally I rang them up, and this time I spoke to an insolent young puppy who refused to understand what I was on about and in essence told me I was lucky to get the cover offered for the sum in question. I got nowhere, and told him I would consider my position.
Consideration of my position involved ranting about the experience to my husband, who said "Yes, dear," as is his wont. Then I researched online and with difficulty obtained a comparative price for the cover I was being offered for £135.96. They make it difficult by "cleverly" (annoyingly, transparently trying to stop you bothering) altering what they call each bit of the cover - thus on their renewal sheet I had Roadside, Home Start (complimentary!) and Relay. On the website you have to read carefully to check which of the new names they are calling things relate to the same cover you have got on your renewal letter. You can see why most, sane, people give up and just renew regardless.
However the AA have got to get used to the idea that some of us are not "most, sane, people" and will not stand for it any longer.
On their website, I discovered that as a newly joining member the same level of cover can be yours for £125 and you will get a £30 fuel voucher thrown in. 
This is a confounded cheek specially as their renewal demand came with a most sycophantic nauseating letter in which they

i) declared their extreme gratitude to me for my years of membership and assure me that I am a) hugely appreciated, b) valued, and c) being given preferential treatment.

ii) proudly boasted that they will "show a 'no quibbles' approach to breakdown", - well I should bally well think so, what do they think we're paying them for?

iii) said they are giving me their most valuable benefits free. I couldn't care less about these "most valuable benefits" which I never asked for and don't want. They include
      the AA app - useless;
      2-day European breakdown cover - useless;
      Key insurance - of no interest to me whatsoever;
      "My Member Benefits" - sounds as though it could be lively but I bet it isn't;
      Accident Management - I'll manage my own accidents, ok;
      Legal Advice - don't need that thanks my husband's a solicitor;
      Vehicle Helpline -  what's that for?
The AA have failed to grasp the meaning of "free". These things I neither asked for nor want, I can only have because I must pay more. Therefore, I am paying for them.  They aren't free. I refer you, AA, to the Concise Oxford Dictionary.

iv) told me that the At Home cover which I am being "given free of charge" should really cost me £66.74; which is unfair since new members would get it for £36, and which means that the other bits of cover are even more more expensive than normal, unappreciated, unvalued customers are expected to pay. It simply does not make sense. 

I think the AA are lying. They do not value me and are not giving me a special good deal. They are hoping to rip me off due to my own laziness.

My position having been considered, I cancelled the Direct Debit and the AA can go to blazes. I bite my thumb at it. Their loss is the RAC's gain, till next year when the RAC will doubtless try the same game and I will be back to square one.



I have done the AA a re-draft of their sycophantic letter which they might like to use in future if they wish to avoid dishonesty which would stand them in poor stead on the Day of Judgement. Act now, AA, or you could end up writhing on a pitchfork for all eternity.

Redrafted letter : what the AA really mean.
Hi, Twit! 
Since you have proved what a sucker you are, by renewing your membership all these years, here is your inflated overpriced estimate. Pay, or get lost - we don't care. We aren't grateful, you aren't appreciated and your loyalty makes us scorn you. We don't give two hoots about you or your paltry contribution to our profits. 
Yours, the AA.

Affronted by Recipes

Against my better judgement, on Sunday (Easter Day) I  cooked 2 recipes that were in the paper and I find that my long-held animosity to newspaper chef recipes is ...  FULLY JUSTIFIED! Yes! My poor family.

Firstly there was a silly recipe for fancy roast lamb. Look. I have cooked perfectly good roast lamb many and many a time, with no need for marinading it first in a ridiculous mixture of roughly torn mint leaves, vinegar, brown sugar and sliced onion. As you can probably imagine, this was NEVER going to work. Slices of onion take about 5 mins to cook, whereas lamb leg takes some 30 mins per pound. Thus smoke and a vile smell of burning soon emanated from the oven and the onion had to be removed and discarded. 

Don't tell ME those bits of onion have been in the oven as long as the lamb. They aren't even burnt.
This was the picture accompanying the ridiculous Lamb recipe.

The resulting lamb was just as nice as usual, but there was no HINT of mint in the flavour and the addition of costly vinegars and sugar was a pure waste of money. The pan was also ruined due to burnt-on sugar studded with incinerated mint and onion. The recipe had advocated lining the pan with foil but that is a stupid idea as you can then not make the gravy in the roasting pan, so I left it out. I also added some garlic, thank goodness, because the newspaper chef had forgotten (I presume) to put it in. Also the fool had forgotten to dictate the oven temperature, which did not really matter as I would have ignored his advice anyway. I was able to manipulate the heat as I pleased. "Do till Done" is the best way of cooking and is far more reliable than obeying some bossy idiot who has not cooked such a dish and is only trying to submit copy in order to get paid. Really the cookery pages in the Times are a wicked waste of paper and they get away with it most of the time because no-one in their right mind attempts these recipes.

Having suffered the repeated sounding of the fire alarm siren while the lamb was being cooked the family had more to assail them when I followed the lamb with a "Luscious Lemon Pudding" which far from being "a cross between a soufflé and sponge with a heavenly texture and gooey succulent base, intensely lemony, light and rich, good hot or cold, does not require cream with it" as claimed by the Times, was in fact a lump of burnt-topped, heavy, dry, dull-flavoured nasty cake which no-one wanted any of. And who can blame them? It was not for want of effort either. This recipe demanded that you 'microplane-zest 2 lemons or remove the zest in paper-thin sheets and chop small'. Not being in possession of a microplane-zester (or knowing what one is actually) I just scraped the lemon on the fine grater. It then made you separate 3 eggs and beat the yolks and the whites separately. Now look here, Times, I don't do THAT lightly I can tell you.  I'm a busy woman, with hymns to play and dishes to cover.*  The cost of beating yolks and whites separately is extremely high in human suffering, washing up, valuable drinking time, and various other amenities. The only recipe I am willing to beat yolks and whites separately for is Aunty Pat's Lemon Whip (trustworthy recipe with consistently excellent results). Finally, it was recommended that when cooked it should be turned out of the dish and served up side down. Remember that the recipe writer had claimed that this was a soufflé type of thing. She had either forgotten that by the time she got to the end of writing the recipe, or she does not understand what a soufflé  is or how it works. 

Certainly they are a forgetful lot the cookery writers. The lamb one, as mentioned, forgot to tell us what temp the oven should be. Often they list something in the ingredients which then never turns up in the method, or, in the method they suddenly say 'Stir in the beans' leaving you going 'Eh? What beans? How many? What sort?' etc. and proving thereby that the recipe has not been read through let alone tried out.  Also they are profligate and impractical, making you use about 30 different bowls and utensils etc. where one would do, and telling you to do pointless, impossible things which don't work. It is highly irresponsible, specially when people are so short of money and time.

The lemon recipe here described had the cheek to write at the end, "Make this and send a photo of the finished dish to food@thetimes.com". What a nerve! I will send them a picture of my fiasco if they like, but they won't thank me for it. Still, they ought to be confronted with the consequences of their instructions.

Fiasco, or Luscious Lemon Pudding? I think we all know the answer to that.

Menu for next Easter will be the usual Lamb Done till Done, and Aunty Pat's Lemon Whip. I can not think what got into me this year. 



*  reference to superhero 'Cling Film Arm'. Cling Film Arm has one of his forelimbs replaced surgically with a roll of cling film and leaps into kitchens going "Stand back, Ladies! I've work to do - dishes to cover."

Estate Agents and their Shortcomings

We have just sold our house and bought another one. It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of Estate Agents as we were forced to do. Our ones were called F*x and Sons. I leave you to insert the vowel of your choice but I can confirm it was not A, E or I.

We only used them because they were selling the house we wanted to buy, and we thought the lure of 2 sales commissions would motivate them to action. What fools we were. F*x and Sons stayed in their office with their feet on the desks, filing their nails throughout the whole process and stirring themselves only at the last minute, to serve us a huge bill with more alacrity than they had shown during the whole rest of the proceedings.

I made particular enemies of 2 of their operatives, known to us as 'Mrs Assertive' and 'Supercilious Man'.

We should have known from the start that there would be trouble because it took three phone calls from us before they arranged to show us round the house we wanted - and when they did they did not bring the keys for the outbuilding which I particularly wanted to see, and thought I was a nuisance for wanting to do so. Mrs Assertive offered to make another appointment so that we COULD see the outbuilding, but made it clear I was being unreasonable. No matter that it had been an utter pain organising for our family to be available to look round the house at the time arranged and I had no wish to do it all again.

They lied and dissembled repeatedly, made us show our prospective purchasers round, never rang back when they said they would, always claimed to have been discussing our sale/purchase that very morning, various people were always "out of the office" and would be back "early next week" (they never were) and essential repair works which we demanded be done on pain of our backing out of the purchase, were always "in hand" but never got done. 
Furthermore the particulars they wrote for our house were of very low quality and negligible literary merit so that we were ashamed to distribute them. I wrote one of my own which was far better than theirs, and I am not even being paid for my pains.
In their description of the house we were buying, they called the kitchen "a real 'hub of home'". This is a wicked thing to do and has resulted in our family saying such remarks as "I've left the wine in the Hub of Home." We can't help it. Once heard (read) one can not forget something like that; and there is a constant danger that the neighbours might hear us. Imagine if your new neighbours were overheard referring to something as 'hub of home' - you'd be horrified and you wouldn't yet know them well enough to realise that they were exercising sarcasm at maximum setting. Assertive Lady is suspected of being the perpetrator of the phrase.

We were made fun of for not wishing to move into a house with an active flood from some of the plumbing. They told total fibs to our purchasers and sent round people who particularly wanted a house with a garden for their dog to cavort in (we hadn't got one) and told them we used to have a dog, which we had not, because the property was not suitable for dog husbandry.

A selection of dogs none of which, sadly,
live or have ever lived at our old house.

Further dogs that have not lived at our house. I'm sorry but there it is.

I planned to do some revenge when their bill was to come in; I was going to say we'd been talking about it that very morning, and that my husband was away until early next week and I would get him to phone them when he got back, to tell them the payment of the bill was in hand and in the post, to make fun of them for wanting to be paid what they were entitled to, and to inefficiently date the cheque Jan 2015 (a perfectly understandable mistake as it was the beginning of Jan 2016) and to make it payable to Mrs Assertive and Supercilious Man. In the event however, Supercilious Man was so unpleasant when we went in to pick up some more keys that had come to light, that I decided I wanted nothing further to do with him or any of F*x's hateful Sons, and therefore sent off the enormous, utterly unjustified cheque to his head office without comment. I had thought of including a covering letter remarking how DELIGHTED I was to be ending my dealings with them but I could well imagine them using  ' "Delighted" - Mrs M Carroll' in their testimonials, so I didn't. Also as mentioned, the less you have to do with people of this sort, the better.

We are now receiving by every post, brochures and so on from firms of whom we have never heard, much less informed of our activities, congratulating us on our move and offering various services for which we have no desire. We must assume that the Sons of F*x have been selling our details to the open market.

We must throw off the yoke of these appalling parasites. Every bad thing you have heard about Estate Agents is true. Should you wish to sell your house do it on one of those online selling sites. Together we can expunge Estate Agents from every High Street in the land, and the world will be for ever in our debt.