Its All Greek

So off to London for Onassis. To One Aldwych for cocktails and lunch first. It was fabulous as ever. Onassis was a little less fabulous. Robert Lindsey was, of course, brilliant. And the play could have been brilliant but needed to have been written more as a play and less as a documentary. The supporting cast were not great - even though the guy playing Aristotle's son looked great in his pants. To the Waldorf afterwards for more cocktails where I had a Waldorf-tini. Same as a vodka martini except that its mixed in a gold cocktail shaker and has edible gold and silver flakes added. Rather extravagant but fun. Left DD in London as she was off to a friends in Guildford for the weekend so me and B &M caught the train home. Extra hour in bed this morning which was nice. That's all. J x

Been a While Again

Sorry about that. So what's been happening? Have been to the Bridgewater Hall for The Planets Suite by the Houston Symphony Orchestra (could have been done better I thought although the music is good). Saw WNO's production of Fidelio at The Grand in Swansea (superb apart from size and shape of principals - I'm a fan of appropriate casting (there's a technical name for this that escapes me for the moment) but to see a starving prisoner played by someone who is wider than he's tall (to be fair he's quite short) is not good). We've had the Spending Review announcements - not too bad for HMRC and my job on the face of it but we won't know quite how it will all play out until April. And then yesterday I went to an all day film workshop-thing on The Manchurian Candidate (hence Jane's link in the comments of the previous post). Had a great day with Jane (she's always good company even though we will never agree on a single thing that's work related), met some really interesting people and got to see a great film in a really cute old theatre in the middle of Glossop (who knew Glossop had such treasures?). And I'm off to some arts and crafts thing with DD and friends in Spinningfields this afternoon. Need to buy some gloves first though. Busy as ever.... That's all. J x

The Good and the Bad

The good news is that I had my check up at The Christie on Thursday and everything was fine (apart from not seeing the lovely Debbie of course - Sean reckons she was having a "cheeky lie-in"). But my next appointment is not until July next year and it will be my final appointment. My last ever (hopefully). How fucking fantastic is that? I got quite choked up when Sean informed me. That means I will have been cancer-free for 5 years. I'm not sure what the recurrence statistics are after 5 years but I think they are virtually nil (apart from my mother who had it again after 8 years but I'm not sure she had the same cancer the second time round - she survived both obviously). So that's really good. Lots of good stuff happened at work too. And I'm off to Swansea on Thursday for a production of Fidelio by the Welsh National Opera at the Grand Theatre and so get to spend some more time with the Aged Ps who will be back from Portugal by then. I hope.

The not so good news is that I heard that a friend of mine, Sharon, is just starting out in her own cancer journey. I hope you'll all join me in wishing her the best of luck - I know she reads this blog from time to time and so will see any encouraging messages. Good luck honey, we'll all be thinking of you and rooting for you and - if you don't start up your own blog - drop us all a line on here to let us know how you're getting on. Much love. Jonathan x

Cornwall Round-Up

Well, I liked Cornwall although there's not a whole lot to do apart from beaches and gardens. The visit to St Ives was nice though and I can now say that I have done all four Tates. Any of my readers have this claim to fame too?

Was a bit disappointed in the Eden Project. My own fault really as I was hoping it was something it wasn't. Had I read up on it properly beforehand I would have known it was all the sustainable living and aren't we being cruel to our planet so we should all sit in the dark and eat hemp mumbo jumbo that I can't abide. The Biomes were cool though and some of the planting was nice. But I much preferred Heligan which was more garden-y and therefore more up my alley. Trouble with Heligan was that it rained on that day. Still it didn't spoil our walk through the woods and the Lost Valley nor the Jungle area. All of which were fantastic. It did mean we had the place to ourselves though which was nice - apart from the Gardeners World crew who were filming in the Melon House. The formal and kitchen gardens were also nice but not at their best at this time of year.

We also visited one other garden - Pine Lodge. Not a great name admittedly but they did have a Pinetum which was fantastic. They also had an extensive Winter Garden which was just starting to come into its own. Apart from all this we also visited Fowey which is just unnaturally picturesque.

The cottage we were staying in was nice although the beds weren't big enough so consequently no-one slept brilliantly.

Came back to Manchester yesterday (a day earlier than planned) as the forecast was dreadful for today - and looking out the window I'm not sure I'd have liked travelling today. Plus I'd have got caught up in all that Ryder Cup shenanigans... Unpacking, washing & cleaning today. What fun. Have some planting and terrace-tidying to do tomorrow when the weather is, apparently, going to be nicer. That's all. J x