Pembroke

We have lunch at the Pembroke Lodge which began life as the mole catcher's cottage in Richmond Park. Hunters wished to hunt without the threat of ..molehills .. tripping them up, you see. The mole catcher's cottage eventually extended into something bigger and given to Elizabeth Herbert, the countess of Pembroke, principal lady-in-waiting to George III. Elizabeth then built further, creating the building today more-or-less. There is a large dining hall with comfy chairs and a number of gardeners rooms and quiet places. In 1847 Queen Victoria granted Pembroke Lodge to prime minister Lord John Russell. In 1854 the Earl of Aberdeen's Cabinet met at Pembroke Lodge and decided to proceed with the Crimean War against Russia. The lodge offers lovely views of the park and Teddington and beyond and is also a lovely spot for a pot of tea.

Eitan: "Gracie, out of ten, how much did you like 'MegaMind' (a cartoon-movie we saw the other day)?
Grace: "About a six."
Eitan: "So you didn't really like it."
Grace: "It's a strong moral tale that blasts in your face. Do you know what a 'moral tale' is?"
Eitan: "It is a message that you should always keep trying and never give up."
Madeleine: "Be very good and not evil."

Grace: "Yes, those are good thoughts."

Eitan: "What do you get when you cross a dinosaur and a pig?"

Me: "What?"

Eitan: "Jurassic pork. Ha ha ha! I get it!"

Eitan: "Why did the crab blush?"

Me: "Enough already."

Eitan. "Because the sea weed."

Me:

Eitan: "I liked the other one better."

Eitan, hiding: "Boo!"

Sonnet: "Ah! Don't ever do that again! You scared the bejesus out of me!"

Me: "That was some excellent positive re-enforcement."

Sonnet: "Grrrr"

Preteen

Every now and again I get a preview of my teenagers. Already the battle-lines forming around their bedrooms - I want it tidy, they want a mess. Usually the cleaner provides the convenient middle-ground and I roll my eyes when their junk goes missing - not my problem where Maria puts their stuff.

Me: "Joe, does your dad do projects around the house?"
Joe:
Me: "Does he curse and scream and holler?"
Eitan: "Looking for a bit of inspiration Dad?"

Sonnet: "Did Eitan and Madeleine have dinner last night?"
Me: "It's a good question. Did you kids have dinner?"
Eitan, Madeleine: "No."
Sonnet: "Jeff!"
Eitan, helpfully: "I was waiting for Dad to make us something."
Me: "You could have asked the baby-sitter."
Eitan: "Busted."

The Curator

And, thank goodness for me, there is Sonnet. Here is Sonnet's professional photo+bio from the web: "Sonnet (Dear Reader) is curator of 20th-century and contemporary fashion at the V&A, a post she has held since 1999. Before joining the V&A, Sonnet worked as a fashion buyer in New York and San Francisco. Sonnet curated the V&A´s recent fashion displays New York Fashion Now (2007) and Ossie Clark (2003) and has coordinated a number of the V&A´s popular Fashion in Motion series, including the catwalk shows of Stella McCartney for Chloé, Hardy Amies and Christian Lacroix. Sonnet has lectured and been published on various aspects of contemporary fashion design and is the author of the book New York Fashion (V&A Publishing, April 2007)." I might add that she has done all of this with a couple of kids and she has met the Queen.

This morning I suggest a museum to get us (the hell) out of the house which receives squeals of protest from the Shakespeares so I give them a choice: we can go by car or we can go by train. They ponder this before choosing the car. To show that I am not without reason, I back off the early contemplated Dulwich Picture Gallery for the Sciences Museum. We park at the V&A and cross the street and have a blast. There is an exhibition on psychology and the mind for Gracie while I tell the kids I wish them to report on a thing with detail. Each has his/her trusty notebook and goes to work with determination. Eitan disappears for an half-hour and, unlike a year or so ago, he is perfectly OK with this (though Madeleine rings her hands in worry).

Madeleine tells me about the Apollo engine used to take the first voyage to the moon. Along with the one we see, the spaceship owned five more. The contraption with its pipes and plugs and chambers otherwise unfathomable. Moe notes that Wherner von Braun wanted to send into orbit trained chimpanzees instead of astronauts which pissed the astronauts off. We get a nice chuckle from this one.

Eitan does "Hackworth's Royal George Locomotive, 1827 (I copy from his notes); Timothy Hackworth (1786-1850); engineer to Stockton and Dartington Railways, 1815 to 1840; Built the locomotive Royal George; Believed Hackworth made 1:16 model to demonstrate to Directors of Stockton and Darlington Railway the soundness of his design."

Madeleine (in the museum's 'Industrial Era'): "Dad, if this was a yard sale, I would love to go."

Madeleine: "What do you think would happen if you licked the dogs face?

Me: "I don't know."

Madeleine: "Well I wouldn't want to do it."

Me:

Madeleine: "Can I watch TV?"

Capping Off The Madness

National Bird

This friendly fellow allows me a snap or two before darting off. He is otherwise a rarity inside The Palm House and makes me wonder : how so?

And, since you ask, Robins are one of the only UK birds heard singing in the garden on Christmas day. This because they hold their territories all year round, defending against intruders with .. song. Males often hold the same territory throughout their lives, and will attack their reflection, mistaking it for another individual. Their melodious voices, along with their "cocky little attitudes," have endeared robin red breasts to the British public, and in 1960 they were crowned the UK's national bird.

Not surprising given, well, that this is Great Britain, bird-watching a national past-time. I was not able to find the hard-data but serious bird-spotters number, easily, in the hundreds of thousands. Just go to the "Birding News" website to find "Bird Alert" where various species spotted and posted to your mobile or wherever - a Black Grouse, for instance, seen at 11:25:00 AM on 27-12-2010 by "Kilgo." Similar sitings noted for the Feldfare, Redwing and Jack Snipe. Nearby is the Barnes Wetland Center whose gift-shop allows the punter to own a full bird-spotting kit complete with camouflage fatigues, wellies and military-rated binoculars; the grounds supply the wooded blinds. Many a time have I been to The Wetlands Center, Shakespeares running amok, to be dressed down by an elderly spotter planted (no doubt) for hours. Who can blame them ?

Potted Plant

This sucker is believed to be the world's oldest potted plant and re-potted at Kew Gardens last year after, "once again," out-growing its pot (this one of 25-years). The huge Jurassic Cycad - or 'Encephalartos altensteninii" to those eccentrically smart Brits - is four-meters, growing 2.5cm a year. It was first "installed" at Kew in '75. 1775, that is. The relocation took three months of planning, five members of staff and a lifting gantry to move the old beast from one pot to the other. The life-expectancy is another 250 years. Do note the poles that prop the plant up - there are four of them.

Arboretum

We visit Kew Gardens, a favorite place, and this the Palm House, pictured, built between 1844-1848 from the cooperation between architect Decimus Burton and iron-founder Richard Turner. As the name might suggest, the building specialised for growing palms and other tropical and subtropical plants. It requires constant heat and built as status symbols in Victorian Britain; several examples of similar ornate glass and iron structures at Liverpool's Sefton and Stanley parks. Back then, the Palm House continued the glass-house design principles developed by John Claudius Loudon and Joseph Paxton (source: Kew Gardens). It was the first to first large-scale structural use of wrought iron : A space frame of wrought iron arches, held together by horizontal tubular structures containing long prestressed cables, supports glass panes which were originally tinted green with copper oxide to reduce the significant heating effect. The 19 meter high central nave is surrounded by a walkway at 9m height, allowing us a closer look upon the palm tree crowns below. We take a twirl.

If you are tired, Dear Reader, of the grey, bleached out, photographs on this blog - join the club. It has been, like, three months since any continuous sunshine. I have the kids on a Vitamin D supplement. Martian Chronicles, dude.

Me: "Chelsea hasn't won a game in their last six. What's up with that?"

Eitan: "They are pooing on their own guts."

Me:

Eitan: "Metaphorically speaking of course."

Madeleine: "Alex, just to warn you, sometimes Rusty humps people."

Gracie And Moe

The Sugar Hill Gang

After an early movie - MegaMind - we cross the street to a pizza joint in Richmond, pictured. I lament the closing of Berkeley's Pirro's, which was the best I ever had (excluding Napoli with Katie and Minoti). Pirro's Pizzeria on Shattuck Avenue opened in '73 and closed in '06 or '05. The same sad, friendly waitress there the entire time and the chefs tossed the dough into the air. The tables red-checkered with dripping candle wax. A coat pole took the over-sized jackets and there could not have been more than 12 tables. I always sat in the same, towards the back. As for the order : salami pie accompanied by blue cheese dressing, some chickpeas and a little green lettuce. Perfecto.

Britain's favorite not pizza. A recent UKTV survey suggests Spaghetti Bolognese, or "spa bol" as it is often stupidly called here, #1. Maybe not too surprisingly half of the Top 10 recipes foreign; celebrity chefs like Jamie Oliver and Delia Smith have also influenced our pallet. Here are the remaining nine, in order:

2. Roast Dinner (Sunday family time)

3. Chile con carne (Weird. The British otherwise hate Mexican)

4. Lasagna

5. Cottage or Sheperd's Pie (Classic)

6. Meat or chicken stir-fry (Gross)

7. Beef casserole (Really gross)

8. Macaroni and cheese (Pathetic)

9. Toad in the hole (Anybody's guess)

10. Curry (England's night cap of choice)

You are what you eat.

Grandma

My parents look, well, like Grandparents to me for the first time. They move a little slower, the hearing is not always there and in other ways they are frail. This is not a bad thing somehow, mind you. With age comes wisdom.

I recall my mom with our Euclid neighbors Loraine and Horace Haynes; Horace debilitated when I knew him, age 10, and made me uncomfortable as his speech unrecognisable though his mind sharp and eyes clear. Grace never acted differently around Horace and, I noticed, used touch often (at the time, this about the last thing I wished to do - touch an old person). Before his stroke, Horace worked for Standard Oil. Loraine and her sister Murial Drury (who lived together) Berkeley stalwarts with stories of the early UC campus and Berkeley fire of '23, which destroyed 584 homes in the North Berkeley Hills, including theirs and ours, both soon rebuilt. Murial's husband Newton Drury involved with the Save-The-Redwoods League which has, since '21, established over 1000 redwood memorial groves in thirty of California's state redwood parks; one grove named after Newton, who served as the league's first Executive Director as well as being the fourth Director of the National Park Service. I have been to the Newton Drury grove in the South Grove of Big Trees State Park.

Me: "What did you and Moe talk about on your walk?"

Madeleine, building a Lego house: "I don't know. Nothing."

Me: "That's it?"

Madeleine:

Me: "You know, talking to your Grandfather is like a great short-cut."

Madeleine: "What do you mean?"

Me: "He can tell you things that will take you many years to figure out. Ever think of that?"

Madeleine: "No, not really. Like what?"

Me: "Well, that is for you to consider. What are the things you wish know? Then ask him."

Madeleine: "Ok. Can I play with my Legos now?"

Me: "Fair enough."

Christmas, Take Two

Christmas, Take One

Eitan and Madeleine follow their tradition of sleeping in the same bedroom Christmas Eve which means not much sleeping. We stay up late wrapping presents and Sonnet later setting the kitchen table and taking care of the final finals. This morning I walk the dog .. or vice versa .. in darkness. The High Street silent - not one coffee shop to satisfy my needs.

The kids rip into their presents like nobody's business - Katie gives them red PJs with their names engraved on the front and their bottoms, which gets a nice guffaw from the Shakespeares. There are electric toothbrushes, a music player, ManU cloths and Alex Rider books; chocolate (of course) and DVDs; stuffed animals; "The History of Manchester United" and Legos .. Thank you everyone, one and all. Moe and Grace watch the action from the couch .. I recall Mary Lou, my Grandmother's Florida friend, remark: "Youth is a feast for the eyes."

Sonnet asks me to chop the goose's wing at the joint, which requires a cutter from my tool box. I find this to be disturbing. Next door, "Singing In The Rain."

Almost Diamond

More "Rusty" love y'all.

Sonnet's parents celebrate their 49th anniversary the day after Christmas. Grace and Moe (who did, in fact, arrive today) enjoyed their 48th on the 21st and will do so again on the 28th .. two ceremonies - one for the Jews and the other for the Protestants. Integrated they were in a very American way : Moe from University City, St Louis, and a reformed Jewish family and Grace, Upper Arlington, Ohio, where my grandfather a Company Man and every house with a two-car garage and no sidewalk. Grace a "wasp" : white Anglo Saxon protestant who, she notes, "everybody hated during the civil rights movement." My parents broke the mold, met in the first Peace Corps, spent three years in Malawi, then Berkeley California.

In the same spirit, Stan and Silver married shortly after meeting each other in Colorado and moved to Anchorage in '64, weeks before The Great Alaskan Earthquake that lasted five-minutes and the most powerful recorded earthquake in U.S. and North American history, and the second most powerful ever measured by seismograph with a magnitude of 9.2. Silver described the ground "melting." Stan a lawyer and Silver an English Professor at University of Alaska - I met a woman at Gare du Nord who took Silver's course "Women's Autobiography" who told me Silver changed her life. Stan and Silver and Moe and Grace found a way to forge a direction unhindered by legacy. Our parents had a sense of adventure and desire for .. something different. And they got it.

The Goose

Sonnet gives me a good kick and I jump from bed, grab the boy, and off to Chubb & Son for the Christmas bird. Not until standing in line do I have my first sip of coffee. The trick, as we have learned these last eight years, is to arrive 30 minutes before opening otherwise the queue around the corner and the wait two+ hours. Eitan in pretty good spirits as are we all as Moe and Grace set to arrive Heathrow today .. inshallah. This year, Grace notes, seems extra-special given the effort to be together including three cancelled flights. Katie remains closer to NYC and in Vermont.

Last night we see "39 Steps" at the marvelous Criterion Theatre on Piccadilly circus. To be precise, the theatre under the circus and we descend four or five flights to our seats. The venue dates to the 1870s and feels wonderfully of an other era which is fine since the decor not replaced in a generation (The Criterion a Grade II listed building so no structural changes allowed but a good upgrade, or at least a tidy dusting, would do nicely). Wartime music plays before and after the show. Sonnet describes the play as "an inventive comedy" which references every Hitchcock movie. Four actors fill various rolls and some of the set pieces, like racing across the roof of a train ("Number Seventeen") or avoiding a dual-wing plane ("North By Northwest"), spirited. Eitan adds "It is a bit of a mystery" and my two-cents that it is more like Monty Python. It is perfect for kids, though well passed their bedtime. Ah, well - holiday schedule dude. Anthony joins us and we have dinner at the very cool Soho House since it is, well, Anto. Kids allowed until 9PM. Sharp. The manager stops by to chat with us for ten minutes despite the busy busy.

The Pope does "Thought For The Day" on Radio 4.

Me: "Anything to say on Christmas Eve?"

Eitan: "Um, it feels like any other day."

Me: "Really?"

Eitan: "Yeah, I guess so. What's it supposed to feel like?"

Me: "I don't know. That's what I asked you."

Eitan: "Where is this going, Dad?"

Our Kate Is Always Sunshine

Kate in Ibiza on a yaght. She frolics for us all.

The winter solstice, I explain to Eitan and Madeleine, occurs exactly when the Earth's axial tilt is farthest away from the sun at its maximum of 23° 26'; this occurs on the shortest day and longest night, when the sun's daily max position in the sky is the lowest. The seasonal significance of the winter solstice is in the reversal of the gradual lengthening of nights and shortening of days. Depending on the shift of the calendar, the winter solstice occurs on December 21 or 22 in the Northern Hemisphere, and June 20 or 21 in the Southern Hemisphere. This year, ye perfectionists, the winter solstice occurred on December 21, at 23:38 UTC. This is 11:38 pm Western European Time or 6:38 pm Eastern Standard Time. Bada bing.

Eitan, reading from a joke book: "What do you call a polar bear in the desert?"

Me: "What?"

Eitan: "Lost."

Madeleine: "That is horrible."

Eitan: "Why did the loo paper roll down the hill?"

Me:

Eitan: "To get to the bottom."

Me:

Eitan: "Ha ha ha! Get it?"

Me: "Man is it dark. What do we call the darkest day of the year?"

Eitan: "The darkest day of the year?"

Me:

Eitan: "The day it's really dark?"

Madeleine: "The blackest day?"

Eitan: "The day of blackness?"

Madeleine: "The day with less sun?"

Eitan: "The day with no light?"

Me: "How about the winter solstice?"

Eitan: "Oh, yeah - that one."

Upper Hunza Valley

Munir sends the KKH gang this shot from Minapin, where Munir has been often in 2008 and 2009. In '97 Munir took us into the heart of Pakistan's Northern Territories, nicking Afghanistan, through the Karakoram Mountains and finally the Xinjiang Provence of China.. Then, Munir was responsible for small enterprises along the highway so he new every inch of the two-lane black top.

Shangri-La is a fictional place described in the 1933 novel Lost Horizon by British author James Hilton. In the book, "Shangri-La" is a mystical, harmonious valley, gently guided from alamasery, enclosed in the western end of the Kunlun Mountains. Shangri-La has become synonymous with any earthly paradise but particularly a mythical Himalayan utopia — a permanently happy land, isolated from the outside world. In the novel Lost Horizon, the people who live at Shangri-La are almost immortal, living years beyond the normal lifespan and only very slowly aging in appearance. The word also evokes the imagery of exoticism of the Orient. In the ancient Tibetan scriptures, existence of seven such places is mentioned as Nghe-Beyul Khimpalung. One of such places is mentioned to be situated somewhere in the Makalu-Barun region. The other is the Hunza Valley. Source: Wiki

Merry Cheer

Madeleine and I have a special afternoon at The Old Vic where we see a decidedly adult play "A Flea In Her Ear." I was supposed to be with my mother but the airports closed so Moe and Grace expected tomorrow, inshallah. The play's innuendos fly fast over Madeleine's head ("Dad, what are they supposed to be doing in that room?"; "Dad, why is she wearing hand cuffs?") she is into the excitement of live performance and this very different than Peter Pan, which she saw with Aggie last week, and starred "The Hoff" as Captain Hook. Woah. After A Flea, we walk across the street to the book store and spend a few bob on gifts then Waterloo station and home on the train. London lit up like a Christmas Tree and glows with holiday cheer.

Madeleine: "Do you think it was better or worse to live in the olden times?"

Me: "I think it was probably the same with a few big differences."

Madeleine: "Like going to America. That would take ages!"

Me: "And medicine. If you were born a hundred years ago you would have feared things like polio. Or imagine the plague."

Madeleine: "In Tudor times, they slit the women open when she was having a baby. They rarely had a chance."

Me: "That sounds ghastly."

Madeleine: "They did that to save the baby. But mostly both of them died."

Me:

Madeleine: "I'm glad I wasn't born during the Tudor times."

Me: "Me too."

Eitan, quizzically: "Dad, would you rather eat a cow pat or compost?"

Richmond Park Pond

The pond a favorite for years - I am with the dog and the park mostly to ourselves. A five by 5 foot unfrozen hole services the waterfowl : ducks, swans, and others I don't know.

Love Affair

The kids sleep in after a late night watching movies ("Shriek 3"). Eitan wanders into the kitchen and does what every ten-year old does : bakes a cake. This time it is a butter-milk something batter with pecans on the top and side. It turns out flat as a rock but we both note: "tastes pretty good." Me, I swim a few laps (in and out before dawn), walk the dog and organise some family papers. I yell at the kids a couple of times to clean their bedrooms, do the dishes - usual stuff. I ask Madeleine to wear a dress as we are going to the Royal Albert Hall but never going to happen. I offer her £100 and she refuses - either 100 quid not enough or she knows mine an idle jest. Either way, I like her principals.

David

Sonnet's cousin David, on her father's side and the son of Bill. David is a carpenter in Brooklyn - you cannot get any cooler than that.

The cold persists and more snow expected tonight. My parent's flight cancelled - again - leaving everybody a bit blue. Since this be England and our house from the 1920s, the pipes on the outside .. where they can burst .. which they do. No water. These things so routine they barely cause a ruffle. Kids happy, no bath. For the record : I insulated last winter but to no consequence against the lowest lows on record.

Growing up in northern California has had a big influence on my love and respect for the outdoors. When I lived in Oakland, we would think nothing of driving to Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz one day and then driving to the foothills of the Sierras the next day.
-- Tom Hanks