Mel’s Meanderings New World Day 24
Did you miss me? It’s been three whole days since I blogged, during the course of which I have eaten several tons of matzah ( unleavened bread ), got to half-way in the Hilary Mantel book ( by the way they are repeating Wolf Hall on BBC 4 starting tonight so must watch that to help me make sense of this third volume in the series that I am ploughing through… and having to stop ever five minutes to work out just who is who…. Note to Hilary, you can over- do the detail you know, dear ) three quarters of the way through the Biography of England Cricket ( won’t go into that as the non-sporting readers will complain again… though I will mention a thanks to Sky Sports for doing a re-run of the fourth day of the Headingly Test where Ben Stokes and the be-spectacled Jack Leach dramatically won the match , the latter looking for all the world like that character Hiram Holliday from the old tv series of the 50’s ( whose only weapon was an umbrella ( which as I recall did contain a sword and he would warn his opponents that he was rather proficient at using it ) and I’ve read all the poems in “The Flame “ the post-humous collection of the works of Leonard Cohen.
So, on one of the days of Passover I was sitting in the garden with the latest edition of “ The Cricketer “ magazine and “ The Flame “ and I was blotting out all that was going on the in the real world when The Noisy People arrived in a nearby garden. I will call them TNP for short. Now, we all have TNP in our neighbourhoods, I am sure. They are the ones who mow the lawn at 8am on a Sunday , or have a barbeque at 10pm or a random firework display other than on November 5th. They have annoying children who kick their footballs so hard that one is amazed no windows are broken…. We used to have an awful neighbour whose wife played German marching music on a Sunday morning ( I am not exaggerating ), objected to my kids playing football in our garden ( they weren’t noisy at all, of course ) and refused to return their balls when they went over the fence. In fact I had to spend fortunes on increasing the height of the fence ( not to mention buying new balls ) as the husband said that a ball might come over and kill somebody ( yeah, right, although that did become my hope in time ) Now we have the lovely Iliffes who read my blog so I can’t say anything nasty about them . But, I digress from TNP.
The last few days they have had a gathering ( I can’t believe it’s just one family ) There is football so competitive that I think Sky are offering to cover it as a substitute for the real thing. There is music ( rap usually ) so bad and so loud that even I with my Catholic taste in music run screaming for the front of the house ( yes, they live at the back. Not directly cos the family who do live there are nice people but, maybe a couple of doors along .) An older member of the family seems to be organizing a daily mini version of the Olympics as I can hear the start of the races ( they don’t seem to have a starting gun though I wish I had one as would most certainly point it in their direction if I did. Obviously, I can’t go out to complain or even find out where they live but I am praying for rain to keep them indoors.
On the subject of music ( and what they blare out simply isn’t ) I see that Bob Dylan’s “ Murder Most Foul “ has become the Number 1 single on both sides of the Atlantic. Amazingly it’s the first time The Bobster has topped the Billboard charts. I told you a while ago it last 17 minutes so my plan to see off TNP is to play it four times on the bounce this afternoon. Very, very loud. Apologies to my other not noisy neighbours in advance. And then “ The Baked Potato “ song has now raised £1m for the NHS ( my son’s charity for the Royal Free is well over that figure so thank you readers who have donated ) and stick that in your jacket Baked Potato.
Continuing the musical theme the Leonard Cohen book was compiled by his son Adam, no mean singer himself. I’ve read and re-read all the poems and am now convinced that Leonard was the greatest poet of the twentieth and probably the twenty-first century as well. I’ve decided to quote from him as this blog develops. That’s a promise and a threat if you aren’t a fan and a useful filler for me . I didn’t know he was also a talented artist ( as was/ is Dylan ) and the book is sprinkled with little sketches ( mainly self-portraits so not sure what that tells you about the man, although he does complain that the lighting in the lift in the Malmaison Hotel in Manchester is so bad he couldn’t see his own face ) I can testify to that as I’ve stayed there. They gave me a suite after I complained that the towels in my original room were dirty. And then the suite was so dark that I couldn’t find any of the light switches.
When Leonard died I was in Buenos Aires and I went to synagogue ( well, I was going anyway ) to say kaddish for him, a prayer for the repose of his soul. There’s been a lot of that lately and one of the saddest deaths has been that of an 179 year old. Now, I know I’ve been accused of typos but I really did mean to type 179. The deceased is the “ Jewish Chronicle”
It’s the national Jewish newspaper published weekly and has been around since 1841. Sadly, it is no more. I say, sadly, though like most members of the Jewish Community I have mixed feelings about it. It was famous for its “ Hatched, Matched and Despatched “ sections, better known as the Personal Columns of births, engagements and deaths. There was a time when you were nobody unless you paid for the insertion of the birth of your child/ grandchild/puppy or kitten, the engagement of your son or daughter, and the death of a loved one. Then it got more and more expensive and social media became more and more prevalent and there was a huge fall in revenue. Then the Big V put paid to restaurant adverts ( they usually were non-kosher restaurants anyway ) and catering adverts and wedding organizer adverts and travel adverts…you begin to get the tone of the paper, even if you weren’t a regular reader. )
I have to confess that I did read it. I particularly liked the theatre reviews as anything that got five stars was sure to be awful and anything with one star was a must to see. It was the same with books. They gave one of my books which I wrote under the name of Tim Elsen ( it was only afterwards that my wife told me that this was a chemical toilet if I recall correctly ) a dreadful review and said it was sub-Dick Francis ( it was about horse-racing ) I never understood why they chose to review the only fiction I ever wrote that had no Jewish content at all and never any of my other works. I mean “ The White Corridors “ even got a great review in “ The Times “
And then there was the totally fictional story about Gazza coming to our house for a Friday Night Dinner ( love that programme by the way, as I’ve mentioned before. ) I complained and said the story was nonsense. In the true tradition of journalists everywhere ( and any similarity between anybody who wrote for The JC and say, anybody who wrote for The Times is purely coincidental ) they stood by their story. When I delved deeper they said their source was my late mother-in-law ! They alleged that she had told somebody at her hairdressers…. so a second hand source emanating from a Gants Hill Ladies Hairdresser, yeah that’s got to be rock solid. Anyway, she’d said no such thing, he’d never come to my house on the Sabbath ( I was always very careful to keep my social and business life very separate on the 7th Day of Rest ) although when I wrote my first book “ Danger Zone “ and gave her a signed copy and wrote in it that P 156 was censored ( it contained a fairly detailed gand bang ) she proudly took it to her hairdresser on a Friday and all her buddies immediately turned to P156. The JC never reviewed that one wither though it did have a Jewish ticket tout based upon the father of one of my ex-girlfriends. I was never short of Wimbledon tickets even back then
So, I do have mixed feelings about the demise of The JC. I wanted to break the record in the Despatched colum for the number of insertions and was even planning to make provisions in my will to ensure that happened. I counted the biggies every week and nobody got beyond 30 and I reckon I could have made a century. Also I just renewed my subscription in February and reckon that’s money I will never see again. But I hope this mention in my blog does provide a suitable send off for a publication that will be missed by most English Jews who can no longer say
“ Oh, The JC, it’s become so bad. I never read it. “
Well, that last sentence is certainly true now.
Apologies to all of those who don’t like the sport, music and Jewish content , but I’ve done it again. Will try harder tomorrow to stray off the well-worn path.
Happier post-scripts. Wanda has her paws firmly on the ground in Edgware, North London and is loving her daily walks in the park. Sainsburys not only delivered, but we have another slot for next Friday. My old school friend Stuart Gould has set up a kind of round robin email train of poetry . I’ve got to figure out how that works as on first reading it was a bit techie. Then other old school friends, Jeff Gold, Colin Mortimer and Alan Neagus have invited me to a video catch up tomorrow. It’s an ill-plague that blows nobody any good.
Speaking of Jeff his new book “ The Naturalisation Of Nix: Journal of a Friendly Virus “ ( I kid you not ), has just been published as a Kindle e-book. Not sure about the timing of that one,Jeff! But I am going to buy it anyway. I mean, we all need a friendly virus in our lives. If we’d only given the Big V a name ( I mean we give Hurricanes names so why not viruses ) and a bit of affection it would probably have gone by now. Bit like Osama Bin-Laden who I reckoned only wanted his own tv chat show with all those broadcasts he made.
So, on those positive notes I will end. It’s amazing what can happen in three days, isn’t it ?
Stay safe and well and see you tomorrow if we are spared.