The Garden in August

August is not the best month for colour in the garden. However, there are the odd plants that are thriving.

I'm pretty sure the two photos above are a Hibiscus, but I have no record of having planted any. I'm not sure what else it could be.

I bought two very small white Lychnis for £2 each, and this one has done particularly well.

The deep red rose is on it's second flush.

As is the Acanthus.

This year the Rudbeckia has been very successful, but only because I kept in watered in the dry spell.

The yellow Ligularia was donated by Anne and has flowered much later than I expected.

Another plant that likes to be kept moist in the early summer is the Lythrum.

At least the Potentilla gives some colour n the long border.

Clematis Montana recovers - again.

In 2010, I included a post when I cut the clematis down to base. This time I left some branches held in the wires I previously noted were badly needed.

And already the shrub has recovered. I now know that it will flower on new growth, so hopefully come the spring, there should be a good display.

This was how it flowered in May.

The Girls, Hot Milk and Black Water

The Girls by Emma Cline is strangely captivating in an unsettling way. I liked how the early chapters set up the main event, we know from the start something bad will happen. But it is the relationship of our (too) young narrator Evie with Suzanne, the older girl she meets at the run down ranch, that is at the heart of the novel. The emotion that is the focus of the story is the demand for attention. Is this a girl thing? In any event it should not be an excuse. The book is well written and constructed, uncomfortable and unconvincing at times but never less than interesting. 

I'm really not sure what to make of Hot Milk by Deborah Levy. The writing seems to swing between ordinary and startling. I found the language to be sometimes obtuse or idiosyncratic. Or is it because our narrator Sofia is herself an anthropologist and the book maybe veers towards a study of this subject? When she talks about being given a croissant, she says "I had an appetite beyond my status and size". And later "History is the dark magician inside us, tearing at our liver". I did like the short insertions at the beginning of some chapters written by another person about Sofia. I liked the setting and descriptions of the area around Almeria. I loved the characters and the story. It was just it's presentation that I guess was meant to be disturbing and it was just that.

I was glad that with Black Water Louise Doughty had returned to the dramas of books like Whatever You Love (brilliant) and Stone Cradle (not so). Especially after the histrionics of Apple Tree Yard. Set mainly in Indonesia (with a welcome break in America) John Harper is a flawed central character. Part thriller, part historical and part family drama, the author does not stop to weave a dizzyingly complex web, backwards and forwards in time. This hugely ambitious novel does not always work, but when it does I was enthralled. "..... closing the door behind him with a small shove that, however gentle, thudded with the resonance of fifty years of accumulated guilt".           

60 Years of Test Match Special - Fred Trueman's 300th Test Wicket

If I had to choose one highlight from 60 years of Test Match Special, it had to be Fred Trueman taking his 300th test wicket. The first bowler to reach this milestone.

It was on the 15th August 1964 and the Fifth Test at the Oval against an Australian team one up in the series. I was home for the weekend and had set up my new Grundig tape recorder to record what might be an historic event.

Sitting next to me was my brother John who had just finished sixth form and waiting to start at Uni. I have never forgotten his words when that crucial wicket was taken, even if the tape has long gone. Reminding us all that Trueman was "a spell bowler". How right he was.

Amy MacDonald, Joseph, Ward Thomas, London Grammar, K T Tunstall, Birdy, The Pierces, Tift Merritt and A Fine Frenzy

We have had to wait five years for Amy MacDonald's fourth album Under Stars. Not quite living up to This is the Life, A Curious Thing and Life in a Beautiful Light, but welcome nonetheless. The stand out tracks are Dream On, Automatic and From the Ashes. It was great to hear her in concert in April.

From Joseph come their second album I'm Alone, No You're Not. It's extraordinary how they sound much like First Aid Kit, but that's not a bad thing. A good collection of songs written by a combination of the three Closner sisters and the odd collaborator. Firmly in my favourite bracket of indie folk. Canyon, I Don't Mind. More Alive Than Dead (showing off their harmonies to best effect) and Sweet Dreams are the highlights.

More polished harmonies from Catherine and Lizzy Ward Thomas. I was not at all keen on their earlier albums I tried on Spotify, far too country for me. But this new offering has been toned down from that heavy country to a more mainstream sound. But only just. So I was happy to buy this CD and hear stand out tracks like Almost Home and Guilty Flowers. And I like to support a Hampshire duo.

After their great first album If You Wait, comes the second and almost as good Truth is a Beautiful Thing. I'm not sure why I like this band, their songs filled with some atmospheric electronica. But the "posh folk" of Hannah Reid's voice over the carefully constructed background of guitars and piano. And everything done at a stylish slow pace. Such as Oh Woman Oh Man, Hell to the Liars and the title track.

I passed on K T's acoustic album from 2013 Invisible Empire/Crescent Moon. Her new album Kin is back to her old up tempo style with tracks like Maybe Its a Good Thing and  Run On Home  mixed with ballads like Two Way and Kin. All pretty much middle of the road, just the kind of thing as background in the car. Maybe I should give the acoustic session a go.

After her exceptional 2013 album Fire Within comes Beautiful Lies, the latest album from Birdy. Full of trademark ballads such as Deep End, and the brilliant Lost it All. Worth it for that track alone, but every song has something.  

My third album from The Pierces, and maybe the last for a while with Allison Pierce having released her first solo album. (Sounds very ordinary on Spotify). Creation is, perhaps better that their previous CD's, I think I preferred The Pierces to You and I. Full of the soft rock harmonies I love, especially on tracks like Kings, I Can Feel, Monsters, Confidence in Love and Flesh and Bone. I am trying hard not to play this last wonderful track too often on repeat for falling out of love with this superb ballad written by Catherine Pierce. Can't wait for her solo album.

I dont know how I missed this 2008 album from Tift Merritt. It may have been that her only other album in my collection, Tambourine is too country for my taste, as is her latest album. But Another Country veers towards the kinder folk sounds of Emmy Lou Harris and Nanci Griffith. With tracks like Broken, the superb title track, even the soul inspired Tell Me Something True and Tender Branch.

What a disappointment to end with. After extolling the virtues of A Fine Frenzy in an earlier post, for Alison Sudol's recording career to probably end with this acoustic album recorded live, well it is such a shame. It's just that on Pines the songs are so poor. I will have to put this 2013 album away and forget about it.

Songs from Atomic Blonde

The movie is set around the time of the fall of the Berlin wall and much of the action is set in the vicinity. It was when I heard the song over the opening credits, I knew we were in for a great soundtrack.

Cat People (Putting out the Fire) by David Bowie is my favourite song in any movie when it plays at the opening of Chapter 5 of Inglorious Basterds. (See post entitled Revenge of the Giant Face). So to hear it in a new setting was amazing.

The Berlin wall opened in 1989 and the soundtrack is full of 1980's hits. Some of these will resonate with my children.

99 Luftballons by Nena

I Ran (So Far Away) by A Flock of Seagulls

Under Pressure by David Bowie and Queen

Father Figure by George Michael

London Calling by The Clash

Just Like Heaven by The Cure

Hungry like the Wolf  by Duran Duran

Atomic by Blondie

Not a list of all the songs in the movie; go to tunefind.com for the others.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead - Faber Modern Classics

After seeing the play live in cinemas in April (and at Oxford Playhouse in 2005), I thought it might interesting to look at the script. Faber Modern Classics published this version earlier this year to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary production at The Old Vic.

And yes, reading the play is as funny as watching it. I could not read the lines spoken by The Player without hearing David Haig in my head. Or for that matter, Daniel Radcliffe and Joshua McGuire. Towards the end, Stoppard has fun with Guildenstern's summary of Hamlet's state of mind:

"It really boils down to symptoms. Pregnant replies, mystic allusions, mistaken identities, arguing his father is his mother, that sort of thing.; intimations of suicide, forgoing of exercise, loss of mirth, hints of claustrophobia, not to say delusions of imprisonment; invocations of camels, chameleons, capons, whales, weasels, hawks, handsaws - riddles, quibbles and evasions; amnesia, paranoia, myopia (I could not stop laughing of how that is so ridiculous, especially after how serious is the previous word); day dreaming, hallucinations; stabbing his elders, abusing his parents, insulting his lover and appearing hatless in public - knock-kneed, drooped-stockinged and sighing like a love-sick schoolboy, which at his age is coming on a bit strong."

Far more dramatic than seeing the play, the excerpts where R&G are included in Shakespeare's text of Hamlet stand out vividly. This is a book to revisit time and time again.

Julius Caesar at RSC Stratford

I was lucky enough to see Edward Hall's vibrant production of Julius Caesar at Stratford in 2001. Greg Hicks was a dynamic Brutus and Tim Pigott-Smith an insecure Cassius. In the old theatre, the introduction of a catwalk and a mob scattered through the auditorium worked really well in what is, quite frankly, a fairly boring political play interrupted by some devastating interludes.

In this new production, Andrew Jackson has the benefit of the new space, so much more suitable to this play. He has raised the stage ( brilliant for us in the circle, less so for those at the front of the stalls peering upwards) with only a raised plinth on what is otherwise a bare stage. We are definitely in Roman times, the togas are perhaps too overpowering.

What surprised me most was that the cast is so young. I had forgotten that the play is mostly about the conspirators. Brutus and Cassius have twice as many lines as the rest of the cast put together. Alex Waldmann (on the right) is such a youthful and slight Brutus, it was hard to imagine his leadership in their project. Both Martin Hutson as Cassius and James Corrigan as Mark Anthony also seem to have been cast in a young person's guide to Rome. So when Caesar eventually comes on stage, we are taken aback by the maturity of Andrew Woodall. He ( and Patrick Drury as the poet( seem so out of place.

On the plus side, we have beautifully spoken dialogue, I hardly missed a word. The funeral orations to the mob from Brutus and then Mark Anthony are quite superb. These resonate with much of the political rhetoric we still see around the world today. So my final reaction was that there was too much concentration on the politics and not enough theatricality in the performance. I just hope my seat in the stalls for the upcoming Coriolanus is not too near the front.

The Big Sick, Valerian etc and Atomic Blonde

In the desert that is the cinema during the school holidays, an occasional oasis appears; take Juno as an example. This year it's The big sick. Although this is not comparable with the former, its is still an interesting diversion from the cartoons and blockbusters. Not as funny or witty as it could be, and given the plot, we see far too little of Zoe Kazan and too much of co-writer Kumail Nanjiani (no Diablo Cody unfortunately). But in a desert, anything is welcome.

Here is a case in point. I only went to see Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (to give it it's full pretentious title) because of the director. Oh Luc what have you done. When you follow a director sometimes you find a turkey. How can the creator of  Nikita, Leon, The Fifth Element and more recently Lucy come up with such a poor script. He was done no favours by the dreadful Dane DeHann in the title role. Maybe I should have watched it in 3D? Or then maybe I'm too old for this kind of thing.

All that was missing from this high action spy thriller was some wit. The James Bond franchise knew that a quip after a successful punch up was what was needed. In Atomic Blonde it is all too serious. The plot has been derided by some critics as hard to follow, but I didn't find that a problem. The action sequences work quite well and "towering" above all is the cool Charlize Theron. She is not required to put on the acting hat that gave her an Oscar for Monster, but has to reprise the stunts from the excellent 2 Days in the Valley, all of 21 years ago. Time has been kind. Actually she looks better now, especially given all the fabulous costume changes. David Leitch has directed with a relish and there is just about enough story to make this an enjoyable couple of hours.

Songs from The Handmaid's Tale

Another list, this time of my favourite songs from the riveting  Channel 4 series The Handmaid's Tale.

The superb collection of modern music started for me in the first episode with:

You Don't Own Me by Lesley Gore (See post 6th November 2016 for it's reincarnation on Strictly Come Dancing).

Episode 2 has this 1985 song:

Don't You Forget About Me by Simple Minds

Episode 3 has a song I could not remember hearing before:

Waiting for Something by Jay Reatard

On to Episode 4 and a song that played constantly on the Motorola radio in my Triumph Herald:

Daydream Believer by The Monkees

It wasn't until Episode 8 that I chose the last of my songs:

White Rabbit by Jefferson Airplane.

Tring Book Club - The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry

If there is one word that summarises this book it is substantial. Not only over 400 plus tightly packed pages, but also in themes of science meeting religion, the hysteria of village life in the 1890's and an unusual love triangle. Cora Seaborne is recently widowed and finds her way to Colchester and from there to that village on the mysterious Blackwater Estuary.

The characters who she meets along the way are very well portrayed and the story develops on different fronts without losing it's thread. Sometimes I felt the author went into too much detail on some of her descriptions surrounding a few events, but mostly this is a gripping tale of a woman realising her own identity after a hard marriage.

The dialogue is excellent and there are many clever and witty remarks: "I'd no idea you knew England extended beyond Palmer's Green. Are you lost? Can I lend you my map?"

Like everyone else at book club, I loved this stirring novel.

Bearbrook 10K - 2017

A third running of my home village race. After last years 54.06 PB and my best run at any distance with a first 68% age grade, I was back to about the same time as the previous year. But given that the sun was out the whole way, I was pleased with the 55.16. I didn't really cool down until the evening.

No photographs this year as Alison was on volunteering duty at the London Stadium for the World Athletics. It was nice to see lots of friends from parkrun. I tried to keep up with Kate and even took a turn at pacing until she took off over halfway. Angie next door was helping out as she is a member of the Bearbrook club. She was there marshaling and to wave to me after a few hundred yards and at the finish taking off the timer tag on my running shoes.