Take a left, I said

Thinking about London theatres reminded me of this, when Tony and I visited New York for the launch of Mistmantle over there. We'd travelled to London the day before, stayed the night in a Heathrow hotel, got on the flight to NY, and were collected at Kennedy Airport. The publishers were fantastic, and put us up in a fantastic hotel in Central Manhattan with the friendliest staff ever.

Having arrived at about three o'clock NY time (eight o'clock in England) we decided to have a little wander and explore, and discovered to our delight that we were ten minutes walk from the internationally famous Carnegie Hall. (I noticed that there was a subway station just beside it, and thought how sensible that was, putting a station right beside the venue.) There was a choir festival concert on that night, and we saw that they were doing Faure's requiem, which we love.

Well, it will be very expensive, we said. We looked at the prices. It wasn't.

There won't be any seats left, we said. There were, lots.

So a few hours later we found ourselves in the amazing Carnegie Hall, listening to some stunningly beautiful music sung by world class choirs and occasionally pinching ourselves to make sure that this was really happening. Us, here, now. Never in our wildest dreams.

We were walking on air back to the hotel when an American lady stopped us to ask if we knew where the nearest subway was. Tony hesitated, but I - and by the way, I usually have to think twice about giving directions to my own home - said, 'straight along here, take a left at that light, and it's right beside Carnegie Hall.'

I'd been in NY for all of seven hours. How cool is that?

too much choice

I have a London trip coming up at the end of November and am already looking at websites regarding what to do with my spare evening. In London you're alway spoiled for choice regarding musicals, but I don't know if I want to go to a musical this time.

There's a much talked about play about the Duchess of Windsor (the one King Edward VIII abdicated for.) There are some top notch actresses in that. Or there's the Pitmen Painters, a play about a group of miners from North-East England who started going to an art class and became highly accomplished artists, depicting life in the coal mines and the mining community. But it seems a bit silly for me, a lass who grew up in the North-East, to go all the way to London to watch a play about it.

If there's any Shakespeare on anywhere, I'd give that serious consideration. I'm a moth to a candle with Shakespeare.

And the Royal Ballet are doing Sleeping Beauty at the Opera House. They've still got plenty of cheap seats!

Or it might seem cosier to go back to my comfy hotel room and sit in bed watching TV or reading.

What would you do?

Missed!

A new duck, all alone, appeared in the river today. He (I think it was he, it wasn't one of our usual mallards) was having a wonderful time. He was enjoying a bath. Sometimes I could see his head, sometimes I could see his feet, and sometimes there was nothing to see at all but a splash and ripples. I snatched up a packet of out-of-date oatcakes and ran down to the bottom of the garden. By this time he'd sailed under the trees and I couldn't see him at all, but they usually respond to the sight of food flying through the air.

This was when I realised how dry it's been for the last few days, because the river was a long way down. From the fence, there was a lot of riverbank between me and the water. I threw as hard as I could - twice - and bits of oatcake dropped on the grass far out of eyeline of the duck (wherever he was by then. Probably underwater.)

I even tried bowling overarm. (By the way, do you know that bowling overarm in cricket was first done by a girl?) Closer, but it still landed with a flop, not a splash. Still, I hope his duckship comes back. He was fun.

I'm so worried about what's going on in The Archers. It's not that bad brother Clive has struck fear into everyone, or that there's a row about the Cider Club. No, it's because , at one time, families regularly happened by each other at the duckpond while the children were feeding the Ambridge ducks. Those kids never spoke, but they were always out there feeding those ducks. It's a long time since there was a good gossip around the duckpond.

What do I deduce? Does this mean those apple-cheeked country children are all stuck in front of TVs and computers, and the ducks are so hungry, they're reduced to raiding the pub?

cake and things

Last week I was at the most amazing poetry event for children. There's been a poetry festival nearby, and they'd invited a children's poet, Paul Cookson, who entertains, reads from his books, gets the kids joining in, and is simply a five star act. The children, who practically ate out of his hand, were from the local schools and had been invited to present some of their own poetry, too. And if that weren't enough, there was cake, too.

On Saturday morning I did some storytelling and told, among other things, The Lambton Worm. It's a well known story in the North East, where I come from, but most people at the south end of Yorkshire don't know it.

Then, this afternoon, Tony went out to visit a couple from one of our churches, and it just so happened that their little grand-daughter was visiting and was Baking Cakes with Granny. They gave Tony two buns fresh from the oven for tea time, one in a pink case, one in a blue one!

When my lot were small, it was bread, more than cakes, that we used to make together. Bread dough is a great thing to do with children, because it doesn't mind being squidged and it's very flexible. They'd make bread rolls shaped like the initials of whoever was coming to tea, and there was always a bit left over to make lardy cake, which is a kind of poor man's Chelsea Bun. It's light and sweet and utterly gorgeous and so bad for you that if you made it these days it would be impounded by the Health Police. But it's good. And the kids spent far more time running about than they did eating lardy cakes.

A theme is developing. Cake. There is a Scottish story about The Woman Who Baked for the Fairies, but I can't remember it quite well enough to tell it. Does anyone know it? I could do Storytelling and Cake sessions. That would go down a treat.

Us dooks

Listen oop.

You may call us ducks, and posh folk and southerners say it like 'dacks', but we're Yorkshire dooks. (It's not so much an 'oo' sound as somewhere between 'oo' and 'u'. You 'ave to 'ear it.) Trouble is, ever since missus at T' 'ouse of Stories got all particular about what to feed us dooks, the foowd's not so goowd as it were. We were 'appy with t'bread.

So lately us 'ave been 'anging around t'bridges and we eat what we're given. Still, we might give T 'ouse of Stories another visit. See what we get. Much the Gnome might be up for a chat, too. 'E's a grand chap, is Much. And seeing missus tramp down t'garden in t'rain in 'er coat and wellies always gives us something to laugh at.

NB from Margi - if you didn't understand a word of what those ducks were saying, never mind. Neither did I.

Look!

Following Dad's birthday, here's a picture of Dad, Mum, Tony and me outside Wallington Hall on a glorious October afternoon, and a picture of his favourite thing inside the stately home - a limewood carving by Thomas Kendall of Warwick, dated about 1870 ish. If you see the thing close to, you can even see the whiskers on the water rat.

92

92

That's how old my dad is, as of yesterday. Tony and I drove north and met up with Mum, Dad, and my sister and brother-in-law to Wallington Hall in Northumberland. It belongs to the National Trust and has been a favourite family place since my sister and I were kids. You can find it on the National Trust site.

The day excelled itself. It was a perfect sunny autumn day, and they were having a Food and Craft Fair, which meant that Dad could watch a wood carver at work. We walked through the shady wood, past the lakes and the fallen tree where my children used to play, and through the walled garden which is a bit like walking into something from Alice in Wonderland. Father inspected all the gardens and greenhouses, got annoyed with himself because he couldn't remember the name of a particular flower (which I didn't know in the first place) and walked right to the end of the grounds. Walking all the way back might have been hard work, so my brother-in-law brought the car round. We rounded off with ice cream and birthday cake in the car park.

Mum and Dad had a wonderful day. Chatting to guides and the craft fair people, they let it drop that it was Dad's 92nd birthday, and people really cared about it. They were impressed, they were interested, they struck up a conversation. As the familiar accents made me feel at home, so did the warmth, that Northumbrian attitude of warmth, friendliness and welcome. I'd forgotten how good it is. Holy ground.