Today is cold and grey, and if we had any thoughts about going out, they have vanished.

Last Sunday, though, last Sunday was glorious, and we visited Crook Hall

The person who checked our passes boasted of the tree peony (a huge bloom, rather blotched and blowsy) and the Himalayan poppy (just the one, but they are very proud of it because apparently it is quite hard to get them to bloom). I was more impressed by a fine cluster of wild garlic (which has an apologetic sign in it: This garden in the process of remodelling - oh, well). Randomly, my favourite picture was of some lingering blossom:

There is a new sculpture of a toad, to replace the old wooden one, which was rotting, and has been put somewhere he can rot peacefully and productively; the new, metal toad is, inevitably, by Graeme Hopper. There is a moorhen on the pool. And there is a new second-hand bookshop, but I didn't buy anything (though I did photograph a copy of Pride and Prejudice for the previous post).

'Twas on a Wednesday morning
The electrician plumber came

We now have a fully flushing toilet in the upstairs bathroom. Just in time, because -

- we had a house guest for the end of the week:

Frances's three children, whose homes are scattered across the country, came to Durham to finalise her funeral arrangements, and make a start on clearing her house (in which they had lived as children). Their initial intention was for all three of them to stay at the house, but it would be a squeeze, especially since (and I find this rather sweet, both irrational and entirely understandable) no-one wanted to sleep in their mother's bed. So durham_rambler suggested to L. (middle 'child', with whom he maintains contact on - Bluesky, I think) that he should stay with us. Which worked very well: a practical, rather than a social, visit, but with some time for conversation, those peculiar conversations you have at these times with people who have known you not terribly well for all their lives...

Thursday evening, a civic event:

durham_rambler was invited, as a Parish Councillor, to the opening of 'Two Tales', a pop-up outpost of Seven Stories, the national centre for children's books in Newcastle. One of the many empty units in the shopping centre has been repurposed into a bookshop cum café cum events/ outreach venue: not the aspect of Seven Stories that most interests me, but surely a good thing nonetheless. The gathering was more civic than literary: no conversations about children's books, more (still) about the local elections. durham_rambler commiserated with one unsuccessful Labour candidate: "Sorry you weren't elected - " "I'm not!" was the reply, and I see his point. I almost left without buying a book (which would have been rude); we were already outside when I spotted in the window a supply of a book about illustrations in the Seven Stories collection, and had to go back in again.

Saturday was Eurovision!

But I have run out of time, so that'll have to wait...

durham_rambler has a group of volunteers who are helping him to distribute his election publicity. They are all much appreciated, but I was particularly tickled that one had sent in a report. So here it is (the redaction is mine):

Took advantage of sunny day yesterday and delivered the leaflets.

My report:

A few properties appeared vacant.

Two or three I have no idea how to access or find a letter box.

Interesting smell of recreational herbal products around one part of Whitesmocks

And cheerful complaint (unrelated to above point) from one resident of Whitesmocks that it never gets mentioned in Council and election literature.

[Redacted] is the place to go if one wanted to pilfer Amazon parcels

One Alsation

Lots of yappy dogs in St Nicholas Drive

One rabbit.

Cheers

Wednesday was durham_rambler's birthday: celebrations were low-key, as we have been distracted by builders, but we did manage to find a party to go to -

- if you can call something a party when it starts at 9.00 am. We had an invitation to the opening of the new building at the student development which currently houses Hild/Bede College: I'm still not sure who they thought they were inviting, but durham_rambler is Chair of the residents' association, and he wanted me to accompany him, and since it was his birthday, and since I had to be up early because of the builders, and anyway why not, I went with him. The Vice Chancellor cut a purple ribbon, there were some brief speeches, and then we retreated from the sleet into the JCR and chatted with friends and neighbours (including the Mayor and the Parish Clerk) and drank coffee and ate pastries...

We weren't home long before it was time to go out to lunch: we had booked at the Vane Arms in Thorpe Thewles, where we have eaten before, though not recently. There were mussels on the menu, which always makes durham_rambler happy, and the sun was shining, and after lunch there was a bus shelter repurposed as a book exchange to investigate (we got away without actually taking any books, although durham_rambler was intrigued by a biography of Josephine Butler).

Out again in the evening, to the pub quiz where, for the second week running we found ourselves in a three-way tie breaker for first place. We are not good at tie breakers, and we came third: but there's still a decent prize, and all the glory of top marks. And the winners were our friendly rivals, the student team on the next table, who have gone several weeks without a win, and were getting fractious, so it's all to the good.

When the Parish Council launched its search for suitable locations for blue plaques to commemmorate noteworthy local people and events, durham_rambler suggested Sam Green. We had known Sam in the 1970s, when he was our local City councillor, and were proud that Durham, at a time when when north east England was seen as socially backward, had elected the country's first out gay councillor. (Here's the Wikipedia page.)

The Parish Council has adopted this idea with enthusiasm. durham_rambler and I had assumed that they would seek to install the plaque on the house where Sam was living when we knew him, and which he was offering as a "crash pad" - quotation marks because this term for informal emergency accommodation seems to have fallen out of use, and I get blank looks when I use it. We were disconcerted to discover that instead of engaging with the owner of what is now, of course, a student let, they wanted to affix the plaque to the house where Sam was apparently living when he was first elected, which is the house where we now live (Sam having told us, back in 1975 "I see my mother's house is on the market again...")

At the same time, a project is under way in the University to "research [Sam's] career and write an article about his experience - and what an 'historic first' such as his election does (and doesn't) mean for thinking about social and cultural change over the past 50+ years in Modern Britain." So on Tuesday durham_rambler and I went to the History Department to be interviewed by Richard Huzzey and David Minto. The History Department has resisted any attempts to move it into new buildings, and is still where it always was, in a warren of old houses on the North Bailey. I have no idea how they accommodate students (or staff, or indeed visitors) with limited mobility: not only was the office we were visiting on the second floor, you have to find the right staircase (we didn't) or you will find yourself on the wrong bit of the second floor, and have to go back down to the entrance and try again (we did).

Despite this, I was glad of the opportunity to visit the department. I felt a bit mean about this, because they would willingly have come to us, and I think would have liked to see the house where Sam had grown up - but it was so much easier to visit, and to let Richard clear a big space on his table, and set out his (British Library approved, archive quality) recorder, with the lapel mikes positioned to pick up whoever was speaking, and bustle around apologising for the instant coffee...

I enjoyed talking about the past, and remembering someone we had known - maybe not all that well, but known, and liked - a long time ago. At times I felt that what we were doing was establishing context, rather than talking about the man himself, but that's useful too. There were, as I knew there would be, gaps in my memory: the first question was "How did you first meet Sam Green?" and neither of us could remember exactly. Did we meet Sam through the Welfare Rights Group, or did we come to the Welfare Rights Group through Sam? (The more I think about it, the more I incline to the former: luckily, I don't think this matters to the historic record). Interesting, too, after we had stopped recording, to hear some of the things other interviewees had said: I had remembered Sam wearing a single giant pearly earring and some lacy curtain as a scarf, but I had forgotten the holey knitted jumper - and now it was mentioned, yes, I could see it vividly.

Anyway, it was a fun afternoon, and a worthwhile project; now we let the historians do their thing, and later we will go to an open talk, and see what they have found out, and what they make of it all.

At Wednesday's pub quiz, the Professor warned us that he might not be on top form, having had an interrupted night. The doorbell had rung at three in the morning, and he had answered it to find a student neighbour uronating on his doorstep. Words were exchanged. He went back to bed, and next day discovered that his assailant had returned, and thrown eggs at the front of his house. (He had also dropped his ID: recriminations followed, and apologies, and cleaning up.)

This being a Durham student, they were quail's eggs.

J invited us to lunch on Thursday, which is always a treat.

We returned home to find a delegation of young women on our doorstep, holding a package wrapped in tissue paper. They were representatives of the student household next-door-but-one, there to warn us that they would be having a hallowe'en party, to apologise in advnace for the noise, and to appease us with home-baked brownies. We thanked them for the brownies, and asked what time they planned to end the party, and they said they planned to move into town at elevent o' clock: of course they did, because elevent is the locally agreed curfew.

The brownies were good, and the party must have been good, too: there seemed to be a huge number of people there, and it was very loud. At eleven o' clock there was no sign of it winding down: I heard a couple of blasts of a whistle on the garden, and wondered whether this was a 'time's up' signal, but time clearly wasn't up.

It was loud enough for durham_rambler (who is quite deaf) to go and remind them of the time: the police advise against doing this, but he found them quite affable: "People kept offering me drinks," he said, "but I just pulled the jackplugs out of the DJ's desk."

Which seems to have had the desired result.

After the Museum of the Moon, after a visit from Gaia, this summer Durham Cathedral has played host to a flock of Peace Doves.

Artist Peter Walker invited people - community groups and incividual volunteers - to write a message on a paper dove, then strung them together to make his installation. There's a lot about this process which arouses my prejudices: I've nothing against community involvement as an end in itself, but it's about the process not the outcome - I'm not more likely to admire the result because the artist has farmed the work out to other people. And I'm not against peace: who is? This is just a way of side-dtepping criticism, isn't it: but it's in a good cause...

You can't criticise art unless you've seen it, though. So in the last few days available, we caught the cathedral bus and went to have a look. And while I can't say I was moved by it, it was very pretty:

The BBC report linked above mentions music: I did not hear any music. But I quite liked the effect of the mass of doves, and the way they were fromed by the cathedral. I thought, in fact, that, unlike those Luke Jerram globes, this was a piece which had been devised for this space, and it wasn't until I came to write this post that I discovered a description on the artirt's website of his Doves of Peace installation at Liverpool Cathedral.

It can't be autumn yet, surely? It's still August. But the heat has gone out of the weather, the days are shorter, the students are returning, and it is blackberry season:



It is nothing to boast about, that the brambles have overrun our garden: I have failed as a gardener, and as a responsible neighbour, too. But dirham_rambler goes out and gathers their fruit - this is the third or fourth bowlful, and not the largest, either. Yesterday we went to the little parade of shops at Cheveley Park, where there is a greengrocer (also a mini-Sainsbury's, a cashpoint and a charity shop) and bought cooking apples, and there will be apple-and-blackberries for dinner, and more to freeze...

I am so pleased to have found a greengrocer: I also bought Victoria plums and a perfectly ripw avocado (I made guacamole).

Like everyone else, I have been watching the news appalled as the country goes up in flames. And, no doubt also like everyone else, I have many and various thoughts on the subject. I don't promise there won't be outbursts, but I'd prefer not to post about them until or unless I can say something coherent.

But I have watched reports from the streets of Sunderland, and Hartlepool, and even Middlesbrough, and all those places appear in this diary. So this is what is (almost) happening in Durham City.

For the last couple of days, the local police have been aware of reports that something is planned for the City. They have issued a dispersal order for the city centre - whatever a dispersal order is (enables the police to tell people to disperse, I think). The boundary of that order runs across the bottom of our road, but takes in the Elm Tree.

As of earlier today, the Parish Clerk circulated an update from the police, confirming that a high number of dispersal orders had been issued yesterday evening to youths in the City centre, and there had been at least one arrest for a public order offence. But there had been no serious issues or mass gatherings.

durham_rambler's exercise session in Chester-le-Street this morning was cancelled, as a precaution. So he took his exercise by strolling down to the Elm Tree, who confirmed that they had every intention of staying open this evening, and the pub quiz would take place.

So I'd better go and read a chapter of Swallows and Amazons.

Saturday was the Gala, the annual Big Meeting of the Durham Miners - and, these days, of anyone else who cares to attend. This year it was cold and grey and rainy, and our attendance was minimal: blame lack of stamina as much as the weather - or perhaps they go together, because it wasn't a day for taking a break, finding somewhere to sit and watching the procession go by... Instead we called in at Elvet Methodist church, open for coffee again after missing several years, and agreed that neither of us wanted to go much further. We did linger a little longer in Old Elvet, and then cut through to the river, crossing Baths Bridge and walking along the riverbanks. The procession was still crossing Elvet Bridge when we reached the Boathouse, and we could hear the bands all the way: the usual tunes (YMCA, Sweet Caroline) and some less usual (was that really Raglan Road?). I didn't hear Gresford at all, though.

Tomorrow we set off for a week's jaunt: driving across country and seeing people. No, of course I'm not ready. Bedtime now, though.