Puck

My knowledge of Shakespeare is limited. However, about 25 years ago I went to see a Midsummer Night's Dream in the open air theater in Regent's Park in London. Difficult to think of anything more magical invented by people.

Difficult but not impossible

And, of course, not true.

Jacob went back to his mum`s house this morning amid scenes of outright violence and aggression. Jacob was crying and traumatized and I was absolutely impotent to do anything. I have just spoken to my friend Pablo who was in a similar situation one year ago and now has joint custody. He has been advising me as to the psychological evaluation this Friday which is key to the outcome of the case.

Plank table

As thick as one short plank which is quite a long short plank.

Rioja

All out

Today's poem;

Miss J. Hunter Dunn, Miss J. Hunter Dunn,

 Furnish'd and burnish'd by Aldershot sun,
 What strenuous singles we played after tea,
 We in the tournament - you against me!

 Love-thirty, love-forty, oh! weakness of joy,
 The speed of a swallow, the grace of a boy,
 With carefullest carelessness, gaily you won,
 I am weak from your loveliness, Joan Hunter Dunn.

 Miss Joan Hunter Dunn, Miss Joan Hunter Dunn,
 How mad I am, sad I am, glad that you won,
 The warm-handled racket is back in its press,
 But my shock-headed victor, she loves me no less.

 Her father's euonymus shines as we walk,
 And swing past the summer-house, buried in talk,
 And cool the verandah that welcomes us in
 To the six-o'clock news and a lime-juice and gin.

 The scent of the conifers, sound of the bath,
 The view from my bedroom of moss-dappled path,
 As I struggle with double-end evening tie,
 For we dance at the Golf Club, my victor and I.

 On the floor of her bedroom lie blazer and shorts,
 And the cream-coloured walls are be-trophied with sports,
 And westering, questioning settles the sun,
 On your low-leaded window, Miss Joan Hunter Dunn.

 The Hillman is waiting, the light's in the hall,
 The pictures of Egypt are bright on the wall,
 My sweet, I am standing beside the oak stair
 And there on the landing's the light on your hair.

 By roads "not adopted", by woodlanded ways,
 She drove to the club in the late summer haze,
 Into nine-o'clock Camberley, heavy with bells
 And mushroomy, pine-woody, evergreen smells.

 Miss Joan Hunter Dunn, Miss Joan Hunter Dunn,
 I can hear from the car park the dance has begun,
 Oh! Surrey twilight! importunate band!
 Oh! strongly adorable tennis-girl's hand!

 Around us are Rovers and Austins afar,
 Above us the intimate roof of the car,
 And here on my right is the girl of my choice,
 With the tilt of her nose and the chime of her voice.

 And the scent of her wrap, and the words never said,
 And the ominous, ominous dancing ahead.
 We sat in the car park till twenty to one
 And now I'm engaged to Miss Joan Hunter Dunn.

The most English of any poem ever written

Angels' s Trumpets

Angels' trumpets are flowers. They may be Brugmansia Suavolens or Brugmansia Datura. They give off an intoxicating, heddy aroma and belong to the faries.

The House with yet more weigela (which are not trumpets or strumpets)

After becoming mind - numbingly frustrated with the state of the custody case, apparently just filed away in a cupboard somewhere, I went to the court last week to find out what was happening.  What was happening was nothing. The file was sitting on a shelf with a patina of blue dust. The depressing truth was that I was unsurprised.  To cut a long story short, two days later a date had been established for the psychological evaluation.  Jacob's mother has already started to brainwash him. When I picked him up from her house on Monday there were scenes of anguish too difficult and too complex to explain adequately or succinctly.  But poor Jacob will be subject to a further barrage of Machiavelian manipulation. 

No my matter how big you are...

I AM NOW writing in the future, a future which is fraught with uncertainty and the pungent aromas of self justification; this might smell something like old cod.

My laboral situation is hanging by a thread. By a threat. For the last 8 months I have been working with an illegal contract.  A bureaucratic foul-up, which might accurately be termed willful incompetence.

This blog entry seems to be spanning rather a long period of time. And what you want are photos.

The Garden Admin'

Unlike me, the dogs are getting older, slower and losing their hair. Jacky adores them and they are an integral part of his family.

Tends to get a misty around here; seven in the morning

Any road up it is now Saturday the 20th of June and my problems have been solved. The old adage about, "it's not what you know, it's who you know? - far to embarrassing to say "whom" - is probably true.

Oh Hammock; invention of the gods

(slung between fig and cherry)

Here is the labor scenario, the highly abridged version.

• this has been my fifth year working at the school
• The fifth year with the same temporary contract
• In Spain this is illegal
• They should have either sacked me or given me some kind of tenure at the beginning of October
• They didn't 
• They then offered a solution which, at first glance, appeared to be fairly rubbish
• The administrative secretary wangled it so that it was better
• This was probably aided by the fact I could have taken them to court and, according to a friend who is the lawyer for the work inspection unit, would have definitely won. Leverage
• I still haven't signed anything and won't until the first of September
• If anything should go awry I can always take them to court between now and this time next year 
• Have accepted all, pending a thorough reading of the contract with a specialist lawyer
• From the first of September I will be full time, earning slightly less per month but quite a bit better off annually and in terms of a pension and stuff like that. 
• And I have tenure, which is a kind of big deal over here, but I'm not sure why. 

Any way a beautiful day today spent with friends in the morning and with J. Have finished making my table which only took me a couple of hours. Here are the results.

Working party

Not a lot of Table

This view makes the garden look ginormous. It's just perspective.

Today's poem:

Summer

Come we to the summer, to the summer we will come, 
For the woods are full of bluebells and the hedges full of bloom,
And the crow is on the oak a-building of her nest,
And love is burning diamonds in my true lover's breast;
She sits beneath the whitethorn a-plaiting of her hair,
And I will to my true lover with a fond request repair;
I will look upon her face, I will in her beauty rest,
And lay my aching weariness upon her lovely breast.

The clock-a-clay is creeping on the open bloom of May,
The merry bee is trampling the pinky threads all day,
And the chaffinch it is brooding on its grey mossy nest
In the whitethorn bush where I will lean upon my lover's breast;
I'll lean upon her breast and I'll whisper in her ear
That I cannot get a wink o'sleep for thinking of my dear;
I hunger at my meat and I daily fade away
Like the hedge rose that is broken in the heat of the day. 

Today, the first day of Summer. All is right with the world.