72. A letter to Terry ✒️ #14
A postcard from Wales, and some deep concerns about Puddlegate.
Dear Terry,
Thank you very much for your recent letter: and again, no need to apologise for its belated arrival. What with summer already knocking at the door (and do tell me what on earth happened to spring, because I’m certain I missed it) it’s amazing how busy life has become. Perhaps some time off is in order?
Well, we’re recently back from a work trip to Wales – have you ever been? To Wales, I mean, not to work. I know you spend a great deal of time at the llatter. Ha, I know that looks like a typo, but what I really lloved about my short time in Wales was the diversity both of llandscape and of llanguage. Road signs are in both Welsh and English – and actually not only road signs! On a lovely walk one afternoon I came across this:
The Welsh language is so beautiful to listen to as well as to read – it’s like a lilting song. Did you know that the longest Welsh place name comprises 58 – fifty eight! – letters? Here it is:
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch
The sign on the town’s station platform even shows how to pronounce the name correctly.
In English, the name means this: St Mary's Church in the hollow of the white hazel near a rapid whirlpool and the church of St. Tysilio near the red cave.
(You’re welcome.)
We passed through Snowdonia on our way to recce a temperate rainforest in preparation for a forthcoming project, and Terry, the views were spectacular.
Jim made me laugh: when this vista hit his peepers he announced ‘I’m half-expecting Julie Andrews to come running over the hill there’! Now, I’ve never been to Austria but I’m so familiar with Rodgers & Hammerstein’s representation of it in ‘The Sound of Music’ that I even started looking for Julie myself.
That wasn’t the only film extract that came up on the trip. ‘We’re gonna need a bigger windscreen for that view!’ made us both think of an iconic scene from ‘Jaws’.
(If you don’t know the scene, I’m sorry. I have not included the clip here on purpose, in case it makes people jump so much at the sight of the shark that they spill their tea. I have a responsibility to our mutual audience, after all.)
I loved the picture of you and Elaine outside the House of Lords, although I can see straight through your claim of ‘that is not my handbag because I don’t use one’. You are clearly trying to distract my attention from its contents: those three cats of yours that you had brought along to share in your experience of mixing with the aristocracy in the upper house of our Great British legislature.
And never mind your hobnobbing with that sort: have you turned your back on more local government affairs? Several letters of yours have now arrived with absolutely no mention of Puddlegate, and given the ever-growing state of what had started as a smallish flood around your local bus stop I very much doubt that the issue has been resolved. Had you better follow up with the powers that be at your local authority?
Or perhaps you were at the House of Lords in order to bring the Puddlegate affair to the attention of a higher authority? In which case, how did you get on? I know my rights.
Puddlegate and potholes: they are so very closely related. I saw a lovely story from the Independent on the Apple News app a couple of weeks ago: a Cornwall resident had taken the repair of a pothole into their own hands, to the delight of their local community but, it seems, the exasperation of the council.
According to the article, Cornwall Highways said the work had been done ‘by persons unknown, without consent’ and urged the local community to share any information that could identify the person responsible.
Gosh, it sounds a bit extra, wouldn’t you say? I’m sure the ‘persons unknown’ had been only trying to help!
I was really interested to see the examples of crosswords which you’d so thoughtfully included in your letter, but only from the point of view of a casual observer rather than someone who is ever likely to even consider trying to solve such things.
Because, crosswords? The ones you featured are beyond cross: they’re bordering on livid!
No thank YOU.
But Terry, only this morning – in the communal crossword time that Jim and I enjoy over breakfast – I found that not only had you and I been featured in the Telegraph Saturday General Knowledge crossword ourselves, but so had Willow, Misty and Mocha!
Observe:
43 across is clearly us, Terry – how jolly kind of The Telegraph to recognise us as the writers we are. And no, I’d never heard of a ‘clowder’, either. Rather too close to ‘chowder’ for my liking - actually, forget I said that… 🙀🙀🙀
After all my concerns about how you might feel about 13 being an unlucky number you have revealed that you were born on the 13th! I’m much happier now to think that you are much more sensible less superstitious than I had initially given you credit for.
Although I’ve got some artwork planned for one of my next Saturday posts I’m afraid I haven’t got anything arty of my own to show you in this letter, Terry. You’re not going to mind, though, because instead, I’d like to introduce you to Mary B from ‘Thrivin’, not Drivin’. In a little over a year, Mary and her husband Jim have saved over 2,400 miles of driving by replacing car journeys with riding their bikes. I know that would appeal to you as a fellow cyclist, but Mary is so creative and I also really enjoy her artwork. Finding her painting of a juicy slice of watermelon at the weekend absolutely made my mouth water!
Please reassure me though that your term ‘bath day’ is a typo, and that you’d intended to write ‘birthday’? Nice that you declare your annual ‘bath day’ as a public holiday, but do you really only take a bath every 365 days? You’ve reminded me – and not in a good way – of a history lesson on the Tudors in junior school, in which even my most mud-streaked classmates had been revolted to learn that Elizabeth I (1558 to 1603, yes, I still know my dates) had allegedly said: ‘I take a bath once a month whether I need it or not.’
Her own father, Henry VIII (1509 to 1547, yup, I know that too), according to those clever folks at Quora, was known not to favour baths as he considered them ‘too French’. 🙄
Lovely. And back to 2023, Terry, with the rain we had instead of spring now a dried-up former puddle at the bottom of an everlasting London pothole, it is just as well that you have committed to saving water. But let me just say this: if we ever meet in person, do please excuse me for keeping my distance. 😉
All the very best,
Rebecca
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Thanks for sharing, Terry and catching us up Rebecca. Llaughing a llot!
Also, the fella that sealed our driveway patched an errant pothole and was severely reprimanded for same. The local government doesn't need yer help with the byways.
Llove it. Thanks so much. Annual baths, filled-in potholes and Julie Andrews. What more could anyone ask for? Happy sigh. 🤗🤗🥰