Funeral's Eve

I've come to London to attend a funeral. It is Wednesday evening and the city is rumbling in its usual way. It's stranger than I expected to be here, to be visiting for him without him. This place never felt like home, but a root of my family tree is undeniably here, or was, or is.

For old times sake I take the tube to London Bridge in search of an appetite, but find only an M&S sandwich. Doubling back to Blackfriars my clogs clatter noisily against the metal treads of the steps.

My funeral coat smells strongly of damp. It's been a while since anyone died. The oil stained pockets almost the only indication that this coat has ever been anything other than respectable, I fiddle with the screw which once failed to hold my moped together - almost.

It's half past Nunhead. I find this city confusing, too loud, too much, two friends board and fill the doorway with chattering laughter. My brain strains to hear familiar place names, Beckenham will do - I think we came here to buy a tyre once.

In my head I try to think of a satisfactory conclusion to the eulogy in my rucksack, outside the window buses rest under the bright lights of a depot. Shortlands is our next stop and on the platform a man enquires "Is this the way to Amerillo", I wouldn't know, I've never been this way before, but Blyth Road is marked with the familiar green signs of the Borough of Bromley. Not home, but here.

Bloody well right

It’s (give or take a couple of days) 20 years since I started secondary school. It’s funny to think just how much of an impact those following five years have had on my life – how much was set in motion there.

There is another trouser leg of time where I didn’t apply for Archbishop’s and went to Fulford instead. Maybe I didn’t lose my religious faith in an RE classroom and instead became a vicar, maybe I didn’t fall for engineering and did history, I almost certainly wouldn’t have landed up at York College when I did. And from wherever there was, did I still apply for Lancaster? Meet my wife? After 20 years did that Edward write a similar post, and did you read it?

But out of the subjunctive bifurcation and back to the trouser leg of reality, the things which did happen and which still echo through my life now. I still use trigonometry quite a lot, I’ve had less use out of knowledge of the essential parts of a Sikh Gurdwara, sometimes I still feel pangs of shame about being queer. I found a love for engineering, I learnt how to spot when someone was lying when they said “I’m fine”, I learnt how to sit very still on a hard chair whilst the word “outstanding” was repeated several times from the lectern at the front of the hall without giggling or farting. I learnt how to cut the pleasure out of poetry, but also how to sew joy into learning, and then - there’s the music.

I am not a good musician, I am too ill disciplined apart from anything else, but for hours a week I was allowed to cause (mostly) tuneful chaos. Orchestra, choir, and (best of all) soul band. I don’t think I realised how lucky I was at the time - not just that the opportunities to make music were there, but that a clown like me was allowed to make the most of them. My career was perhaps inevitable (that I am a railway engineer does not surprise my primary school teachers) – even if the path could have taken some different turns on the way - but I wonder what my life would have been like without that bit of my musical journey. Would I have found that joy on my own? If access to music had been restricted only to those with the discipline to do grades, would I have bothered? (The answer there, I can say with some certainty, is no). It would be trite to say that music has saved my life, but over the years through singing in choirs it’s brought me friendship and comfort through some of the very darkest nights – and even when it’s not been my redemption it’s brought joy and light.

And so 20 years on, a couple of feet taller, with a wife and a child and a job that I love, I look back on those first few days of that short five years and feel terribly lucky that that’s the choice I made, and even luckier that all the people (staff and pupils) made that choice a happy one. Today I will go to choir, tomorrow I will go to work with a smile, on Wednesdays we wear pink. School, what a concept.

A Sad Little Poem on the Death of a Dear Friend

Today I am sad.
I am sad because my friend is dead.
That's the long and the short of it.
And it's funny because the most important thing she ever told me,
was that everything is a phase.
And it turns out that's not true.
And it turns out that's not really funny.
But it's slightly funnier than her being dead.
Which is one of the saddest things.

 

TW: Suicide. We learnt recently that one of the most important people in the making of us as parents, and as a family, took her own life. She built a wonderful safe space for new parents (and mothers especially) around her and gave so much to so many, including us.

It's often said that it takes a village to raise a child, and through her, hundreds of miles from our own families, we found our village. She gave good advice, and tea and brownies, but most of all she gave confidence. I shan't name her here as it still doesn't feel like it's my news to break, but I sort of had to say something somewhere (I am okay, this isn't a cry for help!). A lot of people have lost a lot without her here, many of whom will never now be lucky enough to know what they don't have.  

Be good, be kind, be understanding, listen and talk.

Take care my loves,

E. x

 

Samaritans are available on 116 123 by telephone - other means of contacting them are here.

 

Apple Cake with Crystallised Ginger and Dark Chocolate Flecks

Makes

1 kg loaf tin

Ingredients

1 Whisky Mac (25ml blended scotch whisky, 50ml ginger wine)

2 Apples

2 Eggs

160g Caster Sugar

120g/130ml Vegetable Oil

150g Plain Flour

1½ tsp Baking Powder

1½ tsp Ground Ginger

40g dark chocolate (70%+)

A handful of Crystallised Ginger

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C / 160°C fan / gas mark 4.

Grease a 1kg loaf tin and line with baking parchment – ensuring there’s enough to to pull the cake out with once it’s cooked. You can just line the long edges and base (saving paper and forgoing the pain of folding in the ends.)

Cut the apples into small chunks (around ¼ inch cubes – about the size of a standard dice) and place in a large mixing bowl with the whisky mac. Give the chunks a stir to ensure they all get a bit of a taste of alcohol. Don’t bother pealing the apples but do remove any visible blemishes as these will show in the finished cake.

In a large bowl, or using a mixer, whisk the egg and sugar until they start to puff up and go pale, before slowly pouring in the oil until it has all been incorporated. Be careful not to add the oil too fast or the mixture may split.

Using a spatula (or mixer beater attachment) fold in the flour, ginger, and baking powder into the mix until you achieve a smooth consistency. Then fold in the apple / cocktail mix.

Chop the chocolate into flecks and fold these and the crystallised ginger into the mix.

Pour the batter mix into the cake tin and bake for 35 minutes. Turn the tin around and bake for a further 15-20 minutes.

When done it should be springy to the touch and a knife should come out ‘just’ clean. If it’s taking its time cooking to the middle – lower the oven temperature and insert metal skewers (or all metal cutlery knives) through the centre of the cake until done.

Allow to cool in the tin for 15 to 20 minutes, if you have left the short ends of the loaf tin unlined, run a knife between the tin and the cake before releasing.

This cake can be eaten warm or cold, and will stand being frozen.

 

Backstory 

Did you know I (re)started this blog as a bit of a cookery blog? Well I did! Right back in 2011 when I went away to university and wanted to chart my cookery progress, setting out into the kitchen for the first time armed only with half a copy of Delia's complete cookery course and a set of knives so blunt you could ride to London on them and not cut your arse. I probably wouldn't bother with those proto-recipes now, but I have a few which I've developed over the years which I might feed in, with some thoughts, from time to time. 

This recipe is inspired by one from The Baking Book by Sarit Packer & Itamar Srulovich from Honey & Co (Saltyard books), which I heard on Simon Mayo's Radio 2 drivetime show. I much prefer ginger to nutmeg and my mum suggested that a whisky mac might make quite a good base for a ginger based cake. After some trial and error, here's the result!

Exam test 2021 - Paper 1 - Non-calculator

 A couple of people have asked that I provide a full pdf of my Exam test exam test paper. If you are considering presenting this to a young person please note that the words "cock" and "balls" are featured in question 15, and according to Ofcom those are a strong and a medium swearword respectively.

I'm delighted this little exam seems to have brought joy to people. If you have any questions, or would like your papers marked, feel free to send them my way - I'd love to see any answers!

You may turn over your papers now.

Stop writing!

2021 - New Years' Morning - About half past midnight

This time last year,
you danced in my mind's kitchen,
all v-neck and Chic and disco moves.
But there is no context where that you make sense here.
Retrieving a torn down breadstick box from the floor with your mouth,
Is not in right now.

2020 has been... quite the time.
You never experienced anything like it,
but I think,
given your appraisal of the heatwave of '76,
I'll perhaps explain it to you thus:
2020 - Wore slippers all year.

Observations from 1V64 approaching Taunton

There’s nothing quite like a train journey to make you realise how blessed the UK is with scenery, and what an absolute blight the general public is thereon (present carriage occupants who may be reading over my shoulder excepted). 1V64 leaves Edinburgh at 1307 and by the time I joined it at Derby it had already been on the rails for four and a half hours (technically, having been formed from a service starting in Birmingham in the morning, it had been in near constant motion for almost 10). Already past was the beautifully rugged section from Dunbar, the impressive bridges of Newcastle, Northern cities of Durham and York. From Derby to Birmingham I was treated to the repetitive throb and rattle of both loose interior fittings and the various musical choices of my fellow passengers in glorious 360 degree surround sound, the sights of the breweries of Burton doing little to ease my growing irritation.

Blessed relief from the chart hits (played with remarkable clarity through airpods and my neighbour’s head) came at the circle of hell commonly known as Birmingham New Street – the carriage largely emptied and my tablemate was very talkative once the offer of tea was made and accepted. There passed a happy few hours talking about travel (hers in India, mine across Europe, both happily by rail) as our train trundled towards Bristol passing the gorgeous Malverns.

At Temple Meads I bade my friend goodbye and my luck with ran dry. With wonderful Great Western architecture to both sides we were held waiting for a driver on a late running northbound service, and a member of the public with a great number of opinions and a voice with remarkable travelling qualities boarded. As the train waited he entertained the otherwise peaceful carriage with discussions on solar powered battery banks, the correct way to consume a sandwich if you are unable to wash you hands, and into which specific bin a compostable carrier bag aught to be disposed if it is to fulfil its composty purpose. Across from me sits a delightful fellow in sportswear – beside me sit his Adidas clad feet. We are now approaching Taunton, with luck we will be treated to the most wonderful late evening sun as we promenade at speed along the coast at Dawlish. If I’m very lucky indeed Taunton has the correct bin to dispose of a compostable carrier, but I fear that it might even be Plymouth.

Post Script 1 – Departing Exeter St. Davids

Taunton does not have the correct type of bin but fortunately Exeter does. Thanks to Britons having a generally awkward attitude to turfing people out of their seats I am still sitting next to some trainers. The rightful seat holders are quite loud so this might yet prove to be a blessing, but I think I’d prefer loud conversation to the sound track of a Mission Impossible by way of headphones and skull and occasional kicks to the elbow.

Post Script 2 – Passing Tavistock Junction

All is well with the world. The light held just long enough to enjoy the view of the boats at Teignmouth.