The end of the month

The penultimate day of the month saw us visiting the fire station to stand down a fire safety visit. Maybe partly because it had become clear that the visit was not going to involve a fire engine, which would have given the visit a bit of spice. Given us a bit of standing in the road. We could not find a non-emergency number for the station, hence the visit, where a pleasant young man opened the side door in seconds and our business was done. After which I was dropped off at the hospital for a blood test.

Back down South Street, where I found that a chunk of the wall keeping Mounthill Gardens out of the street had collapsed during the recent rain. Not seen serious timber props of this sort for a long time.

The snowdrops, a bit further along, were unscathed.

I moaned about arty types getting a bit above themselves yesterday (at the end of reference 1). On this occasion another arty type had seen fit to mess about with the signage in the Ashley Centre, which I found confusing, but luckily I wound up in the right place - you never know when someone is going to get in a state about mistakes of that sort.

Perhaps it is all part of the same syndrome which leads to all kinds of ugly outdoor art in so many of our provincial towns. Perhaps it is all down to our local art college? They bring a lot of business into town, so maybe the council is wary of upsetting them - just as our universities are wary of upsetting the Chinese authorities, indirectly responsible for so much of their income.

Later the same day, over the hill to pass one of our private schools, Kingswood House. To notice for the first time a very serious sliding gate, the sort of thing one associates more with commercial premises, like warehouses, containing all sorts of thievable goodies. Perhaps the school took fright after a burglary?

I remember seeing such a thing, a much larger version, at the entrance to a north London synagogue, there for more unpleasant reasons, on the occasion of a lunchtime concert, which I now know was more than ten years ago. I don't remember the singer having a website at that time, but she certainly has one now, at reference 3.

I am a mezzo-soprano, singing teacher and vocal animateur of British-Egyptian (Coptic) heritage. I trained in the western classical tradition, but have also have come to specialise in singing music of other cultures, and have built up an eclectic performing career.  I often work with contemporary classical composers to premiere works that include elements of Arabic and Sephardic repertoire, such as Bushra El-Turk’s one-woman opera, Silk Moth, at Grimeborn [!] in 2019. I sang the Egyptian composer, Nahla Mattar’s Songs on Colloquial Arabic at the Royal Opera House Engender Festival in July 2021. My CD, Daughter of Arabia is the culmination of a three-year project exploring the rich musical styles of my heritage. In November 2021 I completed a PRS Resonance Residency with Opera North.  This was a funded week to research and develop a new performance piece fusing western classical song with Arabic music. The result is an exciting new song-cycle called Mezzaterra, which will receive its first full performance at Tête-à-Tête in August 2022.

From which the paragraph above was lifted. The CD mentioned is the one that I have... I shall have another listen later on. I remember being rather taken with her at the time.

Back on West Hill, we had this very rustic bit of gardening in front of what was probably quite an old cottage. It seems unlikely that the present owner is a real cottager. Nevertheless, never seen such a thing before.

The house appears to appear in the Ordnance Survey at about the time of the First World War, to the right of where it says 'infant school' (no present trace) and below the orange spot.

Clapboard, of which there is a fair bit in and around Epsom, in a style which is now called 'Surrey vernacular', but even then, presumably, a bit retro. Built as a country getaway for some tier two city gent whose wife was into William Morris wallpaper?

It does not appear to be there at the beginning of the century. And what is now part of our Chase Estate was empty space, that is to say farm land - presumably waiting for a speculator to turn up, as now.

By way of a sighting shot. Railway station lower right.

The day following saw a turkey roast, BH having recently discovered the wonders of turkey drumsticks from Sainsbury's, as previously noticed. Plus some superior lemon squash from Waitrose, a litre of which probably cost getting for as much as the turkey, but it was good. As was the turkey.

I close with the important news, brought to me by Microsoft, that the Pope is having trouble with the Latin Mass tendency, who want some more bishops. Another tussle between old and much loved tradition and an attempt to keep the faithful by going modern. But it is probably not as bad as the four piece bands and tambourines that I understand to be present in a lot of Anglican churches. Not to mention lady priests who don't know a word of Greek, let alone Hebrew.

PS 1: initial search of the archive for 'synagogue' failed to turn the concert up, but luckily I still had the CD and was able to search for the singer, one Camille Maalawy and turned up reference 3. After that, search for 'synagogue' was more productive. Was I having finger trouble or was Windows search being unreliable? I have been caught out in the past by Windows search only searching the files which happen to be online, on the spot as it were, but I don't see how that could have been the case here. Certainly, all the little green spots for 'online' are present and correct now.

PS 2: I am reminded this Friday afternoon, by an item bought to me by Microsoft News, of a song which was very popular around the same time as the Profumo scandal. The burden of which was 'I danced with a man who danced with a woman who danced with a man who danced with a woman who danced with the Prince of Wales'. Or something of that sort. Also that Profumo went on to do good work for many years for an East End charity. Some things change, some don't.

No connection, as far as I am aware, between the song and the scandal: a coincidence of memory if not of fact. But the small world networks of reference 5 are real enough and crop up all over the place.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv6.blogspot.com/2026/02/lentils.html.

Reference 2: https://www.uca.ac.uk/campuses/epsom/.

Reference 3: https://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/2012/06/visits.html.

Reference 4: https://camillemaalawy.com/.

Reference 5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small-world_network.