The Sun

I took a late afternoon stroll through Epsom today, taking my chance on the threatening weather. Although I did take the folding umbie just in case and the thrift sweater against the cold to come.

Over West Hill, to be greeted by three trees looking something special, framed by the threatening sky to the east and the late afternoon sun to the west, shining strong from under the clouds. The snap captures something of it, although its impact is reduced by the wide angle of the fish-eye lens: the trees occupied a far bigger chunk of my field of vision than they do above.

Another hundred yards, and I could see the line of hills on which Crystal Palace is to be found, for which a slightly different view is to be found at reference 1. I was also reminded that I am often surprised by the distant views one can get from unexpected places. For example, heading south from St. Helier Hospital and heading either north or south in the vicinity of Harefield Hospital. But I would not have thought that it is going to happen in central London; for distant views there, one has to climb.

Through Epsom where - it being half term - there were lots of pre-teen children running around. Some being a little silly, but young enough not to be aggressive about it.

Down Hook Road, where the big leak, previously noticed, has now been repaired, although not all the gear had been taken away. I thought I located the hole, perhaps two feet by five, but it was hard to be sure, with the western pavement being littered with patches, old and new, large and small.

And so down Manor Green Road where there were some more spectacular skyscapes, gone by the time I got home. Unscathed, as it happened, by any rain - just a few passing drops when I passed through the High Street.

PS 1: once home, I had a rare go with the OS route function, which was, as it turned out, very easy to use. Even if the verdict was a touch over 4km rather than the 5km I have been claiming for it. And an hour rather than the hour and a half that I take. And with the climb up West Hill being a piffling 24m. Looks more serious than that from the bottom! 

Christ Church bottom right, a large church which, these days, is mostly locked up. And with another parson whose knowledge of Greek and Hebrew is probably zero, which is probably in line with the current Archbishop of Canterbury and her predecessor, both second career types. A rum do when the established church can no longer find its leadership material from among its proper churchmen - of whom one supposes there are at least a few left. See reference 2 for one such from the fairly recent past.

PS 2: I have been rather annoyed with myself, on several occasions of late, after watching one of the Davies episodes of Maigret, episodes which we had previously watched not much more than six months ago, but from which I remembered virtually nothing. But why was I annoyed by these slices of my life going missing? A lot of it goes missing in fairly short order and now, as a pensioner, nearly all of it has gone missing. 

The best I was able to do today was that a drama - be it on a screen, on a stage or on the page, has been constructed to be memorable. The messy real world, which is not very memorable, has been straightened out, tidied up, has been made memorable. After all, a drama loses most of its impact if you have forgotten the beginning by the time that you get to the end. So maybe there is a more or less subconscious expectation that dramas are remembered. Ordinary life can come and go, but dramas should persist.

For some chapter and verse (a properly Biblical allusion, as it happens) see reference 4.

PS 3: a little later. Ruminating on the piffling climb above, I remembered that sixty years ago, when I was still in short trousers, most if not all of the family strolled up Snowdon, routed above. Up and down, something more than twice the distance - but with an ascent of some 1,000m, rather than the 25m I can manage today. Things have clearly changed a bit.

I remember that, on another occasion, there was low cloud as we approached the summit, with more or less zero visibility. When, just about point 993, the cloud rolled away giving us a spectacular view of the lake below, to the east. These being the days when there was warm beer to be had at the summit cafeteria. I wonder if that side of things has been changed?

Gemini says not, which I found slightly surprising, but corroboration was to be found at reference 5.

Gemini goes on to translate 'Hafod Eyri' for me - and to explain that 'eyri' is not etymologically related to our word 'eyrie', despite the connection between eagles and nests in high places. 

OED does not list the word at all under 'e', but Longman tells me that 'aerie' is an alternative spelling, and OED (of 1888) does have that one, where the alternative with 'e' is mentioned. A rare lapse of cross-referencing. But it does offer a discussion of the origin of the word, settling for 'aire' (a useful feature of French motorways), but for different reasons than Gemini, with the Welsh word not being mentioned at all.

'Eyre' is different again, being an old legal term to do with travelling judges.

But when poked, Gemini can offer a discussion of why the old OED went the way it did, citing the preference of the time for Latin derivations rather than folksy, that is to say Welsh ones. Gemini also knew all about 'Brythonic'. Another example of Gemini responding well to dialogue - with one catch being knowing when and how to probe. And another being that you end up with a lot of information, the distillation of which into a nice neat answer to your assignment being non-trivial.

Maybe the chocolate mousse loving Welshman we met at Café François would have known something - if not all - about it. 

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/10/long-grove.html. For once, an event which was far more recent than I had thought, rather than the more usual much longer ago.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2024/06/ramsey.html. 

Reference 3: https://psmv2.blogspot.com/2013/12/birthday-book.html. A rather different sort of archbishop. And then there are the more or less eccentric parsons who turn up in murder mysteries on ITV3 on a regular basis.

Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/search?q=davies+maigret.

Reference 5: https://snowdonrailway.co.uk/.

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