Keeping Up with Terry Jones

Terry Jones had invited us to join him and Anna for lunch in London on Saturday. We had other plans. . .No! Of course, we jumped at the opportunity. We trained "up" to London early in the morning--that is, "early" as defined by Robbie which means "lauds" to me.
We thought that we might have time to go for a ride on the Eye before lunch, but that was a complete mistake. Even though it was a rather blustery morning, the streets were packed with tourists. We took a few snaps, and then tried to take the underground to Highgate, but the Northern Line–as Terry had warned us–was not operating past Kensington: "Curse You, Blair/Bush." See oral formulae still exist in English.
So, we climbed into a cab, and drove to a most beautiful part of London that I never knew existed. We met Anna for the first time and she’s lovely and smart and sweet and very tolerant of perfect strangers. We also met Nancy, their puppy Jack Russell Terrier who just loves being a dog. Terry claims to be allergic, but he obviously loves to play every bit as much as Nancy. Terry made us espresso and tea and then we headed across the heath (not to be confused with a fen though every bit as muddy on this day). Anna, Roberta and Rob wore Wellies, but Terry and I ventured forth with just dress shoes–not recommended. We both managed to avoid the every amusing face-plant, however. . . barely.
We went to the Spaniard Inn where Keats was reportedly inspired to write "Ode to a Nightingale." We drank some ale and ate fish and chips and drank some more ale, and stout, and. . .now it gets a little vague. We headed back by a different, though equally beautiful and slippery path. Terry tried to talk Nancy into washing off the mud in a duck pond, but she was far too smart for that, knowing there was a perfectly good hot shower at home.
I thought it was time to go; I mean, I thought we had already imposed too much on Terry’s generosity. He insisted that we come in for more coffee and wine and singing-along to the best bits of some Fred Astaire movies. I should confess that I interpreted a quick "Would you care to?" as "insisting." Terry also explained the genius of Mae West with his ever unflagging enthusiasm.
Finally, we did have to depart to catch a late train back to Cambridge. It was a local with stops every five minutes, but I noticed that Rob and Roberta smiled all the way back as I’m sure did I.

The Bottle of Britain

On Friday, Robbie planned a trip to Duxford–about which I knew nothing. It’s a flatness about an hour by local bus from Cambridge. It had been an airfield during World Wars I and II, and now it is a war museum with bunches and bunches of planes. And Robbie (as he’ll be the first to tell ya) knows everything about this stuff.
So we walked around. . .a lot. . .and then some more.
Roberta stayed in Cambridge to shop.
I really did enjoy the day, but mainly because Robbie truly could explain everything.
However, I think my favorite single sighting was lunch.

Billingsley-Ely

Rob and Roberta came to the Cam just to visit me and play! The day they arrived from the States, I thought we should “take it easy.” But they rested only a little bit, and then we started walking. We ended up seeing most of the Old School sites as well as the City Centre. Roberta took account of all the shops; Robbie, of all the pubs.
It was Ash Wednesday, so after freshening up we attended evening services at King’s. I had planned to take about thirty minutes to get from Wolfson to King’s, which is normally about fifteen minutes extra. But Robbie doesn’t march double time. He promenades; no, he oozes along. Anyway, we arrived right on time though a painfully proper verger harumphed that we were “excessively tardy” as we entered.
The combined men’s and boy’s choir was singing. The introit was especially sublime; indeed, as the choir processed around the stalls, the acoustics of the chapel caused a celestial echo. Afterwards, we went to the Loch Fyne restaurant for a lovely fish dinner. . .true penance.
On Thursday, we headed to Ely. I thought we’d only be there for a couple of hours. But Roberta found all sorts of nooks and crannies I had missed. Sue, the docent at the cathedral, was especially sweet and deeply in love with her job. A quick lager down by the Greater Ouse (named after Robbie), and we headed back to Cambridge for Hall.
Formal Dinner with Rob and Roberta was the best yet even though we didn’t actually sit together. We were the guests of the English majors, and they adored the new Yanks. I warned Roberta about the never-ending wine; she’ll recover eventually. And Robbie actually wore a necktie!

Pure Dead Brilliant

Last Saturday I attended a symposium on "Textual Cultures" in Stirling, Scotland. I had been to Stirling Castle before, but only for a very brief visit while attending a conference at Glasgow. This was my first time both to see "the Uni" and to walk about the old town.

I tried to travel cheaply; the Scots would approve. So I booked a flight on Ryanair from Stansted to Glasgow. The website said the fare would be only one pence each way! But when I actually booked the flight it came to about sixty pounds with taxes and fees. The train through London would have taken eight hours with two connections and cost over a hundred pounds. My main mistake was flying to "Glasgow" which was really "Prestwick" which is really "MacTarmac" in the middle of County Nowhere by the Sea. So I still had to make two train connections, and the trip took about seven hours–mostly just waiting in the airport.
The conference itself was both fun and informative. The papers were all over the place from codicology to literacy, from legal restrictions on the sale of Satanic Verses in South Africa to. . .well my paper about a fifteenth-century poem by King James I of Scotland. . .which I gave in Scotland. . . and, ai, I do know the Scottish slang for "chutzpah," but it’s far too filthy to write in a blog that my mother may read.

Stirling itself is right on a fault line that marks the start of the Highlands. Controlling this pass across the Forth is "the key to the kingdom." The old rock itself is quite intoxicating to watch on a crisp bright day such as we had. The colors on the hills and the cloud shadows are hypnotic. OK, maybe it was the whisky too. Above us was the Wallace monument, below us the bridge and town. The campus buildings are all 60's-70's–love it/hate it–surrounding a small loch. Almost all the sites are connected by one long hallway, a pre-global warming design. The people are all very friendly albeit in a brusque and easily amused way. I’m embarrassed to say that I did find "Lallands" very difficult to understand sometimes. For example, I’m pretty sure that the homily given at St. Aloysius in Glasgow on Sunday was about "repentance" and not about "rape and tuppence."

Well, well, well.

Well, like I said, I really don’t have much to report this term. I’m spending way too much time on footnotes and a bibliography. I have gone to several lectures, mainly just to get out of my room. The sun is low. It’s hardly winter, just a nasty Fall. I overheard some students refer to this time of year as “suicidal term.”So, when another walk-about was announced for last Sunday I was ready to leave on Friday. Our destination was to be Nine Wells, the source of Cambridge’s potable water in days of yore.
It was quite long walk and muddy, and the scenery was rather non-descript and muddy; we crossed chartered fields and railroad tracks and mud.
But the company and conversation were wonderful. None of the locals really knows much about Nine Wells. They think it’s sort of yonder, like the Gog and Magog hills which are “not far” but not clearly “there” either.
I had dreams of trekking upstream to the haunted fountainhead of some Brythonic mere.
Not so much.
We realized we had arrived at Nine Wells only when we found the small sign. Our ultimate destination was quite literally a whole in the ground. . .and muddy.

Hardly the “fontanone del Gianicolo.”

The sun came out on the way back. Lunch was simple and convivial. And then back to my still flowing flood of footnotes.