Jonathan Miller 1934-2019

Science is not a blasphemy; the wilful rejection of its insights is.

I only met him once, but he stands tall among the handful of people whose words and works have significantly shaped my life.

His gentle voice, visibly reaching for, and then using, exactly the right words, with characteristic flailing arms to emphasise the point, was unique, commanding and magnificently engaging.

I last saw him in London some years ago describing, amongst other things, a recent conversation that he’d had with his son about the absolute number of war dead in successive centuries. Of all topics!. His curiosity was boundless. He articulated thoughts so well and produced analogies and metaphors to help explain even the most abstract point.

Rest well, sir.

Autumn

Some days the season just comes into its own. Earlier today, for example:

A few live performances…

Eddie Izzard in Manchester was even better than Eddie Izzard in Birmingham earlier in the year.

Jonathan Pie was good value.

Jools Holland and the band were excellent…and Ruby always gives 100%.

Al Stewart was just brilliant. He’s not there but I promise you he was. Really.

And it was great to see and laugh with Tim Minchin again after all too long.

This year…

In a break with tradition there won’t be any Christmas letter going out with Xmas cards this time. You’re wondering why? Or maybe not. It has to be better for the environment, amirite? Also, it’ll nudge me into providing more content here and then there’s a choice whether to read it rather than it just flopping out of the envelope onto your cornflakes.

Meanwhile, back to watching the original of The Spy Who Came in From the Cold. Burton always had such a wonderful presence.

The Fire at Betley Court

It's very saddening to see rooms I played in as a kid reduced to ashes. I have looked at that front view from the gardens so many times as I was growing up.

Betley Court was my playground. We lived in one of the flats next to the Clock Tower: No. 2. My friend Nigel lived in No.1, the ground floor flat below. We spent so many hours playing together in The Dingle next to the gardens, making dens and damming up streams. We played in the large walled kitchen garden, much the consternation of Mr Mulliner, the gardner. We played on the rolling lawns under the Cedar of Lebanon and watched croquet, archery and cricket competitions between the patients who were rehabilitating there.

We climbed the massive piles of coke stored in the yard, waiting to be taken by wheelbarrow to feed the furnaces that were used to heat the place in winter and to provide year-round hot water. We drove our tricycles in races around the paths interweaving the servant’s quarters and outbuildings.

Occasionally, we were allowed into Miss Finney’s Office, entering through the French windows at the centre of the ground floor where the patient’s dining room was, and turning right through the panelled corridor in front of the massive staircase into the large corner room with the great bay windows. Miss Finney was the matron; a diminutive and impeccably polite woman wearing a crisp dark blue uniform and her grey hair in a tight bun beneath her white cap.

Almost everything inside that building was wood. Floors, roof supports, wall panelling, stairs, furniture - everything.

A terrible day for the village and, more particularly, for those who've lost everything. I'm so sorry for those poor people, the community and the fabric of the village.

23rd August 2019 will be a day remembered for a very very long time to come.

Backfill #2

Copenhagen Summer Jazz Festival was again blessed with (fairly) good weather and, although my stay was only a short one, I took in lots of concerts in several very different venues

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Then it was back home and straight down to Cornwall where, again, we were spoilt with 5 days of lovely weather and gloriously relaxing places to visit, eat and drink.

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That’s a shot from Smeaton’s Pier at dusk as they’re landing the lobsters.

I can recommend all of these:

Porthmeor Beach Café [book a booth well in advance and watch the sun go down)

The Mex

The Seafood Cafe

Peppers Pasta & Pizzaria

The Firehouse Bar & Grill - they say they have >240 gins available and I actually believe them. I asked for one of my favourites, Sacred Gin, not widely known outside London. They replied “Which one would you like?” Impressive. Book a window table upstairs and watch the New Year’s Eve fireworks - oh, wait, that was last year (and will be again this year as it happens).

We found the Lost Gardens of Heligan - they are about an hour’s drive from St. Ives and so worth a visit.

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I’ll add a bit more about Cornwall in the next post.

Backfill #3

Cornish sunsets are the best:

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And Mousehole is one of the prettiest villages ever:

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Backfill #1

I’ve been to London a few times - once to an office with a great view

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That’s my view of Brexit, right there ————>>

Another time, I took in an Edvard Munch exhibition at the British Museum This guy took a bit of finding…but there he was:

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Then a short visit to Copenhagen.

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The metro trains are driverless so I always fight viciously with all the little kids waiting on the platform at the airport stop so that I can get the front seat.

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We went to see/hear a concert at the Royal Arena. My first visit there - and what a delightful venue to grace such a wonderful concert.

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Mark Knopfler getting up under those coloured lights to do his thing..

We enjoyed a little wine and took a walk in the park.

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I’d be back in Denmark for the Jazz Festival within two weeks, to see my friends Otto and Bent, but before that it was back home and up to London again for an important day in the City reflecting on the importance of the UN Sustainable Development Goals and the role that industry has in ensuring that we deliver them. The expression on my face might suggest it wasn’t such a good day, but it truly was.

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Betley Local History Society

I should have mentioned this before - I’ve been a committee member for the Betley Local History Society (BLHS) for over a year now. You can find out more about us here. We organise regular talks and occasional visits and exhibitions.

There’s also a blog where, in addition to posting about topics that, I hope, are of general information for our members, I also try to capture some of the flavour of those talks and presentations that I attend.

Having grown up in Betley, and now taking a little time to reminisce about the place and the people who lived there, makes my involvement with BLHS that much more important.

Brain surgery

There's a subject line you don't write very often.

I'm trying to get back into reading for pleasure. Reading almost exclusively for work over the years, and reading newspaper columns (even well written ones) has taken so much time… now I need to relearn the pleasure of just getting lost in a book.

I've just finished Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death and Brain Surgery by Henry Marsh. Here's what I thought about it:

A haunting and powerful read that eloquently relays, contextualises and describes the human side of being a brain surgeon. You need particular character traits to stick with that job and Henry's narrative is both gripping and profound yet rarely over-emotional. How else could you cope with the kinds of discussions you need to have day in and day out in that line of work? Yet the book is uplifting in so many ways, and the author's stories and self-descriptions in harrowing situations, both personal and professional, will stay with me for a long time. It's a very good book.

Liverpool M&S Arena

Liverpool had a party last weekend when The Reds, crowned as Champions of Europe the evening before, enjoyed an open-topped bus parade through the city on a sunny Sunday afternoon. We, however, had rolled into the city to find the Q-Park multistorey behind John Lewis, eat at Wahaca’s and bop around to Mumford & Sons. They didn’t disappoint. Take a bow Marcus:

Update

Nothing has changed - the mantra associated with Theresa May - should no longer be repeated, at least by her, after yesterday’s departure. The next few months promise to be rough on those of us who feel democracy is not best served by allowing our future course to be dictated by swivel-eyed rhetoric from Tory leadership hopefuls as they try to compete in their increasingly fraught race-to-the-Farage end of the party, seeking to appease around 100,000 mainly old white men who have the final say in the run off ballot.

And don’t get me started on Corbyn; just don’t.

In other news I had a lovely trip to Copenhagen in the Spring - here’s Tolboden in the sunshine.

I’ve been to London a few times - look…

I’ve spent time in committees at the Royal Society of Chemistry, including starting work on a review of the Chartered Chemist professional status which will take place over the next 12-18 months.

Here’s an eager audience awaiting one of my gripping talks there:

I’ve walked around Bathpool Park many times, but not many enough to make any serious impression on my gently expanding waistline.

Monthly visits to Rode Hall Farmer’s Market provides the ideal excuse to take a look around the gardens and watch the seasons changing.

It’s pouring with rain today but there have been a few sunny mornings to enjoy:

The annual visit to the laburnum arch at Bodnant Garden never disappoints:

It also provides the perfect excuse to spend some time in Conwy - a town that has vivid memories of all the days I spent there as a child when on holiday in nearby Llandudno with my mum and dad.

Grasmere

A warm sunny contrast to yesterday’s showers, Grasmere is resplendent in spring greenery and blue bluebellry.  

Grasmere from Allan Bank

Bluebells near to Rydal Water

Maybe I should try live-blogging in the sunshine more often  😊

Xmas 2018

As in previous years, if you’ve been spared the annual Christmas newsletter in the inevitably too-small-enveloped card, here’s a recap of some of the things I got up to last year:

The most important bit first - this year was marked by a very special occasion - Mark married Brittany. It was a fairy-tale wedding ceremony in a  castle by Lake Garda on a beautiful sunny day in late September. Welcome to the wider Skerratt family Britt - you and Mark will have many, many happy years together. This, I know.

That’s my Christmas present, right there.

As for me…I’m still on the committee of the Local Section of the Royal Society of Chemistry, and I write this on the way home from chairing a meeting of the RSC’s Environmental Chemistry Group. I also managed to find my way onto the committee of the RSC Water Science Forum and the Energy, Sustainability and Environment Division. If that wasn’t enough, I’m also an elected member of the RSC Professional Affairs Board. Yep, seems I’m all in on the RSC at the moment. Don’t tell them, but I’ve moonlighted carrying out some professional body licence reviews for the Science Council and I’m also now a member of their Registration Authority. I also reviewed a couple of interesting legal cases for the Environment Agency which kept me busy...but not too busy to continue working with the Nantwich Museum Research Group and the Betley Local History Society. The former is interesting because Nantwich is a lovely old market town with an interesting history, & Betley is where I grew up. Membership of the latter also gave me an excuse to go to spend a wonderful summer’s afternoon at Betley Show for the first time in donkey’s years.

Lucky with the lovely weather for an all-too-short holiday in beautiful Cornwall and a couple of energetic weekends tramping around charming Grasmere in the Lake District, R&R-time was immeasurably enriched by the annual visit to the splendiferous laburnum arch at Bodnant Garden which was in full bloom at the end of May when we dropped by. Go and see it; it’s amazing.

Less jet-setting from me this year - must be my age! The annual visit to the summertime Copenhagen Jazz Festival, and a flying visit in April to a concert at the Jazzhus renewed old friendships and left First Direct aghast at the amount of money I could spend in Copenhagen restaurants in 72 hours. A glorious visit to N. Italy at the end of April to see the fruit blossom, sample the vino and stock up on olive oil, balsamic vinegar, Parmigiano-Reggiano and speck was bettered in September with the most wonderful of weeks in Malcesine for the wedding. 

Seen and heard during the year…in January we went to see Harry Potter & the Cursed Child - a truly brilliant production and worth buying tickets for well over a year in advance. Also, if you’re ever close to Piccadilly Circus and feel hungry, seek out Brasserie Zédel and enjoy the great food, reasonable (for London) prices and amazing décor. I must make a note not to start buying tickets for things too far in advance…says he, having just purchased tix for an Elton John gig in Nov. 2020. He’s on my bucket list, OK? I also had a lovely evening reminiscing during the Barclay James Harvest 50th anniversary gig in May - they were one of the first bands I ever saw live and that was back in 1971. They were so good I went to see them again a few times over the next year or two but fell out of the habit, so it was wonderful to catch up.

Other (separate) memorable evenings spent with Don McLean, Paul Simon, Ralph McTell and Jools Holland rounded out my musical treats during 2018.

Just before Christmas last year a local National Trust property - Dunham Massey - transformed their large gardens with a Christmas light show. Spectacular and magical, so good was it that a follow up visit this year is booked.

I laughed all the way through separate evenings with Bill Bailey and Dara O’Briain, two of the funniest and most talented entertainers around. Either can lift my spirits and carry me through the most turbulent times. Speaking of which, I went on my first demo in 47 years when, along with 700,000 other assorted citizens of nowhere, we marched in the sunshine for a People’s Vote. If you’re a Brit, whatever your views on Europe and whatever political changes have taken place between me writing this and you reading it - which could indeed be profound, we probably deserve a day or two’s respite over Christmas. So let’s do that.

Whatever happened to...

 ...well, whatever happened to ‘me’ really. I’ve been a mixture of busy and lazy for the last 6 months. No excuses.

The Xmas letter is currently being written and I’ll post it on here later in the month. It’s a short one this year - there’s been a lot of stuff that’s happened but I can’t bring myself to believe that, as time moves on and in the current political climate, you’d be too interested in me recapping each of my pretty sunsets in distant lands.

Much will happen during the next couple of weeks that will dictate our country’s direction of travel for years to come. Whatever happens, it’s likely that we’ll be stuck with our Remainer and Leaver labels for the rest of my life and a bit longer besides.

All very depressing and un-Christmassy...and our politicians continue to play parlour games.

History will not treat most of them kindly.

The Colonel's Walk at Rode Hall

A returning Wilbraham, home from the Crimean War, must have gained immense pleasure in later life from walking along this avenue at Rode Hall. It's like being in another world at this time of year - the scent, the sounds [the hum amplified by the hidden bee hive half-way down on the left!] and the dappled sunlight through the yellow canopy.

I could get my step count in just walking backwards and forwards :)

May already (the month not the robot)

After last night's thunderstorm, today promises to be an unbelievably warm and sunny second May Bank Holiday in England. There's a specialist plant fair being held just down the road so that'll need checking out.

In other news, chairing some licence reviews for the Science Council at the Association for Science Education, the British Society of Soil Science, the Royal Society of Biology, the Institution of Environmental Sciences and the all-embracing Institute of Mathematics and its Applications has kept me busy over recent months. Committee meetings at the Royal Society of Chemistry for the Environmental Chemistry Group and the Water Science Forum filled in a few of the other blank days. I also fitted in a site visit to Swanage - the last time I was rhere was with my mum and dad about 55 years ago. I bet it hasn’t changed much although, these days, I can barely remember places that I went to last week let alone when I was a kid.

Attending a meeting in Exeter gave me the perfect excuse for a long train journey and a first visit to the city centre. The area around the cathedral is very pretty.

There was also a really nice Moroccan restaurant there too...well, in Exeter what else would you eat?

I splurged on a trip to Copenhagen to catch up with two old friends and listen to Kenny Barron play the piano. Always a pleasure - here's a picture of his feet - 2 belong to Kenny and 1 belongs to a friend.

This year I managed to time a very long weekend in the S. Tyrol so I hit the fruit trees at peak blossom.

Just wonderful.

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Some of my favourite music on a Monday evening

It's probably some of my favourite music anytime really but what's a headline between friends. Here's what I listened to this evening...

The East German government of the time got waaaaay more than it bargained for when Bruce was invited to perform:

https://youtu.be/WBIcfPBVxxQ

He played to a gazillion people in East Berlin the year before The Wall came down. Just look at the pride in his body language singing Dylan's Chimes of Freedom...and it may be just my romantic sense of nostalgia but there seems to be a real sense of urgency coming through from the crowd.

Needless to say he gets an ovation :) And this performance helped inspire young people to make a change. And that was remarkable then, and it will for ever be so.

Next up is Lindisfarne. I saw them live once in the mid-70s. Wonderful gig...I remember us singing along and dancing together to songs like this:

https://youtu.be/Z9QjyTAxPMs

'I've made some mistakes,

Had my share of the breaks'

Indeed I have...

Then there's Elton & Bernie's Sacrifice. Turns out he recorded this in Denmark where, coincidentally, I shall be at the end of this week.

Here he is doing it solo...well, ok, it's a smart piano but I still think it's brilliant.

https://youtu.be/RLFJARmnBvg

Speaking of Denmark, I still get the shivers hearing Procol Harum's Gary Brooker's voice in these opening lines, sung with such feeling:

https://youtu.be/St6jyEFe5WM

Only in Denmark would you have a full orchestra and a breathtaking open air venue in which to enjoy a song like this... but we'll have to make do with YouTube.

Cat Stevens made the best love song ever:

https://youtu.be/wsk5MJeV5Qc

A lovely feel-good song that's always guaranteed to make me smile from Kenny Loggins & Jim Messina:

https://youtu.be/nqayWZN0zLA

'Count all the bees in the hive,

Chase all the clouds from the sky'

The best outro ever is this masterpiece from Mark Knopfler:

https://youtu.be/Uf9ANwp1LcM

It takes you from quiet soulful melancholy, through aching anticipation, to total ecstasy in less than 5 minutes. Quite an achievement.

Alan Clark's piano stirs the soul in the finale but look at the way drummer Terry Williams deals with that monster kit from 6:46 in to the end. Just heroic. You can see him say, just before the final note, "Effin' good one'. Couldn't agree more.

And just in case you were in any doubt, here's another version:

https://youtu.be/k7eRGKJKVB8

Perfection.

Finland and I

I can still remember the first visit I made to Finland, with a work colleague, over 25 years ago. That was before the Finns joined the EU and I would get my passport stamped at immigration when we arrived in Helsinki.

We left Manchester in the afternoon light and arrived in the cold, dark Helsinki night. I had no idea what to expect. Within 2 hours of landing I had learned that there were big, comfortable Mercedes and Volvo taxis with the latest satnavs and one truly excellent hotel that I've subsequently returned to many times.

I know now that they do have other excellent hotels too :)

I've made some very good friends in Finland over the years and I’ve been well schooled in the country's complex and convoluted history.

In the depths of winter even the Finns struggle when there's no snow to reflect the light and brighten the place up a little. The few days that I was there at the end of last year were so grey and so bleak, it was such a welcome relief when it began to snow.

Back in Helsinki after 2 days in Hämenlinna it snowed some more, and I wandered around the city doing touristy stuff like I was Bill Bryson.

It'll be nice to be back there when the days are longer.

Some pictures...

Smoked garlic...

A nice sunset... 

A bendy building... 

A cool reflection... 

Another one... 

Swanage - which, coincidentally, is where I'm off to on Monday...