Our family’s 2005 attempt to celebrate our father’s birthday led to the organisation of a Curmudgeon Conference, backed up by solid market research and pricked by a porcupine …
Continue reading “Qurmudgeonly Questionnaire”Qurmudgeonly Questionnaire
A Tolerable Toast – Burns’ Night
Caledonian Club, London, 11 February 2005
Your Excellencies, Distinguished Guests, Lords and Ladies, Highlanders and Rabbie-like Lowlanders, Waiters and Waitresses, … and uhm, ahh yes, native English people. Continue reading “A Tolerable Toast – Burns’ Night”
Francophilia – Selected Translation Tidbits from Le Royal Tour
Selected Translation Tidbits
from Le Royal Tour Restaurant menu by the Eiffel Tower, 23 Avenue La Bourdonnais, 75007 Paris, France, +33 1 45 51 38 04
All entries are absolutely true – heck you couldn’t make this up – i.e. the first line is the French, the second was the restaurant’s translation, the third in brackets is a helpful, cultural interpretation (all right, perhaps they were my comments).
Continue reading “Francophilia – Selected Translation Tidbits from Le Royal Tour”Barging About In The Solent
[This article was published by Yachting World, on the official Cowes site (www.cowesweek.co.uk) – Monday 4 Aug 2003]
Barge matches date back to the late 1700s, even if their meetings were not known by that name then, but it took until 2000 for this particularly challenging form of sail racing to make an appearance within Skandia Cowes Week.
Continue reading “Barging About In The Solent”Teach Yourself Germlish Racing On A J-24
Lesson 1 – On the Boat/An Bord
Continue reading “Teach Yourself Germlish Racing On A J-24”Dropping The Hook To Win The Race
[This article was published on the official Cowes site (www.cowesweek.co.uk) – Monday 5 Aug 2002]
Continue reading “Dropping The Hook To Win The Race”Middle Aged, Middle Of The Fleet, And Loving It – Kiel Week 2002 (Kieler Woche)
Sailors are only young once – for this sailor it’s once a year at Kiel Week.
Continue reading “Middle Aged, Middle Of The Fleet, And Loving It – Kiel Week 2002 (Kieler Woche)”Racing With The Settees, The Kids, And A Roaring Fire
[originally published by “Yachting World,” IPC Media, Spring 2002 online]
“Free the wang (sic)”, “keep the horse clear (ditto)”, “babies below (what?)” and “shall I serve lunch before the next tack (yes!)” are not the sort of phrases one expects to hear during a race. However, this is fairly common racing patter in the midst of a barge match. Races of enormous, graceful classic boats haven’t left Britain since last summer’s wonderful J-Class events; after 158 years Thames sailing barge matches are here to stay. Many people don’t realise that the oldest continuous racing after the America’s Cup (1851) is the Thames Match every year from Gravesend round a mark off Southend and back (1863).
Continue reading “Racing With The Settees, The Kids, And A Roaring Fire”Fifty Ways To Cut Your Mustard
Those who know me, know my weakness:
“The problem is all inside your bread”, she said to me,
Continue reading “Fifty Ways To Cut Your Mustard”