I Could Murder a Pint

The Murderers Public HouseNorwich is blessed with a wealth of hostelries to quench the thirst and chew the cud, but few are as famous as the Gardener’s Arms on Timberhill, one of the last family-owned pubs in the city. Partly dating back to the Seventeenth Century, the traditional ale house is stuffed with oldee worldee nooks and crannies, knotty oak beams and exposed brickwork. Its fame derives from an infamous past. The Gardener’s Arms might be the pub’s licensed name but, for years, it’s been known locally as the Murderers. Why? Because after closing time one late night in 1895, Frank Miles battered his estranged wife with a hammer and left poor Mildred for dead. Handy Frankie should have swung for his dastardly deed but the case attracted huge public sympathy and his death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. What had the luckless Millie done to deserve such a sticky end? Apparently, she was seen with another fella. Oh, that’s alright then.

Murderer's Pub

Jack the Lab Rat

With Norwich covered in a blanket of low grey cloud, the much anticipated solar eclipse was a bit of a damp squib – more like God just dimmed the lights than a biblical black out. Hardly a spectacle to drive the ignorant to their knees. Still, I did sense a fleeting cold snap. Spooky.

I was up and out early for my appointment at the docs that morning. Following my arterial rebore last summer, the local surgery had invited me to be poked and prodded by five pairs of second year medical students from the University of East Anglia. It was revision time, just before their exams. I was the star turn and was more than happy to do my bit for medical science. The apprentice quacks grappled with inexperience and dodgy equipment and tried to find a pulse in my right leg. It would have been easier to find El Dorado. The poor things hadn’t been told about my condition beforehand but despite the frustration and head scratching, they turned out to be a cheery and dedicated lot. I’m sure they’ll all be a great credit to public health one day.

By the time I’d left the medical centre, the clouds had been replaced by warm bright sunshine. Typical. If God wants to see me on my knees, she’ll have to do better next time.

Here’s one she made earlier…

Solar Eclipse

Chasing the Dragon

In 2013, we had gorillas in our midst. Last year it was the elephant parade and for 2015 it’s Go Go Dragons. Expect to chase the technicolor creatures along the Norwich dragon trail this June. Now call me a party pooper if you want, but I thought the purpose of these campaigns was to highlight the desperate plight of endangered animals. The last time I looked, dragons, unicorns and centaurs, fun and fantastic as they may be, don’t actually exist. I know, shut it, Jack. The kids will love it.

Dragon

Through the Round Window

For weeks now, a flock of starlings has been ebbing and flowing in the skies above Norwich. Every evening, at dusk. I took a few snaps from the loft with the Nokia.

Yes, I know. They don’t really capture the magnificence of the mumurating birds (that’s what they do, apparently). You had to be there. So, here’s something someone made earlier.

Bewitched

The CrucibleMaddermarket Theatre Blue PlaqueA damp and dingy Saturday afternoon saw us at the Maddermarket Theatre for an am-dram matinee courtesy of the Norwich Players. We were Maddermarket virgins and I fancied a peek at the converted Catholic chapel. A striking Sixties’ add-on foyer looked better on the outside and led us to the interior of the church, reconfigured as an Elizabethan playhouse. We took our pews for The Crucible, Arthur Miller’s loud and densely scripted account of the Salem Witch Trials in colonial Massachusetts at the end of the Seventeenth Century. I looked around the audience. Many of them could well have sailed on the Mayflower. By now, we’re used to mingling with the grey herd at Norwich’s cultural events, but the care homes of Norfolk must have been deserted that afternoon. When the over-generous use of dry ice to create the misty ambience of a midnight glade threatened to gas the first four rows, I feared some of the punters might not make it back to the coach.

Maddermarket Theatre

Miller’s now iconic play is a story of rampant fundamentalism, ignorance and the abuse of power. Mass hysteria is whipped up to impose religious orthodoxy and settle old scores. Miller wrote the piece as an allegory of Fifties’ McCarthyism when the U.S. government hounded and blacklisted alleged communists (and socialists and liberals and anyone else who didn’t tow the party line). Sound familiar? Just take a look around the world. The play’s core message is just as relevant today as it was then. The talented thespians did well to deliver the difficult drama with conviction leaving us with the real sense of a menacing world gone completely bonkers. Sadly, the message was all lost on a few. As we queued to leave the auditorium at the end of the performance, an old Norfolk broad turned to her companion and announced:

“Didn’t understand a word of it. Not a word. Marvelous, wasn’t it?’

Jihadi Janes

Death

With the remorseless horror in the Middle East being played out on our screens every day at 6pm, it’s hard to make sense of the senseless. The baffling case of the school girls who have allegedly travelled to Syria to become brides of ISIS only adds to my bewilderment. Sometimes, it takes humour to wade through the treacle – the British funny bone is a cultural characteristic forged by wartime adversity and a healthy disrespect for the respectable. Cue a recent Facebook exchange with a Bodrum Belle of my acquaintance.

“Hello, Jack, now where’s this new book of yours? Got myself a little girlie spa holiday booked to get away from frozen Bodrum. I need something to read so get printing. Bodrum is seriously cold this winter. Roll on spring. Me and a few gals are off to Egypt, and very cheap it is too, all 5 star inclusive tackiness. Why so cheap? Because the British Government says it’s unsafe and advises not to go. Well that doesn’t hold these gals down. If we do get taken as Jihadi brides, at least we can say we’re used to the heat.”

“Hello, love. The book’s with the designer. It’s not just thrown together, you know. Make sure you pack some sheets – just in case you need to wrap yourself in polycotton for the wedding. You’ll forgive me if I turn down the invitation to your nuptials…”

Who’s the Daddy?

When I first started this blogging lark way back in 2010, I began to attract cyber-friends from across the blogosphere. Yankee repat, Charles Ayres, was one of them. Right from the off, Charles was a great supporter of my literary pretensions (blog and book) and was one of the first to review Perking the Pansies. He’s one of those virtual pals I know I would enjoy getting drunk with in the real world.

Charles published his own expat story, Impossibly Glamorous in 2013 and has now followed this up with a sequel, ‘San Francisco Daddy’ under the name Charles St Anthony (he thinks it sounds like a posh Yves Saint Laurent scent; it reminds me of a cheap hairdresser I once dallied with). Here’s what I made of it…

San Francisco DaddyCharles St Anthony used to be big in Japan. That was until that earthquake in 2011 which proved that Mother Nature was the bigger bitch. So what did Charles do? Kicked off his heels and chucked himself down the evacuation slide. Inexplicably drawn to tectonic faults, he parachuted into San Francisco. While waiting for the Next Big One, he wrote his brilliant autobiography, Impossibly Glamorous, keeping the wolves from the door with a series of less than glamorous dead end jobs. Gay men never grow old they just grow body hair and Charles joined the party by ditching the waxing and growing the whiskers. Transformed into a ‘bear’, he embarked on a series of romantic liaisons as dead end as the dead end jobs. San Francisco Daddy: One Gay Man’s Chronicle of His Adventures in Life and Love, is Charles’ brutally honest account of his tales of the city. Charles has lost none of his well-honed observational skills or self-deprecating caustic wit. The book is a delight to read. Did Charles land the dream job and the dream man in the end? You’ll have to download San Francisco Daddy to find out.

 

Check out San Francisco Daddy on…

KindleUK

KindleUS

And the Winner Is…

The-Theory-Of-Everything1It’s Oscars night and the smart money’s on Eddie Redmayne as Best Actor for his extraordinary portrayal of scientist Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything. Part love story, part biopic, we saw the film last month and were utterly mesmerised; by the performances, by the score and by the story. Hawking, everyone’s favourite cosmologist, was diagnosed with motor neuron disease at the hopeful age of 21 when he was a rising star at Cambridge. He was given two years to live. He’s now 73 and his place in the heavens is assured. As for Redmayne, he is Hawking’s doppelganger and when he smiles, the entire screen lights up. What kind of cinematic trickery is that?

My Letter to Özgecan

Maybe, just maybe, something positive will emerge from this.

Jane Gundogan's avatarjaneyinmersin

I never had the pleasure of meeting you Özgecan.  I never had the chance to hear you laugh with your friends or sing along to your favorite tune.  No I did not know you at all but I know you now.  Your name will forever be etched into my heart and into the hearts of millions of others here in Turkey and around the world who woke on Valentine’s Day, the day of romance, to the sickening news of your death at the hands of a monster.  We are shocked beyond words hearing of your suffering and of knowing that the simple task of stepping on a bus is no longer safe here in Mersin.

Aslan

What happened to you happens to other women every day, all over the world.  Whether it is in New Delhi or Melbourne monsters can be found everywhere.  But with your death comes the news that tens of thousands…

View original post 329 more words

Death Duties

PensionEvery so often, Liam whips out his abacus for a fiscal review. Nothing gets Liam’s juices flowing quite like a multi-coloured spreadsheet and a rub of his crystal ball. As we edge ever closer to our incontinence years, Liam has decided that this year’s theme should be death and the hereafter, to make sure all our ducks are lined up in a neat row should the unspeakable happen. I’ve parked a reasonable pension courtesy of my long career as a municipal bean counter and I plan to draw it at 60. The beer-bottle budget isn’t quite enough to support our Champagne tastes but it should prevent the need to turn a few tricks for the living dead down the day centre. But what would happen if I dropped off my perch in the meantime? Well, here’s the thing. Through a bureaucratic fluke, Liam would come into a small fortune. When I caught him fingering the chicken wire at B&Q, I knew he wasn’t contemplating Eggs Benedict. I could hear him thinking ‘I wonder how I could string this across the top of the stairs?’