My hairdresser is great. He remembers me. I go once a year in December and as he said today “It wouldn’t be Christmas, if you weren’t here.” So true. My hair grows really slowly and the cut is generally good for 9 months and not great for three.
I had my annual haircuts today and despite my very best efforts he would not at all take off as much as I wanted. It’s grand but I wouldn’t call it a huge change. I’ll have to go back to him in July. Sigh.
My cleaner asked me this morning whether we would be getting a Christmas tree this weekend. “Certainly not,” said I, “it would be dead by Christmas let alone January 6 (statutory day for taking down your Christmas decorations etc. I will brook no argument in this regard).”
“I wouldn’t think so,” she said, “your house is so cold.”
On Sunday the parish priest said that for the next 12 months we will be praying for one vocation in Dublin. Yes, one. Setting our ambition level low, I see. I wonder would it help not to cut out half of the potential candidates?
The Trinity Christmas tree was lit this evening. I left work a bit early to be at the front gate where I had arranged to meet husband and one child at 5.30. Chaos ensued: child turned out to be at a lecture; husband was carried away by the crowd; rain lashed with real enthusiasm; the Trinity choir tried some challenging numbers instead of going for crowd pleasers; of the anticipated mulled wine and mince pies there was no sign (to be fair, my expectations were low on that front anyhow, were they planning to feed the 5,000?).
“Feeling Christmassy?” asked Mr. Waffle when we eventually found each other. We went to find our own cup of tea. The Westin had an event in the atrium and directed us to a noisy pub downstairs; the Palace Bar was heaving (full of men in suits drinking pints); the Joy of Cha, despite indications otherwise on the internet, was closed. We cycled home in the rain and I lost my hat of which I am very fond (herself models the hat below in a shot from this time last year, idle to deny that it looks a lot better on her than me). When we got home I went back to the shed to cycle in to try to find the lost hat but then I got a work call which I dealt with in the shed (glamour) and then somehow, I’d lost the will to retrace my steps.
However, when I finally got home, as part of my gradual Christmas prep, I got out my Spode ware and found my Christmas tablecloths and tea towels (“Oh my favourite Christmas tea towel,” I exclaimed as it emerged from where it had been nestling since last January. I am now the kind of person who has a favourite Christmas tea towel, apparently.) Mr. Waffle turned on Christmas FM, lit a fire and made me a cup of tea. Perhaps I am feeling a little bit Christmassy after all. You?
Updated to add:
Look what I found this morning!
My brother came to stay and gave out to me about our (tiny) CD collection. “It’s all on Spotify,” he said reprovingly, “You should throw out those CDs”. I wouldn’t say that he is the king of organisation himself so this was particularly annoying. Yesterday afternoon, I went through all the CDs and put them in alphabetical order (this is how I get my kicks) and I found ones I hadn’t thought of, let alone listened to, in years. Since then I’ve had them on rotation on the CD player which I am enjoying very much. Over the years Mr. Waffle’s tastes and mine have merged in many areas but I would have to say that his CD choices have stood the test of time (Ben Folds) better than mine (Emilia); still I am enjoying both the cool and the naff music choices. It’s somehow much more satisfying than waiting for the Spotify algorithm to throw out something.
Since Covid we have had the Irish Times delivered to the house daily; it’s pricey but I love it. And all my children are more or less on top of the vanishing art of how to turn the pages of a broadsheet newspaper. Middle child was reading the paper one day and said to me, I paused at that article and I thought, “Oh no, my algorithm will send me loads of related content on this but then I realised that I could safely pause anywhere.” Time permitting we all flick through the paper in the morning and pick up yesterday’s news (you are always 24 hours behind everyone else, if you get the news from the paper, I am afraid). Mr. Waffle does the cryptic crossword, I do the Sudoku; each to his own. The Irish Times has just announced a price increase and Mr. Waffle is inclined to jack it in but I am arguing for its retention. I’ll keep you posted on developments.
Anyway, I was pretty pleased to come across this podcast in praise of the analogue world (though the definition of analogue is broader than most people would allow and the title of the episode – Everyone Online is Going Analog – does raise some questions); maybe daily newspapers will outlive me after all. What’s that? Did I send the podcast to my brother? You betcha.
Did I tell you about when Mr. Waffle and I went to Cambridge to visit herself earlier in the year? I did not. Well now, here’s something for you to look forward to. It was in March but look, we’re scraping the bottom of the barrel here content wise (I can hear my father spinning in his grave at this terrible construction but here we are).
Friday, 14 March 2025
There was rugby in Rome the weekend we were travelling. At the airport Mr. Waffle and I ran into not one, not two, but three people we knew: one off to the rugby; one going to a party in Cornwall; and one, like us, going to London. This last was the son of my mother’s friend from college and he was always a bit charming and feckless. This may have been why he and his wife were on stand by for the flight they were taking with their two teenagers. It all worked out in the end. It always does for the charming but feckless in my experience.
Mr. Waffle and I traveled with laptops and had to do a bit of work when we arrived. Were we pleased? We were not.
There was a formal dinner arranged in the Princess’s college for Patrick’s day and I was filled with pride when she got up at the drinks at start of the evening and read – in Irish – the poem that begins “Anois Teacht an Earraigh”; it’s a poem I love and her grandmother loved it too. She explained to the audience about wandering bards and how this poem would have been recited all over Ireland and now, she said, it’s come to Cambridge. My mother would have been delighted.
Herself had become great buddies with a guy from Cork and on chatting to him I discovered that he had gone to the primary school where my cousin had been headmaster for many years. Rather charmingly when we established this link, he said in awe struck tones “You know Mr. K?”. He obviously felt unable, even at that distance, to bandy around Mr. K’s first name as I had been doing so recklessly.
Look at me filled with delight dining with my firstborn (I am wearing my sail – our hotel offered bikes for guests and they were handy but I did worry slightly that I might take flight on my way to dinner).
Saturday 15, March 2025
We went on a punt. It was shockingly expensive and the young woman powering the punt, though very strong given her willowy frame, was distressingly ignorant about the sights. We were able to get the gist from other guides on nearby punts but not as good somehow.
We went to Fitzbillies, a popular Cambridge tea room. Fine but nothing to write home about in my view. There is a really lovely cafe where I always went for breakfast with herself on my visits and we definitely graced that with our presence at some point but, sadly, if you were thinking of visiting yourself, I cannot now summon its name to mind.*
Herself knowing my love of a good cemetery took us to a lovely one.
One of the Edgeworths is buried there (a sister of the better known Maria). A long way from home.
We checked out the Princess’s room. She did a great job of decorating it notwithstanding some challenges, the most serious of which was the quantity of furniture (particularly tables) which the university authorities provided with the room and which could not be removed for complex and doubtless administratively understandable reasons.
Sunday 16 March, 2025
Herself took us to Mass. It was very long and enthusiastic. There was an excellent sermon on a papal encyclical sent to America in which, to quote from Wikipedia “the pope addressed a heresy that he called Americanism and expressed his concern that the Catholic Church in the United States should guard against American values of liberalism and pluralism undermining the doctrine of the Church”. I mean, some of us felt that the topic choice was a bit tactless given that next up was some innocent young American woman telling us about the church’s charity work but ok.
After lunch we walked to Grantchester. My mother-in-law used to enjoy quoting the last couplet from Rupert Brooke’s The Old Vicarage, Grantchester “Stands the Church clock at ten to three?/And is there honey still for tea?” When we got there the clock did indeed stand at ten to three which was very gratifying.
I only took a picture after our cup of tea and the clock stands at five past four and I seem to have included some large bins in shot. Somehow, life never is as romantic as poetry. I mean, look, apparently Jeffrey Archer lives in the old vicarage now. Incidentally, whoever wrote the Wikipedia entry on Jeffrey Archer really hates him.
We all had dinner together on Sunday night and then Mr. Waffle and I headed home on Monday morning. A good time had by all etc.
Tomorrow is November 30. Are we all heaving a sigh of relief?
*Updated to add: Mr Waffle made it his mission to find out the cafe’s name. He did. It was Cafe Foy apparently.