Thursday, January 04, 2007

What, mememe ?

There I was, happily languishing in obscurity, certain that this thing wouldn't happen to me, when rr went and memed me. This, it seems, is a kind of game of tag, where the person tagged (that is I, in this case) has to perform the forfeit of telling 5 things that people don't know about them. Like anyone else, I naturally have things few people if any know about me. There is usually a good reason for their not knowing, that is the things in question are/were sordid, painful, embarrassing, stupid or just plain boring. And I certainly can't compete with sexual cavorting with spies in embassies and the like! However, in the interests of being a good sport, and in acknowledgement of notice kindly taken, here goes.

1) When I was 5, I won a postal order for 5 shillings in a painting competition. My picture was exhibited in Berkhamsted Town Hall, and was titled "London". It consisted of a wide arc (London Bridge) being traversed by many little men sporting bowler hats and umbrellas. I doubt that it was an accurate depiction of the capital at that epoque: if the denizens of the city did still wear bowler hats, I don't suppose their arms were growing from the middle of their torsos.
The work is now lost.

2) When I was old enough to know better, I used to want to be Biggles.

3) On a birdwatching expedition to the Norfolk Broads when we were about 15, rr and I were fortunate in seeing all three species of British swan - Bewick's, whooper and mute, on one stretch of water.

4) While working in a shoe shop on the King's Road in the mid-eighties, I sold a pair of lemon yellow pixie boots to Grace Jones.

5) The first autumn we were here, Tom and I completely re-roofed the house, completely on our own, slates and batons, using a death-trap lash-up of borrowed scaffolding - rusting poles and pegs, rotten planks and bits of string - and a rather novel and acrobatic way of balancing on the timbers to avoid walking on the slates. In fact, everybody knows about this as we haven't stopped talking about it since. I can't think why, it wasn't courageux , it was just foolhardy. Tom fell off a ladder shortly afterwards, then went down with a fever and nervous exhaustion, and spent much of the subsequent winter laid out on the sofa - our only seating at the time - so I read "Vanity Fair", and many other classic English novels by firelight sitting in a laundry basket.


-Well, there we are. Unfortunately I can't participate in the next part of the game, which is to tag 5 other people who must also carry out the forfeit, because I don't know anybody. Or, more to the point, they don't know me. The other bloggers I read have either recently been tagged anyway, or are far too enigmatic or stratospheric to be importuned in this way by an upstart parvenu such as yours truly, so, alas, I must break the chain.

6 comments:

andy said...

Biggles! My childhood hero!! By the time I was 10 I think I'd read nearly every Biggles book 'Captain' W E Johns ever wrote.

Oh, and I hope it was a comfortable laundry basket...

Lucy said...

The Biggles phase seemed to be a curious early adolescent backsliding into the fantasyland of truly dreadfully written fiction - I was older than 10, and had read far more serious literature by then. You put the worthy man's rank title in quotes, I notice, are you in some doubt as to the veracity of it?
The laundry basket wasn't too bad when padded with plenty of cushions and blankets.

Anonymous said...

Grace Jones? That's soooo cool!

Thanks for being a sport.

andy said...

Yes, I'm sorry to say our hero could be said to have been a bit of a fraud. His rank title was adopted - although I believe he did work his way up and was eventually commissioned, he never got as far as Captain (or so the website I checked said). But I forgive him since it adds a touch of authenticity (and I'm sure it didn't do his sales figures any harm either).

Glad the laundry basket didn't result in any permanent deformity...

Lucy said...

Yeah, I reckoned Grace Jones might earn a few points on the coolometer; I'm not sure lemon yellow pixie boots would now, though. I seem to recall Biggles had an unfortunate liaison with a spy too, in the early days when he was still into Sopwith Camels, which led to his subsequent forswearing of women in favour of Algy, Ginger and his joystick. But excuse me, this is lowering the tone of my blog...

Lucy said...

...she said tersely.