Don't judge a book...

This unpretentious building (OK, it's a pre-fab) is home to tip-top café/restuarant Alfonso's Place.

Tucked away behind the railway station, Alfonso's is one of those eateries about which people say: 'I didn't think places like this existed any more.'

Friendly service, fresh ingredients, home-made puddings (yes, all are home-made, including the ice cream, I think) and plenty of choice. Low, low prices.

The HB and Mr G enthuse about the breakfasts (fab) and the Sunday lunches (terrific).

Pleasure, pleasure, pleasure

Mr Gnome is in a state of barely suppressed frenzy as he anticipates a visit to the Bantam Team Rooms, Chipping Campden.

The Bantam Tearooms, in his opinion, are as close as one can get on this planet to the Platonic ideal of quintessentially English teashop-ness.

Let the home-made cakes be brought forth, let the warm crumbly scones be dolopped liberally with clotted cream.

One could continue - but the tidal wave of delight overwhelms man and gnome....

How to be topp

The immortal Nigel Molesworth (aka the Curse of St Custards). I wonder if anyone remembers him....

Molesworth was the deeply subversive love child of writer Geoffrey Willans and illustrator Ronald Searle.

I discovered him when I was nine and a boarder at a prep school that had echoes both of Linbury Court (of the Jennings stories) and the loopily recognizable world of St Custard's.


It's one of those books where much (but not all) of the humour comes via Molesworth's idiosyncratic spelling.

I relished the fact the Molesworth's constant efforst to be 'tuogh' came to nothing, and he's frequently trumped by the gloriously effete Basil Fotherington Thomas 'who say "Hello clouds, hello sky" and skip like a girlie'.


Nigel Molesworth, friend and role model. Hurrah!

Maybe in your town....

We're five minutes into a creative writing lesson. Heads are down, pencils are scratching, and the majority of the twenty-four third-graders in my care seem to be, er, creating. I'm an optimistic teacher.

Then the miracle occurs.

Ricky appears at my desk with his notebook. He wants a word. Could this mean that he wishes to take part in the lesson?

It does.

This is the classroom equivalent of Margaret Thatcher volunteering to hawk copies of Socialist Worker to passers by from the doorstep of Number Ten.

By this point in the school year Ricky and I have reached an uneasy truce. He doesn't disrupt the class. I don't ask too much of him in terms of work. It's not going to up the achievement profile. But it's working for us.

I've no idea what this nine-year-old native American boy makes of me, the English exchange teacher. I've gained the impression that as far as he's concerned I may as well have dropped in from the moon.

But now he wants to join in. The lesson is based around a series of cartoon drawings I've prepared. They show an old-time prospector working in his mine. Check shirt, spiky beard, the works.

We've talked about the mining history of the region - we can actually see a worked-out gold mine from the classroom window. And now we're going to imagine that Spike the miner is telling us his story. Inspiring, huh?

'You need a word, Ricky?'

'Uh huh. Strukkid.'

'Strukkid, Ricky?'

'Yeah, strukkid.' Slight rolling up of eyes.

'Er, so what's the sentence you're trying to write?'

As if speaking to a dimwit, Ricky says: 'Spike was happy 'cos he strukkid rich.'

'Great sentence, Ricky. But actually it's two words "struck it", not "strukkid".'

A sigh. 'I want strukkid.'

Two brown eyes are focused on me. This boy probably knows every disused mine shaft within a five-mile radius, just as he knows where the local bald eagles nest, and where the Pacific salmon surge up the pebbly creek beds to spawn and die. How weird is this teacher not to know a simple word like strukkid?

I give it one last shot: 'Ricky, believe me. There's no such word. It's not "strukkid", it's "struck it". OK?'

Those eyes fix me, the so-called teacher from England, wherever that is, with a look of infinite pity, as Nicky sighs and delivers his unanswerable put-down.

'Maybe in your town....'

Good news in a bard place

On a whim I took myself to the Mothering Sunday service at Holy Trinity, Stratford-upon-Avon.

Big church, packed with people aged from a tiny baby (baptised without a whimper during the service) to a woman of over 100 (I think I heard that correctly.)

Nice mixture of the formal (vestments, white-cassocked servers, trad hymns, vibrant organ) and the informal (teenage singing group, friendly MC-ing from cheerful vicar aided by tip-top radio mike.)

During the service we were invited to take part in an 'activity.'

Not a big fan of audience participation, I nonetheless appreciated the opportunity to jot down a mum-related thought/prayer/thank-you on a small paper flower and later leave it on the altar. As someone with neither parent living , and no children, I was grateful that someone had thought of this simple but effective way of including everyone in the service.

The vicar is Martin Gorick (yes, poor man, it rhymes with Yorick). His talk/sermon was short (hurrah!) and to the point. He spoke affectingly about the 'fathering' and 'mothering' love of God.

And he spoke clearly and simply about the church's 'vision' to be 'bridgebuilders' - to help take God to the community, and the community to God. Sounded like a good concept, to me.

He mentioned the fact that as a church they have adopted three 'values' to help them as they start to build bridges: humility, holiness and hospitality.

Hmm. I think I could start to get excited about that.

Anyway, ten out of ten to the community at HT, S-u-A for a joyful, inclusive, positive experience. Hurrah.

Overseas readers: please don't panic re climate change in UK. Photo was taken in August.

Fair exchange

At the end of the 1970s I taught this third grade class at a school in South East Alaska.

SE Alaska is an elongated mosaic of islands hugging the north-western edge of Canada. The community where I taught, though sizeable, is inaccessible by road. You arrive by plane (two hours from Seattle) or ferry (fifty hours).

Mostly uninhabited, the region's main industries are fishing and logging. Though northern, SEA qualifies as a rain forest. And I remember the rain as constant, relentless, endless.

After a shaky start (homesickness) I fell in love with the place - and relished every moment of my Alakan experience.

More recollections soon.

Edward Ardizzone

As a boy I was a dedicated devourer of Puffin Books. So it was only a matter of time before I fell under the spell of the illustrator Edward Ardizzone.

Ardizzone's pen-and-ink drawings, mostly black line only, manage to suggest so much through a minimalist, loose, seemingly speedy technique.

Long ago I decided I'd like to buy an orignal drawing and wrote to the artist, receiving this charming response.
I contacted his agent and bought the picture shown here. It's from The Godstone and the Blackymor, an eccentric little volume of Irish memoirs by TH (Sword in the Stone) White, long out of print.Mr Ardizzone died shortly afterwards. I am very proud to own this tiny example of his work.

Want to know more? Take a look at the Imperial War Museum's archive of Ardizzone's career as a War Artist.