from Perdio to Perfidy

Our house is stuffed with radios. There's at least one in every room, apart from the downstairs loo, but there's one just around the corner if you are desperate.


The first radio I remember was a big hulking thing that my brother had in his room, which I used to listen to occasionally, but the first one of any great import was a Perdio transistor with a bright gilt grill. I used to claim it as often as I could and twiddle the dial that had magical names like Motala, Kalundborg, the wonderful Lux and Allouis. Of course, pop-pickers, I did listen to the top 20 countdown on Sundays and by then had a growing collection of LPs, but I loved the radio for the plays, for classical music and for listening to foreign language stations which drifted in and out with the tide. I used to stare at that dial for hours; I really should have got out more.


I found a Perdio radio (I now know to be a 1962 PR36 Fanfare) a few years ago in a collectors' emporium in Brighton and had to get it. It's not quite the same, though. The dial and the grill are there as is the badge, although reduced to "Perdi" now, but some of the casing is pink and not oatmeal and the L/M switch isn't right, but the on/off switch sounds the same. I wasn't joking about the time I spent with that radio.

Which brings me to the cursed tale of digital radio.


On a very rare shopping trip recently, we bought a new digital radio suprisingly cheaply. I'd wanted one for ages, so it was jolly exciting. When we got the thing home it was permanently stuck on the BBC Asian channel, which isn't so bad as the music is good, but more variety was required. Anyway, I have no patience for instruction manuals, but Richard has, so we eventually got off that and on to Birdsong. Now, we live in the country, so aren't short of a twitter or two, but it was very soothing. Then we find out that the channel is temporary. We then switched allegiance to TheJazz, an excellent station, and soon the notebook next to the kitchen radio is full of tracks and artists. However, that closed down in March. The reassurances that we can listen to it online fall on drum solo-deaf ears; listen up, Classic FM, not all of us have online access where we want to listen to music (can't quite see us sitting around the PC in the spare room and, anyway, that's where I work everyday). I like drama on radio, so access to OneWord was something I had in mind, but that has stopped broadcasting. Thank goodness for Planet Rock, we say, to find that its future, too, is in doubt.


No wonder the bloody radio was cheap - there's nothing to listen to apart from the main BBC channels and, er, sport. Hurumph.

cape of good hope

Scouring the house for things to sell, as usual. I recently acquired a rather nice cape, thinking I would wear it myself, but have decided to let the eBay population have a sniff. I was rather impressed by its Harvey Nichols label, a first for this household which isn't generally known for its sartorial elegance, although Richard scrubs up nicely, thank you very much (down, Judith).

I've found some CDs we can live without (not sure why we have some of them in the first place - hope they are ours and we haven't borrowed them from someone, eeek) and one or two books. Most of my books for sale are on Amazon, but occasionally I spot something I think will do well on eBay and give it a go.

Some of my friends gasp when I tell them I'm selling my own books. I'm not sure how and where I became desensitized to this, living as I have so closely with books all my life. I used to make houses out of annuals when I was little, and carried on making my world out of books, rather less literally, for 15 years, not counting the various times I was studying. After school I used to go to the bookshop of Beatties department store in Wolverhampton and buy books, mainly Penguin Modern Classics. My confession, offered up to cleanse the soul on this lovely spring day, is that I read hardly any of them, but used to buy them for the covers alone. Modern Classics had wonderful covers, mainly of modern art; I was studying sciences, but my real interest was in art and design.

How appropriate, then, that I should be selling my world of books and anything else I can lay my hands on, to help maintain our life here and to fund the art course that I shall finally be starting in September.

One of those Beatties' books was David Karp's "One", with a wonderful Edward Hopper cover showing a man and a woman in deckchairs staring out, desolately, at nothing in particular. I bought it in 1972 and I had it until last year when I sold it. Mmmmm, I think I might just nip on to Amazon and see if I can replace it.

one mad tart in the kitchen

As Monday is now the day I assume the mantle of Dolly Duster, I was particularly interested in last night's BBC offering based on the history of advertisements for cleaning products. Now, I like a vintage advert - very useful for spotting items of decor - but am pretty scathing about the advertising industry per se. Full of Ridley Scott wannabees or frustrated wordsmiths taking themselves way too seriously and paid far too much. I hadn't heard the expression "two tarts in the kitchen" (and its even more insulting variant 2CK, which I won't spell out) before last night, but it confirms everything I think about this contemptible "profession".

Researching it today, I find that David Ogilvy is quoted as the first advertiser to stop the condescending "two tarts in the kitchen" commercials and instead use an experienced older woman, nicknamed the "battle-axe". Progress there, then.

princess margaret serves me ice cream

After a late curry on Friday night, I had a very odd dream about attending a medieval royal wedding at which Princess Margaret served me coffee ice cream. Very peculiar. I'm not known to think much (or a lot) of the royals, although I have been known to lust after an ice cream from time to time. Last night's epic (after a sherbet or two) was equally bizarre, but thankfully forgotten. I dream a lot: recurrent themes are singing (usually in a made-up language) and driving a car from the back seat (no prizes for that one). My favourite is the flying dream, in which I soar over buildings, checking out people's back gardens and the like. An excellent way to travel - cheap, low on carbon emissions and plenty of leg room.

loud, louder

Went up to London last night to hear the Neil Cowley Trio at Cargo. What a treat. These boys are just utterly fantastic and such a range - from delicate tunes picked out by Neil on the piano to the three of them raising the roof. Those more equipped to discuss jazz have talked about the band's “augmented chordal feel, sense of momentum and mininimalism set free". Wish I'd have thought of that. Still, in my book it's just bloody marvellous. Drummer Evan Jenkins played an absolute storm, as did bassist Richard Sadler, but it's the seemingly inexhaustible Cowley at the piano who set the place alight. They are on Jools Holland on 4 April. Queue up for a copy of the latest album.

doin' it

It's now the time of year to just get on and do it - meaning the vegetable garden. It's always a bit daunting. Sowing the seeds is great; I love filling up the greenhouses with trays upon trays (HOW many tomatoes??) . Inevitably, though, the time for digging the beds looms. The permaculture folk say don't bother to weed, but after a year of neglect I reckon something has to be done. Last year's waterlogging courtesy, as it turned out, of next door's leaking water pipe and the ensuing pipe laying and trampling has meant our heavy clay soil has taken a beating. We did grow some beans, but not much else. Even the tomatoes didn't play ball. This year, armed with The Self Sufficientish Bible and DK's Organic Gardening book, I am determined to do better. It's only fair I do most of the work as I'm here most of the time and work is intermittent. I work in the garden with the radio on, unless it's "Quote, Unquote" or "Just A Minute" both of which I hate with a passion. This year I will be spurred on by re-reading "Hovel in the Hills", an account of a couple setting up in Wales, and John Seymour's "The Fat of the Land". Seymour's "five acres and a cow" self-sufficiency manuals are famous; this book, however, is about Seymour and his wife Sally and their smallholding in Suffolk. It was published in 1961, not long after they settle at "The Broom" for a rent of £25 a year, plus rates. I got this copy from the library, where it has been languishing on the county store shelves, taking a rest from the pounding it has had over the years. I like to think of it being read by generations of gardeners and allotment holders, taking a break in the shed with a mug of tea. Some people like their books to be pristine, not me.

Right, boots on.

Not Working

So why, I ask myself, do we live this frugal life, eco-considerations aside? Well, I would love interesting, creative work and am looking all the time, asking friends and contacts, keeping an eye out locally, thinking of possible business ventures. It's not happening at the moment, but to stave off depression as best I can, I have to believe that something will come my way. I have come to realise that, apart from the first few honeymoon months, I have not enjoyed most of the jobs I have had so far. This is sobering. Some jobs were just plain dull, but were in interesting places or with nice people, which was distracting. Some started off well, but re-organisations, bloody minded people and other obstacles eventually got in the way. Some had good aspects to them which I enjoyed, but overall ... The best job, on paper at least, was as a university lecturer. I enjoyed the contact with students, the facilities, the status, the salary, the opportunities to be creative. Heavens, I even enjoyed (most of) the meetings, although "curriculum development" was a bit of a screen for tea and buns or a drink. However, the subject became dull and I wasn't inspired to engage in research, which is pretty crucial. I couldn't think of a way to bring it round to something I was interested in, and a new unsympatico head of department killed it for me. It would have been a great niche otherwise. I chose to leave to change direction, had a fabulous time studying and was successful for a while, but then the work dried up. The disappointment consumed me for years and, even now, I can't afford to think of it for too long. Since then, I've had some mainly short-term research contracts which were OK, a spell at another university as a researcher which I did enjoy, done some indexing, some writing, bits and bobs, but the gaps in between have stretched out into Tumbleweed City. My interests are all creative - photography, art, craft, writing (music is on an appreciation level only) - but as I'm not established professionally in any of these it's unlikely I will find paid work there.

Santa or Mr Savile - what I would like is a series of reasonably well-paid (I'm not greedy) short-term research/proof-reading/indexing jobs, if you could fix that, please.