Mrs Moore

For the time being, Mrs Moore has more pressing commitments.  See you all in due course.  Sx

Quarante-deux Bouteilles De Vin

Tuesday, 28th October

We didn't even get placed.  Bleeding heck!  Even Dan, Fran and Jumper Steve got more points than we did.  Big day tomorrow, meeting the literary agent.

Wednesday, 29th October

I arrived in Rowan's office 20 minutes late, not a great start.  I left Battersea at ten, but due to road works, one-way systems, and faulty Centrepoint lifts, it took eighty minutes to get there.  I sincerely hoped she wouldn't think I was taking the piss.  We seemed to hit it off immediately, and chatted for about an hour and a half.  She really liked the style of writing, and we had a long talk about how to put together a proposal that may wow the socks off any potential printing houses.

Nicola rang about five to confirm that my impressions of the meeting were about right.  Rowan had rung her, and now I have to crack on with a proposal.

I am feeling a bit overwhelmed.

Thursday, 30th October

I am still feeling more than a bit overwhelmed.  I haven't been able to concentrate, which means that nothing is getting done.  Oh dear!  And we are off to France for two nights tomorrow, for which I am totally unprepared.

Friday, 31st October

We arrived at the hotel at about half past eleven, but it is absolutely beautiful.  La Maison Des Plumes is an Art Deco delight, an old manor house with a magnificent spiral staircase at its heart.

Saturday, 1st November

A fantastic breakfast of coppa, chevre, and the biggest croissants we have ever seen.  We then hit the supermarket to buy coppa, chevre, and gigantic croissants.  Well, apart from the croissants.  We bought all the wine for Christmas, and a bit to spare.  We also bought two bottles of champagne, and two of cremant, for Damian and Kelly to have a bit of a blind taste test.  300 euros on that, and a further 125 euros I had great fun taking photos in the house, and also at the supermarket, and got together most of the photos for week 6 of the course.  Back to the Maison for a great supper, and a brief ghost-hunting episode, which turned up nothing.

Sunday, 2nd November

Back home.  Kids back, 'Ooh Frisk Sours, ooh M&M table football, ooh wine.'  Perry can be a strange kid.  Xanthe coolly informed me that she had created a mountain for her geography project.  Eh?  I haven't seen it, but it does fit in the back of the car.  Crushing 9-1 defeat for 'The Park.'  At last it's the end of the season.  A week's break next Sunday.  Thank god.

Home, Sweet Home

Friday, 24th October

The eurotrash descended tonight.  Eve, two Italian boys and a Rumanian girl joined us on our evening out to Le Madugou.   They turned up brandishing champagne, and balsamic sauces (not to be consumed together).  We polished off the champagne and a bottle of wine before going to supper, which doesn't augur well for an early start tomorrow.  However, we had a thoroughly good meal, and a laugh, and Troy arranged a little cake, to get my birthday celebrations off to an excellent start.

Saturday, 25th October

Up at five (four UK time) to clean the house before leaving.  Ugh, will definitely throw 70 Euros at the problem next time, but it didn't seem worth it just for a couple of days.  We had an uneventful, and frankly efficient journey back, landing at ten.  Troy gave me a lovely white crystal and silver pair of earrings and bracelet.  Now I have to rethink my outfit for the evening.  I spent the afternoon working, then got ready for dinner.  We had an amazing meal in the private room at Greenhouse, with apple bombs, beetroot cigars, oatmeal foam, turbot, avocado ice cream, quails egg with anchovy and caper, pigeon breast, and a million other lovely bits and pieces.  It was so good I even ate dessert.  Then they brought cake.  How they expected me to stuff that down too, I have no idea.  So we took it home in a box!

Everyone decamped to Manny's, and we had a great evening.

Sunday, 26th October

I am paying the price for a great evening.  I spent the afternoon in front of the workstation with my head thumping.  I couldn't face standing on the soggy touchline, and we were back to Manny's for more birthday celebrations. I have been given scented candles by four people, which is great because you can't have too many scented candles. Seriously.  And, bizarrely, nearly all my cards were pink.

Monday, 27th October

Mercifully I am not paying any prices this morning.  More staring at the workstation.  There are literally thousands of X-rays, dating back to January 2007, that need doing.  That should keep me out of mischief.  We are going back into The Woodman tonight, after nearly three years, to do the quiz.  Should be interesting.

If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Naples

Saturday, 18th October

How marvelous, a holiday that doesn’t start with an alarm going off at stupid o’clock.  We got off to a flying start on the grand tour, largely by flying to Palermo.  We dropped the car off at the valet parking (love it), and went to the Speedy Boarding Plus check-in.  One day, everyone will cotton on to Speedy Boarding, and then we will all be back to square one.  Lots of screaming infants on the plane, mercifully none near us.  There was a nasty drop due to an air pocket, just as we were coming in to land.  Apart from the blood-curdling scream that this produced, Xanthe was remarkably quiet for all of the flight. 


Our hotel in Palermo was a little bit weird, not least of which being that it wasn't actually IN Palermo, and the fact that it was more than slightly orange.  Serves us right for booking through Easyjet.

We found a little restaurant near the hotel, which was very much in the ‘you’ll eat what you’re given’ mode.  We had ‘Frutta di mare mista,’ and an excellent ‘pesce grigliata, con salata.’  Perry surprised me by eating a substantial amount of the salad.  And it was mostly green.  There was a little debate over what sort of ‘pesce’ it was.  I thought it might be bream, and the waiter told us it was a ‘sarago.’  We dined ‘al fresco,’ overlooking the little bay, and it was charming.  Online, back at the hotel, I googled it.  Bream, bingo!

Sunday, 19^th October

A reasonably early start, leaving the Palm Beach Hotel (it was a hotel, but a bit short on the palm, or beach, front) at nine.  Breakfast was dominated by French Saga louts, all wearing shorts – revealing distinctly dodgy, wrinkly knees.  It was hard to work out who were the chavs, and who the chav-nots.  We had a moderately hair-raising journey to Palermo Stazione Centrale.  The train took two hours and twenty minutes to reach Milazzo, and we were taken to the hydrofoil by an ageing hippy.  He looked like an Italian ‘carne-pane’ (Meatloaf?), and his ‘antichita’ Fiat stalled repeatedly on the way to the port.  We are struggling with the local dialect.  And the locals are struggling with our Battersea-isms.  My Italian is a grubby mix of French, Latin and Spanish, but we are coping.  We took the hydrofoil to Lipari, just making the onward connection to Salina by ‘la pelle della nos denti.’

The hotel is a rustic triumph, perched on the mountainside, with a not quite infinity pool, (a palm tree pops up to destroy the effect) and a spa.  Xanthe has declared it the best hotel she has ever stayed in, as usual.  We sat on the main roof terrace, and drank cocktails before supper.  Unfortunately, the mosquitoes here are vicious.  Some of the worst I’ve encountered.  Ever.

Monday, 20^th October

Troy and I were up remarkably early today.  Considering.  Considering we didn’t have to be.  Actually it was quite nice for a change.  The morning was spent chilling by the pool, and trying to take a decent photo of the giant blue bees which are everywhere.  We all hit the spa this afternoon.  It is a proper ‘terme,’ with a variety of different mineral baths. We steamed (in a traditional tholos), Jacuzzi-ed, kniped and hydrotherapied with the best of them.  Supper out of the hotel tonight, although it took a little while to find the restaurant.  Off to Napoli ‘domani.’

Tuesday, 21^st October

Up before any larks were, at six.  We had an anxious moment when the taxi hadn’t turned up by ten to seven.  We are so used to our cars turning up at least quarter of an hour early, that it’s unnerving to deal with the southern Mediterranean taxi ethos.  We got to the port at San Marina in ample time, only for the ferry to be nearly ten minutes late.  The first stop was Lipari, where a gaggle of ‘ragazzi’ got off to go to school, accompanied by some exasperated looking adults, who must have been their teachers.  I thought it might be easier just to have a floating school that circumnavigates the islands.  Although that might make sport a little tricky.  They could always go swimming.

Next stop Vulcano, and at this point it was looking increasingly unlikely that we would make the 9.52 train to Napoli.  We should have arrived at Milazzo at 8.50, but didn’t in fact land until 9.20.  I got myself to the front of the disembarkation queue, (this week is turning me into a bit of a militant traveler), and legged it for a taxi.  ‘Milazzo Stazione!’  I barked at the taxi driver, and he sensed my level of urgency.  It took just over five minutes to the station, and I ran to the ticket office.  Three minutes later I was in possession of a first class family ticket to Napoli Centrale, and we trundled the cases as fast as we could, to Platform 4, to meet the express service from Palermo Centrale to Roma Termini.  Only to find that it was running thirty minutes late.  You can see a theme emerging here.  All that rushing about for nothing.  Pesky Russians.

At Messina Maritime, the train did a remarkable thing.  It got on a ferry.  In fact it split in two, and got on the ferry.  We got off and went deckside for some fresh air.  After the short crossing from Sicily to mainland Reggio Calabria, the train settled it’s issues, got back together again, and continued along the coast to Naples.  I dozed happily, listening to my meditation playlist of various Paul McKenna tracks, and was rudely awoken by Aerosmith, insisting that I ‘Walk This Way.’  How did that get on the playlist?  By the time I got to Napoli Centrale, I was neither thinner, nor richer.

Naples seems to be the underbelly of Southern Italy, every street is hung with washing, and there is constant tooting and beeping from the near stationary traffic.  It seems incredibly poor, with none of the shops that one would associate with a major Italian city.  Although proud of its Greek heritage, Neopolis looks like the backdrop to one of Fellini’s darkest films.  We checked into the Villa Ranieri.  This used to be an aristocrat’s home, but the wallpaper was peeling off the walls because of the damp.  It was trying to punch higher than it’s weight, claiming a four star status, but generally falling apart at the edges.  In fact, if Claudio Ranieri did run a hotel, that’s exactly what it would be like.

The concierge recommended a restaurant to us, and we walked about fifteen minutes (downhill) to it.  It had closed down.  However, we did find a little pizza bar nearby.  We had a good meal, which came to around fifty euros, including the tip, for four massive pizzas (we really didn’t need one each), two desserts, three beers, three soft drinks, and a bottle of wine.  Staying in an underbelly can have its advantages.

Wednesday, 22^nd October

A civilized start time for our trip to Milano.  The hotel boasted of ‘the best breakfast in Naples.’  So, good job we didn’t stay anywhere else then.  It was the usual plastic cheese and cheap cold meats, enlivened by the offering of coca-cola and profiteroles.  What?  For Breakfast?  Bring it on.  The coffee was first class though, as were the toiletries (not at breakfast, in the room - doh!).  Small mercies.

We hopped in a cab to the airport.  The flight at the gate before ours was going to Lourdes, so there were lots of folk in wheelchairs.  Their faith didn’t manage to get the flight off on time, so I don’t hold out much hope for a pile of abandoned wheelchairs at Lourdes airport for the return leg.

Milan was overcast and drizzly, and there’s only one thing to do in Milan anyway.  So we hit the shops.  I spent a ludicrous amount of money on a new collar for Oly.  We went to a potty restaurant in the evening, the décor, service, and music were all great, but sadly the food left a lot to be desired.  And cost three hundred euros.  Come back, Napoli, all is forgiven.

Thursday, 23^rd October

We walked to Milano Centrale – which is not unlike Grand Central, NY.  On the way, Xanthe and I made a detour, to one of the many bead and jewel shops we had spotted the night before.  There were loads of gorgeous chunky faceted beads and drops, with chunky silver clasps.  We chose heavy faceted garnets, smooth turquoise pebbles, and crisply clear amethysts.  Just as in the eastern parts of Europe, these gems are sold by weight, the boy serving us winced when he saw the price.  His boss said that he would do us a wholesale price, so we chose a further large multicoloured quartz, a massive flat turquoise, and a pendant with three rough rubies and a freshwater pearl.  The total bill came to less than eighty euros for cash.

Having established that there was no ‘carozza mangiare,’ (what is it with Italians that they can get on a five hour train, with only a mouthful-sized espresso for sustenance?), we armed ourselves with ‘panini e bebite.’  Surely this was the point at which nothing could actually get cocked up on our precarious travel arrangements.  Or so you might think.  No more than ten minutes into the journey to Nice, we were informed that because of a strike by the SNCF staff, the train would be terminating in Ventimiglia.  Ah.  And there were no guarantees of onward travel.  I ran through the possibilities, trying to (a) not panic, and (b) not have a paddy.  We could try to get a coach from Ventimiglia to Nice – did such a beast exist?  We could hop in a taxi to Nizza Centrale – how much would that cost?  We could try to change our hire car booking to collect in Ventimiglia – was there a Europcar office?  Although my French could cope with these complex issues, I was sure ‘mi Italiano’ would not.  I elected to throw our travel arrangements into the hands of The Fates, and trust that karma, entropy, and the universe, would provide the answer.

A couple of hours later, karma, entropy, and the universe, hadn’t emailed, faxed or phoned.   We munched ‘nostre Panini in cilencia.’  I continued to churn over the possibilities, and came up with – nada.  Yes, I do know that’s Spanish.  About twenty minutes before our scheduled journey execution in Ventimiglia, it seemed our sentence had been commuted.  There was a regional French train scheduled from Ventemille to Nice, which would get us in only forty-five minutes late.  Result!  Now, the Iltalians might have sea-faring trains, but the French can go one better – double decker trains!

Oh, how great to be back in our little house in the mountains in the Var.  And a whole two sleeps, although only thirty six hours, until we are home in not-so-sunny Battersea.

The Hotel's Bright, The Hotel's Orange

Saturday, 18th October

We got off to a flying start to the grand tour, largely by not having to get up early for the flight.  We dropped the car off at the valet parking (love it), and went to the Speedy Boarding Plus check-in.  One day, everyone will cotton on to Speedy Boarding, and then we will all be back to square one.  Lots of screaming infants on the plane, mercifully none near us.  Our hotel in Palermo was a little bit weird, not least of which being that it wasn't actually IN Palermo, and the fact that it was more than slightly orange.  Serves us right for booking through Easyjet.

We found a little restaurant near the hotel, which was very much in the ‘you’ll eat what you’re given’ mode.  We had ‘Frutta di mare mista,’ and ‘pesce grigliata.’  There was a little debate over what sort of pesce it was.  I thought it might be bream, and the waiter told us it was a ‘sarago.’  Online, back at the hotel, I googled it.  Bream, bingo!

Sunday, 19^th October

A reasonably early start, leaving the Palm Beach Hotel at nine.  Breakfast was dominated by French Saga louts, all wearing shorts –revealing distinctly dodgy, wrinkly knees.  It was hard to work out who were the chavs, and who the chav-nots.  We had a moderately hair-raising journey to Palermo Stazione Centrale.  The train took two hours and twenty minutes to reach Milazzo, and we were taken to the hydrofoil by an ageing hippy.  We are struggling with the local dialect.  And the locals are struggling with our Battersea-isms.  My Italian is a grubby mix of French, Latin and Spanish, but we are coping.  We took the hydrofoil to Lipari, just making the onward connection to Salina by the skin of our teeth, or – la pelle della nos dente.

The hotel is charming, a rustic triumph, with an infinity pool and a spa.  Xanthe has declared it the best hotel she has ever stayed in, as usual.  We sat on the main roof terrace, and drank cocktails before supper.  Unfortunately, the mosquitoes here are vicious.  Some of the worst I’ve encountered.  Ever.

Monday, 20^th October

Troy and I were up remarkably early today.  Considering.  Considering we didn’t have to be.  Actually it was quite nice for a change.  We all hit the spa this afternoon.  We steamed (in a traditional tholos), Jacuzzi-ed, kniped and hydrotherapied with the best of them.  Supper out of the hotel tonight, and then off to Napoli domani.

The Hotel's Bright, The Hotel's Orange

Saturday, 18th October

We got off to a flying start to the grand tour, largely by not having to get up early for the flight.  We dropped the car off at the valet parking (love it), and went to the Speedy Boarding Plus check-in.  One day, everyone will cotton on to Speedy Boarding, and then we will all be back to square one.  Lots of screaming infants on the plane, mercifully none near us.  Our hotel in Palermo was a little bit weird, not least of which being that it wasn't actually IN Palermo, and the fact that it was more than slightly orange.  Serves us right for booking through Easyjet.

We found a little restaurant near the hotel, which was very much in the ‘you’ll eat what you’re given’ mode.  We had ‘Frutta di mare mista,’ and ‘pesce grigliata.’  There was a little debate over what sort of pesce it was.  I thought it might be bream, and the waiter told us it was a ‘sarago.’  Online, back at the hotel, I googled it.  Bream, bingo!

Sunday, 19^th October

A reasonably early start, leaving the Palm Beach Hotel at nine.  Breakfast was dominated by French Saga louts, all wearing shorts –revealing distinctly dodgy, wrinkly knees.  It was hard to work out who were the chavs, and who the chav-nots.  We had a moderately hair-raising journey to Palermo Stazione Centrale.  The train took two hours and twenty minutes to reach Milazzo, and we were taken to the hydrofoil by an ageing hippy.  We are struggling with the local dialect.  And the locals are struggling with our Battersea-isms.  My Italian is a grubby mix of French, Latin and Spanish, but we are coping.  We took the hydrofoil to Lipari, just making the onward connection to Salina by the skin of our teeth, or – la pelle della nos dente.

The hotel is charming, a rustic triumph, with an infinity pool and a spa.  Xanthe has declared it the best hotel she has ever stayed in, as usual.  We sat on the main roof terrace, and drank cocktails before supper.  Unfortunately, the mosquitoes here are vicious.  Some of the worst I’ve encountered.  Ever.

Monday, 20^th October

Troy and I were up remarkably early today.  Considering.  Considering we didn’t have to be.  Actually it was quite nice for a change.  We all hit the spa this afternoon.  We steamed (in a traditional tholos), Jacuzzi-ed, kniped and hydrotherapied with the best of them.  Supper out of the hotel tonight, and then off to Napoli domani.

Wednesday, 15th October

Beth and I took the children to see West Side Story at Wimbledon tonight, tonight.  Da da da da da...It was less than a success.  The casting was mostly woeful.  The most entertaining part of the evening being Xanthe having an attack of the Malaprops.  She told Beth that she keeps all her money in an offshore account in the Canine Islands (not true, it's in First Direct and the Halifax).  On the way home, we were discussing the full moon, and Xanthe announced that she had never seen an ellipse.  I said that I thought she probably had, and she said that she meant a total ellipse.

Thursday, 16th October

I had the longest day I've had in years.  I was up and at them at 9.30 this morning at King Eddie's, then off to the Institute of Public Health for a Breastlight seminar.  Heard some great stories, then off to John and Lizzie's (this is actually a hospital, not a dinner party,) for the afternoon session.  A list full of regulars, which is always nice.  Then back home to crack on with the 4 Ways reporting.  By the time I had worked for ten hours straight, I was nearly in tears.  However, I managed to make a chicken soup supper with broad beans, chilli, and courgettes.

Friday, 17th October

I am deeply apprehensive about our grand tour.   I am sure we will miss a connection, or some such disaster will befall us.  So most of the day was consumed by checking, and double checking, our arrangements.  The household ritual is never to cook before a trip, so we went to Manny's for supper.  Funnily enough, we are probably more organised than we ever are at this stage of a trip.