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September 2020

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Faith Healer

September 28, 2020 in Flotsam and Jetsam | Permalink

Last weekend we saw again one of my favourite plays – the late Brian Friel’s “Faith Healer“. Though I have read it again in the interim I have not seen it since the splendid 1992 Royal Court production in London.

“Faith Healer” is a three hander but written in an unusual form – comprising as it does four long monologues, starting and ending with those of the play’s protagonist – the ‘Fantastic Francis Hardy’ (as the poster for the faith healer’s one-night performances in small towns and villages throughout Wales, Scotland and – fatally – Ireland has it).

I am not usually a big fan of the monologue (a fact that I have broadcast within these musings on more than one occasion) and particularly of the way that it forms the core of the majority of one-person shows. It seems to me in most instances to lack the dramatic power of dialogue, reducing the performance to a one-dimensional perspective. Now – there most certainly are exceptions to this generalisation, but they have to be exceptional to be so as the form itself mitigates against it.

That Friel’s masterpiece does so triumphantly only starts to become apparent some minutes into the second monologue – delivered by the faith healer’s English mistress, Grace – or is it his wife – and is she actually English after all? Even those familiar with the concept of the unreliable narrator will find it difficult to keep their feet as the play lurches from one telling of the tale to the next (the faith healer’s manager Teddy completes the trio) and even the faith healer’s own second monologue contradicts his first in vital respects.

The audience is left to try to pick the elements of truth from this tangled web of narratives – a brilliant device that renders the play instantly multi-dimensional and restores to the form one of the elements it most commonly lacks – that of subtext!

In the aforementioned 1992 Royal Court production a good friend played the part of Teddy – the which he was to repeat in the 2016 London revival to five star reviews. We were sadly unable to see the latter production – having already moved to Canada.

This latest production was live-streamed from an empty Old Vic in London as part of that wonderful institution’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic – “Old Vic: In Camera”. The theatre sold the same number of tickets (at heavily discounted prices) for Zoom streaming as the house usually seats and for “Faith Healer” there were just four live shows – which were not recorded. For us this meant watching the excellent Michael Sheen, Indira Varma and David Threlfall at 11:30 in the morning (that being 7:30 in the evening UK time) and it really did feel a little like being present at a live theatrical performance. It was – at any rate – about as close as we are going to be able to get anytime soon.

Our grateful thanks to all concerned for a wonderful and thought-provoking experience.

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Patience my ass!…

September 24, 2020 in Life in BC | Permalink

Photo by Andy Dawson Reid“Fear the vulture, and the vulture will come. Fear nothing, and you are the vulture.”

Suzy Kassem

“By the time I got to kindergarten, I was surprised to find out I was the only kid with a turkey vulture.”

Jean Craighead George

We had an unexpected visitor in our garden (yard!) today. He arrived out of nowhere in a rush and settled on top of the post that holds our weathervane – and that many mistake for a gibbet!

Appropriate – in a way, I suppose…

I was in the studio working on something and my attention was captured by the big shadow that crossed the window. I rushed upstairs to alert The Girl (who was just about to climb into a bath) so that she might also view the bird… before it had flown!

Photo by Andy Dawson ReidWe need not have worried as our visitor was clearly not in any hurry, settling itself in and busying itself preening. I imagine that it had recently frequented the Roadkill Diner and wished to rest a while so as not to suffer from indigestion.

“What the heck is that thing?” – I queried the expert. For sure it was a vulture – but what sort of a vulture?

We rarely see Turkey Vultures in the garden, but if we did they would be easily recognisable by their distinctive red heads. This one – as you can see – was conspicuously lacking any sort of crimson.

Black Vultures are as rare as hens’ teeth in these parts. We did hear tell on the InterWebNet (well – The Girl did!) of just one such feathered friend that had escaped from the Raptor sanctuary in Duncan some three years back…

Could it possibly be? Could it?…

Photo by Andy Dawson ReidWe were reluctantly persuaded that it could not – and that it was almost certainly an immature Turkey Vulture – the which have not yet morphed into red-headedness. Shame!

Pretty big bu**er for a baby, though!

The other birds took a pretty dim view of the visitor and all manner of squawking arose. The little hummingbirds – those most territorial of creatures – bustled up, jaws jutting – spoiling for a fight. The vulture simply ignored them and gave its tail feathers an extra polish.

Finally the crows figured that simply making a racket was not going to get the job done, organised a drawing of straws and nominated the unlucky loser to see the intruder off the premises…

…which it duly did!

Sorry that the images are not any better, by the way. I had only my phone to hand and I had to push it to full zoom to get anything at all. Double-clicking may help to make out some detail…

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Decorate your home

September 21, 2020 in Flotsam and Jetsam | Permalink

Photo by Andy Dawson ReidDecorate your home. It gives the illusion that your life is more interesting than it really is. 

Charles M. Shulz

Just to record that our house-painters have commenced their endeavours. The stucco, siding, doors and trim of our humble(ish) abode are getting a long overdue make-over.

I will naturally post further pictures when they have finished – which should not be too long as a fair bit of the house comprises patio windows (sliders to Canadian folk).

I may even post some before/after shots if I can locate suitable ‘pre’-pictures (said he, revealing a total lack of forethought or planning!)

Sadly it was ever thus…

Photo by Andy Dawson Reid

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As good as it gets?

September 17, 2020 in Flotsam and Jetsam | Permalink

What feels like just a few weeks back – but is in fact nearly a month – I wrote a post entitled ‘Welcome Back‘, which raised more than a cheer for the return of Premiership rugby in the UK. In its infinite wisdom (?) the Premiership had decided to complete the unfinished 2019/20 season by the end of October – a feat the achievement of which would require the playing of midweek matches as well as weekend games – before ploughing directly into the 2020/21 season.

Now – rugby is not like soccer (thanks goodness!). It is a contact sport (of course) and a tough one at that… without the dubious protection of the helmets and other accoutrements that are de rigeur in North American variants of the oval ball game.

This means that the players need more recovery time between fixtures than do top level footballers. Of course – there is also nowhere near as much money in rugby, so squads are smaller and one can’t simply run two fifteens in that way that soccer teams can field multiple elevens.

As a result the clubs are all experiencing a particularly intense period right at the moment. The fact that they had plenty of time to prepare during the lock-down has certainly helped – but it is going to be a long haul to the end of the next season.

From the rugby enthusiast’s point of view the more frequent games are rather wonderful – particularly as we went without for so long. If your club is not going so well – of course – it can get pretty depressing, as losses pile up even more rapidly than usual.

If you are doing well – on the other hand…

The gentle reader has probably guessed where this is going. Our team – Bath – has had a run of form such as it has not experienced since the year that we came to Canada. That year they made it through to the final and only lost to the beastly Saracens (boo!). This time Bath have won all of their games subsequent to the return bar one – and have also acquired a healthy crop of bonus points to boot. With two fixtures to go they are comfortably in the top four – which teams get through to the playoff stage.

Now I don’t want to jinx anything (though it is probably already too late for that). The way the season has panned out only the top five clubs have a chance of making the finals – which means that one of them is going to miss out. Bath does not have the easiest of run-ins and the other four are looking strong.

Still – whichever way it turns out this will have been one of their best seasons in recent memory – and that definitely merits a seriously huge cheer.

Come on you Bath!

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Never too busy

September 13, 2020 in Life in BC | Permalink

Photo by Andy Dawson Reid“Have you noticed that even the busiest people are never too busy to take time to tell you how busy they are?”

Bob Talbert

Well, it has – of course – been busy. It was, after all, the first week of term… the first week of exclusively online teaching (for me – as I did not teach during the summer). As it happened it didn’t go too badly. Fingers crossed that this is a portent for the remainder of the course and that we will sail through it serenely – without alarums or excursions – and that everyone gets an A+ (well – all those who deserve so to do anyway).

On Friday we were also washed – and by ‘we’ in this case I mean ‘the outside of our humble abode’. I mentioned in a relatively recent post that we we finally getting the outside of the house painted; a thorough wash and brush up being the first step in that process. We now wait for a week for the dust to settle (metaphorically, I assume) before the actual business kicks off.

The crew that washed the house were all personable and strapping young chaps and it took The Girl all of about a minute to determine that they play rugby together for one of the Victoria clubs. I can’t tell you how much confidence it fills one with to know that one’s treasured property is in the safe hands of those who participate in that most excellent of sports. The Rugby ethos forefronts the core values of Teamwork, Respect, Enjoyment, Discipline and Sportsmanship – and what’s not to admire about that!

The image at the head of this post marks another development this week. Back at the start of June – in this post – I celebrated the fact that for the first time since the start of the pandemic I had been able to purchase a large container of Lysol disinfectant wipes. At the time I posited that this might indicate a change in the air with regard to the progress of the pandemic. As it turned out that was the last time that I saw the wipes, though not for want of looking. I asked one of the grocery chaps and he told me that they do come in from time to time, but that they usually arrive on a delivery at 11:00 at night and are subsequently and rapidly cleaned off the shelves by the old folk who habitually do their grocery shopping at 7:00 in the morning.

This week – finally – Thrifty (our local grocer) had a consignment that must have arrived during the hours of daylight. I scampered home with my allotted single container, to be met by The Girl who had – naturally – just found one somewhere else. We now have a pleasant surfeit of disinfectant wipes.

Photo by Andy Dawson ReidMy very recent post concerning the wildfire smoke from Oregon and California crowed somewhat prematurely at the rapid disappearance of the noxious fumes. Naturally the very next day they returned with a vengeance and have settled in for the duration. We now have no vista at all, though that does not in any way compare with having no home – which is what happened to one of The Girl’s acquaintances from Oregon.

Looks as though this unpleasant stuff is going to be with us for at least a few more days and I feel suitably humbled.

Now what do they call that? Hubris? Amour propre? Smug-bastardry getting its due comeuppance?

Take your pick…

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Smoke on the water

September 9, 2020 in Life in BC | Permalink

What a difference…

Just the other night I took this picture in the gloaming as we entertained a dear friend to a garden-based repast. It was Sunday evening and it was a good way to end the weekend. The Haro Strait obliged us – as it often does at this time of year – with a spectacular array of subtle tones and changing light – and very beautiful it was too.

We discussed the weather forecast that had been circulated during the day that had threatened the first (and really quite early) of the coming season’s fall winds. The Haro Strait seems to attract them but – as I say – not usually for another month or so.

Sure enough, the following day was blustery to a fair degree. Not a winter storm for sure, but certainly a ‘promise’ of things to come. What made it particularly unusual is that the temperatures here are still comfortably well into the twenties (Celsius) so the winds were more like those encountered in desert lands – hot and dry.

They also blew in from the South – which had another un-looked for outcome… On the Tuesday morning we awoke to a very different view.

Yes – that fuzz in the middle of the picture is smoke… wildfire smoke!

This season has been mercifully free – thus far – of serious wildfire smoke here on the Island, but these winds had blown this lot up the coast from the fires in Washington State (and elsewhere) that you may have read about on the news. Not good – and those with chest ailments were particularly unhappy.

The good things with winds, however, is that they just keep right on a-blowin’… Come this evening the view from our window had reverted to that of Sunday evening.

Thank goodness for that – say I! (With apologies – of course – to those of you who are still under the cloud!).

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The other stuff (2)

September 5, 2020 in Flotsam and Jetsam | Permalink

Herewith the recently promised second example of things that take a great deal longer to accomplish than they should…

Those who have been following these ramblings for some time may recall this (strangely unseasonal) scene. Back in February 2019 Victoria suffered one its rare serious falls of snow, the last few remnants of which still lingered in sheltered spots a month later.

The good ship Dignity (pictured here) suffered a mishap as a consequence, the weight of snow piled on top of her aged and decaying (I know how it feels) Bimini cover causing it to split at the seams and to deposit several feet of snow into her cockpit.

Once the snow had gone I immediately set about finding someone to make a replacement cover. Until such time as this could be done Dignity was likely to be laid up, covered with a tightly secured tarpaulin. It was touch and go as to whether we would get her on the water for the 2019 season at all.

Oh – if only things had been that simple!

Now – to be fair we were away for a month in the UK and Europe during May and early June – but there really is no excuse for what transpired. I had been recommended a canopy maker – one of Victoria’s long standing family concerns – and they took my deposit, agreed to order the necessary materials and I left them to set to work. That proved to have been a mistake and six months and more later I was still calling, visiting their workshop and generally trying to make a (polite) nuisance of myself. Each time they swore blind than there had been this problem or that emergency and they were just getting started. Each time absolutely nothing – zero! – zip! – nada! – happened.

Then the company disappeared! The workshops closed and emails and phone numbers became black holes from which no response ever escaped. I saw the proprietress once more – when she called at my front door to return the existing canvases from which she was to have made the required copy. I asked for my deposit back. She said she would effect an e-Transfer.

Did I get my money back? Did I bu**ery!

So – at the end of last year Dignity was still securely wrapped in a tarp and I was looking for a new Bimini maker. I thought I had found one, though he was busy until the new year. We very nearly got a cover made in February – but that was just at the time that we went to Mexico for a week and the date slipped back.

Then the COVID-19 pandemic struck. My canvas maker lost his assistant (who did not return from his winter holidays down south) and the job started to get pushed back and back again. Then the canopy maker’s wife fell ill and he had to withdraw from a host of jobs – mine included. At least this time I got my deposit back… and a recommendation to a third company.

The good news is that, in this case, third time was definitely lucky and – as of this week – Dignity is now resplendent in her shiny new Bimini top – courtesy of Marlene at Verde Studios in Langford. She gets the kudos and the name-check for having finished a job that took more than a year and a half in total.

Of course – with term starting this week and with everything else that is happening Dignity won’t be getting on the water this year either.

Oh well – here’s to next year!

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Huzzah!

September 2, 2020 in Flotsam and Jetsam | Permalink

With regard to my application to the UK Passport Office, from whom I have been waiting patiently for some good news… I think that the attached needs no further explanation:

Now just waiting on the Canadian equivalent for my Permanent Resident card…

How about it – Canada?

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