Friday 5th January 2018

Well, here we are – 2018. 100 years since the end of the 1st World War coming up. Robert Nevil has announced that today is 12th Night. I’m in a flat-spin because it’s always been 6th January in my world. I’ve never heard of 5th January being 12th Night. The thing it’s bad luck to take cards etc down before 12th Night and just as much bad luck to leave them up after – so what to do? I feel as if I’m suspended from the ceiling. I actually put all my cards back up today after cleaning – before hearing this news.

Anyway – one important thing I forgot to mention from Lord Arrowby’s father’s funeral.  Lady Veronica Sealyham-Stanway, married into one of the leading political families of our Nation – her coat. Rufus Pitman admired her coat on exit from the church. There was also a good white fur hat, but it was the coat that drew us in. You can’t cover everything.,especially when there’s so much.  ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘it’s been extended, you see.’ First of all it was extended downwards, then cuffs were added and finally pockets. She explained it all in some detail. The extensions were marked by bands of crimson braid over the crushed raspberry wool, giving striking drama to the coat. This must be what separates Greatnesses from ordinary people – they have their coats extended.

Christmas in the Far West was most satisfactory. The outfits went according to plan. I wore the Tartan frock coat by Topman for Morning Service and the Zara crushed green velvet jacket in the evening at Cousin Smurry’s. Our pre-Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve was really good although neither the Gay Mother nor I could be bothered to get the candlesticks out. The bird was moist. 1hr 20 mins in the Aga. The Gay Mother did the bread sauce and the sprout preparation work. We had the little sausages and Oh the heaven of  vacuum-packed chestnuts! They’ve made Christmas possible really. It was no different from doing a normal bird dinner – just the little sausages and the chestnut exterior stuffing for Christmas uplift.

There was nearly a drama though. Why is Christmas so fraught with peril? On 23rd I broke the toilet handle of the upstairs toilet. We were facing Christmas having to pull up the wire handle in the cistern by hand and cistern lid off throughout. Can you imagine? Then I had the brain wave of B&Q. Open on Christmas Eve, this year a Sunday, of course. So toilet order was restored.

But others were not so lucky. I had word on 2nd January that an acquaintance had dropped dead on New Year’s Day then immediately word came that Francis Petworth, the mentor of Reggie Cresswell and great taste-shaper of our age, had died aged 93 on 28th. Also that architectural historian with whom I dined in November – he was taken.  Is it the pre-Christmas run-up that kills them? Now I discover that another Poor Little Rich Gay – his mother was subject to emergency open heart surgery on Christmas Eve while visiting her son from abroad in London. Thankfully is recovering well. But no bird joy in that home, you can be sure.

Christmas Font Flowers in the Far West

Christmas Flowers at Church in the Far West