Saturday 14th April 2012

Suddenly last night I saw it – it’s looking Shard-like at last. But still not on straight.

Tonight I dine with my architect, Bruce MacBain. This afternoon Lord Arrowby asked me to a football match. But I couldn’t go owing to exhaustion and also struggle with a Val-made curtain that was falling down – no fault of Val’s, you understand. Val himself texted from his armchair, to which confined post hip-snap (op delayed: too bad!) ‘Just decanting some lighter fuel into an old Tia Maria bottle.’

The Shard Looking Shard-Like At Last But Still Wonky

Wednesday 12th April 2012

At last! The final India installment. India has been a massive statement this winter for Poor Little Rich Gays. Lord Arrowby, then the Multis, adorned the Sub-Continent. Finally Anthony Mottram, ‘consultant’ of Prague, my oldest and closest friend despite estrangement of 27 months, and Robert Nevil, the biographer of the Pony Club, regained 1st class from Bombay on March 26th.

All Poor Little Rich Gays are back in now. Even Reggie Cresswell, the Ghanaian ceramicist, as regained from his tour of the Far East, New Zealand and Australia.

Poor Little Rich Gays, of course, have private connections with this great Nation, insider knowledge. As you know some very lovely personal Indians have reached the highest plateaus of the Poor Little Rich Gay hierarchy – Arjan Bose, for instance, the treasured mini doc and pseudo-kitchen. In addition, Rufus Pitman has surged into print in triumph with Bangladesh. Such a picture he creates of the life there in the 1970s. The launch is next week.

Anthony Mottram was somewhat reduced in scale by the time of boarding for London. His activities in India were limited apparently to tottering into the Malabar Caves (as seen in A Passage to India by Morgan) then veering straight out again with convulsions. Robert Nevil’s shopping can’t have been very encouraging: lichen for a chicken recipe,  plus poha and phoolkopir daln and bags of Goan pickled prawns.

While Mottram was writhing, Robert Nevil was out and about in Mumbai, visiting a flats block (no, block of flats) where he met high-level private Indians. Now he is to advise the newly-elected Governor of West Bengal on the future of Calcutta.

1st Class Lounge at Bombay Airport: Robert Nevil Entranced by Personal Taxi to Tarmac Service

Empire Atmosphere Reinforced in Bombay Airport 1st Class Lounge by This Poster

Bombay Flats' Block Where Robert Nevil Began his Campaign to Take Over India's Running

Sunday 8th April 2012

India once again held back. The Lord has Risen!

I was saying to Val yesterday, if Jesus existed, why do we know so little about him? There must have been more to him than doing miracles and making announcements. What did he think about lettuce, for instance, or gravy? God, too – what does he do all day? Where does he live?

But let’s not get bogged down in detail. For Poor Little Rich Gays, the sense that life is measured, if not judged, is important. Some prefect in the sky, regardless of existence, spurs us on. Otherwise we’d be no better than the vain, foolish Earls’ Court Gays.

Poor Little Rich Gays will rise again: who knows what the summer holds? Such richness! What new configurations of friends and lovers? What will the Poor Little Rich Gay signature summer dish be? What will replace  fennel shivered over the barest flame for four hours and spread on pain polene? What about summer scarves? Will they remain crucial?

The Gay Mother’s vicar was just a teeny bit upsetting this morning. His Easter Sermon raged against ghastly concupiscence; apparently giving only begins once we’ve disposed of 10 per cent of what we have to those less fortunate.

I don’t think so. The Lord loves a well-honed interior, a really good bronzer, a stunning ensemble of frockage. It is our calling to embroider his Gifts.

Whether in existence or not, the Lord is a kindly all-embracing Prefect. He comforts the Poor Little Rich Gay on his gruelling path; he does not judge, unless really bad.

He ‘brings us safe through Jordan to our home above.’

Well, not quite, because our Home is never quite what it should be. But we strive ever onward.

Saturday 7th April 2012

India held over yet again. The Crucifixion this time.

On this Saturday of Christ’s death, the only Saturday of his death as it turned out, we meditate upon the Cross. Poor Little Rich Gays, here and throughout the world, were asked ‘What does the Crucifixion mean to you?’

Most were too busy to respond.

The Gay Mother and I were riding westward, in my official car with Xenon driving lights, after Aunt Lavinia’s 80th Birthday Party at Shoreditch House.

But Poor Little Rich Gays embrace suffering, we’re not too grand for it, unlike the Earl’s Court Gays with their bleached teeth and muscles. I have been suffering for 27 months now, kept perpetually in non-speakers Abu Ghraib by Anthony Mottram, ‘consultant’ of Prague. It is a classic Poor Little Rich Gay falling out – essentially a battle of wills, a fearsome deadlock until wipe-out victory is gained.

Christ endured only 40 days and 40 nights in the desert, then 3 hours on the Cross. So I’ve done longer.

Christ at once emblazoned in glory, gilded to the rafters in Heaven yet nailed roughly to the Cross – it’s the Poor Little Rich Gay story.

The Photo Multi sees the Cross as an absolute indication that funding for political parties should not be provided by the State. Smaller parties would be crucified.

Wednesday 4th April 2012

India is held over until tomorrow, which is also Aunt Lavinia’s 80th Birthday Party at Shoreditch House. I’m not to be in pearl grey after all.

Feeling that I had not quite caught the Blond Multi yesterday, I realise with horror that I have not paid tribute on the occasion of his 50th birthday.

He’ll hate it, of course.

It was Laura Malcolm, that commentator on French affairs and possessor of the one of the largest known Bruce-MacBain-designed premises, who first saw in the Blond Multi a 1st World War Captain, marching direct from public school, commanding absolute loyalty from his platoon.

It would not have been his glamour alone nor his fine manly figure that would have bound the men. Nor his knowing to leave them alone at mealtimes and just what unintrusive enquiries to make after their families. Nor his superb cuffs and uniform, no doubt kept at a peak even in the Trenches.

No, no or rather yes, yes: it would have been his miraculous Poor Little Rich Gay quality that would have inspired utter devotion, the extraordinary gift, perhaps only sensed by his men,  of being in certainty, determined on action, clear in decision yet at the same time mysteriously agonized. They would have glimpsed the painstaking humanity as the Blond strode ahead quite dependable.

I also failed to mention that the Multis took the Passion very well. The Photo Multi has always loved Bach and other high music; the Blond too moves to embrace it.

Tuesday 3rd April 2012

Intense pressure: already I yearn  for the glorious enveloping lounger ( I mean Tuscany in August). The Queen must be feeling the same about Balmoral. Four months before any hope of rest.

Except in Tuscany we’re so busy.

The gardening! How to rein in nature which gallops in this hot weather?

Did I mention that I’m now triple Glyndebourniana this summer? What will I wear? What will I wear? And the Jubilee? And the Olympics? And I’m to board for Paris in June.

Poor Little Rich Gays have now all reported back in from India: Lord Arrowby, that stern Government figure (he’s already diarised his Summer Party), the Multis and now Robert Nevil and Anthony Mottram, who regained 1st Class from Bombay last Monday.

Robert Nevil has India news forthcoming for tomorrow, here at Poor Little Rich Gays. They were at the Malabar Caves, you know, as in Passage to India, a novel by Morgan Forster.

Speaking of novels, Rufus Pitman has whirled out another, already lauded: it’s about Bangladesh.  Finn Magnus, the hot boy doc, is coming on well – he took a 4 star in Venice and hosted his mother there.

Reggie Cresswell is still apparently absent; he toured the Far East, Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

Thursday is Aunt Lavinia’s 80th Birthday Lunch at Shoreditch House, the first 80th ever to be held there. Cousin Barley’s on the committee. The Gay Mother gains 1st Class from the Country tomorrow.

I haven’t a thing to wear! I’m nowhere near the pearl grey I crave. Or rather I don’t want to fork £742 at Paul and Joe.

Sunday, such touching scenes, when Captain Blond Multi (did you hear he’s retired at 50? He’s just announced his prices for odd jobs, such as fetching Mothers from station or dry cleaning: £420 an hour) waited loyally, although himself  in the Festival Hall in good time, for his beloved Photo Multi who was trying to park their machine – thus missing  the entire first half of the Passion.  The poor Blond had been practising very hard with a CD in his car all the way back from Cornwall, whence he retreated for 4 philosophical days to meditate on his retirement last week.

The Multis have never been apart except for business trips in 23 years.

They engaged in a consoling blazing row with the Managing Director of the Festival Hall over their refused admission as latecomers, then  retired to the Oxo Tower. A high-end luncheon was always to lift the day and it did. The Blond laid extensive plans on Saturday. They really wanted to take a new place in Aldwych but it was too far from the Royal Hall.

Captain Blond Multi bears and feels the pain of the Poor Little Rich Gay calling as well as the glory.You can see the bar of responsibility and leadership laid across his eyes often. In the Trenches, the men of his platoon would have done anything for him.

It’s no bed of roses, being a Poor Little Rich Gay.

I should mention that Captain Blond’s Official Birthday Month was bought to a close on Saturday night when Prince Dmitri Hersov, of the Accountancy firm, gave a dinner at which 100 balloons hugged the ceiling. The Prince had purchased on-line two helium gas cylinders for £75.

Oh, I forgot: we saw Kent’s Duke on the stairs at the Royal Festival Hall: he has no commoner blood, unlike Her Majesty the Queen, divine as she is.

Balloons at Prince Dmitri Hersov's for Closing Ceremony of the Blond Multi's Official Birthday Month

Captain Blond Multi Gains the Royal Festival Hall on Sunday for the Passion

Champagne Gained at the Oxo Tower after Latecoming to the Passion

Contradictory Lav Seen by Photo Multi in a Barratt Home: No Idea What He was Doing in a Barratt Home

Wednesday 27th March 2012

I’m rushing. With the green shoots of Spring I’m shopping again, I’m re-frocking. I see pearl grey for Aunt Lavinia’s 80th birthday lunch at Shoreditch House next week (her granddaughter, Cousin Barley, is on the Committee). A pearl grey suit. I’ve got to get started on the shops this afternoon if a purchase is to come forth by next week.

What will have hatched at Topman, Zara, Paul & Joe while my back’s been turned, since January in fact? Such pregnancy!

Last week I sat at the counter in Bocca di Lupo and had small plates with Joshua Baring, one of our youngest Poor Little Rich Gays. After, his friend, Patrick Lockyer, rebounded from a date (hadn’t looked like the picture: Hermes counter at H. Nicks; nice, not fancied), in a Topman coatlette and with complex hair. Patrick Lockyer is very coming, on the contracts side, v. lucrative, and just about the best shape ever seen. Springy and active. See a gazelle or roe deer changing its mind as to direction.

To his hair he is applying a keratin gel in a honey blond tint, and hair spray.

Saturday 24th March 2012

You just won’t believe it. The whole Poor Little Rich Gay world is rocked to its foundations. It’s all to do with Bruce MacBain, my private architect. We’ve always wondered about him.

Meanwhile, other Poor Little Rich Gays are blazing the truer trail: they’ve been up all night booking Glyndebourniana. The public booking opened at 1 minute past midnight last night. I thought it was noon today. I thought 12.01 am meant noon. But Sebastian Archer, who once shaped world taste in words for a living, put me right – just in time.  What a narrow escape! By noon there would have been nothing left.

Comment whirled through the world: surely Poor Little Rich Gays are on the Friends List? True – I’ve thought of it. You have to pay £500. But why bother if you can book anyway? I went on at 6.am this morning and gained two tickets for The Fairy Queen at once. Sebastian Archer booked The Cunning Little Vixen at 1.30 am.

So I’m double Glyndebourniana this year!

Poor Little Rich Gays get what they want, rarely by the usual means. Private, free entrance is the dream, almost always come true.

Anyway, back to Bruce MacBain. You remember he was well-refreshed at the Blond Multi’s 50th at La Pont and nearly threw Peter Acharya in the Thames. Well, that’s not the end of it. He told me himself, last night, while we sat in a Gastro being blasted to smithereens by bellowing, toilet-talking male heterosexuals, which is ironic really.

Bruce MacBain was flirting at the Blond Multi’s 50th birthday party at La Pont.

And not with a man.

But with a concert pianist. She even said, ‘You’d better watch out. That’s my husband over there.’

Luckily she’s Argentinian and likely to give a home concert in the Multis’ wrapabout penthouse soon.

What neither of them knew, or maybe they did, was that that husband was being very carefully attended to by his dinner neighhour, Marcus Cargill,  England’s leading clock mender. Later, when many Poor Little Rich Gays became unanchored from their seats (or had fallen straight to the floor on rising), Hamish McCory, Marcus’s partner, was found to be in the vacant seat on the other side of the concert pianist’s husband, creating a pincer movement.

It’s thought he was being groomed for a threesome.

Thank God for normalcy: when you think of what Bruce MacBain was up to!

Meanwhile, I’ve had the idea of displaying russet apples flat on my trolley. I feel Angus Willis, the Hastings-based International food writer and stylist, will approve.

He, by the way, is dining Priscilla Carluccio this evening. She has crawled into the Tudor House, Hastings, for the weekend. I could have dined too, but have a dinner at home.

My New Flat Fruit Bowl

Wednesday 21st March 2012

Robert Nevil reports from Bombay: there are crows at the Taj. That’s the highest hotel there. You may remember it was attacked by terrorists some years ago.

Better watch out! It’s so easy to bring down an hotel. In one of the Firbank novels, someone said in passing, ‘There are fleas at the Ritz.’ Next thing you know, the Ritz has closed.

Now, accompanied by Anthony Mottram, ‘consultant’ of Prague, my oldest and closest friend, estranged at the last count for 27 months, he’s boarded 1st Class  the Deccan Queen for Pune.  They passed  through Diva Junction. On board some holy men offered the Bhagavad Gita for sale. Thereupon, Anthony Mottram single-handedly destroyed two million years of Indian spiritual life.

Crows at the Taj: That Great Bombay Hotel

Prayer Room at the Taj Hotel Bombay

On Board the Deccan Queen: the 1st Class Accommodation

Anthony Mottram (Out of Picture) Systematically Destroying 2 Million Years of Indian Spiritual Life

Saturday 17th March 2012

I am emboldened and radiantly happy, in Bath today as it happens, but last night at my London home. I invited the Multis and Prince Dmitri Hersov at 6pm and by 7.30 had the full dinner party vehicle underway: the table heaped and emblazoned with wares, 3 courses planned and produced. I couldn’t believe how the pieces fell into place. Usually it’s one day min. to launch the vehicle and run it.

When the Multis gained, they were three: I mean they had another with them: Ariana Chronicopoulos, bailed out from Greece for the Blond Multi’s 50th 10 days ago and still here, lodged in one of their remote flats, a friend of the Photo Multi’s from the Photography School.

She’s very depressed, very tragic, very haggard, or absolutely blooming depending on the point of view, yours or hers.

But I’d only got four steaks (£14.37, Waitrose meat counter); I managed to re-style the table. Somehow, if I cut the steaks in half, I’d be able to eek out. Luckily the Multis are still on an arc from Ananda, Himalayas, where they ate specks of designer food on the weight loss programme.

My menu: spinach soup (I had self-made chicken stock in stock), bacon and toasted pine nuts garni, grilled steaks (v. small person portions) with leek  and thyme butterbean whip (not whipped actually; whole. Couldn’t resist the opp to put ‘butterbean whip’) rhubarb with orange. Anna del Conti recipe I’ve recently discovered. You must try it. Lacerate your rhubarb with orange juice for 2 hours before ovening, then drain off the juice, boil down to a gracious syrup.

Ariana presented chocs but it turned out they belonged to the Multis. She’s quite light-fingered. During dinner she conducted bizarre massage. It looked as if she might strangle the Blond Multi but the Photo said if she did they wouldn’t let her back into that flat they’ve lent her. She then questioned us about our sex lives – are we perverted? What kind of humiliation do we like? No humiliation at all – we were at least agreed about that. Surely not, she said, humiliation is going on all over Greece. She herself has recently acquired a liking for humiliation.

The Photo Multi was showing a new scarf from India which periodically he Isadora-Duncan-ed, sweeping shelf-fuls of antiques to the floor.

Meanwhile Anthony Mottram and Robert Nevil have quietly died and been installed in sarcophagi in Bombay.

Well, up to a point: they’re in an apartemento there and lie side by side on little and large beds. See graphs below.

I wonder what the Hindi for ‘apartemento’ is? ‘Apartemendu’?

The Photo Multi's Indian Scarf Work with Jewelled Applique

The Photo Multi in Indian Jewelled Scarf

Mottram and Nevil: Here They Lie Buried:Their Sleeping Quarters in Bombay Apartment