{"id":11449,"date":"2025-12-16T17:53:31","date_gmt":"2025-12-16T17:53:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/?p=11449"},"modified":"2025-12-16T17:53:31","modified_gmt":"2025-12-16T17:53:31","slug":"val-didnt-want-that-nest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/?p=11449","title":{"rendered":"Val Didn’t Want that Nest"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Tuesday 16th December 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a most discouraging arrival. On the previous visit I’d brought Val a nest of tables, or une ne des tables (except it’s not ‘ne’: read on to find out). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

They were a job lot in an auction at Nottingham. \u00a340 with premium. The main thing was to get a card table for Fergus Strachan who had been required to host Bridge by the Photo Multi. The oak trolley I thought perfect for Normandy, for garden service in the summer. And the nest… maybe it was worth restoring. It had a slight repro tinge but that might wear off with time. There was a lovely veneer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was 3 hours each way in the car to fetch the items. Plus agony of whether have committed traffic offences and might get banned. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The trolley – I had to get a Zipcar to take it over to Laura Malcolm’s and Matt Driver’s in Fulham. Terrible worry about a speed camera on the Embankment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Laura professed thrilled with the trolley. Sudden flash one morning – surely the nest ideal for Val. He doesn’t have any dainty tables of any kind in his drawing room. Everything’s on the floor. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, Val took one look at the nest. ‘Can I re-gift?’ he said. ‘Maybe Dolly will like them.’ That’s one of his neighbours. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

‘But Val..’ I cried, ‘you’ve no table by your sofa… you could be so dainty.’ <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was left that I would put the nest under the piano. I hoped at least it would be forgotten about. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So imagine my horror as my machine drew into Val’s forecourt of his Hastings bungalow for a second visit last week – accompanied by Anthony Mottram of Prague. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was the nest dumped outside the front door. It had even come on to rain. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

‘Val,’ I said, ‘you… ‘ I used a bad word and more. ‘Val, you’re an absolute…. ‘<\/p>\n\n\n\n

‘Dorabella visited on Saturday,’ Val said. ‘She thought they were horrible too.’ Dorabella is one of Val’s mannish woman friends, a grand blue-stocking doctor. ‘Not even Dolly wanted them.’ <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later on I did a Christmas card for Val: ‘Bunnies can and will have un ne des tables,’ I put in it. By the time Val opened the card he was in bed (but we were still there). ‘The French for nest is N.. I ..D,’ Val announced, having enough strength to correct. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’m not giving up. I’m going to get Val a really fine Regency nid des tables of the most superb quality. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In even worse news, it now turns out that Matt Driver has taken against the oak trolley. Not just mildly. Really withering… it’ll never get across the grass, you can’t get a trolley over steps… He applied an extended analysis lasting 40 minutes, such as, once, he gave to the preposed global campaign to launch the latest Persil washing liquid. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The only happy thing is that Val’s rejected nest has found a happy home in Royston King’s drawing room – which is very grand and has received world figures. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

\n
\"\"
Le Nid des Tables – Not Good Enough for Val <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tuesday 16th December 2025 It was a most discouraging arrival. On the previous visit I’d brought Val a nest of tables, or une ne des tables (except it’s not ‘ne’: read on to find out). They were a job lot in an auction at Nottingham. \u00a340 with premium. The main thing was to get a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":111113,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adrain-edge"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/111113"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11449"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11451,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11449\/revisions\/11451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}