{"id":1759,"date":"2010-11-28T20:18:45","date_gmt":"2010-11-28T20:18:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/?p=1759"},"modified":"2010-11-28T20:24:23","modified_gmt":"2010-11-28T20:24:23","slug":"val-still-valiant-in-adversity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/?p=1759","title":{"rendered":"Val Still Valiant in&nbsp;Adversity"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Sunday 28<sup>th<\/sup> November 2010<\/p>\n<p>Val continues uncoupled from the dear bottle, or at least on a longer reign. A little drop now and again can do no harm or hasn\u2019t done so far. He tried AA years ago but couldn\u2019t bear it, nor the Wolfsheim wing of Ealing General (something like Wolfsheim. Maybe you know it).<\/p>\n<p>Val will never be institutionalised nor doctored as to personality, just as he has never and now will never work in an office.<\/p>\n<p>This is the longest run of low in-take for years, possibly ever. And what glory! What deeds and words!<\/p>\n<p>What Val needs is a private income. He should never have been put to work.<\/p>\n<p>He went North the other day, I thought to make cossies for a pantomime, but it was something else. Somehow he got on-line, a novelty for him and, first thing, Googled Eudora Welty.<\/p>\n<p>Have you heard of Eudora Welty? Well, you\u2019ll Google her yourself now, won\u2019t you?<\/p>\n<p>This Googling is marvellous.<\/p>\n<p>She was a short-story writer of yesteryear, possibly on a ley-line with Warwick Deeping, another curiously named and now forgotten author.<\/p>\n<p>Before the North, Val edged a jacket with hat petersham ( see graph below). It\u2019s a kind of ribbon. He had to go to V.V. Rouleaux (if you hear the name without knowing how it is spelt you might assume a cabaret artist) to get exactly the right sort that would stretch just a little on the corners. So much detail.<\/p>\n<p>In the North there was an immense programme of visits \u2013 Tatton Park, Dunham Massey, Nutsford, Manchester Gallery of Costume Platt Hall (Val loves an obscure museum: the museum of catering and commerce at Budapest; the never-found museum of paprika at Szeged) and the Lady Lever Art Gallery at Port Sunlight.<\/p>\n<p>Future plans include a visit to Hastings, where a friend has turned vegetarian. \u2018I told her, you\u2019ll get nowhere if you don\u2019t know how to make Sauce Mornay.\u2019 She\u2019s also to be instructed in bread-making, for which Val is wild.<\/p>\n<p>On Tuesday Val and I were in the front row at St John\u2019s Smith Square for the astonishing and thrilling recital of Chopin by Artur Pizzaro. In the interval Val had a cup of tea. Standing by the sugar lumps, he made a moving affirmation to all nearby: \u2018I\u2019m here, by the sugar lumps.\u2019 The tongs, whirled at arms\u2019 length, decorated and strengthened the statement. He\u2019s worried there will be fascinators at the Royal Wedding. I hadn\u2019t heard, but apparently Mrs Middleton was recently spotted, flat on her stomach in the grass at Sandringham, with a shot-gun. No more sure nor certain sign that Royal marriage is imminent could be imagined.<\/p>\n<p>Val said: \u2018You could pour your cup of tea straight down the loo and cut out the middleman.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>Now we\u2019ve both\u00a0 been rather knocked sideways by the death of Bernard Matthews. Val is munching on a Turkey Twizzler in remembrance.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1761\" style=\"width: 572px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1761\" class=\"size-large wp-image-1761\" title=\"001\" src=\"http:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/11\/0011-562x750.jpg\" alt=\"Val's Jacket Self-Edged with Hat Petersham and With Self-Made and -Appointed Coat of Arms from Tie Fabric\" width=\"562\" height=\"750\" srcset=\"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/11\/0011-562x750.jpg 562w, https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/11\/0011-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/11\/0011.JPG 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 562px) 100vw, 562px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-1761\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Val&#39;s Jacket Self-Edged with Hat Petersham and With Self-Made and -Appointed Coat of Arms from Tie Fabric<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sunday 28th November 2010 Val continues uncoupled from the dear bottle, or at least on a longer reign. A little drop now and again can do no harm or hasn\u2019t done so far. He tried AA years ago but couldn\u2019t bear it, nor the Wolfsheim wing of Ealing General (something like Wolfsheim. Maybe you know [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"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-1759","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\/1759","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\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1759"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1759\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1764,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1759\/revisions\/1764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poorlittlerichgays.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}