Pub talk at the Eagle: summer shorts and really Eel-y, dangerously hip Ely.

Me: “I liked your e-mail recruiting for the cricket team. It almost made me wish I could throw a ball. The wind is beginning to lose its sting, and the gaps between rainstorms are getting gradually longer - yes, the English summer is on its way. Along with imported strawberries and inappropriate shorts, cricket is one of those things without which summer would not be complete.

While some may chose to spend that season lazing beside rivers and quaffing champagne, the more discerning amongst us elect for the greensward and the thrill of clattering wickets. To feed this passion there exists the Trinity Hall MCR cricket team. This august collective has a long and proud history of sending players boldly into competition, to be thrashed soundly by the other team.

“You too could be part of that tradition.”

Him: “There are always some pretty dire and wrong shorts come the summer.”

Her: “My father doesn’t own any shorts. He doesn’t even own any casual clothing. Everything he owns is a suit.”

Me: “Well, it’s the one thing almost all men look good in I suppose. And it saves a lot of thinking. Not much good in an Australian summer, though. ‘Just popping down to the beach in my casual suit’.”

Him: “Yes, it’s a plan that works well until you get a few days of really hot weather. Or get on the London tube in Summer.

“Then it can only go horribly wrong.”

Me: “Well in an act of gross optimism I bought two pairs of shorts with me …”

Noise of Britons snickering into their beer.

“ … which of course I haven’t worn at all. But rather stupidly, I managed to have them sent after me – so I arrived in Italy in September at the end of Europe’s worst heat wave for a hundred years.”

Her: “In that situation I think I’d just rip the legs off my jeans, you know, into those fashionable little shorts?”

Him: “Are those fashionable?”

Her: “In that, ‘the 80s are back way’. Y’know, retro.”

Him: “Yes, 80s retro, 90s retro, 15 minutes ago retro. It’s hard to keep up.”

Me (looking at a magazine): “Hello, we’re living in the wrong town. Apparently Ely is growing in population and sophistication and is in serious danger of becoming hip.”

Him: “What’s Ely got Cambridge hasn’t? A Cathedral?”

Me: “That is the first thing they mention, yes.”

Him: “What’s the second?”

Me (reading from said Magazine): “A Woolworths on the High Street. As everyone knows Cambridge know longer has a Woolworths on the High Street, or anywhere else.”

General silence.

Me: “Ely. Is it pronounced E-lie, or Eel-ee?”

Him: “Eel-ee. From their historical origins.”

Her: “What origins? Undrained swamp?”

Me (still looking at magazine): “Third thing they have we don’t - hills.”

Him: “They have a hill, yes. With the town on it. Before the fens were drained you had to row out to it.”

Her: “So that’s the reason for their name? Isle-ee, because they used to be an island?”

Him: “No. It’s Eel-ee, because they used to have a lot of eels.”

Me: “You can’t be serious.”

Him: “Deadly.”

(My Berlin photos are finally up, click on the headline for the latest)

The Berlin Experience (or “Birds of a Feather Flock Together” an entry for )

After doing Dublin as a solo tourist it was great to go with a flatmate to Berlin. Also, as the flatmate in question is Italian, my pig-ignorant English-speaker status was not an undue encumbrance as his friends were used to speaking to him in English. Two non-German speaking flatmates stranded together in a foreign capital. Excelllent.

But what a group of friends! S. the Italian sociologist spent a summer in Berlin recently and met a really eclectic group of people. I met a correspondent photographer straight back from assignment in Haiti (having seen his Iraq photos on S’s laptop), a fashion designer in her third year of getting an original label off the ground, a medical intern and S himself was staying with a record company promotions officer who routinely sends him batches of free CDs. (Also, in true college-life style, a woman we knew from the grads at college was a native and was able to hang out with us a bit.)

S’s artsy friends seemed pretty much the scene in Mitte, the central district of the old East Berlin, artsy and based around internal migration (most people were not from Berlin, but had moved there because it was cool). It had, for want of a better analogy, terribly Brunswick Street.

Top things about Berlin (for an Australian most comfortable in Canberra and Melbourne): for Western Europe, it’s dirt cheap (ie Australian prices), I had a fabulous hostel http://www.circus-berlin.de/_private/start_ho_e.htm, there’s a very lively bar scene – and they have trams!

Actually, the main thing I enjoyed after a English winter was three days continuous sunlight.

Berlin has a really interesting character. I tried as much as possible to exempt myself from the obligation to be a comprehensive tourist and just hang out with S and the locals where I could (though I did take in the Jewish Museum, the Checkpoint Charlie Museum and the old National Gallery. In a moment of spectacular incompetence and irony I could not actually find the secret police museum at the old Stasi headquarters.) What did I notice, other than the reassuringly familiar metallic whale-song of tram brakes?

Berlin seems a perpetual construction site. Communism imposed an architectural time-bubble on the East, resulting in a lot of buildings with facades like grated chocolate bars, and redevelopment and restoration proceeds at a frightening pace. Also, there are a lot of vacant lots with rubble (the legacy of bombing?), converted to community uses like kids’ playgrounds. The light has a chalky quality, the sky white with dust and the centre is intensely modernist and concretey. It’s one of the first places in Europe I’ve seen park-corners thoroughly trampled, Australian-style, into hard, messy packed earth and dusty plants.

But it has a vitality I really like: not enough trees to alleviate the raw building, but a real zest and relaxed pace of life. As S said to me, you suspect no-one in East Berlin has a full-time job, any time of day the cafés are crowded.

I liked it, and I liked getting behind the scenes. The first night we dined in a local pizzeria in Christburg (where the pizzas were seriously wider than the narrow tables, two easily feeding five people) while the photographer-friend regaled us with tales of Haiti and somehow drew me into an impassioned discussion on the rule of law and merits of international law.

A great three days, which would not have been the same without a flatmate tour-guide.


PS Naylor: a new instalment of Elliot's adventure went up Friday, which even features a handy summary of the plot so far (more or less) and something of a revelation for our amateur detective.

Movies from Heck

Doug: “Hey Lyn, it’s me!”

Lyn: “ … ?”

Doug: “Doug. The one in Cambridge. University friend? Misspent evenings in Canberra featuring red wine and pizza?”

Lyn: “Right. Yeah. Doug. What time is it?”

Doug: “Here or there? Look I figured in the time difference, daylight savings, your office job and how long it must take to get from Balmain to the city, shower, get breakfast …”

Lyn: “And this led you to believe I wake up about five, right?”

Doug: “Well, it seemed sensible.”

Lyn: “It’s really been too long since you had an office job. You sound a bit jittery, too. What’s your coffee count today? Because I’m guessing your waaaaaay over your limit. I know you're a student again, but there's food groups other than caffiene, y’know?”

Doug: “Look, sorry, forgot you’re not a morning person. But there’s something I had to tell you, given your brilliant movie site and all.”

Lyn: “Oooookay.”

Doug: “Well, the Hellboy movie opened it the states today. The New York Times is raving about it. The director, Guillermo del Toro, even turned down a Harry Potter contract to finish it.”

Lyn: “Hellboy?”

Doug: Yeah, the huge red demon-hunting … um … demon from the Mike Mignola comics.”

Lyn: “Yeah, I know. Great art. Incredible use of shadow, high-gothic atmosphere and steam-powered looking machinery at least a mile high. And lots of references to that horror-writer you and the other boys are so obsessed with.”

Doug: “H. P. Lovecraft. You forgot to mention Mignola’s really gratuitous use of both Nazis and Bavarian castles. Anyway, I’ve spent all morning looking at trailers on the movie site. It looks so cool. Think Raiders of the Lost Ark meets City of Lost Children. I was pretty unimpressed by the New York scenes, but once they get inside a decent Nazi Bavarian castle it actually begins to look like Mignola’s work – and the combination of action and Hellboy wry humour seems spot on.”

Lyn: “Didn’t you just have adventures of your own in Germany you should be blogging about, instead? I know Big George as Batman traumatised you a little ...”

Doug: “Well, we’ll have to see if Christian Bale makes up for it in “Batman Begins”, but the only official thing up on the movie site so far is pictures of some Bat-tank with monster-truck tires bogged in a field. Anyway, I just had to tell you who’s playing Hellboy. Ron Perlman. One in The City of Lost Children. A soft-centred strongman with a sort of tender, gritty charm and humour. That Perlman.”

Lyn: “Oh, wow.”

Doug: “Exactly. In a weird twist, the new Halle Berry Catwoman film is being directed by Pitof, the digital effects supervisor from Lost Children, but I don’t think that’s going to save it somehow. It looks like being a travesty beyond comprehension. Berry’s a mystically empowered revenger who brings down an evil cosmetics company that has a sinister secret behind its new anti-aging products.”

Lyn: “Let me guess. Tested on babies?”

Doug: “Much worse. Marketed by Sharon Stone.”

Lyn: “Ouch.”

Dublin (and photos)

Dublin, city of pubs, pedestrian bridges and a four-meter monument to an orator, politician or writer on every corner.

If, indeed, you can no longer see a six-foot plinth surmounted by a six-foot bronze national figure, or a pub, you are probably in a cow-field deep in county Meath.

Also, in a variant on the old game of tacking words onto the end of fortune-cookie fortunes, some things sound better with the worlds "in Dublin" added.

Such as -

Dancing badly to an Irish accented Abba cover band ... in Dublin.

Sitting in a smoke-filled local pub talking to American geneticists on their night off ... in Dublin.

Giggling at the wit of Oscar Wilde ... in Dublin.

Browsing a teeny book-market ... in Dublin.

Buying a M&S shirt you could just as easily have bought at home ... in Dublin.

Yup, the commonplace is never more entertaining than it is on holiday.

I had a pleasant three days on the ground, wandering about looking at things and two nights pub-crawling the town on two rather different organised outings.

The literary pub-crawl on Thursday drew an older crowd, other than me it seemed thirty – retirement, but was a good deal of fun. Two actors lead you around four pubs, not necessarily the watering holes of literary notables (one I believe was simply the closest surviving pub to the former pub where Michael Collins met with spies returning from the government offices at Dublin Castle) – but what they did add was a dash of history and four acted scenes of street theatre from the work of Dublin greats, opening with Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot”.

The backpacker’s pub crawl Friday drew a predictably younger crowd, and zoomed through half a dozen night spots including a rather nifty, airy Japanese-themed cocktail bar Sosume and the art nouveau wonderland Café en Seine (pronounced “café insane” by locals). Café en Seine seems to have a local reputation as a hang-out for the uber-trendy and cooler-than-you crowd, but on a less busy night it would have been amazing for a quiet drink: three stories, chandeliers, enormous mirrors, prints of nineteenth century Paris cabaret poster-art everywhere, rather like wandering into the set of Moulin Rouge and drinking with suits but still very pleasant.

Met a lot of Americans and Canadians both nights. (And reflected that the night-life I like invariably reminds me of life in Melbourne ... )

I did find the writer's museum and the James Joyce house faintly dissapointing - thought it must be a bit of a struggle to make an "exciting" musuem for people with essentially inward lives (here is a typewriter, it was owned by someone famous).

Still, I also liked the little markets scattered through Temple Bar on a Saturday (especially the small food market) and the Guiness Storehouse museum/exhibition centre was surprisingly entertaining and brilliantly designed. (The free pint at the end in one of the best look-out points in Dublin didn’t hurt.)

I got the impression it would be somewhere I could live happily for a year or two, though flat rental in the inner city did not look at all cheap.

It was the fulcrum of my week of travel: three days in Dublin through to Saturday, then I spent Sunday in London for the 150th Oxford vs Cambridge boat race on the Thames, we have people round to dinner tonight and three days in Berlin starting tomorrow.

And I’m excited about everything. Other than the 4 am start (again!) tomorrow.

PS The Boat Race

So yesterday I went to see the Cambridge/Oxford boat race on the Thames (the 150th individual race, and 175th anniversary of The Race). Through the kindness of others, I was invited on a friend-of-a-friend basis to watch the race simultaneously on the teev and out the window of a house with views over the river near Barnes Bridge.

Bit odd to find myself in a house full of Shakespeare academics, but great fun.

After some astonishing oar clashes (the boats so close they looked like two parts of a fighting zipper), Cambridge won by an astonishing four boat lengths (having lost last year by 12 inches), and the Oxford cox did not take it well. In a bit of a blow for the concept of sportsmanship he managed to spend some quite time talking to the cameras about how Cambridge should have been fouled for cutting in on the Oxford boat, disputing the umpire’s decision and then congratulating Cambridge, “much as it sticks in my throat”.

Ah, ancient rivalries.

(View over Caius college to Trinity Great Court and St John's Chapel)

That bastard Hegel: prising my fingers from the window-ledge of sanity

History and Theory of International Law has been fun, if mind-bending, to study. That does not mean the exam scares me any the less. Particularly when I am trying to revise Hegel for my little discussion group.

Hegel is now officially my new foe in the battle for sanity. (Three rounds in and he's still ahead on points, the wiley old codger.)

With quotes like these to decipher, who needs psychosis?

From my notes for circulation to my fellow-sufferers:

Hegel, G W F, Philosophy of Right (1821)

The state must be more than the mere coming together of individuals to protect their individual rights. The state is the “objective” (communal?) mind and personality of a society. As human beings long to become part of the universal, it is only within the state that they can exist as part of a “universal life”:

“If the state is confused with civil society, and if its specific end is laid down as the security and protection of property and personal freedom, then the interest of the individuals as such becomes the ultimate end of their association, and it follows that membership of the state is something optional … Since the state is mind objectified, it is only as one of its members that an individual himself has objectivity, genuine individuality, and an ethical life. Unification pure and simple is the true content and aim of the individual, and the individual’s destiny is the living of a universal life.”

The function of law is to universalise individual behaviour:

“Rationality, taken generally and in the abstract, consists in the thorough-going unity of the universal and the single [ie the particular]. Rationality, concrete in the state, consists (a) so far as its content is concerned, in the unity of objective freedom (ie freedom of the universal [rational] or substantial will) and subjective freedom (ie freedom of everyone in his knowing and in his volition of particular ends); and consequently, (b) so far as its form is concerned, in self-determining action on laws and principles which are thoughts and so universal. This Idea is the absolutely eternal and necessary being of mind.”

While, even for German philosophy, this may seem opaque, I think it boils down to this: law mediates the relationship between individual volition (in the sense of both desire and will) and the objective will of the state (being the rational mind of an entire community) – with the result that by being law-abiding the (otherwise selfish) actions and purposes of the individual citizen are harmonised with those of the state. To live lawfully is to give expression to the universal mind of the state and thus to be universalised.

Far be it from me to suggest it would take a nineteenth century Prussian to think that this is inherently a good thing.


***

Roll on Dublin I say, head-cold or no.

It’s a 4 am start tomorrow, and I’m betting on it being a cold walk to the train station … see you all next week.

More conversations from the kitchen

Most people will be shocked and astonished to hear that in a house of five men and one (attached) woman, we occasionally discuss women. Or, as the Europeans here (like PJ Harvey) have been known to phrase it, “beautiful girls”.

Shocking, I know. And astonishing.

This morning, breakfast conversation ran something like this.

Greek mathematician: “My friend. How are you?”

Me (joking): “Throat’s still a bit sore, but I don’t mind the sexy voice. Now I just need to find a woman who likes a deep voice and doesn’t mind catching cold.”

GM (looking at my jeans and hooded blue jumper): “You should also not wash these clothes for a few days. So you smell.”

Me: “Um … ”

GM: “And get some of the black stuff from the bicycles.”

Me: “Grease.”

GM: “Yes, grease. Get a little of it on your hands and face.”

Me (comprehension dawning): “And let my beard grow out to around the two-day point. Not as bad as when I went to London, but stubbly.”

GM: “Yes. Like you worked as a mechanic.”

Me: “Because Cambridge would be the one town where if I couldn’t pass for mechanic-sexy, I might just manage bicycle-mechanic sexy.”

The Greek mathematician laughed, I washed out my porridge bowl. I wondered who really is the most mad person in this house.

I still suspect I’m the front-runner.

Random randomness

Booked a lot of travel last week.

So I am going to Dublin on my lonesome for two nights/three days on Thursday, just because I could get there and back for 25 pounds (most of which is taxes, the airline component in 34 pence).

I have two or three days back in Cambridge, before heading to Berlin for two nights/three days with a flatmate.

Then there’s at least two of us, but it could possibly rise to as many as four, who have booked for a three day holiday in Paris in the week before exams commence.

We’re selling it to ourselves as motivation to get the work done early, then take a break and unwind and head back into exams raring to go.

Some have called this sensible, some have said “good idea … but brave”, some have muttered something along the lines of “suicide”.

It’s not like I need to get a first because I’ve applied to stay on for the PhD or anything.

Oh, wait, damn – I have.

… Maybe I should just not be allowed to buy things on line any more. I booked all that travel with a three day window.

PS in other news Christopher Eccleston of "Shallow Grave" and "28 Days Later" is apparently going to play the new Dr Who. I thought Eccleston was amazing as the weirdly deluded army officer in 28 Days, and it'll be really interesting to see what the Beeb does in reviving this childhood favourite.

(Trafalgar Square 1)

Some days nothing in my nature is decisive. Like Sundays when, after being up much too late on Saturday, I have the energy to eat brunch and listen to Oscar Peterson, but little else. Days of a solitary and meandering mood.

In that vein, I present in no particular order, loose impressions from a fairly random week. Actually, I’ll never cover the week in one go, let’s stick with the last thing I mentioned here …

London with the posse of sociologists. An Australian, a South African, a Canadian and an American wander through Covent Garden looking for somewhere for a coffee and a snack (settling, lord help our lack of imagination, on Prêt a Manger), we turn a corner:

Doug: “Um, would that be Nelson’s column and St Martin-in-the-Fields?”

Recognising things you’ve not seen in twenty-three years is a little disconcerting. I left the sociologists to go to their LSE lecture and stopped in at St Martin’s. A chamber music quartet was rehearsing for a Vivaldi recital, and it was gorgeous.

I drifted through Trafalgar square and photographed the ducks in the fountain. Wandered through a few rooms of the National Gallery to say ‘hi’ to Degas, Rousseau, Cezanne, Seraut and those other dudes of the late nineteenth century I always find kind of comforting.

Wound up at the National Theatre, Southbank, but the returned tickets were out of my price range (much easier to get cheapies over the net, ah well). Diversion was worth it for the view of Big Ben, a cyclops in the night sky, glowering through the ferris-wheel cage of the London Eye. I had always thought the Eye a singularly ugly and awful affliction upon the Thames riverside, but lit at night, towering over the windswept concrete blocks of Southbank it was beautiful.

Glass-fronted restaurants with starchy high-albedo tablecloths populated converted spaces under railway arches. I had a brief pang for the corporate solicitor’s life, but only briefly.

Wound up at the Royal Court watching the excellent “Ladybird” (by Vassily Sigarev) – a play about modern Russia. The characters seemed to fall out into three types: those adapted to the new Russia, essentially predators; the elderly (mostly killed by the young); and the rest, being brutalised, callous, but somehow innocently naive and optimistic. Strangely moving and uplifting. Strong performances and interestingly written characters. At first it was slightly amusing to hear English actors speaking in the British local-accent equivalent of their Russian characters, but in a world where Sean Connery can command a Russian submarine, it wasn’t a big adaptation to make.

On a tangent, provided the voice for the Viceroy of Portugal in a recent recorded version of “The Spanish Tragedy” done for a college drama society. Was asked by the director to re-do part of one speech with longer “a” sounds in some words like “chance”. My Australian “ahh” in “chaan-sss”, was (for a radio-style production) proving a little too much of a contrast to the surrounding BBC RP accents, so I did it again putting an “aar” in my “chaarn-sss” – and managed to suppress the urge to giggle.

The alternative, I suppose, would have been asking the “Portuguese” characters to sound more Australian. No-one else seemed to think this a terribly sensible suggestion.

(PS grossly overdue Naylor is up.)

(Trafalgar Square 2)

Every damn day, I pack like it was a trip to the Antarctic

I’m going to London this afternoon on an impulse with flatmates who are going down for a talk or workshop in sociology. Am planning on rocking up to a few theatres at the 6.30 mark and seeing whether there are stand by tickets or returns for anything I’m interested in seeing. Not much of a plan, but need to get out of town for part of the day.

So I know the contents of my backpack and overcoat pockets for this little venture will include:

wallet, keys, mobile (obvious stuff);

digital camera (remember to change batteries and memory card);

iPod (check battery charge before leaving, lament loss of one fuzzy earpiece cover);

water-bottle;

muesli bar, piece of chocolate, fruit;

snack dinner for consumption in a park (chicken risotto);

novel (for tube and periods of waiting);

guidebook, train timetable, tube-map;

gloves, beanie, scarf; and

my collapsible travel umbrella (if not lost by my flatmate at the drinks reception for Prince Charles at Trinity on Monday, where we behaved, of course, impeccably, did not drink too much and certainly did not repair to the King’s bar afterwards, and did not round off the evening with G&Ts in the kitchen).

Now where did I leave the damn husky dogs?

In other news, caught up yesterday with Melbourne blogger Michael on his whistle-stop in Cambridge as he shuttles about catching up with friends, family and generally seeking employment as part of the great Aussie invasion of the green and pleasant land.

Only in my household …

I have a habit of only holding conversation with one particular flatmate (a fellow lawyer) when either he or I are about to leave the house. Yesterday morning he was on his way out as I was making my porridge and black coffee.

He (eyeing my two volumes of breakfast reading): “Milton and international criminal law. Odd combination.”

Me: “Not a great respecter of humanitarian law, Satan. More than the odd breach of the laws of internal armed conflict during the revolt in heaven.”

He (exiting through kitchen door): “Ah, but as Prince of Hell, would he have immunity from prosecution as a head of state?”

Me: “Unless it had been specifically abrogated by treaty. Have a good day!”

Another frantic end-of-term

Right, yes, last week got a bit busy didn’t it?

Saturday 6th, the promotional jumpers for the play were distributed at rehearsal: bright red, hooded and groovy. Have been more or less living in mine since.

Sunday 7th, got in from a drink or two and decided it would be a good thing to distract my Italian flatmate from his dinner party and get him to shave my head. We’d been talking about it for a while and took the final decision with only a few eyebrow motions and hand-gestures.

Monday 8th, was informed by many people they liked the new hair (but thought it, the hooded jumper and black leather jacket was perhaps making a bit of a statement).

Tuesday 9th, the Grantchester experience, and a first meeting for the radio-play project I’m doing this week. Went afterwards to stand-up comedy and for a drink at the Eagle with the director.

Wednesday 10th, attended rehearsal in black tie before going to Lent Term dinner.

Thursday 9th, stumbled into a 9 am class, went home and napped, went to an utterly surreal play (Saint-Genet’s, “The Balcony”), a friend’s birthday drinks and wound up drinking red wine until midnight with debater’s in someone’s rooms at Trinity.

Friday 10th, had a verse-speaking and radio-play workshop for next week’s recording of “The Spanish Tragedy”, the Italian flatmate’s visiting mother cooked us a three course meal (saffron rice, pollo alla Romano, marinated strawberries with brown sugar and cream), and went to the Anchor for last drinks.

Saturday 11th, play rehearsal, Bun Shop brunch, spontaneous punting with people from the play (where on the River we found many an actor who had ducked rehearsal … ).

Sunday 12th, a lazy day, capped off with one quick drink with the law grads at The Mitre (followed by an overdue call to the family).

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I and a select one thousand other people are off to meet Prince Charles.

“Letter to a celebrity” (an entry for )

Dear Mr Clooney

I think a human being is made interesting by their irrational prejudices.

One of mine is against you.

Yes, I know, perhaps an international lawyer should really prioritise war criminals, holocaust deniers, terrorists, the architects of US foreign policy or people who kick puppies.

But, some time ago, I assigned you – with good cause - the title of “the ineffably smug George Clooney” and the crown of being my least favourite actor. My ostensible reason at the time was that – well, you really do only ever play one character don’t you? It's alway just pure Clooney: invariably smug and swaggering, if occasionally with a cutesy Southern accent.

However, some of my favourite actors of the black-and-white/early colour era have this same lack of range, Humphrey Bogart or Jimmy Stewart to take two at random. Bogart, the only man alive capable of generating Raymond-Chandler-esque film noir sex appeal despite being saddled with a first name more at home in the post-World War I British Foreign Office (“I say, Humphrey, could we no move the borders of Turkey a bit to the left? I think the Kurds will be much happier over in Persia, don’t you, Bumps, old chap?”) Stewart, who despite a homespun charm that could have just become irritating, managed under Hitchcock to express a kind of suburban dread which Grant could never summon.

So why, Mr Clooney do I chose to pillory you?

I still haven’t seen “Three Kings”, for which you’ve generally been praised. I enjoyed “O Brother, Where Art Thou?”, “Ocean's Eleven”, “Intolerable Cruelty” and “From Dusk ‘Till Dawn”.

But let’s face it, in one of the greatest lines of cinema review of the 1990s, you were indeed the George Lazenby of the Batman series.

Yeah, sure it’s a comic book film. But you signed on for the second Schumaker disaster – it’s not as if there was no forewarning of just how awful it would be. Sure, the prospect of snogging Uma Thurman would warp the judgement of many a better man than I but - while honestly anything would have been an improvement on Val Kilmer - even the arch campness of Adam West would have been preferable to your self-congratulatory swagger. The first two Burton films were fun, dark and creepy - if ridiculous.

You, however, were merely (and unforgiveably) ridiculous. All your acting said was: “Yup, I’m a lot cooler than you. Because, me, I’m George Clooney. You? You are not George Clooney. See anyone else on screen who’s George Clooney? Nope. It’s just me. I, Clooney. Cooler. Than. You.”

And that’s pretty much all I ever find in your acting.

On the other hand, you have had the grace to say: “Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind bombed. But I can take it. Most of the films I've done haven't done particularly well. I'm surprised I'm continuing to work.”

As I said, I have to concede, on reflection, I like everything else I’ve seen you in.

So I am, with astonishing generosity, prepared to lay down the hatchet, the bazooka, the blow-torch.

You will, forever, remain “the ineffably smug George Clooney”, but I imagine I will actually go and see (despite my better judgement) “Oceans 12”, if it survives pre-production.

George, I'm extending the olive branch here. I hope you chose to take it.

Cheers

Doug

(flatmates at the Lent Term dinner, one freshly sheared)

End of term dinner

I think attending rehearsal in black tie would count as one of the more odd moments of my time in Cambridge.

I felt rather like a stage magician entering a room full of jeans-clad thespians in my DJ, bow tie and waistcoat. Still at least one other girl had a formal dinner to go to immediately after as well.

The dinner itself was lovely: probably too much champagne, wine and port, but good company and great fun.

Which is perhaps more than could be said for my mood at the history and theory seminar at 9 am the next morning …

(More soon, rehearsing again.)

“I confess …” (an entry for )

I finally did it.

This is a vaguely embarrassing confession.

After five months living in Cambridge, I finally made it to Granchester.

Granchester. The village that’s a mere 40 minutes by foot up the Cam. Famous as a favoured hangout of Russel, Wittgenstein, Plath, those sorts of people.

Oh, and Lord Jeffrey Archer lives there. Apparently.

I woke late (without going into details, a committee, a new constitution, beer and a midnight full English breakfast with flatmates was involved) and decided to take the day off and cycle upstream. (Not literally, my cycling trousers are not entirely waterproof.)

Naturally, I got lost. The pedestrian tow-path runs into a fen nature reserve, barred to cyclists. It took a fair bit of map-jiggering to get back on track.

To get to Granchester involves passing through the English countryside. I mean, The English Countryside. You expect to see James Herriot elbow-deep in a calving cow or Constable at his easel at every turn.

A robin red-breast nearly flew into my face when I startled it from a tangle of bramble, green and yellow spring fields beside the ambling Cam, that kind of thing.

(Apparently in Granchester, they still call it The Granta.)

Anyway, it made my realise that Cambridge can get a bit claustrophobic in a way a big city doesn’t, just because it is so small. The open air did me a power of good, except on the way back when the wind was in my face not at my back, when it just sliced right through me.

Granchester’s a pretty village, where almost every building is named: “The Old Vicarage”, “The Old School”, “The Old Master’s House”, “Balls Park”, that kind of thing. It also had some good pub signs, and faded out into farms and horse-stables fairly quickly.

The main attraction is meant to be afternoon tea in The Orchard, which, frankly, has the sole attraction of being out-of-doors and leafy and green. (One could just as easily go to the Botanic Gardens). Still, all very pretty, a pleasant little two-hour trip and another New Thing.

There are some other recent New Things. I’m going to do a radio play read-through tonight, and I – well – sorry, Mum – shaved my head on Sunday night. But that’s another story.

So, I took a day off work. When I cleared my e-mail I found a very brief note from my supervisor. She thinks my dissertation is done except for the tidying and there’s no need to meet again unless I have questions.

Golly. It’s not due for another seven weeks …

Almost history, certainly Cambridge

In 1646 (or near enough as makes no odds) the Civil War reached quiet Cambridge, Cromwell’s horses were stabled in King’s Chapel and the Parliamentarians grabbed most of the colleges silver. Somehow, Trinity Hall, almost uniquely, came away with its silver intact. We are now able to present, almost from original sources, the negotiations that may have transpired (just about) ...

The Master of Trinity Hall sits at a table, in a ruff, reading papers. The desk is covered in a cloth. Enter Cromwell.

Cromwell: “Right, the Bursar wasn’t in, so they sent me up here. If you’re the Master of Trinity Hall, I’m here about –”

Master: “It’s closed.”

Cromwell: “I beg your pardon?”

Master: “My door is closed.”

Cromwell: “Not since I opened it.”

Master: “My door is closed. This is my research time. There is a clear note affixed to the door by means of a stout tack detailing student consultation times.”

Cromwell: “Have you got any idea who you’re talking to? I am Oliver Cromwell!”

The Master looks up at Cromwell.

Master: “Not a student then?”

Cromwell: “Not recently. I’m here about the silver.”

Master: “What do you mean, you’re here about the silver?”

Cromwell: “Have you been listening? My name is Oliver Cromwell.”

Master: “Yes, and I’m the master of Trinity Hall. Now, what silver are you referring to, young man?”

Cromwell: “I’m here to collect the college silver.”

Master: “I wasn’t aware you’d been hired to clean it.”

Cromwell: “Noooo. I’m not here to clean it. More – confiscate it.”

Master: “Confiscate the silver? But the president’s cup alone is worth hundreds of ducats! It was a gift from the Pope!”

Cromwell: “I’m not sure you’ve really grasped the implications of what’s going on here. I’m Oliver Cromwell.”

Master: “And?”

Cromwell: “Commander of the New Model Army? Lord Protector? Ring any bells …?”

Master: “Oliver Cromwell?”

Cromwell: “Yes.”

Master: “Cromwell? Cromwell, sounds familiar … ”

Cromwell: “Look, if you could just fork over the silver then, I’ll be going. I have a Civil War to run, the New Model Army to pay, Parliament to reform and it’s not going to happen without cash. The King’s Court has retreated to Oxford and now is the moment to press our advantage.”

Master: “Oxford? The King’s in Oxford you say? Well, I have to admit that’s news to me … Oxford? Well! Perhaps monarchy isn’t such a good idea after all.”

Cromwell: “That is rather why there’s a civil war on.”

Master: “Cromwell! Yes, I remember you now!”

Cromwell: “Sweet merciful Mary and Magdelene, the light finally dawns!”

Master: “You were at Sidney Sussex, weren’t you?”

Cromwell (through gritted teeth): “Yes!”

Master: “Well, don’t you think you should approach your own college for funding first?”

Cromwell: “No, you’re just not listening. I’m head of the New Model Army! I’m not a student, I’m not applying for post-doctoral research. I’m Lord Protector! My army is out there, right under your bloody window! We’re off to attack Oxford this afternoon. I am, if need be, by force of arms, confiscating your bloody silver in the name of Parliament, freedom and the Commonwealth of England!”

Master (peering out the window): “Good lord! Is that your army?”

Cromwell: “Impressive isn’t it?”

Master: “Impressive? It’s outrageous. It’s unbelievable! They’re … they’re standing on the fellow’s lawn! … Wait! Did you say - attack Oxford?”

Cromwell: “Yes!”

Master: “Well that sounds promising. Attack Oxford, eh? Well, I know you’re not a member of the college but … (conspiratorially) if you don’t mention it to the bursar … I could probably get you a travel grant.”

Cromwell: “Look you jumped up fart in a cassock and frilly shirt, could you concentrate just long enough to join us over here in the seventeenth century? Listening? Excellent. Let’s start with the basics, shall we? In case you hadn’t noticed there’s a bit of a civil war on and … I … am … Oliver … Cromwell. Yes? I run the country. I’m here to take you silver. Now give it to me before I have your extremities and appendages ground down and fed to my horse.”

Master: “Um, no.”

Cromwell: “No? No? I’ve got the bleeding New Model Army under your window! What the Cam-punting kind of an answer is no?”

Master: “Well, we can’t give you the silver. We’ve … um … mislaid it.”

Cromwell: “You’re the smallest college in Cambridge. You’ve got a tree takes up a quarter of the available space. How in the name of apostle-buggery do you mislay the silver?”

Master: “Well, the Bursar told me he’d sent it elsewhere for safe keeping. But we’re involved in a bit of contractual wrangling with service-provider. They won’t tell us where they’re keeping it until we pay up.”

Cromwell: “Where in the name of Beelzebub’s morning bile and bowel movement is this Bursar? You’ve hidden him haven’t you?”

Master: “Don’t be ridiculous.”

Cromwell: “Right, I’ve had enough of this. Just tell me where he’s sent it to.”

Master: “Rome.”

Cromwell: “Rome?”

Master: “Yes, it’s with a chap called Bernini. Went and got himself made pope, though. Makes things rather difficult.”

Cromwell: “The Pope?”

Master: “Well, you try asking the Vicar of God for your silver back, see how far you get. It’s no fun negotiating a contract with a man who’s infallible, I can tell you.”

Cromwell: “Demon-spunk gargling son of a Babylonian strumpet! And the Bursar?”

Master: “At the Vatican. Fact-finding.”

Cromwell: “You simpering, flatulent, gnat-witted, simian-faced, goat-pizzled, priest-poking, choirboy squeezing, idolatrous, mendacious, parricidal, pustulous, bursting excrescent carbuncle upon the foul and wizened nether cheeks of Satan!”

Cromwell storms out.

Master (calling after him): “Good luck laying waste to Oxford! Sew some salt into the fields for me!”

Master (peering under the cloth on his table): “It’s alright, Bursar. I think he just about bought it.”