In which Terry outlines his strategy for becoming a millionaire by Christmas, releases his first ever sax recording, and unveils his latest artwork to the world.
Greetings!
This is a bit later than I’d intended, but stuff came up that I had to deal with pronto. But enough of this persiflage. On with the newsletter!
My foolproof savings plan
For many years I've had this concept of myself, that because of how useless most of my maths teachers were at secondary school, the only potentially useful thing I learnt in maths lessons was how to cheat in tests. I say "potentially useful" because cheating is anathema to me. But one maths "teacher" had an interesting way of teaching. He would set a test each week, and if you got any of the answers wrong he would put you in detention for an hour and a half. Had he used that time as a revision tutorial it wouldn't have been so bad, but it was purely and simply a punishment. We had to sit in absolute silence for an hour and a half doing nothing. After one such experience I did the most logical thing anyone could: I made sure that I sat next to the mathematically brainiest person in the class and copied his answers, surreptitiously of course. I spent that year neither learning nor understanding any maths, but at least I didn’t have an hour and a half stolen from me each week1.
A few days ago I decided to take an Open University maths test to see if I might understand their Introductory Maths course. To my surprise, I did well on the Level 1 questions, and on the Level 2 questions. However, I didn’t do so well on the Level 3 questions, Hardly surprising, though, given that the Level 3 paper seemed to be concerned with arcane topics like how to measure the area of a rhombus. Why would I need to know that? The last time I saw a rhombus was when I glanced at the hand of some celebrity sporting a massive diamond ring.
So what did I learn from doing these tests? Firstly, that I know a lot more maths than I imagined I did. Secondly, and following on from this, I don't need to do an OU maths course, thereby saving myself nearly £2,000. I’ve decided to identify numerous other courses I don't need or want to do, in order to save even more money. At this rate I'll be a millionaire by Christmas.
A conversation on a number 8 bus
As far as I'm concerned, the most enjoyable kind of journey is one which involves as little interaction with other people as possible. On bus journeys I like to look out of the window and watch the world going by, or rather me going by the world. We bumped into a neighbour of ours a few years ago. "I've just had the most wonderful bus journey", She said. "Really?" said Elaine. "How come?” “Everyone was chatting to each other and having a laugh." "OMG", I thought. "Any second now she's going to tell us they all sang Knees up mother Brown.” (I still haven't quite recovered from the experience of being overtaken by a coach at 70 mph with all the windows open and a load of elderly people singing that song.)
When travelling on the tube, I adopt my special scowl that people rightly interpret as "Don't mess with me and don't talk to me: I want to read my book"2. Elaine, on the other hand, can get on the train at Stratford, and know someone's life story by the time we get to Holborn– see illustration below. She has that sort of welcoming aura.
A few years ago we were on the tube, and Elaine and a girl opposite got chatting. I was reading.
Girl: So how long have you guys been married?
Elaine: Around 30 years.
Me (Mumbling): More than you get for murder.
Girl: what would you say is the secret for having such a long-lasting relationship?
Elaine: You have to like the person.
Then it was our stop. Elaine got off first, I followed. As I passed the girl, I said:
Me: The real secret is that I just say "yes".
Girl: 🤣🤣
Elaine: What did you say to her?
Me: Nothing, dear.
Where was I? Oh yes, the bus conversation. On returning home from my saxophone class I was sitting on the number 8 bus, taking up an extra seat because of the shopping I'd been instructed to get (I wonder if Stan Getz et al had this experience. "Hope the gig goes well, dearest. Could you pick up some boiling potatoes and a bottle of milk on the way home?"3). All of a sudden a young lady asked me if she could sit down.
Young Lady: Whats that on your back, a violin or a saxophone?
Me: Saxophone.
YL: What standard are you?
Me: I'm at the level where people no longer ask me to stop playing as soon as I begin. I've been doing it for about a year.
YL: What made you take it up?
Me: I love the sax and I love jazz, so I thought I'd learn how to play before I became too old and decrepit. How about you?
YL: I'm a jazz singer.
It turns out that I was chatting to Louise Messenger, jazz singer, on her way to a gig in shoreditch.. Who'd have thought I'd get to meet a professional singer on a bus? Here's her website:
And here’s a video:
Mind you, we were on the train last week. Elaine was reading a book about Shostakovitch. Someone on the train noticed, and started chatting to her. It transpired that he had been the organiser of a well-known music festival for years, and that he and Elaine had one or two mutual acquaintances. Astonishing! I suppose it ties in with the idea of six degrees of separation, that is that we’re all just six friends of friends etc separated from everyone else in the world. It’s a beguiling theory but I can’t help feeling that there’s confirmation bias involved, which, according to Britannica, is the tendency to search for, interpret, and remember information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or theories while giving disproportionately less consideration to alternative possibilities or evidence that contradicts those beliefs.
More on music
I bought a digital saxophone recently. The main reason was so that I can practise without driving the neighbours mad. The big advantage of a digital sax is that you can produce a decent sound without thinking about embouchure, breathing from your diaphram, the distance of the sax from your mouth or lots of other variables. The big disadvantage is that you can produce a decent sound without thinking about embouchure, breathing from your diaphram, the distance of the sax from your mouth or lots of other variables. It’s a similar thing with digital pianos, Elaine tells me: they’re great for practising but if that’s all you use then you can lose your touch, literally.
Anyway, the other day I used it to practise thinking of a tune in my head and then attempting to play it, with the aid of a backing track I found on YouTube. It’s the most boring tune in the world, and I played a couple of duff notes, but I’m quite pleased on the whole because I largely managed to do what I set out to do. None of the voices sound remotely like a sax, so I used a flute/pan pipes voice instead. Here it is, and if you don’t like it then kindly allow me to refer you to the wise words of that great blues woman, Bessie Smith:
If you don’t like my potatoes, why did you dig so deep?
A bike ride
We went on a bike ride yesterday. Here's a picture of us. Elaine is leading the way.
High art
On the subject of pictures, I am pleased to unveil my latest attempt to improve the works of the so-called great masters. This time I've reworked the Mona lisa to give it a more modern feel. I hope you like it4.
And finally (almost)…
I think that’s enough from me for now, so I will leave you with a quote from Sonny Rollins, the jazz saxophonist:
“No matter how you feel, get up, dress up, and show up.”
My blogging courses
If you’ve considered starting a blog then you might like to take my course. There’s an all day version in a couple of weeks’ time, and a two-evening class version in November. More information at that link.
Articles you may have missed
Experiments in style: Shakesperean version
One of the things I’ve been trying out is reworking a piece of text into a completely different style. Here’s the latest:
My most recent letter to Rebecca
and I write a letter to each other on alternate Wednesdays. Here’s my latest one. It’s her turn to reply to me on Wednesday, so subscribe to her newsletter if you don’t want to miss it.Respect
Good advice from
: Don’t diss your peers (or your reviewers)Videos
To Sir With Love: real shmaltz but it gets me every time! (I’m such a softy really. <Sniff>)
A Bob Hope clip
This is from one of the “Road” films, which I always enjoyed because of (a) Bob Hope’s humour, (b) the way they often spoke to the viewers (aka breaking the fourth wall) and (c) because I fancied Dorothy Lamour (drool):
That’s it from me. I hope you enjoyed reading this. Do leave a comment. And if you haven’t subscribed yet, what are you waiting for5?
I should point out that there was one exception to the useless maths teacher experience. See Dear Mr Dale.
Check out my bestselling books on the subject: Scowling for Beginners, Advanced Scowling and You’ll Always Walk Alone (with any luck).
I’ve just discovered that I’m not the only famous person who has to put up with this sort of thing:
That’s the nearest I get to a hard sell.
By the way, can anyone spot the omission in the tube map?
haha, a millionaire by Christmas!