Letter to Rebecca #24-24

Weather, music, more music and persiflage

In this rather late epistle, Terry waxes lyrical about Tosca, Fats Waller, and a grooved up version of Vivaldi that probably has the red priest turning somersaults in his grave. Yes, it’s another instalment in the Rebecca-Terry correspondence. Who says epistolarily writing is dead?

Dear Rebecca

Thank you for your delightful letter.

Our letters

Perhaps our correspondence will one day be donated to the Bodleian, or the Library of Congress. Or will it be written off (pardon the pun) as an example of epistolary persiflage? As the great philosopher Fats Waller liked to say: one never knows, do one?

Fats Waller

Speaking of Fats Waller, here’s one of my favourites of his songs. Apart from the music, his interpolations are hilarious!

What do you think?

Weather

I enjoyed your glossary of what different kinds of weather means, but you appear to have omitted British Rail’s leaves and snow. To be specific, some trains are cancelled when there are leaves on the line. This was laughed at but it’s actually quite serious, as Network Rail explains. Also, trains have been cancelled because the wrong kind of snow is on the tracks. Although greatly chortled at, this is a serious issue too.

Sometimes I wonder if anyone takes any notice of disruption warnings. I was once castigated by a headteacher for delivering a talk to his school via Skype rather than in person. The fact that his school was 200 miles away, there was a severe weather warning, and there was almost no public transport appeared to matter little to him.

Mind you, I don’t agree with closing schools when the weather gets really bad. Give the kids a map and a compass, I say. Let them know what life is really all about.

I must have mentioned to you at some point about a severe weather warning when I was teaching. Someone arrived in school just before 12 noon, having started out at 7am. Just as he’d finished telling me about his journey, which involved traipsing for miles across a field to get to a bus stop because the trains weren’t running, only to discover that the buses weren’t running either, causing him to walk even more, the headteacher gathered everyone together in the staff room and said they were sending the kids home, and so we could all go home too. Oh boy, I had a stomach ache from laughing. I still feel guilty about that.

I saw a really funny spoof weather forecast once, aimed at people who don't understand isobars or who, like me, just want to know whether to take an umbrella and wear a waterproof. Being American, it included such classic lines as “Don’t be a big shot: wear a sweater.” Definitely my kind of weather forecast.

Here’s a short selection of British weather forecast bloopers. I’ve set the link to start at a point where the presenter plays a joke on the viewers. I think it must have been Halloween or something!

Minty

Thank you for asking about Minty. The vet says she has an underlying infection, which is now being treated with antibiotics. The asthma attack was triggered by her inhaling fumes from a mat that was on a heated drier. My fault: I washed a mat in the washing machine, and then put it on the heated drier because I thought it would be too big and heavy for the spin drier. Minty decided to sleep on top of it. It hadn’t occurred to me that the rubber backing of the mat would give off fumes. Here’s a picture of Willow (aka my brother aka big boy) grooming Minty (aka my girlfriend aka a great lump whose mission in life is to drive us to bankruptcy):

Willow (left) and Minty. Photo by Terry Freedman

Planning

I was interested to see your planning for your letter to me. I tend to use a Google doc to write a checklist, and then tick off the items as I use them, like so:

Terry’s letter plan. Screenshot by Terry Freedman

Notice the use of single words or short phrases, which is all I need to remind myself of what the item is all about. I notice that you use sentences. I don’t have time for that because I’m concerned with matters of consequence¹.

I go through yours and respond to several items – not necessarily all of them otherwise the letter would turn into a book – and then add a few of my own.

Once I’ve drafted the plan, it doesn’t take me very long to write. In fact, not many things do take me long to write. How about you, Becks? Do you spend ages mulling over every word in your letters to me, or do you bash the letter out and say “That’ll do”. Or somewhere in between? My letters are all carefully crafted, each word and phrase examined for both balance and nuance. I just do it all very quickly. Chortle. 😂

Overdue library books

Cartoon by Terry Freedman

Thanks for sharing the info about overdue library books. I returned a book to my university library around fifty years after I’d borrowed it. The library staff had no knowledge of it, so I could have kept it and they’d have been none the wiser. But, as Omelette said, “Conscience does make cowards of us all”.

Reading matters

Wochoo reading? I recently started The Human Stain.

I’ve enrolled on a course called Writing Modern America, and that’s the first book on the list. I found the first 30 or so pages a struggle, not my cup of tea² at all, but all of a sudden, it just took off. Roth used a literary device known as “free indirect speech”, which is where the author writes something in the style of one of the characters. In this case, when Roth is describing the motivations of a Vietnam veteran, the visceral anger and horror just leap off the page. I don’t usually like that sort of thing, but in this case the narrative was on fire.

An operatic interlude

We decided to see a film of the Met Opera performing Tosca. The following conversation took place here at Freedman Towers.

Elaine: Do you know what the story is about?

Me: I imagine it involves someone who finds out they are about to die, so decides to start singing about it.

Elaine told me the story, and off we toddled.

It was absolutely brilliant, Rebecca. In the intermissions, the main performers were interviewed, and background information given. I really enjoyed it, and in particular I was fascinated by the fact that Quinn Kelsey, who played the evil Scarpia, was able to sing and grin horribly at the same time³. The only disappointing aspect was the audience, some of whom talked all the way through. I “shushed” a man who was sitting next to Elaine but he was too engrossed in his own important conversation to hear me. At one point a woman behind me started talking in a too-loud voice so I turned around and gave her my best teacher stare, which stopped her in her tracks. Elaine and I have taken kids from the poorest areas to things, and they were better behaved than this audience.

I am embarrassed to reveal that that was the first opera I’ve ever seen. Fancy that, at my ripe old age. We’ve booked a few more and I’m very much looking forward to them.

In case you’re interested, the main characters were:

Tosca: Lisa Davidsen

Cavaradossi: Freddie De Tommaso

Scarpia: Quinn Kelsey

Sacristan: Patrick Carfizzi

Here’s Quinn Kelsey singing one of the arias in an excerpt from the production we saw:

More music

On the subject of music, what’s your opinion of the Hooked On Classics albums? I think they’re a bit rubbishy, but I enjoy them anyway because I like anything with a disco beat! Why not get down and groove to Hooked on Vivaldi?

Even more music

Elaine is still attending piano classes, and at the end of each term the class has a concert in which each student plays for the others. Guests are invited. Unfortunately, because of a signal failure I was held up for a long time on the tube. I eventually got off and did the rest of the journey by bus. I arrived too late to hear the start of Elaine’s performance, but I managed to record the latter half of it. Swing with this one time. She is playing Mendelssohn’s Scherzo Number 60 Opus 2:

Finally…

I thought you might like this photo of glorious autumn colours, seen in our local park a few weeks ago.

Autumn leaves by Terry Freedman

That’s it from me for now, Becks, so I’ll love you and leave you. Bye for now

Terry

To anyone reading this missive, you can see the whole archive here. Rebecca should reply next Wednesday, so make sure you don’t miss that by subscribing to hers.

Thanks for reading!

1. Here’s a mini-quiz for you, Miss Becky. Do you know where that phrase comes from? And on the subject of quizzes, have you entered my prize competition? And if not, why not?

2. There seems to be some confusion in your letter, and in one or two of the comments, about how to make the perfect cuppa. This is most disappointing. Please permit me to draw your attention to the full instructions I wrote on the matter some time ago. You will recall that the water temperature has to be precisely 98.6 degrees Celsius, which you can achieve by allowing the kettle to boil and then waiting exacly 2 minutes and 14 seconds before pouring the water.

3. He is now my role model.