Bad Hair, Great Golf

Britain melts in a moment of heat - for the first time we have red weather warnings because of the extreme temperatures. I endured an uncomfortable drive back from Mon this morning because my ageing SUV has knackered air-conditioning. Air conditioning - one of those toys that used to be seen as a luxury but which we can now see as a necessity. The drought of 1976 seems a long time ago. I sat my 'O' levels that summer and we had to wear full school uniform, blazer included. But we were, as Monty Python observed, happy. I bet the exam room was a bit whiffy though - all that adolescent sweat in an age when deodorants were far from ubiquitous.  

So who has the bad hair? That would be Cameron Smith whose barnet even the Donald might deem inelegant. But, wow, the way Smith dismantled St. Andrews to win the Open was magnificent. I doubt he is troubled by my criticism of his coiffure. I hope he can find it in himself to turn down the Saudi/LIV Golf millions that are inevitably being promised to him but one has to doubt it. A pity - the last four days demonstrated that championship golf is played over seventy-two holes with a half-way cut and a one tee start.

Once the golf was over I watched Joker. This is a difficut film, one that divided the critics. My turn now. It is a super-villain origin story and is decidedly not for the kids. Quite rightly it carries an 18 certificate. 1980's Gotham is putrefying under the weight of its uncollected garbage and collapsing morally under the burden of societal divisions. From this cess-pit crawls Arthur Fleck, who is to become Joker. The film makes some bad decisions and its debts to Scorsese's Taxi Driver and King of Comedy can be distracting. However as a study of psychosis I found it compelling and Joaquin Phoenix in the lead is never less than magnificent - skeletal thin and fuelled by a diet of nicotine and hatred, he populates the film with a worrying meaning. The ending is enigmatic. Joker 2? Part of me hopes not but apparently I am wrong. 73/100.

Back Home In The Searing Heat

We have left beautiful Northumberland behind us and are back at Casa Piggy, where, I am delighted to report, all seems to be well. The cats have been collected from the cattery this morning and the Groupie is already hard at work in her transplanted office - because of the heat (it is what we meteorologists term bloody hot) she has moved downstairs to the North facing study. As for the Pig, well I have been to the municipal dump to decant historic garden rubbish and am now looking forward to a game of golf at the Royal Pype Hayes - haven't touched a club since tour three weeks ago. Expectations are low.

Reflections on Northumberland: it is an area that has a magic about it. Judging by the throngs at Bamburgh it is no longer quite right to describe it as an undiscovered secret but there is plenty of scenery to go around and I would recommend it to anyone. The village of Beadnell was a happy accident for us. We had booked relatively late in the day and Bamburgh was full. In fact Beadnell was a better alternative - not as crowded and a great base. I even ran from the village out to Seahouses and back on our final day. The Groupie and I then retraced my steps (and a little further) that afternoon. I slept bloody well that night.

A great holiday deserves a great film. We duly watched one. When Harry Met Sally - I use the descriptor 'great' quite advisedly. We have seen this film umpteen times but always find enough new in it. Its most famous scene is in fact rather de trop and yes I do know that it borrows some narrative tricks from another great film, Annie Hall, but this is a delightful piece of art - Baby Fish Mouth anyone? 90/100.

You know I got all excited about the golf ball I found at Dunstanburgh Castle. Well, would you believe it, I found another one as we walked through Seahouses Golf Club. I intend using these lucky charms at Pype Hayes this afternoon. We will quickly learn whether they are indeed lucky or just like every other ball I have ever owned - doomed.

And of course, whilst we were busy holidaying, the country lost a Prime Minister. No need for much comment from me. I have made clear my opinion of the shitbag Johnson. I could even find some satisfaction in the line that the generally hopeless Keir Starmer deployed at PMQ's as the cascade of ministerial resignations went on - the first instance of sinking ships deserting the rat. 

Now to go into my pre-golf mental regime - designed (badly) to avoid hitting the trees alongside the first tee. Om.

A Wee Bit O' Culture And A Fine Piece Of Fish

The weather looks drab as I write this, armed with my morning coffee made in the stylish new stove-top pot I bought in Berwick. We have been lucky with the weather here in Northumberland and it is supposedly going to clear up today. Destination - Bamburgh Castle.

We went to Edinburgh on Monday. Great city. We drove to the excellent and refreshingly cheap park and ride at Newcraighall, then onwards by train into Waverley Station. We went for the cultural option and visited two fine museums, the National Gallery of Scotland, and the National Museum of Scotland. A wee bit o' culture does you good. Particularly impressive is the galleried hub of the National Museum, shown in the second picture below. We were unadventurous at lunchtime but Pizza Express was a handy and satisfactory option. I recommend the American Hot with jalapenos.

We were back in our walking boots yesterday, following the public footpath across Bamburgh Golf Course before descending to Budle Bay and returning to Bamburgh via the beach. The golf course is one of my favourites and always brings to mind my late friend Rod Meere - he and I enjoyed some great golf there . It is proposed by some as the the most scenic course in Britain (the world?) - they have a point. As for Bamburgh beach, well, all one can say is that it rivals the sand belt in Oregon - and in Oregon you don't get a castle.

We ate yesterday at the Craster Arms, next door to our apartment. The Groupie, after her slight disappointment at Lewis's on Saturday was delighted with a gargantuan piece of cod and excellent chunky chips. The Pig had an excellent burger, chips and a side of onion rings that were world-class. In my lifetime one of the greatest improvements has been the quality of pub food. Two pints of Beadnell Blonde helped the cause.

A Fine Day

Just occasionally come days of wonder. Saturday was such a day. I ran for 5.5k and was thereby bathed in that ridiculous warmth of self-reighteousness that comes with even mild athletic endeavour. In the company of my favourite person we headed for Seahouses, a place which deserves the old-fashioned description of being jolly. We found a parking space and the pay and display ticket machine actually worked - often they don't for me. We then collected our tickets for the Billy Shiel's boat trip to the Farne Islands.

The sea betrayed a slight swell, enough to make the outward journey exciting, those sitting in the exposed areas getting a souvenir soaking from flying spray. Seals were observed as they basked on the rocks. At Inner Farne we disembarked (that makes it sound rather grand but work with me here) and spent an hour observing closely the nesting birds, most photogenically the puffins. This was not tamed nature, this was nature in the raw, right down to the feisty Arctic Terns who peck your head (wear a hat!) to remind you just whose domain this is. Brilliant. The return voyage (again there's me being rather grand) skirted the threatening rain. 

But that was not all. I have ventured the opinion before that Lewis's in Seahouses serves the world's best fish and chips. Saturday's gargantuan portion did nothing to disabuse me of this view, although, in the spirit of journalistic completeness, we should record that the Groupie was not so convinced and seemed to be favouring Bennlech's Golden Fry for the world title. No matter that slight controversy. Days of wonder.

Contrasts

The BBC may be achingly woke but you have to admit that iPlayer is a magnificent resource. After our exertions each day here in Northumberland (of which more anon) the Groupie and I settle down to a bit of televisual culture.

Two films have presented themselves and it would be difficult to imagine a greater contrast in style and content. First up was the coruscating satire of In The Loop. Anything from the mind of Armando Ianucci has to be treated with respect and this film (spun out of the equally arresting television series The Thick of It) does not disappoint. Peter Capaldi reprises his devil incarnate Malcolm Tucker role and other familiar faces flit in and out in a brilliant ensemble piece. You laugh at the educated profanity so much that the disspiriting message can glide over you - there is no redemption on display, merely malevolence and blind self-interest. The film is now more than a decade old but the same soulless half-wits are still running Britain and America. The political badges they wear may change but they are all the same. So if you fancy a dose of The Thick of It mixed with Ianucci's later American triumph, Veep, look this out. 81/100.

Joan of Arc (1948) is altogether a different kettle of fish. A worthy, wordy (though those words are mostly, and rather divertingly, American in timbre) film marked by a compelling central performance by Ingrid Berman. The English (and their Burgundian allies) don't come very well out of this, but that's history for you. History has us bang to rights on this one. The first half of the movie rumbles along adequately enough but really heats up when Joan is put on trial and, inevitably of course, martyred. At this point it achieves genuine drama. An old-fashioned sort of a film but none the worse for that. 70/100. 

A Stately Pleasure Dome

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan / A stately pleasure dome decree

Coleridge lived too early ever to have seen the stately pleasure dome decreed by the remarkable Lord Armstrong at Cragside but the poet's lambent words went searing through the Pig's pretentious mind as he walked from the car park to Cragside this morning. Don't get me wrong, the Pig loves this sort of stuff, that is to say both Coleridge's poetry and Armstrong's grandiosity.

The house itself is a higgledy-piggledy affair, remodelled and extended on several occasions by Armstrong as he rose from a law office to mechanical genius - yet another case (take my mate Walter Bagehot for example) of someone qualifying as a lawyer and deciding there was a better life elsewhere. If only, if only, muses the Pig.

The whole Cragside Estate is testament to man working on his environment - lakes were created, hydro-electric power harnessed, millions of trees planted. It is fabulous. The Groupie made a very good point as we soldiered about in the rain - precisely what would the modern media make of a billionaire who had the audacity to try something as adventurous as Cragside today.

The Coleridge lines get an outing in Citizen Kane of course. I don't know enough to say whether Armstrong died bereft like Kane, but he certainly died childless and a century plus later his creation is in the hands of the National Trust who do a grand job. Death and taxes - life's two great certainties.

Cragside - a brilliant and thought-provoking day out. No dining out today. We're having shop-bought pizzas and I've opened an insolent (vinous argot for cheap) rioja. Good times.