6April1996

My dear folks

Happy Easter! I know that as I write, the Hambachers & some Calgarians will be speeding off to holiday destinations. For once, the British Isles have entered a holiday weekend in a welcome outbreak of sunny weather. I took myself off for a long mid-morning walk, tracing a path through St John’s Wood (now merely a wealthy suburb) in the direction of Regents Park.

My attention was taken outside one house by a ginger cat that was clawing repeatedly at a window pane. Closer inspection revealed an unruffled parrot sitting on top of its cage immediately inside the window. It was alternately cleaning an extended wing & popping a head out to say a lot of parroty things to the cat - which clawed all the more. I tried to explain to the mog that it was on a loser. It stared at me with a long, unloving look. It was not a very pretty cat at all.

Mavis was thrilled to be able to follow me down to the basement flat this morning as Stef’s dog is spending the weekend in a kennel while Stef & Herman are away. Stef’s cat came rushing up to the door expecting food and human warmth & was greeted by the imposing presence of his nibs instead. A lesser cat than Mavis would have taken the long hiss amiss but our fat feline breezed in as though he still owned the place.

My walk took me around the outer edges of the park and back past the mosque where lots of worshippers were congregating for Friday prayers. I noticed with interest that the gypsy types who beg for a living in Spain & Portugal were hard at it outside the mosque - making their appeals in Arabic - and getting short shrift from those people I saw them accosting.

It’s now evening, as lovely a sunset as it has been a day. I shall cycle off to work shortly to enjoy the last of it. I had several hours on the bed this afternoon, aided by a couple of pints of Belgian beer at a pub down the road. It was the Leffe beer that so much impressed me on my visit to Brussels, but the pale version rather than the brown & somehow lacking the same inspiration. So often, the inspiration comes with the place, as I know too well. It was still lovely just to sit in the warming sunshine & slow the day down for half an hour. Unless one does that from time to time, one simply loses account of them.

And that’s all I have to tell you.

Seasonal blessings upon you
T