Colder than the Scales on a Mermaid's Tail

The forecast was brilliant sun, with a temperature of 5°C, so we promised Ted we'd take him to the beach for a nice long run the next morning. 

It was tipping with rain when we went to bed. So we didn't expect to wake up to snow all the way over to the Cotswolds. Still, the forecast still said sunny all day, and 6°C at Berrow, so we decided we Might Just Risk It. 

Once in Somerset there was a smudge of snow on the Mendips too, though not on nearby Brent Knoll.

It was sheltered winding our way along the sunken footpath between the thickets of thorn and sea buckthorn. Ted, who had sulked when we got into the car because he hadn't really understood the beach bit, brightened dramatically and led the way to the shore. There, however, a northerly wind was biting ... and it had put its teeth in. 

We'd arrived bang on high tide. Not only could you could see the sea, it had waves in it. There was snow on distant Exmoor ... 

... and on the probably-not-quite-as-distant-as-the-crow-flies Welsh hills ...

... but the freezing cold didn't put Ted off. 

In fact, it didn't put any of us off. We were having a lovely time. 

There was no sign of the wreck of the SS Nornen sticking up through the waves, even though the beach is very flat and the yellow buoys which mark the site looked as if they were close to the shore.

And the sanderlings which had been scurrying along the high tide line departed sharpish when Ted materialised. The oystercatchers hung around a little longer, though. 

We could only bear to walk into the wind as far as the first set of groynes. Up in the dunes, however, it was much balmier, and the views were gorgeous. 

Over to Steep Holm and the coast of Wales

Up to Brean Down

Over to Brent Knoll ... with a raven overhead

In fact, there were lots of ravens.

Looking down to the Quantocks

It was a mercy to turn our backs to the wind and walk back down the beach.  

Already the dark was seeping up from the ground as we made our way back through the dunes to the churchyard. But we were full of light. 

Alchemy in Curry Rivel

I was bang on time to visit my everso very scary, 94-year-old Aunt in North Curry, in order to collect her Christmas presents for my parents and bring them up to Bristol. That is, until I arrived at the end of her road to find it closed while workmen repaired a broken gas main. Alarmed at the prospect of a nine-mile detour and how late that would make me, I managed to sweet-talk my way through the road block; on our way to the pub for lunch, she climbed out of my car, marched down the lane (tottering only very slightly) and pulled rank by citing her very great age. But there was no way back in; our return journey was to take us through Stathe and Curry Rivel, and along a twisty causeway with deep rhynes on either side.

Upon leaving, again via the scenic route, I decided I might as well use the last hour or so of sunlight to perform an act of alchemy and transmute duty into A Jaunt. So instead of barrelling back through Curry Rivel, I stopped off and visited the Church. 

You wouldn't really mistake St Andrew's for anywhere beyond the Somerset Levels. Like many of the churches around here, it's built of both blue lias stone from the north (Somerton upwards) and golden hamstone from Ham Hill to the south. 

Plus, it's well endowed with hunky punks, which name stems from the attitude of the carved animals, squatting on their hunkers. 

You can see them here below the crenellations. 

I've been watching the TV dramatisation of 'The White Princess' lately, not for its historical accuracy, obvs, but because Son the Elder did a fair bit of extra work on it last summer. 

So I was interested to see the mother of King Henry VII (and antagonist of the series), Lady Margaret Beaufort's family badge depicting a portcullis on the ornamental frieze above the door. Apparently she owned estates in the area. 

Before I went inside, I wandered around the churchyard in the slanting winter sun. 

There was lots of mistletoe in the trees and I had hankering to pick my own, like I did two Decembers ago in Ilminster churchyard, only it was all way out of my reach. 

There were some already harvested stems in the porch, with a request for donations to the Church in lieu, but I didn't like the idea of reimbursing a Christian institution for so pagan a plant. 

Inside there was lots to explore and marvel at. An unpleasant West window with garish glass was more than compensated for by the remaining windows, many of which incorporated mediaeval glass in the upper lights.

A beautiful window by Victorian stained glass designer and manufacturer Charles Eamer Kempe was half hidden by the organ ... 

... but a trespass into the Sanctuary was rewarded by delicate cobweb visions of etched glass by Laurence Whistler.

I liked the way the tree beyond the 18th century East window gave the impression of being part of the design. The roundel is a piece of 12th century glass from Canterbury Cathedral.  

I also loved the bench ends, some of which date from the 15th century. This one features Tudor roses, presumably to remind parishioners who ruled them. (More of Lady Margaret's influence, perhaps.)

The guide book also tells us that the small cupboard with its original linenfold door in the south wall of the Chancel was probably used to store precious books.

Tombs with 13th century effigies of a knight and children (maybe) of the de Lorti family. Inside the tomb chest the knight rests on are bones thought to be of Lady Sabina de Lorti, née Revel, whose family the village is named for.   

Hard to get a view of the Jennings tomb (Marmaduke d 1625, and son, Robert, d 1630), as it's ringed by railings. On the sides kneel their wives and children, as well as effigies of stillborn infants.

Outside, in the gathering dusk, I noticed a lower tree smothered in mistletoe and happily snapped off a small bunch to take home, getting around the donation conundrum by telling myself I was paying extra for my guide book. 

The journey home along the top of the Polden Hills was moderately arduous but accessorised by a stunning sunset. I couldn't easily stop to take photos, but my friend Jan Lane who is now living just up the road in West Pennard did ... so here is one of hers. 

A Wandering Star

When Son the Elder said he was doing some extra work in Cardiff on the weekend, the first thing I did was check the weather forecast and it was going to be 🌞, all day. Fantastic. I would drop him off and spend the day in Rhossili with Ted the dog. 

Except that Ted went and pulled a muscle in his foreleg and went a bit limpetty, and this being Ted, it was hard to tell how much it hurt and how much he was hamming it up. And then the weather forecast changed to ⛅ with a possibility of ⛆. OK, I'd leave Ted at home with the Northerner and maybe venture as far as Llancarfan and Llantwit Major. I'd been meaning to visit the churches there for aaaages.

Except when I looked at my diary, I realised that every single day between now and 22nd December was at least partially taken up with either Work or Doing Things For Other People. And the forecast had turned to ⛄. So I decided I would drop Son the Elder off and return home to Do Some Of My Own Stuff. While I Had The Chance. And maybe just go over an hour earlier than necessary for the return leg to have a little wander around my past life.

I crept out of bed at 4.45am and did bathroomy stuff without putting the light/fan on so as not to disturb the Northerner, and emerged to ... porridge and tea, made by the Northerner who had been disturbed after all, bless him.

I was back home by 7.30am, just as day was dawning. 

A bath, some present sorting and several batches of mince pies later, I was just driving past our house to make the return journey to Wales when I spotted the Northerner in our front garden. He was wrangling a beautiful but extremely headstrong border collie/husky cross, while Ted stood on our massive oak table and barked crossly through the front room window. 

Now, being a Northerner is a bit like being a super-hero, at least as far as Northerners are concerned, but all the same, I couldn't really leave my partner on his own with a spooked stray called Star and a jealous, neurotic border collie with his snoot out of joint, so I got out of the car and located a spare lead. One phone number on her tag was unobtainable. The other wasn't answered. I know the local dog warden and she definitely doesn't work on Saturdays so I couldn't call her. The RSPCA won't attend calls about stray dogs. And ringing 101 can take forever, especially if the person on the other end wants your date of birth, National Insurance number and inside leg measurement. 

My phone beeped. 'Hi Mum - we've wrapped early. Can you come and pick me up now, please?' 

I called Son the Elder back and carted a by now furiously discombobulated Ted over to my parents' house for safe-keeping. As I drove back along our road, I heard a shout and saw a worried-looking woman with damp hair. She was trying to run in slippers. 

'Have you lost something?' I asked, getting out of the car.

'Yes, my dog, Star. I was having a shower and it all went very quiet and she was gone.'

Once that was sorted, I was off to Cardiff in the dregs of the light. There was just enough to glimpse how beautiful the snowy hills of the Ebbw valley looked as I whizzed past Newport on the M4. 

Son the Elder was waiting in the appointed spot. 

'Fancy a little look inside the Cathedral?' I asked, desperate for some seasonal light and something - anything - in the way of distraction. 

'No, let's go straight home. I'm knackered, Mum. I've been up since five, you know.'

Yes, I did know. Funny, that. 

Grayson Perry - The Most Popular Art Exhibition Ever! - Arnolfini, Bristol

One of my favourite pieces of art ever is God Please Keep My Children Safe by Grayson Perry, which I saw at the Love exhibition at Bristol City Museum back in 2008. More than any other artwork I've encountered, it epitomises for me that obsessional and terrific  love with which your life is weighted the instant you feel your baby shift inside you. (I don't mean terrific in the sense of 'mahvellous, dahling'; I mean 'Causing You Terror'. Because in that instant you know that your life is utterly bound up, one way or another, with this new one for the rest of its duration.) 

Suffice to say, I've been really looking forward to seeing the most recent exhibition of Grayson Perry's work in Bristol - The Most Popular Art Exhibition Ever! - at the Arnolfini. If I were still writing my arts column for the local paper, I'd have been down there to see it a lot earlier in its run, but I'm not and I'm glad, too, since the note to one of the exhibits - Puff Piece - says that GP can't bear to read any of the reviews of his shows these days, as the good ones affect him just as much as the negative ones. (Not that he would have come across said local paper, of course, but even so.) 

Anyway, I'm just going to post photos to remind me of my favourite bits, and of the fun I had watching other visitors to the exhibition react to the pieces on display. 

Battle of Britain

Battle of Britain (detail)

Kenilworth AM1

Matching Pair 

the Remain pot 

the Leave pot 

Marriage Shrine

(The outside trying to break  in. This is through the gallery window, not an exhibit.)

Alan Measles and Claire Visit the Rust Belt

Jeremy Corbyn holding Claire's hand while Theresa May and Boris Johnson look on 

Trump kissing Alan's hand as Melania Trump and Nigel Farage look on

The Digmoor Tapestry

(More obtrusive outdoor scenery through the windows)

Red Carpet

Our Mother

Puff Piece (detail)

Luxury Brands for Social Justice

'rich people deserve equal rights too!' ... 'war and poverty are bad, I learnt that at university' ... 'super expensive knick-knacks against facism' ... 'all my ideas are recycled' ... 'liberal values sold here' ... 'this art makes me a better person' ... 'I've read all the academic research about empathy' ... 'remind me what it it we're protesting about' ... 'let them eat conceptual art' ... 'I'm off to buy a very serious piece of political art' ... 'poor places are so much more authentic' 

Animal Spirit and Object in Foreground

Death of a Working Hero (detail)

Shadow Boxing (detail)

Reclining Artist

Long Pig

What I like best about GP's work is its layered quality, which is most evident in the pottery and tapestries. There is always so much more going on beneath the surface, and the longer you look, the deeper you see. It's something I always try to do in my poems, and I left the exhibition more determined than ever to achieve that.

Grump of the Day was that the perspex boxes protecting the pottery and sculptures, whilst necessary, were horribly smeary and in need of a good clean. 

Final Joy of the Day was the discovery that having waited years for one to come along, a second Grayson Perry exhibition, featuring six tapestries inspired by Hogarth's The Rake's Progress, will open at Bristol City Museum on 31st March 2018.