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New Books for Anglophiles

2/28/2013

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Dear Anglophiles: A couple of books have come to my attention that may tickle your fancy.  One is nonfiction, filed under "history," but it's the funny, entertaining kind of history book.  The other, a detective novel, is set in Oxford . . . which, of course, is conjuring up the likes of Inspector Lewis in my mind.  The publication dates for both are drawing near!

Here's the lowdown:



ACROSS THE POND by Terry Eagleton     (Nonfiction)

This book offers an Englishman's view of America.  Says the publisher: Americans have long been fascinated with the oddness of the British, but the English, says literary critic Terry Eagleton, find their transatlantic neighbors just as strange. Only an alien race would admiringly refer to a colleague as “aggressive,” use superlatives to describe everything from one’s pet dog to one’s rock collection, or speak frequently of being “empowered.” Why, asks Eagleton, must we broadcast our children’s school grades with bumper stickers announcing “My Child Made the Honor Roll”? Why don’t we appreciate the indispensability of the teapot? And why must we remain so irritatingly optimistic, even when all signs point to failure?

On his quirky journey through the language, geography, and national character of the United States, Eagleton proves to be at once an informal and utterly idiosyncratic guide to our peculiar race. He answers the questions his compatriots have always had but (being British) dare not ask, like why Americans willingly rise at the crack of dawn, even on Sundays, or why we publicly chastise cigarette smokers as if we’re all spokespeople for the surgeon general.

In this pithy, warmhearted, and very funny book, Eagleton melds a good old-fashioned roast with genuine admiration for his neighbors “across the pond.”

  • Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 1 edition 
  • Hardcover; 192 pages
  • Release date: June 24, 2013
  • May pre-order now


EVERY CONTACT LEAVES A TRACE by Elanor Dymott     (Fiction)

Says the publisher: Elanor Dymott’s gorgeous debut tells the story of Alex, a solitary lawyer who has finally found love in the form of his beautiful wife, Rachel. When Rachel is brutally murdered one midsummer night on the grounds of their alma mater, Worcester College, Oxford, Alex’s life as he knows it vanishes. He returns to Oxford that winter and, through the shroud of his shock and grief, tries to piece together the mystery surrounding his wife’s death. Playing host to Alex’s winter visit is Harry, Rachel’s former tutor and trusted mentor, who turns out to have been involved in almost every significant development of their relationship. Alex also turns to Evie, Rachel’s self-centered and difficult godmother, whose jealousy of her charge has waxed and waned over the years. And then there are her university friends Anthony and Cissy, who shared with Rachel her taste for literature and for the illicit.

As he delves further into the mystery surrounding her death, Alex discovers in Rachel’s wake a tangled web of sex and jealousy, of would-be lovers and spiteful friends, of the poetry of Robert Browning, and of blackmail. Brilliantly written and suffused with eroticism, mystery, and a hint of menace, Every Contact Leaves a Trace introduces a stunning new voice in contemporary fiction.

  • Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
  • Hardcover: 416 pages
  • Release date: May 6, 2013
  • May pre-order now



Save money!  Pre-order through Amazon here ->



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DAME MAGGIE SMITH, A BRITISH TREASURE (Please take poll)

2/27/2013

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DAME MAGGIE SMITH (Wikimedia)
Dame Margaret "Maggie" Smith is one of Britain's most beloved actresses.  The 79 year-old, now starring in the famed Downton Abbey TV series, has won seven BAFTA Awards, two Academy Awards, three Golden Globes, three Emmys, and one Tony.  Thankfully, she has no plans to retire.  I just watched her interviewed on 60 Minutes (see video below) and was saddened to learn that she is, in fact, quite lonely . . . a complaint voiced by many elderly folks, whether movie stars or not.  Since Maggie's second husband (the "love of her life") died, she has had no desire to remarry and lets work fill the void.  Currently, Maggie is busy filming Season 4 of Downton, and my fingers are crossed that fine scripts continue to come her way. 


                MAGGIE FACTOIDS
  • Her father, a pathologist, taught at Oxford University.
  • She has (older) twin brothers.
  • She's been married twice; both men are deceased.
  • She has two sons and five grandchildren.
  • She is a breast-cancer survivor (diagnosed in 2008).
  • She was briefly hospitalized for chest pains last year but is now fine.
PLEASE TAKE POLL


Dame Maggie Smith, 60 Minutes Interview


Downton Abbey: Top 10 Maggie Moments
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LAUGH WITH BRITAIN'S TOP COMEDIAN: MICHAEL MCINTYRE

2/26/2013

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In case you're unfamiliar with Britain's Michael McIntyre, here's your chance to see his legendary talent.  According to The Telegraph, Michael is currently the highest-grossing, stand-up comic in the world, having made £21 million in ticket sales last year.  

The 37 year-old, award-winning, English comedian hosts his own BBC1 program, the Michael McIntyre's Comedy Roadshow, and has a slew of impressive credits under his belt (see bio link, below).  He attended Edinburgh University for one year before dropping out to write and pursue his career.  (When asked in an interview what he studied, he quipped, "...er, biology or chemistry … I remember there was a white coat involved." 

Michael McIntyre website & bio


THE BIRTH OF THE KILT


ON GLASSES


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What You Never Knew About Fish & Chips

2/24/2013

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I'm delighted to present today's guest writer, Graham Greenglass, a London Taxi Driver (black cab) and Tour Guide.  We know how informed London taxi drivers are, right?  Unlike we muddled tourists scuttering around London, they know the inside scoop about nearly everything.  Here, Graham gives us the lowdown on one of the most quintessential of all British meals: fish and chips.


Fish & Chips:  A Flipping Great Tail That Can’t Be Battered
by
Graham Greenglass
The big question, the one BIG question, I get asked by my customers is this: Where can I find good fish and chips?  Thankfully, the answer is not complicated.  I tell them, you have to go and get your proper fish and chips from a proper fish and chip shop (or "chippy" for short).

Not strictly proper is a pub, restaurant, or cafe that claims to serve "traditional fish and chips".  Authenticity is easy to find.  The clue lies in the name "shop," and a shop denotes an establishment into which you walk, purchase the merchandise, and walk out of again--with said merchandise in hand.

A proper fish and chip shop will have a deep frying range on view because in such a shop, the food is fried fresh and sold quickly, mainly to take away.  Some chippies provide a few tables for customers who prefer to eat in, and some have restaurants attached.  If you’re a visitor in London, the "restauranty" kind of place is the one you want to seek out.

Londoners are a loyal bunch.  They talk about their local chippy, and I’ve been going to mine for about thirty years.  It’s had the same owner since it opened.  It seats no more than about sixteen people although there are rarely more than two or three people eating in at any one time.  Mine is definitely more of a shop and less of a restaurant.  I buy my food, and I move on and I move out, usually back home, to eat my fish and chips in front of the telly, watching whatever box set is top of the list (Mad Men or Breaking Bad right now since you ask).  

Like many "traditional" British dishes (curry for instance), fish and chips, as separate entities from each other, are not strictly speaking what you’d call British.  It’s said that the fried chip is Irish in origin and that fried fish is an import by Jewish immigrants.  (Thomas Jefferson describes eating "fried fish in the Jewish fashion" during a visit to London.)  The chip is not in any way French.  That suggestion will not be tolerated although, credit due, the pommes frites or French fry, does appear to be a Gallic invention.  The traditional chip is much thicker--a solid slice or wedge or, indeed, chip of potato.

The combination of the chip and the fried fish also seems to be Jewish in origin.  There was clearly a gap in the market, a gluttonous great empty hole, and that gap has been well and truly filled ever since Joseph Malin thought of combining the foods in a take-away shop in London around 1860 and Samuel Isaacs opened the first restaurant serving the combination in the 1890’s.

During the same period, the north of England (especially in Lancashire) developed its own way of frying and combining the fish and the chip, and so developed the regional differences, which are maintained and loyally championed to this day.  Northerners' "batter" tends to be beef dripping and southerners use vegetable oil, although in certain parts of London, fish fried in matzo meal is still an option.

Fish and chips has always been regarded as working-class food.  It gained its popularity in the industrial heartlands of Britain, and during WWII, the dish was deemed so important to morale, it was not rationed, unlike many other staples.

King Edward (the potato, not the monarch), Maris Piper, or Desiree seem to be the favourite potatoes from which to make chips.  The fish of choice in London tends to be cod, haddock, or plaice, although there are regional variations and favourites that prevail too.

However, it’s the accompaniments that provide the icing on the cake--if you get my meaning--for any fish and chip meal.  Mushy peas, or even peas that haven’t been mushed, are a popular side dish.  A large, sweet, pickled cucumber would not go amiss either and can be found on all chippy menus.

Sauces are also important.  Some people prefer tartar sauce or tomato ketchup--it's all a matter of taste--but it’s the condiments that are really crucial.   Salt and vinegar go together in the British psyche, not so much like horse and carriage, but like fish and chips.  A light sprinkling of salt and malt vinegar over the chips is recommended.

So back to the BIG question, where do you get the best fish and chips?  Because of the foods origins, fish and chip shops (with restaurants) tend to be found in residential areas.  They certainly don’t cluster within what could be described as traditionally posh neighbourhoods.  I can’t think of any fish and chip shops in Belgravia for instance, or Knightsbridge.

I’ll get the ball rolling by mentioning a few well-known establishments.  I have always liked the North Sea Fish Restaurant, 7 Leigh Street, WC1.  

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Other central London fish and chip restaurants of note include:

The Rock and Sole Plaice, 4 Endell Street, WC2
The Sea Shell, 49 Lisson Grove, NW1
Seafresh, 80 Wilton Road, SW1
Fish Central, 149 Central Street, EC1
Faulkeners, 424 Kingsland Road, E8, 
Poppies, 6 Hanbury Street, E1
Fryer’s Delight, 19 Theobald’s Road, WC1
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WRITER'S BIO
GRAHAM GREENGLASS
Website: www.londoncabtours.co.uk


Graham is a qualified and experienced London Taxi Tour Guide (since 2001), Licensed London Taxi Driver, BA.Hons (History) and proud Londoner.


He’s a great choice to guide London sightseeing tours, providing full commentary himself throughout all the tours.

Graham's black taxi tours are conducted across the city, in the perfect vehicle for London sightseeing. Clients are collected from anywhere in central London and dropped off anywhere they choose in central London, at the end of the tour.   With many stops on the tours, passengers can stretch their legs or take photos as Graham highlights the London attractions and details of interest that surround each stop.


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What the British Say vs. What We Hear 

2/22/2013

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Dear Anglophiles: In the name of international relations and better understanding between nations, I offer the chart below.   (And I dare say, the translations are quite accurate, are they not?)  
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BRIT Awards 2013 (Nominees & Winners)

2/21/2013

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NEWS ALERT!   The BRIT Awards held its ceremony last night in London's O2 Arena.  Winners and nominees are listed below.


BRITISH GROUP
Mumford & Sons – WINNER
Alt-J
Muse
One Direction
The xx


BRITISH BREAKTHROUGH ACT
Ben Howard – WINNER
Alt-J
Jake Bugg
Jessie Ware
Rita Ora


BRITISH FEMALE SOLO ARTIST
Emeli Sandé – WINNER
Amy Winehouse
Bat for Lashes
Jessie Ware
Paloma Faith


BRITISH MALE SOLO ARTIST
Ben Howard – WINNER
Calvin Harris
Olly Murs
Richard Hawley
Plan B

 
BRITISH SINGLE
Adele – Skyfall – WINNER
Olly Murs ft. Flo Rida – Troublemaker
Alex Clare – Too Close
Coldplay & Rihanna – Princess of China
DJ Fresh Ft Rita Ora – Hot Right Now
Emeli Sandé – Next To Me
Florence & The Machine – Spectrum
James Arthur – Impossible
Jessie J – Domino
Labrinth Ft Emeli Sandé – Beneath Your Beautiful
Rita Ora Ft Tinie Tempah – R.I.P.
Rizzle Kicks – Mama Do The Hump
Robbie Williams – Candy
Rudimental Ft John Newman – Feel The Love
Stooshe – Black Heart


INTERNATIONAL FEMALE SOLO ARTIST
Lana Del Rey – WINNER
Alicia Keys
Cat Power
Rihanna
Taylor Swift


INTERNATIONAL GROUP
The Black Keys – WINNER
Alabama Shakes
The Killers
The Script
Fun.

 
INTERNATIONAL MALE SOLO ARTIST 
Frank Ocean – WINNER
Bruce Springsteen
Jack White
Michael Buble
Gotye

 
BRITISH ALBUM OF THE YEAR 
Emeli Sandé – Our Version Of Events – WINNER
Alt-J – An Awesome Wave
Mumford & Sons – Babel
Paloma Faith – Fall To Grace
Plan B – Ill Manors


BRITISH LIVE ACT 
Coldplay – WINNER
Mumford & Sons
Muse
The Rolling Stones
The Vaccines


BRITs GLOBAL SUCCESS
One Direction – WINNER
Adele
Mumford & Sons


BRITISH PRODUCER OF THE YEAR 
Paul Epworth - WINNER
Jake Gosling
Damon Albarn


CRITICS’ CHOICE 
Tom Odell – WINNER
AlunaGeorge
Laura Mvula


Video of BRIT  launch and hoopla
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10 THINGS YOU DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT THE QUEEN

2/20/2013

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This video presents ten things viewers (allegedly) do not know about the Queen...but are Anglophiles better informed than most?  Test your knowledge!



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Downton Abbey's Writer May Step Down

2/20/2013

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NEWS ALERT: Downton Abbey's writer, Julian Fellowes, may step down--heading to U.S. to write NBC's The Gilded Age.

METRO article


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SAVILE ROW & ITS TAILORS

2/19/2013

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“I’m a Savile Row tailor.”  Now, that is a statement that commands respect.  Savile Row tailors are the best of the best!  

As Anglophiles, it’s important to know about Savile Row because of its prominence in British fashion history.  For the uninitiated, Savile Row is a street in London where the very best “bespoke tailoring” shops reside.  (A “bespoke tailoring” shop means the shop sells only individual, customized suits rather than mass-market ones.  Some 20 to 30 bodily measurements are taken for a typical bespoke suit.  The term arose from fabrics that the customers chose for their suits being set aside, thus "bespoke.")

Today's prices for Savile Row suits run between $4,600 to $7,000, with most in the $5,300 to $5,900 range.  A suit generally takes six to twelve weeks to produce,  requiring 80 to 100 man-hours and three or four fittings with the customer.   

Nearly all the Savile Row tailors are actually located on Savile Row, but a few are located on adjoining streets, such as Old Burlington St.  Savile Row owes its existence to the third Earl of Burlington.  In the 1730's, when he developed his estate, situated in the Mayfair section of London, a new street was constructed, and the Earl named it "Savile Row " after his wife, Lady Dorothy Savile.  Eventually, a few tailors popped up on the street, and when several famous dandies began frequenting them, the rest is history, as they say.  Since those days, Savile Row has whipped up custom-made suits for many of the world’s top celebrities and world leaders.  The Beatles, Winston Churchill, Napoleon, Cary Grant, the Royals (of course)—and the list goes on and on.

Here is a list of Savile Row's top players, ranked by shop's founding date:

  • Gieves & Hawkes (1771)   1 Savile Row
  • Henry Poole & Co (1806)   15 Savile Row
  • Norton & Sons (1821)   16 Savile Row
  • H. Huntsman & Sons (1849)   11 Savile Row
  • Dege & Skinner (1865)   10 Savile Row
  • Kilgour (1882)   8 Savile Row
  • Anderson and Sheppard (1906)   32 Old Burlington St.
  • Meyer & Mortimer (1920)   6 Sackville St.
  • Hardy Amies (1946)   14 Savile Row
  • Chittleborough & Morgan (1969)   12 Savile Row
  • Richard James (1992)   29 Savile Row & 19 Clifford Street

The video below features Prince Charles at Anderson & Sheppard, visiting the shop's apprentice tailors--wearing a natty Anderson & Sheppard suit.  This famous house (A&S), founded in 1906, is known for constructing garments that follow a natural body line and allow the body to move easily.  Certainly a suit that a lean, fit prince who engages in much arm waving to the masses would want, right?

I mention Anderson & Sheppard because--in addition to dressing Royals--it offers a tailoring apprenticeship program.  Needless to say, getting accepted to the program is a shining nugget for one’s resume!  The shop also publishes a fascinating web blog called The Notebook. It features articles by Anderson & Sheppard apprentices in which they talk about tailoring, how they became tailors, and how they snagged an A & S apprenticeship.

To read The Notebook blog posts, click HERE  

To read The Notebook's "How I Got Into Tailoring," click HERE  


As this New York Times article points out....not all Savile Row customers are the high and mighty.  Some are folks who buy only one (or a few) nice suits in their lifetime.  
NY TIMES: On Savile Row--A Tale of Two Tailors

Video of Prince Charles visiting Anderson & Sheppard apprentices


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THE CHANGING WORLD OF BRITISH SPORTS

2/18/2013

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Dear Anglophiles: I'm delighted to present a guest writer for today's post.  Jon Malings, of the UK, reflects on the changing ways of British sports. 

Post by Jon Malings
One day, when she was about nine years old, back in the 1980s, my daughter came home from school and announced, triumphantly, “Show me a good loser, and I’ll show you a loser.”  I paused momentarily, aghast at how the world was changing.

I was brought up to believe that playing the game, whatever it was, was more important than winning.  We even had phrases that reflected that ideal: someone who didn’t mind losing was a  “good sport.”  “It’s not cricket” implied that, while the rules may not have been broken, they were certainly being stretched.  In that far-off perfect world it wasn’t enough just to obey the laws of the game, we had an inherent belief in the unwritten rule of “fairness.”  We didn’t want to win unless our opponent was given a “sporting chance.”  We’d rather lose than have a victory achieved by underhand means on our conscience. 

I sometimes think that sport was invented so the English could show the rest of the world how to lose gracefully.  Not that we would, if we could avoid it.  Lose that is. And we’d be just as graceful in winning, trotting out self-deprecating phrases like, “luck of the draw”, “rub of the green” or even “better luck next time.”  Even if you “played fair” there was something decidedly uncomfortable about “whitewashing” your opponent.  It didn’t do to demonstrate your superiority too overtly.  We English didn’t like to “kick a man when he was down.” 

But now the world has most definitely changed.  All our top-flight sportsmen and women are professionals earning megabucks--yes, we say that. Winning, at almost any cost, is what counts.  So we have footballers “diving” at the slightest provocation to try and persuade the referee (umpire) to award a “free kick” or an even-more valuable “penalty” because of a supposed “foul” by a player on the opposing side.  Gone are the days when a cricketer would “walk” or declare himself “out” just because he knew he was, even if the umpires didn’t think so.  Gone are the days when the official’s decision was the final word.  Although I’ve never seen one change his mind, and I’m sure players don’t expect it, I think the protests at questionable decisions are designed to soften the ref up so the next debatable one goes their way…. “it’s only fair.”

Today it seems that snooker players are the last sporting gentlemen, always willing to declare their own foul if the ref doesn’t see it.  They manage this despite earning megabucks too.  Perhaps it’s because they know that they’re playing against the balls on the table, or even themselves, rather than the opposing player.  And a man ( I’ve not yet seen a ranking female snooker player) must be pretty low to cheat himself.

I’ve spent quite a while trying to think of any sport played worldwide that was not “invented” by the English.  After a lot of head-scratching, I could only come up with golf. We codified most of the others back in the nineteenth century, presumably as part of a cultural colonising strategy that spread the red of the British Empire across the map as successfully as any regiment.  Even now that the sun has set on that Empire, our international sporting links remain. 

As an example, the mystifying (to Americans) game of cricket is not just an English pastime but is played seriously, with just as much care, attention and devotion in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan and the West Indies.  Ireland recently discovered that they, too, have a cricket team, as they “broke their duck” playing England in last year’s cricket World Cup.

Most other English sports have escaped the confines of the Empire too.  Argentina, France and Italy have international rugby teams.  Snooker is very big in Asia, particularly China, while tennis and football ("soccer" is a word we rarely use) run rampant across the world.  Next time you see a news report from a refugee camp in Africa, or wherever, look for someone wearing a Manchester United, Arsenal or Liverpool team shirt--they’re sure to be there.

Before we go any further, there’s something I need to tell you: I’m a citizen of the United Kingdom, my nationality is British, and England is my “national” football team--got it ?

Most sports in the UK are organised on a country basis, i.e. England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. There is no UK football team for example.  This presented a bit of a problem at the London 2012 Olympics.  It was unthinkable that Team GB (in actual fact Great Britain, Northern Ireland and a few off-shore islands.. .i.e. the UK) wouldn’t compete for the football gold medal.  There was a lot of resistance from the “home” nations to forming a joint team as the world governing body, FIFA, has started questioning why four teams from one country are all allowed to compete in the football World Cup.  Of course, FIFA’s interest in the subject has nothing to do with the fact that British newspapers have spent the last few years making allegations of corruption in that august body.

A final word from my daughter, ten years on, when she was at University in Manchester.  We were visiting her one evening, with thousands of  Pakistanis on the streets celebrating their victory over India in the Cricket World Cup final, a game which had been played in Manchester that very day. Someone called out to her,  “Which side were you on?” There was no pause, momentary or otherwise.  “The winning one,” she said. 

JON MALING'S BIO

Who am I ?
…Michael Jon Malings, a true-born Englishman, despite the fact that my grandfather was born in Ireland (purely by accident, you understand) and also spoke Welsh, which was a good thing, as my grandmother, Margaret Parry, was Welsh through-and-through so he couldn’t have popped the question otherwise. All of which leaves me with a bit of a problem; if I was so inclined I could play Rugby for Wales, Cricket for England or Snooker for Ireland.

The other stuff…
I graduated with a University degree in Psychology a long time ago and, having never seen a computer, was offered a job by IBM fixing  software…those were the days! I spent a few years travelling round England, hunting down and trying to fix bugs. Eventually, realising I wasn’t very good at it, I moved to an IBM Software Development Laboratory and spent the  next 20 years or so travelling the world extolling the virtues of our graphics and transaction-processing software. India and Hong Kong are my two favourite countries, after England of course.

Apart from that…
I’m now semi-retired, living in Ireland, looking after chickens, goats, ponies and flowers, researching my own, and other people’s, genealogy and some of the (very) minor figures of English history. I’m also trying to improve my communications skills so I can tell the Irish how great England (and Wales) is. Spending all that time talking to computers has left me in need of a bit of re-adjustment on that front. I love 17th Century oak furniture, old houses and strange things. For a while, we owned a shop selling old Chinese and Indian furniture and curiosities; there were certainly some strange things in it, not least the owners. I’m also fascinated by domestic architecture. I’ve built a couple of houses, and “re-modelled”, as the Americans say, several more. I’m currently struggling with a 150-year-old granite farmhouse with walls two feet thick.


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    Zella

    I am a writer, artist, and incurable Anglophile! Thank you for reading my blog, and please feel free to join my discussions about Britain.  I look forward to hearing your comments and stories!

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