Germs
16 October

Ross has had a cold for the past fortnight. Lots of my Quaker friends were coughing and sneezing over this last weekend. I've been surrounded by germs.

Therefore, I shouldn't have been surprised when, whilst I was out in the back garden on Monday afternoon, I began to realise that I had sore throat. From there it was all down hill.

I made it into work on Tuesday morning but I was feeling increasingly poorly. I set to and sorted out all of the materials and set-ups that I needed for Thursday's commercial course and then I came home and went to bed. I skipped yoga.

Wednesday, I was ill. I lay in bed and was delighted that I was not travelling to work as the torrential rain beat down from leaden skies. Apparently, it was hell on the roads as half drivers were over-cautious and the other half proceeded as though aqua-planing was a real treat.

I relaxed by listening to Rigoletto. I had been thinking of attending the new Opera North production but the reviews were dreadful and so I enjoyed a production in my head. I also watched DVD of La Bohème from San Francisco. Welsh National Opera are performing this later in the year but I shall probably miss the performances in Liverpool. I stretched out on the settee in the front room and turned the sub-titles on. It was a revelation. I hadn't realised what a lots of references to muffs there are throughout the piece. Both Musetta and Mimi share and sport muffs in abundance. I giggled a lot which was therapeutic.

Thursday morning I was out of bed for work. In all conscience, I couldn't take another day off given that there was a commercial training course for me to give. I left promptly which was fortuitous given the dense fog all around. Apparently, the driving was appalling later in the morning that day as well. I got through the day, which is the best description I can muster.

I was lacklustre on Friday also. Even the bright sun failed to cheer me up. The cold seems to be settling on my chest.

In the evening, Colin came to visit. The excuse was the chance for him to see Brokeback Mountain for the first time and for Ross and I to watch our DVD for the fist time. I found that it was just as affecting as when I first saw it in the cinema back in January.

As part of the hospitality extended to Colin, I cooked Red Dragon Pie which is a sort of vegetarian shepherd's pie. I followed a recipe from vegetarian cook book I bought in the 80s. Reading it now shows how things have changed. Aduki beans are no longer quite so exotic. They don't need soaking overnight and neither does the rice. The beans I used were organic and bought pre-cooked in a tin from the health food shop; the rice was Basmati rice, organic, free trade and bought from Tesco's.

It was one of a line of meals which I cooked over the weekend including a tasty spaghetti bolognaise and a splendid chicken casserole. Along with my predilection for boiled bacon ribs with cabbage and mash and my tried and tested steak braised in Guiness, I'm getting quite a little repertoire of dishes to set before guests.

I've read a few books recently. None have been bad but most have totally gripped me as I'd hoped.

I had high hopes for Boris Akunin's Winter Queen. Sleuthing in late 19th Century Russia. A cross between Sherlock Holmes and James Bond. Appreciative comments from Ruth Rendell. But my enthusiasms waned as the novel wore on. Too much plot. Not enough characterisation. Too many obvious twists. Not enough good historical local colour. Two stars.

Michael Frayn is an author whom I rate highly. I thoroughly enjoyed his play Copenhagen which I saw in London back in 2000. I found Headlong disappointing when I read it in 2001. Spies followed a similar pattern of starting confidently and then tailing off. I'd link it with The Go-Between. It's more adventurous in theme and tone than that novel but I feel that it achieves far, far less. It won the Whitbread Novel of the Year Award for 2002. I don't see how. I'm giving it just two stars.

I've similar dissimilar problems with Hawksmoor by Peter Ackroyd and this extends throughout Ackroyd's work. He's astonishingly erudite, amazingly accomplished, full to the brim with ideas, lavish in his language. But I keep thinking. Oh for God's sake, just get on and tell us the story, why don't you? So again, it's got to be just two stars.

The work which breaks the mould is Robertson Davies's Salterton Trilogy. I picked this up from Oxfam. It was one of those moments of inspiration when I just had to make the purchase even though I knew nothing of the work. Almost immediately, I realised that I had stumbled upon a new voice which I really relished. The writing is sort of like a male Barbara Pym, well characterised, acerbic, elegant, wise and sad in equal measures.

The three novels that make up the sequence are Tempest Tost, Leaven of Malice and A Mixture of Frailties. All are set in and around an upper middle class Canadian academic backwater during the 1950s. They sketch a community immediately recognisable to English eyes but also one which has many obvious differences. I liked the final novel less (mainly because it stepped outside of Canada and sort of destroyed the clever claustrophobia of the first two) but would still offer it up three stars. The other two get an easy four stars apiece.

There's not a lot of good TV around at present.

The BBC's go at a classic serial for the autumn has been Jayne Eyre. I guess that it makes a change from the Dickens and Trollope that has dominated proceedings for a while. Without going overboard, it has been good though, for me, not excellent.

I can't quite take Toby Stephens as Rochester. His performance feel too detached for me to feel engaged. Ruth Wilson has been an accomplished Jane. The adaptation has been handsomely mounted. But still. Just three stars I feel.

Ross is enthralled by Robin Hood - I'm not. I can't take Jonas Armstrong seriously as the eponymous hero on any level whatsoever. He's a lad like many I have in my classroom - including that perpetually worried look that he has in his eyes.

And the production really cannot make up its mind as to whether or not it is a straightforward, mythless re-telling of the story or a camp classic. It uneasily shifts between the two. For me, it barely rates two stars.

I've kept quiet about boys recently. Well, here's a new stable I've encountered. Corbin Fisher. All nice boys. Get your all nice boys here.

The four in question here are Logan, Brent, Dawson and Jesse. And, if you believe that those are their real names then you'll also quite happily believe that only Jesse on the right acknowledges that he is gay. Apparently, the rest are straight studs to a man. They just happen to like fucking men and performing all sort of other intimacies which are well beyond the call of duty. Still, that's the fantasy that they are peddling.

Peddle on, my dears, peddle on.