We lunched at the club today.  The Mississippi Golf Club. In the clubhouse on the Mississippi River in the Village of Appleton across from the serene and exclusive Glen Isle. I recall having had years ago from Glen Isle clients who although unconventional were nonetheless kind and generous. They were an elderly couple who, rightly or wrongly I cannot now recollect, took exception to the ambitions of a local property owner and developer. Like most people in remote, rural, idyllic environs – especially riparian – they had their idiosyncrasies and predictable conventions.  As well they might! I too feel commited to my Elysian view upriver without the benefit of feudal entitlement.

Continue reading →

Ship money, in British history, was a non-parliamentary tax first levied in medieval times by the English crown on coastal cities and counties for naval defence in time of war. It required those being taxed to furnish a certain number of warships or to pay the ships’ equivalent in money. Its revival and its enforcement as a general tax by Charles I aroused widespread opposition and added to the discontent leading to the English Civil Wars.

Apparently there has forever been a price to pay for seaside dwelling. This historical reference to ship money is but a reminder of the allure to me of the Atlantic Ocean. One of my first expressions of this nautical enchantment – aside from having attended Dalhousie law school au bord de la mer in Halifax, Nova Scotia – was the acquisition of a ship’s bell.

Continue reading →

Once you’ve posted your review, email us
with your Google profile name,
Halo location, and RFID tag number to claim
your complimentary week.

It is seldom if ever that I have responded to an invitation by a retailer to promote its product for free benefits. This however is an exception. Not because I want free benefits but because I adore the product. I am hugely impressed with the retailer in this instance. Quite frankly I willingly and heartily embrace the chance to speak endearingly of it.

Continue reading →

To my credit I began the day by reading The History of England by Thomas Frederick Tout.

Born in London, he was a pupil of St Olave’s Grammar School, still then at Southwark, a graduate of Balliol College, Oxford, and a fellow of Pembroke, but failing to obtain permanent fellowships at All Souls (1879) and Lincoln, his first academic post was at St David’s University College, Lampeter (now the University of Wales, Lampeter), where his job title was ‘Professor of English and Modern Languages’.

Continue reading →

Forgive me. I can’t resist the view from the balcony. Even on a rainy day. Yesterday the brilliance of the sunshine and the effulgence of the blue sky were remarkable. But we all need a break. Even from the good stuff.

Continue reading →

Having drained myself of energy yesterday (and having overnight survived an indecipherable though completely irritating and sporadic sound) I’m rather enjoying gazing blankly upriver at the distant clouds.  In fact the azure dome is completely clear. All evidence of storm has passed. The cumulonimbus subsides on the horizon as though being drawn over the edge. In the meantime I am saturating myself with my own tonic of schmaltz, deep bass notes and delicate pianissimo on the keyboard.

Continue reading →

Man was not intended to live like a bear or a hermit, apart from others of his own nature, and, philosophy and reason will each agree with me, that man was born for sociability and finds his true delight in society. Society is a word capable of many meanings, and used here in each and all of them. Society, par excellence; the world at large; the little clique to which he is bound by early ties; the companionship of friends or relatives; even society tete a tete with one dear sympathizing soul, are pleasant states for a man to be in.

This society, composed, as it is, of many varying natures and elements, where each individual must submit to merge his own identity into the universal whole, which makes the word and state, is divided and subdivided into various cliques, and has a pastime for every disposition, grave or gay; and with each division rises up a new set of forms and ceremonies to be observed if you wish to glide down the current of polite life, smoothly and pleasantly.

Continue reading →

This morning upon awakening I was smitten by an email from Mrs. Conscience (as I now call her). Mrs C is a new but in many ways an old friend. She and I have a caring relationship animated by humour (mostly on my part if I may say so) and directness (mostly on her part). In addition to my old friend being stubborn (which of course she has repeatedly denied and then embellished with threats of abandoning our acquaintance), she is always attacking my seeming disquietude (to which objection once rendered I predictably end up crawling). She commands social regulation surpassing anything the “The Gentlemen’s Book of Etiquette and Manual of Politeness (rules for the etiquette to be observed in the street, at table, in the ball room, evening party, and morning call; with full directions for polite correspondence, dress, conversation, manly exercises and accomplishments)” by Cecil B. Hartley (1860) would ever have imagined or prescribed.

Continue reading →

On April 27th last we returned home to Canada – slightly jarred and damaged – from our winter sojourn on Key Largo. The estate agent knicked our travel plans for the comng year because our former landlord decided the sell the place. Now after 4 months of getting settled in our new locale on terra firma (this time with a corporate landlord and the accommodating nicety of perpetual existence), adjusting to altered living and parking arrangements, familiarizing ourselves with the neighbourhood and the people, daily reliving the splendour of the view of the fertile meadow, the constant motion of the river and the thrill of glimpsing a hawk, a fox and a variety of birds, the sky is at last beginning to clear. The transition is now both up and down as we, like painters of our own work of art, complete the colours and intensity of the entirety of canvass.

Continue reading →