Thread 9 - TalkLair: “Russell's teapot goes on being round”

[Kucinghitam]

Continuation of previous threads (thread 8).

The new lair of JTT escapees is all cosy and homey; we have truly settled here. Outside, the garden is blooming with summer flowers - should bloody well be, what with all that rain. Inside, the hearth is glowing, pictures are up on the walls, rugs are down on the floors (and assorted pets curled up on them).

We just won’t mention the gnawed bones of our prey over there in the corner of the cave…

I took home the beautiful sewing kit provided by the poshest hotel I ever stayed in, and carried it around unopened in my bag for years afterwards to take out and gaze at, it was perfect, in a proper rigid case with glass lid, real metal scissors, lots of needles and different coloured threads, I love all compartmented boxes, like aeroplane meals and bags with loads of zipped pockets, even my cutlery drawer thing. I then had occasion to use it, badly sewing on a button or a torn hem, probably, and bit by bit all the marvellous things and perfect order disappeared, wish I’d never opened it, I could have photographed it and posted it for your delectation.

It was a big castle hotel in or near Ashford in Kent. I had a 2-bedroomed mews suite with big kitchen and living room, and a terraced garden, ALL TO MYSELF, as part of the National Cancer Services Peer Review a decade or so ago. It was the very last service to be reviewed so they spent the rest of their budget on accommodation, none of the other hotels we’d stayed in had been so plush!

I've darned some socks, MrKitty had some thick wool walking socks, and it seemed a waste to throw them out when he'd put his toe through them. So I darned them (badly probably) and they're worn in the house instead of slippers. I think my darning is a bit too lumpy for wearing with shoes, probably would be blister central.

I've also done darning using my sewing machine to fix up some awkwardly placed holes in old jeans.

I still darn but not very often - socks usually and a favourite cardigan, that my dad kindly told me looks like a compost heap. It's partly because he said that that I keep that cardigan going.

For small mends I like to sew by hand and enjoy the deft movements of mending something neatly. In a similar way, I enjoy writing by hand and watching the miraculous flow of words from my mind onto the paper.

Mavis, I have sewing kit envy. My kit is stored in an old cool bag, a freebie that came with engine oil, from about 1990.

That was fascinating, thanks for the link. Men like Rush make me think of some people I know who, no matter what they're told, go headlong into very inadvisable situations. Usually, though, it's just them who gets a big slap from Reality and they don't take others with them. It's incredible that no one was able to talk Rush out of his crazily dangerous ideas.

It's partly because he said that that I keep that cardigan going.

Ha ha @Tricyrtis2022 ! No better reason than that.

I also have sewing kit envy!

Somewhere (probably my suitcase as it’s very much travel scale) I have a little Muji sewing kit in a plastic box with folding scissors as well as the usual needles, pins and threads. I almost never mend anything (mostly I just wear clothes with holes in) but like knowing that I can in needs be.

I was 7 when I first attempted sewing, when I asked my mother to mend my trousers and was told to do it myself. I did and when she realised, she was quite surprised and told me I'd made a mess of it.

I had, patching isn't as easy as it looks...

I used to do a lot as a teenager, with patchwork punk jeans; with denim, tartan, leather and anything I could find.

I’ve been googling “posh castle hotel ashford kent” but can’t find anything resembling the place I stayed. Maybe my theft of the sewing kit was the final financial straw, I hope not. It’s not as though I swiped the slippers or dressing gown.

patchwork punk jeans

I had patchwork hippy jeans, they were great. One patch was made from the tape on a policeman's flat cap, as my bf's brother was a policeman.

Congratulations baby Weasel, hardly seems 5 minutes since she was born!

I made quite a few clothes when I was a teenager - there wasn't much in the way of punk / goth clothing in my East Midlands town back in the 80s, so we had to make our own between rare trips to London. Kids today etc etc - although my son does know how to use the sewing machine to adjust clothes. Daughter not so much.

I learned sewing and clothes-making in Home Ec/Domestic Science (Forms 1-3). Apart from clothing repairs such as replacing buttons, fixing rips, darning knitwear sort of thing, I've hardly bothered to sew anything since.

Had a vague thought about all the children I "knew" about from the Old Place threads. That they're simultaneously all still babies or littlies because that's how I remember them from those threads, but also that they're all gangly teenagers or in fact completely grown up because my DC are already gangly teenagers.

We had basic sewing lessons (and cookery lessons) when I was at secondary school, but only for girls - in those sexist days the boys did woodwork and metalwork instead.

I've told this story before, but one boy in my school, just one, his Mum made him do DS instead of woodwork 'cos it was more useful'. And sure, she had a point. But that poor kid sure took some stick for it.

My secondary school still segregated at the point I did my 'choosing schools' tour, but had succumbed to modernity by the time I actually arrived, so both boys and girls rotated round all the various practical classes, doing 6 weeks of each thing before moving on to the next. Buttons and darning one term, bashing red hot metal wirh hammers the next.

My previous school was the enlightened variety where they let us all loose on both cookery and woodwork from the age of 3 (with pottery, CDT and other similar classes when we were slightly older.).

Poor kid, he'd have got loads of stick in those days. The school I went to had different classes for boys and girls and a girl in my class challenged the school to let her do technical drawing instead of sewing and, after a lot of hand-wringing, she was allowed to.

I didn't mind the cooking classes but loathed the needlework classes because the teacher was so thoroughly unpleasant. We weren't allowed to talk at all and she was very critical, especially of me, for reasons I never figured out. I detested that woman.

Binturong, that sounds like a better set up.

I learned some incredibly useful skills by doing A level foundation art after leaving school. It was bloody brilliant, we did wood and metal work, so learned to use all the machines, along with random stuff like mixing Araldite with sawdust to fill gaps in wood. Then there was ceramics, printing, jewellery, photography, textiles. Of course, there was also drawing and painting and art history. I absolutely loved that course, it gave me a groundwork in practical skills that have had a big impact on my adult life and mean I can turn my hand to so many things with the confidence that I won't completely mess it up.

That sounds like a brilliant course.

As well as the timetabled classes, my junior school also had 'Wednesday choice', which was a fantastic way to try things out. The afternoon was divided into 2 sessions and you could pick anything you wanted - all year groups in together, new choices each term. The teachers did whatever they were interested in. So some of it was fairly traditional art, craft and sport like pottery, screen printing or girls football. And some was more unusual things like kite making, enamelling, shadow puppetry, and learning to rig a boat.

I taught on an art foundation. It’s the most fun you’re allowed to have in education as a student or a tutor. Everyone should do it!

I have two poems (not by me, sadly) of the humorous variety to share with you. I loved both of these. One is the winner of a recent humorous poetry contest One is called Epistle to my Lord concerning my sons' future spouses

The other is a video piece called . Both of them made me laugh a lot so I wanted to share them.

Damn the lack of an edit button!

Ha!

In a more lavatorial vein of humour, I give you loo-in-a-cupboard:

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/135765002#/?channel=RES_BUY

Ha ha! The toilet in the bathroom appears to be floating above the floor and casting a shadow - possibly a urine puddle - but it’s actually the slightly darker pedestal mat that causes the illusion.

Love those poems, Brit!

(Photo 19.)