Well, for Lois and me, the party's over - the highly enjoyable get-together at Beaconsfield for me and some of my fellow old-codger cousins was yesterday, and now it's all over for another year: as we all get older, these get-togethers have quietly morphed into annual events. Well, it's interesting to speculate, but let's hope we'll all still be around next year haha!
But "yikes" at the same time haha !!!!!
flashback to yesterday: me with 6 of my 30-or-so cousins,
plus Lois and Alan (host Jeanette's husband) on the far right
And today Lois and I have got to drive home to Malvern.
Lois and I are both looking for kicks today, with a dash of nostalgia, but there's no "Route 66" that goes anywhere near Malvern, so we take a chance on one of the alternative routes in the map above.
The option we choose is where we come off the M40 quite early and take the so-called "middle route" past Oxford and Cheltenham, one of the routes coloured grey, which is actually only 5 minutes longer than the "superfast" blue one. Call us crazy if you like, but we've decided to go for it anyway!!
This route has got lots of memories for us, and it's a delightfully sunny day to drive past the fields and hills of Oxfordshire, where we took so many of our so-called "nature rambles" after we first "hooked up" at the end of the 1960's - happy days !!!
Yes, and the memories come flooding back as soon as we start off on the journey. My goodness yes!
09:00 The initial bit of the journey, on the M40 motorway, reminds me strongly of trips to and from Heathrow Airport in the distant past, like in 1971, the time my father brought Lois and my little sister Jill (13) to the airport to meet me off my plane, at the end of my student year in Japan.
I'm sure you remember that, don't you - be honest! It was so nice to be in Japan, but, as Sinatra once said, it was oh so nice to come home. You know that feeling too, don't you!
Heathrow Airport in 1971 - I arrive back from Japan, via Moscow,
exhausted after a sleepless trip - oh dear - but so pleased to be home!
(me pictured here with Lois and my little sister Jill (13))
Later, as we drive through Oxfordshire along the A40, we pass Cutteslowe Park, Oxford, and the house where Lois lived with her parents, from about age 11 till she married me in 1972, when we were both aged 26.
flashback to the 1950's: Lois as a young "teenybopper" outside the house
in Cutteslowe Park, Oxford, where she spent most of her childhood
I was still a student, and we were both living with our parents at that time, so it was great to get in the car and be somewhere quiet on our own, out "in the sticks" somewhere, especially when it was nice weather.
10:30 Then, as we drive on further today, along the A40 at the Witney by-pass, we pass the exit to RAF Brize Norton, where, in 1981, I boarded an RAF transport plane for my first visit to the US, a "business trip" with my boss Harvey, a trip which convinced me that I would like to do a 3-year tour-of-duty working for the British Embassy over there, which I duly did from 1982 to 1985.
the late 1960's: some rare photos we took of each other on our early
nature rambles deep in the Oxfordshire countryside
- happy days !!!!
RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, where I took my
first ever flight to the US in 1981, with my boss Harvey.
1981: my boss Harvey and I stop by at Harpers Ferry,
West Virginia, with its world famous custard shop
- not just that custard, but a lot of other things as well,
convinced me that I would like to try working in the US.
14:00 After reaching home and having a makeshift lunch of cheese sandwiches, Lois and I both feel pretty "zonked out" after the journey and the whole last 3 days, so we spend another afternoon in bed - no surprise there, is there - oh dear!
20:00 By evening, however, Lois starts to feel a bit more lively, so she takes part in her church's weekly Bible Class online. When she emerges we watch an episode of "Starstruck".
Have you seen Starstruck? It's written by, and stars, New Zealander Rose Matafeo, as Jessie, a young kiwi in London, who falls for a British film star, Tom. And don't you just love that cute New Zealand accent of hers?
I know I do!
actor-scriptwriter Rose Matafeo, as young kiwi visitor to London,
who falls for a British film-star Tom Kapoor, played by Nikesh Patel
(see the poster on the side of the bus shelter)
Jessie turns up at the church anyway, with two of her kiwi friends, let's call them Isla and Oliver, to discover that Oliver has brought several ties with him, because he can't make up his mind which one he should wear.
Who knew that you could buy ties that conveyed such a specific message? We didn't!
I must ask about those ties, next time I'm in M&S - I could get a selection saying different things, just the kind of things I'm always saying, of course, the things which Lois most gets tired of hearing haha!
Anyway, it turns out that that's enough information for Jessie to choose the right colour tie for Oliver, which is nice.
22:00 Enough said. We go to bed - zzzzzzzzz!!!!
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