Miles Kington - a bit late.

There aren't many people you encounter in life that you feel you could relate to on almost any level; a friend, a sister, a hot date.

That's how I feel about Miles Kington.

Such a pity he is deceased.

I should have taken more notice of him during his lifetime.

A bit late, I know for general worship and reverence but not too late for a tribute now, that I have got something of the measure of the man.

An event at Cheltenham Festival of Literature had the extraordinarily well-kept Joanna Lumley, Terry Jones, Maureen Lipman and Miles' widow Caroline talking about their memories of him and reading extracts from a book of the letters he wrote to his friend and agent Gill Coleridge when he knew he was dying of pancreatic cancer. The letters are comic, quirky, witty and not in the least maudlin. The affection for Kington was almost palpable.

I knew Miles Kington was a witty writer and always enjoyed what I read of his but I didn't actively seek him out, which is a shame because I find I like him a lot for many reasons.

He was a cyclist for a start. Cycled from home to Fleet Street every day. Cycled at weekends down in the countryside near Bath.

Miles: “I have often found that the mind goes into free wheel more easily on a bike ride than anywhere else in the world and you get some really good thoughts up there in the saddle.”

yeah.

He wrote with an easy, witty panache. He had an extremely messy study, he was a musician and he had a liver and white English Springer Spaniel. He was entirely my kind of bloke.

The more I read of Miles the more I like him. He penned his collection of letters, collected in the book “How Shall I Tell the Dog?” after the time when he realised he would probably not outlive his spaniel, Berry.

He never told the Independent, for whom he was writing a daily column, that he was ill. So even when he was admitted to hospital for chemotherapy, he'd hand-write his columns in the morning, gave them to his wife Caroline and she'd take them home to type them up and email them to the Indie as usual. She did say that he hated all those columns because he disliked not having the opportunity to “polish” them.

Reading the book in a corridor at Cheltenham Town Hall, I found that he pitched the idea of a book called “A Hundred Things To do Before you Die” rather than the “1,000 Places to Go Before You Die” (written by some American woman) which I've always considered unrealistic to achieve especially if, due to indecision over dates and suitcase size, you have lost time and find yourself wheeling along the oxygen, drip and catheter bag.

Like me, Miles dislikes the whole Yank thing of travelling the world ticking off the sites of interest as they are bagged. He extols the virtues of doing all the things you ever wanted to do but didn't without even leaving home which is v achievable in spite of credit crunches etc.

He cites the essentials that everyone ever wanted to try but didn't get around to it, like Learning to Give a Piercing Two-Fingered Whistle. My Sicilian sister-in-law was very good at that. She could whistle her children in from a crowded Cefalu beach in high season. She tried to teach me but I think my fingers were the wrong shape. I envied her ability though.

I was with her at a dog-training session on the edge of a vast recreation area full of people playing Sunday league soccer. It came in handy when her large Doberman puppy slipped his lead and careered off into the distance to join them.

She put her hand up, wedged a finger in each corner of her mouth and emitted a whistle of jet-engine pitch and volume that simultaneously brought all four soccer matches to a complete halt.

Like meerkats, the players gazed in the direction of the whistle. The dog stopped dead too, briefly acknowledging the call before seizing his chance to snatch the nearest football and flee.

Some other valuable learning strategies proposed by Miles included:

How To Pronounce 'Macho' and 'Chorizo' Properly – Unlike Mark Lawson

Get – and Keep – That Space By The Beach Or Pool

How To Make Children At Adjacent Tables Burst Into Tears For No Apparent Reason

It's Never Too Late To Learn How To Shoplift

Beating A Duvet At It's Own Game

How To Do A Cartwheel

Of the wider list, I could only mentally tick off four, which is extremely poor.

How To Swear in Other Languages (I've got a neat little phrase book), How to Fix a Ballcock (you bend the ballcock thingy until it almost snaps and mostly does so you have to purchase a whole new section) and as for How To Make A Noise With A Blade Of Grass, I perfected that when I was eight. It's rubbish. Only useful for alarming pheasants.

As for Tossing A Coin, I can already toss a coin really high – something I had to learn in order to avoid looking even more stupid playing league ping pong.

Anyway, like him, I think there is a market for the One Hundred Things book. I'd buy it, if only to master the two-fingered whistle.

Miles also planned his own memorial.

“If there is any money accruing from any of the books which may be written as a consequence of these letters to you between now and my death, I would like you to arrange for a bench to be bought and dedicated to me along the canal.” (The Kennet and Avon, near his home).

He liked benches. They were useful for pausing to do up shoelaces and for sitting and scribble thoughts that had occurred during his bike rides.

He wanted the Kington seat to bear a plaque with the following words:

“IN FOND MEMORY OF MILES KINGTON, WHO HATED THIS SPOT
BECAUSE THERE WAS NEVER ANYWHERE TO SIT DOWN AND ENJOY IT FROM.”


'How Shall I Tell the Dog?' is a special book by a lovely bloke.

Maureen Lipman says it's a glorious feat of good nature, imagination and courage. I tend to agree. Worth a look. Definitely.

Sorry I'm not here to take your call....

......if you'd like to leave a message after the tone I'll ring you as soon as I can.”

This isn't a blog about answering machines. They are old technology now and besides, it's been done to death the way you can tell personality types or social status from the kind of greeting message people leave.

The standard BT message, after all, belongs to the traditional reserved middle-class person who takes themselves very seriously and wishes to avoid revealing anything remotely personal.

Not for them the kooky family messages “You have reached the Mad House!!! Rory and Steph must be out doing the taxi service for Adam and Sophie. Either that or the kids have finally left home and we are comatose on Tesco's Finest chardonnay.”

It's more about the messages people leave. Some are normal, businesslike and to-the-point. There are others, of course, where you hear nothing but the Click of Frustration or a long protracted sigh and a muttered “not there AGAIN....”

Best of all are the messages where people treat the answering machine as a mute friend. My machine would record for 30 minutes if necessary, which was just right for my late lamented mumsie.

Her messages were epic; easily as long as our conversation would have lasted had I been there – occasionally longer.

It wasn't that she enjoyed the sound of her own voice. She always began with vital information to impart and once in full spate, savoured the freedom of not being interrupted.

Her monologue would ebb and flow as she paused briefly to collect her thoughts, and she delivered those thoughts interspersed with real-time observations about her immediate environment.

Because the phone point was still in the hallway (in its original location from the mid-sixties) mater could answer the door, collect post from the postman and continue her voicemail thread in a seamless flow.

Being Welsh, she was effortlessly articulate and never lost for conversation, especially when no-one else was involved.

“Janie? Are you there? It's only me...” she'd start.

“Oh. (pause) Maybe you're in the garden. (pause) But hang on. Ah. It's only 9.30am. Maybe you're still out with the dog. Oh well. (sigh, pause..... longer sigh) I'll talk to you later. I've been up since 5.30am. Done everything. Seems like lunchtime already. Ray is picking me up at 11.30 and we're off to Moreton market. Let me know if there's anything you'd like me to get?

“Anyway, I only wanted to remind you about Aunty Joan's birthday. It's Saturday. We usually just send a card. She never buys anything so don't feel you have to. We don't want to start anything now. Anyway, I've got her a nice make-up bag. You needn't get anything though. The last present she bought for you was when you were seven before we left Llanfach.

“Aunty Glad's never forgotten your birthday. She's always spelled your name with an extra 'n' but I never had the heart to put her right and it's too late now, forty or so years on. Anyway, it's not as if you mind.

“I forgot to tell you a horrible black labrador attacked our Buster yesterday. Bloody owner let it off and it came after Buster like grease lightning. I lashed out at it but kicked a tree. My toe's in agony but Buster had him. I'm still shaking now...”

.........and so on and so on.

I especially enjoyed it when she switched into real-time commentary to describe a sudden on-going event.

“Oh! Hang on. (pause) I'm sure that's Ken's car. What's he doing here? Ken's car's just pulled up across the road. He must be back. I told you, didn't I, that I saw him leaving with his suitcases three weeks ago? Josie left them outside. She'd changed the locks by then.

“She hasn't mentioned she's expecting him back. Oh dear. I'd better go over later and make sure she's all right....” etc

Absolutely the best voicemails. They always made me smile. The prosaic and the funny alongside the drama, the reminders, veiled criticisms, veiled sadnesses, the uncertainties, the diary dates, the disappointments were all there. Mater's monologues could knock spots off anything Alan Bennett ever produced because hers were utterly heartfelt and authentic.

Just occasionally, there would be a gem. Like the day the milkman called.

Mumsie was leaving me a complex message about holiday arrangements (she was dog-sitting for me and needed to know precisely how many pigs' ears a day would be required for Rolls) when the doorbell rang.

“Hang on. Milkman,” she said, clunking the phone down on the hall table.

I knew she'd opened the front door because of the jangle of the security chain. I heard her trill to the milkman “Hello. Yes. Won't be a second. I'll just go and get my purse. I'm on the phone.”

Footsteps to kitchen and back to door followed by prolonged jangling of security chain.

“Oh no. Sorry about this. Can't get the chain off. It's tangled.”

I could hear the milkman's mumbled voice.

“S'ok. I'll wait.”

“How much do I owe you anyway?” More fevered jangling of metal.

“Thirty-six pounds forty-two pence.”

“Right.”

Noisy struggles continued.

“I'm so sorry about this.”

Mater began to giggle apologetically.

“I dont know what's going on here. I seem to be making it worse. The chain's getting tighter and the gap's getting narrower and narrower...”

“This is ridiculous!” She snorted with laughter.

“I'm so sorry. I can hardly see you now........I'll just have to post the money through the crack.

“Can you take it? Can you see the ten pound note yet?

Milkman, laughing now: “I thought it was a fiver but yes, I can see the edge. Shall I grab it and pull?”

Mother, giggling hopelessly : “It's this stupid chain. It's got a mind of its own.

“Here comes the second ten pound note...got it?”

The milkman was choking with laughter. They both were.

“Got that? Here's the last one... Coming through. No, hold on, the edge keeps curling up. I'm trying my best to stuff it through....”

In a lull between hysterics, I just catch the milkman's voice. He sounds exhausted.

“Tell you what, Mrs R, let's call it quits at thirty quid.

“We'll leave the change until next time. I can't take any more of this. You've made my morning, though. See you.”

Mother finally regains her compusure and picks up the phone again.

“Oh my god, J. Did you hear that? That was embarrassing. He's usually a bit miserable but we were both doubled up. Oh dear.

“Right. I absolutely must go now (said in an accusing tone that indicated that I had been keeping her!!)

“I've got to get this damn security chain undone before anyone else comes to the door.”

Homage to Liam Killeen

Oh dear. The Malvern Marvel Liam Killeen did it again; wiped out in the opening two minutes of the Olympic mens' mountainbike race.

In the frantic melee of riders trying to get a decent position before the track narrowed, his bike touched another wheel and he went over the handlebars. We've all done it (well, technically my over-the-handlebars-experience was due to a malevolent tree root and there wasn't a soul for at least fifty yards and it wasn't in a race but I was still well winded, I can assure you).

If Liam hadn't wiped and spent several minutes remembering who he was and getting the bent bike straightened, he might well have had a medal because, despite spending what seemed like an eternity before he got back on the circuit, he managed to zip through a field of internationally brilliant riders to finish seventh. Fourth place is first loser but his catch-up attempt was nothing short of heroic and we must look forward to success and stability for 2012 even if it means glueing his ass to the saddle.

As far as I'm concerned, his efforts were worth it because he inspired me to tempt DT man out for a lengthy mountainbike ride; an Olympic achievement in itself, especially as there was Very Important Lawn Mowing to do before The Rain.

In the true spirit of Olympic ideals – faster, longer, higher, wider, wetter, floppier etc – I devised a challenging route to test a whole range of mountainbike skills.

It included some busy road, some quiet road, plenty of off-road, a horrible hill, loads of lifting bike over gates and one ancient wooden gate, which when opened, disintegrated into pieces necessitating hasty, inadequate reassembling and sharp exit. Goodness knows how many miles we covered but it took more than three hours, what with refuelling and everything - much longer than the Olympic version.

There were additional, specially negotiated, obligatory elements of three pubs and a chinese restaurant. The pubs, as you can imagine, were especially gruelling, with their riverside views, g&ts, real ales and chips (not as scientific a diet as the Olympians, admittedly).

Interestingly, at the second pub, we were able to watch a proper tree pass by on the river which we'd noted from a picnic table vantage point at the first pub, upstream. Then the ex-swan floated past that we'd seen at the first pub too. There was some controversy about the swan. Without my specs, which were quite muddy, I thought it must just be head down and dabbling but remembered that swans don't dabble while heading downriver, upside down, at 4mph. The afternoon was turning into a giant version of Pooh sticks. I reflected that the Severn had undoubtedly taken a shorter, quicker route than we had, so we must have cycled quite fast – an achievement worth celebrating with a second round.

Then there were extra-hard elements which would have been too unreasonable to include in the Olympic course – impossibly steep uphill with the wrong sort of grass, long tricky sections of horsey-churned thick mud with lacerating brambles either side and then a further mud surprise at the top of the hill, just at the bit where one would normally pause to admire the 360 degree view of glorious Glos. Those geography teachers lied when they said that water percolates through rock and spurts out of little springs. It doesn't all do that. A lot of it falls from the sky and stays put. It reminded me of the Langdales where, on top of one of the mountains, my dear departed doggo went to an innocuous puddle for a refreshing slurp and promptly disappeared into a morass of evil black water. Moments later he struggled out and came to me for reassurance. Only a spaniel can look heart-rendingly upset before peppering you with bits of peat bog.

This time it wasn't a peatbog but wide, foetid green/brown puddles which are the unappealing consequence of farm vehicles carrying much animal excrement to nourish our wholesome organic crops.

As night follows day, this kind of terrain is always followed by a stony downhill which might be enjoyable if not for the hefty gobbets of mud flying into your face thanks to the self-cleaning action of the front wheel.

Faces and legs were liberally splattered. Being far too gruesome for dim sum, we decided to give the Chinese restaurant a miss.

And then it began to rain. DT man yelled something and put the hammer down, as they say in cycling circles. I didn't catch what he said but it could have been 'Last one home's a cissy' or “The mowing! The mowing!”

Anyway, as I watched his ass disappearing into the distance and a tropical storm ensued, I couldn't help thinking that final burst of speed had probably been inspired by Liam Killeen.

Like Liam, DT man didn't medal but he went one better. By the time I got in, he'd kettled and left me an Olympic-sized mug of tea.

Friends

En guarde
Swords drawn,
they battle
those two young friends
dancing along a narrow seawall
in the bright yellow-blue afternoon

Fizzing, spitting energies erupt
lunging, clashing, parrying,
all burgeoning strength
and brimming aggression
until the loser falls
hard on to sand below

Time shifts.
Deeper voices ring out
Laughing across a midnight ocean
Long-muscled legs give chase,
tearing dark, closed water
to frothy shreds

A spluttering head caught,
plunged deep for silent drowning
until a hand signals release
Then the peace; the night swimming.
Beautiful reckless youth,
never to be reclaimed.

Toe curling

Why does no-one ever blog about embarrassing moments? No idea. Anyway, mine was yesterday.

I have this bag. It has work files in it, backup tapes and other work stuff. It also has Classic FM magazines and sunglasses and cycling gloves and packs of oatcakes and a carton of fresh eggs and cards and pens - lots and lots of pens - and half-filled notebooks, letters and small parcels for posting and elastic bands.

No-one touches my bag. It's pretty heavy and it's big so it gets dark early down there in the deepest recesses. Well anyway, i'd finished the oatcakes and I'd planned on having a banana half way through the afternoon.

So I reached into the bag and groped around, as you do, (no point in looking in there as there's far too much stuff) and ew, the banana had been replaced by something softly yielding and warmish. It was still banana-shaped but had the feel of a soft leather pouch filled with batter.

It wasn't a good sensation and I realised it shouldn't stay there a moment longer in case it suddenly splattered over the important stuff.

I withdrew it with the same care I might give to an unexploded incendiary device and was astonished to see that while my banana hadn't actually exploded, it had definitely gone off.

It had not gone off to the extent of being freckled. To me, freckles are indicators of banana perfection and they are quite attractive on some people too. It had not even gone off to the extent of being a bit freckled but frankly quite brown. It had gone off to the point of putrefaction. It was an ex-banana. Completely black.

My colleague, Ocean (not her real name but how do kids cope with names like that?) who is so seriously weird that she loathes and detests bananas, began to retch in a melodramatic way.

"Oh Jan that's so gross."

Honestly, you'd have thought I'd piled elephant dung all around her naked body.

I was hoping she wouldn't notice the blackness of the banana if I held it kind of close to my black trousers on the way to the waste bin. But she did. And I was embarrassed. My protests along the lines of "Well, it was all right yesterday" did little to stem the growing suspicion that all I carry around in that bag is a ton of rotting fruit.

It's a strange thing, embarrassment. I spent much of my young life in a semi-permanent state of embarrassment. My blush mechanism was set on a hair-trigger to go off at the slightest thing or even imagined thing.

I blushed for Wales. People - particularly boys - used to compete to see how deeply profusely crimson I would become. It was a psychological handicap as tangible as a wooden leg. My shyness was there for all to see - vulnerably and hotly displayed.

Fortunately, as I got older, began working and became more worldly-wise and at ease with people, the tendency to colour faded and now, thankfully, I don't blush unless someone says or does something which takes me completely by surprise.

It probably helps that I'm not embarrassed very often. There are lots of "Ooops" moments but those are low on the embarrassment index. I feel a compleat twit when people point out my careless spelling errors but that's bearable too.

They don't compare with the truly toe-curling incidents.... like the time I got a bracelet hopelessly tangled in the back of some lacy underwear in a ladies loo. I'm right-handed so the bracelet was on the right hand and caught in a position where the left hand couldn't do a lot to help.

After much tugging and fiddling and getting hot and bothered, I had to emerge to seek assistance - into the wider ladies area not into the restaurant itself, that would have been pure attention-seeking. Anyway, I'd have torn said underwear to bits rather than be compromised in public but would still have been wearing a bracelet unusually decorated with finely-shredded designer knicker.

Several ladies tried to help but it transpired that on a night out, not many women wear the spectacles they need to see clearly. That could be the feminine version of beer goggles. Same result anyway. Finally, one woman with 20/20 vision disentangled everything successfully, bless her.

There was another loo-related awkwardness in Stratford-upon-Avon when I became so desperate that I raced into the nearest pub toilet, gratefully sought a free cubicle and reflected, rather too late, that I'd rushed past several machines on the wall offering packets of condoms. It occurred to me that perhaps the girls of Stratford upon Avon ladies were particularly forward-thinking with their contraception, able to choose from an eye-watering variety of Durex.

It might have been convincing if the smell had been right but it wasn't. There was a distinct whiff and I'm not talking Domestos. Then the voices confirmed my fears that, like a fool, I'd rushed in where angels fear to tread.

It was about 45 minutes before it was clear to escape without being seen. My saving grace was the start of a televised football match. The boyfriend hadn't even noticed my unnaturally lengthy absence being entirely occupied with in-depth lager studies and then the soccer. It didn't last.

Tender

Not velvet

nor satin

or close-brushed silk

but fingertips

trailed

lightly as caressing feathers

of softest down,

tender as a baby's cheek

yielding as a fresh-sprung leaf

briefly,

briefly,

cool against the heat.

A shiver,

delicious,

in the shimmering,

secret dark.

Hurry with a flurry

It was one of those rare afternoons at work when everything had gone to pot.

After endless arrangements and contingency plans because we'd lose the computer network for a couple of hours during an upgrade, it all went wrong.

It was all down to the cabling guys. They hadn't turned up on the day everyone had planned but we were assured that our bigger, better system would be up and running by close of play on Friday.

I guessed it might not be. But party-poopery is not supposed to be in my nature. Of course it was nowhere near finished. And being a Friday meant that at precisely 2.35pm - with three hours and twenty-five minutes worth of work left for the rest of us (plus an extra half hour for the couple on late) these guys were loading ladders back on to the vans and buggering off for the weekend.

So it was an anti-climactic afternoon. We had achieved not much for maximum disruption and it was hot, with only a slight whiff of humid air circulating through wide-open windows.

The conversation turned to muck flurries. I didn't like to say anything but they sounded far too much like the slurry flurry that the local farmer slings all over the fields near me. It leaves a lingering stench for two days or more.

My colleagues assured me that muck flurries are absolutely the thing to eat when one gets bothered and hot, which we all were in a strictly anti-climactic sort of way.

There are chocolate ones, strawberry ones and cornetto-style mint-choc chip ones. Several of the girls were openly drooling at the muck-memories.

Muck flurries were available at Muck Donalds, I was told. Never having been in a McDonalds (let's at least get the spelling right) and not having a clue, I got some directions and went on a small journey of discovery.

I expected the place to be empty at 4pm on a warm Friday. But there were families indulging in chips and burgers and all manner of fried things accompanied by quantities of very small, narrow, dry-looking chips. Where I come from (Wales) the chips are invariably much more substantial and smell gorgeously of copious quantities of vinegar-soaked salt.

There was a United Nations atmosphere behind the counter where the temperature felt as though it was nudging 35 degrees or more. The guy who served me was very pleasant with a strong Far Eastern accent, possibly Korean, so I ended up indicating what I wanted by pointing to the large bright images on display, pointing and nodding with many reciprocating smiles.

He took a while to squirt out and decorate ten assorted flurries giving me plenty of time to take in the ambience. I was gratified to see that one can get an entire day's meals in McDonalds right through from your morning porridge and orange juice, to a light salad lunch before tucking into the seriously deep-fried delicacies on offer for later.

It's also a place where kids need much discipline which is handed out at ear-splitting volume by harassed-sounding mothers who have vocabularies of profane and obscene language far superior to mine - and mine is quite good, even though I say so myself.

Having taken delivery of several trays of ice-cold flurries, the next task was to get back to the office pronto. You've got to hurry with a flurry - especially in the kind of temperatures when they are most needed.

“Hey. They serve porridge in MacDonalds! I thought you'd all like jam with them,” I announced when I got back.

Everyone had been to McDonalds before. Everyone was very familiar with the set-up. I'd been there for the first time ever and was the only one to notice the porridge. How weird is that?

Anyway, there was a mass groan. They know I'm keen on soluble fibre and honestly thought I'd got them porridge.

But how sweet was the surprise when I revealed the flurries, and how touching the delight as they all turned into little kids again taking the plastic tops from their flurry cartons and extracting their weird squared off plastic flurry spoons complete with the hanger attachment.

Mine was strawberry. I was initially suspicious, still having the slurry flurry image in mind, but it tasted just like real strawberry - the kind you get in that excellent French jam. And the Italian-style ice-cream was still cold in the middle yet yielding and creamy around the edges. Yum.

All very surprising as I'd always refused to take my sons to McDonalds or darken its doors for reasons I've actually forgotten now but were probably vaguely to do with corporate world domination and not having proper china plates.

I'd lost my McDonalds virginity and, I reflected, slurping the quite delicious ice-cream, it had actually been worth it.

The other girls were in raptures.

“Better than an orgasm,” gasped one.

Hers must have been one of the chocolate flurries. No contest.