All Purls. No Swine.
So long ago. My last post has me reminiscing about a movie which purported to highlight the early life of one of my adored childhood authors, a person who was--later in my life--one of my heroines: Beatrix Potter, feminist icon. (No, that's a bit of a stretch. But boy, howdy what a girl!) Here's a… Continue reading Quote of the Day: “Once Upon A Time”
Here's a minor reworking of a post originally from five years ago on Ricochet. I've updated and edited a couple of things, but--in the main--it stands: "Diamonds are a girl's best friend:" I can’t be sure that’s true, because I’ve never owned a single one. But certainly, if I were to try and come up… Continue reading “Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend”
It was the first of Bernard Cornwell's "Richard Sharpe" novels to be published, although it ended up, over the decades, being eighth in the chronological order of our hero's history. It was set in July of 1809, amidst the Battle of Talavera, an iconic bookmark during the Peninsular war between the Napoleonic armies and those… Continue reading Sharpe’s Eagle–The Battle of Talavera
Arnold George Dorsey must have thought quite deeply about the answer to Shakespeare’s question, one which seems, at least in his case, to have boiled down to, “quite a lot, really.” Born eighty-eight years ago today in Madras, India (the date is sometimes given as May 2), young Mr. Dorsey riffled through several options before… Continue reading Quote of the Day: What’s in a Name?”
I saw my first movie ever in the UK, when I was five years old. it was 1959, and Dad was on leave from Nigeria. We were living in the family home in Droitwich, and Granny, Mum, and I went to Birmingham's West End Cinema to see a much-celebrated American import. Those were the days… Continue reading There is Nothing Like a Dame: 75 Years Later
American orchestra leader Lawrence Welk was born one hundred twenty-one years ago, on March 11, 1903, the son of German immigrants from Odessa, in what is now Ukraine. Welk's Wikipedia page tells the story of the family's first winter, living in an overturned wagon buried in earth, and of young Lawrence's leaving school in the… Continue reading Ah One, Ana Two: Happy Birthday Lawrence Welk!
Forty-one years ago today, on February 28, 1983, the final episode of the television series M*A*S*H aired. It had almost 110 million viewers, in a world where such numericals were hithertofore unknown, making it one of the most-watched episodes ever. That last episode, "Goodbye, Farewell and Amen," was memorialized here. It took ten years for… Continue reading Mash Up? Tell Me More
A lightly-edited post from that originally published several years ago. RIP, sweet lady. Audrey Kathleen Ruston, who died thirty-one years ago today (far too soon), was born on May 4, 1929 in Brussels, Belgium, the daughter of a member of minor Dutch nobility and a peripatetic English financier father who later changed his name to… Continue reading Ab-so-bloomin-lutely Loverly: RIP Audrey Hepburn
Breathes there an English expat girl with soul so dead, who never to herself has said, “Well, having heard that bloody song again, I’m just going off–not for the first time–to have a quiet little cry…” Here's the song: https://youtu.be/hKdRpDpIR70 Unlike most popular stars of the 1970s and 80s, Roger Whittaker ploughed his own furrow… Continue reading Roger Whittaker: The Last Farewell
"Who is Angela Rippon?" You may ask. And it's perfectly fine if you do. I'm ready to go to war on her behalf. I know who Angela Rippon is mostly because I'm old enough to remember her insurgence on the BBC as its first permanent female journalist on the national television news. And also--not to… Continue reading You Go, Girl! In Praise of Angela Rippon