Madame Galina's Doings Diary

Woman's Hour

Oh, the bliss – I’ve just had lunch with Tonks (aka Paul Tonkinson. Iestyn, what have I told you about stream of consciousness?...ed) at the Corner House in Manchester. Hadn’t seen him since Iraq. It was a joyful reunion. He’s in Manchester presenting the flag ship Breakfast Show on XFM, and going great guns from what I hear on Broadband; though it has to be said: the stand up world and Combined Services Entertainment (alleluia…ed.) are missing him. Well, you would. And do you know I’ve finally realised what it is that gives him his hang-dog expression? His eyelashes curve downward. He very sweetly said, just before he pointed out the shred of mayo globbed onion I had on my nose, how chuffed he is that I’ve had such great CSE tours.

“I have to be honest, Iestyn, and tell you that when the rest of us heard what you did, we thought, that’s interesting, that’s going to die on its arse. And now look at you, the New Forces’ Sweetheart”.

“Miss (Oh, save us! Nicky Ness, Director Of Entertainment at CSE…ed) doesn’t sanction that term” I chided him. “So you can only say that I’m the NFS ironically…”

Whereas, Jenni Murray, presenter of Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, can say it any way she likes. Asthmatically, as it turned out…

To record the show I went to Manchester for the second time in a week. The first, when I hooked up with Tonks, had been for a performance of Anything For A Tenor and Madame Galina at the Lowry Quays Theatre. That had been a long time coming; Diana Quick first told the artistic director they should have me there back in 2002. But the Marschallin is a wise woman when she says “Jedes Ding Hat Seinen Zeit”, and the timing was just right. I could see my techy, James, who had backs so swayed there were more than four seconds between him standing still and his knees locking, thumping the sound desk with laughter; and I got a standing ovation. Punters, Galina’s so-called lesbian stalker among them, later stood at their tables when I walked into the bar. I went and sat with said L.S, and among other things we discussed the difficulties I was having writing publicity blurb that clearly conveyed the content of my show.

“I see what you mean”, she said. “I’ve seen you three times now, and I bought this lot with me tonight…”

A man that looked a lot like my Nan Silcox interrupted, “…and she still couldn’t tell us what to expect. “Just get in the car”, she said, and not so much as the offer of a sweet…”

I got to thinking about my Nan Silcox. “She at all times made an effort to do things properly, even when that was the hard or the slow way”, remembers my Aunt Sophia. Legendary in my family is the story of when she went round to Letty’s next door, looked through the kitchen cupboards, and found tea bags.

“Letty, there are tea bags in here”.

“Can’t be”.

“There are”.

“Can’t be”.

“There are, Letty”.

“You sure?”

“Clear as custard”.

“Where, exactly?”

“Cupboard above the draining board”.

“Never!”

“Aye. Behind the tinned evap”.

“Oh, those tea bags, you mean. The just for life-or-death emergency ones”.

“And what was the life-or death emergency, Let’, you’ve kept quiet, not like you at all, about?”

Let’ walked right into that one. “Haven’t been as yet”.

“Then why are these tea bags open?”

Letty thought quickly. “They came like that. Seconds down at Carrefours. Haven’t used any”.

Nan counted them while Letty sat feeling her blood pressure rise.

“There’s only seventy nine, yer. No number eighty”.

“Oh, now, “said Letty, “just for myself the once, it didn’t seem worth the effort to be in the kitchen, right, then have to come back in here to fetch the footstool, take it back out there, put it flush to the sink to climb on and chuck the old tea leaves out on the roses…”

“Well, there we are for a start. We’ll have Mark move the roses further down the garden so you can’t reach them just by chucking tea leaves out of the window and will have to make the effort to go down there by walking the seven brew-up times a day you do have. Doctor Clem did say you must have more exercise”.

“...and get out the caddy and find the strainer and set out the tray, just for the one person, me all alone, that there was”.

“Letty,” said Nan, with long-suffering tone, “what did I tell you about our Don getting distorted with depression and having to be sectioned?”

“You said the writing was on the wall the day he bought the potato peeler”.

“Yes, because that’s how it starts. Tea bags today, tomorrow a wetted sponge on your work table instead of your Green Shield Stamps being self-licked by tongue, then it’s out of your control and down Argos for a microwave. And the next thing we’ll have is me that do have your spare key thinking I haven’t seen you at bingo for a couple of Thursdays, or heard you singing O, Fy Iesi Bendegedig while you hang out your dishcloths, and I’ll come in here to look for you dead for a fortnight in that armchair stinking of cheesy wee cos you didn’t have a bath the day you died in case you had already had one and just forgot, the remains of a microwave Chicken Biriani in your lap, surrounded like Tutankhamun in his pyramid with stuff you sent off for from the Innovations Catalogue. Death by labour-saving device, Letty. Now, fetch me your nail scissors”.

And she oversaw Letty decanting the contents of the seventy-nine tea bags into her Souvenir Of Barry Island caddy.

“In which”, concludes Aunt Sophia, “there is a lesson for us all”.

Posted by Madame Galina2 at June 28, 2006 04:51 PM