Thalia Thornley’s blog

I spent some time this summer on a tiny, slightly ramshackle farm.  A quiet tree-shaded lane, a pond, a trickling stream, all lovely.  But the farmer had recently brought in a new bull.  The bovine ladies and I had not experienced this for a very long time and it quite upset the holiday.

The bull himself was short in the legs, barely reaching the shoulder of any of his small number of client cows, but he had a huge swathe of hair around his neck, dropping to a long beard below his chin.  This gave him the appearance of a bison, though a scaled-down one.  He seemed foreign and exotic on the green fields.  He stared about him malevolently with round dark eyes which I would describe as piggy, but that would be an insult to pigs.  I never saw him actually move, but it was obvious that he could, since each day you'd find him in a different place on the farm. 

So, although we had no reason to fear him, we just did.  The open walks and picnics of the past were out of the question.  The bull had us neatly fenced in.  Despite the spotty signal, mobile phones were consulted each day as we tracked a route round the farm which would leave the bull undisturbed.  The big bison neck on him cast a long shadow over the late summer evenings and he took on mythic proportions. 

Three cows are in calf.

The office is full of the murmuring commentary and stifled shouts of British men at play.  Or not actually at play, but listening to other men playing, using the medium of the office radio.  It used to be that anyone could use the office radio when they were working alone.  Alone.  Somehow this strange ashy event has broken the bonds of good behaviour and now they talk of nothing but runs and wickets.  Word Count Man has at least added headphones to his digital radio.  Nice Bloke is on holiday but he's one of the worst culprits, and even The Others beyond the partition are getting into it, and they rarely show much animation.  So, good to know that a heaving heart beats in those pale British chests, but really guys, you wait until the next season of America's Next Top Model.  Payback time.

Yesterday I toddled out to my vegetable plot to see what damage the rain had done.  By damage I mean, of course, how much encouragement a bit of rain gives to the weeds which are strangling my raspberries and bullying the beans.  There they were, their pretty white and blue heads bobbing innocently, as though they didn't think I knew who they were...half an hour later the weeds were gone and I turned to the business of the day - harvest!  A bag of baby broad beans in their little fuzzy cases, raspberries and loganberries, redcurrants like tiny oiled rubies and finally, great bloody handfuls of blackcurrants.

Then an hour in the kitchen, bending, sorting, peering and picking off the many little critters who make the journey via Tupperware to my worktops. That's the downside of homegrown, but oh, the benefits...

Good for the soul too.  I started picking in a temper and ended it calm and mellow with a sunburned neck and aching muscles. 

I needed to think higher thoughts so I don't start obsessing  (again) about Idiot Boy.  He's having problems with his boss (Mrs Vader) and doesn't someone say that the enemy of your enemy is your friend?  But I can't really countenance having any friendly feelings for Mrs Vader.  So I can't take any pleasure in this...maybe I just need to move on?

You know when you clean out an old handbag and there's always a little ball of silver paper in the bottom.  And it always had a tiny lump of chocolate imbedded in the side, and some fluff, and a faint smell of leather and tic-tacs?  Well, I was walking around with that scrunched-up ball in my head.  Where my brain should be.  But for two weeks earlier this month I went on a course.  Not just any course.  There was a flipchart, there was a powerpoint presentation, there were stimulating and intelligent people making sagacious comments from dawn until dusk.  And that little blob of silver paper that was my brain?  All spread out now, like a meadow, grassy and slightly damp so that my thoughts can gambol in a carefree and creative manner.  There's a scent of lavender and lemons in the air.

Oh. Last week was all cool green foliage and thoughts of higher matters, this week is dusty pavements of the soul and hard skin on the heels of the imagination. 

Instead of getting down to my own work (writing) I've been grinding my teeth in my place of paid employment. 

I had a meeting with Idiot Boy this week, nothing fancy, just a general catch-up.  I made a suggestion, nothing fancy, just a little detail which our department could handle and which would, I thought, make life a tiny bit easier for other departments.    Well, Idiot Boy wriggled and scriggled as hard as he could but eventually he was forced to agree it might work and I left the meeting feeling that my tiny contribution had fallen on fertile soil.  So imagine how I felt when yesterday, quite by chance, I met a person from one of those other departments.  "Oh!" She said, "I thought that was a very good idea of ......." (we'll call him Idiot Boy).  "Really?"  I snarled back.  She knew immediately, from my immoderate tone, what had happened. 

Alright, it isn't as though we're finding a cure for cancer, I know, but what is a person if not the sum total of their ideas?  And what does a boss, even a junior one, stand to gain from behaving like that?  If I didn't have you to talk to about this I'd have been much more cross than I was but even so, I had to spend 10 minutes on my favourite blog to calm down. Go Fug Yourself is so funny and so beautifully presented that it works like a lovely hand cream on your brain.

Now I have to turn my thoughts to more positive things, re-read my Hay-on-Wye diary and get writing! 

Keep out of the sun between noon and 3.00pm!

I've just come back from Hay-on-Wye, a tiny town in Wales, cradled in the green arms of the Brecon Beacons and home to probably the largest and most famous literary festival...in the world.  Last year it rained - every minute of every day.  So three dry days this weekend increased my joy a thousand-fold.  I saw great speakers, challenging thinkers, comedians and musicians.  I bought more books than a reasonable person could need in a year and I ate fantastic Welsh produce.  I always stay at a great B&B in Hay, The Bear.   Give it a try, you'll get a warm welcome in this interesting building which used to be a pub.  We're the same crowd each year for the Festival so I've made some friends there. 

It wasn't just the Hay Festival though, there was a philosophy festival called HowTheLightGetsIn which was in an old chapel now converted into a venue called The Globe.  It was rustic and charming and run by incredibly cheery young women with shiny hair and absolutely no sense of urgency at all.  A tip, Ladies: being cheerful and sweet sometimes isn't quite enough...but I had a great time listening to the arguments and trying to identify the make of the fairy-lights on the back wall.  Will Hutton wouldn't have appreciated, I'm sure, that I was wondering during this perorations if those pink ones came from IKEA.

Festivals are a bit like the first week at University.  You meet people in the early days and have fascinating and intimate discussions with them - and then never see them again.  You exchange views freely, unenencumbered by your at-home personality, here you're free.  Free to be intelligent, to care about ideas and books and...some more wine.

The highlight for me was the last day.  It was nearly a wash-out.  The event billed as a "Masterclass Workshop" was over-sold so there were far too many people to do anything meaningful.and I'll admit I was beginning to get grumpy.  Then, in one of those strokes of good fortune, C, elegant and warm, got me talking and things started to look better.  Then C introduced me to the dynamic and charming P and we stayed on at the end of the session, talking about our writings, our hopes, our fears.  We were joined by L, as beautiful in her greenery as Hay itself and we moved the chat to lunch.   We exchanged stories, ideas, inspiration and for that brief time we were united.    

That's what Bill Clinton meant when he called Hay "The Woodstock of the Mind."  We didn't take our clothes off but there was plenty of free love to go around, and, at the end of that day, some peace, love and understanding.   

The week before last I was having a manicure (and a pedicure and a massage) at Sunshine Nails in the Bronx.  The day was hot and blue, the salon was busy and I had time while my feet were soaking and my back being massaged in the auto-massage chair, on the difference between America and Britain.  Here in the UK a manicure takes ages, costs loads and is regarded as a treat.  In America, you can get a good manicure in half the time, for at least half the price, on pretty much any street corner in a major city.  As a result, women in the big cities regard the manicure as a regular errand. 

So, is it better to have a "treat" or something you can afford (financially and in time) on a weekly basis.  I'm not sure. 

The difference, I'd like to suggest, lies in this story.  While I was chatting to my technician, Joy, she told me that she'd arrived from Korea while pregnant with her third child.  Her two toddlers and husband stood with her at the airport and when they checked on their resources they discovered they were down to their last $3.  That's three dollars.  Total.  Now the baby Joy was carrying is studying to be an architect.  Only in America. 

Now I'm off to source a bottle of Clambake by Essie and push my cuticles back with renewed vigour.

The strangest thing about the whole MP-expenses scandal (apologies to non-UK readers, but really, is there any other news?) is that the people who have spoken up about it have made such an enormous error of tone. 

Hazel Blears, listen to yourself.  We elected these people and they must meet some of their constituents from time-to-time when they aren't picking out soft furnishings and polishing the ride-on lawn-mowers.  So how did they get it so badly wrong?  Patronising, downright rude some of them, and the worst of all are the "not-me-guv" shruggers who come off looking not innocent, but like bad extras from an episode of (original version) Minder.

In our own small way at work we're dealing with this.  Idiot Boy is a manager who, as they say, walks the walk but can't quite get his feet moving in the right direction.  He recently confided in three members of his staff that he thought some staff in another department loked like - and I quote -  "trollops".  Idiot Boy's staff, whose loyalty is to their colleauges and not to IB, promptly told the loose women who are now swaying around like superannuated strippers, giving IB slightly pouty smiles and revealing their shoulders at any opportunity.  IB is confused.  IB is...irritable bowel?  What a coincidence.

When I moved into this office Nicebloke warned me: "Stay away from The Others," he said, "they're so boring, they'll drive you mad."  I was disapproving, I'll admit. How could one entire department be boring, surely we didn't give into such cliched thinking?

How wrong I was.   Mostly I tune them out and hunker down behind my partition.  Sometimes, though, they venture into my side of the office to chat with someone who, although he doesn't work with them, is an honorary Other.  Then it does become unbearable.  I groan aloud and that stops them for a moment while they look around them like meercats in fleeces, but then off they go again. 

There are loads of cliches around people who do certain jobs but how true are they?  Are all actors luvvies?  Are all accountants boring or teachers bossy?  What about librarians, mechanics and brain surgeons?  Cliche or fact - you decide.

PS: Nicebloke's glasses are nothing like as bad as he feared, but we will NEVER tell him that.

Poor Jacqui Smith.  Why didn't she just say she had to watch "adult films" for her job?  Surely as Home Secretary soft porn falls within her remit?  Instead she's left us all with the slighly grubby vision of her husband waving her goodbye and then running inside, heart pounding, to load up Division Belles, or Give me the Party Whip.  I saw a photo of Mrs Smith in the Daily Mail yesterday (given, they are not her biggest supporters) and she was wearing a pair of black shoes which we might, in certain company, refer to as f***-me shoes.  The shoes, meant to give her confidence and a few extra inches, just added to the Carry On up the Home Office air which now hangs over her. 

And why Adult FIlms?  With such poor plotting and terrible acting (not to mention the completely unrealistic standards of depilation) they only seem "Adult" to a teenager who spends too much time in his bedroom.   

All the grown-ups I know are watching The Wire.

The office is waiting with bated breath and sharpened tongues for the arrival of Nicebloke in his new glasses.  He claims that when he was choosing them, he was looking through them and not at them and so failed to spot the name of a major fashion designer picked out in gold letters on the arm.  His wife scoffed unsympathetically and told him to put black paint over the logo.  I predict that by the end of the day he'll be sporting an elastoplast or electrician's tape.