What do you do when you're not doing what you do?

On (not) travelling, things making me laugh on the internet, deckchairs, lightbulbs

I see that my Substack has gone down to one a fortnight in these summery months… hopefully you’ll be forgiving. I’m tethered to the school holiday timetable, and even though my son is now taller than me and perfectly happy to make his own breakfast and plans, I feel somehow that I need to be around. This is fine by me. I like being available, gently pottering in the kitchen, thinking mildly about supper or laundry, but it means that my working hours are unmoored. I’m not doing what I usually do, and I’m not unhappy about that – it’s definitely pleasant to be both at home and out of the usual routine – but there’s a constant itchy sensation, too. Is there something more constructive I should be doing, or can I just sit down here for a bit and read? I’m conscious that one spends so much of the year working on the house and garden but not enough time just sitting in it and enjoying it. So that’s what I’m trying to do, instead of doing what I usually do.

The best thing about it all is that I’m not travelling. We don’t love travel anymore, do we? I don’t mean the place we get to, I mean the literal journey. When travel was slow and expensive, it was absorbed as a part of the holiday, so it was nicer: big, comfortable seats on trains and planes; linen napkins; real glasses with decent wine; hot, strong coffee. Even the food was good, or at least, plentiful. Until 1972, there ran a train called the Brighton Belle, which Laurence Olivier would catch after his last curtain call, and I dream of it returning: world-class actors in the dining carriage from London to Brighton, regaling each other and star-struck fellow travellers with stories of stage and screen, as they tuck their napkins into their collars and feast on roast beef and cauliflower cheese.

But travel got quicker, then cheaper, and now we rush through it in haste, racing to reach our destination, squeezing our eyes shut against the horrors of Gatwick South. Deprivation is the whole point: How tiny a bag can I travel with? How little food can I eat? How long can I hold it in?

Dinner on the Boeing 747 in 1972. Actually, it looks pretty revolting but still one up on a chicken curry that has melded into the plastic dish it was microwaved in, eh?

I’ve done it all ways – from Queasy Jet to private jet – and I don’t know which is the best option because flinging yourself above the clouds at high speed into a time zone that messes up your body clock for days is not good for you, even with two glasses of complimentary cava. The time I went First Class long haul was pretty lovely, though the thing I remember most about it was not wanting to waste the experience by sleeping. Which meant I stayed just as awake as I do when flying 11 hours in Basic Economy. (It doesn’t get lower than that, does it? Seats that recline precisely 12 degrees, the stewards throw bags of mini pretzels at you every four hours, while the in-flight movie menu reveals only a selection of 14 Bollywood hits and an Arnold Schwarzenegger retrospective.)

I’ve got a lot of work travel coming up in the last quarter of this year, so the summer holidays for us means as little of that as possible. I’m mostly at home and then driving/ferrying to Ireland, to stay in a remote corner of it, in a cottage with no electricity. I’d like to lose my phone for a while, and do what I used to do there, in the summers when I was a child…spend hours on the sofa, my head in a book, my hand in the biscuit tin.

But I’m not there yet, so here are some random things I’ve been thinking about lately…

These deckchairs

You don’t have to wear a long Edwardian frock and have a butler serving you weak Earl Grey tea, but it would help, wouldn’t it? Gorgeous stripes of all kinds – they are made by The Stripe Company – but it’s the pom-poms I love most of all. They’ve got a sale on with 25% off at the moment and even though each chair is made to order (canopy and foot stool optional though I think you’d be mad not to include them), they take no more than 7-14 days to arrive – there’s plenty of summer left to enjoy lying languorously on one, Edith Wharton novel in hand. Take a look here.

PS Talking of Edwardians, I’m quoted in this week’s edition of Country Life magazine, in a funny article about the bed habits of big country houses, by Melanie Cable-Alexander. They’ve got a lovely greyhound on the cover. (Fun fact: whenever Horse & Hound needed to up their sales, they’d put a wet dog on the cover.)

Making me laugh on t’internet

Genevieve Turley. She’s on Substack here but it’s her Instagram account that  (@genevieveturleymua) I like the most. I think she’s Britain’s answer to Celeste Barber, being both supremely silly and kind. Good make up tips, too.

Wanging On with Graham Norton and Maria McErlane

Half-hour podcast episodes, sorting out problems sent in by their loyal ‘wangers.’ They are at pains to emphasise that they are ‘experts in nothing’ but I’ve enjoyed shouting at the podcast in agreement or disbelief, and mostly laughing along with them. Easy feel good. Find it on the usual podcast platforms or here.

Green Cola

These are a decent alternative to You Know What because they don’t contain any aspartame (sweetened with stevia), which I am convinced messes up your internal sugar regulation. They were selling in Sainsbury’s at one point but I think now you can only get them on Amazon. Sorry. But my teenage son says he now actively prefers these to ‘the real thing.’ Not for all the time, sure, but a way of making a treat a bit less unhealthy. Link to buy here.

Turn any lamp into a rechargeable one

Simply buy rechargeable lightbulbs! Note – the fittings are standard, but the bulb heads are larger, so they’re not good for dinky lamps (but you can buy small rechargeable lamps everywhere now, from Ikea, to TK Maxx and Pooky). However, if you have, say, a floor lamp that you want standing in the middle of a room without wires trailing, this is the way to do it. They are operated by remote control, and if you click on the ‘red’ colour, it makes a very warm (not red) light. I bought these – £18.99 for two. You can easily find E27 bulb fittings too.

I’m off now to look for eggs in the garden… the hens worked out how to fly the coop, and now there’s no stopping them. Last time I found the stash there were SIXTEEN eggs there. The fact that I cannot find the new place is less a testament to the size of my garden than to its severe overgrowth. Joys.

Have a happy weekend… tell me what you do, when you’re not doing what you do. I’d love to know.

Jess xx