Gettin Jiggy Wid It

Staring at a large image of two black labrador pups playing in a garden, after forty years of marriage we broached the subject. Are we compatible? It may seem to you to be a long time to wait before deciding but some things are best not rushed. So we had a conversation. Tentative at first but then more passionate, about the right way to do it. And do you know, we agreed. So we did it. And enjoyed it.

First we sorted the straight edges from the rest of the pieces. Then we identified the four corner pieces and assembled the framework.

Then we carried out a thorough sort, identifying some obvious colour groupings. The black pieces were mainly dog. The grey ones paving slabs. The brown bits crate or barrel (hard to tell apart).

As the crates and paving became more complete we sorted more thoroughly learning to tell brown crate from brown slab. and although there were some subtle differences in our technique - I was the more patient and fastidious sorter; she the more emotional commentator on how difficult the whole task was - we worked together on a task, chatting, drinking from tea into wine and listening to music.

Instead of spending our holiday evenings sitting at opposite ends of a sofa reading; or sitting gazing lovingly at iPads, or watching one too many episodes of a box set before retiring, we did a 1000 piece jigsaw. I say 'did'. We had to give up at about 800 because we ran out of holiday and by then it was obvious that we had at least ten bits missing. Although we did identify four pieces that belonged in one of the other jigsaws - a puzzle two previous solvers had noted on the box had five pieces missing. Make that one.

But even the decision to put an unfinished jigsaw puzzle back in the box was taken agreeably.

So now we have a new leisure activity. We have bought ourselves a couple of puzzles and visitors to Vynes Mansions are welcome to join in.

And if you fancy a swap some time. Well we'd be up for that. And with the door into double entendre room firmly ajar I bid you good afternoon.

Bread

I have written before about the difference between bread with presevatives in and a more natural product. Find my piece about Gozitan bread here. It's only short.

Recently I have noticed that we are not eating so much bread in the house again and our home-made stuff tends to deteriorate before we have finished a loaf. We solve this by making a new loaf and freezing half of it each time.

But another first world problem has appeared. We are the destination of choice when Lakeland bread-making packs approach their best-before date. And as the yeast has a few problems of ageing the packs often require a double knead and prove. Even this is not quite enough and some very solid products have appeared recently. Toasting a slice can take longer than a normal adult male has in the morning. So imagine the trouble I have. We play scissors, paper, bread in my gaff now.

I feel I need to crawl back to the lovely Colin at Nailsea's Tuesday Market and buy some of his soudough and rye creations. He calls them campaouille or something like that. Pronounced in broad Somerset the French would have no idea it is their language he is mangling.

Thought for the Day

As delivered at BBC Radio Bristol just now:

When Valentine's Day and Ash Wednesday coincide, Easter Day is on All Fools Day. I said that recently and a helpful parishioner with too much time on his hands corrected me. Unless it's a leap year. Then April First becomes a Monday. It will happen in 2024, apparently.

This is the sort of thing that my sons label with the hashtag #vicarfact - stuff that clergy think important but nobody else does.

Tonight I will be at Christ Church, Nailsea in a symbolic act of Christian worship. We will make marks on our foreheads with ash to remind us of mortality. Then we will share bread and wine to remind us of eternity.

I was seeking a great title for the sermon at this communion event to embrace the lovey-dovey valentines and the reality of Lent:

Bread and ash? Too much like a recipe.

'Til death do us part? That's one of my wedding sermons.

Eventually I chose:

The best lovers say sorry

It's true. The beginning of Lent, often a time when people give things up, is more a time of reflection and repentance. If you are in a long-term relationship which has survived the years, it is likely that both of you will have learned to say sorry. If you are in the first stages of a relationship, introduce the word sorry at an early stage. You're going to need it.

Final thought. The team at Bristol Cathedral tweeted a reminder that Ash Wednesday is more important than St Valentine so the commemoration of that day, in the church, is held over until tomorrow. If you are late with your card it is OK - this year. And that's a hashtag #vicarfact

Liberal Evangelism

I've just come back from a very enjoyable conversation organised by our Diocesan Mission Adviser on the subject of Liberal Evangelism. There were thirteen of us in the room from the four corners of the Diocese. I am hugely grateful to work in a diocese that welcomes and enables this kind of conversation.

We all enjoyed being able to contribute freely and therefore to some extent confidentially. Not all of us who have liberal tendencies in evangelical churches are 'out' yet.

But to give you a flavour of the discussion, we grappled with things such as:

Young people have more of a sense of shame than a sense of sin. Can you do evangelism without making sin the start of the story?

Jesus taking bread, breaking it and saying 'This is me' is the ultimate deconstruction. How much do we think Jesus wanted a neatly packaged ideology to be his legacy?

If we want to grow in numbers we have to use language that is useful to people. Everyone should be welcome to come in and then to tell us what life is like in their experience.

I felt very much at home with this bunch of explorers.

Review of the Year

2017 was a weird year and it has taken me a month to work out how I want to summarise it. It was a year in which I carried a deep and underlying feeling of melancholy. Firstly sadness that the strongest nation on earth should step back from leading, pioneering and guiding and unashamedly put itself first as a slogan. Secondly sadness that our own nation continues to step back from co-operation, sharing and stepping forward together with other nations in favour of the more aggressive, and surely eventually doomed, policy of taking back control. It was a bad year.

To make a mess of a metaphor, in the shadow of this are my highlights:

I was very grateful to Stuart Maconie for a throwaway comment on BBC 6 Music last month - 'New music' he said '...is music you haven't heard before.' He said this in response to a reader thanking him for introducing him to The Lemonheads.

With that in mind I note my Spotify algorithm introduced me to a lot of new music last year but not much of it from 2017 albums. But I pick out the following bands or artists I enjoyed for the first time:

Ultimate Painting

The Vryll Society

Wolf People

Beyond the Wizard's Sleeve

Mark Pritchard

Death Hawks

Sinkane

In a year in which I had three months sabbatical leave a lot of reading was catching up. Lee Child and Chris Brookmyre kept me page-turning when that was necessary. As did Robert Harris' Conclave. Tim Marshall's Prisoners of Geography educated me, James Rebanks' The Shepherd's Life moved me, John Lanchester's Capital impressed me, Paul Beatty's The Sellout made me think, Stanley Donwood's Slowly Downward worried me, as did John Sopel's If Only They Didn't Speak English but for different reasons. I finally read Peter Carey's True History of the Kelly Gang and it is one of the finest books I have ever read.

Podcasts were a new thing for 2017. I started with the wonderful S-Town and moved on through Serial 1 and 2. This led me to subscribe to the excellent This American Life. I now regularly listen to The Political Party and Richard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre Podcast. I dip into Rob Bell's The Robcast but find it annoying that he crams 20 minute's material into an hour. My heroes really shouldn't do this.

Honourable mentions to 50 Things That Made the Modern Economy, The Infinite Monkey Cage, Crowd Science and More or Less, all of which were catch-ups rather than Podcasts.

Spent less time at the movies than I would have liked to (Ghost in the Shell good fun) but enjoyed DVD Scandi-noir a lot - Follow the Money, The Bridge, The Killing I, II and III. Line of Duty was also excellent.

Any year that we see Stewart Lee perform live he is going to be the best comedy gig and he was. David Sedaris reading his stuff was a good evening out. Music gigs were thin but Laura Marling supported by the excellent Ethan Johns was good. I enjoyed Ghostpoet but not The Marble Factory setting in Bristol.


Sad to see the end of The Barn pub at Wraxall. Coates House, Nailsea now gets our custom. Bordeau Quay in Bristol bit the dust (it had been going down for a while) but the Pony and Trap at Chew Magna goes from strength to strength as does WB at Wapping Wharf.

Grayson Perry's The Most Popular Art Exhibition Ever! at the Arnolfini was insightful, moving and strived to explain the two parts of divided Britain to each other.

Here's to more and better culture in 2018.

Thought for the Day

As presented at BBC Radio Bristol this morning:

Delighted that Cameron Balloons in Bristol have been chosen to make a special balloon for Blue Peter's 60th Anniversary. I have a Blue Peter badge which I won for being a runner up in a Christmas competition - a few years ago.

I'm wearing it today alongside another symbol.

Actually I may be wearing my sister's badge. We found it when clearing Mum's flat and it could belong to either of us. She let me keep it.

It is a sign of being part of a club. A precious club which now has three generations of followers and fans.

It's a few years since I was at vicar school. It was a great experience but things could all get a bit serious. Friend of mine had a great antidote to people getting over-earnest. He'd turn up next day wearing his Dennis the Menace fan club T-shirt and badge. The St John's College Common Room subscribed to the quality daily newspapers, the Church press and the Beano.

Badges are important. The earliest Christian symbol was a fish - because the Greek word for fish - ichthus -also spells out the initials of Iesu Christos Theos 'Uios Soterios -Jesus Christ God Son Saviour.

Some Christians still wear fish symbols or have them on their cars. I suppose it makes sure your driving is a good witness.

But many Christians also wear a cross - it reminds us of Jesus; specifically his death. That's the other one I have on today.

What badges do you wear? And what is the deeper truth behind them? For a badge is a sign or symbol of belonging. Belonging to the club of Jesus followers is my most important badge. Blue Peter means a lot to me; the cross means everything.