Category Archives: Seashores

For Sonia

Posted on March 11, 2022 by j futrell

  I can see her over 20 years ago when she will have been younger than I am now in a black one piece swimming costume, slender and erect. The waist of a model and the shoulders of an athlete … Continue reading →

Posted in Dogs, gone west, Seashores, Uncategorized | 5 Comments

happy birthday

Posted on April 25, 2021 by j futrell

  When winter’s gone and chills are scant, Our thoughts do turn to Polyphant. Therein amid a blaze of grandiflora blooms,  A steadfast clock and sun drenched rooms, Each one radiant with wood and dust and webs and brass. Where … Continue reading →

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It’s a dog’s life on Tregirls

Posted on December 28, 2020 by j futrell

The oceanic panarama at Tregirls’ changes all the time. This half mile stretch of sand from St.George’s Well to Harbour Cove, washed by the Atlantic and patterned with a patchwork imprint of thousands of webbed feet, changes from one hour … Continue reading →

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Coronavirus – a September view from Padstow

Posted on September 28, 2020 by j futrell

Kim and I went blackberrying today to an evidently not-so-secret spot near Constantine Bay: our source heavily pre-picked by the look of the denuded brambles.  It had been chilly when we left the house, passers-by in puffa jackets and woolly … Continue reading →

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coronavirus – an April, May and June view from Padstow

Posted on April 2, 2020 by j futrell

June 12, 2020 With everyone and his dog claiming that ‘lockdown’ is somehow making us better more caring people with an enhanced sense of community is overlooking the bald fact that it’s also turning us into caricatures. Today Kim and … Continue reading →

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coronavirus – a March view from Padstow

Posted on March 27, 2020 by j futrell

Monday March 30, 2020 A sign of the loneliness this death is bringing came to Dennis Road this morning. A loved, admired and respected member of the community Rosemary Brinham was take from her home, Wingfield House, in Dennis Lane, … Continue reading →

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The Quiet Life – or a hell of a holiday by Robin Banks

Posted on November 19, 2019 by j futrell

  I ought have known something was wrong when the guest I was expecting insisted on the telephone that I am a “nasty person”. The woman, her mother and partner, had flown down for a short break and wanted to … Continue reading →

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Never Not Never Go Back – a taste of Viareggio

Posted on June 1, 2019 by j futrell

My life is one of stringent rules: Never wear aftershave; always polish my shoes; stand up for elderly people and women with young children on the London underground; never vote tory; spread the jam on top of the cream upon … Continue reading →

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I remember monkey bottles, kangaroo tails, and Frank Ifield

Posted on November 28, 2018 by j futrell

  I am fortunate to have worked through a period in journalism when the gifts, the perks – the freebies to apply the correct journalistic parlance – were worth having. My diary is housed within a handsome Papyrus leather book … Continue reading →

Posted in gone west, London, media, Seashores, travel, Uncategorized | 4 Comments

when is a bookshop not a bookshop? when it’s in Hastings.

Posted on February 15, 2018 by j futrell

We hadn’t gone to Boulevard Books with a view to buying something to read. The thing is this secondhand bookshop in the centre of Hastings Old Town mutates into a Thai restaurant after dark and despite the walls in our … Continue reading →

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