It’s December already? Wow, OK. I guess I should have known this was coming once I reached 2023’s ‘first mulled wine of the season’ moment (this classic phrase thrown in especially for the dom.blog bingo players) at Beckenham Place Park a few weeks ago. Randi and I were admiring the autumnal scenes (as they then were) together with her brother Alex, who is staying with us in London for a few weeks and is giving us the inside track on what actually happens in the city after we’ve gone to sleep.
If you are playing dom.blog bingo (and if you’re looking for an excellent stocking filler there’s still time to order from the merch store) another phrase you’ll be wanting is ‘trip to Scotland’, so I’ll oblige: a few weekends ago I made another trip to Scotland where political activities included a very well-attended canvassing session in Penicuik followed by a warming round of hot chocolates with some of the other volunteers, an awful lot of handwritten envelope addressing and a group rewatch of David Olusoga’s excellent first episode of Union.
On Sunday, before catching the train home, I popped in on Katie and James’s brand new flat (so much space!) and enjoyed another classic Doctor Who screening: 1967’s The Moonbase. Knowing that Patrick Troughton was my dad’s favourite Doctor growing up always makes these stories particularly special, which was in no way diminished by the fact that two of the four episodes are animated recreations paired with the original soundtracks. (However, the archival-loving tendencies of the original fans who made audio tape recordings from the original broadcasts have my eternal gratitude.) Anyway, The Moonbase was the second Cyberman adventure featuring an attack on an international weather-control base on the moon. In a nice show of slowly putting the continuity together in my head, companions Ben and Polly (along with Jamie) are the same Ben and Polly introduced in The War Machines which Katie and I watched back in 2021. Polly remains very smart. Ben remains infuriatingly stupid.
A few weeks later I went to Amsterdam on a work trip for a couple of days, for which I managed to swing Eurostar tickets rather than flying. This is obviously the superior experience for many reasons, and – as Randi ruefully notes – is actually faster than the train to Edinburgh. The Booking.com event I was there for was really great, although I’m slightly embarrassed to admit that I didn’t even notice the potentially historic (and not in a good way) election day going on around me. If future generations ask me what it was like to be there on that day, I’ll have to tell them I was too busy ordering a large portion of chips (with house sauce ) from Manneken Pis…
And now with Christmas fast approaching it’s time for the usual festive preparations, including this year’s Christmas tree which is an absolute triumph if I do say so myself. Ever since moving to Forest Hill we’ve always bought our tree and then carried it home from the same Christmas tree seller behind the station, and he says that we’re the only couple who ever arrive where both people look enthusiastic for the task. Purists might note that we got a bit over-ambitious with the height and that it doesn’t actually fit the dimensions of our flat, but we regret nothing.
Other wintery adventures this month have included pizza and homemade gingerbread at Matt and Laura’s – during which we spent many happy hours playing “escape the monster” games with Cress, and I feel like Matt deserves a lot of credit for nobly agreeing to be typecast as the monster each time – plus a really lovely evening of drinks and catch-up with Jill at The Island (which always brings back memories itself) and, of course, the first two Doctor Who anniversary specials featuring the return of David Tennant and Catherine Tate. I count myself firmly in the “this is awesome” camp, and I am beyond excited to have Russell T Davies’s vision for the show back on screens again. My only complaint – and here is a mild spoiler for the first special – is that Donna’s daughter Rose, who had literally just saved Donna’s life and is totally old enough to be a companion in her own right, made a polite request at the end of the episode to see inside the TARDIS which was totally rebuffed! The #justiceforrose campaign starts here.
Finally, this weekend Randi and I were invited to Caroline and Josh’s housewarming party in Streatham. As per usual we arrived slightly aggressively on time (3pm on the dot) but redeemed ourselves by joining the speedy chair assembly team. We had a great time, but it was particularly nice to be reunited with the Whitstable group from last year including Hilda the dog! And talking of wonderful groups: on Friday night we assembled Oliver, Abi, Sarah and Kira for a Georgian evening at Kartuli. I was so happy we managed to get everyone together to share several bottles of sweet, sweet Georgian wine and lots of general deliciousness, but I also appreciated the educational value after discovering that Kira and Sarah share an uncanny affinity for obscure animal facts.
