Odd, ain't it, how what one learns as a child remains despite constant use of exceptions to the rule. This by the way came out of the conversation the Celt and I had this morning when I mentioned how frequently I transposed i and e and he remarked that I before E, except after C is not a rule and rattled off a long list of words that are exceptions. He and I over the years have had many a conversation about language - conversations during which one of us would head for the OED, Fowler and Roget, and spend more delicious minutes immersed in the springs and meanders of the English language. Absolutely thrilling to both of us!
Nowadays one simply fires up the laptop, googles and reads what Wikipedia has to say - something that will no doubt happen today during our drive north towards the mountains of North Carolina, though the iPhone will be the tool of choice.
I cannot take any credit for what is written below - my only contribution being the picture of Picasso's Weeping Woman which I thought mildly appropriate. I will say, though, that Roderick Cameron has emerged in my mind as a gentleman, nothing more, nothing less.
"Of course I am happy to tell you anything I can about my time chez Mr Cameron. The story of the Picasso plates is as follows:
"Rory had in his kitchen all sorts of things that perhaps some people might have kept in a cabinet rather than actually using, but I thought he was right to keep and use them. He had some very beautiful eighteenth-century coffee cups that were like little translucent shells - I once inadvertently knocked one of them on the floor and was practically in tears about it, but Mr Cameron just said I had broken fewer things than any of his other housekeepers, which was some consolation, but not a lot.
"He had a set of six Picasso plates - well, they were really shallow bowls, and he used them to serve puddings in. During the winter, when he was away, he had work done on the house, and the kitchen cupboards all had louvre doors, and for some reason, I'm not quite sure why, everything went mildewed, so I didn't know what to do about it (remember, I was a young person straight out of university) so I put them in the dishwasher!!!! Shall we just say this did not improve matters: the plates had a glazed bird in the centre, with a pale orange background that was almost a wash, and after the dishwasher treatment, they came out with the background all sort of faded. I can't find a picture of anything quite the same, this is the most similar - but Mr Cameron's just had a single bird in the centre, on an orange background.
"I did not feel nearly as bad at the time as I do in retrospect! Ah, for the ease of mind of youth. He did, however, have some beautiful china, and also some Provençal faience that he used for everyday. He was very particular about how the table was set - he had a whole cupboard of what we used to call "tricky eye" china - i.e. china bowls full of lemons and asparagus, or what have you, that he used as table centres."
"Rory had in his kitchen all sorts of things that perhaps some people might have kept in a cabinet rather than actually using, but I thought he was right to keep and use them. He had some very beautiful eighteenth-century coffee cups that were like little translucent shells - I once inadvertently knocked one of them on the floor and was practically in tears about it, but Mr Cameron just said I had broken fewer things than any of his other housekeepers, which was some consolation, but not a lot.
"He had a set of six Picasso plates - well, they were really shallow bowls, and he used them to serve puddings in. During the winter, when he was away, he had work done on the house, and the kitchen cupboards all had louvre doors, and for some reason, I'm not quite sure why, everything went mildewed, so I didn't know what to do about it (remember, I was a young person straight out of university) so I put them in the dishwasher!!!! Shall we just say this did not improve matters: the plates had a glazed bird in the centre, with a pale orange background that was almost a wash, and after the dishwasher treatment, they came out with the background all sort of faded. I can't find a picture of anything quite the same, this is the most similar - but Mr Cameron's just had a single bird in the centre, on an orange background.
"I did not feel nearly as bad at the time as I do in retrospect! Ah, for the ease of mind of youth. He did, however, have some beautiful china, and also some Provençal faience that he used for everyday. He was very particular about how the table was set - he had a whole cupboard of what we used to call "tricky eye" china - i.e. china bowls full of lemons and asparagus, or what have you, that he used as table centres."
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