"From Greenwich To Cranford, With Love From Philippa...".

This morning, there's a piece in The Times re tonight's Led Zep gig. Hawk-eyed 1st thing ( and huddled in bed as our heating packed up) I saw that this article featured a quote from my 2nd cousin Philippa ( she who comments on m'blog )

Philippa was at O2 Greenwich yesterday, collecting tickets/wristbands for said gig; presumably, she was interviewed while queueing. And poor Philippa. As she shivered in the cold, she told paparazzzi how years ago, she did "some very bad planning"( THIS from a highly efficient geography teacher) ...but she planned SO badly that she missed the very last Led Zep gig of all .. because it fell on another Very Important Day...

I remember that day well. My family gathered in a pretty Worcestershire market town; Philippa ( ringletted ) was romantic in white. Her platinum sister Susan was vivid in red, and me....I was clad in something long, flowery, Laura Ashley; I probably ressembled a Seventeenth Century Worcestershire Milkmaid. My own handsome blue-eyed father (white hair curling over collar of dark suit) " gave" Philippa away. And until today, I thought all had been Very Well.

BUT NOW I've read today's Times with Philippa's quote. And years on, she explains the tragedy of her Missed Led Zep Gig; instead of watching the world's best ever rock band, she got married in a gentle grey church in a serene part of Middle England, and (Philippa's rueful words):" I have regretted it ever since".

OH DEAR.

I'm SURE Philippa didn't mean that how it sounds, but it tickled me. And it'll tickle others ( husband Paul included) and it puts me in mind of lovely "womanly" quotes from the night before...ie. heard while watching Heidi Thomas's adaptation of Elizabeth Gaskell's " Cranford".

Cranford, as Gaskell opens in her book, is a town full of women; it's a place "in possession of Amazons"..it's also a place of " peppery words and angry jerks of the head" but its women are close and eloquent and they're chroniclers, through speech/action, of a long gone Knutsford. Knutsford, Cheshire, is said now to be a warren of wealthy WAGS; in fact, it's rumoured that Victoria Beckham's glam cast-offs once filled an entire Knutsford charity shop....the Cranford ladies would've loved THAT juicy gossip...

Hmm.

BUT as the Times says today ( in its TV review) Thomas, like Philippa (who waits in London now for a fabulous evening) delights with her words, phrases like "She deserves some enjoyment before she settles into marriage"....echoing Gaskell's own :"It is very pleasant dining with a bachelor. I only hope it's not improper; so many pleasant things are!"...

And although it's ENTIRELY the wrong word to describe such a gig, I reckon tonight's Led Zepellin reunion will be very PLEASANT indeed..

AND I hope Philippa, absolutely, "regrets nothing!" ...

PS. How's this for coincidence?? Minutes ago, I switched on BBCTV Lunchtime News...it was exactly the right moment, because who should be sitting on pavement queueing for O2 but Philippa's husband, Paul....and looking pretty happy, I hasten to add.