Good morning! Thank you so much for all the lovely comments and notes about my house (it’s for sale, in case you missed it). We’re now in the limbo stage of not having a single clue about what happens next, or when, or if.
Here are some things I made a note of this week.
Somewhere to sleep in Notting Hill
The Dishoom micro hotel that I mentioned earlier in the year has now opened. It’s above their Permit Room on Portobello Road, and it looks nice. You get two bedrooms, two bathrooms and a sitting room. Given the insane prices of London hotels, it’s almost a bargain at (from) £700 for the whole lot, so *maths face* £350 each if you went with friends. There’s a 2-night minimum stay.
It’s soundproofed and the rooms have blackout curtains. Also: bacon naans and chai delivered to your room for breakfast. All details and info here. And it’s dog-friendly!
(I always feel a little guilty pang when I read ‘well-behaved dogs welcome’. My dogs are charming but I don’t feel I can necessarily guarantee courtly manners at all times).
Something to read
I love everything Rachel Joyce writes (Miss Benson’s Beetle is a particular treat, if you’ve not read it). Her most recent one, The Homemade God might be my favourite yet. It is a departure of sorts - it’s much less sweet, though still warm, full of wit and extremely well-observed.
Story: four adult children, long-dead mother, artist father. The adult children are all extremely close and also slightly broken, having been brought up in benign neglect by the artist father, who they fiercely love and who loves them, but who is a roiling, roaring semi-alcoholic and a prodigious shagger (quick turnover of au pairs). Output wise, he is basically Jack Vettriano, except more charismatic and better-looking - working-class, self-taught, adored by the public and laughed at by critics for his ‘sexy’ paintings.
The book opens with the father, now 76, announcing that he has finally fallen madly in love and is going to marry a 27-year old called Bella-Mae. Obviously the children are appalled, especially as they can’t find anything out about the blushing bride to be, who doesn’t seem keen to meet them. Is she a grifter? Is she a porn star? Is she drugging him? Why doesn’t she have any online presence? I’ll leave it there to avoid spoilers. The novel becomes both a highly compelling mystery and a tender, brilliantly drawn exploration of sibling dynamics. I couldn’t put it down.
A good dress
For a party, £450 from Me + Em. It would also make a good wedding dress if you were eloping to the register office rather than e.g. invading poor Venice with your fake bottom and unsuitable heels.
I was looking at pictures of the Bezos wedding and thinking, not for the first time, that what is really strange about extensive cosmetic work is that your children don’t look anything like the current you. They’re just little ghosts of who you used to be. It must be so disconcerting for everybody.