Telly?

[JoceAndChris]

So unless you're prepared to have a shifty old codger hanging around your gaff for a month, testing your culinary skills and your wine cellar to the maximum:

That does sound quite fun you know. But I wouldn't dream of stealing you off lovely Mrs P, and you would certainly freeze to death here.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Anyway, you can all breathe a great sigh of relief. I've moved my inappropriate TV from one side of the room to the other, and the Chesterfield into the bay, and it all looks much better.

The new 2 seater sofa arrives very soon, so if you can imagine it the 2 sofas will be facing eachother across a rug, with the fireplace on one side and the TV on the other. It's not ideal to block the bay window and the view but it will have to do until I can sort out some kind of James Bondy- pop up-from-an-antique-flat-screen TV.

Now to organise an aerial connection!

 

[Penners]

I've moved my inappropriate TV from one side of the room to the other, and the Chesterfield into the bay

Ah, that's called Feng Shui, isn't it? Often defined as "the ancient Chinese art of moving the telly to the other side of the room".

 

[JoceAndChris]

Hmmm, well, I'm not sure about that Penners! I've just flicked through Lillian Too's 168 Feng Shui Ways to Energize Your Life - a hilarious, gripping and occasionally astute read by the way,and nowhere does she mention moving the telly to the other side!

Here are some tips, picked at random.

1)Wear loads of blusher, to attract good chi.
2) Do not have any scary images in the home.
3) Sharp corners create poison arrows of killing energy- deflect with plants.
4) Cover up the overhanging poisonous energy of exposed beams.
5) Remove the bad energy of antiques by placing outside in the sun for 3 days.
6) Shoes lined up by the door stop good fortune from entering!
7) Never let the main door face higher land (oops!) If it does, hang a mirror to reflect the high ground.
8)Throw away anything that has disturbing associations.
9)Keep a picture of a loved one on your dressing table.
10)Strengthen the northwest corner, which represents the patriarch. His image should hang there, there shouldn't be a toilet there, or any clutter, or the patriarch may die!

 

[Nigel Watts]

Joce - You might want to check out a few salerooms as well. Dreweatt Neate in Nottingham is particularly good (where I bought my Victorian sofa and George IV chaise longue), but there are no doubt others. the-saleroom.com is a good place to search.

 

[Penners]

1)Wear loads of blusher, to attract good chi.
2) Do not have any scary images in the home.
3) Sharp corners create poison arrows of killing energy- deflect with plants.
4) Cover up the overhanging poisonous energy of exposed beams.
5) Remove the bad energy of antiques by placing outside in the sun for 3 days.
6) Shoes lined up by the door stop good fortune from entering!
7) Never let the main door face higher land (oops!) If it does, hang a mirror to reflect the high ground.
8)Throw away anything that has disturbing associations.
9)Keep a picture of a loved one on your dressing table.
10)Strengthen the northwest corner, which represents the patriarch. His image should hang there, there shouldn't be a toilet there, or any clutter, or the patriarch may die!

Hmmm - Mrs P is struggling to achieve a compromise between numbers 2 and 9.

 

[biffvernon]

This is a Sony Bravia LCD TV - it shows digital photos when not being used as a TV.

So it stays switched on in planet-destruction mode even when nobody is watching it? WTF?

 

[Flyfisher]

. . . just like almost every device on the receiving end of a remote controller, almost all the overnight lighting in commercial properties, streetlights, centrally heated homes with more rooms than occupants . . . . the list is almost endless. Let's face it, the vast majority of people are so affluent in terms of energy that they don't really consider such things.

 

[JoceAndChris]

1)Wear loads of blusher, to attract good chi.
2) Do not have any scary images in the home.
3) Sharp corners create poison arrows of killing energy- deflect with plants.
4) Cover up the overhanging poisonous energy of exposed beams.
5) Remove the bad energy of antiques by placing outside in the sun for 3 days.
6) Shoes lined up by the door stop good fortune from entering!
7) Never let the main door face higher land (oops!) If it does, hang a mirror to reflect the high ground.
8)Throw away anything that has disturbing associations.
9)Keep a picture of a loved one on your dressing table.
10)Strengthen the northwest corner, which represents the patriarch. His image should hang there, there shouldn't be a toilet there, or any clutter, or the patriarch may die!

Hmmm - Mrs P is struggling to achieve a compromise between numbers 2 and 9.

I don't believe a word of it! Any woman would be delighted to have your handsome image on her dressing table!

I also read in this excellent work, gentleman, that stale chi is caused if you do not allow us ladies to frequently move, and change the furniture, and ornaments, and refresh the paint and fabric schemes. Stale chi will mean your endeavours are unlikely to prosper. Furthermore, the highly-ornamented wife and home (necessitating plenty of new jewellery, no Argos carp either), is the most likely to bring luck and love into your life.

I think this is my new favourite book!

 

[JoceAndChris]

Joce - You might want to check out a few salerooms as well. Dreweatt Neate in Nottingham is particularly good (where I bought my Victorian sofa and George IV chaise longue), but there are no doubt others. the-saleroom.com is a good place to search.

Thankyou Nigel, I am just starting to explore Nottingham, so I'm very grateful for your recommendation and wil certainly visit next time I go.

We have exceeded our sale budget with the new chair and sofa but I'll check out your website next time around!

 

[yamin]

Haven't read the whole string Joce, but have you had mentioned one of these?

http://www.tvstick.co.uk/products/productinfo.asp?catid=1&prodid=31&gclid=CP_E1vGOmJ8CFWlr4wod513HJA

You would need to get an aerial and a licence, so its not a short cut there, but it does mean you could use your laptop as a telly, which you do already for iplayer, but could add in TV 'as its on', as it were. Not that you're missing a whole lot, but I'll be honest enough to say I would miss our telly if we didn't have it. I hate all soaps and reality shows, still find the time to 'thrash my husband' (!!!!!) and have successfully stopped my brain from suffering TV induced atrophy (I think!!!!). My kids watch virtually none. Like you though, I hate the look of a telly, and hanging one on the wall where normally there would be art/mirror/photo is my absolute horror. Small and subtle is the way for us, but you may prefer to use the above and remove the need to have a 'box' at all!

 

[Flyfisher]

Those TV-on-a-stick thingies only really work well when fed with a good signal from an external aerial - at least that was the case with the two I've tried.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Really useful to know, thanks Abi! And lovely to see you back on this forum again!

Another vote for TV, then, but with disciplined use - and yes, can certainly say I've seen nothing mushy about your brain!

You might have missed the post where I tell you all the exciting news that I've moved my brother's old TV into the alcove, and it looks a bit better there. Even more excitingly, we watched the first DVD since that delicious mild autumn ended, in our soon-to-be-yellow drawing room, complete with fire and warm cat. Plus there was only one set of freezing steps down to where the Amaretto lives, rather than two. It was bliss to be on the comfy sofa watching good old Jack Nicholson in "The Bucket List" (very touching and good), and I wish I'd had the TV down here all along.

I think my first 18 months here has been characterised by a kind of "it's all got to be perfect, and like things were in 1800" attitude; I'm looking forward to sliding into a more slip-shod, happy-go-lucky, ah who cares? 2010. Complete with ovens, tellys- hell, I might even chuck out the piano (which neither of us can play) and replace it with a giant karaoke machine.

 

[yamin]

Ah, that sounds lovely Joce. Its hard sometimes to let go of 'the ideal'. Not that it makes UPVC and 42" plasmas any better at all, but our ancestors must be rolling in their graves with laughter at our obsession with keeping the original and turning away from the comforts/luxuries of modern life. Given the chance I dare say they'd have turned their drawing rooms into a veritable Currys Alladin's Cave of electronics!
Yes, there is nothing quite like sitting warm and cosy with a cat on your lap (with that slight nervousness of knowing he may attack you the moment you try to reach for your Amaretto), watching a good show on the TV and snuggling up with a loved one! The secret for us lies in deliberately picking programmes to watch and not falling into the 'surfing the channels' trap. We actually got rid of our sky subscription just before Christmas (which they couldn't believe) because of all the cr*p we were paying for - only got it for the rugby for J, but amount he watched made it about £90 per game! It really is such a rip off as you have to get all the rubbish channels as well. Anyway, enjoy dipping in and out of your televisual feast, and as my mother says - Television is a great servant but a terrible master!

 

[Nigel Watts]

Staying overnight at my mother's house I was perusing the books in my late father's study and came across a slim volume published by Debrett in the 1970s entitled "The English Gentleman" (probably an Xmas present). In the section Inside the Gentleman's House it says

"What all gentlemen's houses have in common are long dark corridors, windows with inside wooden shutters and a special arrangement whereby the kitchen is situated as far from the dining-room as is architecturally possible."

It goes on to say, under Plumbing Arrangements:

"There is no room in the house which better demonstrates the gentleman's preoccupation with living in the past than his bathroom...He sticks resolutely to the high narrow baths of his forebears which have brown marks on the enamel caused by years of dripping taps and the lavatories are enclosed in a mahogany box ...."

And finally:

"On the whole gentlemen's houses are not very comfortable places to live in by comparison with what those lower down the social scale are permitted to enjoy."

Not sure about the bath, but BC certainly scores well on all the other counts.

There is also an amusing chapter entitled The Gentleman and the Opposite Sex and a companion volume The Gentleman's Mistress (was my father up to something? - there were rumours at his firm, which I worked for briefly, about him and his secretary), but this is not the place for such matters.

 

[Penners]

still find the time to 'thrash my husband'

They make their entertainment differently in Warwickshire. :shock:

tell you all the exciting news that I've moved my brother's old TV into the alcove

Excitement must have a different meaning in Lincolnshire. :|

 

[yamin]

still find the time to 'thrash my husband'

They make their entertainment differently in Warwickshire. :shock: :|

We are talking the 'olde english' version of thrashing of course.............maybe its exclusive to 12th century warwickshire?????

"There is no room in the house which better demonstrates the gentleman's preoccupation with living in the past than his bathroom...He sticks resolutely to the high narrow baths of his forebears which have brown marks on the enamel caused by years of dripping taps and the lavatories are enclosed in a mahogany box ...."

Goodness, I remember those bathrooms!

"On the whole gentlemen's houses are not very comfortable places to live in by comparison with what those lower down the social scale are permitted to enjoy."

In Watching the English, by Kate Fox, she maintains that (sorry for raising the class subject) the most upper of classes has more to do with the lowest of the classes in terms of furnishings, in that ensconced in ones country seat, in genteel poverty (!!), one would always buy a new hunter before replacing the worn out and non-matching ancient house furniture. Indeed, the upper upper classes felt no need to display their class by showing off with new fixtures and fittings. At the opposite end of the scale, those living truly poorer working class lives would have to put up with the old and threadbare simply because getting food to table was much more important than interior design. The middle classes are defined by a need to be upwardly mobile, and show themselves off as what they perceive to be more upper class, by having new and posh furniture in their homes. Of course the new middle classes had/have the money to do this!
I'm sure its not quite as simple as that, and apologies to Kate Fox if I read her wrong, but its an interesting thought.......

 

[Moo]

Who was it that made, not that long ago, a disparaging remark about someone else actually buying his furniture?

 

[Nigel Watts]

Alan Clark, of Michael Hesletine.

The English class system is actually far more flexible that those who occupy its various echalons (especially the higher ones) might have one believe. Clark's grandfather was a self made industrialist and Alan's father had purchased the castle in which he lived.

I like George Orwell's description of his own place in the class system "lower upper middle class" - at once so precise yet incorporating all the descriptors of the three principal strata. As an urban professional son of an urban professional that is more or less where I would place myself, although I went to a much less posh public school than the Old Etonian Orwell.

 

[JoceAndChris]

still find the time to 'thrash my husband'

They make their entertainment differently in Warwickshire. :shock:

tell you all the exciting news that I've moved my brother's old TV into the alcove

Excitement must have a different meaning in Lincolnshire. :|

:lol: 8)

We country bumpkins have to get our kicks where we can! Though you will notice that where Abi lives, inflamed by the lewd and licentious atmosphere of the Bard's theatre, the entertainment is profoundly less wholesome than the innocent pursuits of Lincolnshire.