Small world

Strange as it may seem, I haven't had much time to write here for the last few days, or read many of yours. I have been working unaccustomedly hard, then going home to cook.

Step Daughter has finally received the wedding present of a new fire surround in Portland stone - 8 years late. I think she began to worry that I would die before finishing it, whereas I almost died when installing it. Stone doesn't get any lighter with age, and this stone is 180 million years old.

I think that - after about 3 years of piddling little jobs which I would not normally consider -  I am about to get busy, but that wouldn't take much. An old client who I made the best (in my opinion) fire surround for years ago has got back to me with another project involving large garden ornamentation, and a more recent customer has surprised me by offering several other exciting projects. I thought that after the first thing I did for him he would want me out of his life forever, but no.

The above photo is - up until recently - the only one you will find of me on the net. You have seen the other which surfaced. It was taken in the 1980s and shows me (plus one other) carving a new lyre for the Theatre Royal, here in Bath. Note the dark hair. The picture is from the website of the man on the right. Its caption says 'lyer'. It might just as well have called it 'lier'. These were the days before spell-check looked over your shoulder.

Way back then I was the second stone-carver in the world to have his own website. The first was an American (of course) called Walter S. Arnold. We got to know each other and even exchanged Christmas cards for a few years, then our exclusive world was invaded by thousands of ambitious outlanders.

One day I got a new-fangled email from an architect asking me to price for replacing all the Portland stone features of a church in the British Virgin Islands which had been destroyed by a fire. I duly calculated the enormous cost of what would have been my largest and most prestigious job at the time, then found out that the work had been given to another carver who lived only three miles away on the outskirts of Bath.

I lost faith in websites after that.