Limelight

When I was small I used to play with a music box at my granny’s house. It was a little Swiss Chalet which played ‘Limelight’. I didn’t know what ‘Limelight’ was but I liked the name and the tune. I must have driven her mad, listening to the music over and over again. My granny died when I was 15 and I presumed that the music box was given to my cousin who was 4 at the time. A few years ago I went to see a film about Charlie Chaplin and was delighted that the theme tune running throughout the film was ‘Limelight’. I knew that he finally settled in Switzerland and presumed that was why the music box was in the form of a chalet.

At the end of the summer I was preparing a postcard of a Swiss Chalet for sale and it reminded me of that little music box so I emailed to my cousin who didn’t remember the music box at all. My aunt put a note in my birthday card a few weeks later explaining that when my step-granny’s first husband died she went to Switzerland for a holiday and bought the little chalet back as a present for my granny (they were next door neighbours). When she married my grandfather we presume that the music box went back to her.

Last night Limelight was on TV. A lovely film made in the 1950s with Charlie Chaplin and a very young Claire Bloom.

Happy Christmas!

Hope that your festivities go well, however you choose to celebrate.

On to the next burst !

Christian, my eldest son who lives in England, has just been on the phone. For the last few years he’s been working for Abbey National and doing very nicely thank you. I don’t understand really what he does as banking has changed a lot in the last 25 years since I left Barclays. Recently he went for a new job with them. As you know, they are changing names and all that kind of stuff. They needed someone to be in charge of IT for the change over to make sure everything runs smoothly. The job is for a year and will be based at Milton Keynes. Well Christian found out today he’s got the job. They will even pay his hotel if he needs it. I don’t really understand what his job will be but it is very good news indeed. He’s really, really pleased to have got it and so am I. I wonder what will happen next?

If I don’t tell someone I’ll burst.

Dom phoned a few minutes ago, she’s been talking with her main professor (I don’t know what you would call him in English). If her project continues as it is and if she gets the right results, he’d like her to accompany him to Chicago next summer to present her work at a conference. She’s only a 4th year student! She tells me she worries about not being good enough and there are so many things she doesn’t know. They wouldn’t want her to go off to the states if they didn’t think she was good enough.

As you can imagine I’m bursting with pride, I’ve already put in an order for my copy of the Chicago Sun Times.