Harrrington's - being the collected thoughts of the Hon Sec, by way of excuse and explanation.

Some fellows just have that knack of making you feel that, even if you are a bit of a duffer, you are at the centre of their confidence; your opinions worthwhile and all in all nothing could be more splendid for them but to spend an afternoon in your company.  I once met such when I was working at the Foreign Office. I should explain.   Was a time when most FO wallahs of a certain rank took the Summer off to trudge grouse moors or take in the Tests.   Young chaps were drafted in to keep up the paper work and so it was that between leaving school and going up to Oxford I found myself overseeing the move from Crown Colony to Sovereign State of Sunk Island.   It was a time when, after careful consideration, many coves were feeling that, all in all,   rule from the Motherland might have brought them the benefits of cricket and slightly odd meal times but that was no longer enough.    The good people of Sunk Island had declared they wished to ‘go it ...

  I suspect it is a universal certainty that youth is full of beginnings, endings come only in the form of the pause between the next page.  Were it always the case.  Increasingly I find that, even in our own dear club, I turn a corner and find a space where an old friend had been in residence for many years and in that gap memories flood in.  So it was when I wandered through the Bowls Roof Terrace where Arthur Bland had sat, adding up the scores, for nearly four decades.  People of his kidney took the Official Secrets Act seriously.  I am reminded of those couples who did such important work at Bletchley Park , spending decades of happy marriage without divulging to each other they had been code breakers in the neighbouring huts.  I believe some felt even their names were covered by the Act and never knew each other by anything other than ‘Sir’ or ‘Madam.’  We may speculate on the benefits of secrecy in sustaining any marriage but that is for an...

One of the things that I enjoy about being 'up in town', is just how friendly most people are. You can strike up a conversation in the certain knowledge you are almost certainly never to meet the cove again so the flow of wit need not be capped by regard to have to remember if you told this or that tale before. This is so different to many rural encounters where people will talk to you only to find out your business. Mind you, with increasing forgetfulness this can be useful as a few probing country questions can prod the memory and help a chap recall why the hell he came into this blasted village in the first place. Where was I?   Ah yes. Well, this recent heat had driven Mrs The Hon Sec out of the city and seeking sanctuary in one of the Hill Stations that dot the folds and valleys of the Chilterns. I was a loose end, and, sitting on a park bench and wondering just how long I was likely to be banged up for for feeding either ducks or pigeons - I believe Mary Poppins is no...