The joys of walking - and the Tour de Trigs

Oh dear. It’s that time of year again. With the leaves already turning brown (very early this year) and our teenage son grumbling about going back to school, my husband’s begun training for the Tour de Trigs. If you haven’t heard of this extraordinary event, it’s a gruelling 24-hour orienteering hike through the wilds of Oxfordshire, Warwickshire and Northamptonshire. Just to make it extra-challenging, it’s held every December – when the days are short, the temperatures are freezing and the fields are at their boggiest. Entrants compete in teams of three and it’s so tough that most years only a third complete the top-secret 50-mile route.

My husband’s done five Tours de Trigs already and until a few weeks ago swore he wouldn’t attempt a sixth. But time is a great healer and a year’s long enough to forget what it’s like. When his GP friend Tim rang to suggest their team might stand a chance of winning a prize this year, I couldn’t believe my husband’s jaunty response. “Great idea,” he shot back.

Three months ahead of the event, I can predict exactly what will happen. On the morning of December 3, the intrepid trio will start the big day in high spirits. After a slap-up breakfast and quick kit-check, blister plasters, head torches and maps will be flung into rucksacks amid jokes about the horror that lies ahead.

Nonetheless, they’ll stick to their guns. As long as they keep eating high-energy bars and drinking strong black coffee, the walk is mostly fine till nightfall. Then the rot sets in. One year my husband felt so sick he had to quit halfway. Another year he trudged on through wind and rain, unable to speak or map-read. At one point he got in such a muddle that just like the Grand Old Duke of York he repeatedly led the team up and down the same hill. It still gives him a funny turn when we drive past the village of Brailes en route to the Cotswolds.

If previous years are anything to go by, the morning after the night before a weary-looking walker will stumble up our garden path. His face will be bright red, pummelled for hours on end by the elements, he’ll be covered in mud from head to toe and he’ll be barefoot because his feet are in agony. As he staggers through the front door, dropping his rucksack, first-aid kit, fluorescent armbands and great clods of earth everywhere, there’ll be just one thing on his mind.

“I’m never doing it again,” he’ll splutter. “Never. Ever. Do you hear me? Never.”

Don't go into journalism for the glamour

Journalism can be exciting, nerve-racking, mind-numbingly dull and, at times, very very annoying. But unless you’re a film critic or showbiz correspondent, it’s rarely glamorous. One minute you’re reporting a murder trial at the Old Bailey that gives you nightmares, the next you’re up to your knees in mud writing about an eccentric recluse living on a Thames houseboat.

When I worked in hard news I’d arrive in the news room at 7am knowing full well that by the end of the day I could be anywhere – Paris, New York, Scunthorpe, you name it. Actually, if I’m honest, it was Scunthorpe more often than Paris.

It’s hardly surprising that there are barely any women news reporters with young children working on national newspapers. I’d leave home at the crack of dawn and was often on the tube to Euston or Heathrow by 8am. My husband still quotes the time I left a note on the kitchen table saying “gone to Nairobi. Don’t know when I’ll be back.” A British doctor had set out to climb Mount Kenya, the second highest mountain in Africa, six months earlier and had vanished into thin air. My news editor decided I was the person to find him – a tall order considering the police had totally failed in their attempts. Not surprisingly, I returned home a complete and utter failure ten days later.

Now I’m a freelance writer, journalism is still full of surprises. I recently had to write a piece about a school in the wilds of Northamptonshire. I spent the morning chatting to the head, was shown round by two delightful pupils, who proudly insisted on showing me the contents of every single cupboard, and then got invited to stay for lunch. I haven’t had a school dinner in nearly 30 years so, curious to see what they’re like post Jamie Oliver, I agreed.

As I walked in, the head directed me to the end of a long wooden table that looked like something out of Hogwarts. Grace was said and we all sat down. But as I gazed along the table I noticed lots of expectant faces staring back at me. And then I realised why. I was sitting at the head of the table – so it was my role to be the dinner lady and dish up the roast beef, Yorkshire pudding and watery cabbage. As I said before, you don’t go into journalism for the glamour…

PS: I reckon this gorgeous vintage table (above) I bought in the Pedlars sale is one of the best travelled pieces of furniture around. Originally from France, I spotted it on the Pedlars website and reckoned it would be perfect for the House With No Name. It’s crossed the Channel more times than I have this summer!

The agony of waiting for GCSE results - and Mark Billingham's new book

Thirty years on, I can still remember the horrible moment when my O level results dropped through the letter box. I am old enough to have sat O levels rather than GCSEs and to have received my grades by post rather than email, but my memories of that day are crystal clear. I grabbed the envelope, tore it open and immediately spotted the distinctive handwriting of Dr Mac, my intimidating headteacher. “Congratulations - a pity you missed physics,” she’d scrawled. Her words have stayed with me ever since and even though I’ve never needed to know about reflection and refraction or forces and motion, the shame of failing physics remains.

Getting your exam results is a heart-stopping moment so I feel for the thousands of teenagers due to get their GCSE grades on Thursday (fingers crossed all round). My son got his AS results last week and I was so nervous that I spent the morning pacing up and down waiting for him to ring. He, on the other hand, got up at nine, ate a hearty breakfast and wandered off to school looking as laid-back as usual.

But what most irritates me at this time of year are the so-called experts who pop up to grumble about “dumbed-down” and “easy-to-pass” GCSEs. Of course they’re entitled to their opinions but why do they insist on droning on about it just as a generation of teenagers are anxiously awaiting their results? Students, after all, can only sit the exam papers in front of them.

As Brian Lightman, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said this week: “We should be preparing to celebrate the achievements of our students and offering them compelling reasons to continue their education... Everyone knows that there is more to do but that is no reason to denigrate and undermine what has been achieved so far.”

Wise words. And yes, I know there’s a lot of talking to be done about how we equip our teenagers with the right skills for the future – but not this week.

PS: I’ve blogged before about my new-found passion for crime novels. If you’re looking for inspiration and haven’t tried Mark Billingham’s Tom Thorne novels you’re in for a treat. The latest, Good as Dead (Little, Brown, £16.99), is just out (see above) and confirms Billingham’s status as one of the finest crime writers around. Set over three days, the drama begins when police officer and working mum Helen Weeks pops into her local newsagent’s to buy chewing gum and chocolate. In the space of a few terrifying minutes she’s taken hostage by a gunman who’ll stop at nothing to solve the mystery of his teenage son’s death in prison. It’s absolutely gripping.

Tikka masala cheese, anyone?

Alex James’s hilarious account of life behind the scenes of Nineties’ Britpop is one of my favourite non-fiction reads of recent years.

In Bit of a Blur the irrepressible James (above) recounts how he was catapulted to fame and fortune as bass guitarist of the rock band Blur. One minute he was a university student living in a slug-infested squat in Camberwell. The next he was living the high life – hanging out at the Groucho Club, driving around in a cab festooned with spots painted by Damien Hirst and generally being, as he describes it, “the second drunkest member of the world’s drunkest band.”

Those days are long behind him now. He’s moved to the wilds of Oxfordshire, where he lives with his wife and children, waxes lyrical about the countryside and makes cheese. But I think his latest creation could be a step too far. His Alex James Presents cheese range goes on sale in Asda on Monday (August 22) and boasts flavours like cheddar and tomato ketchup, cheddar and tikka masala and cheddar and sweet chilli. Are you convinced? No, me neither.

PS: David Cameron has just set off on his fifth holiday of the year. After a jaunt to Granada in April to celebrate Sam’s 40th birthday, an Easter trip to Cornwall, a week in Ibiza in May and a recent holiday at a Tuscan villa (cut short when he flew back following the riots), he's heading to Cornwall again with his family.

Even though lots of families can’t afford to get away at all this year, I don’t begrudge the Camerons the occasional break. But five is overdoing it – and sends out a terrible message to the millions struggling to make ends meet. Long hours and interrupted holidays go with the territory when you've got a high-powered career. If you want an easier life and a job that gets you home by 5.30 every night, then top-flight politics probably isn’t the right choice.



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New York - the perfect holiday for parents and teenagers

A message has just popped up on Facebook reminding me that a year ago I was on holiday in New York with my children. Looking back, I reckon it’s the perfect place for a city break with teenagers – so if you’re looking for ideas, here are some of mine.

After weeks of debating where to go it was clear that finding a holiday to suit both my fashionista daughter and bike-mad son was going to be tricky. She craved sunshine, art galleries and shops while he wanted high-octane action and wall-to-wall excitement.

In the end there was only one place that fitted the bill. New York – the city that never sleeps. Even so, the pair of them had to agree to compromise. My son promised to be calm while his big sister gazed at clothes in Forever 21 and she said she’d put up with him spending hours at the Empire State Building, viewing Manhattan (above) by telescope from every possible angle.

It was a flying visit but we were so determined to make the most of every second that our feet barely touched the ground. Even though the weather was blistering, with thirty-degree temperatures and stifling humidity, we packed a week’s worth of sight-seeing into four days. We walked miles and never resorted to the subway once. The Met (Metropolitan Museum of Art) was breathtaking, Central Park surprisingly hilly and I still haven’t got over the dazzling array of Proenza Schouler bags on sale at Barney’s, the up-market Madison Avenue department store. I longed to buy a lime-green PS1 satchel. The only problem was the eye-watering price tag.

We stumbled across some of our best discoveries quite by chance. Bryant Park, a tree-lined sea of green just off 6th Avenue, was one. The park, surrounded by towering skyscrapers on all sides, hosts a mass of free events throughout the summer months. One night we sat and listened to a fantastic jazz concert while the next day we watched a stunning lunchtime performance by the casts of five Broadway musicals. West Side Story, Mamma Mia, La Cage Aux Folles, they all featured, but one of the best performances came from Laura Michelle Kelly, the Isle of Wight-born star of Mary Poppins. Her cut-glass English tones and storming performance of Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious stopped the whole audience in its tracks.

Another day, much to my teenagers’ horror, I booked a sightseeing tour. They were desperate not to be regarded as tourists but in the end our tour guide won them over with his wit and street-by-street knowledge. A film extra by trade, Brooklyn resident Dane took up his new role after his daughter got fed up with him boring her to death with the facts and figures he knew about New York and told him to tell other people instead. From the history of the Statue of Liberty to the day he bumped into Sarah Jessica Parker (“she’s a very nice lady,” he confided), he kept us entertained all day.

Most days we couldn’t resist stopping off at the legendary Dean & DeLuca on 56th Street for a cup of their delicious coffee. As we watched New Yorkers whizz in and out, we could pretend, just for a second, that we were one of them.

On the last afternoon we visited MoMA, where my daughter was entranced by the Cézanne masterpieces and my son was gripped by Vietnam war footage. Finally we sat for a while in the lovely courtyard, admiring the Wish Tree donated by Yoko Ono. As we duly lined up to write our wishes on luggage labels and tied them to the tree, I took a quick, surreptitious glance at my daughter’s tag. “I wish I could live in New York,” she’d written.

The first freelance journalist to take on an apprentice

After a decade of working in Fleet Street news rooms I went freelance when my daughter was born. Working from home, I juggled looking after her with writing features for newspapers and magazines. There were a few tricky moments when I had to bring telephone interviews to a close in double-quick time because she’d woken up from her nap, but mostly it worked fine. And these days, when my children are fiercely independent teenagers and I can write full-time, I’m so glad I persevered with my career.

The one thing I never considered, though, was employing a trainee journalist to help run my business. But that’s what freelance education journalist Jan Murray has decided to do. Two days before this year’s A level results (fingers crossed for everybody), she’s written a piece for The Guardian, outlining her decision to become the first freelance journalist to take on an apprentice.

“I’ve decided to recruit an apprentice to assist me with research, transcription, developing story ideas and – once they have enough experience under the belt – possibly even the writing of articles,” she says.

“They’ll work for me four days a week and spend a day a week working towards a business administration apprenticeship at Harlow College... I want to give them as much hands-on experience as possible, so I’ll be taking them along when I go out to cover stories and, where appropriate, getting them to do some interviewing.”

Jan’s idea is an innovative one, and I’m sure loads of ambitious youngsters will apply, but I’m not convinced it’s the best way to train journalists. As she says, trainee hacks need to be accurate writers, possess good research skills and have “plenty of initiative and determination.” But I reckon these skills are best learned in the news rooms of local papers.

I did my training with a group of weekly newspapers in Devon, where I spent two years writing about flower shows, parish council meetings, golden weddings and village fetes. It wasn’t exactly cutting edge stuff but it taught me a lot of skills that I still use today. After eight weeks of learning shorthand (still essential for journalists), public administration (how local government works) and law (so we knew what we could and couldn’t report in the local magistrates court without committing contempt), we were let loose in the news room to do the job for real.

My worry with Jan’s idea is that her apprentice will spend most of his/her time doing general admin, like transcribing interviews, printing out cuttings and sending out invoices. But in my view it’s the buzz of working in a busy news room, seeing a variety of experienced reporters in action and crafting a great story from an initially unpromising interviewee that teaches you how to be a journalist.

I hope Jan’s initiative is a brilliant success but I’m not convinced it’s the way journalism training should be going.

PS: Thanks to Liberty London Girl's entertaining and informative blog I've just discovered this lovely Anthony Burrill poster (above), which I'm going to order for my office wall. Work hard and be nice to people - I can't think of better advice for us all, trainees or otherwise.