I think she said he was called Banjo Barry. We’d asked her how the Home communicated with the residents about the weekly programme of entertainments and events, and she’d said that they each got a leaflet with the details. She read some of the them out, including a Singalong with Banjo Barry. Asked if she’d ever been she said: NO! It is excruciating for her. There is little dignity in being incarcerated in a place that makes no distinction between refinement and bad taste. I’m sure that it is all kindly meant, and they are having to cater for all, but the leaning towards stereotypical blue-rinsed, pre-war, cosy,scone-eating-jamboree, hug-some-bunting jolliness is a bit much for her. As it would be for me. She goes along to some. Cookery was one. She told us that she went a few times and it involved six people to a bowl where each had turns at stirring it before the mixture went into the oven to metamorphose into a cake. She stopped going because she wasn’t allowed to eat cake for a while after her stroke. “I was put on Level 6,” she said. What’s that? we asked. “It means that they are worried that you might choke.” She’s also done some gardening. Today she will go to Chair Ballet. “Most fall asleep,” she said.
