Late night, writing all day, shut up in the house alone with the dog, this is what you get

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3Fa4lOQfbA[/youtube]

French singer, songwriter and poet Serge Gainsbourg and the British actress Jane Birkin were together from about 1968 to 1980. This song was released, I think, in 1969 and became instantly famous and scandalous. One of their children is the great French actress Charlotte Gainsbourg. In 1969 I was starting a graduate degree at the University of Edinburgh. I used to wear a National Fire Service pea coat surplus from the Second World War. Despite the fact that it’s falling to pieces, my son Jonah now wears that coat around the University of Waterloo. The Sixties run through the family like a great river.

dg