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1 June 2026 (Monday)
- Work, Ironing
I
woke after an hour’s sleep, and then saw every hour
of the night. I finally gave up trying to sleep at five o’clock, got up and
watched an episode of “The Handmaild’s Tale”. It’s a rather
thought-provoking show. How do these totalitarian states run by religious
crackpots actually work when the entire thing is
based on a system of religious crackpottery in which no one actually believes. I
had my usual look at Facebook… perhaps I shouldn’t. The Reform UK councillor
for one of the wards on the Romney Marsh was ranting about the proposed solar farm which might or
might not be built on the Romney Marsh. His position was that he was for it
and against it and would go with whatever opinion would seem to get him the
most votes. I suppose that’s as good a position as we can expect from any
politician? I
got ready for work. As
I drove up the motorway the pundits on the radio were talking about how
parliament was going to be discussing the "Single
Patient Record"; a plan to combine GP, hospital and social
care data records so patients don't have to keep repeating their medical
history time and again at appointments, and so that clinicians can access
anyone's medical history. Needless to say the
conspiracy theory crackpots are up in arms about it, but from my personal
perspective it would be invaluable for me to know someone's blood transfusion
history if they didn't live locally and didn't feature on our works IT
system. I
was rather amazed to hear that parliament was going to be discussing it for
the first time; this was first tried nearly twenty
years ago. The project dragged on and on, and
wasn't the glowing success everyone had been hoping for. My
diaries of the time mentioned the DCW which was rather fundamental to the
project. Perhaps if we had ever found out what DCW stood for, things might
have turned out differently. And
there was talk about a load of midwives in
a hospital in Nottingham. Supposedly having been guilty of everything
possible bad thing under the sun, it was suggested that they were actually massively overworked, with administrators
seemingly unaware of what staffing levels actually were
supposed to be. Rather ironic when you think that NHS Trusts are trying
to get staff to go, isn't it? As
I drove I managed not to crash into the van of
"Orchard 2 Office" ; a company which specialises in delivering fruit
to workplaces. As I have said so many times, if you are going to drive like a
mania, it is best done in a vehicle that doesn't have your company's name and
logo emblazoned all over it. I
stopped off at Sainsburys to get lunch, then went in to work. Today was
supposedly a non-working day, but what with having had a minor hiccup over
the weekend I'd been asked to go in for an extra day. I was happy to do so.
As I said only two days ago, bearing in mind how I was treated where I used
to work, it is rather good to be asked to help. With
my bit done I came home. We had pizza and “er indoors TM” went
bowling as she does on Mondays. I put more episodes of “The Handmaid’s
Tale” on the telly and got on with the ironing as the dogs slept. Somehow
or other I’ve managed to trap a nerve in my leg today. It really hurts…. |
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2 June 2026 (Tuesday)
- Before The Night Shift
I
woke in the small hours to the sound of Treacle squeaking. She’d got off the
bed and couldn’t get back on… until I got up to help her when she jumped up
easily enough. As I was up anyway I went to the loo, and then dozed on and off listening to the sound of
the rain. The heatwave has finally given in to rain. Ho hum… I
got up and made toast. As I scoffed I had my usual
rummage round the Internet. I was presented with quite a few adverts for
an upcoming psychic fair. It will be run by
someone claiming to be “a renowned Tarot practitioner and intuitive healer
who empowers others by illuminating their path with deep insight and
spiritual clarity”. She’s
also a “Usui Reiki Master and Teacher, who practices on a intuitive & spiritual
level”. Am
I being unfair trying not to laugh out loud? Fifteen years ago
when times were hard I used to try to sell oil
paintings at these psychic fairs. The same old people would come to them, and
hand over not inconsiderable amounts of money. One chap would rub their heads
another would have them lie under a blanket and wave what he claimed was an
eagle’s wing over them… and they would all turn up a month later at the
next psychic fair with the same ongoing maladies. I’ll
just make the observation that *if” this
stuff actually worked, why do its proponents go to
doctors and hospitals when they are ill? And
there was whinging from Hastings. The old building that used to
house the printing works of the local newspaper has opened a rooftop bar with
spectacular views… and spectacular prices. One gin & tonic and a tin (tin!)
of cider was eighteen quid. The
weather forecast said the rain would ease so we went to the woods for a walk.
Either the rain or the threat of parking prices had put people off of going to Kings Wood – there was only one other car
in the car park when we arrived. We
walked a different walk to our usual one. With reports that one of my
geocaches had gone missing we arranged our route to go past it and have a
look. The thing was exactly where it was supposed to be. I always thought
that one was rather easy to find, but people have struggled with it. I’ve
amended the hint. From
there we meandered our way back to the car. It was a shame that Morgan had to
rill in fox poo, but there it is. Once
home I hosed muddy paws and muddy bellies (and fox poo), did monthly
flea treatments, put a load of washing in to scrub
and made myself a cuppa. I Munzed. I Wordled from “toast” to “basis” via “scram”
and “ashen”. I wrote up some CPD, and went to bed for
a few hours. It
was too hot to sleep properly. I
got up and watched a few episodes of “The Handmaid’s Tale”. At an hour
long the episodes are loo long, and the characters
aren’t really believable; seemingly changing their
attitudes and natures every two minutes depending on the twists of the plot. I’m
off to the night shift in a minute… |
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3 June 2026
(Wednesday) - Rather Tired
Last night was a typical night shift really (I
suppose), but I did find myself reflecting on how night shifts have
changed. The first one I ever did was some time in August 1985 when we were
called in from home as needed. I did maybe half a dozen blood counts that
night and was finished by half past midnight. Last night I spent the entire shift in the
department (when I wasn't on the loo). I cleared up the work that the
day shifts couldn't complete and then had over sixty blood counts, a couple
of dozen coagulation screens and was going (quite literally) all night
long. Some days I don't get to my daily step target
of six thousand steps; I'd cleared that by half past six this morning. The pain in my back eased a little overnight
which was a result. I did something to my back over the weekend. On Monday I thought I'd got a trapped nerve as the pain
had moved to my right arse cheek, and yesterday it slowly moved its way down
my thigh. I Googled my symptoms (which is never a good thing to do) and ended
up wishing that I hadn't. However the Bombay Bad Bot pot noodle I had for lunch
yesterday had worked its way through, and I spent the last half of the night
wishing I'd had toast and jam for lunch instead. I was glad to see the early shift roll in, and
I was even gladder to drive off homewards. As I drove home the pundits on the radio were
talking about the riots sparked by the death of Henry Nowak. Having been stabbed
to death by some maniac, the chap’s family called for his death not to be
made a political issue, and so no end of people have
deliberately made it just that. As I came up Brookfield
Road I saw that petrol was five pence per litre more expensive than what
I'd paid in Maidstone to top up last night, so that was something of a
result. Mind you the pundits on the radio had said that petrol in America was
four dollars per gallon... that's two pounds
and ninety six pence per gallon which is about
sixty-two pence a litre as opposed to the one pound fifty-six pence per litre
I paid last night. You have to wonder why the
Americans get their petrol so cheaply, don't you? I got home, went to bed and woke up five hours
later feeling like death warmed up. I had a vague idea to take the dogs to
Orlestone woods for a walk, but it was hossing
down. Whilst Morgan ate “er indoors TM” ‘s sock
I phoned Sainsburys helpline to whinge. I went into the petrol station at
Aylesford last night to get exactly the same
experience that I had a couple of weeks ago when I wrote: “It turned out that despite every single food item being labelled as
"meal deal", only certain items were actually in
the meal deal. The woman behind the till felt that it was rather obvious what
was and what wasn't in the deal, and seemed to think
that the labelling was some sort of advertising or artwork”. I got through to someone whose first language
obviously wasn’t English. I outlined the problem and he’s going to
investigate it for me. That will be nice. I’ve whinged in the past… there’s a
simple issue in that they simply need to make their signage clearer, but they
seem to want to blow it out of all proportion. I then spent quite a while making today’s
blog piccie, doing CPD, and downloading
geocaches for next week’s excursions. I downloaded about ten thousand –
hopefully that should be enough. As I downloaded I
watched the first episode of the third season of “The Handmaid’s Tale”.
I can’t help but wonder if the writers have run out of steam; the characters
have completely changed from what they were in the previous season. But I
suppose it makes for dramatic telly all the time you don’t think too hard
about it. We did “FEED THE FISH” and I gave my
new hair trimmers a first trial run. I might have been a bit vigorous with
them. “er indoors TM” boiled up a rather
good bit of scoff which we washed down with a bottle of plonk. But not just any
old bottle of plonk; the cheapest one I could find in Sainsburys last night. It wasn’t too shabby at all… And with it
scoffed the dogs amazed me. Rather than going over to the other sofa
with “er indoors TM”, they all looked at me expectantly. It took me a minute to realise that they’ve realized that after our having a
bottle of plonk I usually share a packet of cheesy biccies
with them. They are rather clever… |
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4 June 2026
(Thursday) - Rain, Puzzles, Packing
I
slept for nine hours last night; that was a result. Mind you I did spend all of yesterday feeling like death warmed up. That’s
night shifts… I
got up and made toast. I scoffed it peering into a dull Internet. Not a lot
was kicking off really. Some left wing crackpots
were posting to Facebook ranting about people canvassing for the Restore UK
party who were wearing some sort of uniform. Some were saying it was a good
thing, some were saying it was illegal, some were likening it to the Brownies…
I’ll just say that nothing has divided the country quite as much as the
recent rise of the nationalists. As
I stared into the Internet so not-so-nice-next-door came and
took our garden waste bin. I popped out to see what was going on. The bin men
had swapped our bins over. We swapped them back; I remarked about how the bin
men never put the bins back properly and she smiled. That’s a step in the
right direction. Despite
the weather forecast I took the dogs out. We delivered cards then went up to
Kings Wood. We got about a quarter of a mile when the heavens opened. We got
about a couple of hundred yards more and I was soaked to the skin, and the
dogs all looked miserable. We
gave up and came home for a warming shower. I made a cuppa for “er indoors TM” and myself, and the sun came out. I
spent an hour trying to solve a series of geo-puzzles that were published
this morning. I didn’t solve any. I
amazed myself by Munzing from “rainy” straight to “alloy” … I
couldn’t think of any other word ending in “y” that had an “a”
in it.. I
had a look at packing for our holiday… You wouldn’t believe the amount of pairs of trousers that I found. I was rather
twitchy about getting today’s trousers ready after their earlier soaking, but
I’ve got three pairs packed that I didn’t know I had, and
will be wearing a fourth pair that I had no idea that I had either. How is it
possible to be so blissfully aware of how many pairs of trousers you’ve got I
ordered up some beer for tomorrow, and had another
look at the geo-puzzles. I solved all of them. Well, Gordon told me the
answer to one. Seeing
the rain had stopped I went into the garden. We did “FEED THE FISH”
and I re-potted one of the pond plants which had got too big for the floating
basket and was threatening to topple it. And
then it started raining again. Once
the rain stopped we got most of our luggage loaded into
the car ready for tomorrow, and the holiday started with a KFC dinner which
we scoffed whilst watching an episode of “The Orville” I’ve
(hopefully) figured out where we are going tomorrow… I
should have an early night as we’ve got an early start tomorrow. |
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5 June 2026 (Friday)
- Off On Holiday
I
couldn’t sleep last night. I gave up and got up at three o’clock and watched
an episode of “The Handmaid’s Tale” before going and waking “er indoors TM” and
the dogs. They
weren’t keen on it. We
got on our way shortly after half past six and made really good time right up
to junction twenty-eight of the motorway where Google told us we’d found a
one-hour tailback. That was an inconvenience. But good old Google told us of
a diversion we might take along Wiggly Bottom Lane and pausing only briefly
to tiddle in a lay-by we arrived at Duxford McDonalds about thirty seconds
before Kark and Tracey. We
chuckled at the row the staff were having; we scoffed sausage and egg McMuffins, and drove down to Rede where we went for a
little walk. As always our walk was guided by several geocaches… We
started with a puzzle at the church and couldn’t find the information we
needed. We
couldn’t find the second one… Once
we’d found the third one we realised what was going
on… geocaches all have difficulty ratings scoring them from one to five.
These had all been rated at one and a half (really easy
to find) They should really all have been rated at three and a half or
higher… But we eventually found twelve out of fourteen, and the dogs were
rather good off the leads which was a result. From
there we went to dinner at the White Horse in Rede.
The people were friendly, the food excellent. The dogs all got a treat of biccies and cream. But it was odd that they had no ale on
hand pumps. They were getting some in a couple of weeks’ time. Presumably no
demand for the stuff? We
then divided our forces. Some went to get food shopping. We went to the Nethergate
brewery to get beer and cider. An interesting place – it’s got its
own bar. Might go back there in a day or so… And
then on to the holiday cottage. There’s a pin for the place on Google maps.
You’d think the pin would correspond with the actual location, wouldn’t you?
But we found it, and once unpacked we had a little
look around. The
place has three ponds. As a pond-keeper I rather thought that the smaller two
might need a little maintenance. The third looked to be in a very sorry
state. Behind a gate and with very thick weed and much all over its surface.
So thick that you might mistake it for solid ground if you were as silly as
Morgan and Bailey who went charging up… There was a look of total horror on
their faces as the ground on which they were running just collapsed underneath
them. They
aren’t keen on swimming at the best of times. Fortunately there was a hose in
the cottage garden. They weren’t keen on the hose either but there it was. It
was as well we’d brought a lot of dog shampoo along, and it didn’t take *that*
long to scrub them. We
had some rather good pizzas for tea which we scoffed in a conservatory. Have
you ever scoffed in a conservatory? I’d not convinced about them. The
beer gave way to port, and it all got rather vague… I
took a few photos of the day… sadly nowhere near as many as I usually do. |
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6 June 2026
(Saturday) - Whelnetham
I
meant to bring a clock… I always feel rather confused and disorientated if I
don’t know what the time is… it turned out that it was five o’clock when the
dogs wanted to go for a tiddle this morning. Mind you when I say “go for a tiddle” I actually
mean “go play silly beggars in the great new garden we’ve got”.
But they’ve learned their lesson and stayed away from the swamp which was
masquerading as a pond. After
five minutes the novelty of “silly beggars” wore off. I dried their
bellies and we all went back to bed. But I was wide awake. I
plumbed the lap-top into the cottage wi-fi and posted up yesterday’s photos.
It’s the sort of thing I want to see when others post them. We
tuned in to Radio Ashford for Steve’s “Guess The
Lyrics” competition. “I thought i could have
my cake and eat it too”…
no? I had no idea either. It was The Four Seasons. Karl
boiled up a particularly good full English brekkie. Oh, it was good. I
contributed by loading the dishwasher afterwards. The plan was to go for a
walk, but it was raining, so we sat in the conservatory and I fell asleep… I
woke to excitement. The rain had stopped and we were forecast four hours of
dry. We hurried off to nearby Whelnetham and had a
little walk guided as ever by a series of geocaches. A rather good series of
geocaches as it happened. I’ve never found one magnetised to a road drain
before. As we walked we saw a rather spectacular red
kite. The dogs chased rabbits and came back incredibly quickly (for them).
The walk was only marred by some local thug getting incredibly aggressive
because Morgan and Bailey dared to run within fifteen yards of his dog. For
someone who never wanted dogs I do tend to get rather protective of them… but
to be fair the dogs just ran in his general direction, and
came back when called. The local by-laws said that dogs had to be under
control which mine were. For all that Thugbert was
ranting about dogs being on leads, those who insist on dogs being on leads
generally know very little about dogs. We
came back to base. We had a pint and sat in the garden with it… for about
five minutes until the rain hit. Then we adjourned to the conservatory for
crisps and another pint. And a game of chess. Not all of
the bits were there, but they rarely are. It
was soon tea time. Karl boiled up a rather good
pasta and chicken sausages and I offered sage
advice, and Jess and Charlotte soon arrived. The
dogs got very excited again… |
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7 June 2026 (Sunday)
- Shimpling
I
had somewhat naively hoped that the dogs would have slept better last night.
This early morning’s bout of silly beggars took place at five o’clock; half
an hour earlier than it did yesterday. Having given the impression that they
needed a widdle I opened the bedroom door… and then had to chase all three
round the cottage to herd them into the garden. I saw two raking out, and can only hope the third did too. We
got back to bed eventually… After
a bit of brekkie we got going. We went down to
nearby Shimpling where we had a bit of a walk
following a series of geocaches as we do. There was a minor incident as the
dogs chased off after a huge rabbit… it might have been a hare: I really
should find out what the difference is. We
found an archaeology site. No one was digging though
which was probably for the best as we could have made serious nuisances of
ourselves. We had a picnic in the graveyard… Geocaching-wise
I can’t recommend the route. When you hide a geocache
you rate the difficulty, state the size of the thing, and give a little clue.
The difficulties were all left at the default setting, the sizes given (when
given at all) were misleading, and the clues were meaningless at best. Sadly many of the caches had been seemingly just
drop-kicked into the hedge. Which was very strange as the chap had clearly
put a lot of effort into creating quite a few very well
made hand-crafted caches. one. After
six and a half miles we were back at the car. We came home for a little
drinkie. And another. And another. And the evening got progressively more and more vague. I
took a few photos (until I fell asleep). |
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8 June 2026 (Monday)
- Long Melford
The
dogs stayed asleep until half past seven this morning which was something of
a result. When at home they spend so much of the day asleep; they are
constantly on the go here. Little Bailey is particularly showing the strain
of it all. We
got up and played silly beggars charging round a damp garden, and as brekkie
was prepared so the rain stopped and started. Brekkie was particularly good,
and with that scoffed we thought about going out. But the rain had come back.
We (I) had a little doze in the conservatory, and eventually the rain
held off long enough for us to decide to take a chance. We
drove down to nearby Long Melford where we had a little walk along a very
long village. There were two geocaching adventure lab series there which gave
us a good walk. The first one took us to the top end of the village . We then tried a puzzle geocache at the church.
It was a huge church; almost cathedral sized, but with a very strong smell of
cannabis. What was that all about? The puzzle geocache was rather rubbish; we
had to find five bits of information from the church and the graves. We found
two, Googled two, and guessed one. But
we found what we were looking for, and had an ice
cream to celebrate. From
there we walked the bottom end of the village; it was rather pretty. And with
walk walked it was only a five minute drive to the Nethergate brewery where we went on Friday. We needed
supplies, and while we were there we had a little
drinkie. A pint of mild, and a pint of lager-coloured stout. It was odd!! We
then came back to base for a bit of a rest and a very good late dinner. And a
couple of games of 3-D blokus… I
took a few photos as we went round today |
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9 June 2026 (Tuesday)
- Rushbrooke
The
dogs were asleep, but the sun was rather bright through the curtains. Being
wide awake I got up and did the geo-admin for the last two days until the
cottage’s wi-fi died unexpectedly at seven o’clock. Hurrah for my mobile and
its mobile hotspot facility, eh? As
I logged our thirty-odd geo-finds I looked out at a glorious morning which
sadly wasn’t forecast to last much past brekkie time After
brekkie we looked at the weather forecast for the ten thousandth time and
decided to take a chance. We drove up to the Rushbrooke Arms where I banged
on the door and had a word with the nice man. He said that my plan of using
their car park, going for a walk and coming back to his pub for lunch was a
good one, so that’s what we did. As
always our walk was laid out for us by a series of
geocaches. Perhaps spread out a little too much for my liking, and perhaps a
little too much on roads, but all things considered it was a very good walk.
Geocaching-wise far better than the frankly impossible hides we’d struggled
with earlier in the week. And
apart from a minor shower the weather held for us too. After
four miles we were back at the pub where we had a very good bit of dinner.
Bang Bang Cauliflower – no, I’d never heard of it
before either, but I would certainly have it again. We
drove back to base where we jigsaw-ed. I say “we”; I had a kip. As the
afternoon wore on the weather alternated between glorious sunshine and
thunderstorms and hailstorms. We
had a few pints, and a very good dinner of bread and oils and halloumi and
olives, and the 3-D Blokus came out too. I took a few photos today.
And I had a bit of an early night… A rather lazy day had been rather tiring… |
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10 June 2026
(Wednesday) - The Kings Forest
I
rather ached when I woke, which was odd bearing in mind that we’ve not really
exerted ourselves massively. I got up and had a shave, and
then took the dogs round the garden (again) gathering dung and again I
looked at a glorious morning. As
brekkie was being prepared I went and sat with
little Bailey who has claimed one of the sofas as her own. She seems to be
struggling this week. Normally spending about eighteen hours a day asleep,
being constantly awake is taking its toll on her. I sat with her… and woke an
hour later with all three dogs asleep on me. We
had a particularly good bit of brekkie, then looked at the geo map.
Admittedly the weather forecast was a tad iffy, but we had this plan that if
we went for a little walk just north of Bury St Edmunds
we might drop Jess and Charlotte off at the train station on the way back to
the cottage. It
was a good plan. In theory… We
got to the designated parking spot and the heavens opened. We waited for
fifteen minutes for the rain to abate, then went for a little walk. After a
few hundred yards it hossed down rather epically.
Only for a few minutes but enough to soak us. My lightweight raincoat needs
to be either replaced or binned. But
the sun came out. Rather brightly. We were all dry in two minutes
so we carried on. We had a good walk though rather pretty
woodlands. We saw deer. We found a dead deer, and some of us rolled in
it (as you do). We even found geocaches. And
then it rained. Seriously rained. Whatever rain you’ve seen before was just a
light sprinkle compared to this. Within minutes my pants were ringing wet. We
abandoned and came back to the cottage where the dogs got a bath. With soap.
As we scrubbed the dogs so Karl and Tracey ran Jess
and Charlotte back to the train station at Bury St Edmonds, and we had a lazy
cuppa. A cup of coffee as opposed to a pint. We
had a rather lazy evening with scampi and chips and the Infinity table
playing Blokus (2-D) and Sorry… I
took a few photos today. |
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11 June 2026
(Thursday) - Lawshall
As the week has gone on
I’ve slept better. Either it’s all a bit much for me or the beer is taking
its toll. The dogs are finding it a bit much too. Earlier in the week when I
got up they would all leap up ready to go bothering everyone
else, but today they were all-in and frankly sparko at seven o’clock this
morning. We spent a few minutes watching the birds in
the garden. There’s certainly more than we’ve got back home. Karl and Tracey were soon up, and we had
brekkie, then went for a little walk. The weather forecast was against up,
but no matter what happened the weather couldn’t be any worse than it had
been yesterday, could it? (at the risk of giving spoilers, the answer was
“yes”) We drove out to nearby Lawshall
where we walked a wonderful series of geocaches. A lovely walk, really well-thought-out caches. Tricky puzzles to solve in
the field. Finding the thing was easy enough, but getting the log out to sign
it wasn’t easy. It would have been one of the best geo-days ever if not for
the rain. But unlike yesterday my pants stayed dry, so
that was a result. We came back to base for a sausage roll and a
scotch egg and a pint (three), and then it was declared that this was
just the starter. We then drove out for a late lunch. Having
had a rather good dinner there a couple of days ago we went to the
Rushbrooke Arms again. I see one or two people have been critical of
the place on Google and Tripadvisor. All I can say was that we had a very
good bit of dinner again. More Bang Bang
Cauliflower, and this time I went for the steak and ale pie. The dogs all got
scraps… perhaps they’ve been getting too much this week? Bailey wouldn’t take
a chip, but would lick the gravy off
of it. We retreated back to
base, where we perused the geo-map, then had even more scoff and even more
beer whilst playing “Trouble”. The house seems a lot quieter without Jess
and Charlotte. I
took a few photos today. |
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12 June 2026 (Friday)
- Coming Home
I
was up twice in the night. I shall miss having a chodbin
in the next room. I got up at seven o’clock and made a noise shaving so
that “er indoors TM” might
wake. She
didn’t. So I clattered about a bit, and that didn’t
work. In the end I piled the dogs onto her, put my suitcase on the bed and
stared noisily filling it. That did the trick. I
then took the dogs out to do what dogs do. I can only assume they’d taken to
dumping in the thicket near the Sanctuary because they’ve been scoffing like
things possessed but dumping nowhere near as much as the
do at home. I hope they haven’t been dumping in the thicket near the
Sanctuary; the Sanctuary is a little shed in an unkempt corner of the garden
where you go to say your prayers, and the last thing anyone wants when saying
their prayers is a bonanza of dog dung. I
had a good look round, but didn’t find anything. We
seemed to get packed up rather quickly, and we were soon on our way to Hutton Country Park; a little park near Brentwood. A walk round there would
break up our drive home, and there were ten geocaches there which was an added bonus. They were rather well
crafted geocaches too. We had a good wander round; it was only a shame
that Treacle was willful. With minutes to go she made a bee-line
for the swamp. I called her back; she ignored me. I shouted at her, and she
glared at me in a most indignant way. And then carried on heading to the
swamp. After a second bellow she eventually took some notice of me. We said our goodbyes, and headed
home listening to Radio Two as we drove. Have you ever listened to Radio Two?
It was dire when my gran used to listen to it (she died in 1984) and
it hasn’t got any better in the meantime. We
got home. It didn’t take that long to unpack. I spent a little while
straining my brain at geo-puzzles. There’s one outside the pub we are going
to tomorrow. Feeling
rather tired we had a cheeky KFC for dinner. We scoffed it, and as the dogs slept we watched an episode of “The Orville”. I’ve
put some polish on my walking boots. It might waterproof them a bit; it might
not. I’m
going to have an early night. I’m absolutely worn out. |
|
13 June 2026
(Saturday) - Dog Club, Bat & Trap
It was good to have a holiday. I really
enjoyed our time away, but you can’t beat your own bed and your own chodbin. And somehow I’ve
managed to knack my elbow… I got up in the small hours. For all that you
can’t beat your own chodbin, mine is quite a hike
from the bed. Whilst I was at it I put a load into the
washing machine. I made toast and peered int Facebook. I was
immediately presented with the claim that “Ashford MP Sojan Joseph & Labour tried
to make KENT taxpayers pay for daily school transport from Crawley, Sussex —
for illegal asylum seekers”. The claim was from
some Reform UK councilor. Did Ashford MP Sojan Joseph & Labour *really*
try to make KENT taxpayers pay for daily school transport from Crawley,
Sussex — for illegal asylum seekers? I really don’t know. They may well have done.
Is there any evidence for this? That’s what we need to see. I did a little
research and all I could find was name-calling on Facebook. Sadly however this is what I’m seeing more
and more from politicians of all shades. No one is saying what they’ve
actually done; they are just making claims about the
failings of the opposition whilst rarely providing any evidence to back up
their claims. I’m reminded of the bickering of children that I had to referee
when I was a cub scout leader. There’s no denying that the people of Ashford
have made a mistake by voting for the current MP, but what is the
alternative? Just shouting “VOTE REFORM” doesn’t tell us precisely
what we would be voting for, and “vote for us because we aren’t as bad as
the alternative” is hardly a defensible political position. Steve was on the radio doing the “Guess
the Lyrics” competition. “The reason for living the reason for leaving”
was from ABC, but it wasn’t “Poison Arrow”; it was “The Look of
Love”. Even with the initial mistake I still got it within a minute. I
felt rather smug about that. I Munzed. I Worded
from “lyric” to “quell” in five goes then we took the dogs to
Dog Club. There were quite a few new dogs along today,
and Morgan took a few minutes to settle, but in the end a great time was had
by everyone. I tried to count the dogs; we had somewhere in the high teens of
dogs along. It was difficult to be sure; they don’t sit still. From Dog Club we drove to the petrol station while
Steve was doing the Mystery Year competition on the radio. “Stand By Your
Man” and the first appearance of Davros on Doctor Who? 1975. We headed out to Staple. Being a few minutes
early we took the dogs for a little walk and as we walked
we met a coupe of friends who were also early for
the geo-meet and thought that they too might have a little walk. It was good
to catch up. And then it was on to the Black Pig for the
annual Bat-And-Trap-othon. Bearing in mind the rain
of the last week we had a really good afternoon in
the sunshine drinking beer and playing Bat & Trap. I scored two, which
was something of a result. I do like the geo-meets, and today’s
was so like how they used to be. As the afternoon wore on things became
progressively more vague. I counted five pints of
ale, and I’ve a photo of gin & tonic. I slept much of the way home. “er indoors TM” went off to the local Am-Dram’s production, and I
settled in front of the telly and watched three episodes of “The
Handmaid’s Tale”. I
took quite a few photos today. And I think I’ve caught the sun…. And
my elbow still hurts. |
|
14 June 2026 (Sunday)
- Frittenden
I
was awake far too early this morning, and so put a load of washing in. I went
back to bed and dozed on and off, and was hanging
the washing out at eight o’clock. I put another load in, made toast and had a
look at the Internet. Apparently yesterday was supposed to be a day of showing
pride in our country as various far right groups had planned marches and rallies, but from what I
could work out they were all incredibly poorly supported and were all
trounced by the anti-racist brigade. Am I alone in feeling that those who are
trying to make me proud of our country are actually making
me shamed of it? And
there was talk about the first games in the football world cup which is taking
place. A friend in Australia was telling his pal that “we” were going
to get through to the next stage and “you”
might not. Almost as though they themselves were playing in the games. People
take football so seriously and so personally. I really can’t see the
attraction. I don’t know if being immune to it is a good or bad thing? As
we headed home we found a load of plants up for sale
in someone’s front garden. We got enough to fill our empty boxes in the garden, and got some rockery plants too. Bearing
in mind it had been a couple of weeks since I’d done it last
I ran out the hoses and cleaned the big pond’s filter. And with that cleaned and
the waste hose away I left the other hose running for a few minutes to top
off the pond as I cleaned out the little pond’s filter. I
hosed round the plants, and felt rather worn out. I
never used to feel so knackered after doing so little. And
flushed with success I then had a go at another geo-puzzle and spent a couple
of hours trying all sorts of ideas and getting them wrong. In desperation I
sent out a message to a pal who’d solved it some time ago… it turned out my
first idea was the right one, but my basic arithmetic was at fault.
Twenty-one minus three isn’t fifteen. Have I ever mentioned that I’ve got a
degree in maths? And
I found the chicken’s feet that we took on holiday. The dogs never got round
to eating them. |
|
15 June 2026 (Monday)
- Another Day Off
I
slept though till six o’clock this morning. I got up, did what I got up for,
and put a load of washing in to scrub. I went back to bed in the hope that I might
get some more kip. I didn’t; I rarely do. Once I’m awake, generally that’s
it. I
eventually got up at eight o’clock. After a shave I stood on the scales. Last
week’s holiday has put half a stone on to me. Oh well; that’s what holidays
do. I hung out the washing, made toast and had a little look at the Internet
as I do most mornings. There was quite a lot of consternation in the Facebook
pages about the Romney Marsh as some asylum-seekers have been housed in the
area. Apparently these asylum seekers have been
bothering local children… Apparently. Everyone’s heard the tales
but no one has actually seen anything; let alone
reported it to the police. No end of hatred and vitriol was being spouted. I
originally wrote “racist hatred” but is it *really* racist?
There’s also quite a lot of bad feeling in the Hastings Facebook pages from
those who’ve never lived more than fifty yards from the house in which they
were born. They really don’t like the “DFL”s.
“DFL”s is a term used to describe the people
moving into the area who are “down from London”. I’m
reminded of my days in the cubs (as a cub, not a leader) when the
children there came from two different primary schools. The leaders tried and
tried to get the kids to mix, but we stayed in two completely
separate tribes. We simply wouldn’t even acknowledge the existence of
a child who went to a different school. So
many people have a general animosity against anyone who hails from somewhere else,
which is silly and a great shame. People you don’t know aren’t actually enemies looking to slit your throats; they are
just friends you haven’t met yet. I
Munzed, Wordled from “slept”
to “broil” in five goes, then took the
dogs up to the woods. We walked one of our longer usual walks, but over the
course of five and a half miles we only saw two other dog walkers. One said
hello, the other looked down his nose at us whilst his poor dog (formally
ordered to walk at heel) watched with a pang of sadness as my three ran
riot in the thickets. I felt sorry for the poor dog; he really was with one
of the normal people. Who else walks in the woods in mid-June in a shirt and
tie with waistcoat, jacket and a coat on? We
got back to the car and came home. We arrived just as “er indoors TM” was
making a cuppa, so that saved me a job. I updated my Facebook profile
pictures with those piccies above, then charged into the garden to get the
laundry in as it was raining. And
with that draped over the banister I popped over to the garden centre.
Yesterday I’d got some new plants but we had no
compost for potting them. I got some compost… at eight quid for a huge bag or
twelve quid for two huge bags I bought two huge bags. And as I suddenly had
loads of compost and the pots at home were small I
got a couple of small troughs too. I
came home where I made myself some toast, and with that scoffed I got on with
the post-holiday ironing. I’d got all the laundry washed and dried over the
weekend, and it only took a couple of hours to get it ironed. As I ironed I watched more episodes of “The Handmaid’s Tale”.
And with ironing done and telly watched I then tried to get up quietly. But
the dogs which had been so soundly asleep and
snoring weren’t going to miss the possibility of “FEED THE FISH”, so
that’s what we did. I then ran round with the watering can and had a look at
that pile of tyres I saved from when I got new tyres for the car. I’ve got
instructions for what I might do with them. “er
indoors TM” boiled up sausages
and chips then went bowling. I watched even more episodes of “The
Handmaid’s Tale”. The republic of Gilead seems to be a scary place,
but with Reform UK councils seemingly repealing a *lot* of
the legislation which stopped the alienation of the LGBT community and there
insisting on prayers at council meetings, is it *that* unlikely
that the UK could be reduced to that sort of religious crackpotism
? I’m
feeling rather worn out. Days off often do that to me. |
|
16 June 2026
(Tuesday) - Walk, Shopping, Gardening, Vets
I
rather ached when I got up this morning. Last night when I went to bed my
watch claimed I’d covered over seventeen thousand steps yesterday. Perhaps I
overdid it a bit? I
made toast and had a look at the Internet as I do. The other day I mentioned
that a pub a few miles away, the Bonny Cravat, was closing
down. There was a post about them on the local news site this morning.
Despite having spent ninety thousand pounds of their own money on a Shepherd
Neame pub they were only getting one or two customers a day and have knocked
it on the head. For all that I keep saying that pubs have had their day, this
one has always amazed me. The Bonny Cravat looks like a council house surrounded
by a tarmac car park whilst the building next door is a traditional
olde-worlde pub with oak beams and a rather pretty garden. The only surprise
here is how the Bonny Cravat kept going for so long. I
saw a friend was off on a river cruise in Portugal. I quite liked the look of
that… but I couldn’t leave my dogs behind. And
several people were posting to say that their children had left school for
the last time. However no one was posting pictures of fishing.
Back in the day freshwater fishing would stop for three months in March so
that the fish could spawn, and fishing would re-start on June 16th.
People would sit on the lakesides and cast out at the stroke of midnight.
These days no one observes the close season. I
Munzed, Wordled from “ached”
to “amaze” in four goes. I
took the dogs up to the woods where we had a good (if long) walk. As
we walked I saw a deer on the path in front of us. The
dogs missed it completely; it watched us approach, and it only ran off when I
reached for my phone to take a photo of it. We
had a “near miss” with the normal people. Bailey disappeared for about
ten seconds. I whistled for her and a voice on the other side of a thicket
told me not to worry; he’d found my missing dog. I whistled again and the
chap said he’d got her. I replied to let her go. This confused him. What –
just let the dog run? Yes. He wasn’t happy about it but two seconds later Bailey
came running round the tree and I could hear mumblings from the other side of
the bushes. We carried on but never actually saw this bloke, which was
probably for the best. We
came home for a cuppa, then I went out on a little mission. First of all to Brewer’s (the paint shop) to get
something to prime my old car’s tyres before dobbing them with masonry paint.
The internet said I should use oil based multipurpose primer. The specialist paint
shop said they’d never heard of it, and after a quick look it would seem
their suppliers hadn’t either. I
drove round to Wickes where I got a water-based multipurpose primer, several
bits of wood, some screws, a chain and most of the ingredients for what I’m
going to make those tyres into. I
came home again and potted the plants I got on Sunday. They look much better
potted, and the purple plants give a nice contrast to the water buttercups round
the bog filter. I scrubbed the tyres with warm soapy water (as it said to
on the internet), painted up the wood with woodstain,
and by then I was worn out. We did “FEED THE FISH” and then I sat by
the pond for a while reading my Kindle as I had a late lunch of a bag of
smoky bacon crisps and a tin of Doctor Pepper. I
took Morgan and Bailey to the vets for their annual check-up. For a dog that
barely eats, Bailey has put on half a kilogram. Morgan’s weight remains constant,
and both dogs passed their MOT with flying colours. I
came home, had a shower, and slobbed in front of
the telly as I do in the early evening playing games on my phone whilst
watching drivel on the UK Gold channel… There’s something odd with that
channel. So often the program goes intermittently silent and the video
pixelates. It doesn’t happen during the adverts and
it doesn’t happen on any of the other (non-UK brand) channels. I shall
hope that the issue is at their end and not with our Sky-Q box. “er
indoors TM” boiled up a very good
bit of dinner which we washed down with a bottle of prosecco and a couple of
G&Ts as we watched a couple of episodes of “Taskmaster”. And
for all that I might have overdone it yesterday, as I type this my watch is
telling me I’ve covered twenty thousand and twenty-five steps
and it hurts to move. I really should take it easier tomorrow. |
|
17 June 2026
(Wednesday) - Taking It Easy
I slept like a log last night. I did have an
idea to go out into the garden and scrub those tyres when I woke far too
early at five o’clock, but I slept through until eight o’clock which was
something of a result. I made toast and had a look at the Internet
as I do. I’ve noticed something - more and more I’m
seeing posts to Facebook starting with “please – no hate”. This speaks
volumes about social media doesn’t it? There’s no
denying I’d be lost without it, but when you consider how many people clearly
just go on-line to spew their vitriol at people they’ve never met and never
will, you can see why the government wants to keep children off
of it,
can’t you? Meanwhile a Russian frigate sailing down the
English Channel has taken a pot-shot at a passing
yacht. I Munzed, got
Wordle on the fourth attempt, and at twenty to nine decided that “er indoors TM” and
the dogs had been in bed for quite long enough. I hoiked
them out of their pit, and once they’d had brekkie I
took the dogs up to Kings Wood. I made a point of taking a shorter walk
today… we did what used to be our standard walk. I need to go back to a shade
under four miles. The recent five-and-a-bit miles is just a bit too much. But
we had a good walk… even if Treacle found the mud and Morgan did come home
covered in bird crap. As we walked we met
quite a few other dogs; the woods were rather busy today. And most of the
encounters passed off well. They only real iffy one
was with some woman with a Labrador and a Poodle who blanked us entirely. Generally there’s a polite greeting, and sometimes a bit
of a chat with those we see regularly, but more and more
there’s an element up there that is stand-offish to the point of rudeness. We
saw one the other day – the idiot in the shirt and tie. We came home. In a novel break with tradition
Bailey escaped being bathed, and with the mud off of
Treacle and the bird crap off of Morgan I made us
both a cuppa. And then I cracked on in the garden. I gave the tyres another scrubbing with soap
and water, and got another coat of wood stain onto
the wood bits. I voomed round with the bionic burner, and spent a little while looking for the roofing felt.
I had this stroke of genius that roofing felt might make a good roof for the
wishing well I’m going to make out of the tyres and timbers. I can
remember having loads of the stuff… It turns out I took it round to “My Boy TM” to help with his shed roof. I drove round to fetch it back. I stopped off at the co-op to get Belgian buns for lunch. The co-op do the best Belgian buns. Sadly
they do the best annoying idiots too. How can so many people blunder around utterly
oblivious of the world around them? At one point one old biddy grabbed her
mate’s arm and dragged her away saying that she was in everyone’s way. The
one being dragged looked around and was very
obviously very surprised to see there was a whole world around her. And with buns eventually bought I went on to
the first fruit of my loin. He’s had his lawn replaced with artificial grass.
It looks rather good at the moment, but will it
last? We shall see. I got the roof felt. And I blagged his white spirit
too. I came home and saw that the little pond’s
aerator pump was struggling so I cleaned it out. As I did
I found one of the grass carp was dead. Ho hum… That got flushed. I had my Belgian bun then went back into the
garden. I rubbed the tyres down with white spirit, then gave the timbers
another coat of wood stain. Then rubbed the tyres with more white spirit.
That stuff stinks. I had a little sleep by the pond and thought about
painting the tyres but decided against it. Instead I
pruned the hedge between us and not-so-nice-next-door. It needed
pruning. I would say something to her about the jungle, but over the years
I’ve sadly found that speaking to her is at best a futile endeavour. I also pruned our no-longer-dead cordyline.
I’ve pulled off all the dead leaves. Maybe that did it some good. Maybe it
didn’t. Time will tell; it always does. Meanwhile my new fuchsia is blooming. I had a phone call from one of my old
trainees (he was a trainee sixteen years ago!) He’s up before the beak
facing allegations of… well, in many ways the allegations are immaterial.
Having been up against the legal system myself a couple of times, and having
seen friends contesting with it, my hopes for my old mucker aren’t high. It really
has been my experience in courts of law that victory goes to those who know
what phrases to say (regardless of their veracity) whilst keeping a
straight face. Am I bitter? Yes. “er indoors TM” boiled me up a pizza then
she went off out with her old workmates. I settled in front of the telly
underneath a pile of dogs and watched more episodes of “The
Handmaid’s Tale”. As I watched there were several commotions
outside. We’ve put a tray under the bird feeders to catch the seeds chucked
by the sparrows. The pigeons have taken to trying to get those seeds by
getting into the tray and making the whole lot over-balance.. My plan for today was to take it somewhat easier…
I’ve come in at under fourteen thousand steps so that’s somewhat better than
the last two days, I suppose… I still ache though. |
|
18 June 2026
(Thursday) - More Rain
Again I ached when I woke. I got up, made
toast and had a look at Facebook. Someone who used to run a rather specialist
shop in Folkestone had the arse with the government because no one was coming
to buy surplus military stuff from him. I can see that only taking fifteen
quid a day wasn’t a viable business model, but more and more
the government is being blamed for every single failing of the world. Am I
missing the point here? Would having a Reform UK government have the masses
running out to Folkestone to dress up like Action Man? Somehow
I doubt it. With “er indoors TM” not
working from home today we were up earlier than usual. We got to the woods a
good hour and a half earlier than we did yesterday. We walked our usual
shorter walk (what used to be our usual walk) of four and a half miles
and in that time we only saw two other people. We
did see a deer though. Again like the one we saw the
other day it wasn’t particularly fazed by the dogs. We
came home. My Forestry England welcome pack had arrived together with the
all-important car sticker which allows me free parking at the Kings Wood car
park. I Munzed and opened a qrate.
I Wordled from “today” through “butty”
to “entry”, then cracked on in the garden. As
always I started by harvesting the dog dung. Strating
with anything else usually leads to disaster. I then got a first coat of
undercoat onto the tyres. The instructions said to allow at least six hours
between coats so I got the spirit level and got the platform for the thing
level, and that was all I could do on “Operation Wishing Well” for
today. I don’t want to saw any wood into shape until I’ve figured out how far
apart my uprights are going to be. That distance will be what it is once the
uprights are actually in place,
and will probably bear little (if any) relation to anything I
might measure. It
was a bit warm so I came inside. I saw I had an
email. I subscribe to a website called “Lablogatory”. Every so often
there would be a work-related post appearing there which I could sometimes
use in my personal continuing professional development. Naively I always thought
the site was created by volunteers. It turns out that those producing
material for the site were being paid to do so, and the money has dried up.
My CPD blog is open to all, and a surprising amount of people seem to refer
to it. Am I wrong in providing this for free? Personally
I don’t think so. I
watched an episode of “The Handmaid’s Tale” as I scoffed a Bombay Bad
Boy pot noodle for lunch. Having been a tad egg-bound recently I hoped for great
things. And then I went out to the shed and had a little tidy-up. I’ve booked
a tip run for tomorrow to get rid of that which I tidied. I
could feel a few spots of rain so we quickly did “FEED
THE FISH”; it was hossing down by the time the
fish and the dogs had had a little scoff. I
then spent the rest of the afternoon alternating between trying to do the
shed when it wasn’t raining, and reading my Kindle
when it was. It rained quite a bit – I’m just hoping the paint on my tyres was
mostly dry by then. “er
indoors TM” came home and boiled
up dinner which we scoffed whilst watching a couple of episodes of “Taskmaster”, and
that Bombay Bad Boy pot noodle has done the trick. I’m going to bed as I
shall lay down there. It hurts to sit right now… |
|
19 June 2026 (Friday)
- Too Hot
As I scoffed my toast
I saw that Ashford is to get a branch of Primark. Is that a good or bad
thing? I don’t really know, but our MP was all over social media this morning
trying to take the credit for it. As I have said so many times before, our
Labour MP is pretty much indistinguishable from his Conservative predecessor
in that all he is ever seen to do is to appear on social media somehow
managing to take the credit for other people’s efforts. Meanwhile the people of Makerfield have elected Andy Burnham to be their MP.
He’ll be Prime Minister within a few months… and facing leadership challenges
of his own within a year. And I rolled my eyes as I read some of the
snake-related Facebook groups. For some random reason Facebook has suggested
I might follow pages about royal pythons. Lovely creatures. I've been following those groups with interest. I used to keep pythons
thirty years ago, and helped run a local reptile
club at the time. Back then reptile keeping was one big argument, and sadly
nothing has changed. Snakes, fish, dogs, Star Trek,
70s bands, geocaching, walking in the woods and now pythons… no matter what
the topic, people just want to argue. I Munzed, and Wordled
from “thing” to “emoji” in four goes. Did you know that today
is Wordle’s
birthday? I took the dogs up to the woods. We walked our usual four-miles
circuit and as we went we didn’t see anyone else at all.
Treacle waded in several swamps… it was a tad warm when we started,
and was far too hot when we ended. But we managed to walk most of the
way in the shade, and Treacle found several puddles in which she cooled off. We came home for a cuppa. I loaded up the car
with a bootful of rubbish, then turned the tyres
over and got another coat of primer onto them. And then I took my bootful of rubbish to the tip. It was rather hot as I
drove. Bearing in mind the local tip has been closed
for redevelopment for months I was rather surprised to find it pretty much *exactly*
the same as it ever was. The only discernible difference was that the various
skips were rather more full than they ever used to
be. And with boot emptied I came home, I spent a
little while pulling weeds, then settled by the pond and read my Kindle for a
bit until it cooled down a bit. When it wasn’t roasting
I ran round the garden with the lawn mower. The lawn had reached that length when
it could conceal a smaller dog’s turd, and I’d rather see them than be
navigating a potential minefield. And with lawn mowed
I voomed round the gravelled areas with the garden
vacuum. That made me sweat. I had a quick shower, and bunged a washload in. “er indoors TM” boiled up ribs and
chips for dinner which we scoffed whilst watching more “Taskmaster”. Part
of me wants to go out and paint those tyres. The instructions on the tin said
to let the primer dry for six hours and it’s had seven… |
|
20 June 2026
(Saturday) - Rather Busy
I
had something of a restless night last night, and
eventually nodded off just before the alarm went off. Being woken by the
alarm - there’s a novelty. I
made toast and had my usual look at the Internet. This morning there was
quite a bit of talk about the Geocaching Association of Great Britain (the
GAGB). Despite its rather impressive name, the GAGB has absolutely
no formal standing with geocaching.com whatsoever and is pretty much unknown to
the wider community of those who rummage under rocks for errant film pots. Back
in the days when the Internet was young the GAGB started its life as one of
those internet forums in which people used to bicker constantly before
Facebook was invented. It tried to make the transition to social media, but therein lay its problem. It was an internet
forum and pretty much nothing else. Its membership is basically those who
have subscribed to its newsletter. Over the years several friends have
suggested that I stood for their committee, but what put me off was that
during the fourteen years that I’ve been asking, no one (least of all other committee members) seemed to be able
to tell me what they actually did, and I’ve only ever heard from them when
they wanted votes in their committee elections. It would seem that they’ve now gone belly-up. I
Munzed, Wordled from “night”
to “drake” on the last attempt. Steve was on the radio doing the “Guess
the Lyrics” competition. He said this one was easy: “Theres a rumour
going round the town that you don’t want me around”. It might be easy for
some… it wasn’t for me. I
got dressed – putting on the same clothes that I wore yesterday. They’d been
washed yesterday evening and had dried in the heat overnight. Being Saturday we went round to Dog
Club where we had a rather good session. I counted eighteen dogs but it was difficult to be sure. Treats were shared, squabbles
were squabbled, a typical Dog Club really. “er
indoors TM” went off to craft club, and as I drove home
Steve was doing the Mystery Year competition… When did the Pope come to
Canterbury, and when did Genesis release “Paper Lace”? I knew that one –
1982. Once
home I emptied the dishwasher. The thing has been playing up lately; the
glass isn’t sparkling like it used to. I’d topped up the rinse aid and the
salt, and used non-cheapo tablets, but still the glass needed a rinse under the
tap afterwards. I suspect the dishy needs replacing. I
got another coat of paint onto those tyres. We’re on to the masonry paint
now. The masonry paint seemed to go on rather quicker than the primer;
despite a serious shaking-up it seemed to be rather thinner. And with the
tyres painted I fiddled and farted about for the four hours it said to leave
between coats. It was then that I struck on the genius idea of getting a
stick and stirring the stuff. When you stirred it (as opposed to shaking)
it was considerably thicker. “er
indoors TM” came home from
craft club and we drove down to Brookland where there was a meet-up of local
geocachers going on. As we walked into the pub garden
so the normal people’s dogs kicked off, and our three totally ignored them. I
felt rather smug. It was good to catch up with friends… even if we had
met up with most of them only a week ago. We
came home, and were soon joined by Chris, Steve and Sarah. We sat in the
garden for a while and got out the 3-D Blokus. I offered
sage advice (!) for the first game, and then
won the second. We
came inside where despite a rather promising start I came last in “Game of
Life” and I amazed everyone (not least of
which myself) with a rather impressive winning score in “Ticket To Ride”. Today
had been rather busy… and I’ve covered about half the steps that I’ve done
every other day this week. |
|
21 July 2026 (Sunday)
- Rather Dull
It
was a hot night, not helped by the dogs all laying in a straight line only allowing
me about eight inches along the edge of the bed. They all looked most
indignant when I hoiked them over (several times). I
eventually gave in and got up at eight o’clock. I had a plan for an early dog
walk, but it was already too hot. I
made toast and peered into the Internet. This morning’s petty squabble was on
one of the pond-related Facebook groups in which quite a few people were
bending over backwards to show they didn’t have the faintest idea about how
to tell the difference between a tench and a
goldfish. And
a friend got married yesterday. I say “a friend”; she’s on my Facebook
friends list, but I don’t recognise the name or the face. I wonder who she
is? I
Munzed, Wordled from “eight”
to “alibi” via “spiny” and “flick”,
and got dressed. Last
Sunday we went for a short walk round Frittenden
following a geocaching Adventure Lab. I did have a vague plan to do one of
those today – a little half-hour walk. Yesterday we met
friends at a geo-meet; there was one of those in Sussex today. Yesterday we’d
also had a great time at Dog Club and with friends round in the evening. But
by the time I’d scoffed toast it was two degrees hotter than that in which
I’d have been happy to take the dogs out. Being far too hot to do anything
much we sat in the garden (under an umbrella) and had a rather dull
day. I got a couple more coats of paint onto my tyres, and in between
painting I alternated between crossword puzzles and my latest waste of time –
“Meowduko”
which is actually rather harder than you might
think. And “er indoors TM” boiled up a rather good ploughman’s lunch so the day wasn’t a
total write-off.. In
between “Daddies’ Little Angel TM” sent messages and “My Boy TM” visited,
both in honour of today being Father’s Day. Back in
the day Father’s Day used to be a big thing… |
|
22 July 2026 (Monday)
- Too Hot
Another
hot and restless night, but I managed to stay in my pit until seven o’clock
which was a minor result. I made toast and had a look at the Internet. It was
still there. This
morning my Facebook feed was filled with adverts for pubs and beer festivals.
Quite a few of them, but the closest being a hundred and twenty miles away. Getting
adverts for shops and services half-way across the country is a regular
occurrence on Facebook. Personally I’d never pay to
advertise anything other than a mail-order business on there. You’d
think that the software would somehow be able to target the marketing a
little better. I
Munzed; our guild had reached the second of our
monthly targets. And we made an early start on our walk today. I had a plan
to get out before it got too hot, but by the time we’d driven a mile the temperature
on my car’s thermometer had gone up by two more degrees. We abandoned the
idea of Kings Wood and went to Orlestone instead. We walked a shorter walk
avoiding swamps and fox poo, but saw far more people
than we usually do on our walks. When
we got home I couldn’t park. I couldn’t reverse into
the space as the idiot driver from Clearabee was
only inches from the back end of my car. I drove forward so he could pass…
only he wouldn’t. He remained inches behind my car. And when I pulled up at the
side of the road he too pulled up. I just sat and waited. Eventually he
reversed and passed, whilst the chap in the passenger seat glared at me. Once
home I made us both a cuppa and heard the news that the Prime Minister has resigned. I can’t pretend to
be a fan of the chap, but he’d achieved quite a bit in his short
time in office. Sadly what he hadn’t done was to entertain
and amuse the masses. As we’d driven to the woods this morning the pundits on
the radio had been talking about how Prime Ministers don’t seem to last any
length of time these days. The blame was put on the fickle electorate who
want to be amused. Look at the success of that idiot Donald Trump who says
black is white and good is bad, and when he can never deliver that which he’s
promised he immediately finds a scapegoat to blame. Or consider the antics of
Boris Johnson… I
Wordled from “guild” to “ovate” in
five goes. “Ovate” means egg-shaped, and I got it randomly as it was
the only word that fitted given the letters I had left. I
marked trainee’s work, I wrote up some CPD (not done
that over the last two weeks’ holiday), and then went to have a look at
just how hot it was in the garden. It
was hot. Too hot to be farting about putting the wishing well together. I
didn’t want to be heaving and sawing in the heat, so I just contented myself by
gently trimming back the jungles coming over the fences from next door. And
with those trimmed I had a little doze, then played some more Meowdoku. I
then announced that it was time to “FEED THE FISH”, not that this came
as any surprise to Treacle. She has a built-in timer when it comes to food.
She knows that half past three is fish feeding time, and
is rarely more than a minute or two off at dinner time and chicken foot time
either. I
voomed round with the watering can,
and then got the hair trimmer out and gave myself a haircut. Speaking
with various people over the weekend it would seem that you
pay over sixteen quid for a short back and slap at the barber’s these days.
Stuff that !! “er
indoors TM” went bowling. I cracked on with the ironing
whilst watching another episode of “The Handmaid’s Tale”. Like
so many other shows it started very well, but now that it’s got to the fourth
season it is fast running out of steam. I’ve
got to go to work tomorrow. That will come as something of a shock… |
|
23 June 2026
(Tuesday) - Via Lucem Continens
I thought I saw flashes of lighting as I
shaved this morning. And I heard rumbles of thunder. And then the torrential
rain hit. I watched another episode of "The Handmaid's Tale" as I scoffed
toast. This morning's episode was an improvement on the one I watched last night;
perhaps I won't give up on it just yet. The trouble is that one of the major
characters is utterly inconsistent in his behaviour. One minute he is an
utter git; the next minute he's the hero of the day. Sometimes that sort of
thing works... but not with Commander
Lawrence. He really does come over as two different characters played by
the same actor. I rather thought that the flashes of lighting
and booms of thunder would have bothered the dogs, but they slept right
through it. And slept through my getting ready for work too. I set off to work; a young lady jogger came
past as I walked to my car. She'd got caught in a downpour and her white
jogging kit had gone transparent. She might as well have been in the nip for
all that she was keeping secret. My car's thermometer said it was twenty
degrees as I set off to work. As I drove the pundits on the radio were talking
about how the border processing area for car passengers going to Europe
through Dover won't be ready in time for the summer
holidays. Why on Earth not? Bearing in mind it is ten
years (to the day) since the Brexit vote when we as a country decided
that this sort of thing was *exactly* what we wanted, how much longer
is this going to take? And there was endless talk about the Prime Minster;
both the one that is going and the one that is coming. It seems to me that
the recent spate of very short terms of premiership that we've been having
lately can't be good for the country. I went to Sainsbury's to get a sandwich. The
old bat who supervises the self-service tills was on duty,
and wasn't at all happy as I emptied all of
my loose change into the machine. And so to work. I'd
not been there for three weeks, but it didn't take long to get back into the
swing of things. I did my bit and came home. Once I’d run
round the garden with a watering can “er indoors TM” boiled
me up a pizza and I went up to the woods. I’d organised a geo-meet in the woods
at “Via lucem continens”
(light walk). This is one of three remaining exhibits of the “Stour
Valley Arts” project in Kings Wood. The brainchild of Łukasz
Skąpski (artist, professor, and head of the Department of Photography
at the School of Painting and New Media of the Academy of Fine Arts in
Szczecin), it is two avenues of yew trees which line a clearing which is
about a hundred metres long. Standing at the stone at the eastern end (the
one on which I frequently get the dogs to pose for photos), the twin
avenues of yew trees supposedly frame the setting sun on midsummer’s eve. Or that was the plan when it was planted in
1999. I wanted to find out if it really did. The original plan was that it would be an evening
dog walk, but it was far too hot, which was a shame. My car’s thermometer
said it was thirty-eight degrees as I set off. Leaving “er indoors TM” and
the dogs I went up to the woods. I had a little walk about, and shortly after
eight o’clock I made my way to the clearing. Nine of us turned out and chatted… and (would
you believe it) the sun did set at the end of the twin column of yew
trees. It would have looked a lot better if the trees had been pruned
somewhat… but we had a good meet up. I
took a few photos. We left at the point when the sun had gone
below the tree line. I understand some people arrived after we’d gone… |
|
24 June 2026
(Wednesday) - The Heatwave Continues
It
was a hot night; I didn’t sleep very well. I was awake for much of the night.
I gave up trying to sleep, got up and watched a rather dull episode of “The
Handmaid’s Tale” in which pretty much nothing happened. I
Wordled from “early” to “queer” in
four goes then had a little look at the Internet. It was still there. There
wasn’t much kicking off; I was probably too early for any nonsense. I Munzed, got ready for work and set off wondering where
I’d left my car last night. I
eventually found it in Christchurch Road. As
I drove off the car's thermometer was two and a half degrees up on what it
had said at the same time yesterday. I went up the motorway listening to
the pundits on the radio talking about how the Met Office had released a red
warning about the heat. It was claimed that this was only the second red
warning about heat that the Met Office have
ever issued. There
was also talk about when (not if) Andy Burnham becomes Prime Minister
and how he’s planning to chuck the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves
out on her arse. Is that unreasonable? A new Prime Minister really should
choose his own team rather than take the team over from someone who has himself
been hoiked out on his arse (shouldn't he?). Personally I can't help but
think that a Prime Minister should be called "Andrew" rather
than "Andy", but when you consider that (judging on
recent performances) he too will be out on his arse in a year or so, does
it really matter? I
stopped off at Sainsburys to get a sandwich. I had a minor episode with the
self-service machine. As I filled it with loose change the machine rejected all
the foreign coins that I'd fed into it. I didn't realise that I had quite so
many foreign coins. They must come from the Dog Club pot. I count up the money in that pot, pocket it and pay that
amount into the field owner's bank account. So once
I've transferred the money and then found a foreign coin, it's me that's been
swizzed. I shall look at the coins a bit more carefully this weekend. I
spent some time this morning doing training on the new blood transfusion computer
system today. The chap doing the training knew I used to keep snakes... I
wonder who told him that? And I spent much of the afternoon being trained on
the latest developments in rivaroxiban and apixiban assays. Back
in the day the reps doing these training sessions used to bring cakes. And
an ex-trainee was visiting... it was odd. I can distinctly remember this chap
being rather shorter than me; now he towers over me. In the fifteen years
since I last saw him he has grown about nine inches...
Or I’ve shrunk. It
was ridiculously hot as I came home. We did “FEED THE FISH” and I
played Meowdoku until “er indoors TM” boiled
up sausages and chips which we scoffed whilst watching the latest season of “Canal
Boat Diaries”. And we had a decent bit of pudding too. As I came home the
League of Fiends (!) shop at the hospital was selling punnets of
raspberries. I
feel rather washed out – I blame the heat. Apparently today was the
UK’s hottest
ever June day. |
|
25 June 2026
(Thursday) - Still Too Hot
Apart
from Bailey having a coughing fit in the small hours I had a good night,
sleeping through until eight o’clock despite the heat. I
made toast and had a look at the Internet. It was still there, and much the
same as ever. This morning my Facebook feed was seemingly filled with suggestions
that I might follow the rantings of various Reform UK councillors. Most of
the ones I was presented with had seemingly Polish or Asian names or were
ex-Conservatives… Bearing in mind that many of the issues that Reform UK rant
about can be traced back to the previous Conservative government and that
they are making scapegoats of anyone who isn’t white British, what is it that
I am missing here? Not
that the current government is a model of perfection. Nor are any of the
other parties. More and more I find myself agreeing
and disagreeing with all of the political parties in
equal amounts. I’m reminded of an interview with David Steele (who was the
leader of the Liberal party) in which he said that he only agreed with
about twenty per cent of the Liberal party’s policies, but he agreed with
more of their policies than those of any other party. And
I saw an advert for the London Craft Beer Festival. Apparently
your ticket covers the cost of all the beer you can drink. At sixty-four quid
a ticket that’s about twelve pints… I suppose they are talking London prices? I
took the dogs out before it got too hot. We went to Orlestone where we walked
a rather short walk… the very same walk which used to be our standard walk
when Fudge was with us. Oh that dog used to straggle
behind. We took our time today, and even spending five minutes chatting with other
dog walkers we were done in less than half an hour. Back in the day it used
to take Fudge an hour to do that walk. We
came home where Treacle had a bath. She found a swamp and a water-filled
ditch whist we were out. I hung out the laundry I’d put in
to scrub, ironed a couple of shirts whilst they were still wet, and
had a look at the monthly accounts. Every month I count up
and account for every penny I’ve spent, and every month I end up mildly
depressed about it. I’m far from skint, but could be
a whole lot better off. I
Munzed, and Wordled from
“until” through “unite” to “unity”. I made a rather good
first choice there. I wrote up some CPD. “er
indoors TM” went off visiting
relatives. I settled in front of the telly and watched a film. I first saw “Breaking Glass” one afternoon in
1980 when I should have being doing games at school,
but I bunked off and saw it with a friend (who now has a PhD). I can
remember seeing it about twelve years ago when it prompted me to get a
saxophone. I
then watched a fan-made Star Trek episode. Clearly a lot of
time, effort and money had gone into the show. I hesitate to say it was
tripe… but it wasn’t good. We
did “FEED THE FISH” and got the washing in, and those five minutes in
the sun were quite enough. Yesterday had been the hottest June day in the UK,
but today was hotter. I
played more Meowdoku until “er indoors TM” came
home. Being rather late in the day she got some KFC which we scoffed whilst
watching more “Canal Boat Diaries”. I can’t help but think that living
on a canal boat right now would be ideal – I could just jump in. It’s gone
nine o’clock and it is still ridiculously hot… |
|
26 June 2026 (Friday)
- Still Far Too Hot
I
had a better night than I might have had with this heat, and despite the bin
men making their usual early morning racket I stayed in my pit until nearly
eight o’clock. I
did have a vague idea to get up early and go chasing for First To Find on a puzzle geocache that went live yesterday
which I solved yesterday but it was too hot to go out then. But someone else
had had the same idea, and having got up at five o’clock they’d found the
thing two hours before I got up. I
made toast and had a little look at the internet. Someone with whom I used to
work was having a birthday today. I sent out birthday wishes. And I rolled my
eyes. One
thing which has boiled my piss about the current heatwave is that Facebook is
filled with postings about how we should all keep dogs inside, and about how
cruel it is to walk dogs in this heat. I suppose the underlying sentiment is
admirable, but the posts are all very passive-aggressive, clearly from people
who know absolutely nothing about dogs, and are pretty much all from people
who post anonymously as they are too cowardly to put their names to what they
are saying. I tried telling my three that they couldn’t have a walk this
morning, and they weren’t having any of it. They all stood by the door and
whined. So we went to Orlestone rather earlier than we
might have done. We walked about a quarter of the distance we usually cover,
with pretty much no hills and pretty much all in the shade. Morgan and Bailey
managed to find fresh fox poo, and Treacle found a water-filled ditch. After
half an hour and a mile and a half we got back to the car at about the sort
of time we would usually start our walk. We
came home. Yesterday “er indoors TM” came
home with a packet of croissants. We had one with jam and a cuppa. I Munzed; Our Munzee Guild has hit the last of our monthly
targets, and we got all our rewards. I Wordled from
“night” through “trace” to “acute”. I wrote up some CPD. I wrote to my MP
about the hose pipe ban which is supposedly coming into effect next week. Ironically I wrote to him last year about the floods near
Asda when he achieved nothing, so my hopes aren’t high. I
then spent a little while fighting with my lap-top.
My email provider had upgraded their website recently, and like pretty much
every IT upgrade I’ve ever seen, rather than improving matters, the upgrade
left the thing utterly unable to function in any way at all. Eventually I managed
to get it working… deleting browsing history and cookies did the trick… until
I tried to log in again later. Bearing
in mind the heat was supposed to subside a
little tomorrow (and I’m working on Sunday) I popped over the road to
get some beer for an afternoon in the garden. I wasn’t the only person to
have that idea… why do so many people have to take the entire family whenever
they go shopping? Does it really need six people to stand round watching one
person actually buying stuff? And
then I popped up the road to the other shop to get ice cream. Each little
corner shop has its specialty… I was reminded of my grandmother who would
spend an entire day shopping getting supplies from a dozen different shops. And
then I ran round the garden. I cleared the dog turds, cleaned out the pond
filter and voomed about with the watering can. The
snapdragons are looking rather good. We
had a rather good curry for dinner which we devoured whilst watching more “Canal
Boat Diaries”…
we’ve found a canal boat hire company which takes up to three dogs…
Personally I think taking the hounds on a boat is a recipe for disaster, but
what do I know? And
when fetching the bins back earlier, “er indoors TM” found
a tenner in the front garden. That was a result. |
|
27 June 2026
(Saturday) - Dog Club and Board Games
It
was a hot night. Morgan was whimpering and crying in the small hours, and
once he settled so the thunderstorm hit. After a while “er indoors TM” remembered
she’d left the skylight in the attic room open. Woops. I
got up at seven o’clock, made toast and had a look at the Internet. It was
still there. It usually is. Apparently there was a
big public meeting in Hastings yesterday to discuss renovations and
improvements to the amenities around the sea front. Sadly
what none of those in the meeting seemed to realise is that all of the amenities aren’t in public ownership. If the
owner of a putting green or a boating lake chooses not to spend a small
fortune on doing it up (for no financial gain) then no amount of
public rancour will change anything. Especially when those expressing the
rancour don’t actually spend any of their money in
the amenity they want doing up. I blame Margaret
Thatcher. It was patently obvious that taking anything out of public
ownership and making it a profit-making business is going to stop whatever it
is having its primary purpose as whatever it was supposed to be. Look at the
current mess of the country’s trains and water supply. I
Munzed,and Wordled. “While” was a silly word with which to
start. So I tried “start” which gave me the
first letter. “Scuff” gave me the first two letters, and I got it on
the fourth attempt with “scoop” for the simple reason that I couldn’t
think of any other word that might have fitted. As
I strained my brain Steve was doing the “Guess the Lyrics” competition
on the radio. He gave the clue that it was from the seventies. “Let that
feeling grab you deep inside and send you reeling where your love can’t hide”.
I recognised it as being “Let Your Love Flow” but I had to look
on the internet to find out who sang it. It was the Bellamy Brothers. Being
Saturday we drove round to Repton and Dog Club. Attendance was down; we only
had a dozen dogs along. I blame the heat. But a good time was had by all; even
if there was a lot of eating of grass going on. As
we drove home so Steve was doing the Mystery Year on the radio. There were
several songs which gave me flashbacks of the Open University summer school.
And “Something Good” by Utah Saints?
1992. We
came home. We had a cuppa and a doughnut and I counted up the Dog Club money, pocketed it and transferred
that amount into the Repton’s people’s bank account. This time I made sure there
was no foreign coins in there. Chris
came round and we sat in the garden playing on “the board” which is not entirely unlike the
Infinity Table. I
took a few photos as we played. It was rather good… |
|
28 June 2026 (Sunday)
- Working, Crosswords, Stuff
I
woke feeling full of energy and raring to go… at twenty to two. I didn’t get back
to sleep after that as it was a hot and sultry night. I eventually gave up
trying to sleep and got up. I watched another episode of “The Handmaid’s
Tale” … bearing in mind premise of this show is an uncaring state
forcefully taking children from their mothers (sound familiar!?) I’m
finding this rather hard going at times. I
set off to work. As I drove the talk on the radio was of a religious nature
this morning (what with it being a Sunday). There was an interesting article
about religious freedoms in America in which it was suggested that the
biggest threat to religious freedom was the exponents of those advocating a
competing religion to your own one. Two senior bishops of different churches
came on, and there was an embarrassing five minutes in which both bishops
flatly refused to let the other say a word. Both claimed that they were being
shut down (which they were) and both claimed that they were tolerant
of others (which they weren’t). As
I drove there was an inordinate amount of groups of
cyclists; both pedal ones and motor ones. I always thought that pedal bikes
were banned from having organised road races, but they seem to do them with
annoying regularity. I
drove through Pembury this morning as I had a few minutes before work. I
spent a few minutes looking for a geocache along the main road. I eventually found
it. I hesitate to say that it was buried in someone’s front garden, but it was
buried in someone’s front garden. And
I got petrol. In the past the petrol in Pembury has been about eight pence
per litre more expensive than that in Ashford. Today it was five pence per
litre cheaper. One thing which puzzles me is how petrol prices go up and down
so regularly and vary so much within such short distances. The sweetie bars,
sandwiches and chocolate that the petrol stations sell are all the same price
everywhere, so why does the price of petrol go up and down? I
went in to work where I had a rather hard time of it. Such is life. But I was
only working a half day today and so was soon on the way home. As I drove home I tuned to Radio Four Extra as they were playing a
dramatization of the Secret Diary of Adrian Mole. What I heard of it was
rather entertaining. It was a shame that for most f
the time I was listening to silence as the signal kept cutting out. I’ve
mentioned before that either DAB radio is a disappointment, or the one in my
car needs replacing. I
got home where it was too hot to take the dogs out. Nowhere near as hot as it
has been recently, but still too hot. And all the normal people come swarming
out at the weekend and I really didn’t fancy dealing with them today. So we sat in the garden and I
struggled with a crossword puzzle. One clue really had me foxed. “Daunting,
Formidable (8) A - - - - O – E”. I can’t *really* be “arsehole”
(can it)? We
did “FEED THE FISH”, I ran round with the watering can, and Treacle was
threatened with having her buzzer collar put on. When she barks the thing
vibrates uncomfortably. The idea is that if she didn’t bark at absolutely
everything then it wouldn’t vibrate. Usually the threat of the thing is enough to
shut her up, and the threat worked. We
had a rather good bit of dinner and watched more “Canal Boad Diaries”
in which our hero was having aggro with sunken trees. The
more I watch this show, the more I’m getting the impression that canal boating
is quite a bit of arse-ache. We’ll probably still have a go at some stage
though… |
|
29 June 2026 (Monday)
- A Walk, More Tyres, Aching
I
slept through till seven o’clock this morning which was something of a
result. I made toast and had a look at the Internet as I do. It was rather
quiet this morning… someone had posted on Facebook that they’d seen a large
black cat (non-moggy) near Tunbridge Wells. I wonder what it
was. I once saw a very large black cat walking across a field
near Hawkhurst, but that was twenty years ago. Photos of panthers look very
like what I saw – I’m not saying it was a panther
but it certainly wasn't someone's moggy. I
took the dogs up to Kings Wood. As we drove the pundits on the radio were
talking about the immediate ascension of Andy Burnham. There was precious
little fact, but endless speculation. We
got to the woods to find some woman washing her smalls in the car park. I smiled
at her and asked if she’d camped overnight. She said she had, and that it was
a lovely place to camp. We
walked our usual walk. Treacle found four swamps. Bailey rolled in something
foul. After four miles we came back to the car park to find the campers were
cooking their breakfast. They seemed happy enough. I can’t help but wonder
how Forestry England are going to enforce the proposed parking charges on
people only stopping for an hour or so when other people are camping
overnight with impunity. We
came home. The girls had a bath. I made a cuppa for me and “er indoors TM”, Wordled from “slept” to “crude”
in four goes, Munzed, then went out again. I needed a Stanley knife. Against my better
judgement I went to B&Q where (for once) I got what I needed with
no fuss. From there I drove round to the Repton
centre. Over the weekend we’d heard third-hand rumours
that there had been complaints about the Dog Club. It turned out that there hadn’t
been, and all was fine. Or as fine as could be expected for Saturday mayhem. I
came home and with the heatwave gone I cracked on in the garden. I got on
with my wishing well project. Toady’s plan was to get the uprights into
place. That involved cutting some holes in the tyres I painted the other day, and sticking the uprights through those holes. Have
you ever tried to cut a hole in a tyre? Whenever
you hear mention of someone having had their tyres slashed, I’d seriously
question it. It took all of my effort to force a brand new Stanley knife into the tyre, and it took
sustained effort to get the knife to actually go
through. And as for any actual cutting… I eventually got six holes cut, sawed
the uprights to size, and got them in place. Flushed
with success I then started sawing the wood for the roof into shape… and I
had a minor hiccup. Somehow I’d lost a bit of wood.
A bit that was two and a half metres long. I wonder where that had gone? It
didn’t take *that* long to nip over to Wickes to get another. And
equipped with all the timber I need (I think), I sawed it all to size
and gave the new stuff a coat of wood stain. We
did “FEED THE FISH” , I voomed
round with the watering can and suddenly it was four o’clock and my step
count for half the day was double what it had been for Saturday and Sunday
combined. I
made a cuppa for “er indoors TM” and
myself, and realised just how much pain I was getting
from my right elbow. I’d certainly overdone it with the cutting of the tyres. The
wishing well is nearly together. It just needs the roof to be built … I’ll do
that later in the week when I can take my time over it. “er
indoors TM” boiled up a rather good bit of dinner then
went off bowling. I turned on the telly and it
suggested a film I might like. “Downton
Abbey; The Grand Finale” was rather good but I got the impression
that the writers had forgotten what had gone before in that show. The plot
was all about the great scandal of Lady Mary having got divorced… this was
the same Lady Mary who in the third episode of the show porked
the Turkish attaché to death. I would have thought that after porking the Turkish attaché to death, getting a divorce
would have been rather trivial, but what do I know – times were different
back then. |
|
30 June 2026
(Tuesday) - Cheap Plonk
I
woke feeling full of beans and raring to go... at half past one. I then lay
awake for much of the rest of the night before giving up and getting up just
before five o'clock. I
made toast and watched an episode of "The Handmaid's Tale"
in which I got scouting flashbacks. Rather than talking, the lead character
of the show was doing this arty-acting-thing where she was
supposedly communicating her feelings by pouting and smiling and looking
wistfully at the camera. Back in the day when I was a Cub Scout leader one
of “My Boy TM”'s contemporaries
used the same technique to communicate. Rather than speaking, he would go up
to someone and grimace. He seriously expected people to know what he wanted
simply by pulling strange faces at them, and his success at communication was
on a par with her in the TV show this morning. And
with telly watched I got another coat of woodstain
onto the wood which I sawed yesterday, then set off for work. It
was a shame that I'd forgotten that there were traffic works in Chart Road,
but they only delayed me by ten minutes. I was soon on my way up the motorway
listening to the pundits on the radio who were spouting their usual brand of
drivel as they do. There was so much talk about Andy Burnham. At the moment he really can do no wrong... it will only be
a matter of time before he is out on his arse like all the rest. And
there was a lot of talk about a national review of midwifery. Some woman from some pressure group or other was being
interviewed. She really boiled my piss when she referred to babies that had
been "killed by the NHS". Was she seriously saying that
health care professionals were going out of their way to cause harm? That was
the message that I got. Admittedly the NHS isn't perfect, but giving air-time to this sort of ranting does absolutely nothing
for staff morale, does it? I
popped in to Sainsburys to get lunch
, then went into work. Earlier than I might have done. I spent quite a
bit of time teaching one of the trainees the mysteries of blood film
morphology, but as the day wore on the bad night's sleep did weigh on
me. I
walked out of work past the hospital’s league of fiends (!) shop who
were again knocking out fruit. I got a punnet of strawberries from them, and took a diversion to Aldi to get some cream. Coming
home was hard work. The motorway was seemingly full of idiots trying to
constantly tail-end everyone. I remembered not to drive down Chart Road, but
not doing so took me through the town centre… I was only twenty minutes late
home. I
got another coat of woodstain onto my sawn wood,
and we watched the last episodes of “Canal Boat Diaries” as we scoffed
dinner. We washed it down with a bottle of plonk; we got a job lot of cheap
plonk. At three quid a bottle it wasn’t at all bad. We’ve paid far more for
far worse… And
those strawberries were rather good too. |
