Sunday, 5th June, 2022
Quite a grey, warm day. This is a dreadful weekend when people like me – atheist, republicans feel angrily outsiders. Well, I was feeling that until so many of my contemporaries shared my sentiments on line. This came from Kevin in Leeds:
and then this came from Kevin in Scotland :
There is absolutely nothing that could bring me to support monarchy. Certainly, it will be good to see the back of the Tories and bring about a rapprochement with Europe.
Fascinating to read reports of Boris Johnson regretting his support for Leave; Daniel Hannan (arch Leaver) now admitting that we should never have left the Single Market and a considerable majority of the British public now thinking the decision to leave was wrong. It is so easy to say I told you so but …. I told you so.
Monday, 6th June, 2022
Grey start and fantastically hot and sunny finish today. Done a 10 mile walk followed by a couple of hours of gardening.
Cut the lawns – maybe for the last time – and tended the beds. Shouldn’t need to buy salad for a few months.
The garden redevelopment is due to start in about 3 weeks time and then we will do a drive into France for a much needed break from the humdrum of life. I’ve booked a starter hotel. Still got to arrange Tunnel crossing.
Tonight, the Tory party decides whether to implode slowly or quickly. Either way, it will happen. Johnson will either be dead or just a dead-man-walking. For Labour, it would be preferable for Johnson to survive. He is a huge vote winner and recruitment sergeant for Labour. Better in place and wounded than out with a new leader.
Tuesday, 7th June, 2022
Well Labour got about the best result they could have hoped for last night. Johnson is mortally wounded but still staggering on to help opposition parties garner disaffected Tory votes. Look forward to the by-elections in the next couple of weeks.
Damp and misty start to the morning. Going to spend a bit of it looking at potential investments to shelter our cash from the ravages of inflation. Looking more for Growth rather than Income although both would be nice. UK Inflation is currently 7.8% and that is almost impossible to outstrip in the short term. The best we can hope for is mitigation. This is about as good as Cash Savings accounts will offer if you ‘fix’ for a year.
The problem is that even paying just £100,000 into it would take us into tax paying which means Cash ISAs would have to be considered instead/as well. ISAs, of course, mean fixing to get even a half decent rate and even then it is rubbish.
The Skipton rate is fairly typical of what is available but each of us can only put in £20,000 per year and that is a 3-year fix. In such a volatile world at the moment, I am extremely reluctant to fix for 3 years. I am also a very (perhaps too) cautious investor. I think that comes with age. We have less time or ability to adjust to losses. This, of course, limits our options as well. A Financial Adviser has drawn my attention to an M&G product. I was investing in them 40 years ago almost before he was born.
Don’t like the look of the 2019 – 2020 year. I wonder what happened there and that’s the Cautious Fund.
Booked a trip to France yesterday for early July but my mind has drifted towards sunshine. I looked at a Greek website and up popped the Sifnos branch of ‘Tesco’ as the ‘supermarket was known.
To be honest with you, Moshka’s Tesco looks better stocked if not as well organised as the local Sussex store.
Wednesday, 8th June, 2022
Lovely sunny and very warm day has turned to rain this afternoon. Managed to get 7 miles in plus a trip to the Garden Centre where we bought dahlias – Dahlegria Sunrise and Moonfire.
plus Osteopermum Tresco Purple and a variety of Nemesias. They should flower through until the Autumn.
That about concludes the plants for this season. Now I’ve got to sort out an automatic watering system for when we are away.
Kevin has come back from Spain and, surprise surprise, tested positive for Covid. I’m not surprised. The world and particularly the UK is behaving as if it is all over. It certainly is not. Our region is experiencing a massive resurgence of infection and the London University Zoe study I am contributing to is predicting another strong wave of infection long even before the Winter months. I still wear a mask in public buildings and hope you do too!
Thursday, 9th June, 2022
Lovely warm and sunny day. All the plants are going to be planted out into the beds. We’re going to have more Basil than a Pesto factory.
Talking to Kevin this morning. He is bored being confined to the house. Christine, his wife, has also got Covid but that is no surprise. Neither are feeling particularly ill. Julie told me this morning that she is still suffering a debilitating Long Covid fatigue which comes in waves and gets worse the more you try to fight it. That is something I’d really dread.
I’m still doing a minimum of 10 miles each day and have done for the past 3 weeks. It is 4 weeks since my operation. Actually I am averaging 11 miles a day recently. The thought of not feeling able to continue doing it appals me.
I’m struggling to find things to watch in the Gym at the moment but a new 4th Series of Borgen – the Danish, Political Thriller was released on the Nexflix platform this week. That will keep me going for the next 8 hours.
Friday, 10th June, 2022
Lovely warm and sunny day. Shopping and lawn cutting early followed by a 10 mile walk. Absolutely exhausted. Spent some time sitting down at my computer. Great cartoon from the Greek newspaper – Ekathimerini today.
You will know, Dear Reader, that the concept of a Pyrrhic Victory is a victory that inflicts such a devastating toll on the victor that it is tantamount to defeat. It neatly sums up the current political position in UK.
You will know also that old men are prone to sentimental thoughts. Kevin & I have spent this morning remembering our glory days as film stars – well, Extras in a television series. Just 51 years ago this Summer, Kevin & I spent a few days doing filming for a television series called Villains. The episode in which we were involved had us on a demonstration. We had to burst out of a van carrying placards to protest against Hare-Coursing (???), getting arrested and being lined up in the police station.
The back story is …
ln September 1969, I had just failed to get the 2x A+ 1x B at A Level results which Newcastle University required for a BA English Lit. and I applied for Teacher Training which is what I had always considered anyway. I was a Roman Catholic boy and was shocked to find I had applied for a C.of E. , Women’s Training College. Within a couple of weeks, I had been interviewed, offered and accepted a place and was preparing to go up to Ripon. My Mother, desperate to make sure l didn’t let myself down, marched me into Burton upon Trent’s finest Gents’ Outfitters where she barked out orders for me to be kitted out as a Gentleman for my College debut. Khaki Slacks, white, pinstriped shirt, mustard yellow cravat and the finest, country jacket in Lovett Green with Magenta Check lines and leather buttons. I had no say in the matter. She insisted although the outfit alone cost almost as much as my term’s fees.
Within days, I had sold the jacket to Nigel and gone down to the Ripon Army & Navy store to buy the green jacket you see in the photo above of us as Extras. It cost about £3.00 and I wore it non-stop for three years. My Mother said it made me look like a Toilet Attendant which made it even more attractive to me. I don’t know about Kevin but I can fly back to Summer 1971 and this scene in the blink of an eye. I remember him and I spending hours sitting on a grassy bank set against a stone wall talking (well listening) to Alun Armstrong telling us funny stories. I can see the room we are pictured in here after being a rowdy group of student protesters coming out of the back of a white van. I remember Kevin throwing a cigarette to the floor when the Sergeant (sitting at the table) ordered him to put it out. Kevin ad-libbed and got paid extra for a speaking part – jammy as ever! I think the ITV series was called Villains.
I know that I thought Alun Armstrong was much older and more experienced than us. Researching it today, I find he is only 4 years older than me! He does have a very lived-in face nowadays but don’t we all? He has certainly had a successful acting career which continues today as he appears in a 3rd Anglo-American comedy series about parenthood called Breeders. I was surprised to find that one of his sons is a well-known television actor called Joe Armstrong who is currently appearing in Gentleman Jack on BBC.
Ted Heath’s Conservatives may have replaced Harold Wilson’s White Heat of Technology administration but nothing could have prepared us for what we are going through now. The Trumpist tactics of Johnson’s three years have been more appalling almost than Thatcher. I’m afraid I find it all too depressing and it makes me feel like a crabby, old man. I don’t know if you know one!
We are having a lot of landscaping work done in our garden over the next few weeks and then setting off to drive through France for a while just staying where we feel like when we get there. Athens in the second half of August … if Easyjet let us … and then Florida in the Autumn. We may go for a couple of months to make the long flight worth it.
Kevin’s got Covid. Chris has got Covid. Nigel’s had Covid. Julie’s suffering from after effects of Covid. We have a massive resurgence of Covid down here at the moment. I used to think, perhaps, I should just get infected and get it over with until I learnt you could be infected multiple times and that doing so could be more likely to result in Long Covid. We are still wearing masks in public buildings in the vain hope of avoiding it. I had 5 days off after my Hernia operation but I have been doing 10 – 11 miles walking each day for just over the last three weeks since. In the past 12 months, I have walked 3740 miles and I’m feeling quite fit but tired.
Saturday, 11th June, 2022
Gorgeously hot and sunny day. Nothing special to do today which feels a waste. We had to go into Rustington to go to Boots. I don’t know if you’ve shopped there recently but it feels like a different century. It also feels fairly run down. I know an Indian conglomerate are bidding to take it over. They’ll have to work hard to bring it up to date. Actually, there is little in store that can’t be bought on-line and delivered next day by Amazon Prime.
Back home and plant watering before the sun burns everything off, a long walk in beautiful conditions. Everyone seems busy … apart from me. On the edge of the Development, the Rugby Ground is hosting a 5-a-side tournament and there are lots of parents and grandparents sitting in the sunshine with picnics and enthusiastic support for their youngsters.
Mr Perpetual Motion, Dr. John Ridley, is busking in Richmond in support of Ukraine. What am I doing? I need a new purpose! You’d have thought that, after 13 years, I’d have come to terms with Retirement but I’m still searching ….. Are you there, Purpose?