Sunday, 2nd July, 2023
Glorious Summer’s morning after a hot and humid night with a wonderful almost full moon. Back to garden watering this morning. My friend, Kevin, is off to Benidorm for the fourth time this year already and Summer has really arrived there.
He has had quite patchy weather previously but this week, it will be perfect. I envy him that but not the location. If only Lancashire could be like this..
Yesterday, I was proudly showcasing produce from my garden and, this morning, my Memory Box threw up this from 2010 in my Greek kitchen. Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.
Be quite nice to be reading the Sunday Times on our patio and under our pergola this morning but … it’s not to be. There are other things to look forward to.
Monday, 3rd July, 2023
Lovely morning again. Going for an early walk. Had an absolutely terrible day yesterday – the worst for a long time. Agonisingly tired all day from the moment I got up until I went to bed. Sweating profusely. Skin itching. Very emotional. I had to fight all day to do my exercise and fight back my emotions. Nearly lost!
Today, after my walk, I am driving to the Royal Sussex Cancer Centre in Brighton and The Macmillan Centre. This is a dummy run. We have been warned by friends and medics that the journey is a nightmare and parking is even worse. I am given a ‘free parking’ pass but, if the small carpark is full, I will have a real problem.
Well, the drive down was better than expected – about 40 mins with reasonable traffic at 10.30 am. Brighton is an amalgam of the old, 19th century glory and the brand, spanking new which a rich city can afford. The medical centres are no different.
The Cancer Centre is state-of-the-art and leading facility in the country. Having walked past the old and gulped, the new is really impressive and the support is wonderful. Even the coffee bar and restaurant is airport style.
I was greeted warmly and really reassured by the service. I have to go for a CT scan in Brighton towards the end of the month which will tell me how well the hormone treatment is working and tell the radiographers where to target the beam when I go for my next stage of treatment which should be towards the end of August and just after I come back from Athens. Let’s hope that it turns out to be worth it!
Tuesday, 4th July, 2023
A warm night and the early morning has brought light, sporadic rain. We currently need heavy rain and we are grateful for anything.
With the hot, humid weather we have been having for weeks and my consistent watering, everything is growing like mad. I am being threatened by a glut of lettuces, endive and courgette. The first meals are great – fresh, clean produce from the garden – but you can have too much of a good thing. On the plus side, all this lettuce is helping me to lose weight and get back towards normal.
Just got to get on with life while it gets on with me. Not going to be messed about by anyone. At 9.30am, the sun is out now and I’m going out for a long walk. As we drove home from Brighton yesterday, our Gym Machine Service Engineer texted to say he could arrive a day early. Fantastic! He arrived ten minutes after we got home and fixed the problem in 20 mins. Makes me feel totally inadequate. Today we’ve got a plumber coming to fix a small leak under one of the bathrooms’ basins. Should be simple for an expert. At one time, I might have attempted it myself but, these days, I’d rather an expert did it for me.
Today, I am going to spend a second bout of time on something I am quite good at – investing money. I have most of our ‘fixed’ investment accounts coming to maturity this month and it is a really interesting time in the financial markets. A lot of our money will be coming out of ‘fixes’ just under 3% and I can now get fixes at around double that. I’m looking at Investec Bonds at 5.85% for a 3-year fix. This is important if you have money you can do without for 3 years because rates, while not quite at peak yet, are not far off.
I will take this but the problem with it is that we will go well over the unearned income allowance for 2 people of £2,000.00 per year so we will definitely pay a lot of tax on it this year. The one way to mitigate that is to take out ISAs which are tax-free. Everyone went off ISAs because the rates were so low. Now, they are back with a bang and I have selected Virgin Money 3-yr fix at 5.2%.
These are rates only dreamed of for the past decade and to get them fixed for 3 years is a real bonus. The downside is, I can only put £40,000.00 in now and have to wait until April before I can put another £40,000.00 in.
Fixed rates do allow withdrawals but a penalty accompanies that so I will need to put some into a rainy day/easy access account. I can even do that at 4.25% at the moment. Mark my words, these rates will seem fantastic in a couple of years time when all around us they are falling for new money. Happy days!
Wednesday, 5th July, 2023
Torrential rain over night. Wonderful to hear. This morning the world looks fresher and cleaner. The lawns are already greening back up. Warm and dry as we went out early to Worthing. My in-house tailor has been struggling to maintain the integrity of my suit jacket sleeves with its 4-button vent. I suggested from the outset that we farm it out to a private concern but she wanted to do it herself. It is so long winded and difficult that I have won the battle and I found a company last night which will do it for us urgently.
I decided to be there early in order to get it done and I was proved right. The works is down a quaint, 18th century alleyway that would have originally been formed out of fishermen’s cottages some of which are still standing. Lovely people who have been running it for almost 30 years. They are snowed under and were, initially, reluctant to take it on at short notice but a little charm and a bit of cash go a long way and it will be ready for Saturday.
We have lived here for 7 years now and walked down the main street at the end of the alleyway without ever noticing it. There are lots of little concerns down here including a bakery, an ‘alternative’ jewellers and one which might interest my little sister who lives about 5 miles away. She is mad as a hatter and has been Vegan for years. Can’t be many places specialise in services for lunatics but this is one.
We eat Pesto so often that my in-house chef make lots of it at home. If you’ve ever bought a commercial jar of ‘Pesto’ and tried it, you may never eat it again but, trust me, home-made pesto is a totally different and infinitely superior thing. I grow the Basil in the garden and Pauline makes copious amounts of pesto with it. Last year I grew lots of Basil but less this year for a reason.
Pesto is made from Basil, Pine Nuts, Garlic, Parmesan Cheese and Olive Oil. These ingredients are all blended together and can be stored frozen. That’s exactly what my chef does. We are just finishing 2021 pesto and starting last years.
Today, we did a stock check before harvesting Basil for this year. We still have over 100 portions left. Chef knows the amount of pesto we are allowed in our calorie controlled diet each meal and portions it up for freezing. Today chef will be harvesting, chopping and freezing a field of Parsley and then make the first batch of 2023 Pesto. This evening, Dinner will be Roast salmon with Pesto Crust and Green salad from the garden. Got to finish my Gym session first.
Thursday, 6th July, 2023
A really lovely morning with blue sky and sunshine and high humidity again. The garden is at that perfect state on the pivot between full grown and over blown. As August develops, plants will start to go over, become overgrown and turning to seed and thoughts will turn to Autumn. The Child in the Grave. A theme for life. From Cradle to Grave.
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
Ecclesiastes
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted …
Today is Cosmos Day for me although they have been flowering for weeks and will go on until the frosts. They will be approaching their best in the next couple of weeks.
Hot, sunny weather and a good drink brings most things to fruition – even me – and that’s what these Mixed-Colour Cosmos are showing this morning.
Whatever you think of the advance of New Technology and however it frightens you, it is essential to embrace it. Otherwise, you will be increasingly left behind. You only have to look at the closure of Bank branches, the reduction of Post Offices, the closure of Rail Ticket Offices, the increasing access of Government services on-line, the way Health services from the NHS are to be rationalised through on-line delivery with remote consultations, etc, to know that you just cannot afford to be left behind.
Today, a new social media facility has started to challenge Twitter. I communicate with lots of people on Twitter every day but, recently it has become uncomfortable with the ownership of Elon Musk and now, Facebook/Instagram have launched a new platform called Threads. I have downloaded it this morning and will trial it during the day. See you on Threads! Well, maybe not you!
I drive a Honda CRV Self-Charge Hybrid car. I have been demanding of Honda that they upgrade this model to a Plug-in Hybrid but the biggest drawback of all is the Range that is possible between charges. I want to drive around Europe without having to search for and spend hours waiting for my car to re-charge.
Well, this morning, Toyota have announced the holy grail. They have developed a new battery that will allow me to drive London to Milan – a drive I have done many times – before needing to re-charge and that re-charge will only take 10 mins. I won’t necessarily be buying a Toyota but I will be personally demanding Honda produce the same.
Friday, 7th July, 2023
Gorgeously hot and sunny morning. Not a cloud in the sky. Poor night’s sleep again. Up early. I’m going to the Beautician’s. Not personally, of course, but I am chauffeuring. My next door neighbour texted me this morning to ask permission if he can mow his lawn. I have been regrowing it for him because it had almost totally died. I went to have a look this morning and it is lush, green and long. Just right for its first cut. He is delighted and I am relieved.
The day just got hotter as it developed. We reached 28C/83F at peak and I both gardened and walked in it. Kevin was sea swimming in Benidorm and the temperature was just a little warmer but not much. Julie was only 18C/65F but was delighted her car had passed its MOT. What is an MOT? I’ve never had one. John R is out cycling in 26C/79F and even Wales was dry.
Lovely to pick beans for our Dinner. They are producing quite a yield. Good job I love them. It is 9 years ago today that we sold our Greek home. It was a screamingly hot night – in the 30sC/90sF – at 9.00 pm in the evening in the office of our friend, Elerania Milliotie, the Notary.
Unlike any transaction of a house sale in UK where solicitors exchange monies electronically into Bank Accounts, we were paid for our Greek house in cash – hundreds of thousands of bank notes which we were expected to count out in front of our purchasers who were paying us. I found the whole thing rather embarrassing, almost demeaning but the reason was that our buyers didn’t want the tax authorities to know how much they were paying us and so would have to pay tax on it.
Our only problem was converting cash to a Greek bank account entry without being asked where it had come from. Fortunately, we had spent time cultivating workers in the Bank of Greece and the Piraeus Bank who looked kindly on us and passed the transactions through with a blind eye. We stayed in the house for a week after the sale as we packed up and prepared for the drive home. We felt fortunate to have had the opportunity to buy and own the land, to design and have the house built and live in it for almost 15 years. But we equally felt grateful that we had found a great buyer and we could take our investment home for future use.
It is 7.30 pm. I have just completed my Gym routine. The temperature outside is still 27C/81F and sultry. Air conditioning and a Netflix film tonight. I have walked 10 miles, cut 6 lawns, reseeded a neighbour’s lawn and done a Gym routine. You would expect me to sleep. Testament to the turmoil I am in that I rarely do.
Saturday, 8th July, 2023
Incredibly hot and humid night. The temperature didn’t fall below 20C/68F and it was 23C/74 as we set off for Worthing at 9.00 am. Air conditioning in the bedroom on full. Woke up in the night and was so cold I couldn’t feel my limbs. Not good when you’re going to the loo. Air conditioning on in the car on icy so getting out in town feels like getting off the plane at a Mediterranean airport. My glasses steam up.
Picked up my altered suit. Fantastic quality. Lovely people. So cheap. I will always use them in future. went on to M&S to collect an order and so it was I found myself photographing the Bra displays. Two women went past saying, We’ve heard about men like you. I thought, I bet you haven’t. but I actually said, I’m doing it to show my friends. I don’t think that improved the situation.
Back to do grocery shopping. A lot of our produce is from the garden at the moment. In fact, my heart sinks a bit when I see this in the kitchen. One thing we can’t grow is low calorie frozen yoghurt lollies. I am addicted to them.
We get them in Sainsbury’s. Low calorie, sweet and creamy. What’s not to like? It looks ominously like they are discontinuing this stock.