Sunday, 5th May, 2024
I was feeling better yesterday although Pauline is not feeling at all well. Did another Covid test after the one two days ago and I genuinely though I might be clear. Absolutely not. Starkly infected so confined to the garden. Had lovely, sympathetic and supportive Whatsapps from Kevin, Julie and John.
I am part of the Left Wing family and have been since teenage days – my reaction to Daily Telegraph, Tory voting parents. My reaction to Roman Catholicism. My academic life has been informed by left wing analysis based in Marxist Dialectical Materialism, a method for the empirical study of social processes in terms of interrelations, development, and transformation. In the 1980s, it was the dominant analytical tool of Historical analysis.
Convention seems to hold that we move Right as we age. I have fought convention like so many educated Boomers and have held true to the Left Wing view of politics and the world. Although we were happy to take a Labour Government – an absence of Tories – the Blair Government never quite did it for us.
Now, after 14 years of the most horrendous Right Wingery, we are on the cusp of a return to sanity and socially directed policies. Policies which serve all the people not just a few. This weekend is a time to celebrate before getting on with the fight to ensure victory later in the year. If that victory comes, it is unlikely to be for one term of 5 years. The Tories are going to be in the wilderness for 10 years at least after this debacle – maybe 15. I could be 88 by the time I let a Tory back in.
It’s not been the most brilliant weekend in Greece but today is Easter Sunday and we wish our Greek friends, Καλό Πάσχα – Happy Easter. They will have been singing and dancing and feasting on spit roast lamb. We will be joining up with them soon to relax in the sun and drink in the culture and atmosphere we have loved for the past 45 years.
Feeling quite emotional tonight as I review the loss of the years. So many things loved and lost over the years. I always believe they can be regained if I am determined enough. We have to go back to Sifnos.
Monday, 6th May, 2024
Talk about things lost over the years, I thought Covid was one of them and isolation was another. I have them both at the moment and I don’t like it.
Today it is cool and …. raining but I just had to get out for a while or I would have gone mad. As you can see, the beach was packed out as it always is on a sunny, Bank Holiday Monday. Back home for porridge and then a Gym session. I know, I’m just so rocknroll.
Talking to College friends this morning, I am constantly amazed how many have or have had cancer and how much older than me so many are – something I didn’t realise at the time. Just as Keith Lowery was buried at the weekend after dying of prostate cancer, I learnt today that DaveW from Bolton – who I’m shocked to find is 75 – has cancer and DaveRoberts from Rochdale has been treated for cancer. My old friend, John R is 76 this year I think. I really was the baby at College.
Tuesday, 7th May, 2024
Gorgeous morning …. and I’ve still got Covid. Tested positive again this morning and so did my co-pilot. Grounded for a while longer. Don’t actually feel too bad just a light, flu-like condition but I’m obviously such a poor specimen that I haven’t thrown it off yet. As we move into the afternoon and work in the garden, the temperature has already hit 22C/70F and feels delicious.
Just heard from my Greek friend, Martini, that she has Covid now. I think we all must have just been unlucky to hit a new wave of infection. On the plus side, we’ve both heard from the Bowel Cancer Screening Programme that all is fine and neither needs a follow up.
Labour will win the next election and one of my political heroes, Professor John Curtice, tells us that the large majority of Labour voters and particularly those returning to Labour from the Tories want to re-enter European membership. They realise at last that Leaving was lunacy and harmful to their welfare and the welfare of UK.
I have long been a Euro enthusiast. I’m one of the few people who watches the Euro News channel on Sky. I have always believed that the Leave vote was mindless nonsense and so it is being revealed.
It is so easy to appeal to the mindless, xenophobic minority who like to trot out the racist, lunatic phrases. Stop the Boats! / We’re Full! / Migrants Out / No Asylum Seekers. You’d be amazed how many of those people profess to be Christians and believe in the parable of the Good Samaritan. And yet they can’t see the connection. Little Englanders have to be reminded of their European heritage. They will go to a European country for their holidays and some will complain about all the foreigners there. We are a very dim people.
Wednesday, 8th May, 2024
A warm but grey start to the day but we know the sun isn’t far off. Tested positive for covid again this morning. It’s going to be a long week. The order of the day will include gardening. My cold frames are bursting at the seams with seedlings pushing up towards the sun.
Second week of May is always the sort of time that gardeners start to feel the itch. On the edge of early because of the weather but on the edge of late because we want things to plant out and establish quickly.
The South Coast does us some favours because it almost guarantees an absence of frost which is the gardener’s mortal enemy. I am going to plant out Green Bean plants this morning. They are pushing against the glass frame tops. It is probably about a week early but I should get away with it. My friend, Julie, in North Yorkshire will need to wait at least two more weeks before hers go outside.
I will sow a succession of Green Bean plants because we eat so many of them. Picking them fresh from the bush in your garden is so much nicer than flying them over from Kenya and it is so easy to do. If you were to cut a cross-section of me, I would probably be made up of Green Beans and Tomatoes.
It’s 10.00 am and the sun is out. It’s going to be a good day. Outside, BT Openreach are installing additional fibre cable to serve superfast broadband to new customers. I’ve had it virtually since the day we moved in 8 years ago. Before we came from Surrey, I had written to BT and to our Builders to suggest that the ducting infrastructure was built in to the design. Initially, I had a polite brush-off but soon after we moved in, I found that the require piping had been installed and the cabling came soon after.
My broadband speed went from 32 mbps to 1000 mbps over an afternoon. Nowadays, everything loads instantly even though everything from TVs, iPads, Computers, watches, Gym equipment, Security Cameras, Car apps connects to the net and makes demands on it. Even our House Phone comes over the net now. All copper wires from the last century are gone. I’ve always believed that it is important to fully embrace change. I have to have the latest. Apple is releasing new iPads next week and I will be looking to upgrade ours soon after. I’m hoping this edition will become far closer to a laptop than it currently is. I’d like to get an emulator to put my MS Windows software on it.
Really feeling out of sorts with my body today. Everything is too much effort. I can’t eat or drink. Everything tastes weird. I haven’t been able to drink coffee for a few days now because it tastes dry and lifeless. Wine has tasted like battery acid. As soon as I start to eat, I feel full. I’m having to beat myself up to get my Gym routine done and it is hurting. And at 1.00 pm this afternoon, the sky is cloudless blue and the sun is hot. I should be out in the garden enjoying it. Can you tell I’m feeling sorry for myself? Well, thanks for your sympathy!
Thursday, 9th May, 2024
Gorgeous morning. A morning to celebrate being alive. I received an In Memoriam card from my friend up in Leeds remembering our College, football team friend from 50 years ago who died recently of Prostate Cancer. It is a shock every time I hear such news. There but for the grace of fate go I. It is something of a Titanic moment … the heart will go on. I, certainly, will not go quietly. I am definitely a trouble maker.
Testing again tomorrow but don’t feel brilliant. Still, lots to do and can’t afford to waste such a lovely day. I was going get a company in to clean the patio. I’m not a very practical person and I like watching people work for me but, conscience got the better of me and I ordered enough cleaning fluid to cover 150 sq. mtrs. plus a pump sprayer and set my wife on using it. She has managed quite well and the stone is coming up like new.
The stone flags are York stone quarried not far from where I used to live in the North and the cleaning fluid comes from a small company just 10 miles away from my current home even though I bought it on Amazon. I like that sort of thing – items with relevance and meaning. After 4 hrs, I will spray off the cleaner (not my wife) and all should be good.
I can touch, taste, smell 50 years ago with amazing clarity. I can hear the raucous, naive laughter of my Geordie football friend reaching down across those years. In just the same way, I am shocked that it is 15 years to the day since we sat down and selected 3 estate agents to come and value our Huddersfield house as we prepared to put it up for sale and to look for a property in the South of England. That span of 15 years both feels very short and incredibly packed with life events. Time is a strange thing, Dear Reader.
Friday, 10th May, 2024
The 10th of May could have been a wonderful day, Dear Reader, but all things are still on hold because I’m still testing positive for Covid. When will it end? All kissing is off … for now.
Still, the weather is rather nice. We’re touching 24C/75F, the sun is out and I am still alive. I’m going to cut all the lawns in our street, plant out some green bean plants and sow more. My patio cleaner has done such a good job that I am thinking of keeping her on for a while.
It turned out to be such a simple, cost effective plan that I won’t need a contractor for a few years to come.
I love this time of year when everything is rushing ahead like mad. No time to lose. This morning, the Green Bean plants are just luxuriating in the sunshine. The ground is warm and moist, the sunshine is hot and overhead. What more could they want? They haven’t got Covid! My friends Kevin and Julie are both feeling rather down about life. They’re going to have to taste my Green Beans.
Saturday, 11th May, 2024
Oh, what a perfect day. I wish you could spend it with me, Dear Reader. Chef is making Bread. The sun is shining warmly outside. There is no hint of a breeze. The French Beans are standing erect to the sky. The day is promising everything.
This was last night as the Northern Lights visited our garden. This is not something you see very often on the South Coast. A harbinger of good things to come.
Mind you, in just over a month, we are going back to sunny Thessaloniki in Northern Greece. This was Thessaloniki centre yesterday as bad weather sweeps across Greece. I notice Jet2 have cancelled flights from Manchester to the Greek Islands today because of the weather. Almost unprecedented.
The garden is a delight. As we reach 27C/81F this afternoon, it is beginning to feel like my sort of climate. Someone said the other day that they could cope with hot weather less as they became older. When I say that, take me out and shoot me.
We’ve nipped out to the Garden Centre The pots are being planted up this afternoon by the under-gardener and the garden should be brighter for it.
A glass of chilled white wine with Supper under the stars – griddled chicken and salad. Life could be worse although, of course, it could be better. Making it better is in our own hands. I will do that. Trust me, Dear Reader.