Sunday, 28th July, 2024
Glorious morning. I woke up at 4.00 am on the beach in Colwyn Bay. It was warm and stuffy which is unusual for the North Wales coast but I was …. dreaming.
I had gone to bed thinking about Tenby and Saundersfoot on the coast of South West Wales. I had been reading about them in a Times article which was about the attempt to tax out of existence second home ownership.
Before my Dad died in 1965, we went on holiday to Saundersfoot. Tenby is the next place down the coast. So I was about 12 or 13 when we were there. It wasn’t my ideal holiday.
After Dad died, when I was 14 or 15, we holidayed in Colwyn Bay which was also ‘difficult’. By that stage, I wanted girls and the North Coast of Wales was not the place to look.
There is something special, elemental, enticing, absorbing about that line between land and water. It can be tranquil, soothing, exciting, threatening, frightening at different times in the union of the elements. We know that the moon controls the globe’s tides. Research suggests the human menstrual cycle which is about same length as the lunar month may be influenced by the phases of the moon and, therefore, the tides. Charles Darwin thought that the 28-day human menstrual cycle was evidence that our ancestors lived on the seashore and needed to synchronise with the tides.
All that from a visit to the beach … and I’d only driven down to Lidl to buy packs of almond milk.
Monday, 29th July, 2024
L’été est arrivé. At last. We should see at least 25C/77F today and may get to around 30C in the next couple of days. Not a cloud in the sky and I’m going to spend my time outside soaking up every ray – gardening, walking, relaxing, dreaming ….
I am a politics obsessive. In retirement, I have so much more time to be obsessed. I read, listen, watch politics constantly. Because it is no longer necessary to access the media in a linear fashion – times decided by the producers – I juggle multiple sources at the times of my choosing. In the past year I have been hooked on podcasts and, particularly, the Newsagents.
During the Tory reign, the BBC was deliberately slanted to the Right through appointments and management. Nothing as horrific as stations like Fox News but slowly and insidiously to the Right. The Left-leaning presenters upped and left. The set up podcasts to showcase their talents and found they could earn more money through advertising/sponsorship. They are sponsored by big, city banks like HSBC down to advertisers like Tesco Mobile. Podcasts are money-spinners. Why didn’t I think of that. Emily Maitlis, John Sopel and Lewis Goodall – all ex-BBC journalists – have hit a rich seam being paid for doing our hobbies of researching, writing and talking about politics.
Two pieces of news came to me this morning in the true meaning of co-incidence. Radio 4 ran an item about a new piece of research which found that broad beans contain significant amounts of dopamine which is used to treat Parkinson‘s sufferers. Apparently, dopamine improves motor function.
I love broad beans hot, cold, turned into a dip and they are easy to grow. I used to grow too many and gave them away when I lived in Yorkshire. Just as I was thinking about this, I was told that my old friend, Nigel, has been diagnosed with …. Parkinson’s Disease. You couldn’t make it up really. Although it really is scary for Nigel.
Belatedly, I must wish my sister, Jane Georgiou, a very happy Birthday. She is one of the skinniest people I know, has run long distances including for her club of Harriers and her country in International events. She is still doing it in spite of being stick thin. I’ve sent her a picture of a 4,000 year old Olive Tree illustrating what should happen as she gets older and how she’s failing nature’s laws.
Tuesday, 30th July, 2024
At 9.00 pm last night the temperature was still an uncomfortable 27C and not conducive to sleeping. This morning has opened a little cooler but is expected to rise to 30C during the day.
I’m walking on sunshine, wooah
I’m walking on sunshine, wooah
I’m walking on sunshine, woooah
And don’t it feel good
You didn’t think I knew songs like that, did you Dear Reader. It always surprises me what springs to mind from the shadows of an unconscious past. Outdoor living is good preparation for Athens.
I’ve found a wine cooler to replace the broken one. I was just about to contact a repairer but a new one with a 5-year warranty is more appealing. I managed to get it for just £507.00 which will include fitting, installation and removal of the old one. Tuesday will be a good day. Must get the champagne ready.
Before that, I have a lot of outdoor work to do in the garden. I discovered that mice had been renting our garden storage sheds over Winter and only now have got round to permanently eradicating them. That’s a job for this morning along with picking more beans which are proving unstoppable this year. Carrots are now on stream as well. We are eating lettuces like there’s no tomorrow (Maybe there won’t be.). Pauline is constantly harvesting herbs, preparing and freezing them. The other jobs we have at the moment are watering and constantly dead heading. Is this all becoming too dizzyingly exciting for you, Dear Reader.
Had the utter delight of watching Rachel Reeves taking on the duplicitous and routed Tories yesterday. We will lose our Winter Fuel Allowance which we’ve never needed and the country will get a serious, Chancellor at last which we’ve all needed for so long.
At least we don’t have to cope with the mean streets of the North of England. Just as we were hearing about the poor little kids enjoying their holiday dancing in Southport being killed and injured by a mad man with a knife, the MEN was reporting otherwise un-broadcast details of gang warfare in Middleton, Greater Manchester. There is a world outside my world of which I know so little.
At 1.00 pm and as the temperature has reached 31C, I’ve just been visited by this gorgeous girl. Look at the eyes … to drown in. Mind you, don’t blame her for dropping in.
Maximum today was 32C and at 9.00 pm we are still at 25C. Once again, sleeping won’t be as easy. Who needs to sleep? Life’s too short.
Wednesday, 31st July, 2024
High humidity usually means thunder. If only. We wouldn’t have to water but there is no rain forecast for us at least until Saturday. I will have to set one of my minions on to that task because I’ve got far more important things to do.
I love griddled swordfish steaks. They were commonplace when we were in Greece and Spain but have become so hard to find here since Brexit. The Mediterranean fishermen are keeping it to satisfy a huge demand across their continent and don’t want to cope with the import difficulties we have placed on things. This morning, our fishmonger has contacted us to say they have sourced some and we are going to pick up a 2kg Loin plus Sea bass fillets which go so well with salad.
A summer of disturbance is being encouraged by Farage and the extremist element who lost out so badly in the ballot box. To use the senseless deaths of three, little, innocent girls is utterly unconscionable. Of course, there will always be the ‘stupid’ people who believe the first rumour that they hear. And there were plenty of those yesterday. I did enjoy the instant karma this member of the intelligentsia received for his bravery. Play it back when you need cheering up.
Been invited to Lunch with some College friends in Yorkshire soon and we are flying off to Athens shortly as well. Be nice to be moving again. Athens is only 36C this morning and looks like this taken from a webcam this morning. You can just feel the heat oozing from the concrete. Down here on the South Coast, the humidity is almost unbearable in 29C. Every activity leaves one swimming in sweat. Sorry if that is too much information.
Thursday, 1st August, 2024
We’ve said Goodbye to July 2024 …. Forever. We will never see it again other than in photographs which are merely reflections of real life. On the first day of August, I looked outside on an incredibly humid, oppressive, rather grey start to the month and thought I saw signs of early Autumn. A few dry, brown leaves dropping from trees; my neighbours’ wisteria dying away in the heat; overblown herbs turning to flower and reseeding for the new year, a slight smell of natural decay. It is almost time to go away, Dear Reader.
The rolling news has been dominated by the awful murdering of little girls, the social media false speculation about the perpetrator being a Muslim and the thick boys of Britain First–Tommy Robinson–National Front–Faragist persuasion believing it. It is almost as if elements of the media are rejoicing in/encouraging news content. There is always a fascistic element trickling along the bottom of British politics.
If we only go back to 1930s Britain and Oswald Mosely’s British Union of Fascists which conceived of fascism as a ‘white’ fight against the global forces of ‘colour’ but was initially focussed on antisemitism while members of the Royal Family were courting the ultimate antisemite, Adolph Hitler.
After the war, we had the BNP and the National Front who fed on the utter foolishness of Enoch Powell’s Rivers of Blood speech which was widely seen to incite violence and division. In what has become known in more academic circles recently as The Great Replacement Theory has underpinned these far right beliefs since time immemorial. The belief that England was once populated by some pure-bred English people and all these foreigners are coming in replacing us and diluting our purity is the crude sum of that belief.
Gradually over this new century, this anti-foreigner theme has melded into the poverty of the dispossessed and very much into a North/South split of the haves and have-nots. There is a strong feeling in the North of England that everything goes to the South and they have been deprived and forgotten. There may well be some truth in it and this was harnessed by people like Farage and Johnson to further their own political aims by hitching to Brexit. It was never going to solve poor people’s problems, it has actually made them worse and the result is a massive Left Wing majority.
Across Europe, Macron is struggling to contain the threat and across the pond Kamala Harris is rising to the challenge of the latest right wing icon, Donald Trump. It is hard to opine from this distance but at least it looks as if she is turning it around. In France, Le Penn has tried to soften her fascist party’s face to get elected. In USA, Trump is too far gone to retreat on his lunatic opinions. Harris will find a lot of points to ridicule and attack. Who knows, she might just keep him out and become the first female President.
Friday, 2nd August, 2024
The wonderful weather continues and all around us, farmers are harvesting their crops, before it deteriorates in the Autumn rains.
This area used to be a centre of growing herbs and salad vegetables in acres of glass houses. Many have been replaced by executive 5-bedroom houses now much to the chagrin of some old timers. Quite a lot of wheat grown round here in large fields which are lovely to see.
What farmers can do in their great fields with huge machinery, we have just done in our raised beds around our back garden. Yesterday was cut-and-process-herb-day. The basil is still producing and pesto being made, portioned and frozen for use until next time. Rosemary is thrusting for the sky. Oregano, Thyme, Sage and Tarragon is being washed, chopped and frozen although Chef is also experimenting with her new dehydrator so some will be stored in packs of dried.
The focus of the morning is (drum roll) valeting the car. It is absolutely filthy and has needed it for weeks. For at least a fortnight, it has been covered in Saharan dust which is not a good look. Oh, Dear Reader, I have become a dirty, old man!
And talking about dirty, old men …. Down at the beach, The Great Unwashed were out in force this morning. school holidays, energetic little sprogs, tired parents and grandparents – the excitement of sun, sea and fresh air is just too much.
They were out in force with deck chairs, cool boxes, wind breaks, barbecues, picnics, sun cream and anything else you can imagine for a day at the beach.
Saturday, 3rd August, 2024
Warm but breezy, overcast but with sun breaking through. Chef is making strawberry jam and I am planning an escape but not until I’ve valeted the car which I didn’t get done yesterday. Oh, life is so full, Dear Reader!
Our neighbours all come home today. Their two weeks in the sun done for another year. I am turning my thoughts to UK and Mediterranean travel. While I was searching, this hauntingly beautiful photograph came up from an award winning photo journalist and Sifnos resident, Filoktitis Salaminios. He is a friend of mine and records the darker sides of Greek life.
We first travelled to Sifnos in 1984 having already stayed on Zakynthos, Milos, Naxos and Corfu in the previous 3 years. When you arrive in a new destination and particularly on a small, Greek island, you want to settle in quickly by finding places to stay, modes of transport available and places to eat. Simos Taverna was the ultimately welcoming place to eat by the ferry dock in Kamares. The cook was Nikalos Podotas and the front of house/table waiter was his wife, Vangelitsa. If we arrived in colder months and March/April can be very cold, they were the only place open and their roaring fire was so enticing.
If you are not familiar with Greek traditions, you should know that you don’t sit at a table with a menu and wait to be served. You march into the kitchen and demand to see what all the huge cooking pots on the hot range contain. You make your selection, the cook memorises it and the assistant records it later for the bill (Ο λογαριασμός). In this case, Nikolas is not only the cook but the provider of the ingredients. He runs his farm to grow vegetables but also chickens and pigs and sheep. They are the staple of his kitchen. Most traditional of all is the chickpea that he serves every Sunday in a soup called Revithia (Ρεβυθιά).
In the summer, the tables by the waterside are most popular for a cooling breeze. I liked to sit there because I could see my house part way up the mountain as I whiled away the sunny, hazy days. You see what a photograph can evoke. Sadly those days are gone now and so is Vangelitsa. She died of stomach cancer 20 years ago at the ripe old age of just 61 but I remember her. Nikolas still cooks and farms but his son and daughter have largely taken over. Life moves on ….