Sunday, 20th October, 2024
A grey, breezy, wet morning. Still very warm but I’m going nowhere beyond a walk across the garden to the Gym. I’ve just been told that Greater Manchester has actual wind and North Wales has severe gales. Inhabitants are advised not to travel at all. Here, travel is all I want to do but Pauline’s got a couple of medical appointments to attend this week so I won’t be going anywhere.
I was noticing a Van Gogh Exhibition at the National which is on this month and through to January which I quite fancy but other things come first. Got to get Pauline’s problems sorted out first and I have follow-ups to my prostate cancer in the next few weeks with a full body scan. When that was first mooted, I though it was great but a little excessive.
Having read about Chris Hoy this weekend, I’m beginning to understand. He has Stage 4, terminal cancer which was found in his shoulder but soon discovered to have originated in his prostate. The cancer had metastasized and is now throughout his body. My scan is to make certain no cancer has esaped from my prostate and I will be on edge until it is done. As I understand it, I will have a full body scan once a year for life or until they consider me too old to bother at which point, I will have to pay for it privately. Apparently, hours in the saddle each day increase the risk of prostate cancer considerably. I spend 30 mins a day on an exercise bike but I don’t know if that counts.
We can only do what we can to keep the plates spinning, to remain healthy as long as possible and to enjoy our lives. Healthy food, healthy exercise, mental stimulation and maintaining friendship groups all are prescribed to that end.
Monday, 21st October, 2024
A grey morning. Dry but threatening. Lovely and warm with a dry, warm week in prospect which will allow me to get some outside jobs done. When the radio comes on at 5.45 am it is still dark-ish now. Actually, the clocks go back next Saturday night/Sunday morning so we’ll all gain an hour.
Like a stopped clock, I go on about my enthusiasm for the new, for innovation, for the move from analogue to digital. I’m going to go on about it again today as the Labour government launch their push for a new, digital record in the NHS. I’m enthusiastic about it.
In October 2000, my bank contacted me and asked if I would like to be on the trial group using their newly launched online banking site. My identifier was 0001. It was great fun and look where it has taken us. Almost everyone who still has a brain uses a mobile phone to pay in shops and uses online accounts to pay across the web. They have internet access to/control over their bank accounts and investment/savings accounts. On street banking outlets are disappearing fast and the whole process is rapidly abolishing cash altogether.
When Pauline’s Mum was in her 90s, she was admitted to hospital many times. Often it was for a day or two and then off home. Each time, we accompanied her and sat in corridors and cubicles while she was interrogated about her health conditions, her medications and her treatments. After a while, we could provide the information ourselves without bothering her at all because the same questions came up over and over again and the answers were recorded on paper by over worked medics. I remember thinking then that all of this should be available online.
For the past 4 years, we’ve been using the NHS app and the Patients Know Best website. It really came to the public during the Covid Pandemic. In a sense, the two, separate apps could be merged into one. Equally, our GP Surgery has adopted another online information base which is called SystmOnLine and offers very similar functions. We’ve been using all three from the start. We book appointments both with our GPs, our Pharmacy and our hospitals.
These are all early attempts to move our information from face-to-face to online and I applaud it. What has always been amusing is that we can look up our appointments and the results of our tests almost before the professionals have seen them. Unfortunately, the old NHS still feel the necessity to double up the information stream by sending paper copies through the post as well. This is clearly time consuming and expensive. Now, this forward thinking Labour Government are going to bring all these disparate sources of information together under one, digital app which will both store information but also monitor health – blood pressure, physical activity, weight, etc..
The work goes on to get fit and lose weight. Warm and grey on the promenade this morning. We didn’t get any of the forecast strong winds thank goodness because our fence won’t be fixed until tomorrow. Back home for coffee and Gym work. Got to keep striving. P&C + M flew out of Gatwick this morning Florida bound. Should be lovely and sunny for them all. They will be back for Christmas and I will still be keeping on keeping on. I’ve done 55 days alcohol-free and will have achieved almost 140 days by the end of the year.
Tuesday, 22nd October, 2024
Gorgeous morning. Slept well and up out of bed with energy. Looking forward to the day. Got lots to do. Take my housekeeper to her hairdresser’s. Hopefully, meet the Fenceman although he hasn’t confirmed a time. Do a beach walk and a Gym session.
As winter approaches, the Gym will come increasingly into its own. With all the rain this year I have used it a fair amount anyway. We set it up just over 4 years ago. Leaving David Lloyd Health Club was a bit of a wrench. We enjoyed meeting people and using the outdoor pool, sauna and jaccuzi but the pandemic made it essential. It was costing us about £2,000.00 per year but we used it every day so it was cost effective.
When we set up our own Gym, I spent about £5,000.00 on equipment and about £3,000.00 on converting the garage. So, over the past 4 years, we have about broken even. I don’t meet many people in my Gym, of course but I do get to choose when all the equipment is free. I get my own, 65″ tv to watch rather than one of those tiny built in screens on the equipment. I don’t have to drive there. I just amble across the garden garden and, if I get thirsty, I’ve got 400 bottles of red wine racked up behind me – not that I would dream of touching them. Well, dream ….
We had a service agreement built in to the price of our professional quality equipment which we bought from a wonderful company in Shoreham by Sea near here. Even so, little has gone wrong. These machines are built for work with multiple users throught a full Gym Club day so I’m not going to break them. Because of our ages, I bought a lumbar support bike from a different supplier so it would keep us fit into the future. It would cost about £800.00 to replace. Recently, the pedal straps needed replacing and I couldn’t get any.
The manufacturers said I had to buy a pack of replacement pedals which would come with straps – cost £100.00. Desperately, I bought them. This morning, I found generic ones on Ebay for just £8.60. What an idiot!
Wednesday, 23rd October, 2024
An overcast start to the day but very warm. We’ve got workers due to arrive this morning so we are tied to the house. I’ve got lots of jobs to do plus Gym work so it’s not a problem.
What is wrong with this place setting? Answers on a postcard. It is the most common setting for Supper in our house. A fish knife & fork, a pudding spoon & fork plus a wine glass and napkin. The cutlery is set out so one eats from out to in as convention teaches. Can you spot the element that makes this a sign of us being ‘common’?
The most usual evening meal for us is one of fish and vegetables. I use a fish knife and fish fork for that purpose. I learnt this from my upbringing. Actually, we only ate fish once a week – on a Friday because we were brought up as Catholics. Almost always, we ate Plaice smothered in parsley sauce with boiled potatoes and we ate them with our fish knife & fork.
I never eat plaice or parsley sauce now probably because of the past but I do use a fish knife and fish fork and this week I am told it makes me Common. Lady Glenconner, former lady-in-waiting to Princess Margaret, declared that the offending cutlery item is a telltale sign of one dreadful thing: being middle class. And that, Dear Reader, is common.
My Mum was a snob. I think she almost acknowledged that herself. She went to a snooty, Catholic High School/College where she felt she had to compensate for or whitewash out her Irish ancestry. She adopted signs, trappings of success to that end. I clearly inherited this trait. I am aware of it too. An article in The Telegraph this morning sparked by the current fish knife row, lists other things that indicate common, Middle Class traits:
- Using Liquid soap – not sure why but use encouraged by pandemic.
- Mounted televisions – Anything bigger than a 46in television is suspect especially massive 100in televisions. Even worse if it is wall-mounted. Class is a small, very old TV set indicating you’re not really interested in watching anything.
- Prosecco in lieu of champagne – cheap alternative giveaway.
- Personalised number plates – considered provincial, vanity plates.
- Trainers – chavvy.
There are others on the list that I don’t do:
- Eating on the street – behaviour is American. When eating, you sit down at a table.
- Holding a knife like a pen – quite obviously vulgar.
- Applying make-up in public – desperate and vulgar.
- Hot Tubs – Must admit I can’t see the point in them.
Of course, there is Common … and then there is Working Class isn’t there, Mum?
Thursday, 24th October, 2024
Gorgeous bright, sunny and warm morning. Hard to believe we are in our final week of October. Shopping, walking and Gym-ing day. Tomorrow we have workers in and we are out for Pauline’s eye test and new reading glasses. This is what living the High Life is like!
While Pauline is having her eyes tested and spending interminable hours searching for new frames which will suit her while reading her iPad, Kindle, Laptop, Ingredient containers, etc. because she always has to look her best, I am going to investigate SuperDrive Varifocals because it is time. I wear distance glasses for driving and reading glasses for … reading. is so much reading to do while driving now that it has become a real problem for me.
I paid £350.00 about 20 years ago for a pair of bi-focals but just couldn’t get on with them at all. Eventually, they went in a drawer and stayed there until I tidied them out. Technology has developed much more effective varifocal glasses and I am thinking of trying them again.
Currently, our new car has a number of speed settings – maximum speed, consistent with current traffic speed, speed set to road side speed limit sign, etc. This latter one is a new, European Directive. All new cars have to be fitted with a speed recognition/vehicle control system which dings to warn the driver of a speed sign and if the vehicle is going over that limit – rather like a seat belt warning noise. In our car, this information is projected upwards onto the windscreen just above the steering wheel. I am struggling to read it through distance glasses. I think varifocals could be the answer.
Delicious walk down the beach path this morning. Incredibly warm and sunny. So many people had been attracted by the weather that it was difficult to park. Plenty on the jetty soaking up the rays and signs of the beach being deposited on the promenade after high tides.
Down the length of the promenade, attracted by the lovely weather and the confluence of Half Term and Bonfire Night, contractors were busily installing fun fare installations on beachside and a huge bonfire on green side.
Friday, 25th October, 2024
Up early and lots to get through today. Early appointment at Specsavers in Rustington. Pauline is having her annual eye test. She only needs reading glasses but wants new ones … again. As I reported yesterday, I am thinking of retrying varifocals for driving after rejecting them some 20 years ago.
While Pauline was being checked, I spoke to a nice, young lady who found me the perfect frames for the new lenses and I agreed on the spot. I could deny her nothing even at £310.00. After all, it was cheaper than 20 years ago. Eventually, Pauline emerged to look for new reading glasses – two pairs = £220.00. Cheap at half the price!
As we were near to the beach, we took the opportunity to do a walk. It was lovely and warm but grey and gloomy. What a difference a day makes. Quite a few children around with their parents and grandparents as if they were on early Half Term. I kept wanting to challenge them: Why are you out of school? but I was restrained by my Minder.
You may know that I am on a restricted calorie intake. Alcohol and refined carbohydrates are forbidden. No wine, no bread, cakes, biscuits, potatoes, pasta, rice, etc.. I am allying this to increased activity on the basic calories in versus calories out theory. It is working well. I am half way through my 59th day of a 300 day stint. My intention is to be at my target by the end of May. When I say I will do something, I will do it. Putting it down on the Blog just makes that committment even more unswervable. Everywhere you look are seasonal temptations. I am strengthening my resolve.
Saturday, 26th October, 2024
In retrospect as I’ve written before, I so wish I had done a Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (PPE) degree. I did politics and philosophy but not economics and I find that discipline absolutely gripping now. I enjoy the theory of economics and the practice of it as it impinges on my life. I love researching National Economic policy. I’m really looking forward to the Budget – the first Labour Budget for 15 years. I love researching investment opportunities, forward projecting them and deciding how to proceed.
I am 73 so I can’t afford to think too long term with my investments. I have no children and so no one to leave my money to. When investing, I only think in terms of insulating my wife’s life when I’m gone. She has good pensions of her own but a widowed life can be cold and expensive so she will need a large insurance pot to draw on. We can never rely on the State to provide that.
Ten years ago this week, we were back in UK after selling our Greek home. I was negotiating Banks’ money-laundering checks in order to put the proceeds into UK investment vehicles. It wasn’t as straightforward as you’d think. It was a bit tense but I found it exciting. I had prepared the ground before leaving Greece and, ten years ago next week, we were preparing to return to Athens to transfer the rest and close National Bank of Greece and Alpha Bank accounts.
A decade on, those investments have done well although the early years were in a climate of low inflation & low interest rates. More recently, interest rates have been (relatively) so high that tax has become a big issue and the need to shelter profits has become imperative. Fortunately, I chose fixed rate Bonds and fixed rate ISAs when interest rates were 6.1% and 5.5% respectively – so well above the current BoE interest base rate. Now inflation has fallen to 1.7%, those fixes look very healthy. Having moved out of ISAs in the last 20 years, I have been forced to move back in to get tax-free earnings. At least I have another 18 months of real earnings of around 4%+ above inflation tax free.