Sunday, 8th December, 2024
Well, the predicted storm never materialised. A bit breezy and with heavy rain over night, the day has opened bright and dry with sunshine. Last Sunday, we were welcoming December. Now, we are hurtling through it at pace. The older I get the less confident I am about the time line of events.
Yesterday, my neighbour told me he had been married for 18 years and I felt old for the rest of the day. I never forget a teacher announcing in the staffroom when I was in my 3rd year of teaching that she had just completed 25. I thought that must be an amazing situation – near end of life. I attended a Golden Wedding anniversary with just the same sense of unreality. The ship of time continues to sail slowly and largely silently towards us, Dear Reader. We don’t know when. All we do know is that it will surely arrive.
And so the week opens with joy and optimism. I am looking towards the new year’s travel. I have already booked hotels in Athens and Thessaloniki plus flights for two separate visits. I have arranged an extended trip to the North of England to seek out friends of old. Now I am actively looking at a month in the Canaries probably in November. I have learnt to be really careful in choosing such properties. Photographs can flatter to deceive.
This property is bigger than we need with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms but that is what you have to pay for to get quality and space. There is no point in spending a month in a property that is a lot less than you would expect at home. This has a pool, good kitchen with dishwasher and washing machine. Fast wifi, nice bathrooms and reasonable views from the terrace, somewhere to park a rental car. The price for a month is £5,400 which will be around £6000 with flights and transfers. For 2 people over 4 weeks that seems reasonable and ought to guarrantee reasonable service. The aim is to move our lives to somewhere with warmth and sunshine in a generally cold and dark month.
Out for a walk this morning. Strong wind made it all feel freezing. The tide was completely out. The distant windfarm more visible in the sea and obviously generating lots of power. Vast swathes of revealed beach with streams of sand whipped up by the wind. Very few people braving the day.
Monday, 9th December, 2024
Walls are built for two, main reasons. One is to keep things out – cold and wet, invasions, immigrants, etc.. The second is to keep things in – warmth, cattle, prisoners, the insane, populations under an authoritarian regime, etc..
The decision was taken to build a Wall between East and West Germany and work began in the early hours of 13 August 1961. I was 10 years old. The Berlin Wall became the symbol of the Cold War and a tangible manifestation of the world’s separation into two, distinct ideological blocs. The Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, or SED had been the ruling party in East Germany since 1949. The experiment was failing citizens of the Eastern, socialist Bloc. Economies had long been faltering and citizens were rising up and demanding change in Czechoslovakia (1968), Poland (1980) Hungary (1956 & 1988), and now Gorbachev, leader of the Soviet Union, was forced to recognise the inevitable.
The people of East Germany had seen the comparatively luxurious lives of their Western counterparts and wanted it. The wall separated them. A new travel law was mistakenly announced on November 9, 1989, crowds rushed to the border, which was opened under the onslaught of so many people. The fall of the Wall led to the ultimate collapse of the German Democratic Republic. The cold war that had been the stuff of legend throughout my childhood, was over. I remember echoes of my parents discussing the capture and imprisonment of businessman and spy, Greville Wynne in the early 1960s and then watching this played out in a Netflix film, The Courier, 60 years later.
On April 6th, 1994 – my 43rd birthday – a three day Irish conflict peace was announced. By August of that year, the Provisional IRA announced a cessation of military operations. A conflict that had occupied centuries and had been particularly prominent in the early years of my adulthood was tentatively over. Recently, I have been watching a drama called Say Nothing which told the story of resistance that brought the IRA to this position which is even now moving ever closer to a united Ireland.
Both of these socio-political changes had looked intractable. The occupying forces seemed immovable …. until they weren’t. Despots survive and thrive on confidence, threat and bluster. There comes a time when autocrats like Tito in Yugoslavia, Idi Amin in Uganda and Robert Mugawe in Zimbabwe see the aura of invincibility slipping away. And so it has been with Bashar al-Assad in Syria this month.
I draw my own lesson from these occurrences. When things look bleak, impossible, not worth fighting for, that is exactly the time to fight. All walls crumble eventually. The mists blow away and a new beginning comes into view. Nil Desperandum, Dear Reader.
The skies on our walk this morning were overcast with dark, fast moving clouds which were reflected in the sea and beach below but there will be brighter days and sunshine will reveal a new view as the wall comes down.
Tuesday, 10th December, 2024
What a dull, December day. Depressing. Trying to brighten the load with innovation this morning. I have a new girlfriend arriving who I ordered from Amazon. It is an Alexa. I must admity that I was slow to accept the value of virtual assistants. I thought it was a sign of laziness – almost unfaithfulness. I suppose I have used software on my smartphone to control household devices for quite a while.
I use the SmartThings App to control the two Robot Vacuums, to link to my Honda car’s system control, to pair with my Lounge TV’s Bose soundbar, to link to my Huawei earbuds, to my Philips shaver and to my Garmin watch. It is invaluable to do stuff when I am away from the house.
I use the Hive Smart App to control the central heating zones in the house upstairs and down independently, the hot water system and then radiators in the Gym and lights around the house by room. These things are so useful and particularly when we are travelling. Not only that but they are incredibly economical. The central heating very soon overwhelms the house with heat so it can be turned on and off from the phone app and, therefore, is rarely on.
A few month ago, I replaced an old and loved friend – a bedside radio alarm – with a wifi, voice controlled one. It is an Amazon Echo Spot with Alexa. It wakes me up at the right time every day with BBC Radio 4 every morning. It tells me the weather. It reads me my calendar for the day and will play anything else that can be grabbed from the internet just by me telling it to. It is the perfect girlfriend.
Now I’ve order another iteration of the Amazon Alexa remote automation for the Kitchen. There are times when my wife is cooking and wants a recipe. While she is doing housework, she wants to listen to music. She might want to talk to her friends face to face without leaving the room, to call up a short video of how to fix something her useless husband can’t manage. She might just want to display a slideshow of her favourite photographs.
The new Amazon Alexa Echo Show 5 will do all those things and more from our kitchen. I’m looking forward to the challenge of setting it up for her. The next thing will be to install a wifi, video door bell which will alert us of someone at the door on our watches, smartphones remotely and allow us to speak to the visitor on this Alexa screen from the kitchen. Very soon, we won’t need to open the door at all.
Wednesday, 11th December, 2024
Another gloomy, dark day. Not going out to early today because it’s just not inviting. This morning is going to be a Xmas card and newsletter production time. Pauline writes the cards because she is the only one left who remebers how to use a pen. I am printing the address labels because I am the only one who knows how to use the database.
We receive newsletters from so many that I can’t stop with mine now. I have been doing it so long that it has just taken me an hour to knock this off today. My little friend in the kitchen is writing, stamp sticking and newsletter folding. I will help carry them to the post box.
I have sunk to a new low. I have drunk a bottle of alcohol-free wine. In preparation for Xmas lunch at home, I bought three, different bottles to trial. So far, I have tried two separate bottles of alcohol-free Sauvignon Blanc which I thought would go with a fish platter. The first one was absolutely dire and nothing like Sauvignon Blanc … well until I tasted the second one which was nearer to white Shloer. I’ve got a third bottle of alcohol-free Malbec. Let’s hope it comes through.
Thursday, 12th December, 2024
A grey, December day. I am enjoying wine this morning …. by proxy. I am sending cases of delicious wine to all my friends around the country. Amazon are a great wine shop aren’t they? I subscribe to Amazon Prime which gives me lots of benefits but one I’m using this morning is ‘free’, next day delivery. All it takes is money …. which is what Chrsitmas is about isn’t it, Dear Reader. No? Well it works for me!
I am a people person. I love people. I love their life stories. This morning I was contacted on DM by a girl called Catherine who I taught in the 1980s. I must admit I don’t remember her at all but she certainly remembers me. She looks like she has grown into a lovely, kind woman.
I often find these contacts quite moving. We forget the part teachers can play in our lives. I always tried to treat the kids as individuals. In fact, I never called them by their real names but made up nicknames based on how I perceived their personalities. At first they resented it but soon began to enjoy the fact that someone had taken the trouble to notice them enough to do it …. although BumFace never quite came round to it. Anyway, I replied to Catherine telling her that I contacted my own English teacher with similar sentiments just before he died and hoping she will not have had the same effect.
I’ve been to Aldi. It was bustling but I won’t be going back in a hurry. I went to buy a couple of bottles of alcohol-free Fizz. On to Sainsburys, which was also busy, for a couple of bottles of alcohol-free wine. Tasting session over the weekend. I’ll will report back later …. if I’m sober. Don’t hold your breath.
Our new-ish car is only 10 weeks old and today has achieved the grand mileage of 999. At this rate, I wil manage 5000 miles a year. Yesterday, I wouldn’t have been that optimistic about getting there at all. Driving back from the beach, a man shot out of a driveway in a Range Rover and almost drove through the middle of me. He stopped with less than 3 inches to spare. I don’t know who was more shocked. Anyway, I smiled and waved as he heaved a huge sigh of relief. We all do daft things.
Driving out to the supermarket this morning, I thought something had gone wrong with my new, varifocal glasses. I really couldn’t see well at all. Were they misted up? I took them off to find I was still wearing my half-moon reading glasses. Silly, old fool!
Friday, 13th December, 2024
Paraskevi Dekatreís / Παρασκευή και 13 / Friday 13th / Just the day for the Dentist! Who booked that for this morning? I’d rather be having my hair done.
Had some lovely newsletters from people I don’t get to talk to on a regular basis. My cousin, David, who is, of course, many, many years older than me, sent me a life update this week. I love hearing about people’s lives and how they solve the problems of living.
I heard from my youngest sister, Caroline, who lives in Ireland and hasn’t left there, she tells me, since 2012. I haven’t seen her since Mum’s funeral and it was lovely to catch up. Pauline had a newsletter from one of her oldest school friends who she hasn’t seen for years. When we first got together in the 1970s, Pauline was spending her weekends playing Netball and refereeing matches. She is a qualified Netball referee. Her friend, Lynn, who became a Primary School Headteacher in Oldham, played in the same tea.
I am going to enjoy Xmas by proxy this year. Not drinking wine but buying cases of wine presents for others. Not eating cake but delivering cakes for others. Not celebrating but leaving that to others. It will be an Xmas without Xmas. You can’t get much more Scrooge than that. I was interested to find Chef using the new Alexa in the Kitchen to entertain her while she worked. Icing the cakes was done to the background sounds of Fleetwood Mac, Leonard Cohen, Elton John – things which haven’t been heard in our house for a long time.
The weather’s pretty Scrooge-like as well. Overcast and uninviting. We’ve had weeks of the red top newspapers telling their gullible readers that there would be avalanches of snow at Christmas. Can you believe it? We are now forecast to be mild and sunny. The North of England will be cool and wet. No snow anywhere. Isn’t life exciting, Dear Reader. Around this time 15 years ago, I was driving over the Pennines in these conditions.
Back from the Dentist without problem. No work and the next checkup on my Plan is the end of June. My favourite part of the process was when they reviewed my general Health. They asked the long anticipated question: How much alcohol do you drink, Mr Sanders? It amused me to be able to say, Oh, I don’t drink. while thinking, at the moment.
Saturday, 14th December, 2024
This weekend marks mid December and is just a week away from the Winter Solstice. Saturday night next week is the longest night of the year. The fight back starts then as days begin to lengthen towards Summer. I don’t know if we will have a Winter this year. It is just depressingly grey and mild.
Funnily enough, my Memory Box this morning threw up a photo of a group of women frozen in time. They were in mild but grey-looking Istanbul. My sister, Ruth, is in the centre of the group. Of course, 15 years on, she remains so much older than me but will always stay frozen in 2009.
On this day, in 2010, we were in France buying wines and presents for Christmas in Surrey. It really does feel so far away and so long ago. So much has happened in the intervening years. We have to make sure they happen again.
On this day in 2013, Pauline gave me one of my Christmas presents which I had requested. I don’t know what phase I was going through. I think it was Malvolio. I’m over it now.
At this time in 2014, we were visiting our old friend, Jill from Middleton, who has been living on the South Coast for 30 years. She was a PE teacher at our school for a while. We were visiting her at her brother’s house in Surrey. The house had formerly been owned by Rick Parfitt of Status Quo and was a rambling old pile with swimming pool and tennis court.
In 2017, I received this portrait of another sister, aka Lizzie Dripping. I think she was going through her intellectual period. Whatever, this is the redeeming element of a tawdry celebration called Xmas. Hearing from people who we don’t see from one year to the next. Today, we had a lovely card from our Doctor of 25 years ago. He bought our house in Helme, Meltham, West Yorkshire. I featured the house a few weeks ago when we found it up for sale.
The Doctor and his wife told us that he is having the same problem we had. When we put the property up for sale in 1999, it took 18 months before we found a buyer. We moved out in July 2000. He has had it on the market since June this year with almost no interest. The market does seem slow in West Yorkshire. He is moving to a large house he has inherited from his family in Norfolk so the sale is not immediately important. Their three sons have all become doctors and one has moved down to live and work near us on the South Coast. He is promsing to come down soon to visit his lads and call in on us which will be nice.