Sunday, 4th May, 2025
Easy like a Sunday morning … Nice, sunny and warm start for an relaxing day. Some people go out and pray to false gods, some light candles in the hope of redemption. I just plough on regardless and enjoy my latest gadget in making my favourite drink – a caffemachiato – at the press of a menu button. Literally, it means stained milk and is steamed, frothed milk with a shot of strong coffee over the top. The coffee sinks and the milk forms a band on the top.
You drink the coffee through the milk. Usually, I have a sprinkling of chocolate powder on top of the milk but then I’ve always been self indulgent. Oh, god is good!
Politics goes with the coffee – Trump, Farage, Populism, Nationalism, International Isolation, Racism, the big boost for Labour with the rise of Farage and the impending death of the Tories. Life is never dull, Dear Reader.
You only need to glance at the populism of the Colour Comics to see the gulf in understanding that serious politicians have to cross. They say, Don’t look here at the real national problems, worry about some errant member of the Royal Family that has been built up by the right wing press and an ex-footballer’s family trouble. Who the hell cares? And what about the the disgraceful distraction of the Express, Dear Reader? Millionaire farmer threatens suicide because his millions are being taxed as much as everyone else’s. Utter pap!
Lovely, sunny walk around the local area this morning. Down past the rugby ground which is absolutely packed this weekend. They are hosting the Girls’ National Rugby Tournament finals all weekend. Hundreds of girls in sports kit, many with their parents and friends in support are putting out gallons of energy and enthusiasm on a variety of pitches in the sunshine. There is so much of this down here.
Monday, 5th May, 2025
I like Mondays but I can’t stand Bank Holidays. Conflicted this morning. Lovely blue sky and sunny morning but quite chilly in the air. Wanted to go down to the beach but the hoards will be out today so it will be better at home. The roads will be busy. Chatting to friends on Text and Whatsapp where traffic doesn’t affect us.
This morning Skype finally ceased to exist. Just over 20 years ago, our Greek home was built and we were spending lots of time there including 6 weeks at a stretch in the Summer. My lovely Mother-in-Law was in her 90s and increasingly frail. We were caught in the age old trap of wanting to / having to live our own lives but needing to support her. In those days, mobile calls from Europe to UK were difficult and expensive. Fortunately, some Estonian lads developed phone connections across the internet (VOIP) using Skype which was almost ‘free’. It literally cost a few pence for an hour’s face to face talk.
It was genius and liberating. We talked every day. Having bought a Skype phone for our Laptop, it was wonderful to sit in our house on a remote Greek island and be instantly beamed into a retirement flat in Waterhead in Oldham but, like everything else, the internet’s expanding bandwidth overtook Skype.
Ten years later, Apple brought out the iPad and gave us Facetime which was a huge step forward. To just have a screen to talk to anyone anywhere in the world as if you were sitting with them is life changing – literally. Mind you, you have to remember to put your clothes on before answering the call, as I once found to my cost while cooling off in Greece.
In the past 10 years or so, Whatsapp have added video calling which is easy and free if you have a smartphone. It is such a quick connection process that I prefer it and use it all the time. I often wonder how my parents generation would have benefitted from these developments
These days, more than 20 years on and fulfilling the predictions of all the sci-fi writers, we can use software with videocams and microphones to hold meetings of huge numbers of people simultaneously. It is a revolution hastened by Covid and the socio-economic shift of working-from-home.
Nearly 15 years ago, Zoom cornered the Office interface market but was quickly challenged by Google Meet and Microsoft Teams. I’m eagerly anticipating being able to do all this through my glasses in the near future.
This morning, I’ve been talking to my lovely neighbours who are actually in Germany and are flying back from Berlin having checked in on their elderly parents. I’ve told them to avoid the VE Day Spitfires ….
Tuesday, 6th May, 2025
Quite a chilly edge on the morning’s breeze. Only 11C/52F as we go out for a 5 mile walk before the tasks of the morning. We are driving up to Surrey to see little M who is back from Florida. It is a lovely, sunny morning so the drive should be nice. We will be taking another Kilo of sweets for C and a batch of home made Flap Jacks for everyone …. apart from me.
Flapjacks, particularly the British kind, have a history dating back to the early 1600s in England. The term “flapjack” initially referred to a flat cake or pancake. While Shakespeare mentions “flap-jacks” in his play Pericles. ‘Flap’ refers to a flat cake and ‘Jack’ refers to an ordinary common man.
You see, Dear Reader, you learn something new every day or you should try to. This is the way to ward off Dementia … if I remember rightly.
Had jobs to do this morning including booking an Executive Lounge at Gatwick for November. Got to get in early! I’ve also been chasing up the delivery of a pair of trainers from Sketchers which should have arrived last week with UPS but didn’t. They tell me now that they are coming from Belgium and are stuck in Customs. Bloody Brexit!
Gorgeous drive up to Surrey in lovely sunshine and through wonderfully lush, green roadsides with very little traffic. Nice to see M again. She is a lovely girl. Well, I say girl. She might be 60 but she will always be a girl to me. After a couple of hours of chat, drove home on almost empty roads and then did an hour’s walk followed by a Gym session.
Having finished the marathon of 96 episodes of the absolutely brilliant Homeland, I have moved smoothely on to another Anglo-American production of Succession which is based around the Murdoch family and their Newspaper/Magazine/Television/Film and Sky Platform company. After 5 episodes of the first of 4 Series. It’s interesting but it isn’t distracting me completely yet. These things need time to work on me.
Wednesday, 7th May, 2025
Lovely but slightly cool start to the morning. The sun rises here at 5.30 am and the temperature slowly recovers. It is 8.00am as I write and the current temperature is just 12C/54F. The most tender plants are still kept under glass over night and have to be moved out to harden off during the daytime.
Gradually, daytime light and temperatures lengthen. Today, sunset is 8.30 pm so they will have had 15hrs of growing light. Watering is the most important at the moment. With no rain for ever and none in sight for the next few weeks, I have to provide it. The potting up area of the back garden is looking a bit like an off-shoot of the Garden Centre at the moment.
Had to go down to the beach to collect a fish order. Back at work and school for the hordes, seaside free and clean and wonderful. The colours are just wonderful and my eyes really want to drink them in.
Great to hear Joe Biden talking on UK media this morning. He is a much underrated politician and President of the USA. This is mainly down to the avalanche of insane, right wing media there and here. There is a feeling engendered by this media engine that Trump is strong on Economics and Biden failed. In fact, the evidence is all the other way and increasingly so with Trump version 2. An approach to tariffs that doesn’t understand their effects for your own citizens and causes international instability which narrows your trade deal negotiating scope and reduces your soft power around the world
The Center for American Progress article published a few couple of months ago makes the argument powerfully and authoritatively. They list the areas that you don’t see acknowledged by the rabid Right:
- Economic growth surpassed expectations
- Stronger productivity growth returned despite a global slowdown
- Inflation was tamed without a recession
- Workers benefited from the strongest labour market in generations
- Households saw substantial wealth gains
Their Conclusion is:
Looking ahead, analyses from Goldman Sachs and Moody’s in 2024 predicted that retaining current policy settings would continue favorable macroeconomic performance in future years. However, increased tariffs—as proposed by the new administration—are expected to worsen economic performance, particularly over the next two years, with increased inflation and lower GDP growth.
History will judge the relative merits of the two men and Biden will surely prevail as he did before Trump tried to overthrow the American Constitution by inciting the riots of Capital Hill.
Thursday, 8th May, 2025
I am a very pampered man. I fully recognise that. I am treated very well by my Carer. Every morning, after I am provided with freshly squeezed orange juice, my body is fully serviced.
I have got up every morning since the beginning of April and put on shorts and tee shirt. I spend a great deal of my time outside in the sunshine. I walk 8 miles a day every day. I garden most days. My skin is exposed to the sunshine for many hours a day. My feet take a pounding every day. I get through trainers at a fast rate and replace them with new ones. I can’t do that with skin and feet.
I am a man and generally can’t be bothered looking after my body. That’s why I have a Carer. After Breakfast every day, I have sun tan lotion on my face and moisturiser on my arms and legs. The soles of my feet are filed for hard skin and creamed to avoid cracked skin. I have early signs of nail fungus on one toe so that is treated with an athlete’s foot cream. I had a sun damage spot which has been successfully treated with Actikerall – a Cutaneous Solution which worked like a dream. Finally, I grazed the top of my head in a gardening accident and that is still being treated with antiseptic Germaline.
I walk into the Office feeling like a new man each morning. I know how lucky I am. Today will follow that pattern – Walking & Gardening. My Carer is leaving me next week to go up to London. I will be left to fend for myself. My body will just have to cope. This morning we are going down to the station to sort out her travel and then on to the Garden Center to spend yet more money on plants. Actually, it’s a cool and rather overcast morning. Not very conducive to gardening but jobs have to be done.
Good to see the UK Labour Government doing such important trade deals around the world where the tired, old Tory band failed. Last week, a free trade deal was announced with India – one of the world’s great and expanding markets.
India has cut taxes on goods imported from the UK including:
- cosmetics
- scotch whisky, gin and soft drinks
- higher-value cars
- food including lamb, salmon, chocolate and biscuits
- medical devices
- aerospace
- electrical machinery
- The deal will also allow British firms to compete for more services contracts in India.
Today, we are expecting a UK – USA trade deal to be announced which will reduce trariffs and particularly on cars. In a couple of weeks, we expect the most important trade deal of all to be announced with the European Union which we hope and expect to include some return to free movement under the guise of young people’s increased freedoms to travel, explore, work and learn across UK and the whole of Europe.
The long haul back begins …
Friday, 9th May, 2025
Been a hot and sunny day of hard outside work. Had to do all my walking and Gym work but we both spent the largest part of the day doing voluntary Community Work.
We were working on the lawns and flower beds along our street outside neighbour’s houses. If there is one thing that stands out about living here it is the wonderful neighbours. People came out of their houses to say thank you. People stopped their cars to say thank you and, within an hour or two of completing this evening, our lovely neighbour, Dee, had sent this video of thanks.
I’ve been growing flowering plants for the past couple of months and they will go out next week. It will be something of a relief to get our garden space back but, as they grow and flower, our street looks good, attractive and develops the physical unity of similar colours which we have in human terms of happy people living in some harmony. Sounds a bit too good to be true, doesn’t it? But almost everybody around here says the same thing: the lovely neighbours make it somewhere they want to stay.
I am rather ashamed to admit that in many things I am rather too faithful. I’ve driven Honda cars for ever. I’ve been a Sky customer since the outset. I get my mobile phone contracts through EE and have done, they tell me, since 2011. I am so completely sold on the Samsung brand that all my TVs are Samsung and our mobiles – we have one each – are Samsung, our vacuum robots are Samsung. We are even thinking of buying new Samsung washing machine and heat pump tumble dryer.
Today, EE offered me upgrades for our smart phones. We have two S24 Ultra 5G handsets but they are keen not to lose us. We currently pay them £160.00 per month. The upgrade will tie us in for another two years and increase the monthly cost to £188.00 but the camera is so much better and the software is AI assisted so they are irresitible! The big question is which colour? The most important feature of the contract though is the unlimited calls, texts and data at 5G speeds in UK and all across Europe.
Saturday, 10th May, 2025
Don’t you just love the Summer. The weather here is set fair as far as the eye can see. It is a time for growing. My garden is a hive of industry. We even have these gorgeous Scented Stocks in the Kitchen pervading the air with their sweet perfume. Outside, we have reached 25C/77F by mid-afternoon – almost as hot as Athens.
On the Greek Cycladic islands, the temperatures are rising. The anticipation of tourists and income is rising rapidly as well. Beautification is going on apace in anticipation of the clink of cash registers – or credit cards nowadays. The Mediterranean light is enhanced by the stark, bold, primary colours of buildings and nature.
The Bourgainvillea is in full bloom and screaming out in reds, purples and apricot hues. The gardens are rapidly burgeoning with fruit and vegetables – tomatoes, peppers, aubergines and lettuces, parsley and the ever present sweet basil plants.
I grew huge patches of Basil in my Greek House garden but, when I tried to grow it in the North of England, I had little success. Just too cold. Fortunately, down here it grows for fun and I have been nurturing these seedlings under glass for a few weeks. It is virtually time to plant them out. I have 8 plants and they will roar away to give me a large and constant supply from late June to mid-Septenber to feed the Pesto Factory.
We eat so much Pesto that a whole freezer draw is given over to storing it frozen in measured proportions to suit one meal for two people. Usually, it serves as a fish crust and home made is like a different thing altogether. Basil leaves, garlic, pine nuts and olive oil combine to encapsulate the summer warmth and a form of heaven.