Advent

 Today is Advent Sunday, the beginning of the season for preparation of Christmas.  We can sing O Come O Come Emmanuel now.  I have never had an Advent Calendar and they did not feature in my life at a Catholic Convent and were unheard of as far as I am aware.  It was only later in my life that Advent Calendars appeared and I  understood them to have been of German origin and the German way of celebrating the four weeks leading up to the coming of Jesus Christ.  The Advent calendar has now been totally taken over as a commercial entity in Britain.   

At my school we had Advent prayers and candle lighting each week and the emphasis was on preparing the crib and the feeling of hope for mankind.  On the last day before school broke up we would have the Christmas Party laid on by the nuns which was a special afternoon tea before we were collected from school.  I remember jellies and always at least one child would be sick.  

I will prepare my crib on the table in preparation for hope, peace, joy and love, one for each week of Advent.    Each Sunday I will add a further part of the crib.

I bought my crib figures when I was travelling in the Azores, a Catholic country part of Portugal.  The making of the figures is a tradition on the islands.   I have also added other figures and animals although would like to have all of them from the Azores as they are very special.  However, I will not be making another visit to those islands so must make up the crib with what I have here. 

There is no more special time than the joy of Christmas is coming in the Church.  

Pillion

 I went to see Pillion.  It was released yesterday and the only day I could find an early showing so I went.  (I normally like to avoid Friday afternoons at the cinema because it is a busier day than the rest of the week with people wanting to see first day releases). 

It is a bondage and submission movie with 18 rating and warning about sex and nudity.   I knew from the trailer that I had seen that it was about a strong handsome looking biker who is attracted to a puny male mummy's kind of boy.  It is certainly that and full on with the bondage and submission, male bikers and bare bottoms but I was unaware of most of this from the trailer.  The sex is pretty explicit.

It is good thanks to the acting skills of the two leads.  The strong handsome guy, Alexander Skarsgard, plays Ray,  and Harry Melling is Colin, the mummy's boy.   Both terrific in their roles.   It could have been an embarrassing  failure as a film but it wasn't.  It is both poignant and uncomfortable at the same time when  on the surface it looks and leans towards being cruel but Colin is in full agreement with his submissive role and being dominated by Ray and learning as he went along in a kind of sweet, naive way of discovery and tells his mum to shut up when she questioned it.  Colin's mum didn't think so and made it perfectly clear to Ray over dinner one evening, the only time when Ray was persuaded to go to dinner.  It was one of the best lines in the movie and I think I may have said out loud, yes,  when she expressed herself to Ray in no uncertain terms as to what she thought of Ray's treatment of her son.   (Colin  had some very good lines when he was alone with Ray so it wasn't really the best line in the film but it was at that point).  

I didn't find myself leaning towards either Colin or Ray, Colin was free to walk away at any time,  and the film led me in that it was non-judgmental in all respects although at times excrutiatingly painful both literally (I imagine) and metaphorically.    Throw into it unexotic British folk and locations and you get a bit of comedy in the pot.  

I imagine there will be quite a lot said about it and mixed reactions. 

Fifth Step

 I went to see the National Theatre's Fifth Step yesterday which was showing on stage via the cinema link throughout the country.  A great way for people in the sticks to see live National Theatre productions from London.  Of course I wasn't seeing it on the day live because I don't go out in the evenings but I was seeing it in the daytime.  

The Fifth Step is a two man production starring Jack Lowden and Martin Freeman.  There are no props apart from a couple of chairs and the audience sit round the stage almost on stage.  At first I found this a little off-putting but that was probably mainly because I wasn't expecting it when the curtain went up shall we say.  It soon became perfectly ok and I became one of the close-to-stage audience myself. 

It is raw stuff and the Fifth Step refers to an Alcoholics Anonymous 12 step programme.   Martin Freeman (James) plays the sponsor to new member Luca (Jack Lowden).    The plot was crystal clear to me from almost the start and the crucial fifth step was going to be no surprise as the two swapped stories and came closer and closer to an awkward coincidence at the fifth step.

There were three of us in the cinema to enjoy this production.  I had an almost two hour writing session in the café beforehand having caught an early train in the morning so all in all a good and productive day out and home before 5pm.  

Labour continues its destruction of Britain (with edit)

 From Attlee's Britain, 80% Death Duties on family businesses like Rootes Group, they didn't sell half their stock to Chrysler just for the hell of it, oh no,  through to Wilson, 85% Death Duties, over to  Blair, giving the immigration miscalculation, and the  human rights Britain we live in over to Starmer and Reeves, set to make the destruction complete.  The total destruction of work, work ethic, workers, employment and industry.

Edit. Small business rate rises hidden in the small print. Rateable values to go up for some by 200% come April. 

Remember the Channel Tunnel operator thought of expansion in preparation for Virgin entering the market? The operator changed mind and left Britain because of business rate rise and that was before the Budget?  Businesses will and are being destroyed.

Another nail in coffin for pubs.  More promises broken.  No help given. 

PM, we are told, defends the Budget. No mention of any of this.

Britain under Labour

 1947 Labour Govt.  Chancellor of Exchequer resigns before Attlee sacked him for leaking some of his Budget.  Hugh Dalton.  Now at every turn leaks come out.  The leaks are allowed out and they put fear amongst the people.   Budget purdah is a period when this does not happen, or rather,  should not happen.   The purdah period is a period in which you do not speak to press, if you are an employee in a company about to give its results you are not allowed to trade in those shares is another example.  A purdah period prevails.   Huge rumours and newspaper headlines have been putting fear into the population and people do things to their savings based on this fear that they should do something and then it maybe isn't right.  It has become disgusting.  The civil servants are deliberately doing this with the population via the press who lap it up. 

Make no mistake, this country is led by a Chancellor and staff who know nothing about economics.  They have no knowledge of economics: they are flying kites to see how public opinion reacts.  Business leaders are not investing, nothing is being expanded in this country at the moment.  It is the ruin of Britain led by Labour.  

This is Britain, still a bit of a force in the world, an economy of some significance, is being led by a government of ignorant idiots and all investment has been killed.  Investors turn away and go somewhere else, not Britain, to expand their business.  

And do not forget that less than a third of us voted Labour. 

Nobody in the Labour Party has experience of trade, running companies, the market nor of  investment and investors. 

And no, you cannot separate yourself as a government from the bond market, you have to pay off your debts.  Come on Labour.  Learn at least a little about economics and what borrowing money means, i.e. that you have a debt to pay off.  You cannot escape that.

Business rates are tripling.  Investment is stopping.   Britain is a no-go land for expansion of trade.  

Today's budget will not alter any of this.  

Add into the mix the Rayner (un)employment rights bill, unfair dismissal from day one, employers will not take a risk on employing people.  You employ someone who is a disaster and you cannot get out of it, you cannot have a probationary period with new employees.  Back to the 1970s.  

You may hate entrepreneurs but this country is nothing without them.   And businesses are going to stop and eventually this country will be finished.  

9.35 am Wednesday 26th November 2025

Observation observation observation

Yesterday morning when I got up I was thinking about Keep the Aspidistra Flying by George Orwell.  This is a very good read and Orwell' writing illustrates the minute observational skills of good writers.   The crumbs on the table that never got wiped away and moved their place each morning.  

When I go out I am always watching and listening.  Sometimes I write things down but this is not always necessary.  I have a good memory.  I am a good observer.  We were taught to develop skills of observation by our English teacher and we kept what was called our Observation book.  She would task us with such things as writing about the ketchup bottle on the table at home.  She was not popular with some parents for these homework assignments and I suspect I am probably the only one who remembers them.  I think she was way ahead of her time in the teaching of English and creative writing.  She was eventually removed and replaced by a more traditional English teacher when we were in our 5th year, our O level year. 

George Orwell looked and listened and had a good take on the society he lived in.  I realised yesterday morning when thinking aboutt Keep the Aspidistra Flying that all the world of everyday life is contained in the four or five blogs that I read by UK writers and is there in front of me - the modern day equivalent of Orwell's novel.   I don't need to go out everyday to a café or go on a train ride, it is all here.  Your lives are spread before me.

One of my poem's for my final collection at the university was about Mrs Herring, a woman I once came across in a place of work in London in 1970. The office was in Tavistock Square, number 12.   She came back to me, unexplained and suddenly, and I could recall everything she told me and I could see  her clothes, her build, her looks and the minutiae of her life that she told me about.  I put it in a poem.  Now at this moment I can remember more about Mrs Herring than I can about the poem that I wrote only three months ago!

Yesterday I sat in the Queen of Iceni pub for an hour and a bit.  I watched the people and I listened a bit.  I read two newspapers.  A man told me I looked like Margaret Rutherford and then proceeded to tell me a story about saying that to a woman on the Isle of Wight.  I doubt that either of us look like Margaret Rutherford and it was his stock story to start a conversation.  He was reading a library book and I gathered from some snippets of conversation between him and other men who passed his table that it was about horse racing.  I spoke to the manager and suggested he move the coffee cups so that his staff did not have to keep disappearing to the kitchen to fetch a cup when 90% of customers at that time of day were drinking coffee and requesting a cup.  It would make ergonomic sense for his staff and the efficiency of taking orders.   He said he was new and would address the subject.  I doubt he will.  It has been like that in the Queen of Iceni in all the time I have been going in there. Pubs don't run as pubs anymore.  Bar staff are absent.  Old people during the day like to see bar staff to take their orders even if night time customers are happier at the table via the App.  Study of the age demographics of customers need to be made as well and adjustments to staffing and levels adjusted accordingly.   I suspect the cost of the staff prohibits employment of numbers really needed.  I then went to see The Running Man.  The same studies need to be made by Odeon as well, old people need help with their orders and don't like non-human apparatus for ordering a coffee and popcorn so they go without.  On arrival home late afternoon I thought that's another day over and drew the curtains and put a match to the fire. 

Incidentally, The Running Man is a great Edgar Wright film.  The book was written by Stephen King many years ago and it is a dystopian tale and we are bordering on living it right now.   It is a must see for those who like dystopian action movies.  Glen Powell is the Running Man 

TV to watch

If you are looking for something to watch on tv I highly recommend Malice currently showing on Prime.  A psychological thriller.  Some of it filmed in London and some on the island of Paros in Greece.  

And then The Beast in Me on Netflix.  Another psychological thriller.  I could only take one or one and half episodes per night before having to turn over to something else but I did not let this stop me from tuning in the next evening to see the gruesome bit I couldn't stomach the night before.  It is very good. 

I watched After the Hunt again, now streaming on Prime, and enjoyed it the second time more than I did the first time a few weeks back at the cinema.  Starring Julia Roberts.  Seeing a movie more than once is a definite yes yes;  the second time you see things you didn't see the first time and so on.  The soundtrack still irritated me but seemed less intrusive at home than it did in the cinema.  Recommended.  

Yesterday I spent the day alone.  Nothing unusual in that for me.  I haven't spoken to anybody since meeting my two poet friends on Monday.  But I have been to the cinema twice so had contact with people there and I have had positive news re. my health so not a bad week.  The two films I went to see were Nuremberg, as already reviewed a few days ago and in case it was not clear from my first review, I did enjoy it, and Christmas Karma which I went to on Friday and the least said about that the better.  One of the worst Christmas films I have ever seen.  (A modern day take on Charles Dickens' Christmas Carol, highly political. I kept expecting Starmer and Sadiq Khan to  appear.  Maybe they did, I left before the end.  The songs are awful, the acting bad, and the Bollywood take did not work). 

Realism and Covid, Claptrap again? No

 During flu outbreaks of a serious level the hospital that serves the people here takes fridge lorries into its mortuary carpark for the dead bodies because the mortuary can't always cope with the number of dead to be held.  During Covid no fridge lorries were needed.  Numbers of Covid deaths were reported in the local press each week.  The numbers could be counted on one hand, the ages were consistently over 80s and in many cases over 90 there being a high number of nonagenarians in this county, and the occasional younger one was noted as having underlying health issues.  

The country was held to ransom by the SAGE member academics of Imperial College.  Neil Ferguson had once predicted the millions who would die from mad cow disease. That never happened.  He was one of the unelected academics on this committee who "advised" the government.  Unelected.   Decision making was put in their hands and Johnson was too weak or too alone to stand up to them.  The country were misled by academics and Johnson proved to be a weak prime minister who did not come up to the level of leadership that I expected of him.   I emailed the PM each week basically to tell him where he and his cabinet were going wrong.   I always got the standard reply that he was too busy to respond.  That did not stop me  as my rage increased week on week.  He fell lower and lower in leadership qualities until we seemed to be governed by a ludicrous band of unjoined up thinkers that did not possess one ounce of common sense between them. 

On the better side of give and take, when all else had been taken away from the workforce like their job and their pay packet, they were given furlough payments in place thereof.  Schools were given lunch money in addition to normal lunch payments for provision of extra school meals.   At least two teachers in Norwich exploited this and took the money for themselves.  They are now in prison.  

Test results

Yesterday I had the follow up blood tests, plus a few more, which had been requested by the first doctor I saw at the start of my illness a month ago.  The follow up gap has actually been five weeks because of the absence of nurses to do the blood tests at the surgery. 

It has been a rough month and my nerves have been on edge and I have been extremely worried.  I do not wish to go into details here about the problems I had but for some unknown reason I had something and the nearest matching illness to my symptoms was non-respiratory covid where my internal organs were attacked.  Some very nasty things were happening to me.  The local GP surgery were supportive although unable to name what I had wrong with me.  The elderly Indian doctor acknowledged that something was wrong but as I was feeling better the internal functions would be improving and the blood test results would, he assured me,  illustrate this.  At the time I was worried that he may be wrong.  Although I was getting better I was also very on edge and concerned. 

This morning I have woken up to a message from the surgery saying that all my tests have come back normal

I have been through them and made some comparisons and they are indeed improved.  I did this myself because I wanted to see where my results stood up alongside the stated average norms for my age group which I consulted Google for.  Links from the NHS app alongside the test results are in fact given for this purpose. 

The NHS app is a wonderful tool, I can see all my test results listed in date order, and I can make comparisons of my progress without troubling the surgery.   I can see on my record the comments made by the doctors.  The lovely Indian doctor commented on my record that as I left the surgery he thought I was reassured and calmer.  Yes, I was.   Now that I have seen the results I am now even calmer.  

If you do not have the NHS app and are in two minds whether to have it or not I would say don't hesitate to get it.  It helps and is there if you want it.  Blood tests  are the gold standard in medicine today, I don't always agree with this but it is where all investigations start.  If I can have a look at my results without hurry and with the availability of further comparisons if I want them,  then for me it is good.  

I have adjusted to the surgery and the messages and the algorithms and moved on to the way of medicine as it is now. And  I know that if I want to speak to a doctor I can. 

Nuremberg

 I went to see Nuremberg yesterday.  I have mixed feelings about it and am struggling to write.  Russell Crowe was brilliant and will be up for award nominations for his part in it.  He plays Goring (sorry can't do umlauts two dots on this laptop).  But from there I am all at sea.  The film is like two halves, before the trial and during/after the trial.  The before part is where we meet the characters and set the scene.  (I couldn't help but be reminded of my favourite book on the subject of the origins of crimes against humanity and genocide (East West Street by Philippe Sands) and perhaps a reading of that would have helped the screen writers).  However, I digress.  In the first half of the film  we meet the US psychiatrist played by Rami Malik who is sent to assess Goring and his defence before the trial.  This is where the film gets bitty, probably an edit nightmare.  Malik maybe the right choice for a somewhat naive psychiatrist, I don't really know, but he certainly came across as that.  Odd.  I found it a bit difficult to get my head around his reaction to Mrs Goring which I do not believe is factual but I could be wrong.  But to find him liking Mrs Goring, sympathising?  No.  That cannot be right.    Anyway, there is a shift in the film when the trial starts and we see historic film archive of what took place in the concentrate camps.  It moves up a notch.  Richard E Grant plays a saving of the day as the British prosecutor who steps up and cross examines Goring, a small but significant contribution to the proceedings and from a purely poetic film goer point of view saves the whole 2 and half hours of sitting there in the cinema.   

Frost and things

It is a lovely frosty morning with everywhere covered in white, roofs, lawns, gardens, everywhere  As I foresaw a frost last night I turned the heating on when I got home for the first time this year and boy has it made a difference.  I am sitting here this morning feeling warm and cozy - I certainly picked the right evening to turn it on.  

The sky is a beautiful blue and white with the sun rising with glints of golden on the edges.  

I am having another delivery of logs in a minute - I ordered a few days ago not because I urgently need it but because I don't want to get low and then it turns out to be Christmas and I don't know whether the wood yard will be working or over busy so I thought I would get it in now.  I generally order more frequently in winter and used to panic when I was running low but I keep my stocks high now and am more organised than I used to be.  I hope that makes sense. 

I have an appointment with Hannah to do my hair at midday and will be heading off to the market town nearby for that and will call into a couple of charity shops beforehand to check over the jigsaws. 

Yesterday I went to the university to meet two of my poet friends for lunch.  It was lovely to see them and to go through how we are doing now and in recovery from the dissertation writing.  Our lunch went through until mid afternoon, we had so much to talk about.   We are all writing and sending off poems to magazines and journals.

Tuchel and England

 I do like to see the Tuchel England team as I said in the first post back here.  I like the way the team are playing and how he handles the British press with nothing more than a shrug and they aren't going to bother him because he is in charge.  It takes a strong foreigner to do that.  He seems to have the measure of Bellingham too.  

It is clear that England will struggle when they meet the stronger teams in world football though.  This World Cup qualifying group has been the second tier of European football.  It was obvious that as soon as even Serbia and Albania, the two most recent games, went up a gear that England smarted under pressure and the times were too long before they were able to overcome the pressure.  They will be mince meat to some.  Kane plays better under Tuchel and when it was thought under Southgate he was becoming a has-been he is now showing how much he is needed in the team.  Foden still comes on as a substitute which seems to be the most effective way he shines in an England shirt and Bellingham must heed his position and stop reading the press about himself that he is wonderful.  He has his moments for sure but he still has much to prove and he, like Foden, perhaps is best coming on later as a substitute to lift a game that is slipping away.  It is said the only player  in the squad who can control him is Jordan Henderson with his maturity of years and time in the game.  Bellingham needs to learn a bit of humility and maturity will come hopefully.  It is possible, it happens. Beckham grew up, Bellingham can too although I don't think Beckham ever had that arrogant stance that Bellingham has.  Oh well, what do I know, just a blogger talking claptrap eh?  

Saturday morning

 Yesterday we were well and truly hit by Storm Claudia and rain thrashed down all day and all the previous night and has continued through and it is still raining, Saturday.  I can get trapped in here and have been a few times and it is quite alarming when all roads to my house are flooded. It is particularly frightening if you go out only to not be able to get back as happened to me two years ago.  However, due to a low rainfall for a long time here the water-table is low and so far the land is coping.  According to the forecast  seen on my phone an hour ago the rain is due to stop soon but so far it shows no sign of letting up.   The wind was bad on an off yesterday and there were fierce gusts last night which rocked the house and made it creak.  Not my favourite kind of weather here alone. 

On a lighter note, I did go out yesterday morning to meet a friend locally and go for a supermarket coffee and chat.  It seemed like the world and his dog were thinking the same and the café was heaving with people.  The server put it down to the weather.  It looked like sharing tables but as if by magic a lot of people aware of the influx of others gave up their tables and left so C and I were able to sit at a table for 2.  

C and I have known each other for about five years meeting at the beginning of Covid during a a short course we were taking which had a switch of venue because of Covid and was shortly after abandoned completely.  I was with a group of people I had never met before and was very much the outsider.  C and I gravitated to each other in the short time before Covid totally up-ended it.  I assumed I would never see any of that group again when the lockdowns came in.   However, C and  I  later bumped into each other in a supermarket and have been good friends ever since.  We are both flexible and due to circumstances surrounding C at present any arrangements can be called off with little or no notice and we both understand this and accommodate it.  Yesterday, C whats app'd me to say she had a window when we could meet and I took it.  There is nothing sinister in this odd sounding sequence but it is private to C and not something I wish to discuss here.   

C & I sing from the same hymn sheet on most things and it feels like we have known each other for years.  It is funny how this kind of friendship can just happen - not a lot of explaining is needed when we chat, just like old friends, and no wondering 'does she understand what I am saying?' moments.   Neither of us have children and therefore no grandchildren and kind of sets us apart from a lot of the people we know and gives us an immediate private world of shared thoughts and understanding.  A bit odd but the childless will probably understand what I mean.  

We chatted for an hour and then C went to do her shopping and I came home having done my shopping before we had the coffee and cake.   The rain and wind were worse by the time I drove home and I worried a bit about the roads but I needn't have done, all the drains were coping well.  I stayed in for the rest of the day, read the papers and spent a couple of hours on the jigsaw.   

I sat next to the woodburner in the evening watching old movies on Prime.  I am currently reading a Sebastian Faulks novel in bed which helps me relax and fall asleep.  He is such a good storyteller.   I am still waiting for more blood tests which should have been this week but were rearranged by the surgery for next week.  The surgery don't seem to realise the stress these sort of changes can cause.   So I still have tension about illness and results and finding relaxation before sleep is important.  

Textile art

 I went to the creative arts group session yesterday.  We are creating an embroidered blanket which a team of two from the art school are putting together in hospitals and various collective groups such as ours.  It is basically a Tracy Emin-type textile project for the community and we went through various examples in a preliminary talk.  One of our most well known examples, apart from Tracey's blankets etc, is a textile message from a young girl, Lorina Bulwer, who was housed in an asylum in Great Yarmouth.  Her work looks incredibly contemporary although it was done somewhere around 1893.  Her words were her plea to get out of the asylum. 

We each started a square of embroidery using words that are important to us in belonging to a community.  I used the words which came to mind when I joined the group three or four years ago when seeing somebody smiling at me was important to me and having friendly people around and being made to feel welcome.  I finished another square whilst watching the football last night.  This one I used just a single word: Talk.  It is so important to talk to one another.  When all the squares are sewn together single words are just as important as whole sentences and add context and stops to dwell on in the finished product  

We are having a second session on the blanket (it will be all our squares sewn together onto a soft piece of fabric like the fabric used in teddybears) in December.  It was a great session and everybody enjoyed it.  No fancy stitching is required, just running stitch if you want to which is what I did.  Only two of us finished our squares and we were photographed holding them.  I then finished another last night and will no doubt do at least another one.

The creative group is one of my favourite groups that I go to and is run by Creative East who run events throughout Norfolk and some of Suffolk.  I think quite a lot of people are put off because they think it is just old people and no fun.  The people may be old but they are definitely fun with high intelligence, life experience to share, and friendship.  I took a friend along once but she didn't want to go again.  She could not adjust to the age and said it made her think too much about dementia. Funny because she is at least three years older than me.   When I first retired I found it difficult to adjust to only meeting older people and not seeing young and old mixed.  I have got used to it now and find being with my own age group most of the time is being with people of experience with lots to offer and share.  I have been able to face that I am no longer a young person however much I might like to think I am.  Underneath the grey hairs everybody has an opinion, something to say if you talk to them, hidden gems of wisdom, and most of all, everybody needs friendship and they wouldn't be there if they didn't.   

I enjoyed my afternoon very much. 

Today unfortunately it is chucking it down with rain.  I am not sure what I will do yet but I will tell you tomorrow. 

Die My Love

 I went to see Lynne Ramsey's Die My Love yesterday.    It is beyond superlatives.  I loved it, full on, exhausting, Jennifer Lawrence at her most exceedingly best.  

I know mental illness from living with a schizophrenic.  It is full on.  It is unbearable, it is draining, frightening and horrible.  (Don't worry, he is gone now).  All mental illness at its true state of mental illness (not the "oh, I feel depressed today sweetie and I can't go to work') is horrific for all concerned particularly for those in immediate proximity like the loved one to the mentally ill person.  In the film Jennifer Lawrence is mentally ill verging on madness with post partum depression.   All mental illness is horrible horrible horrible. 

It is more than I can do to write and do justice to this movie.  I loved it, I loved the choice of music, I love the full-on-ness and I was fixated and happy but drained.  I wouldn't want to go again - I often go again to movies that I like but no, not this one, I don't think so anyway on the morning after.  I stayed until the last credit because I didn't feel like moving from my seat too quickly. 

Anemone

 I went to the cinema yesterday to see Anemone.  I went knowing nothing about it.  All I knew was it was directed by Ronan Day-Lewis and his father Daniel Day-Lewis was in it along with Sean Bean.  There ended my knowledge.  

It is a psychological drama.  It is filmed mainly in Anglesey with wild scenery and wild seas and a hut in a forest where most of the drama takes place.   There is also plenty of running along an Anglesey beach , wind and wildness through dunes and forests.  

Ronan directs it well.  Sean Bean acts well as does DD Lewis.  

It is a drama about estranged brothers (Bean and DDLewis)/a father son complication spanning past and present/priests/pagan versus religion/the British military and the Troubles (to us in Britain the Troubles means Northern Ireland late 1960s) both brothers having served in the military.   It is atmospheric, we don't see the Troubles, but they gradually ooze out.  I felt immersed there in the hut waiting....

Real life family estrangements in my experience don't really work through like this but I wish they did.  It is a good psychological drama with a suspense that kept me watching and just enough to move me to liking both brothers.  Back home there is a complication of a wife and a son that overlap Bean and Lewis.   

The anemone is in the garden, both in their childhood and now.  It brings the threads together. 

I recommend.

On a different note, the weather here is looking good for Joy's visit today.  The clouds are high and the sun is breaking through.  She may not even need her umbrella. 

Recap of yesterday

The optician yesterday commented on my cataracts and thinks I have two or three more years probably before I need to have them done.  She said she wants to see me annually now which makes sense.  I am on a monthly plan with the opticians because of my contact lenses and all check ups and lenses and eye tests are included in the plan.  I have six monthly contact lens check ups on my eyes.   I do, of course, have to pay for new glasses when needed but yesterday she said that I didn't need to change them as she was not changing my prescription from two years ago.  This was good news.

I didn't stay long in the city but did visit Primark but the queues were too long to buy my new knickers which I had planned to stock up on with a view to my holiday next year.  I am thinking well in advance of needs!  The shop was very busy and the three paying areas had enormous queues.  I said to the security guard that I would not be waiting and placed the knickers on the desk next to him.  He didn't seem bothered.  (I was by now on a different floor to lingerie for the  paying area so I couldn't take them to place them back on the shelf myself,  The shop appeared to have many assistants walking around chatting to each other but very few pay desks open which I thought was bad on the part of management. I didn't see any managers walking around but plenty of security guys.  Norwich Primark is incredibly busy and a huge store.  It makes one think that people only shop in Primark.  I am betting that John Lewis in comparison was pretty empty). 

I paid a visit to the bank, I was sitting outside it when having my coffee and you can see it in the photo yesterday.  I visit the bank on my visits to Norwich in order to take out some coinage and, of course, a bit of cash to keep me going. My local branch closed a year ago and now the three market towns around me which all once had a branch no longer have banks.   Getting pound coins for car parks is the main reason why I have to visit a bank although now that I am no longer at the university the need for the pound coins for parking has reduced but I still need coin for the odd tip here and there and still keep a small coin bag in the car for car parks.

All in all a rather boring post.  Sorry about that.  I had a nice day and no rushing around, I went by train to avoid the roadworks around Norwich, and was suitably relaxed all day. 

It is still dull and overcast but I will go out to the cinema later and see the Day-Lewises in Anemone, I think.   

Edit: 9.30 am the sun is now shining. I am so pleased. 

Monday

Photos just now 12 noon, for Joy  (I took the photos sitting outside Caffé Nero, first looking one way towards the Castle and then looking the other to the Market and the City Hall.  It was drizzling a bit but I was not the only person sitting outside.  I was killing time waiting for my opticians appointment). 

 

 I am off to Norwich this morning because I have a regular eye test, the one I have every two years.   I am having a new person to examine my eyes as my man I have had for the past 20 years is now in semi-retirement and only comes in 2 days per month. (It is his family business so he is available to cover holidays etc. but mostly he is retired).   I am happy to have a different person and will be interested to see what she says about my cataracts and what their progression is this time round.  

The day is overcast and dull and mild.  This is forecast for the whole week and I am thinking of Joy coming to Norwich on Wednesday - it is unlikely she will see any sunshine but you never know, let's hope for Joy that the forecast is wrong and there will be a break in the weather for her visit. 

I went to see my brother and his wife yesterday.  We don't see each other every week now like we did during Covid when we kept each going with teas and biscuits sat outside in all weathers wrapped up in coats and hats or undercover in his cart shed if it was raining.  One good thing that came out of that is that I am much happier sitting outside having a coffee or a meal than I ever was.  In fact I used to be the one who always wanted to eat inside rather than at an outside table when out and about or on holiday.  This has now been totally reversed and I will now  always sit outside if given the option providing it is not raining.   

I took them a jigsaw puzzle knowing that they have just finished the one they were doing.  We swap puzzles and they pass on again to other family members.  My brother and I used to do puzzles together when we were children, now he is doing them on the kitchen table with his wife, both of them nearly 80.  He still cuts my grass for me and in fact turned up unexpectedly on Saturday morning which was a lovely surprise so I have seen plenty of him this weekend.  Visits and people make such a difference to me. 

Sunday (edited)

 I see that the BBC is in the place where it should be - found guilty of doctoring news to suit its agenda.  I hope those who swear by the BBC will read this piece of news and digest it and ponder upon it.   I have a feeling that they will not see it, and will pretend it never happened, didn't exist, all lies and never mind, it was only Trump.  

For those overseas who also swear by the BBC, take heed too.  Those in Israel do not believe the BBC and rightly so, and those around the world should also not.  The BBC is an out and out liar at times.   It covers for the perverted and the paedos but is no help to those who call a pregnant person a pregnant woman in a news bulletin. up-holding the hurt of the woke who have not ploughed a field nor lived from the land to put food on the table, chopped mangolds,  lit a fire,  lived in war, divided one Mars bar between 6 or seen the Corona lorry.  Lives at the BBC are not as we folk know it where we know a baby comes from a woman from between her legs.  That newsreader was quite right in wanting to describe a pregnant woman as a pregnant woman and ignore being told in her notes to say "pregnant person".

Edit

BBC Director General Tim Davie and CEO Deborah Turness (Head of News)  resigned last night.  They have gone. Admitted they doctored news re. Trump to suit their agenda.  

The Choral

 Today after my early start I went to see the morning showing of The Choral released here today.

It is a British drama set in 1916 when Britain is in the throes of WWI;  a small Yorkshire mill town community with a choral society;  written by Alan Bennett (can he really still be writing at his age?... there is hope for us all) and directed by Nicholas Hytner.  (They did a collaboration with the The Lady and the Van and the History Boys previously).

If you are expecting a warm glow from a choir in a Yorkshire mill town you won't really get one.  It is also one of those annoying films where you see all (well almost) the good bits in the trailer and it gets your saliva going to see the film and then find that the trailer is the sum total of the good lines in the entire film.  

It kind of works and it doesn't as a film about the choir, World War I, adversity, horrors of men going to war and not coming back or being maimed and coming back, and conscripts and those left behind and some hint of subjects like queers and prostitutes thrown in, perhaps, I think.   It was like Bennett and Hytner chucked as much as they could at the mirror in the hope that some of it would stick. 

All in all I shuffled about a bit and at times almost thought, dare I say, that it was a bit boring.  Others will like it for sure.  There were some good performances - an oddly strange Elgar played by Simon Russell Beale - and Ralph Fiennes was the choir master.  The performances were good it was just a shame about the rest of it. 

Headlights dazzle and remembering trains and Russia

I am up and about fairly early in order to start my day and enjoy the daylight hours and get out and back before dark.  It makes sense not to drive with those LED headlights coming towards me in the narrow lanes and driven more on my side than theirs in the best of light and totally unfathomable in the dark and dazzled. 

There are early showings of films and today I will see something new out at the cinema.  I will have coffee and make notes, read the paper, make this early start.   The trains were running when I last looked. A freight train had caused a delay - late running freight train - but now they should have caught up.  What a great image that portrays - Freight train freight train going so fast.   Freight trains also fascinated me when I was on the train in Russia.  All night long freight trains would pass my train going the other way in Siberia.  I loved that sound of the approaching train and then the disappearing sound.  I would sometimes look out at the lights too but mostly I was sleeping and so snug and warm that I did not move from my bunk.  

I liked the Russian way of life.  Irina lived a happy life in her apartment and her former husband lived in a bedsit when once he had been a hospital consultant, a happy life of two rooms.  She pointed it out when we passed it - 'he lives up there' - she said pointing to a window above a shop.  Irina spoke fluent English, went swimming once a week, shopping, occasionally took paying guests like me and cooked for us and some like me paid her to be our guide,  and did whatever she did in her private room which she did not show me.  I think she had a television and a chair, her bed and her cats.  

Marxism doesn't work

Marxism will eventually destroy the world as it rears its ugly head here and in the US and in the EU.  All denied of course.  Do your research, learn for yourself.   Read the Bolshevik ideology.  Understand it.   A 34 year old with Marxist ideology smacks of Democrats desperation, no New Yorker, no man from the Bronx, no man from Queens, no docker, no butcher, no son of scaffolder, no taxi driver, no deli owner, no local girl and local boy with dreams come true on a wedding day, no Hudson River, no Manhattan, no Chinatown.  

There is a whole lot of trash written by dumb people about an unknown, untested so far, 34 year old.

Film and Football

 Yesterday was a nice day, as is also today by the looks of things, and I wasn't feeling bad so I pushed myself to go out to the cinema as there was a single morning showing of The Life of Chuck.  I had wanted to see this since seeing the trailer some weeks back but, as is the way with the Odeon sometimes, they had only been showing it in the evenings.   And then yesterday morning when I woke up and checked my Odeon app I discovered an early showing had miraculously snuck in.  It wasn't there when I checked on Sunday when I was vaguely making some sort of plan for the week.

This was a film of a Stephen King novella and directed by the regular Stephen King director Mike Flanagan.   It is probably the first Stephen King/Mike Flanagan movie that I have ever seen but don't hold me to that but on a guess I wouldn't think I have gone out of my way to see one.  This is because I do not go to horror movies full stop.  I live alone and I do not want to bring terrifying scenarios into my home even in my head from a movie so I just don't do horror.  However, I had a very strong feeling that this was not a horror movie from the trailer and without any research I trusted my instinct.  I was not wrong.  Dedicated Stephen King horror fans may be disappointed.  

I was not disappointed of course and enjoyed the film very much.  It has to be said that it is a bit weird but what would you expect from Stephen King? You would not expect a contemporary, not out of the ordinary everyday story would you?   It is in three acts and they are in reverse.  The story is a mixture of joyful and profound which some say, I noted afterwards, the profundity did not really come off.   However, for me it was enough and I did not drift nor wane in my attention to the detail.  The acting was strong and it held it together with strength where there may have been weaknesses.  There is a strong narration which is, I can do no more than to say, pleasing. 

I even found some tears in my eyes on a couple of occasions, happy ones at poignant moments. 

If you get the chance to see The Life of Chuck do not hesitate to see it. 

Later, in the evening, I watched football from the Champions League thanks to Prime who are showing some of the matches to Prime viewers at no extra cost.  It took me back 20 odd years when I was a dedicated Champions League follower.  It was a joy to watch Liverpool v Real Madrid without commentators invading my view of the match.  I used to watch Champions League football when it was Sky exclusive and I had an analogue set up where I could take an option to watch without commentary.   Prime offered various options for watching and I happily chose not to listen to Alan Shearer and Jon Champion.  It was a fast game and I wanted to see the greatest goalkeeper in the world once more, Thibaut Courtois, in the Real Madrid goal.  I had written in my journal earlier in the day whilst sitting in the Odeon café that Liverpool would not get a goal passed him.  As it turned out I was wrong and they got one and won the match 1-0.  This was not before he had made eight stunning saves and was once again the outstanding goalkeeper that he is.  

Yesterday was a better day for me and another in my total of better days which now reaches 8 in a string of days. 

The day ahead

 My day starts with breakfast of porridge, linseed, a cup of tea, a glass of beetroot juice and a few gulps of Kefir.  While I eat my porridge I do Wordle, followed by Codeword, followed by something called More Wordle, then back to Codeword to test my memory of solving the puzzle.  That will make sense to those who do codewords.   All the puzzles are on-line. 

After that described above I then go out to the shed to fill the wood basket for the evening fire.  I do this religiously whether I have used all the wood the night before or not. If there is wood left I stack it in the fireplace and then go out and fill the basket again.  I do this each day.  Then if a day comes when it is such bad weather I cannot get outside then I can use the stack in the fireplace.  Also ill health may prevent me from going out.  The illness I have had for one month stopped me one morning from filling the woodbasket.   I have more blood tests next week.  I have finished the blood pressure chart.  I am feeling better and each day I count up how many days I have felt better.  I am now on day six of feeling better.  The illness lasted for almost 30 days.    It has been a frightening experience.  I have seen three doctors and met the lovely Indian doctor who held my hand.  It was a bonus to the issue of being ill.  He helped me although he did not name my illness.  He did not think it had a name.  

I am reading now of others who have had similar things wrong with them.  At the moment if you mention ill health people automatically jump to the conclusion of flu, covid or colds, in fact anything respiratory.  This illness is none of those things.   I was very scared.  The fear is subsiding as things very slowly return to normal.  I never gave up but that means very little in relation to how I was actually feeling mentally which was very scared.  I am grateful to the local surgery for helping me through this. 

It is a good day again today and the sun is shining in my face once more.  I have been outside to do my exercises.  The exercises come after the wood basket.  I sit outside if the weather is fine and if it is not then I do them in the garage.  I do not allow myself to do them in the house.  

Today I am going out to the cinema to see The Life of Chuck. A movie of depth and three parts in reverse I believe.   A novella by Stephen King.  I am looking forward to it.   I will pack my lunch, fill my drink bottle and move onwards to the train. 

Bugonia

Following my month of ill health I clutch each good day that I have and,  even if the day is not quite so good as the day before as it was this morning, I still grab at it and make myself do something. 

Today I went to see Bugonia, the latest movie from Yorgas Lanthimos, he of The Favourite and Poor Things and the Killing of the Sacred Deer.  He is not a movie director for everybody and his films can be described as wacky.  I love them. 

This one was no less wacky than any of the others although I think I enjoyed Poor Things better and even went to see that one more than once.   

So this is not everybody's cup of tea and anybody who did not like another wacky movie, Everything, Everywhere All At Once, is probably not going to like this.

Emma Stone is a favourite of Lanthimos and she does not let him down.  I love her in these wacky films. 

The story is of a kidnap and two cousins, one a bit dippy but you will warm to him, who kidnap Emma Stone who is a CEO of a pharmaceutical company.  Nothing is ordinary in Lanthimos movies so don't just think of an office block in New York with ordinary things going on.   The dippy cousin is led by his more mad non-dippy cousin who is very dangerous and he has some insane ideas about the head of the pharmaceutical company and aliens.  

I loved the music score and it gave the events a great edge.   

I loved the movie although its bizarre ending is puzzling although very much a Yorgas Lanthimos ending.  

In conclusion, I loved it all and a visit to the cinema to see such a bizarre movie is a great escape from the daily drudge of life, the lighting of the fire, the cooking of the tea, the making of the bed, the feeding of the cats, the cleaning of the lavatory and the four walls of the house. 

Blair's Britain

 TOLD YOU SO 1789

take a

letter to

tony blair 

where should i address it sir?

the middle east?

the catholic tablet? 

care of the synagogue

doncaster north?

no no no

he is yet to be born boy

he will come as saviour (they will learn soon enough of their mistake)

and the post will 

find him via

the czech republic now start

dear mr blair

i wrote the 

anarchical fallacies

but you did 

not pay attention

fettes boy you did not listen

to your masters or pay attention at Oxford only Europe penetrated your core

and as we know already from the Revolution the French are never to be trusted

and now you nor

anyone else in your very ungreen and unpleasant land

dare utter what

a total nonsense 

on stilts 

you got your 

people into - 

put that in boy -  

sir yes but do you

think this is a total waste

of ink and just a stink 

oh shut up boy

and post in 300 years 

and send it

if there is anything

left of Britain it will

be burned by

the imam no doubt but go ahead

what sir?

oh shut up boy

ask me no questions find a stamp when invented and post and do as you’re told 

signed 

yours 

jeremy bentham

Missing a Man

It is a beautiful morning here again and the sun is in my eyes as I sit typing.  It has been wet during the night but the rain has stopped now.  The temperature is pleasant.

Each day I do my daily exercises.  I prefer to do them outside.  I started doing them indoors but there was always the temptation indoors to take a lazy attitude, peeking at something on the table, being pulled to the comfort of an easy chair, not taking them quite seriously enough.   One good thing that came out of  Covid lockdowns is that they made me appreciate outdoor living when I sat with my brother and his wife outside in their garden when his wife refused all guests access to the house during the Lockdown time so I am happy to do the exercises outside. 

I now have a space in the garage too which I have designated for the exercises on days when it is raining.  I have used this space twice now and it works well, giving me fresh air, good for breathing,  and leg space for the stretching and manouevres and my phone picks up the You Tube channel so I can still follow the session. 

I have been doing the exercises for over a month now and feeling the benefit I think.

You may recall that earlier this year I started seeing a man who I met at the Creative East sessions who asked me out at Christmas time.  I eventually started seeing him in January and had a perfect seven months with him.  I believe it was meant to be that it happened because you will know that I was required to write a collection of poetry for my Masters dissertation.  Well, this seven months of dating gave me plenty of poetry material.  If you are writing a collection of poems you need a subject even if only a loose topic.  My collection was actually about a three month period of the summer of 2025 so included the time I was with him.  Some poems were specifically about my "love" journey, others about cinema visits, and some fantasy as well.   

I put it down as fate that this relationship happened.   It has now ended but it was not me that ended it and I was sad, and am still sad, that we no longer see each other.  However, I am old enough and long enough in the tooth to not let it get me down, it was as it was meant to be and I enjoyed it while it lasted.   The ending was a mystery and it had the modern twist to it that I believe I have been "ghosted" as they call it.  This is not a modern twist that I like but seems to be the modern way of saying goodbye.  On our last day out he got up and walked off and said he wanted to change his life.  He did not say goodbye, explain anything about his "change his life" statement; we had not argued or disagreed, we had had our usual laughter, jokes, putting the world to rights, general sharing conversation.    A man sitting at the table opposite smiled and shrugged at my friend's sudden departure and I said "I don't know what happened".  

What went through his mind I do not know.  Lots of people ask me about him because they all knew him and apart from me missing him they also miss him too.  There were never many men around in the groups we go to and he was  popular with everybody.    I still hope that one day we will get together again if only for a coffee and a chat.  He is missed in the groups too and I wish he would return.