Beaten by the rain. Going out in the rain. “Steaming” thougts. A bit of toy nostalgia.

This morning the weather defeated me. I could have gone running in the rain but it was battering down so hard that I just gave in, snoozed my alarm and some time later went and devoted ten minutes to the rowing machine. Not quite the same as a run round the village, but there it is. Later I will take a brisk walk into the village to post a birthday card to my Spanish sister, having failed to do so yesterday.

Last night, for the first time in just over a year Phil went out to chess club to do some training with their older juniors. It was raining on him then too. The chess club opened its doors last week but Phil stayed at home as he was full of a cold - just an ordinary cold but one demanding “steaming”. Steaming involves inhaling menthol vapour - Vick’s vapour rub in a bowl of hot water - to clear his head. We have joked that he risks becoming addicted. 

This, we joked, is the equivalent of “sitting on the doorstep”, the regular habit of the youngest member of the family next door. Long ago his father assured us that nobody smokes in their house but surely they cannot remain unaware that their 21 year old sits on the front doorstep most days smoking something interesting and strange. Many’s the time that we have walked up the road breathing in his second hand fumes from as far away as the entrance to the pub next door. It’s quite a wonder we are not too high to open our door by the time we arrive home. He seems quite harmless though.

I am currently reading a book by Ian Rankin, not one of his Inspector Rebus stories but a different kind of thriller / detective story, with Ian Rankin writing as Jack Harvey. I always wonder what motivates a writer, an established writer, to write under a pseudonym. Is it an experiment to see if their work will sell even without their well-known name? But then they re-publish with the front covered labelled “established author writing as different name”, presumably to appeal to another set of readers. I have come across other writers doing the same thing. It’s a curious practice. Quite different is the case of an established writer lending their name to a new author, publishing books supposedly written by the two of them together. 

Anyway, I mention this because “Bleeding Hearts” by Ian Rankin, writing as Jack Harvey, has the description of a flat:-

“It was well finished though, if you like your home decorated according to fashion rather than personal preference. Everything had that just-bought-from-Habitat look.” 

How many people furnish their homes from Habitat in today’s world? Their store in central Manchester, where I bought chairs in the 1970s has long since disappeared. The book I am reading was published in 1994, before Ikea was so well established. Nowadays I suspect a utilitarian look would be ‘just-bought-from-IKEA’. The flat we rent in Vigo is almost entirely IKEA furnished. Different times. 

Different times, it seems, are influencing the way toys are made as well. Here is a link to a short article about Lego, which has launched its inaugural LGBTQIA+ set, titled Everyone Is Awesome. The article tells us: “The colours of the stripes were chosen to reflect the original rainbow flag, along with pale blue, white and pink representing the trans community, and black and brown to acknowledge the diversity of skin tones and backgrounds within the LGBTQIA+ community.” Looking at the picture in the article, the pink figure looks decidedly ‘girlie’ to me. 

I never quite understood why some felt there was a need for girls’ Lego. Both our children, one boy and one girl, played happily with all the Lego sets they could lay their hands on, be they space ships or any other kind of set. The same applied to the Playmobil sets. Pirate ship, zoo, farm - all the sets were enjoyed by both of them. No need for gender stereotyping. All children need is encouragement to develop imaginative play.

It was always the same I suppose. When we were children, my brother had a Bayko building set. Checking the spelling, by the way, I discovered this:

Bayko poster from the 1950s.

“Bayko was a British building model construction toy invented by Charles Plimpton, an early plastics engineer and entrepreneur in Liverpool. First marketed in Britain, it was soon exported throughout the British Commonwealth and became a worldwide brand between 1934 and 1967. The name derived from Bakelite, one of the world's first commercial plastics that was originally used to manufacture many of the parts. Bayko was one of the world's earliest plastic toys to be marketed.”

There you go. In our house it belonged nominally to my brother but the three girls also spent hours creating weird and wonderful buildings. It is interesting that the 1950s poster shows both a boy and a girl playing together. And none of it was pink!

Some years ago, my brother’s widow gave me the Bayko building set, maybe thinking that a couple of our grandchildren, then 7 and 9 I think, would enjoy it. I explained the principle - rods plugged into a plastic base and bricks slotted into the rods - and they examined it for maybe half an hour. Then they went back to playing Minecraft! Different times!

Among the various adverts that pop up on social media I was sent an advert for sports leggings. What have I been looking at online to promote such a happening? Lately I am more likely to receive adverts for art and craft materials. Whatever the cause, there it was, telling me that their leggings are “zero gravity” (is stepping on the scales wearing them a way to convince yourself that you have lost weight?), “bum sculpting” and “thigh sculpting”!! Whatever next? They sound like a sort of lower body corset. And they were quite pricey!

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!