On Tuesday the weathermen were issuing warnings of heavy rain, positive rainstorms, possible flooding in some parts of the country. Yesterday, Wednesday, dawned dull and damp. I chose to walk to the market in Uppermill (a rather feeble showing of a market with only the fish-man and the fruit-and-veg-man - better than last week but still not exactly bustling!) rather than cycle through the drizzle.
The drizzle turned to something more like rain after I returned home but as the day went on that rain eased and the day got marginally brighter, bright enough for a brisk walk round the block in the late afternoon. I began to think that those predictions of torrential rain were exaggerated. Maybe the rainclouds that had featured in the weather forecasts, swirling in over the western side of the Iberian peninsula, across the Bay of Biscay into France and swooping over Wales, had shed their load before reaching us.
Maybe we had got away with it, I thought!
Hmmm!
Then in the late evening Granddaughter Number One started sending messages about the torrential rain that fell on her when she went out into her garden to make sure her quails (yes, her quails!) were properly covered up for the night. She followed that with concerns that the water was getting dangerously high outside her back door. We looked out. Yes, it was pouring down here as well, maybe five miles away from Granddaughter Number One’s house.
The torrential stuff continued through a good part of the night. This morning, however, was bright and sunny. The cloud has moved in since but it’s not threatening rain, at least, not according to the BBC!
We’re fortunate only to have weather to worry about. If all that falls from our sky is rain, maybe he occasional hailstorm, we can love with that. Other parts of the world are a good deal worse off.
I see that the USA has given Israel 30 days to allow aid into Gaza before they cut off arms provision. In the meantime, presumably, they’ll still provide those arms. And in those 30 days people will die of starvation and disease. 30 days is quite a long time.
We watched Newsnight on the BBC last night as they discussed the proposal that appetite-suppressing injections should be provided on the NHS to overweight out-of-work people. The idea is the reduce the number of people claiming disability benefits and declaring themselves unable to work because of obesity. There is a part of me that wants to protest that not all out of work people are obese, but of course they know that.
One of the participants in the discussion had funded her own injections, thousands, possibly tens of thousands of pounds worth of injections and had gone from something like 26 stone to 12 stone. Impressive! but surely we should be able to deal with obesity without having to resort to drugs and surgery!
In the middle of this serious discussion came a newsflash: a singer from One Direction had died falling from a hotel balcony in Argentina. There followed quite a long discussion about the singer, with tributes and expressions of surprise and sadness. I don’t know how long it continued as we changed channels. Now, I can understand a brief interruption for such a newsflash, and I sympathise with fans of the singer. After all, he died young and seemingly as he was about to embark on a successful solo career. But did it really merit suspending a serious discussion for more than a minute or two?
Okay! I admit to being influenced by the fact that I am not a fan and cannot name one song by One Direction. But there it is. We give a lot of media attention to trivia such as game shows and scandals and who is getting married or, more salaciously, divorced. Bread and circuses!
Or maybe, appetite suppressants and news about the rich and famous.
On the subject of the rich and famous, and the maybe not so rich but in the public eye, cabinet member Bridget Phillipson told ITV’s Good Morning Britain that while she would not repay the £522.54 cost of the two tickets, which she was given as a gift by the FA, she would not accept further freebies in future.
£522.54!!! For two tickets!!
No wonder Taylor Swift can generously contribute to food-banks. No, I am not belittling her contributions. I think she’s wonderful to do such a thing. And I am aware that not all the extortionate price of concert tickets goes to the performers. I’m just rather amazed that anyone pays such a price for tickets.
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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