The painter Kandinsky is supposed to have said that colour is a force that directly influences your soul. So here is some stuff about colour.
The lighting in our bedroom is subdued, to say the least. Reading in bed is only manageable because there are good bedside lamps. But the main lighting is so dull that it is often difficult tell what is the true colour of socks or tights or, indeed, almost any item of clothing. Sometimes I have to take things out of the room to a better lit part of the house to check the colour. It’s probably more important with the tights than with anything else. You can feel really foolish when you get to the bus stop thinking you are wearing brown tights, only to discover that they are, in fact, purple and clash horribly with the shoes you are wearing, if not with the whole of the rest of your outfit for the day!
Perception of colour is a funny thing. Phil and I have been known to differ, if not actually argue, about what colour something is. He has a pair of grey trousers which he swears are green. Okay, I concede that they might have a greenish tinge in certain lights but really their basic colour is grey. But I make absolutely no concessions about the grey woolly hat which he says is purple. Never in a month of Sundays is there even a hint of purple there!
And now I learn that I should be the one seeing extra colours in the grey rather than him. Actually I put it down to a misconception on his part, nothing to do with seeing more colours. However, scientists say that we women see a greater range of colours than men, differentiating between varying shades of the same colour. This all dates back to ancient times when men were the hunters and women were the gatherers. Women needed to be able to decide whether or not a berry or fruit was edible or poisonous, usually according to the colour. A difference in shade could mean the difference between life and death!
Men, on the other hand, have a better perception of fast moving objects than women. Again this goes back to more primitive times, when men had to be able to hunt and kill fast-moving animals. According to the scientists, this is why men have better hand-eye coordination than women and are better at playing catch!
Eat your heart out egalitarians!
Some might argue that this colour perception business explains why women’s clothes are often more colourful than men’s but then there have been periods in the past when men were as colourfully dressed as women. I wonder if the same rule applies to birds and animals where the female is often more drab; think of peacocks and peahens! Maybe the colour would be wasted on the male of the species as he could ot really appreciate it!
It might also explain why so many women end up selecting their husbands’ wardrobe!
Friday, 24 November 2017
Thursday, 23 November 2017
Licence to kill?
As part of the task of untangling UK law from EU law it seems that MPs recently voted that animals cannot feel emotions or pain. I find it hard to see how they actually know this. Now, I am not a sentimental animal lover. My grandchildren will testify to that. They get quite cross when I will not say that I “love” Baxter the dog, even though I do concede that he is part of the family. Neither do they understand why I do not want to hold the oldest one’s lizard/dragon/reptile creature. However, Even I can recognise that animals have feelings and I would never do anything to hurt them.
Of course, such a ruling makes it feasible to reintroduce fox-hunting. And why not badger-baiting, even bear-bating and dog-fights while they are at it?
On the other side of the Atlantic, President Trump just signed a bill getting rid of Alaska’s ban on killing vulnerable bears, for example when they are hibernating! Wolf cubs in dens can also be killed! Somehow it smacks of a cowardly way of hunting, if hunt you must! 76.8 million acres of federally protected national preserves across Alaska are affected by this ruling. One of the people in favour of the new ruling argued that the previous rule, that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued in August, was “bad for Alaska, bad for hunters, bad for our native peoples, bad for America” and a “direct attack on states’ rights.” Oh boy, I can see that someone might argue that Alaskans “value hunting as a deep part of their culture” but how does protecting animals turnout to be “bad for America”?
Meanwhile, elsewhere in the USA, in Wisconsin, they have just reduced the age at which a child can hunt and kill animals. Previously they had to be ten years but how children as young as six can shoot to kill, presumably under supervision. Here’s a link to the story of one little girl who shot a deer.
I bet she doesn’t understand the story of Bambi at all. She won’t be crying because his mother gets shot!
I notice that her father bought her a special light-weight rifle. Was it pink, I ask myself!
Get them started on gun use when they are small appears to be the philosophy. But then, I hear that fox-hunting enthusiasts have the same idea about introducing their offspring to the sport when they are young.
It’s a different way of looking at the world!
Of course, such a ruling makes it feasible to reintroduce fox-hunting. And why not badger-baiting, even bear-bating and dog-fights while they are at it?
On the other side of the Atlantic, President Trump just signed a bill getting rid of Alaska’s ban on killing vulnerable bears, for example when they are hibernating! Wolf cubs in dens can also be killed! Somehow it smacks of a cowardly way of hunting, if hunt you must! 76.8 million acres of federally protected national preserves across Alaska are affected by this ruling. One of the people in favour of the new ruling argued that the previous rule, that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued in August, was “bad for Alaska, bad for hunters, bad for our native peoples, bad for America” and a “direct attack on states’ rights.” Oh boy, I can see that someone might argue that Alaskans “value hunting as a deep part of their culture” but how does protecting animals turnout to be “bad for America”?
Meanwhile, elsewhere in the USA, in Wisconsin, they have just reduced the age at which a child can hunt and kill animals. Previously they had to be ten years but how children as young as six can shoot to kill, presumably under supervision. Here’s a link to the story of one little girl who shot a deer.
I bet she doesn’t understand the story of Bambi at all. She won’t be crying because his mother gets shot!
I notice that her father bought her a special light-weight rifle. Was it pink, I ask myself!
Get them started on gun use when they are small appears to be the philosophy. But then, I hear that fox-hunting enthusiasts have the same idea about introducing their offspring to the sport when they are young.
It’s a different way of looking at the world!
Wednesday, 22 November 2017
Other people’s business!
Sometimes it is necessary to bite your tongue and prevent yourself from joining in the conversations of others on public transport. Very occasionally they almost invite the whole bus to join in but as a rule it would be considered rude if you were to give them your opinion. Of course, the problem is made worse by the fact that some people just cannot hold a quiet conversation but must speak at top volume even to the person sitting next to them.
Such was the case yesterday when the two ladies behind me, discussing local secondary schools. One of them had a strong London accent and freely admitted she did not know much about this area. This did not prevent her from expressing her opinion of all the possible schools her grandchildren might go to. I sat on my hands and bit my tongue! When she moved on to the subject of public transport and how much more efficient, organised and generally pleasant the Manchester tram system is than the London Underground I was similarly taxed. “I love the Manchester Metro,” she gushed, “It’s so much less crowded and cleaner.” Well, it’s a bit like comparing two very different beasts, cats and tigers maybe, that have some similarities but don’t really bear comparison.
While she was growing so enthusiastic I began to fear that she and her companion would get off the bus to catch the tram to Manchester and that I would have to try not to join in their talk all the way to the city centre. Fortunately they stayed on the bus!
At Piccadilly station I met my nervous companion from the Italian class, the one who likes to have company for the last stage of her journey as she fears the neighbourhood might be a bit disreputable and dangerous. Despite the rain, which seemed to have decided to fall specifically at that time, having held off earlier in the day, we decided to do the 20 minute walk to the venue.
Initially we just trusted to the hoods of our raincoats but as the rain persisted we put up umbrellas. That was when we ran into one of the local loonies (seemingly mostly harmless despite smelling strongly as if he had been smoking illegal substances) who stood in our path with his hands raised. “Ladies!” he declared, “ you have hoods AND umbrellas. What is going? Enjoy the weather!” With that he ran his hands through his wet hair and went on his way.
He would not have hesitated to join in the conversation in the bus, of that I am pretty sure.
Walking around Manchester, I was struck once more by the number of beggars there are around. Some people say I should not do this, but I now tend to go around with a pocketful of change so that I can offer something more than just a greeting. And I read somewhere that actually stopping and greeting them at least gives them a sense of belonging to society and not being invisible.
Here come some related statistics: “In Greater Manchester last year there was a 41% year-on-year rise in rough sleepers. During the last annual count, in November 2016, there were 189 people found spending the night on the streets. Charities say the real numbers tend to be about three times those officially recorded.”
That”s all.
Such was the case yesterday when the two ladies behind me, discussing local secondary schools. One of them had a strong London accent and freely admitted she did not know much about this area. This did not prevent her from expressing her opinion of all the possible schools her grandchildren might go to. I sat on my hands and bit my tongue! When she moved on to the subject of public transport and how much more efficient, organised and generally pleasant the Manchester tram system is than the London Underground I was similarly taxed. “I love the Manchester Metro,” she gushed, “It’s so much less crowded and cleaner.” Well, it’s a bit like comparing two very different beasts, cats and tigers maybe, that have some similarities but don’t really bear comparison.
While she was growing so enthusiastic I began to fear that she and her companion would get off the bus to catch the tram to Manchester and that I would have to try not to join in their talk all the way to the city centre. Fortunately they stayed on the bus!
At Piccadilly station I met my nervous companion from the Italian class, the one who likes to have company for the last stage of her journey as she fears the neighbourhood might be a bit disreputable and dangerous. Despite the rain, which seemed to have decided to fall specifically at that time, having held off earlier in the day, we decided to do the 20 minute walk to the venue.
Initially we just trusted to the hoods of our raincoats but as the rain persisted we put up umbrellas. That was when we ran into one of the local loonies (seemingly mostly harmless despite smelling strongly as if he had been smoking illegal substances) who stood in our path with his hands raised. “Ladies!” he declared, “ you have hoods AND umbrellas. What is going? Enjoy the weather!” With that he ran his hands through his wet hair and went on his way.
He would not have hesitated to join in the conversation in the bus, of that I am pretty sure.
Walking around Manchester, I was struck once more by the number of beggars there are around. Some people say I should not do this, but I now tend to go around with a pocketful of change so that I can offer something more than just a greeting. And I read somewhere that actually stopping and greeting them at least gives them a sense of belonging to society and not being invisible.
Here come some related statistics: “In Greater Manchester last year there was a 41% year-on-year rise in rough sleepers. During the last annual count, in November 2016, there were 189 people found spending the night on the streets. Charities say the real numbers tend to be about three times those officially recorded.”
That”s all.
Tuesday, 21 November 2017
Water, education and isolation.
Yesterday morning there was plenty of water falling from the sky but none coming through the taps in our house. I popped out to see if the neighbours were having the same problem. If it was a localised to us problem we would have to take some us-specific action. Hardly was I out of the door when I spotted a van from what I still refer to as the water board. So I went and asked the engineer if he was responsible for our having no water. Not personally, he told me; it was actually to do with the leak which I could see fountaining up nicely down at the corner.
All being well, he should be able to put it right in about an hour, he went on to tell me, but life, and his job, was being made difficult because the local council doing resurfacing work had happily resurfaced over all the access points to water pipes. Surely there are maps and diagrams intended to avoid such things happening. It’s great when two departments that should be ale to cooperate just get in each other’s way!
We were fortunate; the water supply resumed mid- to late-morning. I heard that some people in other parts of the village had no water until very late in the afternoon. And, sensible people that we are, we always have a jug of water in the fridge and so were able to make coffee for breakfast as usual. In fact the only true disruption was to the washing up which had to be put off for a while.
This morning I read an article based on a book called “Miseducation: Inequality, education and the working classes” by Diane Reay. As the title suggests, it was all about the disadvantaged lower orders. Children receiving free school meals and pupil premium (a special funding to the school intended to provide extra help for disadvantaged pupils) are 27% less likely to achieve five or more GCSEs at grades A*-C. Half of these free school meals children are concentrated in just one fifth of the schools in the country.
Similarly four-fifths of children from working-class minority ethnic families are taught in schools with high concentrations of other immigrant or disadvantaged students – the highest proportion in the developed world, according to a by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. More statistics were given but the basic message was that things have mot really improved in anything like the way we thought they would or indeed in the way that fought for back in the 1970s.
Some of the comments were interesting, especially this one from someone who called himself Sir Someone or Other:
“Perhaps if the schools paid more attention to basic academic rigour in English and Maths starting in primary schools say at age 6 onwards we would see better standards. Of course it's fun learning about history etc. but no good if you have no grasp of the basics. Only an hour a day day. Schools can use material used as lead up to the 11+.”
I suppose that if you have, or give yourself, the title “Sir” you might think that way. I wonder if he has been in a primary school to see how much time actually does go on English and Maths and how hard it is to squeeze in the other stuff. Oddly enough I can remember a time when head teachers used to tell us that we were all teachers of English, no matter what our subject specialism.
Oddly enough again, I read recently about a primary school where the head had decided that all the children would learn to play a musical instrument and that all would be involved in choirs. Art was given enhanced importance as well. All lessons in all subjects would involve arts and music, even Maths and Science. Astonishingly, that school did really well in SATs!
As we plan to pay out large sums of money to leave the EU, I wonder if any will be left to fund education at all. Meanwhile, I have a sense of shutters coming down on the UK, isolating us from all sorts of things. The European Medicine Agency is planning to move to Amsterdam post-Brexit and the European Banking Authority to Paris.
Interestingly, a Spanish friend of mine, someone who opposes Catalan separatism and wants her country to stay united, has been posting stuff from a forum called España que bonita eres to the effect that the Catalan Nationalists lost Barcelona the chance of becoming home of the European Medicine Agency.
So it goes!
All being well, he should be able to put it right in about an hour, he went on to tell me, but life, and his job, was being made difficult because the local council doing resurfacing work had happily resurfaced over all the access points to water pipes. Surely there are maps and diagrams intended to avoid such things happening. It’s great when two departments that should be ale to cooperate just get in each other’s way!
We were fortunate; the water supply resumed mid- to late-morning. I heard that some people in other parts of the village had no water until very late in the afternoon. And, sensible people that we are, we always have a jug of water in the fridge and so were able to make coffee for breakfast as usual. In fact the only true disruption was to the washing up which had to be put off for a while.
This morning I read an article based on a book called “Miseducation: Inequality, education and the working classes” by Diane Reay. As the title suggests, it was all about the disadvantaged lower orders. Children receiving free school meals and pupil premium (a special funding to the school intended to provide extra help for disadvantaged pupils) are 27% less likely to achieve five or more GCSEs at grades A*-C. Half of these free school meals children are concentrated in just one fifth of the schools in the country.
Similarly four-fifths of children from working-class minority ethnic families are taught in schools with high concentrations of other immigrant or disadvantaged students – the highest proportion in the developed world, according to a by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. More statistics were given but the basic message was that things have mot really improved in anything like the way we thought they would or indeed in the way that fought for back in the 1970s.
Some of the comments were interesting, especially this one from someone who called himself Sir Someone or Other:
“Perhaps if the schools paid more attention to basic academic rigour in English and Maths starting in primary schools say at age 6 onwards we would see better standards. Of course it's fun learning about history etc. but no good if you have no grasp of the basics. Only an hour a day day. Schools can use material used as lead up to the 11+.”
I suppose that if you have, or give yourself, the title “Sir” you might think that way. I wonder if he has been in a primary school to see how much time actually does go on English and Maths and how hard it is to squeeze in the other stuff. Oddly enough I can remember a time when head teachers used to tell us that we were all teachers of English, no matter what our subject specialism.
Oddly enough again, I read recently about a primary school where the head had decided that all the children would learn to play a musical instrument and that all would be involved in choirs. Art was given enhanced importance as well. All lessons in all subjects would involve arts and music, even Maths and Science. Astonishingly, that school did really well in SATs!
As we plan to pay out large sums of money to leave the EU, I wonder if any will be left to fund education at all. Meanwhile, I have a sense of shutters coming down on the UK, isolating us from all sorts of things. The European Medicine Agency is planning to move to Amsterdam post-Brexit and the European Banking Authority to Paris.
Interestingly, a Spanish friend of mine, someone who opposes Catalan separatism and wants her country to stay united, has been posting stuff from a forum called España que bonita eres to the effect that the Catalan Nationalists lost Barcelona the chance of becoming home of the European Medicine Agency.
So it goes!
Monday, 20 November 2017
They’re (almost) all mad!
The world continues to be rather crazy.
There’s Robert Mugabe, at 93 years old, desperately hanging on to power in Zimbabwe. Surely it’s time to go with dignity.
Our own nonagenarian head of state is celebrating seventy years of being married to the same bloke, in itself quite an achievement. She’s also doing a fair job of hanging onto her position. If I were a royalist, I could feel quite sorry for poor Charles, almost my own age and still waiting!
Angela Merkel is having a tough time of it. And as for our Theresa, well, what can we say?
It’s all almost enough to have us believing that the gods are punishing us, especially when you read what the scientists have to say. They are warning that 2018 could well see an increase in the number of devastating earthquakes around the world. This is apparently because of variations in the speed of the earth’s rotation which might trigger intense seismic activity.
Good grief! Is the earth’s motor broken? Do we need a new fan belt? It’s bad enough when they forecast unusually heavy snowfall without giving us earthquake warnings to boot. Surely we have had enough extreme weather with all the named storms and hurricanes and such!
Not all is craziness though. Denise Gough, actress, interviewed in Sunday’s Observer, was asked why she prefers to be called an actress and not an actor, replied, “We fought to be on the stage. We should reclaim that word: I don’t know where it came from, this fucking notion that putting “ess” on the end makes us weak. I would be no less afraid of a lioness than a lion”. Oh, well said!!! At last, a kindred spirit.
But, back on the crazy radar, here are some odd laws from certain American states, researched and publish by a photographer called Olivia Locher:-
In Illinois a hatpin can be considered a concealed weapon. Fair enough! my grandmother had a formidable and dangerous-looking collection of hatpins. We used to borrow them to pick out and eat individual pomegranate seeds. But does anyone still wear hatpins now?
In Utah no-one may walk down the street carrying a paper bag containing a violin. Golly gosh! Where did that come from and how is it a threat of any kind.
In Michigan it’s illegal to paint sparrows to sell them as parakeets. That smacks of desperation measures in trying to earn a living. Imagine the effort involved in catching sparrows, then making them keep still while you paint them. And finally, you have to persuade the purchaser that this small, remarkably un-parakeet-shaped bird is really a parakeet. Amazing!
In Kansas it’s forbidden by law to serve wine in teacups. Does this one date back to the prohibition era? Possibly I suppose!
Here is a link to more such oddities, with photos to illustrate them.
Did you know that there are still people around who believe the earth is flat. Someone called Mark Sargent has 43,415 subscribers to his “Flat Earth” YouTube channel. Thus is not a huge number, of course, and maybe they are all cranks and conspiracy theorists who think that the photographs of the world as seen from space have been created specially to deceive us all. I particularly like the lady who said, “I went down to the seashore, down New Jersey, and did my own testing... ypu take a straight edge and you go from one end and you follow the horizon of the ocean... it’s flat.”
I am so glad we got that sorted out!
There’s Robert Mugabe, at 93 years old, desperately hanging on to power in Zimbabwe. Surely it’s time to go with dignity.
Our own nonagenarian head of state is celebrating seventy years of being married to the same bloke, in itself quite an achievement. She’s also doing a fair job of hanging onto her position. If I were a royalist, I could feel quite sorry for poor Charles, almost my own age and still waiting!
Angela Merkel is having a tough time of it. And as for our Theresa, well, what can we say?
It’s all almost enough to have us believing that the gods are punishing us, especially when you read what the scientists have to say. They are warning that 2018 could well see an increase in the number of devastating earthquakes around the world. This is apparently because of variations in the speed of the earth’s rotation which might trigger intense seismic activity.
Good grief! Is the earth’s motor broken? Do we need a new fan belt? It’s bad enough when they forecast unusually heavy snowfall without giving us earthquake warnings to boot. Surely we have had enough extreme weather with all the named storms and hurricanes and such!
Not all is craziness though. Denise Gough, actress, interviewed in Sunday’s Observer, was asked why she prefers to be called an actress and not an actor, replied, “We fought to be on the stage. We should reclaim that word: I don’t know where it came from, this fucking notion that putting “ess” on the end makes us weak. I would be no less afraid of a lioness than a lion”. Oh, well said!!! At last, a kindred spirit.
But, back on the crazy radar, here are some odd laws from certain American states, researched and publish by a photographer called Olivia Locher:-
In Illinois a hatpin can be considered a concealed weapon. Fair enough! my grandmother had a formidable and dangerous-looking collection of hatpins. We used to borrow them to pick out and eat individual pomegranate seeds. But does anyone still wear hatpins now?
In Utah no-one may walk down the street carrying a paper bag containing a violin. Golly gosh! Where did that come from and how is it a threat of any kind.
In Michigan it’s illegal to paint sparrows to sell them as parakeets. That smacks of desperation measures in trying to earn a living. Imagine the effort involved in catching sparrows, then making them keep still while you paint them. And finally, you have to persuade the purchaser that this small, remarkably un-parakeet-shaped bird is really a parakeet. Amazing!
In Kansas it’s forbidden by law to serve wine in teacups. Does this one date back to the prohibition era? Possibly I suppose!
Here is a link to more such oddities, with photos to illustrate them.
Did you know that there are still people around who believe the earth is flat. Someone called Mark Sargent has 43,415 subscribers to his “Flat Earth” YouTube channel. Thus is not a huge number, of course, and maybe they are all cranks and conspiracy theorists who think that the photographs of the world as seen from space have been created specially to deceive us all. I particularly like the lady who said, “I went down to the seashore, down New Jersey, and did my own testing... ypu take a straight edge and you go from one end and you follow the horizon of the ocean... it’s flat.”
I am so glad we got that sorted out!
Sunday, 19 November 2017
Changing times!
Well, we probably should cancel Christmas right now. Aled Jones has been accused of sexual impropriety or sexual harassment or something of that nature. Every Christmas since I can’t remember when the cartoon film “The Snowman”, featuring that terrible man singing “I’m walking in the air”, has been on television during the festive season. Since Kevin Spacey was accused, it seems to be generally accept that we should no longer watch his films or consider him a good actor. So by the same standards, we should not have any truck with Aled Jones and his fine voice. Okay, he was only a boy when he recorded the song but they do say the child is father to the man.
The whole thing has got a little out of hand!
In today’s paper I have come across two items about the difficulty of ending relationships. Breaking up, it seems, is harder than ever to do. It used to be that some of your friends wouldn’t speak to you after you finished with someone, although quite what it had to do with them I never really understood. In an extreme case, an ex-boyfriend’s mother cut my mother dead on the street as a result of our break-up. Ridiculous! But now you have all the bother of twitter accounts and shared photos on social media to deal with as well.
Someone has even set up a Museum of Broken Relationships, which began as an installation in an arts festival. People sent them items, such as the silk dress one lady was married in, crushed into a jar and thus converted into a thing of beauty once more instead of hanging limply in her wardrobe reminding her of the failed marriage. Clearly it was not a meringue-style wedding dress!
I wonder who goes to such an exhibition!
But we can’t go back to simpler times. That’s just how it is.
My Italian friend was reminiscing the other day about when she used to bring huge great containers of olive oil from Italy to the UK because she could not find it here and could not cook without it. This was, of course, before there were restrictions on the quantity of liquids you could carry from one country to another. We pointed out that it was always possible to buy olive oil here; it was just that you had to purchase it in tiny little bottles from the chemist. Perfume-sized bottles (although now even the perfume comes in bigger bottles) and almost as expensive.
In our turn, we reminisced about how it was used medicinally, a little warm olive oil on cotton wool to cure ear ache. And my mother used to warm her hands at the fire, put a drop of the precious olive oil on her hands and then rub our backs and chests when we had a chesty cold and cough. The smell of olive oil warming in a frying pan still has the Proustian power to send me back to childhood!
There is nothing like a bit of good old nostalgia!
The whole thing has got a little out of hand!
In today’s paper I have come across two items about the difficulty of ending relationships. Breaking up, it seems, is harder than ever to do. It used to be that some of your friends wouldn’t speak to you after you finished with someone, although quite what it had to do with them I never really understood. In an extreme case, an ex-boyfriend’s mother cut my mother dead on the street as a result of our break-up. Ridiculous! But now you have all the bother of twitter accounts and shared photos on social media to deal with as well.
Someone has even set up a Museum of Broken Relationships, which began as an installation in an arts festival. People sent them items, such as the silk dress one lady was married in, crushed into a jar and thus converted into a thing of beauty once more instead of hanging limply in her wardrobe reminding her of the failed marriage. Clearly it was not a meringue-style wedding dress!
I wonder who goes to such an exhibition!
But we can’t go back to simpler times. That’s just how it is.
My Italian friend was reminiscing the other day about when she used to bring huge great containers of olive oil from Italy to the UK because she could not find it here and could not cook without it. This was, of course, before there were restrictions on the quantity of liquids you could carry from one country to another. We pointed out that it was always possible to buy olive oil here; it was just that you had to purchase it in tiny little bottles from the chemist. Perfume-sized bottles (although now even the perfume comes in bigger bottles) and almost as expensive.
In our turn, we reminisced about how it was used medicinally, a little warm olive oil on cotton wool to cure ear ache. And my mother used to warm her hands at the fire, put a drop of the precious olive oil on her hands and then rub our backs and chests when we had a chesty cold and cough. The smell of olive oil warming in a frying pan still has the Proustian power to send me back to childhood!
There is nothing like a bit of good old nostalgia!
Friday, 17 November 2017
Doing the rounds!
Out and about this morning, I ran into one of the old gentlemen with whom I have a nodding acquaintance in the village. The collection has become quite large, I have to confess. They range from my age upwards. I tend to come across them early in the morning. I wonder what their wives do, assuming they have wives. In fact I am well aware that some of them have wives. So what do these ladies do? Are they all proper housewives, unlike me! Are they busy doing the daily dusting and vacuuming? I admit that I have a tendency to do housework only as and when necessary.
Some of these gentlemen have a nodding, or even a stopping-and-chatting relationship with most of the women around the village. The other day, as I walked to Tesco, I met Mike, one of the younger of the gentlemen, who walks his dog, a rescue dog, for miles and miles every day. We put the world to rights as usual.
At the bus stop later, after completing my shopping, I was chatting to another lady shopper on her way back to Delph and mentioned that I had been talking to Mike and his dog. “Oh, you mean Patrick!” she said to me. We swopped notes and decided that we were indeed talking about the same person, the one who lives alone apart from his little dog, in the basement flat behind the post office. It seems he is known by different names to different people. Maybe he leads a double life! Are his long walks nothing to do with the dog needing exercise but in fact part of a spy mission? Who knows? Next time I see him, I must clarify the name situation!
Anyway, getting back to the gentleman I ran into this morning. An elderly chap, he is one of those very gentlemanly gentlemen. You greet him and ask how he is and his stock reply is always, “All the better for seeing you, young lady!” And this even when, like this morning, I am in my most inelegant running gear.
When I first got to know him, this old gent had his arm in a sling. He told me then that he had dislocated his shoulder on a deep sea fishing trip. The fish he caught was so big and strong that it wrenched his arm around and put his shoulder out! He was waiting for surgeons to put a metal plate in his shoulder and then everything would be fine.
And there I was thinking that fishing was a fairly sedentary kind of sport!
So today, six or eight months on, I asked him how his arm was. Big mistake. His eyes filled with tears. The latest scan had shown possibly irreversible tissue damage and there was a big chance he might lose his arm. Good grief! That fish had a lot to answer for! However, he went on, “And the chap who caused the problem has not even apologised!”
I was puzzled. I thought the culprit was a fish! Before I could even ask he began to tell me a rambling tale of a former friend, someone who had worked alongside him on the allotments. At some point recently he had asked this “friend” to help him with something. The friend had refused and a bit of an argument had ensued about favours being done or not done and lack of reciprocity and stuff of that kind. In the end my old gent had turned to walk away. His “friend” growled at him not to walk away from him and grabbed him by the shoulder, the bad shoulder, the one with the metal plate. And because of the metal plate his grip caused damage. So that’s another supposedly peaceful occupation, gardening, which has led to physical harm! Whatever next?
Did the “friend” know about the metal plate? Quite probably. Most of the village seems to know the medical history. Does he know the recent damage he has caused? Again, most likely as my old gentleman is not backward in sharing his tale of woe with one and all.
You don’t need to follow soap operas around here. Village life is quite enough!
Some of these gentlemen have a nodding, or even a stopping-and-chatting relationship with most of the women around the village. The other day, as I walked to Tesco, I met Mike, one of the younger of the gentlemen, who walks his dog, a rescue dog, for miles and miles every day. We put the world to rights as usual.
At the bus stop later, after completing my shopping, I was chatting to another lady shopper on her way back to Delph and mentioned that I had been talking to Mike and his dog. “Oh, you mean Patrick!” she said to me. We swopped notes and decided that we were indeed talking about the same person, the one who lives alone apart from his little dog, in the basement flat behind the post office. It seems he is known by different names to different people. Maybe he leads a double life! Are his long walks nothing to do with the dog needing exercise but in fact part of a spy mission? Who knows? Next time I see him, I must clarify the name situation!
Anyway, getting back to the gentleman I ran into this morning. An elderly chap, he is one of those very gentlemanly gentlemen. You greet him and ask how he is and his stock reply is always, “All the better for seeing you, young lady!” And this even when, like this morning, I am in my most inelegant running gear.
When I first got to know him, this old gent had his arm in a sling. He told me then that he had dislocated his shoulder on a deep sea fishing trip. The fish he caught was so big and strong that it wrenched his arm around and put his shoulder out! He was waiting for surgeons to put a metal plate in his shoulder and then everything would be fine.
And there I was thinking that fishing was a fairly sedentary kind of sport!
So today, six or eight months on, I asked him how his arm was. Big mistake. His eyes filled with tears. The latest scan had shown possibly irreversible tissue damage and there was a big chance he might lose his arm. Good grief! That fish had a lot to answer for! However, he went on, “And the chap who caused the problem has not even apologised!”
I was puzzled. I thought the culprit was a fish! Before I could even ask he began to tell me a rambling tale of a former friend, someone who had worked alongside him on the allotments. At some point recently he had asked this “friend” to help him with something. The friend had refused and a bit of an argument had ensued about favours being done or not done and lack of reciprocity and stuff of that kind. In the end my old gent had turned to walk away. His “friend” growled at him not to walk away from him and grabbed him by the shoulder, the bad shoulder, the one with the metal plate. And because of the metal plate his grip caused damage. So that’s another supposedly peaceful occupation, gardening, which has led to physical harm! Whatever next?
Did the “friend” know about the metal plate? Quite probably. Most of the village seems to know the medical history. Does he know the recent damage he has caused? Again, most likely as my old gentleman is not backward in sharing his tale of woe with one and all.
You don’t need to follow soap operas around here. Village life is quite enough!
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