Thursday, October 18, 2018

Post 315. BACK TO TECHNOLOGY.

WANT IT OR NOT. 
Change is lurking round the corner.
                            Publish your passions, your way
             Create a unique and beautiful blog. It’s easy and free.
Another SOB story. After all my boring threats and abortive attempts to update the layout of this delightful - but unmistakeably yesteryear - blog format, Google Blog seemed to have taken the initiative with the above message which, together with the odd news that I had 'signed out' of my old blog, invited me to create a new one: the invitation being so arranged that I was unable to access the 'new post' page of said old blog. Is there no limit to their cunning? 
I am scribbling this post on Open Office Writer and hoping that the computer lifeboat captain will contact me when my latest save our blog (SOB) story reaches him. 
If it does, the status quo will probably prevail.*
HOME. 
Pauline and Neil. 
Our daughter-in-law and son celebrated their twenty fifth wedding anniversary on Tuesday. Doesn't seem possible but nothing does when you get to our age. 
Mo bought them a congratulations card weeks ago.
Forgot to post it. I was no help. I only remember our anniversary because it comes five days before my birthday (and I only remember that because folk ring and ask what present I shall be saying I don't want). 
Anniversary card, containing apologies and belated congrats, gone now. 
Perhaps we should have a suitably amended version of that message put by for Christmas use. 
Our Roz. 
Roz (on the left of picture with me, her sister Jac and brother Neil) last week underwent a chemo session on two successive days and suffered the not unexpected after-effects. 
Her house in Newport IW has been sold and we are adapting the accommodation here with a view to giving her some breathing space with us for a while.
Mo continues to do all she can for her and we stay buoyant. 
TELEVISION. 
Travelogues. 
Though I normally eschew mockumentaries that seem designed to provide footloose thespians and risible reality show 'celebrities' with freeby holidays, I somehow avoid associating them with 
Joanna Lumley, whose Joanna Lumley's Silk Road Adventure (ITV) has seen Ms. Lumley breathlessly swanning across magical lands like Kyrgyzstan. 
Her sojourn at a camp on the southern shore of Lake Issyk Kul provided the following remarks about the super tent with lavatory and shower room (and signs that it was still somebody's home) allocated to her: 
“I think somebody is living here. I'm inconveniencing them. I've thrown them out. I don't mind doing that. I'm rich and important...” 
It was so gloriously Patsy and tongue-in-cheek that only the most determined anti Lumleyite would believe she meant it. I certainly didn't. 
Though, when it comes to important, Joanna Lumley is the only person I've ever known have a Wightlink ferry brought back for her when she was seconds late to catch it at Ryde Pier. 
From what I recall, she had an appointment at 10 Downing Street so they called back the departing ferry. Yep, she actually is that important. 
No more to say except that 
Ben Fogle, whose New Lives in the Wild (Chanel 5) has also been a firm favourite, was charming, non-judgemental and prepared to muck in with everybody he encountered in this recent series. I gather he concluded it all by climbing Everest. 
Well done. 
In real life (as we few who are not celebrities think of it) Mr. Fogle and his family are every bit as charming. Some time ago when Roz was walking the dog Buddy here on the island, a pair of little girls ran up from behind her to ask if they could stroke him: their parents quickly caught up, apologised for the children's exuberance, gained ready permission for them to make the requested fuss of Buddy (not something to which he is at all averse) and quite made the day for Roz and a blissfully happy dog. 
That family was, of course, the lovely Fogle family. Ignore scandal seekers, there's not much wrong with Ben. He's one of the good guys. 

*As you will have gathered, the computer lifeboat captain duly obliged. Hence the status quo. Thanks again, Neil. 
Google willing, see me later.

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