Post 353. LIKE SUNDAY EVERY DAY.

IT'S ALMOST RELIGIOUSLY QUIET. 

Without the traffic. 

If you ever prayed for some peace and quiet you must be thinking your prayers have been answered.

It's like Sunday every day, isn't it? Almost religiously quiet. I keep expecting roast beef for dinner with Rawicz and Landauer providing the background music. Or Billy Cotton and his band if you were a dinner at lunchtime person.

We live on the main road between the towns of Newport and Ryde. Over thirty years ago a bypass around our village, Wootton Bridge, was planned by the I.W. Council which, in customary Council fashion, compulsory purchased two en route little bungalows from which three helpless villagers were evicted. The Council was then persuaded to reallocate the funding for the bypass to the building of a new bridge at Yarmouth which would enable wealthy yachties to safely get to the supermarket at Freshwater for their groceries.The Wootton bypass plan was abandoned and has never, to my knowledge, been broached at any subsequent Council meeting.

The two little bungalows were demolished and the land where they stood was appropriated to accommodate one large, attractive, not to be subjected to a compulsory purchase order, replacement.

It was probably all settled by Council petty corruption. Most things are over here, just as they are in almost every town and city in the entire country.

So what brings it all back to me now?

Well, on the positive side, if that bypass had been built the road outside here would have been as almost religiously quiet as it is now, we would not have needed double glazing (wonderful though that may be), our windows would have been wide open on every bright sunny day, and the value of this and every other property along this stretch of road would have gone through the roof. 

On the negative side: we could never have afforded to be here.

Anyway, the old bridge at Yarmouth was bloody dangerous.

LAST MONTH I FORGOT TO MENTION.

That confounded hour.

It went forward at 1 o'clock a couple of weeks ago and we shall have British Summer Time now until the last Sunday in October. I'd be happy if it never changed again. I like BST even if, for a few weeks, I shall be awake at dark o'clock every morning with the bedside timepiece telling me it's an hour later than my body clock reckons it to be. By the time October gets here I shall be tickety-boo and totally unready to change back again. I really don't want that clock up there to read an hour earlier come 25 October next. So, you bureaucrats, do us a favour: from now on leave our clocks at BST. 
It's a civilized time.

But it really does fly.

Discussing recently how quickly the years go by after one retires (thirty one since my retirement from the NHS), was surprised to learn that two friends I always thought of as much younger than me have both been retired for more than twenty years.

I've always had a viewpoint older than I am, though that takes some doing nowadays. The only youthful thing I ever did was abandon bachelorhood when I was nearly thirty two years old to marry a lass thirteen years my junior. That rash flurry into adolescence has so far lasted fifty nine years and, three children, two grandchildren, and a bevi of step and courtesy young relatives later, seems set to continue until one of us kicks the bucket.

To those seeking the secret of our lengthy marriage we have a stock explanation: We're both extremely stubborn. Eh? 

Mmm. Perhaps it is a little more than that.

TELEVISION.

It's films and mini-series now.

Every now and then it comes home to me that we survived WW2 without television. 

How did we manage? I guess it was a case of what you've never had you never miss. We had the radio of course. It was seldom off in our house. But we didn't have talking pictures anywhere other than in cinemas – and I was ordered to leave promptly for home if the sirens went while I was 'at the pictures.' I always did as I was told. You didn't defy my mother. 

Our local 'fleapit' survived the war. Was there for some years after. If it's still there now it will be a supermarket.

RIP Johnny Mack Brown. That's progress.

And now we are not allowed out, so thank the gods for the box in the living room.

Currently I am watching a fascinating reworking of War of the Worlds with Gabriel Byrne, Elizabeth McGovern and Co. It's good.

We are also watching 'the last ever series' of Homeland. Really? Whatever. 

CIA agent Carrie (Claire Danes) is still manically rushing around the middle east spreading ill will for America in the most well-meaning way and Saul Berenson (Mandy Patinkin), her mentor, is still failing to control her while making excuses for her excesses. When it's all over I hope Mr. Patinkin will continue to entertain with his singing. I have just been listening on YouTube to his 2008 recording of Over The Rainbow. Beautiful. 

Other than that we are doing the mini-series circuit (Mo goes for the historical stuff and I for westerns and thrillers) and we are constantly on the lookout for decent films. Netflix is pretty good on that score. Have just seen Effie Gray, Emma Thompson's film about John Ruskin and his wife. Well worth the viewing.

And that's that for now.

Mo's talking to her pals on ipad. They go to one or the other's house on Wednesday evenings but that's out at the moment.

So thanks be for technology. 

Go safely wherever you are.