Post 447. DONE AND DUSTED

ANOTHER

THAT WAS MY 92ND.

Yes, the sands of time have been kind to me so I'll have no cause for demurral when the tide finally washes me away. I shall go loving my family, loathing most politicians, disliking almost all reality television, thankful for friends, and eternally grateful for the nice people, mostly on the lower rungs of the ladder, who have somehow made up for the many appalling pricks at the top.

I'm sure I've done the reflective thing in past posts, but repetition is no stranger to anyone who writes. Many far more professional writers than I have written one decent yarn and thereafter produced only modified versions of it, so why break the mould?

I have always been a part-time curmudgeon and a full-time cynic. It's too late to change that.
But somewhere between surliness and cynicism lurks the sentimental, and I am almost beyond words to express my gratitude for the kindness of family and buddies who sent messages and celebratory cards to us this week, or for the love of those who visited. Thank you, my dears.

That's all for this month.
There will be plenty to criticise in October. 

    
 

Post 446. ALL IS NORMAL AGAIN

AFTER AN UNUSUAL WEEK

WHICH IN THIS HOUSE MEANT:
Monday: The entire day was given over to the funeral of HM Queen Elizabeth II. Thousands turned out for the Scottish and English processions and, worldwide, millions tuned in to see or hear as Britain did the only thing it still does better than any other nation in the world, put on a regal show of pomp and pageantry. Funerals usually run smoothly and, as we were incessantly told throughout, this one had been planned by HM herself, so nothing was going to go wrong. Nothing did. Nothing dared. So all well, then God Save The King.
Tuesday. Mo was at the ironing board and the old man was at the computer. I know. But bear in mind we were born quite a long time ago so don't suffer modern concepts gladly. Mo says she doesn't mind - actually quite likes - ironing, and I say I'm happy to keep out of the way. So she ironed and watched Eggheads on television in the living room, while I scribbled and listened to the Steepletone (Lars Vogt/ R.Northern Sinfonia) in the garden room that used to be called the conservatory but is now designated the garden room because it ain't got a glass roof (it's tiled).
Wednesday: Mo supermarket shopped and, behind her back, I shoved the Miele cleaner around the ground floor, A husband needs to be useful sometimes.
Thursday Was our 60th wedding anniversary. Mo's friends Heather and Sue visited us in the afternoon as did family members Jac, Mike, and Neil. Ellis is back at Platform One but was home later in the day. Pauline, who has both cancer and long-time insomnia, and is currently in line for more sessions of chemotherapy, is not up to lengthy visits, home or away, so was unable to make it. (We are not given to offering prayers, but our concern for her is deep and constant.) 

When we married there were those in both our families who thought it wouldn't last beyond six months. They knew not our stubbornness. So I still love the girl and she still puts up with me.

Friday: I put the dustbins out a day late because the Waste Disposal Operatives joined the rest of the world on Monday to watch the funeral: good on them. 

Saturday: Mo shopped, I brought in the emptied dustbins (thank you WDOs), and we had fish and chips from the local chippy for dinner. Yep, all is normal again.

JUST DON'T MENTION THE ECONOMY.

I THINK THAT SAYS IT ALL.
I hope, dear reader, you are going to get through it. Good luck to you.

We've no idea if we can.

But we're very very stubborn.  

Post 445. A PERIOD OF HUSHED VOICES.

 SO WHISPER IT,

LIZ TRUSS IS THE NEW PM.
Apparently not such a big share of the Conservative Party members' vote as anticipated, but 57% was enough. If you are at all interested in politics there is plenty about her on Wiki. Suffice to say she has held the safe Tory seat of South West Norfolk since 2010 and a handful of government posts (each for a year or two) since 2014. Other than that I know no more about her than I do about the county of Norfolk, which amounts only to the waggish Noel Coward description: 'Very flat.'  But, with the state this country is in at present, good luck to her and all who sail with her.
I don't expect much, so I shan't be disappointed.
NO LAST NIGHT OF THE PROMS.
Cancelled this year following the death of  Queen Elizabeth II. Not, I think, an action of which HM would have approved, but I can understand the organizer's quandary. What do you do in the face of national serfdom displaying 'got to be there' grief? You close everything else down, that's what you do. (Well, half the country seems to have joined The Queue in south-east London anyway.)

In this house earlier today, as I was getting dressed, the bedroom radio relaying  Classic FM, I quietly sang along to Eric Coates' London Suite. I have my own words to most of 'the world's greatest music' and they consist of 'mind your manners, son' in a variety of guises. I find the words fit any tune somewhere along the line and I may have just completed "Can't you, why can't you just mind your manners, son?" to The Knightsbridge March, when Maureen, in bed reading, looked over her glasses to say: "You're mad. I'm going to have you committed." 
"In London," I said portentously, "Thousands of people are standing for twenty four hours or more in the cold and damp to walk past a flag-covered coffin, and you're saying I'm mad?"
Dare I whisper we both laughed?

Back when it's all over

  

Post 444. SAD BUT NOT UNEXPECTED.

THE DEATH OF HM QUEEN ELIZABETH II.

AN ELDERLY LADY WHO DID ME NO HARM.
We were watching when television cameras at Balmoral showed the Queen inviting Liz Truss to form a government. It was a brief picture, but Maureen turned to me and said: "The Queen's looking more and more frail since Philip died: I can't help wondering how much longer she's got in this world." As this world now knows, it was barely a couple of days.
Whilst I commiserate with the Windsor family on their sad, but surely not unexpected, loss, I did not meet, or ever see in person, Queen Elizabeth throughout her entire reign; so I shall no more travel to place flowers against the wall of one of her palaces than I would go up the road to put flowers against the garden wall of a suddenly demised old neighbour I had never known. 

I regret her departure though.
I think what you saw was what you got with her. She saw through the creepers and had a degree of sympathy for the army of tongue-tied nobodies who landed in front of her year by year. I think she would have been both touched and appalled at the colossal reaction to her death. I think, too, she would have (probably always has) seen the funny side of what this country does better than any other in the world: producing an army of determined somebodies, in a variety of  suits and uniforms, to carry out weird and wonderful routines because they can. Nothing stops it.
In her own steady way I think Queen Elizabeth II has ensured nothing ever will. That's Britain.
I hope in death she will find whatever she hoped she might and will rest in peace.
I shall always think of her as an elderly lady who did me no harm.

Post 443. REGRET LETTING HIM GO?

THINK IT WAS AN

TO DISMISS THE LATIN SPOUTING LITTLE LIAR?
I don't, but it seems many of his party do. Master Johnson's fan club is already shouting the odds for all to hear. Saint BoJo may have been a bit of a naughty boy, but look at all the wonderful things he did whilst he was team leader; and he really did do them, you know, right now he is saying so all around the country at the taxpayers' expense, so it has to be true. The dear boy was betrayed in exactly the same way dear Donny Trump (that other indisputable paragon of virtue) was betrayed in America. But he will be back, just as dear Donny will. Make no mistake, an army of shitheads on both sides of the Atlantic cannot wait to re-select the pair of them. Christ help us.
Meanwhile it's no systems go until the new PM and her (?) little legion of lickspittles have wrought their own particular brand of havoc, and whatever is left of the UK faces its next general election (i.e. no later than 24 January, 2025), by which time a desperate public could finally vote the Liberal party into power. Well, could they do any worse?
Think so?
TELEVISION.
Mo and I watched This Beautiful Fantastic, a film written and directed by Simon Aboud, and we thoroughly enjoyed it. I have since read mixed reviews and have concluded that the more fervent of its  detractors were of the sort that feels constrained to laud modern classical music. Ah well. So far as I am concerned, the film had a beginning, a middle, an end, and a fine cast of actors.
Y'don't often get that nowadays, more's the pity.

GOOD LUCK TO YOU, DEAR READER, TOO.
Whoever next claims to be running the country.
Let's face it: they've been ruining it for years.