Friends

Some old friends came round last night – old in the sense that Ann and I were no longer the eldest in the room. Yvonne and Robin are MA's in-laws, so we have known them since MA and Sam married. Rae and Malcolm are the parents on one of the teachers in the village school, whom we met when Edwin was being tutored at home. We had a simple meal –  everyone agreed to fish and chips, from the takeaway in Clare, though Ann didn't eat the fish, and some of the others didn't want the chips. But it was enjoyable and the talk flowed freely over the beer/wine.

Some intimacies were shared, though this blog is not permitted to confess them to a wider public. Rae told us how she met Malcolm; she was only 16 and he was dating her best friend. She lost a friend and won a partner. Later, when Malcolm told us how he does all the cooking and always cleans up afterwards, Yvonne said, "no wonder you had two women fighting over you!"

Yvonne has lived in the local area all her life, and remembers riding the train from Clare to Cambridge when it was still running, before the Beeching Axe. Ann mentioned the conversation about the dypsomaniac we'd overheard in the Swan the previous day (Embarrassments with strangers). "Ah yes, Daphne," she said. "She did like her drink. She was really pretty and used to be a model – then worked as a barmaid in the Bell, and they had pictures of her on the walls. She was only 42 when she died, from alcohol poisoning. But it was back in the 60's!" No signs of dementia in Yvonne.

 I took Ann's car into Nico's car wash today. They had a huge price-list on the wall,  showing the typical cost of a car wash with examples of the type of car in each category. Under "Small cars" they had "e.g. Mini ******". It had been "e.g. Mini Copper", but they couldn't correct it once it was painted on, so they'd blanked it out with electrician's tape.

Every wall in Nico's warehouse was papered with adverts for local businesses. One said, "Earn £500/week for doing nothing" and had a photo of a stash of £20 notes to emphasise it was genuine. Another was a notice about a local accountancy firm for small businesses.  Unfortunately it had other notices stuck all over it for the employees and customers: "slippery when wet"; "no admittance beyond this point"; and "Toilets →". The workers had even screwed in a hook in the accountancy notice, to hang up some of their rags.

One of the biggest and most prominent of notices was for "A. Jones and Son, Heating Engineers". Alan Jones calls at our house every year by sending us a card with the date on which he will call, and that dares us to cancel it on pain of our boiler exploding. He then takes about 20 minutes to take the front off the boiler and vacuum clean the dust inside it, before charging us about £150 including V.A.T. for the privilage of his presence. No wonder he can afford a massive bill board in Nico's.

Embarrassments with strangers

Two ambulances were queued outside the antiques warehouse in Clare this morning after I had walked the dogs. Distracted, I forgot to shut the boot to the car and so drove to the Swan with the dogs peering out of the back! Luckily they didn’t try to escape or jump down in the road.
Ann was having her hair done so I had a coffee in the Swan while waiting for her. It was better than any from Costa or Starbucks and only £2; amazing value with a comfy armchair before a roaring log fire to sit beside. These old pubs could make a fortune if they turned themselves into coffee bars and served morning biscuits, or afternoon tea with cakes, rather than rely on the casual trade of an alcoholic public.
Overheard in the pub, the men were gossiping about heavy drinkers they had known. One mentioned a women they knew, whom he'd told her directly: "You're a dipsomaniac!" "No," she answered, "I am no such thing. I'm an alcoholic."
Another mentioned he'd left the pub one day and a strange women came over to him and kissed him. Suddenly she stepped back and said, "Oh sorry, I thought you were someone else. "I didn't mind," he said, "I just told her she should have gone to Spec Savers."
Ann's mother used to tell a similar story: in a toy shop one day, she seized a blow-up hammer and ran up and hit Ann's dad on the head. He turned round, and it was someone else. Ann's cousin Joyce had a similar tale about her mum who always used to pinch the butcher's bum when he bent down — until one day it wan't the butcher but a total stranger.

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Message from Ann in response to yesterday's blog, work-too much and lack of.
The plumber came yesterday to fix our toilet that was refusing to fill. He was telling her that two of his nephews with degrees who live in London cannot find jobs either. One worked two years for the Prison Service and applied to join the Police Force. They told him that he did not have experience with the general public — prisoners are obviously not classed as the general public!!

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Please send a comment if you would like to share some embarrassing moment you had with a stranger.

Mail comments to: grandad.john@2from.com

Work - too much and a lack of

The employment market is very deceptive. My own job is winding down, and may finish soon, but new work seems in short supply. Ann says I can start to do all the jobs round the house that need fixing.

Two of Edwin's friends, both with MAs and experience in a number of jobs, are unable to get work. Northern Alice lives near Nottingham in a job where she is unhappy, but cannot move. She even applied for a job in Leeds, but they refused to interview her, saying she was "out of the area", though she had told them she wished to move. Another friend in Ashford could not get a job even in retail over Christmas. Low paid jobs in London would not cover the price of his rail fare, so they too are out. Are the political statistics deliberately deceptive? We do wonder.

Since Ann's cataract was removed, she is suddenly seeing all sorts of things she was blind to before. Especially dirt and dust. "Why didn't you do it?" she wonders, but I seem to have an inbuilt blindness to it. Now Ann sees it everywhere and has gone about in a frenzy of cleaning every floor and surface she can find. She says when friends come now, they'll think they are in the wrong house, and will ask "Where's Miss Havisham gone with all her cobwebs?"

Brexit drags on, with Nigel Farage haranguing the BBC for their bias against Brexit. Even though the BBC is supposed to be neutral, and even with more than 50% of the country in favour of Brexit, their bias is obvious. Their news items are always slanted against Brexit; their discussion panels are heavily weighted with remainers, and they ignore worthy news items that are pro Brexit, such as Nigel Farage's impressive rant against Juncker and Barnier. Yet for all this bias, and the lack of political will in parliament, a majority of the people still wish to leave the EU. For me, the reason is simple: I hate being told what to do, and rebel against it. Just the fact of the EU dictocrat stating we are foolish to want to leave makes me harden against them.

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Please send a comment if you've experienced a lack of work opportunities, despite the hype to the contrary.

Mail comments to: grandad.john@2from.com

Clare wilderness

Clare park has a tract of wild wood where I love to walk the dogs, away from the regular paths. Few people know it, so I generally have it to myself, a place where the dogs can run among the trees and disturb nobody. In the summer, some people had decorated the trees with ribbons and laced woodwork, to make a magic grotto reminiscent of the woods around the Tor at Glastonbury, but the park rangers soon ripped it down.

Nature

What was once wilderness
is now just torn shrub,
caterpillars tearing roots
yelling for yet more life,
Nature has been raped
its innocence rotted to decay,
and we are all the poorer
for nature's death in our today.

Annie Elliott

Today I entered to find the foresters have been working to cut back the wilderness. Great iron caterpillars have gouged up the earth, tearing up the moss, bracken, snowdrops and early bluebells to leave muddy ruts that catch the feet and cling to the dogs paws and my shoes. They have cut back the undergrowth and cropped the trees, leaving great mess of broken branches and ripped up shrubs, blocking the intimate paths between the trees. What a wild mess the wood is. Wilderness is such a rare and precious amenity it should be encouraged, not pruned back. Soon there will be no wild areas left, and we shall all be the poorer for it.

Hartlepool visit

We paid homage to our some of our grandchildren yesterday with a trip north to see Lucy and her new partner Andy and the children and the newest one Theo plus Aaron. Lucy laid on a great tea and they surrendered their own bed for us. They have a fabulous old house with walls like battlements and a gated entrance. Unfortunately it still needs much doing, especially the plumbing but it will be great when all is done.

Barry, the Great Ex’s second husband, died just five years ago. He too had cancer though much further advanced than mine when it was discovered. He was a devout Christian and believed he would be cured by miraculous intervention so refused to discuss his dying. This meant he couldn’t talk about finances or insurance or funeral arrangements he might want.

Today we met up with Mike for lunch in Sedgefield and then two of Ann’s oldest friends Lorna and Nicky. MA was their bridesmaid and they have several pictures of her on the walls. LOrna is artistic and has done some beautiful tapestries with such fine detail and subtle colours they look like paintings. Finally we took the road south as it was growing dark, deciding to stay somewhere en route to break the journey. We looked in vein as far as Newark, a most barren town. Ann started to phone round and even Ben and Kaz started a remote search to help. Finally Ann found somewhere - the Allington Manor Hotel, a fine ancient house which creaks with ghosts. They don’t serve dinner but the pub across the road did, and we could retreat to the hotel for drinks before the fire.

Brussels

Brussels protesters

Our special Christmas present from Edwin was a surprise trip to Brussels. He suddenly produced two tickets and said we’d need to get away after my radiotherapy was over. He even booked a fine hotel for us. We didn’t know then that Ann would have had her cataract operation two days before. Now she is wearing dark glasses and can’t read anything but at least we should enjoy a couple of quiet days.  We are flying BA from Heathrow. Terminal Five is very up-market, they’re playing Mahler mood music in the toilets.

In Brussels, we did enjoy a very quiet day on Saturday, the constant rain allowing us only to explore the local side streets. The restaurants are all heavily meat pushers; the choice of vegetarian was limited, and combined with gluten-free for Ann, almost non-existent.

Cathédrale Saints-Michel-et-Gudule

On Sunday, the afternoon brought a brief gap in the rain, allowing us to escape and look for the Bronte presence in Brussels. We walked from the hotel towards the Cathédrale Saints-Michel-et-Gudule which Charlotte as Lucy Snowe attended for confession and mass as described in Villette. En route (I am getting back into my French), we were caught up in a mass protest rally and herded by the police—who would not let us leave the crowd—away from the Cathedral. We had had no warning there was to be a protest - but 70,000 people were marching for the environment, and like it or no we were part of the protest. Ann wondered that, when they finally split up after the march, how many would go home in their diesel cars to a Sunday roast? The best way to save the environment is from individual actions, not calls to governments, such as to go vegetarian.

Commemorative plaque to Charlotte Bronte

We finally escaped down a side road to find a plaque commemorating M. and Mme. Constantin Héger's school and the site where Charlotte lived in Brussels - but the plaque is all that is left.

Facing demons

Ann overcoming her demon

Ann had her cataract operation yesterday, and has survived. We cannot pretend that Ann was not nervous. Yesterday, the consultant had given her a prescription for Valium, which we'd had great difficulty in getting dispensed because he'd put the wrong date on! Even a second prescription faxed through to Boots had another wrong date, but the pharmacist agreed to dispense it. Ann took two before we left, but they didn't make much difference.

We arrived at the clinic early and joined into a line of people already waiting. The nurse double checked which eye was to be done, and marked it with a clear line drawn with an indelible pen. Then she started to apply the drops - some to numb the eye, and others to dilate the pupil. The consultant, Mr Ramsey, came out in scrub gear to talk to his patients and reassure them. His stated policy is to make the NHS service as good as or better than private care. It was certainly fast - we were in the next day. Progress was made by a theatre nurse shouting "Ready" down the corridor, and with each call a new patient was delivered, or a treated patient was collected.

Gradually the queue moved along until it was Ann's turn. Mr Ramsey came through again to look at the pupils, and said the woman next to Ann was well dilated and he'd do her next. It seemed unjust as she'd only had one set of drops, and Ann had already had five sets. As people came out, they seemed relaxed and talked of how easy it had been, so Ann was very calm. However, when this woman she came out, she was half-carried by the nurse and Mr Ramsey, because she'd fainted! Then it was Ann's turn. Ten minutes later, there was another call of "Ready" and Ann was brought out, shaky but relieved and upright. She has faced her biggest demon and conquered it.