A concert from Ukraine

Birgitta Kenyon is a choral workshop leader, helping to build new choirs in schools, and to support existing ones. Besides supporting schemes for Parkinson's Disease, Senile Dementia, and a new Summer School for Young Carers, she was equally well known on the cabaret scene, with such numbers as Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer in her persona as A Girl Called Fred. One may then imagine her surprise when she discovered two Ukrainian refugees in her home town who were exiles from the Ukrainian opera house. She immediately set to work to organise a concert to support the Ukrainian cause, and this brilliant evening showcased their work, a mixture of folk melodies and classical arias. Birgitta was accompanist and included some piano pieces to sandwich the singing. She was a performance in her own right, constantly jumping up and down from the stool to raise or lower the heavy piano lid, flexing her muscles, selecting loose music sheets from a huge stack to spread across the stand, wedging them with tissues to stop them fluttering across the keyboard and pausing to wipe her brow, yet never missing a beat to what must have been unknown music to her. The tickets had waited for five months pinned to my cork board: Edwin and Andre's delayed Christmas present of a concert in support of Ukraine. This, then, was the background to a wonderful entertainment, though inevitably tinged with sadness as we remembered the brothers and husbands left to fight there against a brutal invasive force. 

Edwin and I had been to a Ukrainian opera before when Ukraine won the Eurovision. We had flown to Kiev for the competition, and next day Edwin bought tickets for a Rimsky-Korsakov opera in the opera house there, a truly memorable performance but this time the singers sang nothing by a Russian composer.

Andre, Edwin and Rachel come to stay

Andre's sister flew out from Brazil to stay with them for a week before they all go to Rome to meet up with her parents. On Monday, Ann and I went to the pictures in Bury and bumped into them by coincidence as we came out of the cinema, so we shared a meal. Rachel is a stunningly beautiful girl with a degree in chemical engineering and is now manager in a large aluminium smelting plant in the north of Brazil. On Saturday, the three of them came to stay overnight before their flight out. She has good English, especially technical English, but occasionally misses a word. For some reason, our conversation turned to the French people and their willingness to enter ménage à trois. Rachel described the extra woman as "the man's mattress" that caused much laughter but in which she joined happily.

Yesterday, we got to Heathrow comfortably (Andre was driving), but coming back I stopped at the South Mimms service station for a break. I have been there many times before, but this time missed the carpark entrance and ended up on some tiny wandering country lane ending by serendipity at a pub called The Stratford, where I thought I'd better eat as they were serving all day Sunday lunches, which was much better than any fare I might have found at South Mimms.

Philosophy in Traffic Queues

Have you ever considered how road traffic is an analogy for our life-journey? I have been driving for 62 years, and the one thing that stands out is how, in general, traffic flows more freely when drivers control their own flow. Roundabouts and give-way signs are generally much freer than traffic lights, and most people are sensible about letting waiting cars enter in turn. I remember once, at Pfizer in Sandwich, we had one main entrance with cars approaching from each direction so there were inevitable holdups to get in. The management employed a traffic consultant from Liverpool University to advise on ways to ease the flow, so one morning a traffic light was installed to regulate entry. That morning, traffic was backed up in both directions right out to the main road at either end; nothing could move and the whole block of offices was effectively shut. By lunchtime, the system was switched off and the normal morning wait went back to its customary ten minutes, with the right-turning cars filling the gaps between the left-turners.

Many of our Suffolk lanes are wide enough for but one car, yet sensible use of the passing places generally ensures a smooth flow of traffic rather than a snarling tailback from two drivers refusing to give way. Roundabouts, too, generally flow freely as people sort themselves out even in heavy traffic. The roadworks on many motorways have advanced warnings up to two miles ahead of roadworks and lane closures. People interrupt the flow irregularly as they pull into the inside lane until there is basically one queue, but always some annoying pomposity shoots past us all to force their way in at the head of the line. The best roadworks have a sign: "Merge in turn", and this produces equal queues that both move forward steadily without provoking directed anger. Taking away basic responsibility for driving removes the need for thought of others but paradoxically increases our frustration and anger with others, leading to horn rage, bumps, and fights. 

The Oilman Cometh

Our oilman is freely philosophical with his greeting. Early on Monday, moving rapidly from the cost of oil and inflation, he opinionated that all the problems of the world are caused by people "gobbing off". By this, he referred to Putin and Ukraine and European interventions with the resultant inflation, but basically, he is right. At every level throughout our weakened society, problems are exacerbated by people more willing to bad-mouth than good-mouth their family, neighbours or excitable strangers. My mother was fond of the old adages, one being, "a soft word turns away wrath" whenever my brothers or I had raised voices. So much trouble, so many fights, start from a harsh, unforgiving word. Never has it been more evidently true: war is the destroyer of worlds; harmony can build mountains. And in families too, so much more can be achieved, so much is general happiness increased, if we could only forgive and offer praise and encouragement, rather than critisism and complaint or, in the oilman's phrase, "gobbing off".

A stirring Eurovision night

A precious new book from Brian Bolland

Ben and Kaz came over on Saturday morning to celebrate our Eurovision defeat with Edwin and Andre and us. While Andre set about organising food for the evening, Ben and I strolled down to the pub with the dogs for a quiet drink. Ben is a huge fan of Brian Bolland who lives in our village, so he asked the landlord if he ever came in. Ben has amassed a huge collection of comics from the early '80s onward, and Bolland is the comic-collector's favourite illustrator. Seemingly, Brian comes in regularly and the landlord knew him well, so gave Ben a copy of Brian's new book, Bolland Strips. It is a delightful story of two memorable characters: a bishop and an actress, but told as a straightforward relationship rather than the subject of old jokes. Very imaginative, and inevitably beautifully illustrated.

When Andre told us he would organise the food for Eurovision, he did not go half measure. I lost count of the number of dishes he prepared but, including English pork pies (selection of meat and vegetarian) and Ann's English trifle, representative foods from perhaps sixteen countries. After that, the competition itself was an anticlimax and the songs seemed to merge one into another with a certain sameness of beat and instrumentation that washed over my numb ears in a torrent of sound. The colour and costuming surprised the senses, though, and I think the points must have been awarded for those flickering, epileptic designs that best impressed the judges. 

Eurovision Food Hall

Edwin and Andre left next day mid-morning, as Andre was booked onto a Zoom chat with his family to celebrate international Mothers' Day, which Brazil follows although the UK and America go their own way. Ben and Kaz stayed over till the afternoon, allowing us to watch the Middlesbrough/Coventry match as part of the playoffs for promotion, a complex procedure which Ben explained but is still probably beyond me, but it ended with a draw, so they meet again later in the week for a rechallenge.

Ann had yet another hospital appointment. Her AF remains poorly controlled, but they could offer little advice but to tinker with the tablets and await an indefinite appointment for an echocardiogram before they can proceed with anything more definitive. Once, GPs were proud to be called "The Gateway to the NHS". A&E was strictly for emergencies: people who'd fallen out of trees, or brought in by ambulance for a suspected heart attack. Now that wize gateway has been smashed with the outpatient clinic basically a glorified GP practice to which Ann has been going once a week for a check-up. Even busy pharmacists are being paid to do GP's work, and so many people complain they can never see the GP the only solution to the NHS crisis is to completely close all GP practices and attach them to hospitals, such as Addenbrookes and West Suffolk, where the GPs could take on a new salaried role as outpatient triage doctors. So bad and slow is NHS care, we are now seriously considering a private cardiac appointment. Ann's compulsory payments into the NHS over the years would far outweigh even expensive private care! 

Unexpected visitors

Richard and Chris are welcomed

An unexpected call from my brother Richard to say he and Chris would like to drive over to take us to lunch. We immediately said, "Yes please!" and booked the Half Moon Inn at Belchamp St Paul, a wonderful old, thatched pub overlooking the village green, with a good selection chalked up on the blackboard and all finely cooked. Ann had a hair appointment late in the day to which Chris took her, so they enjoyed a good session with Kelly in her new salon. 

We then watched a short film Ann had recorded, "Look at Life: Rebirth of a City" about Coventry's regrowth from the ashes of the war. Suddenly Richard called, "Pause it there!" It was a shot of the newly developed circular indoor market built to replace the old outdoor street market, and on a large stall at the entrance was a sign, "J, Cooper". The stall, selling fine china, had been owned by Chris's grandfather, and there in front, busy with a customer, was Chris's Uncle Arthur who had taken over the stall. Just inside, but out of sight, her father too was selling chinaware. The film was from sixty years ago, and an amazing coincidence. Richard used to help drive a van  and set up the stalls for them at the country's biggest china fare in Cambridge. Their stall was popular with Romanies who delighted in the brightly coloured goldleaf decorations.

Ann remains unwell with her heart condition. The blood report came back suggesting cardiac failure, and indeed she was coughing all night despite several pillows. She remains on the list for physical treatments in addition to the many medications, but it may be a long time judging by the state of the Health Service. 

My own leg pain has eased considerably. I have now diagnosed it as Meralgia Paresthetica, which is limited to one specific nerve, the lateral femoral cutaneous nerve. This seems to get trapped in the femoral canal - probably from sitting too long hunched over a keyboard. The whole nerve has now given up, leaving a patch of total numbness over the outer thigh but minimal pain. Fortunately, it is a purely sensory nerve with no motor fibres, so there is no accompanying weakness or paralysis. Numbness I can live with. Unfortunately, age dictates that my legs seem to get weaker each day anyway, so it gets harder and harder to stand up without using my arms, or to walk any distance at a reasonable pace. Because Ann was admitted twice from A&E outpatients, she has now packed hospital bags for each of us to take whenever we visit the hospital. It is very much a toss-up which one of us might need our bag first.

Chris and Ann

But while I remain mobile, I am grateful for what I can do, and this week I have a new, invited paper published in the journal, Galaxy.  I submitted it in November last year, but the reviewers wanted a number of changes that took longer than expected, and finally it is there in their Special Issue: A Trip across the Universe: Our Present Knowledge and Future Perspectives. My paper is a review of Galaxy Number Counts. Looking out into space in any given field of view, modern large telescopes see ever greater numbers of ever fainter galaxies per unit area as they continue to probe deeper, seemingly without limit. By counting the number observed at each depth, we can lay some limits to the shape of the Universe and its expansion history.

Wild camping, science fiction, and the NHS

Ben has completed another wild camping trip in the Brecon Beacons. He is well prepared, but it looks cold and damp and very wild indeed. I don't think he met many people at the top.

Ben wet and wild camping on Pen Y Fan

On Thursday, the Science Museum in London held a late-night opening, with a special session on Science Fiction. Edwin and Andre had bought tickets, so we met up in South Kensington after Edwin finished work. The special exibition was old out, so having advance tickets enabled us to walk in the rain past a long damp queue to enter through a VIP entry. The display was cleverly arranged from the vantage of an alien visiting Earth, and noting how SF inspired new ideas and inventions, or simply encouraged youngsters to venture into science. An auxiliary hands-on exhibition focussed on the role of technology in supporting new science. Edwin tried his hand at welding until another hand (mine!) jerked his elbow, provoking an ungentlemanly response. Andre and I just kept laughing.

I was always inspired by the steam hall, under the heading 'Power', with the sight of so much ingenuity of invention, and the huge flywheels and connecting rods bringing raw power into the world from awesome engineering ability. Yet now I am reminded of T.S. Eliot, "In my beginning is my end.", or my own poem, Emergent Power from Girders in the Sand: 'O Power, emergent from the mind of man, /  Existing by our blocks of tumbling thought,  / Yet powerful as God of the Koran / Or Christian deity from Yahweh wrought;...', for surely we can trace the destruction of species and habitat to those grim furnaces of coal.  

Saturday, coronation day, brought the boys back to us to enjoy the many tempting nibbles Ann had set out. I well remember seeing, on a tiny black and white set at a neighbour's house, the previous coronation of H.M. Queen Elizabeth. There was then a magesterial, almost magical, dignity to the process, where QEII looked aloof yet regal. I always held that she had a deep intelligence and understanding of people. The new incumbant looks gormless and always has; he is a vague, uninspiring figure whose face has a vacant expression with no evident charisma or inspirational drive. Neither Ann nor I are arch royalists, but my defensive argument is, it is a better system than the corrupt money-driven system of America, better than the recurring vicious dictatorships of Russia, and much better than anarchy or civil war. Our monarch still rules by popular consent, by and large, although in Britain it would take a fearsome revolution to ever attempt to dispose of it.

Ann continues to be monitored weekly now at Addenbrookes, pending her cardioversion and eventual ablation therapy at Papworth, although no one knows how long the wait for these procedures may be. Monitoring outpatient drug therapy, heart rate, ECGs, and titrating drug doses up or down were once all done by the GP. I enjoyed this type of work, for it was simple and rewarding, with the hospital consultant always in the background if more aggressive measures were needed. Now, the GP is nowhere to be seen. They don't even give routine injections at the surgery any more; I had to go to our local chemist for my Covid jab, and the pharmacist even monitors blood pressures. The simplest method of improving the health service would be to move all GP surgeries to help run the A&E departments; these seem to be little more than glorified GP surgeries these days. 

We have just watched a newly released film about our Health Service, adapted from a stage play by Alan Bennett, called Allelujah. It is a depressing reminder of how good local cottage hospitals were, and what a loss now most of them have gone. They can never be replaced.  

Ann in hospital

Ann with a brave face

 Ann has had a tough time since my last blog, with severe bouts of recurrent atrial fibrilation causing palpitations and leaving her breathless. It started over a week ago, causing me to state "If you're no better by Monday, I'm phoning the doctor!" It wasn't, so I did, but without success. After holding for a long time, I finally got through to a receptionist, who needless to say wanted a full description and diagnosis, but seemed to cut me off half way through. I told Ann I was going to drive her to A&E, and her willing cooperation was a measure of how ill she was. But not to West Suffolk, after the torrid time before when she was left in a chair all night without so much as a cup of tea. This time we went to Addenbrookes. 

We got to A&E early Monday morning. Ann was quickly seen and given an ECG, then the doctor came through and said she was going into the resuscitation unit. I followed, to see her strapped to monitors, with a drip in place, and subjected to various blood lets. Much later, she was taken up to a short-stay ward for continuing observations and intensive treatment to try to control the heart rate, which at one time had reached 180 very erratic beats per minute.

On Tuesday, they let her home with an O/P appointment for Thursday, but then they readmitted her for another night to try and stabilise her. All this time, Edwin and Andre had come over to share the visiting and look after us, doing some shopping and cooking meals. They even brought over their super-powerful vacuum cleaner to hoover up all round the house! And on Thursday evening they took me for a meal at a fine old pub they like in Cambridge. Ann has now been home over the long weekend, and is thus far feeling a little better, thankfully. The nurses are now on strike for a couple of days, so hopefully she will not require more attention! She has a further appointment on Friday, so must rest quietly till then - not something Ann is easily capable of. We are now taking bets on which of us might die first! Anyone care to set the odds and make a wager? Survivor to settle up all debts.

Let the dice decide

On going north

A visit to Haworth

During a joyful trip north to visit our grandson Luke in Leeds two weeks ago, we were looked after right royally in the Yorkshire Moors home of Dan and Faye, enjoying their generous hospitality of a home-cooked dish, a fine pub meal, and Whitby fish and chips wedged in-between. Returning south, we detoured via Haworth to savour the wild romance of Bronte country from an isolated base at the Silent Inn. Dinner there was first rate, but at breakfast Ann opted for the 'continental' which consisted of a burnt-black croissant followed by fruit. The waitress asked, "what fruit would you like? An apple, a banana or an orange?" Opting for the banana produced a ready-peeled, melancholy piece of fruit, already sliced up and sitting forlornly on its plate. On settling up, the landlord said in his wide Yorkshire accent, "This is't best bit, getting the cheque!" Certainly, it was better than trying to eat Ann's breakfast.

Today I tried to go to Clare to walk the dogs and do a bit of shopping. It was nine a.m. but already the place was packed; the auction was on, Clare market had stalls filling the High Street parking places, and there was a fun-run in the park with paths roped off and the carpark already full, with an early traffic warden issuing tickets like confetti. Walking the dogs would have been impossible, so I went on to Haverhill where the park was deserted - I was the sole dog walker and mine the only car.

On Haworth Moors

Today, too is the Grand National, which holds the same appeal for me and Ann as it does for so many in England, binding the nation as once the Cup Final used to. We carefully chose our horses using a judicious mixture of reading the form, the potential endurance of the mounts, judging the going after the night's rain, the happy resonance of the horse's name to stir some romantic memory, and a helpful pin. I logged onto the Paddy Power website and discovered I still had £38 in credit from last year's race! I don't even know which horse came in to produce this vast win; I certainly didn't think we'd won anything, or I would have gone back to claim it.

So, this meant we could each back our favourites plus a second horse for an outsider interest - and it didn't cost us a penny! Now we can watch the race with double interest, and for longer than it normally takes our lead horses to fall.