'Keeping the Dream Alive,' Joanna Cherry

A long time ago a wise man commented on politicians books.  He claimed they all ran the same way.  That is, if the Prime Minister did the correct thing, it was my idea.  If the Prime Minister did the wrong thing it was because he did not listen to my warning.  I did not doubt that this book would offer some one-sided opinions on the troubles in the Scottish National Party, (SNP) over the last few years, and this was of course a book written to answer Nicola Sturgeons self-seeking work 'Frankly,' so we would not be disappointed.  

Joanna Cherry covers the years since the failed referendum in 2014, when Scotland ought to have become independent.  The leadership of Alex Salmond, the greatest 'Big Beast,' in Scottish politics and it appears the last one for a while.  Clearly Joanna admired Alex, didn't we all, and like him, she sought a clear, intelligent, way forward for independence.  This book makes clear the next First Minister did not have Alex's talent, insight or purpose, and instead left us with a leadership style not unknown in North Korea.

Joanna discusses the loss of MP seats in Westminster and the reasons thereof, the lack of co-ordinated leadership, the lack of strategy, and the loss of 30,000 members of the SNP caused by preferencing trans people and gays rather than independence.  

The blatant needless and failed attack on Alex Salmond, the reasons for this still unclear, the failed court case in which he was awarded £500,000, and the next case, in which he was suing the Scottish government, when he died from the stress caused by Nicola, a case that continues yet.  

A chapter on the Covid panic, the appearance of control which is now known to be false, and the next big division, the gender problem, and whether a man in a skirt is a woman or not.  A difficulty the Scots government have yet to deal with.  The power of the trans lobby is immense these days. 

The implication of this book is the weak Nicola Sturgeon was more concerned with public image than policy, 'feared' by the intelligent proposals put forward by some, including Joanna Cherry, and scared she would lose her position to another.  At the heart of government Scotland's desire for independence was broken by a weak self-centred woman, and a trans lobby that scared the Sturgeon Junta desperate to keep their well paid jobs.  Joanna would have changed all that had she become leader.

So we read of the usual political tricks, smears in the English owned press, always keen to attack the SNP.  Close friends who side with the other, attacks both brutal in public and behind her back, and fear amongst her supporters who do not wish to suffer the same.  Both Alex Salmond and Joanna suffered much from the SNP Junta. 

The author puts forward an approach to independence which appears intelligent and worth considering.  A debate is required on all aspects of indy, yet debate was something Nicola did not wish for, she tended to lose out here, so debate was replaced by bullying.  I suspect this is normal political life, it is something the one who enters it much face.

This book is easy to read, though some of us yawn when the nitty-gritty of legal and political complications are discussed.  An Advocate, that is Barrister to you, will rejoice in such things, most of us do not.  Nevertheless, the book is readable, I went through it quite quickly, and while there are some womanly ways which irk in the writing I think it is well worth a read for those who know Scotland.  Joanna may no longer be in politics, she might never return, though a change of leadership and a proper perspective on the way forward may lead to that.

I have to say I know who's side I am on before I read this book, that remains the case.

The Heart of Midlothian's final game of 2026

It was not unexpected that the Heart of Midlothian's final game in Glasgow would be overshadowed by controversy.  It was bad enough the Scottish Football Association forcing them to play in Glasgow rather than at home in Edinburgh, as was their right, this was enhanced by the failure of the SFA referees to give decisions benefitting them, but did manage to give decisions benefitting Celtic, their nearest rivals.  Some 7 points difference could have seen the Heart of Midlothian Champions last week, but the SFA have ensured their team has prospered, as expected by most football minds in Scotland.

On the day the game itself went somewhat according to expectations.  A rather tense first half, with only the refs unwillingness to deal with Johnstone, the Celtic full back with a tendency to crash willingly into opponents. Eventually action was taken, he could have been quicker.  Otherwise, we cannot complain re his actions. 

Our goal was welcomed but short-lived, as an unfortunate eager forward handled the ball in the box.  This resulted in a penalty which was luckily scored.  Injuries then hampered the Hearts as a defender, then a midfielder had to leave the field damaged.  Alterations left us somewhat short and allowed the evil one's space.  Eventually a lucky goal crossed the line, and in the end we lost by 3 goals to 1.  

Then followed a pitch invasion by Celtic fans leaving many Hearts players injured.  The game had not finished yet these thugs once again invaded the field and attacked opposition players.

Will the SFA take appropriate action?  That is award the game 3-0 to the Hearts?  Don't hold your breath.  

Nonetheless, the Heart of Midlothian have made clear we are now a side to be reckoned with.  The days of the two team Scottish league are over and we will improve.  We all hope that Motherwell, Falkirk, Hibernian, Aberdeen and all other sides now realise they can defeat the bigot brothers.  Let's do it and improve Scottish football all round.

 

Early Christian Writings

I read through this book some years ago, and decided to read it again, because I had forgotten most of it!  Books containing the words of those who knew the apostles, or those who knew those who knew the apostles, can bring is near to the men themselves.  This gives us better insight into how the early church went about its business.  Here we have Ignatius and Polycarp, both of whom knew the apostle Paul.  Also, Clement of Rome writing a very long letter to the strong-willed men at Corinth, little changing there since Paul wrote his letters 50 years before.  

Clement was a presbyter (Bishop was not used in the 1st century) of Rome in the late 90s of the first century, he may also have known John, though John was based in Asia, now south-west Turkey at the time.  His letter is more of a dissertation regarding the authority of church leaders.  An authority he wished to see imposed as there were many false teachers wishing to move in and corrupt the church at the time.  This is a very long letter, and we have no idea if anyone in Corinth responded to it.  One of the great problems with the ancients is the way important letters and books disappear in the course of time.  Very annoying.  

Ignatius of Antioch.  He had the dubious delight of debating with the Emperor Trajan, one of Rome's better Emperors, and attempted to justify Christian belief, and their refusal to worship emperors.  Trajan was not convinced, he sent Ignatius to Rome for execution around the year 109.  We have a better idea of Trajan from the Letters of the Younger Pliny 110 AD, where Pliny send his questions re various topics to the Emperor for his opinion.  Among these are questions regarding Christians. 

So Ignatius walked to Rome, no buses were available in those days, and on the way he wrote 7 letters to various churches giving us some understanding of how they operated, and what he wished to see among them.  Again one of his main concerns is the rule by authorised individuals to ensure the true doctrines were being offered, sticking to the teachings of the apostles whom he had met.  It is always very easy for any church to allow other ideas to take hold and lead to sin and heresy very easily.  

One letter is addressed to Polycarp, a younger version of himself, who also had 'sat at the feet of John.'  We also have one letter from Polycarp, followed by a report of his martyrdom when he was around 82 years of age.  Both men died facing the future with their God, Ignatius almost wallowing in the fact that he can be considered worthy enough to die for his God.  

These men knew God in a way we fail to comprehend.

To Diognetus Is a strange kind of apologetic work about which little is known, possibly from the second century.  No ancient writer mentions it.

The Epistle of Barnabas Another strange work, of which little is known, though much speculation follows today.  People prefer the unusual rather than the straight forward of course.

The Didache is the last offering here.  This may have been written in the latter part of the 1st century, or sometime within the next 100 years, scholars are still debating this.  Some reckon the teachings are often Jesus oral words, others teachings from the apostles themselves.  This could be the case, it may not be.  It could be written in Egypt or Syria, again debate continues.  However, early Christians do mention it, and it is considered possible that early churches used it as a teaching manual.  Whatever, it is worth a read.

All these letters and writings, though one or two are doubtful, take us back to the early church, the teachings of the apostles, and the men who knew them and followed them.  I believe it required reading to study such works as we get closer to the beginnings of the faith and the reaction of the early believers.  So much has been added since it is often difficult to know what is true or false.  

This translation is by Maxwell Staniforth, one of two translations for Penguin Books.  Seeking a classical academic career he ended up in the Great War.  After this he worked on railways in Argentina, and then became a vicar in Dorset.  He was a man of his time, as seen by the use of 'Thee and Thou,' when prayer is offered in these pages.  Whether he used 'Thee' in his translations of 'Meditations,' by Marcus Aurelius I have not checked.

I recommend this book.  

Culture Saturday

 

VOTE!

I began another day of joy and constant happiness by rising today, conscious that I must vote, and thereby change the world.  I pushed my way through the masses to find the place empty except for two tables stocked with two servers, and one manager standing to the left.  "Where are they all?" I asked, "It was busy this morning," they lied.  It's always, "It was busy earlier," innit?

Council elections do not draw the crowds, County Council ones appear to draw less, as the council appears to that wee bit further off from the people.  

The poll is in the museum hall and the manager is well known to me.  The six of us chatted, there was plenty of time to do so, while they prepared my voting slip and refused to answer my question as to "Why is there no SNP on here?"

Now, we have a choice of five individuals, all of whom wish to become a County Council Councillor.  The usual parties, Labour, Tory, Reform, Lib Dem, and Green.  I looked up the names of the five men, unusually all men, and found little about them.  The Lib Dem, like almost all the Lib Dems standing in this town comes from Chelmsford, the Reform lives here but comes from Colchester, the rest are local, which is how it ought to be.

But what do we know of them?  Almost nothing!

One states his favourite biscuit is 'Hobnobs.'  Surely we can ask deeper questions that this?

Another is a fellow councillor here known to one other councillor who attends our kirk.  So we have some info, and he likes 'Hobnobs' also.  For the other three I found nothing.  

This surely is not the way to seek election, surely they must make some political statement somewhere along the line?  This leaves most people voting for the party, not the individual, which is more important in such elections as opposed to general elections.  The person is nearer to the people here, why are we so poor in offering information?  I of course ignore the Twitter feeds which daily fill the page with Reform candidates withdrawing, or being withdrawn, by party or constabulary.  

I scribbled my vote to await the result in due course, and set off for Tesco.

£35:20 later I left the friendly checkout girl and took my heavy bag back to the museum.  Here I give a little support by buying their excellent honey, this comes from bees living in a nearby village.  The young girl in charge is well known to me, well known for making me spend money I do not have.  This meant I had to resist her pressure and only spent £10:50, then had to ransack my pockets to find enough loose change to give her some £1 coins as they had not left.  I was then allowed to tour the latest exhibition in the museum.  

This was magnificent.  The new curator has made changes and vastly improved the displays, building on what went before.  I was impressed with what she has done with the Great War stuff, and other local history is well noted.  This is indeed a very good local museum and deserves much mention.  The big exhibit was the between wars art deco stuff produced by the main businesses, the cloth and silk mills, in the town. This reminded me of one of my aunts, she was a child of the 20s and much in her house spoke of those days.  Being old I find a connection to the past via aunts and uncles, as well as parents, especially when some of them were born in the Victorian age, and their ideas, books, and attitudes spoke of times past.  Much better attitudes than today I hear you say.  Possibly, as most of them saw two wars, a general strike, near poverty, and a depression, that gives a different view on life.

 

Our new recycling bins arrived today.  Because of lack of space we had been promised the non-standard boxes, we got both!  Coming home from Tesco's I ate and fell asleep, when I awoke we were surrounded by bins.  These are not being used until June, 3 weeks away, and take up a lot of space.  Just how this will work will be intriguing, as we have 3 cars already, and with two flats about to be leased possibly 2 more, plus bins, life will be great in the car park.  We also have 8 boxes now!  I'm to weary to care today, maybe tomorrow I'll look out again.

Police State

Being a Bank Holiday Monday I expected life to be quiet, and so it has been.  So quiet that I went downstairs against my bodies wishes, and began cutting down the even growing bush in the front.  Taking a Tesco plastic bag for the bits I was surprised as to how long the stems were considering I had only looked at the thing the other day.  Anyway, I clipped them down to prevent them from growing ten feet high again, and managed to bag it all up. 

As I began this, a strange small white van raced out off our car park, screaming tyres as he roared away up the road.  This was strange as I did not recognise the vehicle, and racing cars do not normally head into the one way system forcing to race back again. 

I pondered upon this as I took the hoe out and began shuffling the ever-growing weeds that were beginning to show themselves again.  For the most part I just shoved the hoe under them to make them die, most being too small to be worth gathering, the larger ones dumped with the bush.  

As I was finishing the white van reappeared.  

He screamed to a halt just at my door, the squat driver and his mate leaping out to cries of "Oi Stop!" and raced after another gentleman who disappeared into our car park.  Once again I pondered, fearing we had a drugs gang fight round the back.  Just then several uniformed police came panting down the road and went round the back to investigate.  

A handful of young women, no more than 20 years if that, followed, one crying, "I don't want him arrested, I said I don't want him arrested!" The driver of the white van returned to the van informing her in the best police manner to "Shut up!" and drove off at speed down the road.

Shortly after he left the uniformed branch returned with a large gentleman, less shirt, cuffed and obviously willing to help the police with their enquiries.  

By this time most people had stopped to watch, one or two passing understandable comments as they passed me, and another police car arrived to join in, just in case.  My neighbours, living round the back, would have had a close up view of the action there, and they popped out to watch them as they placed the gentleman in their vehicle.  I am not sure about the ages of the girls involved, but they returned to the skatepark across the road where I suspect the situation arose.  They may still be schoolgirls after all.

My neighbours smirked, I leant on my hoe at the door, all calmed down, and I realised that pushing a heavy trolley on Saturday, and attempting to work today, was not pleasing the bones.  I realised again that in spite of all the anti-police stories in the media, and there are indeed some bad ones, it is clear that we need such men, and one woman, to ensure we can sleep peacefully at night. However, now the jobs are done, and that man will be done, and now we eat and prepare for tonight's important football match.    

 

A Walk in a Graveyard

I discovered a fault on my Great War website the other day.  I needed to look up a name, and he was not found.  This surprised me somewhat.  On investigation into these Google free sites I found the problem, the Google site.  Once, when I began this, it was easy to scribble words and insert pictures. Google, to save a few quid, while making billions listening in to all our chats, changed it to a new system, this does not work easily.

Everything depends on little boxes, but adding a picture to the box, while sounding simple, just does not work!  The picture may insert, but it is ten times too big, cutting it down makes the words shrink also!

Therefore, it causes red mist while attempting to fill the page.

On inspection, I discovered the missing man had escaped with several others.  This meant digging out the information and reinserting it, and it comes out somewhat differently to what was there before.  I will not tell you about inserting that picture!  Grrrrrrrrrrr!

However, after perusing the site, making amends elsewhere also, I was glad to have put it all back together for the interest of friends and family who may find it useful.  

 

 

Doing this, reminded me of the time spent wandering about the two town graveyards, seeking out the men, and one woman, who died during the conflict.  The idea of enjoying a cemetery is not one we usually consider, however, it can be interesting to wander round on a good, and quiet day.

Most graveyards can go back to the 1700s, some even further.  This often means names are worn away, depending on the material, and occasionally someone has made the effort to clean these up.  Most have the famous, the great and the good together whether they like it or not.  Many richer folks could wangle a spot nearer the church, sometimes inside it, and the paupers, well into the present day are buried respectfully 'over there.'  

Most large tombstones appear to me to be 19th century, when class distinction was important.  Having worked your way up to be someone of importance in town you expect a stone to remark on your position.  Sometimes looking at such memorials I wonder if these people are still trying to be alive, even when dead.     

 

Reading the memorials can sometimes be quite touching.  A mother who dies in childbirth, the child who dies from diseases we hope they do not catch today, the man accidentally killed during war.  A careful reading of the tombs can take you back in time through incidents that reflect on today, nothing changes, human nature remains the same, what is has been, and will be again.  

The other thing that comes to mind in a graveyard is how easily these people have been forgotten.  It is rare to see a recent posy left at a grave from over a hundred years past.  Many remember the war victims however, but great granny is often forgotten, and a distant relative in a tomb with faded words is not remembered.  Sometimes when inspired by Ancestry or the like, we tour the tombs looking for an uncle.  My niece did this in Newington in Edinburgh but could not find a mention, even the council did not have a record of the name.  I know he is there, I watched as he was buried, and the slow steam train, somewhat apologetically drifting clankingly by as the minister spoke, but no stone have been left there it seems.     

 

Sometimes care is required as on occasion a funeral may be taking place, and it is best to be at the other end of the ground.  Some people come and stand at a graveside, a husband, a father, a wife, it is not possible to know, nor is it possible to understand why they are there, but there they are.  They may stand silent, some talk to the grave, one man parked his disability scooter at his wife's grave and sat there reading the paper early in the morning.  After 50 years of ignoring her at breakfast he did not wish to give up the habit.  

Wildlife can be abundant in such places.  Birds flit through the trees, squirrels, voles or are they rats?  Bats in some at night, the local fox of course, often with cubs, or maybe a roebuck running away from you.  Pleasant for us and the wildlife.  I did see a small deer give birth in the graveyard closer to home about a year ago, it was not possible to get closer obviously, but the quiet nature of the place allowed mum to have her child.

I do see some problems mind.  Recently dead children can have an abundance of toys and gifts left on their grave.  Sometimes to the annoyance of neighbours.  Some mothers give too much when alive, and even more if the child dies.  We can all appreciate the emotions, however, sometimes less is more. A more dangerous concern is stones, frequently very large, falling over while people pass by.  Some councils have taken to knocking them all over to prevent insurance claims.  This is quite sad, especially when the name might be famous in the area.  

I just remembered, Fun posted about Highgate Cemetery the other day, now that is a post on cemeteries worth looking at.

If you can stomach it, I recommend a sunny day wander around a graveyard, especially in a large town.  Who knows who you will uncover, that is, don't uncover anyone, just look at the names I mean.