Resumption of Normal Boredom.

All Easter eggs ought to have been swallowed by now.  All carboard boxes in the recycling, paracetamol passed round for the headaches chocolate guzzling brings, and everyone looking forward to the next commercial money grab, whatever that is.

Having worked hard last week I have done almost nothing this week.  Annual paperwork has been attended to, eventually, online shopping for items to replace things that have shrunk in the cupboard over the last 18 months has taken place, and emails aplenty have been issued, received and answered, not that I made a penny out of this.

An occasional wander across the park, such as today to inform the council of my council tax paperwork, and a visit on other days for bread at Sainsburys.  

Easter is over and it is back to boredom.

 

Now bungling, bumptious Boris has opened the door to some holidays we can expect a mass loss of discipline across the nation.  Set limits will be treated like a visit to Barnard Castle, crowds will gather hither and thither having fun, assaulting police, fighting with each other and forgetting the virus is still around.  Marbella will be wonderfully full of English yobs if the Spanish allow it.

It may be some distance can be covered.  Caravans blocking the main roads will appeal to the 'Top Gear' fan.  Biker rallies everywhere will fill back roads and B&B's will be upping the prices to make up for lost time, those that are still in business that is.

How many cafe's, shops and hostelries will no longer open?  When the shops open barbers and salons will be OK but small cafe's?  Coffee shops and such like have not be able to pay their way, we lost one good one here, but I suspect the pubs will open, they usually survive.

There will be no more Lock Downs, all will be well!  So expect another wave and further LockDowns in June. 

 

Past Trips...

One of the grubby papers was intent the other day to gather information regarding your past holidays.  Where did you go?  What was the best?  Those deeply intellectual questions being asked.  It surprised me as I could not think of having had a holiday for years.  Last year, while others visited Costa Rica, Portugal, Holland and Spain I had a day out in Great Bardfield churchyard.  I am not sure this counts as a holiday.
When did I last go on proper holidays?  Rare to have had the cash let alone somewhere worth visiting.  As children visits to aunts, as adolescents no money was available and few were rich enough for the early Spanish holidays.  A day out to Whitley Bay was forced on me at 15 by my dad.  Why there?  No idea.  I was intrigued I recall by policemen wearing those tall helmets, gone from Scotland in 1956.  Then later a trip or two to London with my mates, nothing intellectual occurring on these trips though a few hostelries were found.   
Once, only once, living in London, 1976 I reckon, I took a trip to Cardiff for reasons unremembered.  An overnight stay, nothing to recall but a friendly B&B in a backwater, and wondering why the rail tunnel was so long before remembering we went under the River!  

 
In November 1990, just before the first Gulf War, I went to Israel.  This of course was a great trip, even if the intifada and stupidity stopped me seeing all I wished to see.  A trip to Hebron? I enquired, NO! came the response, suicide!  Indeed the worst of the two sides abide there and bus trips do not go there these days.  I did see Jerusalem, mostly, finding much of what I wished to see, getting into the Holy Sepulchre with no difficulty, the American tourists stayed away from fear of Saddam, and sat in the most Holy place by myself, bar one nun.  

   
This shoddy picture shows Mount Tabor rising in the middle of a historical landscape.  I stand in Megiddo, corrupted into 'Armageddon' and before us lie the vast plain in which all the armies of the world will meet on the last days.  A huge plain lies before us.  To our right out of the picture is Mount Gilboa where Saul and Jonathan died, In the foothills near Tabor Barak defeated Sisera, and many a battle occurred where we stand.  In 1918 General Allenby's Cavalry swept across the plain of Megiddo more or less bring the end of the fighting in Palestine during the Great War.  
Sadly I saw no battles, though I can understand why people battle Israeli Border Police, they are a tough force.  Most Israelis were friendly enough, though many wished to sell something to tourists, and all Arab guides should be locked up!  

Not  much of a travelogue to be sure, nowadays I wish to see the Battlefields in France and little else.  The desire to tramp around in hot sun or freezing cold does not call me out.  There again both Brexit and the Virus has killed of foreign and indeed inland trips for us all.  
I can see that the use of digital cameras has improved photography greatly.  Most Israel pictures are on slides, so hidden away for now, the film ones are all pretty poor.  From now on all the pictures will concern Sainsburys and Tesco as far as I can see...

Football, Church Women and Holidays

Life has been much enhanced lately, yes Friday night football is back, and today the Heart of Midlothian are slugging it out with Aberdeen as we speak.  I will watch the delayed broadcast on BBC Alba at 6pm.  What a great use of a TV station!  No more Friday evenings wondering what to do, no more Friday evenings staring out the window watching people without TV football wandering about bereft.  At last life has returned to some normality.  
I have lost BTSport however, I could obtain it via Plusnet but this will cost £10 a month, and that is not on, I went there to save cash, anyway BT have BTSport only for this season then it moves to SKY.  This season I may take a 10 month ticket with Now TV to enable me to see Scots football on Sky, along with English rubbish.  I might be able to afford that.  
Of course after Brexit all these English players will be returned home, Trump fashion.  Then what will happen to English football?  A collapse at the top level is on the cards and Boris and his strange backers will line their pockets and run I expect.

 
At church this morning I noticed the three 'old' women gathered together again offering a view of a female 'Last of the summer wine.'  I began to imagine the kind of adventures they would become responsible for.  

'The Guild & the Missing Communion Wine.'  
Nobody knows what happened to the Holy bottles of QV Sherry procured from the Co-op but it was noticeable at the 'Bring and Share' Sunday they girls would not allow the children to drink the raspberry cordial on their table.  It remains unknown as to whether this played any part in their dancing on said table later in the day.  
The curate was later found in the vestry, tied up with string and with an offering bag over his head. 

Sometimes I laugh when folks talk abut little old ladies.  The impression given is of weak and not too bright women.  I remember being in a room full of ex-missionary women, their husbands, those who had one, had all died long before, and feeling more unsafe than when I was in some football grounds.  These women had had to succeed in difficult and often dangerous places, the Belgian Congo was one where many missionaries died, and in inhospitable habitations far from help.  These were not women to men with!

These summer days make me wake early each morning, usually so early that by 10 am I am back in bed!  I am surrounded by people telling me that they are off to Spain, Iceland, Majorca or some far off land while I mention my trip to Chelmsford to by sausages.  This does not seem right to me in some way.  
I keep asking for a pretty young lass who speaks French to drive me around the battlefields in France and Flanders but have so far met with little in the way of encouraging responses.  One or two have been specifically unresponsive I must say!  There again I have little desire to go where others go.  Spain for the sun, especially for those with kids sounds good but would be boring for me.  Iceland might be interesting but expensive and would mean eating a lot of fish!  For Majorca, sitting reading books sounds good but why go there.  If I go somewhere, if the knees let me, I would wish to see something!  Why g abroad to lie about all day?  What a waste.  The old battlefields would be interesting, foreign nations with a history far from tourists might also satisfy, but lounging about amongst lager louts can be done cheaper at home.  Not for me thanks.

 
 

Reading With Eyes Closed.

Tsk! What a to do!  I wrote, in English, that I was away for a few days and I return to find that people do not read the words i struggle so hard "cough" to place before them.  In 'Miscellany' I said I would be away and you ignored it.  Pah!  Anyway I was of to sunnier climes, to good food, warm house, clean sheets, and fine company, alas also lots of appallingly bad television.  That's another story.  
You will be delighted to await the several hundred pictures, some properly in focus, that will follow in the following days.  Holiday pictures abound and some people find them boring.  I had to sit through forty minutes of video taken at the Victoria Falls in Zambia without ever grumbling once, although the crocodile slipping silently into the water made a comment rise in my throat I can tell you!  How many locals he had eaten was anybody guess.  

The sound of the sea and the aroma of the briny filled my head on at least one occasion and a trip to a far of land, nine miles, took us out of ourselves for a day.  I was force marched, in my condition, on several occasions aided only by my companions damaged hips and similar restrictions as myself.  They even forced me to work, getting my hands dirty for the first time in years, and thought this amusing.  It was only the thought of the food when we returned that kept me breathing otherwise I may well have collapsed and awaited the ambulance.
Right I am exhausted from travelling on Britain's luxurious railways, which I must say was actually enjoyable today, I did pray hard about both journeys, and then running up the road to the shops to put something in the fridge before I collapsed in bed for a while.  Worse still I had to watch Ross County defeating Aberdeen 2-0 tonight thus being unable to write anything on here.  The lack of substance inside my head also legislates against this at the moment I admit.  So I am back to bed and tomorrow I will be ready for ...going back to bed.

Lova & kisses etc...

Daydreaming

Danbury

There was a competition in a magazine today offering a prize of a campervan! How very Hippy I thought and slipped into a day of dreaming of travelling the country, stopping off in out of the way places, snoring to my hearts content in distant lands like 'up north' or Wales.  The freedom of the open road, but not at a very high speed I imagine, enjoying distant parts of the land without worrying about expensive accommodation.  That's for me I thought.
The lack of money that running such a vehicle would cost does not disturb dreams, only reality. Therefore I could see myself parking alongside the wide empty white beaches on some deserted part of the highland coast, parked under some ancient castle, drinking coffee brewed on the primus stove while wallowing in the view of deserted silent giant hills.  The crowded roads, cost of petrol, or standing at the side of the highway while the man from the AA worked under the van attempting to replace the bits that had eroded away and fallen off never at any time entered my dream world, I was good like that.  
At first sight it does appear a jolly good way to see the country, to visit people and places at the moment far out of my ken, but the cost will always upset a dream, even if the vehicle itself is free.  Ah well, maybe I will not buy their yoghurt anyway, it would be a tragedy if I won and had the brute parked outside tempting me to go visit relatives.  Actually that last thought might not be too strong!  
What are the chances of winning any competition?  Possibly a couple of million people will not the competition on the side of the tubs of various products, the majority not being interested as it means little to them, they have transport, the kids would hate it, and therefore the numbers entering would be a mere few thousand, possibly.   How many would forget to buy the goods? How many forget or fail to enter?  So the numbers with whom we compete lessens and we have more chance here than we have with the Lottery.  Could it be the computerisation of shop goods can tell the company whether the individual entering often buys their products, therefore enabling then to reach the 'right' person for the prize?  As I have never bought whatever it is they sell I would have little chance.  
Ah well, if the rain stops I will get the bike out instead tomorrow.....