The juxtaposition of petticoats, chickens and severed heads.

52-48.  Not the result of a rugby match but the different proportions of votes cast in the Shall We, Shan’t We Show Johnny Foreigner What We Think Of Him Referendum.  To show just how much British people maintain their reputation for being good losers, some remain supporters are now suggesting that, as there was only a 75% turnout there was no majority.  Old researchers never die – I wonder how many of those crying over the result actually voted against a change to the ‘first past the post’ system in the last British referendum.  It would not be a true comparison, but would be mildly interesting.

After a campaign marked by lies, hyperbole and fantasy we now enter a period of fantasy, hyperbole and lies; plus ca change.  Alexander Bozo De Pfeffer Janus’ Son (I’m not impugning his father, I don’t know the fellow)  appears to have sunk to new depths.  Having shrugged off accusations of his opportunism even when shown recording of his complete voltes-face (so much so that they were mega-volts face) he is now being reported to be back pedalling as fast as a Tour De France competitior on steriods about many issues, as are some of his collaborators.  Apparently having brought the debate to the lowest common (and most common) denominator regarding racism they now aver that the only want to control immigration but cannot cut it; am I the only one missing something here?

Much though I do not like Alexander Bozo De Pfeffer Janus’ Son I am loth to criticise him.  His dire warnings of plagues of frogs and the death of first borns seems dangerously close to a predictiion.  The weather at Le Trou Cachee has been odd, as has the ambience.  On Tuesday last the mirrors in the khazi and one bedroom misted over for no discernable reason.  Later that day the khazi floor  appeared to be sweating and continued so for 48 hours; no matter how much I mopped it, within a short while it was glistening again.  I thought there was a drainage problem but then Alchy Annie complained of the same happening in her house.  Towards the end of that little episode LTC was inundated with a plague of wee, slikit, cowrin, tim’rous beasties, not all longtails but all wee furry things.

Not one to kill anything unnecessarily, I resorted to the humane mousetraps – and found more evidence for the cure sometimes being worse than the ailment.  After two nights of no further evidence I was awakened last night by a fervent scratching which appeared to be coming from a corner of the room.  A search revealed nothing and so I tried to get back to sleep.  Scratch, scratch, scratch – the whole night was disturbed by the incessant noise.  So much so that I thought I would  have to buy poison to rid myself of the little pests.  With the dawn came enlightenment; I had caught one of them!  I had been told some while ago that, contrary to Tom and Gerry films, mice are chocolate lovers rather than cheese eaters and so had primed the traps with nice, dark chocolate.  The wee scunner, once trapped had spent the night trying to escape and and kept me awake in the process.  It was lucky not to get a lump of four by two round the back of its head!

The wisdom with humane traps is to turn them around  and around whilst walking for a hundred metres or so to disorientate the contents.  Thus, when they are released, they do not find their way back.  Some 25-30 years ago I caught a mouse in another similar trap.  Having spent a while putting back what the day had taken out, I wandered down the road turning the trap; unfortunately I was also, apparently, turning myself.  That mouse was back in residence before I was.  Time will tell whether I have learnt from that experience.  On the bright side, I thought it wise to top up the chocolate reserves whilst at a street market today; one never knows when the next plague may happen along.  You don’t have one for 2,000 years then three turn up at once…

Now that Bozo Janus’ Son has had his wicked way I hope, despite the last paragraph, that I will be able to put the traps away for a considerable period.  Unless, that is, his rather unpleasant little toady, Gove, has similar powers.  The pair of them do remind me of classic school bullies: the large, bluff, do as I say or I will squash you and his sneaky little partner.  Independence for Greyfriars – and Bunter banned from the tuck shop!  It lacks a certain revolutionary ring but may catch on.

The changeable weather has meant that the growing season has been marked by wild abundance – and I have accordingly blunted the blade of my brush-cutter.  The fence which Stu and I had carefully placed was all but hidden in the undergrowth.  Not wishing to give the claim-jumping farmers any excuse to say that they had not seen it, I spent many a happy hour slashing – the burning, which is banned under a local ordinance, will have to wait until later.  Close to 200 square metres of rough ground, heavily covered with dense undergrowth takes some clearing; I am pleased that I have power tools with which to do it.

Having been asked by Alchy Annie to show her son how to use my brush cutter I felt that I had to, although I was not too impressed with the thought that he might want to borrow it – it is easily damaged.  When I told her that I was going too cut her lawn she told him – and then me that he didn’t want to come out to play.  I started anyway and then he appeared – and after a couple of minutes asked whether I needed him.  I said no and he went back indoors; at least he won’t want to be borrowing it.  It will be a small price to pay if I cut her little patch of lawn whenever I do my own; mine takes about an hour, hers five minutes.  My detached piece of land takes weeks (so far).

 

Baptism for the Summer Solstice

The maths and other aspects of the solstices have intrigued me.  Are they the longest/shortest days or nights?  As the 20th. was, according to the BBC, the summer solstice – and in the interests of clarity – it may be better to stick with this one.  If it is the shortest night the day either side must be be equally long – and equally the opposite must apply. With druids and other pagans celebrating the solstice and them not necessarily using the same sort of calibrations as are currently employed I wonder if it is a bit like Christmas in that we are all making whoopee (or not, as the case may be) on the wrong day!  Quelle horreur!

Right day or wrong day, the poor Druids would have had a frustrating day.  Sunrise, what sunrise?  There must have been one – it was daylight, but all that did was show what a dreech and miserable day it was.  And now the nights will be drawing in.

My ferry was delayed in sailing, and even further in berthing, by revolting French dock workers.  The ferry companies do not allow the carriage of full fuel cans but I was unaware of the state of the oil terminal barricades.  Fortunately I was now aware that the bike would do a one -way trip on a full tank – and I had a spare 5 litres stashed at LTC.  I also had enough space to take an empty can, so now have 10 litres in reserve.  Despite there still being revolting workers, the fuel crisis appears to have passed.

In a family with a history of myths and unsubstantiated legends – and people with idiosyncratic (at best)  reality, one tale which may be reasonable was told by a long-dead uncle of mine.  He told of going with his father on a  couple of occasions  to meet an uncle of his.  This uncle’s uncle was, apparently, a bodger with a toby in north Kent.  They would go to somewhere now swallowed up in Greater London on a pre-arranged day, once a year, for a family reunion.  My uncle separated from his family and ended his days living in a caravan on a council-owned site near where his employer had relocated.

Thus began my daydreaming of the gypsy gene, which makes a “knight’s move” – appearing in each generation one square down and two across.  And one of my nephews has a job which has so far taken him to two far flung countries. The watered down gene has meant that one of my brothers now takes long holidays with his wife in their touring caravan.  They have a favourite campsite in the Vendee and, with an echo of an earlier generation, we met there both last year and this – despite having virtually no other contact.  How traditions are formed.

Not totally trusting the devious French Trades Unionists I have been keeping the bike well supplied with fuel – and I have just realised the bad pun; it runs on petrol and is well supplied…

My brother is in frail health and so it was good to catch up.  We had a wee blether about some of the myths and legends in the family.  It is a problem emanating from a research background – if it has only one source it is only a rumour.  Him being the oldest and me the youngest it did seem a bit one-sided, he had much to say and me little to offer.

Back at LTC, Alchy Annie, my annoying neighbour, was at her annoying best.  She had scrumped my elderflowers to make cordial – at least I learnt another French word.  By the time we met up – after I had been to the Vendee she had to go to Angers – the bottle of cordial had changed from a clearish liquid to a rich red.  Had the elderberries come out already, I thought…  Silly me, she had guzzled the sweet, sugary but non-alcoholic drink and filled her bottle with red wine.

Unfortunately for her the butterfly had spread its wings over Fujiyama – and the ensuing thunderstorm broke over Angers.  She had gone to sort her quarters for her course, she returned to say that because of her injuries the course facilitator has decided that it would be too much for her.  Undaunted, she continues to glug red wine at a time when many of us are still contemplating that second cup of tea.

Her son, who lives with her, apparently wants to be shown how to use my brush-cutter – something which I find peculiarly underwhelming.  Her daughter, who lives near the Pyrennees,  has taken up with another chappie – and mislaid her dog  (the one over which we had some words as the whole family allowed it to use several neighbours’ gardens as its personal toilet).  And there was me, having finally lost all patience with The Archers, thinking how much quieter life would be.

When Stu came over to help me with a couple of jobs we re-staked the perimeter of my detached piece of land.  To do so we had to cut back a little bit of undergrowth and overhanging trees.  That was a whole couple of months ago.  Now I am happily slashing and burning to make the pickets and their adjoining wire more visible – a nice spring of rain and sun has certainly made the grass grow, and the thistles, and the trees, and the wheat, and the nettles, and the ivy.  The last I have been cutting back from a couple of open out-houses – with some trepidation, I am not sure whether the ivy is holding up the out-houses or they are holding up the ivy.

A problem with using earth from the field for propagating plants is working out whether the shoots are weeds or what I wanted.  A chumess had saved me all the seeds from her wisteria whilst I was away on The Big Train Ride.  I returned, we met, she gave me me the seeds, we fell out, we went our separate ways; at least I got the seeds.  Now I am concerned that I don’t throw away the seedlings, there will be no second chances.  Once, the daughter of a man who was very keen on growing vegetables told me to pinch out the sideshoots on some maize I was trying to grow… for some reason I did not – and found that ‘the sideshoots’ were actually the corn cobs.  Just like Donald Rumsfeld, I am happy admitting that there are some things which I know I don’t know.

Le fer est toujours chaud?

I think that the origin of to strike while the iron is hot lies in the blacksmith’s forge – clouting cold iron would not do much beyond possibly breaking it.  For French Trades’ Unions the iron must be forever hot; they love striking.

With the advent of a twenty-four nation football tournament across the whole of France the iron must be hotter than a dragon’s nostril after eating Scotch Bonnet chillies.  It is slightly paradoxical that a day of action is a call to lay down one’s tools and indulge in inaction – and mildly inconveniencing as one has been called for the day of my next departure for LTC.  Already details of a delay to my ferry have been announced.  Fortunately I have been  made aware of a French website which has details of fuel accessibility and cost – and appears to be fairly up-to-date.

At least the delay will give me more time to whizz about on the bike and continue my test of distance on an over-full tank of petrol.  One of the side-effects of a wrinkly travel pass is how much my mileage has reduced; the days of 10,000 miles per year on bike, let alone car miles, are long gone.  The camper has not moved for over a month and the bike not since last Sunday.  I had promised myself a real cafe biker’s day today – and then saw what a dreech and dismal day it was.  It is interesting how often things seem to fit together as they are rather than as we would wish.

Not only do I need to continue the range of a full tank investigation.  I have finally done something I thought I never would.  Fibre technology now means that leather is not necessarily always the best material for motor-cycle clothing but textile trousers can be sweaty and clumpy summer wear.  Thus, as my old bike kit suggested to me it was time for recycling (the kit, not me, although that could be open to debate) I have indulged myself – a new textile jacket and trousers and a pair of leather trousers! The main problem with new leather trousers is that they are stiff and uncomfortable, hence the need to break them in.  It also meant a happy evening of saddle soap, dubbin, old engine oil and a jolly good slapping around for them – and still they are stiff and uncomfortable.

When the bike is loaded for touring, with panniers either side of the pillion seat, I have to adapt my method of mounting – instead of a jaunty swinging my leg high like John Wayne getting ready to ride off into the sunset, it is now necessary for me to stick my leg out like Sir Gawain’s lance and hop towards the bike until in a position to slide it over the seat.  It is not a pretty sight.  Once clad in stiff leather trousers as well I fear a video of the proceedings would get an X rating on Youtube.

The Crisis Grumpy Chums are all aware of my dislike of being photographed – and, unfortunately one found a photo of me on the WVM website.  This has lead to an almost endless stream of verbal abuse and I can only fear the results if they saw my bike-mounting antics.  They can be very silly at times.

Having had two days at WVM this week it became almost a pressing necessity ‘to put back what the day took out’ and thus Friday evening had a pleasant ending.  It had altogether been a pleasant day – when WVM has corporate volunteers they often get a ride out in the vans (rather than just a day in the warehouse).  So it transpired that Friday was a day with a long drive alleviated by the delightful company of two young, female solicitors.

With two televised rugby matches during Saturday I sensibly drank something non-alcoholic during the morning kick-off  (blow dementia, this is a real sign of incipient old-age) and decided against the England football match in the evening.  As I was in the middle of a phone call the sound of something happening reached me from a nearby pub. After the call curiosity got the better of me – it was presumably the groan of disappointment as Russia equalised in the dying seconds  of the football match.  With the next match against a resurgent Wales the scene could well be set for a repeat of last autumn’s Rugby World Cup… and the last football World Cup… and just about every other international football tournament since 1966… but then again records all have a lifespan.  If they didn’t get broken there would never be new records.

Having booked to be away from Tuesday next until the end of the month and notwithstanding Thursday and Friday last at WVM I have undertaken to drive for them on Monday as well, which, with the clash of rugby matches on Saturday had militated for me to cancel the depot day on Saturday for which I had tentatively volunteered.  When I cancelled it I softened the blow by penciling in a couple of Saturdays in July – but then found out that one of them is the day of Jim’s 80th. birthday celebration barbeque; at least I can alter that one for the day on which I had thought to be unavailable.  With so much in the future it is very difficult to be spontaneous, said he who never plans…

Revenge of the pink panties

Those of a certain age and sense of humour may remember the Pink Panther films – the original a spoof on Agatha Christie type novels, which was so successful that it spawned a whole series which became almost a genre in their own right.  One of that series was entitled, Revenge of The Pink Panther and astute readers may notice a slight similarity to the title…  By strange coincidence I should make obeisance to the films within a week of the death of one of the more memorable characters.

I once watched the first film with a person of good but slightly logical academic brain.  As the titles overplayed the denouement, in which the bumbling Inspector Clousseau accused everybody in turn as they had all been footloose about the murder house in the wee small hours (hence all having no alibi) about their individual nefarious business (hence having opportunity and motive), the person with me looked across and asked, “but who did it?”  As I rolled about on the floor, clutching my sides with uncontrolled laughter, I realised that I had brought about the end of another, no longer beautiful, relationship.

The pink panties in question, however, have no relationship to the film.  Loyal readers may remember the saga of Geo’s pink panties – in reality a pair of faded red pants which, by their size, could only have belonged to his (then aged 7) son which I found under my bed after a Geo. family visit.  As one who has refuted for some considerable time the need to wash separately white and coloured items I have been hoist by my own gusset – a red t-shirt and a pair of knickers formerly known as white nestled together throughout a recent wash with an inevitable outcome.  As one strawberry said to the other, “if we hadn’t been caught in the same bed together we wouldn’t be in this jam now.” Bleach and a few rewashes may resolve the situation but, then again.

A strange situation has arisen between my brothers and  myself.  We have never been close; my middle brother and I only lived in the same house for about ten years.  After many years of estrangement the middle one contacted me a couple of years ago to tell me of the parlous state of health of the oldest; I thought that, if he wanted me to know, he could contact me direct.  Then the middle one had a round figure birthday and arranged a party at which all three of us were together.  At the party the oldest invited me to join his wife and himself for a day whilst they would be on holiday in France not a million miles from LTC.  It was obviously such a resounding success that we had no further contact until recently, when he advised me of their holiday arrangements at the same place this year.  Revolting Frenchmen allowing, we shall be meeting again.

In the interim, the other brother suggested we went to Wembley to watch Eng-er-land play football, which we did. Both of my brothers are politically to the right of me (as were both Lenin and Marx), which seems to affect this brother.  Since that day there has been no contact.  Your friends you choose, your relatives are thrust upon you.

When I had greater disposable income and fewer free hours I gave more money to charity, now I have greater freedom but lower income I give more time to charity.  Giving money one must rely on the charity using it wisely, giving time one is more able to keep check.  For a long time Oxfam has attracted negative comment for the small percentage of its income which actually gets used for famine relief, now, it seems, the whole not-for-profit sector is under critical examination.

As someone who dislikes witch-hunts I am concerned about the current trend.  Have investigative journalists only just been apprised 0f apparent misdoings in the charity sector or has an editor/owner decided to cry havoc and unleash the dogs in a manger?  At a time when xenophobia appears to be rearing its ugly head – the leave the European Union debate is focusing on immigration rather than any other tendentious matter – lowering horizons seems to be the order of the day.

In the late 1960s a wave of anti-establishment, Marxist-Leninst idealism spread across the industrialised world, now a tide of right-wing, neo-fascist, isolationist, beggar-my-neighbour attitudes seems to prevail.  Neither was necessarily altogether healthy but one had a moral rectitude.

Having seen Geo. for a quick catch-up on Tuesday (he was footloose and fancy free, with his family away for the half term) we arranged a Grumpy rendezvous for the Thursday.  Old clever clogs was tasked with arranging a suitable venue and thought of a quiet, off the beaten track RV not a million miles from Baker Street station.  That is the Baker Street where lived Sherlock Holmes and, more germane, is only two stops from Wembley – where Eng-er-land were due to play their last football match before going to an international tournament.  Geo. and the Wee Mannie were on time: I was delayed as WVM did not utilise my time efficiently (it was a good job I had not given them money), so I ended up travelling with some of the football fans.  I arrived, eventually and in less than good humour.

For many years I have suffered at this time of year, getting progressively more suffering, from a form of hay fever.  To ensure a good crop of itchy eyes, sore throat, sneezing and general misery this year I cut hedges and undergrowth whilst at LTC; silly arse.  My less than good humour was not only football fan induced.

On Friday, similarly, my time at WVM was not utilised to its very best and thus I was late away on a whacky races run back by public transport, a quick change and load the bike and off to see one son and his family.  Knowing that I was due he had allowed his two daughters to stay up for my arrival.  As the younger one fell asleep he decided to put them to bed, during which I arrived and caused uproar.  Eventually peace was restored and I was deputed to go for the beer and curry – his wife was out and he was on duty in case the bairns awoke.  We curried and then my daughter-in-law returned, just nicely in the first stage of elephant’s; dizzy and delightful.

It was not fair.  She woke as bright as a bell, I had a disturbed night due to an allergic reaction and felt like death warmed up all day.  Despite that, it was a grand day with that branch of the family, making Rice Crispie cakes with my granddaughters, taking them and their baby brother to the park – then eating said Rice Crispie cakes; I must be getting old, they were a teensy bit on the sweet side.

Having sent those two granddaughters fans that I had bought them in Madrid but which went missing in the post I replaced them in Lisbon and delivered them by hand, with egg-cups from the market near LTC.  Unfortunately my other daughter-in-law had to cancel my visit there to deliver egg-cups for my other two grandchildren; I posted them (the egg-cups, not my grandchildren) and one got broken in the post.  Having only seen that branch of my family for a couple of hours in a couple of years it was not only the egg-cups for which I was saddened.