Oh, it’s been a frustrating week. Showers and wind, showers and wind. Nice when the sun shines and even passably warm but then comes the showers and wind, showers and wind. And then, some rain. Heavy, steady downpours. Penelope has been out in the garden whenever the skies stop dripping, digging and planting and transplanting and hoeing and digging and turfing and stamping and digging.
I’ve been out in the garden wondering how she manages to keep going.
At least it stayed dry for the Garden Club Sale and Café last Sunday morning which was a great success. Penny and a handful of other GC committee members spent hours and days and weeks pulling all the pieces together and their efforts were rewarded. There was a lot of baking and jam-making along with the potting up of several hundred seedlings and transporting all these across to the village hall on the day. Throw the days’ postponement into the mix and it was a splendid accomplishment. A goodly proportion of the Garden Club members and their families came along as well as a handful of “outsiders” (Adam, Ava and Jessie came over for the day) and it was great to meet up with folks and have a chat.
They raised nearly £1000 from the plant sale and the cakes and coffee – and there were some very tasty cakes, I can assure you! Ms Playchute’s Carrot Cake is always a show-stopper but there was a coffee/mocha type walnut cake which was also very appealing.
Adam, Ava and Jessie came over for the day on Sunday, as I say. They even took home a few plants from the sale. Jessie, of course, was more interested in the playground equipment so spent a happy morning making some new friends whilst playing on every apparatus several dozen times.
The bundle of energy that is Jessie continued through the afternoon. There were, you will be surprised to hear, lots of games in the garden all of which seem to involve running around a lot. There was French cricket, football, throwing and then chasing the Frisbee, boules (not so much running around, thankfully) as well as some games which required someone (often Grandpa, for some reason) to sit on the bench out of the game. Not as a “punishment” this time, you will be pleased to know, but rather those are just the rules, Grandpa.
Greg’s Big Bike Adventures continue. I finished the short stage between Monterey and Slates Hot Springs, California on my virtual Pacific Coast expedition on Thursday. I know – I had to look on Google Maps to see where Slates Hot Springs is too. I’m afraid I had never heard of it before but I am sure it is a delightful little spot – the Esalen Institute (spiritual retreats overlooking the ocean) sounds inviting and it’s reassuring to know that there is a Tesla charging point onsite. Hmm, perhaps I’ll rest up for a day or two – some yoga, meditation, hot springs and a massage sound pretty inviting.
Just for fun I looked back at the stats I’ve accumulated since we’ve had the bike. I was astonished to see that I’ve climbed 28,693 meters – does that seem possible?
That’s enough to ride to the top of Mt Everest, back to sea level, up to the top again and about 1/4 of the way back down again. Holy cow – I thought I was tired!
A gem from the You Could Not Make it Up Department – the current Brexit Minister, David Frost, has said that the Northern Ireland Protocol, which is responsible for so much of the current turmoil in Northern Ireland, “is unsustainable”.
The Northern Ireland Protocol is, of course, part of the Brexit agreement pushed through Parliament by the government and negotiated by one David Frost, Brexit Minister. You may remember that the Prime Minister declared there would be no customs checks on goods moving between Northern Ireland and the UK while at the same time negotiating a settlement which did exactly that. Five months into the whole Brexit thing and it’s now unsustainable. Duh!
The investigations into the PM’s assorted financial scandals continue to simmer and bubble away. Who paid for this? Who paid for that? But hey! I sometimes can’t remember who paid for what. Occasionally, I need to go back and check. And then I discover, oh yes, that was me who paid for it.
The poor chap is continuously hard up so I was amused to see this in Private Eye.
He has, allegedly, a County Court judgement against him which has been outstanding since last October. Never mind, he is apparently going to apply to have the judgement set aside as it is “without merit,” so that’s all right then.
Stop Press: It seems that the original application for the judgement against the PM was made by a woman described by the media as a “conspiracy theorist.” Or, as some others might unkindly describe her, a nutter.
Her claim was that the PM had defamed her and continued to defame her and the court, in the absence of any response from the accused, made the order that he owed her money for damages as a consequence.
I suppose the somewhat surprising thing is that neither the PM nor anyone in Downing Street took this seriously since it was issued. Correspondence would have been sent to 10 Downing Street in the first instance asking him to respond to the allegations and then requesting payment. I guess he owes so many people so much money that this seemed such small change it was ignored. Sadly, No 10 has now succeeded in having the judgement set aside.
Which means that we won’t get to see the following spectacle on the evening news.
More excellent work from Cold War Steve. Perhaps I should offer a prize to my American readers (both of them) to if they can name the characters in the piece as well as the various topical allusions.
Another “Word for the Day”
‘Sequacious’: prone to the slavish following of others without any independent thought or judgement.
Susie Dent
Yes, we’ve got lots of those here.
Meanwhile, keep happy, keep smiling, keep isolating as much as you can, wear a facemask when you go out and keep your distance. And keep safe.
Lots of love to you all,
Greg