Yesterday when I looked at the calendar on getting up, I noticed it was Martin Luther King day in the United States. By a cruel twist of fate, the date happened to coincide with the day when Donald Trump is due to be inaugurated for the second time. Trump also promised to sign close to 100 executive orders on his first day in office and said he would ensure that ‘the curtain closes on four long years of American decline’ adding: ‘We are going to give them the best first day, the biggest first week and the most extraordinary first 100 days of any presidency in American history.’ It seems that the whole MAGA movement is now mainstream American and has lost the toxic feel which it used to have. I wondered why the date of January 20th had been chosen for Martin Luther King day and the explanation is that it is actually a movable feast and is celebrated in the third Monday in each January on the date which falls closest to his actual birthday. I wondered if the date had been chosen to celebrate his famous ‘I have a Dream’ speech but this was actually delivered on a day in April. I have awoken to a temperature of 0° Celsius but it is anticipated to rise to 5° later in the day. We had no real plans in prospect for today but as the temperature today was not too cold and there was no biting wind to speak of, we walked down the hill later in the morning to collect our newspaper. When we got back, we had just finished the cup of soup that we had to warm ourselves up when a nurse turned up from our local GP practice. She was here for the sole purpose of obtaining a blood sample from Meg which the doctor had ordered and what was on order was a full blood analysis in which, no doubt, they might be looking at liver and kidney function as well as checking that Meg’s chest infection has been successfully treated. Yesterday, I received a telephone nurse from the District Nurse who had called around to make an assessment of the pressure sore that had been developing around Meg’s heel. As she was in the house, she asked if she could assess the type of mattress that Meg has on her hospital bed which is now in our downstairs lounge. When she viewed this, she was of the view that Meg probably needed a more specialist mattress that would help prevent the build up of pressure sores and when she got back to her base, she was going to explore the options and make a recommendation for an enhanced mattress. The upshot of the telephone message that I received was that a new mattress would be delivered to us this Thursday and, once delivered, I then needed to phone the District Nursing team would then install it and commission it, no doubt. This was very good news for us indeed and I was very pleased that the District Nursing team had acted so promptly. Having said that, pressure sores can be so problematic if neglected so it is pleasing that this potential problem is being treated seriously and addressed by a new mattress. I think the new mattress will be an AirFlow mattress and will have a unit attached to it to keep air blowing through it. The care agency manager had put himself on duty this morning and, as they were short staffed, I was acting as his helper this morning (as I helped the care worker last night put Meg to bed) The manager informed me that the majority of his ‘service users’ had these mattresses deployed for them so he was not surprised that one was forthcoming. Just before lunch, the two care workers arrived to make Meg comfortable and one of them helped me to get some food inside Meg (which I finished off afterwards, complete with some mousse). To complete the round up of medical services, just as the care workers arrived I got a phone call from the SALT (‘Speech and Language Therapist’) professional who was collecting up-to-date details of Meg’s condition. The phone call was quite long and detailed and it appears that I am already doing most of what the specialist is recommending. She indicated that one of her colleagues would try to get to see Meg either this week or next week so that they could make their own assessment of Meg’s swallowing reflexes. As it stands, it seems that I can get soft liquid type foodstuffs into Meg (such as yogurts, mousses and ice-creams) but more normal liquids such as tea are a bit more problematic. But, again, I am relieved that this problem is being addressed and taken seriously.

The afternoon built up to the climax of the inauguration of Donald Trump (for the second time).To the actual ceremony itself, I can scarcely bring myself to watch the razzmatazz and it sometimes seems a little corny compared with British ceremonial. But no doubt attention till focus on two issues immediately after the swearing in. First there will be the inaugural address and Trump will probably make the most bloodcurdling threats which is his trademark. Then he has promised to sign 100 executive orders ‘on his very first day in office’ which could mean either today or tomorrow. These we will have to see but will probably involve trade sanctions against all and sundry plus the intention to deport millions of ‘illegal’ migrants. These number about 14 million at the moment and are they all to be deported practically overnight? In the next few days, we shall see how the rhetoric matches up with practical reality. Immigrant workers are a crucial part of the agricultural workforce, putting food on our tables and supporting our communities. Nationwide, 54.3% of graders and sorters of agricultural products are immigrants, as are 25.3% of workers in the agriculture industry overall. So one wonders what happens if the Trump regime fulfils its promises to deport these millions of essential workers.

Today I have continued to receive supportive emails from family and friends to whom I sent an email message last week detailing how I felt that Meg was slipping away from us. But for the last few days, Meg has seen a bit connected with the world and whilst still in a deep doze is not as fast asleep as was the pattern of a few days ago. These emails I have received are of an incredibly supportive nature and I am truly appreciative of them. In the meantime, I am quite relieved that various services seem to be falling into place.

Yesterday was the day when the ceasefire came into effect in Gaza. Given the complexities of the situation, I wondered if there were last minute discussions of a technical nature, n what language the two sides would basically communicate? I found the answer in this blog – ‘The Arabs that I have met know either basic Hebrew and/or English. It seems that for some Palestinian Arabs knowing Hebrew (at least basic) opens up more job prospects. Also depends on social class since religious private schools (many of them for Christian Arabs but that many Muslims attend) have good English level. So there are more than a few ways, except Israelis learning Arabic which is still exceedingly rare (albeit not impossible)’ So this is what more or less what I suspected. If you are an Arab living in Israel, for example the West Bank, you would have taught yourself some Hebrew but, as I suspected, the Israelis would hardly ever be inclined to speak Arabic. The fallback situation, which I also suspected, is that English is used when all else fails. English is considered the current global ‘lingua franca’. A lingua franca is a language that is adopted as a common language between speakers whose native languages are different. English has become the lingua franca in many fields, including business, science, technology, aviation, entertainment, and diplomacy.

As the carers are coming an hour earlier today, I actually got up at 5.0am and managed to write some emails giving details of Meg’s current condition to family and friends with whom I had communicated the other day when I thought she might have drifted away for good. But ‘the boat bobbed a little bit back yesterday’ which is good and I have to tell myself that a bad day might be followed by a better one and vice versa. After the carers had departed this morning, I got some porridge into Meg followed by a strawberry mousse – fortunately, for me, Aldi seems to have a good supply of things like mouse and tiny little pots of fromage frais which are ideal bits of food I can get into Meg these days. I had just finished breakfast, when I received a text from my sister in her residential home in Knaresborough and immediately gave her a FaceTime call. I thought she looked pretty well and she had, indeed, just had her hairdresser last week. We were mainly talking about Meg and I was pleased to tell her that after my experience of a couple of days ago, Meg seems a bit more connected with the world this morning. I had started to watch some interesting Sunday morning TV when our University of Birmingham friend phoned and he is going to pop round for a chat later in the day which is always very welcome. I had started watching the Alan Titchmarsh programme on ITV called ‘Love your Weekend’ and found some interesting gardening tips. First looking at the kind of waterbut arrangements that enable you to get clear rainwater from your drainpipes, the other thing that took my attention (so something no doubt stocked in gardening centres) was called a gutter snake. Imagine a bottle brush on a much larger scale and available in lengths of several metres. Once the gutters have been cleaned out, then you place the appropriate length of ‘gutter snake’ in the gutter and whilst rain water falls through the bristles into the containing gutter, any leaves that would otherwise end up in the gutter get caught on the bristles, eventually dry out (if we have a few hard cold days of frost later in the year) and then just blow away. This is such a simple idea that one wonders why it has never been thought of before (which it may have been, but not marketed). I was so tempted by this that after the winter clean out of the gutters, I might be tempted to install such a system before the leaf fall of next autumn.

I continue to receive helpful and inspirational emails from one of my nieces who showed me a poem to which she had been introduced by my mother (my nieces’s grandmother) called ‘Footprints in the Sand’ which is comforting in times of trouble. When the two carers came to see to Meg in the late morning, they were both in some distress, the elder one being concerned that her car had in effect broken down with the engine management system limiting her speed to 20 mph. Meanwhile, the far younger carer only a week or so out of shadowing was being called upon to undertake tasks that should really have taken two carers but as so many staff had phoned in sick was asked to do jobs single handed and she doubted that she had the experience or ability to cope. My sympathies extended to them both but there was nothing I could do to alleviate either situation. I managed to get a fair quantity of lunch inside Meg (ham, baked potato and broccoli followed by some yogurt for afters) after which I promised Meg an opera for which she could allow the music to sweep over her even if she did not follow the plot. I chose ‘La Traviata’ principally because of the quality of the singers (Renée Fleming, Rolando Villazon) but the theme was not the most suitable given current circumstances (basically, the heroine is dying probably of consumption from practically the first scene of the opera and spends the rest of the opera tragically fading away, albeit with beautiful singing).

The media attention this afternoon is focused on the release of some of the hostages from both sides in the Gaza conflict. The Israelis are keen to avoid anything that looks like Palestinian rejoicing and are therefore controlling the news media as tightly as they can but after an initial hitch, it now looks as though this release if proceeding as it should on both sides. But the destruction in Gaza is terrible to behold as the ceasefire agreement comes after more than 46,000 Palestinians have been killed and 93% of homes in the Gaza Strip damaged. One cannot see the Israelis wanting to rebuild Gaza whereas the other Arab states (and Arab money) will not invest in rebuilding Gaza without a solution such as the ‘Two States’ solution firmly rejected by Israel so will Gaza ever be rebuilt, one wonders?

Yesterday, Meg appeared to be in quite a deep sleep practically all of the day. I was sufficiently concerned to send off a series of emails to friends and relatives detailing Meg’s current state of health and my friend from University of Winchester days immediately sent me a supportive email, sensing by feelings of concern. We had a wonderful WhatsApp chat for a couple of hours during which I could unburden myself a little but we were largely discussing items in the media and on YouTube that had attracted our attention. Before I actually crawled into my bed, I learnt of the death of Denis Law who was one of Manchester United’s most prolific strikers. He is remembered by a statue, I believe, along side others to George Best and Bobby Charlton. George Best’s quotes are remembered to this day. Perhaps the best known is ‘I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered.’ But another, almost equally memorable is this one ‘In 1969 I gave up women and alcohol – it was the worst 20 minutes of my life.’

The background to the peace agreement in the Gaza war is now becoming clear. The overall framework of the agreement reached on 15 January was broadly the same as the proposal set out by President Joe Biden during a White House address last May. It uses the same three-phase approach and will see a ceasefire, Israeli hostages released in return for Palestinian prisoners, and the Israeli military’s gradual withdrawal from Gaza. But sources familiar with the discussions agreed the dynamics of the talks shifted decisively in mid-December and the pace changed. Hamas, already reeling from Israel’s killing of its leader Yahya Sinwar in Gaza two months earlier, had become increasingly isolated. Its Lebanon-based ally Hezbollah had been decimated and had agreed to a truce with Israel. Bashar al-Assad’s Iran-backed government in Syria had also been swept away. The view in Washington is that Hamas was forced to abandon the idea that ‘the cavalry was coming to save it’, as one US official put it. ‘It is hard to overstate how fundamentally the equation changed and what that [did] for Hamas’s calculus,’ says a senior Biden administration official familiar with the talks. We now await the inauguration next Monday which has moved inside the Capitol building as the normal venue is predicted to be too cold for the participants.

In the morning, although Meg was dozing most of the time, we went to see our friends in the establishments of Wetherspoons where I indulged in a breakfast muffin (fried egg, bacon and sausage including a free refillable drink for £3.99) Meg was largely dozing throughout but at least we made contact with two of our regular friends and then, as we on the High Street, made off in the direction of a cosmetics shop to buy some soap. After that, it seemed a shame not to make a minimal tour of one or two of the charity shops but we saw nothing that took our fancy. But it made quite a long morning for us and the journey up the hill seemed a little more arduous than usual. The minute we got home, I prepared some pea and mint soup for Meg and myself and we were followed shortly by the mid morning carers. Then, whilst the carers were here, the District Nurse showed up which was very valuable because we were able to discuss how to treat the pressure sore that is developing in Meg’s heel. This is not going to be dressed at this stage but the District Nurse will keep it under careful review, having photographed it. Whilst in the house, she wondered if we had the most appropriate mattress on the bed for Meg and was going to recommend once she got back to base whether another mattress might be better for Meg at this stage so that pressure sores do not develop. When everyone had departed, I cooked a quiche with some stir-fry vegetables and even managed to get a portion into Meg which is quite something. This is going to be complemented by a mousse or something similar.

Today, I have received several replies to the several emails which I despatched yesterday. One of my nieces has sent me some very helpful suggestions regarding Meg’s diet at this stage in her illness whilst another, ex-De Montfort University friend of ours was bringing us up to date with their own afflictions. Our friend did make a tentative suggestion of a face-to-face meeting but in view of the health status of our respective spouses, we probably need to confine ourselves to some videocalls. I must say that I have been very appreciative of the messages of support and encouragement that I am being given in these difficult times. One has to live one day at a time but I don’t know what life would be like without the benefit of email and the occasional video call.

Some of us are watching with a certain wry amusement the fact that the social app TikTok may well ‘go dark’ on Sunday morning, The US Supreme Court has ruled that the app or at least that part used in the USA needs to be sold so that the app does not remain under Chinese (government) control. It has been left to Donald Trump to find a solution to the problem but whether a US based buyer can be found at such short notice is problematic. Whether national governments can ever effectively regulate these enormous media companies (such as FaceBook and Instagram) is one of the big stories of our time, as the revenue streams could well give them a financial worth that is more than the GNP (Gross National Product) of many of the poorer countries of the United Nations. So far, the way that the UK government have approached media companies to tighten up their operations insofar as they may adversely affect young people has been very much the ‘kid glove’ approach and the social media companies have not proved to be very amenable to whatever legislation has been passed to harness their undoubted power.

Yesterday, Meg appeared to be in a deep doze and/or sleeping for most of the day. But then sometime after 4.00pm the two young care workers arrived, and a Physician Associate arrived from the GP practice. She quickly diagnosed a pressure sore and said she would make onward reference to a District Nurse which would be extremely valuable. We do know that bedsores (or pressure sores as they are more properly called) can be managed if treated very promptly but can be nasty if left to fester, as it were. The care workers and the PA agreed that we could put leg’s ankle on a little neck pillow that we have in such a way that her heel might not rub on the bed. The whole of this syndrome has its origins in the fact that Meg finds it very difficult to bend her knees, particularly on the right as they are in a fixed position in her chair all day long and she is not using her legs to walk. The interesting thing is that in the presence of the two young car workers with whom she is always incredibly relaxed, she seemed to wake up a little and even managed a smile and some minimal communication. I managed to get the whole of a 200g pot of some Protein Chocolate mousse inside her and then for tea, she had a fair proportion of apple crumble, yogurt and ice-cream so I was relieved to get some food inside her (although her needs were low) but getting her to drink fluids is still a little problematic. The Speech and Language Therapist (SALT) person, if and when they arrive, may be able to recommend a thickening agent to enable Meg to swallow fluids a bit more easily. The care workers are coming an hour earlier at 7.00am rather than 8.00am which always makes life a bit of a rush around first thing in the morning.

The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says a deal to return Hamas-held hostages in the Gaza Strip has been reached. It now looks as though the deal will now be approved by the Israeli War Cabinet and, eventually, the full Israeli Cabinet. But at least one of the far-right ultra nationalist members of the Israeli coalition government is probably poised to resign whereas another is threatening to vote for a resumption of hostilities as soon as the first phase has been completed. There are still a lot of negotiations to be undertaken before the second and third phases of the agreement can be implemented but, focusing on the short term, there should be a cease fire in effect from Sunday and we should the release of at least some of the Israeli hostages (women, children and the infirm) as well as the release of some Palestinian Hamas fighters. Two days before Israel and Hamas reached a long-awaited cease-fire and hostage-release deal, Itamar Ben-Gvir, a rebellious far-right Israeli minister, issued a video statement calling on another far-right coalition partner to join forces and scupper the agreement by quitting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. Mr. Ben-Gvir also asserted that these far-right coalition parties had used their political leverage to thwart a similar deal ‘time after time’ over the past year, causing an uproar. Critics of Mr. Netanyahu’s government, including many of the families of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza, have repeatedly accused the prime minister of sabotaging past efforts to reach a deal in order to preserve his coalition — the most right-wing and religiously conservative in Israel’s history — and remain in power. Mr. Netanyahu and his loyalists have blamed Hamas for past failures to reach a deal. The current agreement was expected to gain government approval even without the support of the two far-right parties, since a majority of cabinet members are in favour of it. But the fracas caused by Mr. Ben Gvir’s comments underscored the resurgent fissures in Israeli politics and society following the deadly Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which prompted the war, and the widening fault lines within the Israeli government. Another far-right cabinet member, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, called the agreement ‘bad and dangerous to Israel’s national security’ and said he absolutely opposed it. But he did not explicitly threaten to leave the government. Describing the emerging deal as an Israeli ‘surrender’ to Hamas, Mr. Ben-Gvir played on Israeli emotions in his statement, saying that the terms of the agreement would erase the achievements of the war in Gaza that were gained with the blood of Israeli soldiers. But the narrative being broadcast by Mr. Netanyahu and his aides says the opposite. An Israeli government official contradicted Mr. Ben-Gvir’s assertions this week, saying Hamas had only put on a façade of negotiating in the past rounds of talks and had engaged seriously this time largely because of Israel’s military achievements.

Our domestic help called around today and was as helpful as always. But Meg was asleep during all of the morning and only managed the briefest of smiles and reactions when our help came to say goodbye to Meg at the end of the morning. This I found particularly upsetting but the carers who were present were very kindly and supportive of me. I had a pasta type lunch which I did not really enjoy and threw most of it away – nor did I manage to get any of it down Meg. Later in the afternoon, I did get Meg to ingest a small chocolate mousse and a very small fromage fraiche but drinks have so far proved illusive. This morning was Meg was asleep I took the reply to one my oldest Spanish friends and forwarded it to another of our friends (these two friends being Erasmus students of ours in decades long gone by and are now our life long friends) This latter friend had married her tutor (who, incidentally, was very good to when I spent a term teaching Information Technology to Public Administration students in the Complutense University of Madrid) but he had died over the last year. So I know we both understand the pain and grief of separation from a life partner and at some time again we may well meet up again in Spain.

The day did not start particularly well as I hit some kind of wrong key and removed (irretrievably) the blog for the current day so had to start all over again. Yesterday, I watched some of the Senate hearings to confirm some of the members of the proposed Trump administration before they take up their appointments. Some of the appointments appeared to neutral commentators to be bizarre such as the nominee for the Defence Secretary who had the reputation as a wife beater, an alcoholic and a denier of human rights issues and was currently employed as a Fox News journalist (Fox News is a rabidly right wing and Trump supporting news media) A sharp contrast has to be drawn between the UK Select Committees where the questioning of ministers is sharply focused, detailed and forensic. The American committee system by contrast is long winded and members of the committee (and those they are supposed to be interrogating) given to long, grandstanding speeches. Such is the hold of Trump over the current Republican party (and they, in turn over their electorates) than these Senate hearings may well turn out to be a formality and even the ‘wackiest’ members of the incoming administration receive approval.

The airways and news media are full of the peace deal announced last night between Hamas and the Israelis in the Gaza war. But Netanyahu’s security cabinet and then full cabinet have yet to approve the deal and may feel inclined to quibble unless the Americans jump on them hard. It is said that the incoming Trump envoys and the outgoing Biden envoys worked as one team on the American side to get the deal over the line and they say and Trump, in particular, is anxious to get the deal in place before Inauguration Day next Monday. Both Democrats and Republicans are claiming credit for the deal, but the truth is that the Biden regime no doubt did the ‘heavy lifting’ over the months whilst the Trump team indicated to the Israelis that ‘all hell would break loose’ if they did not accede to the American pressure. Of course, Netanyahu has nowhere to go as he cannot appeal beyond, the right of an incredibly right-wing administration (as is his own) There are many details still to be worked out in the forthcoming hours and days such as the identities of the hostages to be released and even now, Netanyahu is claiming that that Hamas is breaking the agreement so there is still quite a tense time ahead of us. Of course, it is quite possible that when the peace deal is eventually put into effect, that Netanyahu may be forced out. There is a sizeable part of Israeli public opinion who blame him for not prosecuting the war in such a way that the hostages, their family members, are released, And it is said that Netanyahu’s unpreparedness for the war in Gaza and manifest security failings may result in him being a scapegoat. Those of a long political memory may remember that Churchill was heavily defeated in the 1945 election which was a landslide for the Labour party. My mother when she was alive, always maintained that it was he vote of the soldiers who voted to come home instead of being held in the theatre of war as Churchill wanted, that was the decisive factor in this election and not, therefore, a mass conversion to a left wing political agenda. But WWII had a massive democratising effect upon the population and hence the housebuilding programme just after the way with the slogan ‘Homes Fit for Heroes’ And the 1944 Education Act was groundbreaking as well as the foundation of the NHS in 1948 in which Nye Bevan, the ‘father’ of the NHS was said to remark that ‘if a bedpan was dropped in an NHS hospital, its clatter would be heard in Westminster’. Times, as they say, have changed.

Yesterday was my shopping day and the care workers were scheduled to arrive one hour later than normal. But then I got a text today they would be here half an hour earlier than planned and I was not fully dressed when they called. Then the sit call for me to go and do the shopping was delayed by an hour so the normal constant re-timings of the day’s visits continue. One of the care workers noticed a bruise on Meg’s heel which seems to have got worse overnight. This was photographed and transmitted to me via WhatsApp and I filled in the webform which is the way by which a GP appointment is made these days. Later in the day there should be a telephone consultation and I have to upload the image of Meg’s hotel for the doctor. The fact that she is on a blood thinning medication may be relevant but we will see what a doctor makes of it. I did get a phone call from a physician associate who informed me that bruises of this type are not uncommon on those taking blood thinning medication but, nonetheless, she was going to make a call on Meg later on in the day. Then we received a most extraordinary request from the doctor who had seen Meg recently asking if I could take her down to the surgery to have her weighed (clearly impossible) or could I provide a current and up-to-measurement of her weight in kilograms. I pointed out that this was clearly impossible as Meg has not been able to stand since last May and surely this was appreciated from the notes on her file. Later on in the morning, I managed to get the shopping done and I managed to buy a fair number of mousses, fromage fraiche and similar sweets which I hope will provide her with a little sustenance as it is so difficult to get food and drink inside her at the moment.

The Gaza peace deal is currently in jeopardy as the Israelis are claiming that Hamas has reneged on the deal, a claim which is being vehemently denied. The Israelis say they will not put the plan before their cabinet until final re-negotiations have taken place – this may have been anticipated as both sides jockey for the best possible deal before it is signed, sealed and delivered but I would not be surprised if the Israelis take a lot to be appeased and it is always possible that the deal collapses in complete acrimony.

Yesterday, I got up just before 6.00am as I seem to have entered a pattern where I awake a few minutes before the alarm goes off and go off to make myself a customary huge mug of tea with which to start the day. Meg seemed to sleep quite soundly and is in what appears to be a deep doze during much of the day but I am managing to get some food inside her (just) at mealtimes, even though her eyes are closed. This has implications for the way in which the day is going to progress because I normally try to hunt out interesting programmes for us both to watch during the afternoon but if Meg is only semi-connected to the world and has her eyes closed, then TV watching becomes a solitary rather than a joint activity. On days where the weather is mild and we have no other commitments, then I am still persisting with ensuring that Meg is pushed down the hill every day in her wheelchair so that she gets some fresh air in her lungs, coupled with which there is always the odd chance that I might bump into some friends and acquaintances such as my Italian friend who lives down the road. I have today finally cracked the solution to a facility that I have had with Outlook. I knew that in the past I had stumbled across the fact that one could customise the editor according to one’s preferences and I have now discovered where in the complex menu structure this is located. The practical implication is that I have managed to make UK English rather than American English the preferred editing language which, of course, means that words are spelt with the English ‘s’s rather than the American ‘z’ (words such as ‘organise’) Now that I am becoming more accustomed to the Outlook editor in which I always save what I am working on in the ‘Drafts’ section it means that I can catch many more typos as I work making my work so much easier to check upon completion.

As Inauguration Day approaches for Donald Trump, I keep reflecting upon what the original 18th century framers of the American constitution would make of the current American political scene. They were at pains to construct a system in which there would (nearly always) be a check upon absolute powers and did not envisage a situation in which the Supreme Court, the Presidency and both houses of Congress would be under the control of one party (i.e. the Republicans) Added to this, we have a situation in which the President elect consistently lies (the Washington Post documented more than 30,573 either downright untruths or misleading claims whilst the President was in power for four years) and is entering the White House as a convicted felon having found guilty by a New York court of false accounting and illegal payments to a porn star. Added to all of this, we have the world’s richest and most influential men (Musk, Besos and Zuckerberg) attending the inauguration having donated huge amounts of money to Trump, removed fact checking from the media under their control such as ‘Facebook’ and ‘X’ (ex Twitter) and are being given positions of influence if not outright power in the new administration. Some commentators are saying that this unholy alliance is bound to end up in squabbles and ‘fallings out’ given the inordinate egos of all of the individuals concerned but there are few signs of this happening at the moment. Even British political figures are engaging in a cozying up to President elect Trump and there appears to be no countervailing sources of power that will stand up to this cabal running American politics (under the circumstances nobody is using the word ‘cabal’ but I feel it is fully justified in the circumstances that we now face)

The care workers were scheduled to be half an hour later this morning so I used this to send a long reply detailing Meg’s current condition to our long standing Spanish friends in La Coruna. The care workers arrived 20 minutes earlier than they were scheduled but one of them was one of the agency’s managers who regularly puts himself on a shift and it is always useful to chat with him. He was incredibly busy preparing for a CQC (Care Quality Commission) visit in the next few days so we ourselves shall expect that in addition to a normal complement of care workers, they might well be accompanied by an inspector who can assess the quality of the care provided first hand. After breakfast this morning, it turned out to be to be a beautifully sunny day so I made sure that Meg was well wrapped in blankets (and even I had put on an extra pair of socks which I purchased yesterday in what were termed ‘boot socks’) and then we made our way down the hill. I took the opportunity to purchase some extra milk as well as picking up our newspaper but the Waitrose partner reminded me that even though the cafeteria was closed, customers who possessed a Waitrose card could still avail themselves of a free coffee from the machine which I did) On my way back up the hill, I ran into our Italian friend again with whom I had a pleasant chat. After the accident which had written off her car, she was having a bit of trouble with one of her legs and wondered if there might be a degree of delayed trauma. But the hospital had not found anything really amiss and recommended a regime of rest and some exercise to allow the leg to heal itself. Our friend was adapting to life without a car and was taking the opportunity of a little walk as the sun was shining and the weather more benign than of late. It was one of those days in which although the air was cool, you could just about feel some of the warmth of a pale winter sun. On arriving home, I managed a brief chat with our neighbours who I had not seen for some time so I managed to give them a quick update on Meg’s condition whilst they were on their way down to the park to give their newly acquired little puppy some exercise. Meg and I started watching Questions to the Prime Minister during which time I feel completely asleep and was awoken by my phone ringing with our GP’s surgery making a call which, unfortunately, I just too late to answer.

Yesterday the mild spell continued and the temperatures from now on should approximate to those of a ‘normal’ January. At 6.00am this morning, the outside temperature was 3° and is predicted to rise to about 6° at the time we come to walk down into town to see our friends. The overnight political news was the resurgence of the Reform party. Reform UK has grown in support to within one percentage point of Labour according to a new poll for Sky News by YouGov which suggests Britain has entered a new era of three-way party politics. Sir Keir Starmer looks set to spend the parliament locked in a fight with two right-wing parties after Labour support dropped sharply in the first YouGov poll since the general election. The poll shows the Tories have now been pushed into third place – two months after Kemi Badenoch was elected leader. The data collected over the weekend puts Labour on 26%, Reform UK on 25%, Conservatives on 22%, Liberal Democrats on 14% and Greens on 8%.By all accounts, Reform has put its party in the country on a much more professional footing with a proper vetting of parliamentary candidates but the real first test will be the local elections that will be held in May. Voters across England and Wales will head to the polls in a major set of mayoral and local elections. Highest profile were the election of 10 influential metro mayors across England, including in Greater London and all of England’s largest cities. Voters also elected several thousand local councillors, 37 police and crime commissioners and the 25 members of the London Assembly. Apart from Prime Minister’s Question Time on Wednesday at noon, the big event upon which the world’s press is focused is the inauguration of Donald Trump next Monday, 20th January and what he does (as he has threatened to do) on Day 1 in office.

As yesterday was a Tuesday, we were looking forward to meeting in our new venue of Wetherspoons in the centre of Bromsgrove. So we met with a couple of our friends and ordered some pancakes to accompany the drinking chocolate of which we can enjoy as many refills as we desire. The prices charged are so cheap that the Inveterate Hill walker in our midst was driven to explain the Wetherspoon’s model thus: ‘They rely upon charging a large number of people very little instead of a small number of people quite a lot’ Having consumed our pancakes, we made for home but not before calling in on a local cosmetics and toilet supplies shop to replenish some of our supplies and, in particular, some ointment for cracked heels which always plague me whenever the weather is particularly cold and icy as it has been for the last few days. Whilst we were out on the road, I got called twice by one of the local doctors as I requested a consultation on the practice website when it opened this morning. In particular, I wished the GP to make an onward reference to a SALT (Speech and Language Therapist) as apparently they are also specialists in the swallowing reflex. Patients with Meg’s condition often find it difficult to masticate and to swallow food and although I am making the necessary adjustments to Meg’s diet, there may be some special feeding utensils and/or food supplements that may assist. The doctor indicated that he would mark his request as a matter of urgency but neither of us are particularly cognizant of when a visit to Meg might be feasible. I also got a second call from the Doctor (when I was out in the street) to ensure that Meg’s ‘respect’ documentation was all in order. This is to ensure that in the event of an emergency, Meg does not necessarily get carted off to an A&E department but will be treated as far as possible at home.

The political news this afternoon is Tulip Sidiq, the anti-corruption minister, has resigned although she claims to have done nothing wrong but, nonetheless, referred herself to the prime minister’s ethics watchdog, Sir Laurie Magnus, last week. In a letter to Sir Keir, the independent adviser called it ‘regrettable’ that Ms Siddiq ‘was not more alert to the potential reputational risks’ arising from her close family’s association with Bangladesh. He said this ‘shortcoming’ should not be taken as a breach of the ministerial code, ‘but you will want to consider her ongoing responsibilities in the light of this’ In the face of a comment like this, there was no real option for Tulip Siddiq but to resign. If I had been Prime Minister of an incoming government I would have informed Cabinet colleagues that having elected as the successor to a sleaze-ridden series of governments, the Labour Party needed to appear to be whiter than white and were this not to be the case, then ministers would be asked to resign within seconds and before their feet touched the floor. Naturally, I shall watch the political news with particular interest tonight but I suspect that many in the Labour Party might be relieved that the scandal will not drag on and on. In the middle of the afternoon, I received a communication from the building firm offering me a time-slot to assess the damage to our dining room ceiling and adjacent areas after the bad leak we had last week. I was a bit dismayed to have to wait a week more before we start to get any remedial action but I suppose that with the spell of freezing weather followed by a thaw, there will be cracked pipes followed by leaks all over the country.

It appears that a deal might be close in Gaza bringing something resembling peace to that war-torn area. I wonder though whether Joe Biden who has been very active behind the scenes will get the credit for hi or whether it might be delayed for a few days this enabling Trump. immediately after his inauguration to clam having brought peace to the area even though he as not lifted a finger and he prize of the ‘peace deal’ might just drop in his lap i.e. whilst he is President.

The weather, I am pleased to say, was turning slightly milder yesterday morning with a temperature when I awoke of 3° leading to a high of 5° later on in the day. There are no real plans for today apart from progressing our insurance claim after the leak which will surely go on for some time. In the meantime, we are making efforts to slowly dry the room out with a fan heater being on most of the time. Sky News is reporting this morning that The government will ‘mainline AI into the veins’ of the UK, with plans being unveiled today by Sir Keir Starmer. The prime minister is set to promise investment, jobs and economic growth due to a boom in the sector. It comes as his government battles against allegations they are mismanaging the economy and stymied growth with the budget last autumn. The government’s announcement claims that, if AI is ‘fully embraced’, it could bring £47bn to the economy every year. And it says that £14bn is set to be invested by the private sector, bringing around 13,000 jobs. Those of us of a certain age and political generation may remember Harold Wilson’s pledge to a Labour Party conference that a new Labour government would ’embrace the white hot heat of a technological revolution’ but I do not remember it ever happening. Wilson was keen to promote the idea of being a moderniser as well as courting the votes of a newly emerging cadre of scientists and technologists. If the speech was rapturously received by Wilson’s contemporaries, most historians have taken a rather more sceptical view. After winning the 1964 general election Wilson did keep his promise to establish a dedicated Ministry of (Education and) Science, but his government failed to deliver the scientific national renewal that the Scarborough speech had promised, and was in fact responsible for scrapping several high-profile technology projects. The big political story today is that even if Tulip Siddiq resigns, the damage may already be done to Sir Keir Starmer. Treasury minister Tulip Siddiq is coming under increasing pressure over the way she used properties that were reportedly gifted to her. She has denied any wrongdoing. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the case which are being established as we write, the thought of a Labour MP being gifted or at least benefiting from several London based properties is not what most of the electorate feel is appropriate for an MP with socialist principles – if she were a Tory, of course, there would be no problem.

Currently, I am having problems getting food and drink inside Meg because of her difficulties in swallowing. From my reading, I realise that I need an onward reference to a SALT (Speech and Language Therapist) and so I got onto the nurses who specialise in Meg’s condition to see if they could make an onward reference on my behalf. They informed me that only a GP can make on onward reference and so I contacted the surgery – but after the time that their appointments website had closed. I was informed that there were no appointment slots left for today and they could offer me next week – when I protested that a dementia patient could have choked to death in the meanwhile, I was offered the opportunity to use their website tomorrow which may then give me access to a GP who alone can make on onward referral which may be days if not weeks ahead. Of course, Monday is not a good day to contact the GP service and I was hoping that the specialist nurses could fast track me but it was not to be. In the meanwhile, at least I got some porridge inside Meg this morning which is an improvement on a couple of days ago. As the weather has improved, I had decided that I would wrap Meg up warmly and proceed into town. I gave up the unequal struggle to try to get an outer jacket onto Meg as her limbs are now so unresponsive and made do with a quite a thick heavy travel rug which I think was probably warmer in any event. Whilst in Waitrose, a couple of the staff commiserated with me about the loss of the cafeteria, as did a couple of other store regulars who recognised myself and Meg and expressed similar sentiments mourning the loss of the facility. I asked one of the staff with whom I get on very well about the cafeteria area and it looks as though they may use it as an expanded bakery area. Whilst in the store, we bought some packet soups of a flavour not available in Aldi and also some mousse confections which I know I can safely into Meg these days. On the way back home, though, we bumped into our Italian friend who gave me some good news. The French lady who lives down the road and is a near neighbour of our other friends down the road is certainly selling her house but not moving to be near to her daughter in Sandbach. Apparently she has decided to buy a flat within striking distance of Bromsgrove town centre about which I am delighted as it means we can still see each other when the occasion demands. Our Italian friend had had a bad accident in her car which was now written off by the insurance company and she has decided, I think very sensibly, not to bother with getting another car as she is over 80. She has worked out, and I totally agree, that you can get a tremendous volume of taxi rides instead of the expenses involved in running a car. I updated our friend on Meg’s condition and, in the same way that I gave her a lot of emotional support when other own husband died about ten years ago now, she promised to reciprocate when the inevitable happens as it will in the months ahead. Whilst Meg is continuing to sleep, I have prepared a lunch of beef, broccoli and baked potatoes, But I have cut the meat into incredibly small cubes so that I can feed them so much more easily when I come to give Meg her meal later in the day.

Yesterday, the current spell of cold weather seemed to be coming to a natural conclusion because when I got up shortly before 6.00am and consulted my smart speaker about the weather, the temperature was -1° whereas the day before at the same time it had been -6° so that is a 5° improvement which is surely to be welcomed. Milder air is working its way very gradually from the west which means that we should have warmer conditions in the first part of the week whereas a high pressure zone of dryer air will persist over the South East of the UK. It then looks as though the weather may dip again slightly but not to the extent that we have experienced in recent days. The evening and night before has not been a good one for Meg. Although she had been in a deep sleep throughout much of the preceding day, in bed she was semi-awake and in an agitated condition, seemingly for hours at a time. As I have a camp bed next to her, I can extend a friendly arm and hand for comfort but in her agitated state she will not hold onto this for more than about a second. Under the circumstances, I am just hoping that sleep will overwhelm her but this is very uncertain. The whole of yesterday all I managed to get past her lips was a small chocolate mousse which I had bought ‘on spec’ the last time I went shopping and which has proved invaluable. In the evening before, we were limited to only one carer getting Meg to bed so I had to assist for the second time (if not the third time) that day. The care agency are pleading ‘staff sickness’ which, of course, seems to be perennial. When Meg was in bed last night, I watched a Lucy Worsley quite revisionist programme on the Gunpowder plot and learned a few things I did not already know. She was arguing that Guy Fawkes was a convert to Catholicism and the real ringleader of the conspiracy Robert Catesby and Guy Fawkes may have been radicalised by their witnessing of the death of Margaret Clitheroe in York. Margaret Clitheroe (whose hand is actually preserved in The Bar Convent in York where my sister went to school and which relic I have actually seen) was put to death in a very public and humiliating way for providing a safe place of Catholic priests for which she was repeatedly fined and imprisoned. She was laid on a door with a sharp stone being placed under her back and then a door was placed on top of her and heavy weights put on top of the door before she was literally crushed to her death. She apparently died within 15 minutes but the authorities left her in place for some six hours presumably as a warning to the rest of the public. The Worsley programme was at pains to discover the roots of the radicalisation of the young Catholic males who formed the conspiracy and drew parallels with the radicalisation process of some contemporary Islamic ‘martyrs’.

The care workers were due an hour later this morning but I acted on the suggestion of last night’s carer and gave Meg some chocolate ice-cream this morning, which I was please to say that she enjoyed. Then after she was up, I managed to get Meg to have her customary breakfast of porridge which was a great improvement on yesterday. Then our University of Birmingham friend called around at 11.00 and I was very pleased to see him. We always have interesting chats and this mornings involved questions of astronomy which intrigued us both. After he had left, it was practically time for the couple of carers to arrive and as Meg did not require too much of their attention, I managed to seize the opportunity to pop down the hill and to get a copy of the ‘Sunday Times’, required reading for a Sunday evening. One of the care workers whose mother had had an illness similar to that of Meg’s came me some good advice about getting in touch with a Language and Speech specialist as they have expertise in problems of swallowing and thought that Meg could benefit from some of their particular expertise. This I will do in the morning but I fear it might be quite some time before I can receive any practical help. Whilst in the Waitrose store, I was delighted to bump into our Irish friend who was shortly to go off to Ireland to visit the cottage she has over there and where she needed to make a lightning visit to sort out the affairs of an elderly uncle who was recently died but whose affairs needed some attention. I explained to our friend as now that the weather had improved, we hope we might make a trip down to Wetherspoons and we agreed that perhaps some time after their return from Ireland, this would provide a good venue for us all to meet and have a coffee together. After I returned home, it was time to think about preparing lunch. I had cooked the portion of beef upon which we were to dine in the slow cooker overnight so this made the rest of the lunch fairly easy to prepare. Then having had my own lunch, I was delighted to get a goodly portion of food into Meg which was a considerable improvement on yesterday. Then eventually, we settled down to watch the excellent production of ‘Pride and Prejudice’ which was broadcast on BBC2 last night and which I had been saving for a time when Meg and I could view it together. It is fair to say that Meg slept through most of it and I myself slept through some of it, but nonetheless, I was sufficiently awake for some of the most dramatic moments of the film and very enjoyable it was as well. We are expecting a couple of carers in the late afternoon with whom we get on particularly well but it is going to be rather a poignant meeting because the young female carer who is a Psychology graduate is going to leave the caring profession to start a career as a publishing assistant and today is her very last day so after several months of wonderful association we shall probably not see her again.

Yesterday I awoke 6 minutes before the time that Alex generally wakes me up at 6.00am in the morning but although reluctant to leave my warm bed, I knew that the care workers had been allocated to come along at 7.00am rather than 8.00am (for reasons which they do not communicate to us) The Met Office confirms Friday was the coldest night of winter so far in the UK, with the temperatures falling to -17.3C in Altnaharra in the Scottish Highlands. Meanwhile, Saturday is likely to be bitterly cold, while Sunday is forecast to be a little milder. The weather here in Bromsgrove was -6° and it is not predicted to rise much during the day but we may get a high of 1°. Just before I went to bed last night, I thought I would consult my emails and found (in my ‘Junk’ folder) a communication from the building firm which has been subcontracted by the insurance company to assess (and hopefully repair) the damage caused by repairing the bad leak which afflicted us yesterday. The firm wished me to send electronic copies of the invoice supplied by the emergency plumber (which I had to scan as their own website refused to accept the job number on the invoice) and also photos of the damage. Fortunately my son had taken ten photos of the damage but this had to be uploaded and described to the building form so, all in all, this took about an hour to do when I was desperate to get to bed. On the brighter side, at least the job was done and the receipt of the uploaded files acknowledged so at least I am into their system. But the firm’s email implied that they could not progress any claim until their documentation had been completed so what less competent IT people would have done, I cannot start to imagine. Many have smart phones these days but not necessarily a scanner but I suppose people out there will take a photo of the bill with their smart phones to get an electronic copy. Normally we would consider getting out to see friends but the weather is so ferociously cold I must just stay in all day. Meg and I do have a sort of midday treat to which to look forward because there is a film of the life of Anne Frank broadcast which I hope is worth watching.

On the international front, Foreign Secretary David Lammy has refused to condemn Donald Trump’s threat to seize Greenland and the Panama Canal. Mr Lammy told Sky News he is ‘not in the business of condemning our closest ally’ when asked if he would denounce the US president-elect’s rhetoric. On Wednesday, Mr Trump said he could ‘not assure’ the world he would not resort to military action or economic coercion to try to get control of Greenland and the Panama Canal. He has said he wants the US to buy the vast island off Canada’s east coast that is home to a large US military base ‘for purposes of national security and freedom throughout the world’. Once you enter the mindset of the rich and powerful thinking they can (almost literally) walk over their weaker neighbours, one can understand how Trump views Putin. As the Ukraine was once part of the USSR, then Putin probably feels he has a ‘right’ to retake Ukraine and no doubt Donald Trump in his present expansionary mood, probably agrees with Putin. None of this bodes at all well for the moves that Trump will made once he is inaugurated and the inauguration is only just over a week away.

Our front door bell seems to have failed and it is essential that this is working so that the care workers can alert me to their presence. One of them who had arrived early was outside in the cold for up to a quarter of an hour so this situation has to be rectified. I did take out the batteries and give them a gentle warming in the oven but this move was not enough. Then as a light glows in the keypress when it is pressed, I reckoned there must be a battery inside which had probably not been renewed for about ten years or more. So I removed it from its sticky mount and prised it open to discover that there was a coin size battery of type CR2032 inside. I promptly went ahead and ordered some of these which will arrive some time tomorrow. Then whilst Meg was sound asleep, I decided to go to the garage down the road to pick up both a newspaper and buy a battery. I did get the last copy of the newspaper but the garage said it did not stock the coin size batteries so I went next door to a store called ‘Homes and Gardens’ where they have a large battery bar, as it were. Here too I drew a blank so went to my local Asda where I did find what I was looking for and Meg was still asleep when I returned. I fitted the new coin size battery and was relieved that this solved my problem for me. When the batteries arrive tomorrow, they will always be useful to have in stock.

In the afternoon, Meg was still fast asleep as she has been all day and so I started to watch ‘The Diary of Anne Frank’ made in 1959 and shot in black and white which suits the bleak character of the theme. The young Asian male carer arrived early and as there had been a terrific smash on the dual carriage way between Bromsgrove and Redditch was not keen to depart until the carriage way had been cleared. So we had lunch together, the young carer insisting that I have something from Greggs that got delivered to the house. So after a long chat on the ‘meaning of life’ (well, largely modern relationships in the younger generation) the carer left but he was due to return with another young companion carer for Meg’s teatime call. I then tuned into the last five minutes of the Anne Frank film which was poignant but art least we were spared the gory details of Anne Frank’s death in a German concentration camp a few months before liberation by the Allied forces in 1945.