Today being Sunday was the day for an early rising and then a trip down to the paper shop for our copy of the ‘Sunday Times‘ It was quite a nice bright and not particularly cold when I started walking down, accompanied by a bit of Bach on my ancient iPhone which is my Sunday morning treat. On such occasions, I often think of little numerical puzzles I have encountered – for example, I have discovered that with a bit of rounding a square metre is 1.2 square yards- conversely to convert square yards to square metres, one multiplies by 5/6. As a case in point our communual green area, minus the BioDisc is 300 square metres which it is easy to convert into 250 square metres. But it whilst I was doing a bit of internet searching into push mower rotation speeds that I came across the opinion that revolutions measured in revolutions per minute (rpm) is a particularly pointless idea and one to which we cannot really relate. For example, I know that at my 2mph my little push mower will rotate its blades to give the equivalent of 2200 rpm which is about three quarters (2900 rpm) of the conventional standard for hover mowers and some petrol driven mowers. Now 2200 rpm sounds not to be a particularly fast rate but if you convert it into seconds, it becomes 36.7 revs per second, which ‘sounds’ a lot faster. Again, to try and get my mind around the magnitudes of revolving objects, I now know that a human blink has a typical duration of one third of a second. Now my trusty little lawn mower will deliver a cut with one of its blades at the rate of 12 for each eye blink. Now rather than my ‘slow’ 2200 rpm, I have an incredibly fast 12 ‘cuts’ per blink-of-an-eye which sounds satisfing fast – but all of the statistics are essentially the same. On a similar theme, there is one fact that had stuck with me since my GCE ‘O’-level days and that is a little formula that ‘60 mph is 88 feet per second‘. With a bit of rounding up to 90 this is 90 feet (or thirty yards per second). I mention this only because in my late 20’s I was involved in a bizarre accident in the Polytechnic in which I then worked.   The campus straddled and was criss-crossed by some busy roads. One of these was a ‘T’ junction and approaching one of these a driver ‘fainted’ and crossed the road, hitting me first and throwing me into the air and smashing both my legs and taking two of my students on its bonnet through some iron railings. I reckon the car was going at about 40mph and was about 10 yards (30 feet) away from me before the car accelerated across the ‘T’ junction and hit me. As 40mph is 60 feet per second, then I had about half a second to react to the car speeding towards me. Meg’s father, when we recounted the story of the accident to him could only observe ‘Why didn’t he jump out of the way?‘ All that I can say is that I had just about enough time for my brain to register to not continue walking forward and hence the car hit me with the corner of its bumper rather than full on (when I might have been killed outright) I just thought I would mention how some of these equivalences might work out in practice (As a sequel, the ‘fainted’ driver recovered and fled the next day to Florida where our lawyers served a High Court writ upon him and the case came to court some 5 years later.) Incidentally a ‘fainted’ body at the wheel of a car is not legally responsible for their actions and therefore a legal case where one has to prove that the driver was ‘at fault’ is difficult to construct – but that is another story which I will not go into just now).

Around Easter time, I always like to listen to a rendition of an oratorio, typically broadast upon Radio 3. Today, I looked at the offerings for Palm Sunday and was pleasantly surprised to discover that there was a live performance of J.S Bach’s ‘St John Passion‘ so Meg and I particularly enjoyed listening to this whilst we were having our Sunday lunch and a pleasant relaxing read of the Sunday newspapers. Later in the week there is a performance of ‘Matthew Passion‘ on Wednesday evening (rather an odd choice of day as one would associate this with Good Friday or Holy Saturday (Easter vigil). When we go to church next Saturday, there will be a special Easter service starting at 8.00pm (when it is just about getting dark) when a special ‘flame’ accompanied by candles. I learn from the web that by Constantine’s realm in the fourth century CE, the night of the vigil of Easter began Saturday at dusk, with the lighting of the ‘new fire’, including a large number of lamps and candles and the paschal candle. The paschal candle is very large, made of beeswax and fixed in a great candlestick created for that purpose; it is still a significant part of Holy Saturday services.

Today dawned as a beautiful bright day but it was one of those that when I arose to make our early morning cup of tea, it was evident that there had been quite a hard frost during the night as the lawns were white over – however, as the sun rose, this soon burnt off. It is always a pleasure to look out on the front lawn once it has been mowed (and edged) the day beforehand. After breakfast, Meg and I walked very slowly down into town. We passed our Irish friend who was busy on his knees in his front garden (planting rather than praying) and he was busy planting out some dahlias as his others had not survived the winter. Once we got into the park we had our coffee and I left Meg to go and off and collect our newspaper. I did have a brief chat on the way back, though, with Seasoned World Travellor who was having a coffee in the poolside cafe. When we got home, we cooked some chicken breasts for lunch – I was anxious to ‘tart them up’ a little as otherwse they might have been a bit too bland. I decided to experiment with a honey mustard sauce, augmented with a little barbecue sauce. In theory, this should have been OK but I suspect that I overdid the mustard somewhat so I am making a mental note to myself to moderate the amount of mustard the next time I try something similar to this. This afternoon we are due to go to church leaving the house at 5.30 and returning just before 7.00pm. What is rather good now that the hour has gone back is that we both go and return fom church in the daylight which always elevates the spirits a little. When we get to church, we must stop and admire the floral decorations in which one of our friends has been heavily involved, tomorrow being ‘Palm Sunday’. We will have to wait and see whether we get our traditional palm (folded into the shape of the cross) which used to be the tradition years ago, but of course things change.

One of the unanticipated consequences of the conflict in Ukraine is the likely absence of wheat which has probably not been sown and/or harvested. Ukraine and Russia account for a third of global wheat and barley exports, which countries in the Middle East, Asia and Africa rely on to feed millions of people who subsist on subsidized bread and bargain noodles. They are also top exporters of other grains and sunflower seed oil used for cooking and food processing. So there are some predictions that the hungry of the world might be even more hungry once the full consequences of the war in Ukraine have played out. The other news from the Ukraine is equally depressing. Sky News reports that General Alexander Dvornikov has been placed in charge of Russia’s invasion after it failed to gain control of Kyiv. Formerly commander of Russia’s southern military district, General Dvornikov has been linked to some of the worst atrocities committed by Russian-backed Bashar al Assad forces in Syria.  Speaking to Sky News earlier, former UK ambassador to Russia Sir Roderic Lyne appeared to confirm the reports. Claiming Vladimir Putin has failed in his military objectives, he said: ‘I think that’s why they are re-concentrated their efforts on the south and the east. They’ve appointed a new general with a pretty savage track record in Syria to try to at least gain some territory in Donetsk that Putin could present as a victory.‘

Tonight, or rather late on this afternoon, I put all of the ingredients together for a ‘souper’ winter vegetables soup. So far, I have used carrots, parsnips, swede, celery and turnip supplemented with a fried onion and made with half a tin of coconut milk. This should be bubbling away whilst we are out and ready to consume when we return.

It is the first round of voting in the French president election tomorrow. Normally, this would not be of a great deal of interest to us in the UK but this time around, things are different. This is because the extreme right candidate, Marine Le Pen is within a percentage point or so of beating the incumbent president, Macron. She took over from her father as leader in 2011 and, in an attempt to distance herself from his reputation, banished him from the party in 2015. After losing out to Mr Macron in 2017, she rebranded the National Front to National Rally. Although anti-immigration by nature and a previous supporter of Mr Putin, Ms Le Pen has been quick to announce her support for Ukrainian refugees. She has also focused heavily on the cost of living crisis, which many credit with her recent uptick in the polls. Were she to win through in the second round, the dynamics of the politics of the whole of Europe would receive quite a jolt. 

Today dawned bright and clear and all of the indications were that it was a fine day for a walk. But Meg and I found it a little difficult to get ourselves going this morning but eventually we got ourselves ‘into gear’ and set off for town mid morning. Before we left, we had a phone call from some of our church friends thanking us for some wire brushes which I had spare and left on their doorstep (to help remove rust from some gardening tools – what else?) As we walked down the hill, we bumped into our Irish friend who was getting herself prepared to go off for a few days holiday (coinciding with half term) with some members of her family. Then we struck out for the park and no sooner had we consumed our coffee than our University of Birmingham friend strode into view and as we have not coincided for quite a bit what with one thing or another so it was pleasant to catch up on all of our news. We were putting our heads together to see if here was a small friendly Spanish town to which our friend could journey on his own, to improve his Spanish (hence wanting to go alone – if there is more than one of you, then you form a ‘little bubble’ and do not interact thorughly with the country whereas on one’s own, you have to sink or swim by yourself). We then met up, as is usual with Seasoned World Traveller and then Meg and I pushed on into town where we picked up our newspaper and then made a quick visit to Waitrose, as is our wont, to pick up some things that I have invariably forgotten in my main shopping earlier in the week.

This afternoon was my lawn cutting day and everything worked out well. At this time of year, one can practically see the grass leaping out of the ground so it always good to get this routine job done. The gardening books always used to say, quite irritatingly, that for any particular job that one should ‘choose a nice day’ as though one had complete ability to order a particular set of weather for a particular day. But as soon as the major mowing had been done, there was a little measuring job that needed to be done. I have set myself the objective of trying to work out the rpm equivalent of my little push mower whch I utilised yesterday. By a fortunate coincidence of numbers, the recommended mowing speed of 2mph is almost exactly 1 yard per second and this fact comes in useful later on my calculations. I then measured the circumference of the driving wheel which is 27″ – hence in takes one and a third revolutions of the driving wheel to cover a yard. I then worked empirically (and this was the tricky bit) the gearing ratio between the driving wheel and the reel speed which turned out to be a ratio of 1:5.5. As there are five cutting blades this makes one revolution 5.5 x 5 which is 27.5 ‘hits’ of the blade per revolution or just 36.67 hits of a blade per yard. From this data, I have mnaged to work out that the RPM equivalent at 2mph is actually 60 times this which is 2200rpm. At. walking speed of 2.5 mph, this would be 2750 rpm which is pretty close to the 3000 rpm which a conventional hover mower would offer. Or so I reckon.

Two bits of Ukrainian news are hitting the headlines this evening. One of these which might just be wishful thinking or western propaganda is that in the retreat from Lyif, some Russian troops may have abandoned a lot of tanks and artillery. The abandonment of vehicles  is said to be ‘a collapse of the will to fight’ which bit of information is certainly consistent with several other stories to the same effect. But the other really terrible piece of news is the fact that thousands of people had crowded into a railway station in Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine. Estimates of the numbers killed range from 30-50 and hundreds have been killed. It was well known to the Russian military authorities that thousands of civilians were assembling in the railway station to effect their escapes from the shelling that is going to be unleashed upon them. It looks, therefore, that the attack was intentional and the clearest example of a ‘war crime’ to add to the growing list. Bit by bit, the West seems to be adding more sohisticated weaponry to the Ukrainians, no doubt stimulated by the scale of the atrocities that are revealed as the Russians retreat from the north. Boris Johnson has said he would give Ukraine’s military more Starstreak anti-aircraft missiles, another 800 anti-tank missiles, and precision munitions. He also promised more helmets, night vision googles and body armour. Whether this will prove effective in the coming onslaught in the East of the country, time will tell.

Today was the type of day that I would describe as ‘glowering’ in that it was generally overcast with just some slight bursts of sunshine that did not seem to last very long. But there seemed to be a very strong and blustery wind which made any kind to the park an unpleasant prospect. We were a little late this morning because, as is normal on a Thursday, I had got to the supermarket to go shopping and all of this worked out as planned. One of the joys of Aldi is that after the food shopping has been done, there are always the ‘central aisles’ in which there are a variety of household and hardware type goods (probably remainders from high quality manufacturers) in which you are never quite sure whether you find something useful. Last week, for example, I bought from the central aisle one of those incredibly useful garden ‘Flexi Tubs’ as Amazon calls them – needless to say, they had practically all gone by today which is typical for incredibly good bargains which shoppers are wont to snap up. Today, I was wondering whether it was possible to buy some more pyjamas for Meg as the ones we bought about a month ago have proved to be excellent. Today, though, I picked up what is advertised as a children’s ‘athlete’ suit  and looking at the size of the garment which would fit a 13-14 year old child, I was sure they would double as an extra pair of pyjamas for Meg. So I took a chance and bought them and they have proved to be an excellent purchase insofar as we can tell – let’s hope that they survive their first immersion in the washing machine without shrinkage tomorrow morning. After we had unpacked the shopping, neither Meg nor I felt inclined to go on a trip to Droitwich as it was so windy and unpleasant. Instead, we went by car and treated ourselves to a coffee in the newly opened coffee lounge in our local Waitrose we have now started to frequent once more. I bought a few things I had forgotten in the morning shop and then it was home for a lunch of quiche.  

Friday (tomorrow) is the day when I routinely cut our grassed areas, both the communal areas to the front of the house and our own private lawns to the rear. Whulst my trusty ‘Stiga’ (Swedish) mulching mower does a wonderful job, I also bought some years back an extremely light weight push mower (about 7 kg in total). As well as being a backup in the case of a total failure of the petrol mower, I have in the past used my lightweight push mower to cut one of the long borders which can prove tricky when two of the wheels are on the grass and the other two overhang the edge. I have been doing some research on the exact differences between conventional rotary mowers  and the new generation of  lightweight push mowers and this is what I have discovered (from the web) A reel ( or push) mower cuts grass like a pair of scissors. It has blades that spin around a central axis. The spinning blades create an updraft that causes grass to stand up straight for cutting. As the grass meets the cutting bar, a blade comes down to chop it. A reel mower can either be a push (human-powered) or powered (petrol, electric), although push reel mowers are more common around home.  A rotary mower is what most people think of when they think of petrol or electric mowers. It has a single blade that spins around to cut the grass, like a helicopter. The blade whacks at the grass to cut it. When it comes to comparing the actions of these two types of mower at the ‘micro’ level, then the push reel mowers literally cut the blades of grass whereas the rotary mowers just whack it, by rotating a blade at high speed. A ‘clean cut’ is undoubtedly better for the grass than just a ‘whack’.  When I come to clean up the push mower, I appreciate how very sharp the blades actually are and if the mower is properly adjusted (which mine appears to be) then you can actually cut one sheet of paper as though you were cutting it with scissors if it is inserted at the appropriate point between the spinning blade and the base blade. So overall, I was very pleased with my ‘pre-preparation’ of the lawn this afternoon and hope that I can continue to repeat this procedure week by week, time and weather permitting of course.

I have just watched the Sky News interview of Putin’s press spokesperson with Mark Austin and, of course, it is incredible to watch a Russian spokesman so wrapped into their ideological world that they are trying to argue that Ukrainian actors played the part of dead people whilst the Russians were busy patrolling the streets – according to the Russian account, Ukrainian ‘Nazis’ have committed all of the atrocities in the Ukraine. Meanwhile, some breaking news is that the UN General Assembly has just voted to suspend Russia from UN Human Rights Council.  

Today was to all intents and purposes the typical April day with many showers followed by bursts of sunshine. In view of the variable weather conditions, Meg and I decided that we would pay our visit down into Bromsgrove by car. On our way down, we popped off a new wire brush for the benefit of our friend who  was busy restoring one of the pair of flower stands that adorns our local church. Most churches, irrespective of denomination involved, tend to be a blaze of spring flowers with which to adorn the church over Easter and this year, Easter Sunday falls on one of the latest dates possible. Having collected our newspaper, we then paid a visit to Waitrose and, in particular, which has just re-opened fully after bing closed for the best of two years (to be fair, it did open  for a short period in between lockdowns) But now it seems to be one of the few cafes in the Waitrose network that has been reprieved. We were pleasantly surprised  to see the cafe was practically full and we got the last available table. By happy chance, on the next door was our old park friend, Seasoned World Traveller, so we had a fascinating conversation over a whole range of subjects – we spent a good half an hour and perhaps even more in the most conducive of surroundings. Neither of us would have appreciated being rained upon in the park so it was wonderful to be back. One of the staff who knows us particularly well gave us a little ‘Welcome Back‘ present of one of the small Waitrose hessian bags which will prove tremedously useful to us as it just the right size to accommodate our newspapers and one or two small items of shopping. Then we returned home and had extensive chats with our domestic help who has swopped her normal Friday day for today. She and her husband are due to go off to Venice shortly to enjoy a delayed wedding anniversary trip – as they actually got married in Venice, they are hoping to retrace some of their steps and experiences from their wedding/honeymoon days. We are hopeful that they will get away in time as I have just read in The Times that there has been chaos at Manchester Airport with the director resigning and walking out in the midst of airport chaos and the police are having to step in to restore a modicum of order. But as our friends are leaving from Bristol airport and not one of the large metropolitan ones, and so perhaps the omens are set fair for an uneventful trip. We have promised some interesting photos once they are safely there.

This afternoon I thought I would pop out do a bit of gardening, but everytime I was thinking about it, there seemed to be an imminent shower and the subsequent sunshine did not last for very long. Eventually, I decided that even if the sun was shining, the gound was likely to be soggy or even downright muddy so I decided to write off all thoughts of gardening for the day.

The latest Omicron virus figures are hgher than ever and the latest rates show that 1 in every 16 people in the country are infected by the virus. The infection is by the mildest version and some peopke have no symptoms or just the slightest sniffle to indicate that they have the virus. Evidently, we are in the phase of the pandemic where we are ‘learning to live’ with the virus but to withdraw the free availability of  the lateral flow tests appears to be premature by at least a couple of weeks. Whilst the economy can still function as barely infectious personnel resume their work roles, the possibilities seem to be immense that a new variant might well arise. There is no law of biological viral evolution that indicates that one mutation of the virus should prove to be less dangerous i.e. able to generate a severe illness, than another. Therefore it is quite possible that we are living in a ‘fool’s paradise’ and another variant of the virus might be around the corner to bite us severely in the behind.

Tomorrow, whilst it is our normal shopping day, we may take the opportunity to make another little visit to Droitwich is about some seven miles away from us. Droitwich has several attractions for us, not least the Waitrose and Wilko stores both of which we like to visit but also some congenial coffee shops and interesting charity shops.  There is also an ‘Olde Worlde’ type teashop which every Thursday puts on a magnificent roast dinner – these are so popular that space is limited and one has to book to ensure a chance of a meal. So we shall see how we feel in the morning but Droitwich is always a pleasant little toddle for us and has the advantage of being quite compact which cuts down on the amount of walking that Meg has to do.

Tuesday is my Pilates day so we always have a somewhat earlier routine on a Tuesday. Nonetheless, we made a fairly early start walking down to the park a little earlier. I had previously picked up our newspaper in the car as well as some milk from Waitrose so Meg and I had a leisurely walk in the sunshine but with a little cooling wind. In the park we met up with our octogenarian intrepid hiker who, according to his trekking routine, is half way up or down the Grand Canyon in his latest app which simulates his walk for him (all organised by his medic daughter-in-law) On our way back home, we were a little delayed by bumping into some of our church friends who we have not seen for about a week or so. We were delighted to chat over gardening related things but we had to take our leave fairly quickly in order to effect my quick Pilates turn around. After my Pilates session and a traditional (for us) lunchtime of haddock fish cakes,  we idly wondered if there was anything remotely interesting on the TV. We noticed that there was a going to be a showing of Peter Sellars in ‘The Pink Panther‘ and although I watched the first 20 minutes or so of it, I found it strangely unfunny after all of these years. So I engaged in a little cleaning job which was a little irksome for me. This morning, I had delivered my high quality long-handled patio weeding knife. But when I took off the tightly wrapped black plastic wrapping, there were some strange black marks that spoilt the appearance of the otherwise beautiful ash handle. Whether this was a result of the manufacturing process, or the wrapping or even the transportation who can say, but it was not very pleasant to take delivery of a new item which you immediately have to clean. I used some cream cleaner and I  thought the stains would be surface deep and easy to remove but that was not the case. Afterwards, I treated the shaft with some teak oil to preserve its natural sheen and then a WD-40 treatment of the cutting edge so presuming we have a fine day next Friday, I can then put it to its first use. In the late afternoon, we were due to FaceTime some of our old Waitrose friends but we got some messages to the effect that they had contracted COVID – so we sent them our good wishes and trust that as they are quite well vaccinated-up then any affliction might only be a short-lived one.

The news from Bucha, the town in the Ukraine now abandoned by the Russians, is truly horrifying. It now looks as though victims were tortured whilst some had limbs hacked off. Several corpses with bound hands and feet and then signs of fatal bullet wounds to the head and chest have been discovered. The Russians, for their part, have been showing the images of the bodies lying in the streets of Bucha but with the caption ‘Fake News‘ in bold red type all over the images. The Russians are claiming that the ‘bodies’ were just actors who were ‘playing dead’ and had simulated wounds cosmetically applied to them as part of a Ukrainian propaganda push. However, this claim is easily shown to be the nonsense that it is because the West had access to satellite photos showing bodies lying around in the streets for days, and perhaps even weeks, well before  the Russians departed. All wars exhibit some elements of depravity but these must rank high in the annals of atrocities once the final story is told.

We were having an interesting discussion in the park the other day whether Putin suffers from the ‘little man’ or ‘Napoleon’ complex i.e. the theory that leaders of less than average stature are unduly aggressive in their behaviour patterns. There are several problems with this popular analysis. Whilst it is true that most political leaders tend to be of more than average height,  the likes of Putin may be relatively smaller than the average leader but not necessarily markedly different from the rest of the population. Putin, for example, is 5’7″ which does not make him of incredibly short stature. It could be argued that the relative absence of height has marked psychological correlates (including the need to achieve, for example) but all of these explanations are a little too simplistic. There used to be a parallel argument about the effects of an extra ‘Y’ chromosome and criminality but all of these types of arguments suffer from the same fundamental logical flaw. That is there may be an equal proportion of leaders of less than average stature/men with an extra ‘Y’ chromosome that do not exhibit any particular behaviour patterns. In fact, multiple regression analysis tends to show that many of the attributed effects of an extra ‘Y’ chromosome can be attributed to a lowered intelligence level. So perhaps that puts all of those types of argument to bed for the time being.  

Meg and I both slept in this morning for a reason we cannot discern – after our early morning cup of tea, we both fell asleep again for about three quarters of an hour. I tell myself we must have both needed the sleep. The day opened as a ‘grizzly’ kind of day with a sort of sky I would describe as ‘glowering’. Meg was not feeling too well this morning so after our cooked breakfast, I walked down to collect the newspaper on my own. Afterwards, I took the opportunity to pop into Waitrose because there were several things that we can only buy at Waitrose so we have to do without until I make a special trip. So I lugged a bag of fairly heavy shopping up the hill and was pleased to get home and have a nice, but delayed, cup of coffee. As I have almost finished my big edging job, I am motivated to keep this edge to the lawn in good condition so I went on the web and treated myself to what is described as ‘Long handled patio weeding knife’. Although I could have bought cheaper I ensured that I bought myself with a long handle (160cm), from a recognised make (Kent and Stowe) and with a warranty that they say lasts for 10 years. The point about the long handle is that I know from experience you get a lot of leverage and it saves a lot of back-bending – I am hopeful that because of its design and quality, all I have to do on a weekly or fortnightly routine is to pull the knife immediately adjacent to the kerbing and I should be able to maintain the edge in pristine condition right throughout the growing season. I started to wonder whether I had any tools that would assist me in this task and I knew that several years ago, frustrated by several long handled tools that keep falling over in the box in the garage in which they were located. I had bundled several of these tools toegther with some tree ties and generally forgot about them. When I examined this bundle again this morning, I discovered a wonderful implement I never knew I had. I have no idea what this kind of implement is called but from a basic ‘L’ shape there is the equivalent of a half circle removed (approximately orange size) but with a sharp edge. I suspect that this implement is designed to pull through the ground and to slice through small but hidden roots but this is only a conjecture. I took this newly discovered implement and together with a small, liberated hoe and my trusty garden edge shears I gave them all a good cleanup with a brillo pad, then an oiling with WD-40 type oil to keep rust at bay and finally gave them all on a sharpen using a Spear and Jackson ‘5-in-1’ blade garden blade sharpening tool. This latter even had a tiny phial of a specialised rust-resisting oil complete with applicator sponge that resides within the body of the tool itself and is accessed by a plastic screw. I think the idea is that any tiny shards of metal created by the sharpening process can be wiped away and the oil keeps your tool in a rust free condition.  

Whilst thinking about keeping my tools in good conditiion, I reminded myself when I used to teach Sociology to College of Education students from 1969-1971. As it transpired, lecturing was quite a disconcerting experience for me as I  taught in the college’s one tiered lecture theatre in which even the first row was a step above ground level. This was the hey-dey of the miniskirt and every single teenage girl wore one – but what was especially disconcerting was that as each girl occupied a seat and then crossed her legs (which they all seemed to do) then by looking straight ahead of me I could see the colour of each pair of knickers all across the front row. It is slightly difficult to explain Marx’s theory of dialectic materialism when faced with this distraction. On one occasion, I was letting a bit of social anthropology creep into a lecture and was desperate to avoid the use of the use of words ‘tool’. Eventually hesitating when I wanted to use the word and substituting ‘implement’ or a similar synonym my mind raced ahead of me and I thought that I had better grasp the bull by the horns as it were. So I thought I had better say the word ‘tool’ at some point – what came out ‘And so there is a general cultural prohibition of handling the tools of the opposite sex’. I may have giggled or smiled just after I said it, but what ensued was a pandemonium of laughter from which it took minutes to recover.  

On a more serious note, I did finish all of my edging including cutting the grass back from two access manhole covers associated with our BioDisk system which I need to keep clear of grass and weeds in case the maintenance engineer needs to lift either of these covers to inspect the correct workings of the system.

Today was one of those bright and clear days when it had evidently been very cold overnight and there had been an air frost overnight. So it was reasonably cold when I popped down to get our Sunday newspaper before returning home in time for the Sunday politics programme. I understand that Laura Kuenssberg, the ex-chief BBC political correspondent is going to take over as the permanent presenter of this programme now that Andrew Marr has moved on. So I suppose we will have to get used to a series of political interviews in which punches get pulled and really penetrating questions are avoided. Those who do ask penetrating questions like Emma Barnett tend to get moved on. After breakfast, we decided to take the car down to the park and in the park we met with our Irish friends (who we happened to have a chat with yesterday) Having exchanged our news, we strolled up to our normal bench and drank our coffee. Then our two park friends, University of Birmingham friend and Seasoned World Traveller, hove into view and we chatted exchanging news of the week (usually a comibination of COVID news, interspersed with politics) We were joined by another couple we know well and then we made our way home for Sunday lunch. Today, I was cooking a gammon joint oin the slow cooker and to complement this I prepared a carrot-and-parsnip mixture, mashed with a big knob of butter and a touch of yogurt and this all got served with some tender-stem broccoli. So although Sunday lunch always takes a little longer to prepare, we tend to take whatever joint we are having and to freeze one half of it. This way, we consume enough ‘red meat’ to keep us healthy but we keep our overall consumption within healthy limits.

After lunch, I was determined to get out and carry on with a little bit of gardening. In particular, I wanted to do another section of the lawn edging of the communal green area alongside which runs our communal roadway. The lawn edging is quite a complicated procedure and involves taking a six feet section, edging with lawn sheers, using a specialist edging tool on the ‘lawn side’ to cut off any deep roots, then utilising an old bread knife that I have saved for this particular purpose and finishing off with one of those more specialist tools used to weed in between the stones of a patio. I then finish off with the edging sheers at an almost horizontal angle and finally all of the grass cuttings are gathered up with a gloved hand. In case this sounds complicated, it is but then I tend to develop these techniques and ways of utilising my hand tools but then I forget the procedures if I have not utiised them for a year or so. In such cases, I need to do what I do when I have discovered how to do something on the computer and that is to write it down so I don’t forget it, in a specialised ‘Gardening’ book I keep for the purpose. Once I have got things put right for the season, it tends to require relatively little maintenance – tomorrow, I have the final third of the entire length to finish off.  

The news from the Ukraine is particularly grim this evening. Images have emerged of Ukrainian civilians lying dead on the streets of Bucha with residents saying the victims were killed by Russian soldiers without any apparent provocation. Vladimir Putin’s forces have been accused of ‘genocide’, but Russia has denied its troops killed civilians. Bucha’s mayor, Anatoliy Fedoruk, said more than 300 residents had been killed. Ukrainian prosecutors have found 410 bodies in towns near Kyiv and 140 of them had been examined, prosecutor general Iryna Venedyktova said. Reports have indicated that some bodies have been found in which the vistims were bound hand and foot and they were then shot in the back of the head. This is undoubtedly a ‘war crime’ but who exactly gets prosecuted under these circumstances – can individuals be sought out and identified in the chain of command who could eventually be prosecuted? A lot of evidence is currently being collected to be used in evental war crime charges but I fear that it may take years (if ever) for a successful prosecution.

It seemed quite a bright and cheerful day today and we were in a good mood as we contemplated the rest of the weekend. As we were having breakfast, we turned on ClassicFM on the kitchen radio, which is quite normal for us, but when it came to a ‘tumpty-tum’ type of Strausss walz which is not really our cup of tea, we flipped onto Radio 3. Quite by accident, we landed on a programme which, first thing on a Saturday morning, is called ‘Record Review‘ (I think) The musiciologists were discussing what they considered to be some of the finest recent recordings of Mozart’s ‘Marriage of Figaro’ which, as it happens, is probably our favourite opera.This programme turned out to be absolutely facinating because they were taking each of the individual aria, discussing its context and then playing what they thought was the finest of the recent recordings. As we know the opera very well, it was an extraordinarily good listen to experience the dissection of each aria by the musicologists  and we listened in rapt attention until the program concluded. So this was a bonus way to start the day.  By this time, we were a little late so Meg and I went to collect the newspaper by car. Then we parked in the bottom carpark in the park which meant that we were allowing ourselves a much longer walk around the lake. We had our normal coffee and comestibles and then, on the way home, we parked for a minute outside the house of our Irish friends. We were soon spotted and then the four of us had a brief chat to catch up on the week’s news and our various comings and goings. We got back to the house just in time for the 1.00pm news on Radio 4 which on a Saturday is always followed by ‘Any Questions‘.  There was an interesting discussion amongst the panellists (followed up by the subsequent programme which is ‘Any Answers’) dominated by the two big issues of the day, namely the cost of living crisis on the one hand, followed by the bureaucracy concerning the issue of visas to Ukrainian refugees on the other.

This afternoon, I had set myself to at least make a start on a little gardening job. This is to edge and neaten up the edge of our communal green area which borders our access road. I know there are 20 yards of this as evidently when the roadway was laid down, measures were still in feet and yards (and not metric) as each kerb stone is 36″ long. I managed to achieve about a third of the total this afternoon. The task is not as simple as it sounds as I like to ensure that the grass abuts and does hang over the kerbstone so this generally involves using a succession of implements in a sequence such as an edging tool, conventional edge clippers and even a knife which is run down the inside of the kerbstones. Once it has been done for the season, it should be relatively easy to keep it in good conditiuon, but as always, the first cut of the spring is always the worst.  When I had finished this, I was going to give myself a treat which is to watch the Wales vs. Scotland Women’s Six-Nations rugby. In th first half, the Scots were dominant with a lot of possession and some really fast line speeds. But in the second half the positions completely reversed themselves. About 5 minutes from the end, the scores were tied and then the Welsh scored a try which they converted. But then the Scots came back hard and were within an ace of scoring a try after the clock had gone red  but a ‘play’ was still in process. All ended in tears for the Scots when a pass went forward but it was one of those matches that could have ended in a tie, or a Welsh win, all the way to the final whistle.

There seems to be a lot going on for the Sunday newspapers to get their teeth into tomorrow. On the Ukraine front, it looks as about 30 areas around Kviv have been recaptured by the Ukrainians. A Red Cross convoy is still attempting a mass evacuation from Mariupol but whether they will be successful is too early to say. A Tory MP has had the whip withdrawn for ‘inappropriate behaviour” and Rishi Sunak is having to defnd his wife’s massive investments in Russia. Partygate rumbles on – but will the press manage to discover any of the identities of the Downing Street  staff who have fined? Meanwhile, people are taking to the street in many of our major cities whilst the citizenry protests against crippling cost-of-living increases. Tomorrow may well prove to be a good read if any of our press get their teeth into any or all of these stories – but it won’t be the first time that the Sunday press fails give the issues the coverage that they deserve.

Today is the day when traditionally schoolchildren, as well as others, used to play ‘April Fool’s‘ tricks upon each other.  I get the feeling that this is done far less than used to be the case in the past but I am reminded of one of the greatest hoaxes of all time. The authoritative BBC current affairs was Panorama and they always chose a subject for the program of great topical interest.  The presenter was the eminent broadcaster, Richard Dimbleby, who added a great air of authority to whatever he did. The 1st April, 1957 fell on a Monday and this was a Panorama broadcast day. From somewhere came the idea that Richard Dimbleby would do a report on gathering in the spaghetti harvest from a field full of spaghetti trees. The spaghetti-tree hoax was a three-minute hoax report broadcast on April Fools’ Day 1957 by the BBC current-affairs programme Panorama, purportedly showing a family in southern Switzerland harvesting spaghetti from the family ‘spaghetti tree’. At the time spaghetti was relatively unknown in the UK, so many British people were unaware that it is made from wheat flour and water; a number of viewers afterwards contacted the BBC for advice on growing their own spaghetti trees. Decades later, CNN called this broadcast ‘the biggest hoax that any reputable news establishment ever pulled’. No doubt, this can be viewed on YouTube to see a clip of the full story but many, many people were convinced for years afterwards that spaghetti grew on trees.

Today the weather was as variable as yesterday although just a tad warmer, as the wind was a little less cutting. In view of the very changeable weather conditions, I collected the newspaper by car and then Meg and I went down to the park by car rather than our usual walk. This was just as well because having had our coffee on the usual bench, it was no weather to be sitting about and the park was practically deserted in any case. So we got home to cook a traditional Friday midday meal. This week I had bought some smoked hake from Aldi last Thursday and preparation and cooking was minimal as all that was required was to wrap the fish in tinfoil and then bake in the oven for 15-18 minutes. This turned out to be absolutely delicious – I served the fish with a knob of butter and some horseradish sauce – I think I first ate horseradish sauce with smoked meat/fish at a holiday in Austria and it is rather a good combination.  So I am hoping that this will be a regular ‘line’ at Aldi and not just a one-off.

Straight after lunch, it was lawn cutting time. Although the weather seemed OK when I started, some flurries of either sleet or snow threatened but unfortunately these clouds  were quite soon swept aside. The lawn mowing was unproblematic for the second week in a row but the grass is now down to its ‘regular’ height so all I have to do I to keep up a good weekly routine from now until 5th November – my traditional end of the mowing season. After I had finished the routine mowing, I turned my attention to the lightweight handmower I occasionally use instead of the main mower fur cutting edges and tricky areas around trees and shrubs. This particular model had an adjustable little back roller which is adjustable by the means of spring loaded spigots. All was fine at one end but the other was more free floating so I was not sure if a securing bolt had dropped off without my knowledge. I set myself the task of fixing the errant end in a fixed position (as I don’t intend to keep on adjusting it) so this involved hunting threw a tin of old screws to find a screw that would double as a spigot. I managed to find one that was marginally too small in the thread so I improvised by wrapping some back tape round it to make the thread ‘bite’ At this stage, I must say that one man’s ‘bodge up’ is another person’s ‘innovative solution adapting whatever materials one has to hand’.

Tonight there are a variety of report concerning the situation in the Ukraine. One the one hand, it does appear that the Russians are withdrawing troops from around Kyiv and it may well be that they have determined that they cannot, and will not, attempt to take the Ukrainian capital. On the other hand, they are probably concentrating and redeploying their forces in the east of the country in the Donbas region (principally but not excusively Russian speaking). Meanwhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross are desperately trying to deliver aid to the southern port city of Mariupol where 5,000 have been killed and 170,000 are still trapped and struggling without food, water, or electricity, according to the mayor. It has failed today but is hoping to organise a convoy of coaches tomorrow (Saturday)