Today has turned out to be quite an eventful day. But I am pleased to say that last night, Meg seemed to fall soundly asleep which is a relief all round. The weather is so warm these days that Meg’s carers and I have to judge that Meg does not have too many bedclothes on so as to feel uncomfortable in the heatwave that we are experiencing which is reaching the stage of being quite humid. The weather forecasters are telling us that the spell of really hot weather will break down in about 24 hours leading to some thunderstorms across the country. Personally, I cannot wait until we get a really good thunderstorm which will clear the air for us as well as watering the gardens. When Meg was soundly asleep, I took the opportunity to finally fill the nice cushion covers which I purchased from the AgeUk shop earlier in the week. I am pleased with the results as I happened to have some material in which one of my recently purchased chairs had been wrapped. I assumed that this was a type of carpet underlay but our domestic help who is knowledgable about such things looked at one of the little offcuts that I had left over and announced it was probably furniture padding foam which is exactly what I needed. After a little experimentation, I now have locations sorted out for where all of these newly filled chair pads are going to go.

Wednesday is the day when our domestic help calls around and so this is always very welcome to us. Today, I took the opportunity to pop down into town in order to pick our newspaper and then after my return home, Meg and I viewed the women’s high diving competition where the Chinese and the North Koreans took an outstanding gold and silver. But the British pair managed to cling on to secure a bronze medal fighting off strong challenges from Mexico and the Ukraine. When this competition had been completed, Meg and I got ready for a trip down the road to the park. On our journey down the hill we had just accessed a little service road down which we regularly walk when we heard behind us the most tremendous bang. We turned round to see a large car that had collided with a lamp standard and had completely overturned at a distance about 80 metres away from us. What exactly had happened we cannot say as the accident had happened behind us. The car was at the entrance to a small gated estate on the other side of the road and whether it had reversed at speed into the lamp standard or gone into it forwards we could not tell. All the traffic stopped and people seemed to run from all over the place – we could see a man’s legs pocking out from under the car who we suppose was the driver. The emergency services were on the scene within about three minutes and we counted five ambulances, 2-3 police cars and a fire appliance that had turned up which would have been necessary to either jack up the car or to cut into it to free the occupants. We did not stay to stand and gawp but let the emergency services get on and do their job and we carried onto the park which was a haven of peace and tranquillity after the scene we had just witnessed. So we only decided to stay for about 15 minutes because we needed to get back in time for the carers and, in any case, we suspected that there would be absolute chaos in the road as the emergency services had to cope with the consequences of the crash. No other vehicle was involved and the lamp standard had been bent over to a most crazy angle and we would only speculate as to how the accident could possibly have happened. But as we were passing the scene, we got a call on our mobile from our niece was returning form a camping vacation in Somerset and was coming us quite close to us as she had to journey along the M5. Of course we were delighted to able to see her so unexpectedly and at such short notice – the minute she had put our post code into her SatNav, the system had taken account of the crash and immediately made a new route for her which was a little circuitous but meant she was not unduly delayed before she got to us at about 1.00pm. Immediately, I had got Meg home and told both our domestic help and the (delayed) carers the news about the traffic accident, I raided the fridge to get a quiche warmed up and put got some soup put into a saucepan, gently warming. So when our niece arrived, I managed to give her a little bit of sustenance and we all spent a very happy hour and a half in each other’s company. Then it was the time for our niece to leave to get back home and we took a tearful farewell of each other, wondering how we could possibly organise some logistics so that Meg and I could meet up with other members of the family for the first time in months.

After the terrible stabbings that have taken place in Southport, the far right have organised a huge riot in the vicinity of the mosque in Southport. The police have been attacked by stones larger than bricks and the latest count is that some fifty police officers and three police dogs have been injured by the rioters. The motivation seems unclear at the moment but one can only assume that the Far Right have in their heads that there is an ethnic dimension to the stabbings and have reacted accordingly. Of course it is not the first time that fake news has dominated the social media and the nation is holding up its hands in horror at the further suffering inflicted upon the inhabitants of Southport.

Today being a Tuesday, it is the day when our ‘granny gang’ meets up in Waitrose and Tuesday mornings always hold a particular significance for us. But our numbers were a little depleted this morning because we knew that one of our number had a social worker appointment and one of the others has injured her shoulder somewhat in a fall she sustained last Friday. I don’t think the injury is a serious one but one to keep her out of the normal swing of social events for the next few days which I know she is going to find annoying. But today for the benefit of one the long term partners in Waitrose who is responsible for the plants and flowers section of the store, we brought along our little mechanical toy bear which sings ‘When I am 64’ (Yes – the Beetles song) and sways in time to the music. I had threatened to bring the toy doll along loaned to us by our domestic help so today was the second time the toy has been inflicted upon the store. So this all good fun and on our way home, we were happy to bump into two sets of our friends. The first was our Irish friend who was proceeding down the road with her daughter and two grandchildren and the second was our Italian friend. We had brief conversations with each of them and it always gladdens the heart when we have a chance of chat. Today the journey back was threatening to be particularly hot and humid so we were quite pleased to have two little mini-breaks on the way back. Practically as soon as we got back and inside the house (quite a procedure as the wheelchair wheels have to be cleared of the gritty particles they acquire whilst on the public roads and pavements) it was time for the midday carers to arrive which they did promptly. After Meg had been made comfortable and as they had about ten minutes in hand before they had to dash off to their next job, we all made a sojourn into our back garden where I treated all of us (five of us – Meg and myself, the two carers and the ‘sitter’ who arrived early) to a treat of some vanilla ice cream. This was very much appreciated and not the kind of treat which carers typically enjoy but I like to do my little bit to make them welcome whenever they do come. But the weather was so warm and humid today that I was driven to put on a more cotton-rich shirt which I only do in the most extreme of temperatures. A good thunderstorm may help and one may be on the way in a day or so. As is was so hot today, we could not fancy another hot dinner so threw together a salad like we did yesterday but added some hardboiled eggs for a little variety in place of potatoes.

The British media is obsessed with two huge current stories. The first is a horrid stabbing in Southport where a 17-year old male youth has run amok killing (at the last count) three young chidden and with another five still on the critical list together with two adults who were trying desperately to defend them. One really does wonder what extreme of mental illness or a drug-fuelled addictions which is the animus behind trying to stab so many people to death – and children at that. The other huge story is that yesterday the new Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced £22 billion of budget cuts to fill the so-called Tory ‘back hole’ I say ‘so-called’ because the Tories are saying the whole thing is a Labour party invention to justify the tax cuts they had planned all along. The Tory government had announced a policy of ensuring that people in long term residential care (such as Meg might be) would not have to sell their houses once they had contributed a total of £86,000 towards their own care costs. They then postponed the implementation of this for two years from 2023 until 2025 (i.e. October next year) but Labour have gone one better by abandoning the policy of an £86,000 cap altogether. The Labour argument, no doubt, is that the policy, if implemented, would disproportionately benefit middle class home owners but I feel this misses the point. In my own extended family, my mother and Meg’s mother and my sister’s mother-in-law all funded their own care by the sale of their own houses leaving nothing for their children to inherit, surviving just long enough in each case for the entirety of their capital to be exhausted before they met their Maker.

Meanwhile I learn from my internet browser, Microsoft Edge which is tuned to give ‘American’ news prominence that the internet has been set alight by a Fox News (i.e. extreme right wing and hitherto Trump supporting media channel) that according to the latest polls Harris is leading Trump in each of five key swing states. There is another, altogether more academic analysis, which is pointing in the same direction. After predicting decades of presidential elections with near-perfect accuracy, historian Allan Lichtman revealed that Democrats have the edge using his time-tested formula. Lichtman told Fox News that he used 13 true-false questions — which he calls ‘keys’ — to determine who will win the presidency. A candidate receives a ‘key’ if a question is true. Lichtman has a checklist of items on which each candidate holds the key and these include such as the short and long term prospects for the economy, foreign military success/failure and incumbent/challenger charismas (from a list of 13 items) So far, Vice President Kamala Harris has held the lead over former President Donald Trump. The historian said that Democrats held six ‘keys,’ including the primary contest, the short-term and long-term economy, policy change, no scandal, and no challenger charisma. Meanwhile, Republicans held three ‘keys,’ according to Lichtman. The keys included the Republican 2022 primary win, the current incumbent’s not seeking re-election, and the current incumbent’s lack of charisma. Lichtman’s analysis has been highly accurate in its predictive ability in the past so this is a very significant pointer for the future. But I do see a case where Trump ‘blows up’ i.e. makes more and more outlandish claims and more and more extreme statements as he feels more threatened which might further alienate the moderate centre. Last time the so-called ‘double haters’ who disliked both of the main candidates tended to fall for Trump in the last analysis but in this election it is said that the balance is much more even – if some of the ‘double haters’ are republicans. And of course, those who actually turn out and are not disbarred from voting is a critical factor in this election as well.

Last night whilst Meg was fortunately asleep in her bed, together with many other millions of viewers I tuned in to the Olympics broadcast to follow the progress of Adam Peaty who has gained gold for two successive Olympics and is now in a quest for a third gold medal. I was fearful about this young man’s prospects as there had been an enormous amount of pre-match buildup with emotional interviews with his family members and the like which could only have added to the pressure he was already under to perform. When the final did take place, he was beaten by an Italian who came from seemingly nowhere by 0.02 second which is about the equivalent of a fingernail. Peaty himself seemed philosophical about his silver medal under the circumstances but one wonders whether to be beaten by so narrow a margin will prey on one’s mind for evermore. One theme is emerging from the Olympics on this occasion and it is the mental health of the elite athletes. The issue has been highlighted this year by the return to the Olympic arena of Simone Biles regarded as one of the most superb gymnasts the world has ever seen. Biles, the most decorated gymnast in history, is back for her third Games after withdrawing from most of her events at the Tokyo Games in 2021 with mental health issues. Apparently Peaty had his battles also and it seems to be that once has achieved the pinnacle, it puts the most intolerable pressure upon athletes to stay at the top. I think this issue is being taking more seriously in the sporting world but in the case of Olympic athletes and even more so in the case of the gymnasts the pressures put upon their young charges can be immense and sometimes goes ‘over the line’ It was said that the outstanding Romanian gymnast, Nadia Comenci was slapped and starved (and worse) by her own coach which story only came to light well after the event and Comenci fled to the USA from her native Romania.

This morning, being a Monday and with no particular routine in mind, I decided that we should try something a little different. Since Meg cannot go anywhere in our car, her journeys out have been confined to Waitrose on the one hand and the park on the other. Today, I thought it would be a good idea to access the High Street in Bromsgrove and to do this I wheeled Meg along a road which leads to a large cemetery attached to St. Johns which sits atop a little hillside and overlooks the town. A footpath used by lots of the local residents (including myself almost every day in the not so distant past) cuts across the cemetery and I know that the principal path needed to be accessed via two large steps which made this route inaccessible to Meg in her wheelchair. But there was another curving path which had no steps to negotiate but was incredibly steep for a short distance. Nonetheless we braved this and evidently once atop the hilltop, the journey down into the actual town was quite easy. We popped into the local AgeUk furniture store which also sells other charity items and acquired five cushion covers of which two are an antique gold design, one a tiled design, one a design with a heart motif and the final one decorated by some elephants motif. On the High Street, I knew that the local Greggs had been extended but I did not particularly want to patronise them. There is another newly opened coffee bar of which I have received good reports but I actually diverted down into a little square off the High Street and popped into a folksy little cafe called ‘The Lemon Tree’ This cafe has actually been there for several years now but the two new owners told us that they had only taken it over three weeks ago and had given it a ‘refurb’ Their menu was not just coffees but light lunches as well which might prove an attraction for us. When we got there, we were only the patrons of the cafe and we ordered a toasted teacake (dripping with butter) and a pot of tea served in some beautiful little china cups for which we were only charged £5.00. We chatted with the sisters running the establishment, both of Italian extraction, and started talking about some Italian cities that we had visited. All in all we had the most delightful little sojourn and chat and I am wondering whether to introduce our University of Birmingham friend to it when we coffee with him next Friday morning. So we have determined to make this into a regular little Monday morning ‘slot’ in our weekly timetable because it means that with a walk along the High Street we can occasionally dive into stores to buy toiletries and the like.

It was a beautiful and indeed hot afternoon. I thought I would seize the opportunity to get the front lawned area cut and although this was a real dash, I had in mind to get it all done (which I did) so that I could sit down and listen to the Rachel Reeves announcement of how the £22 billion black hole she reckons has been left by the outgoing Tory government can be filled. But when we turned on the TV in time for the announcement in the Commons at 3.00pm, the news was dominated by an horrific mass stabbings in Southport so I wonder whether this delayed the Commons announcement. Anyway, we will catch up with all of the relevant details which no doubt will be analysed to death in the days ahead. The pay rise for public sector staff of 5.5% looks as though it is going to be accepted in full following the recommendations of the independent Pay Review bodies. No one seems to be making the point, though, that this pay increase for many public sector workers only serves to reduce a little the impact of the pay cuts that have been inflicted upon public sector workers in the past ten years or more under the regime of ‘Austerity’ by the outgoing Tory administration. When pay is squeezed for year upon year like this, a point always comes at which that in order to attract and retain staff and to remain competitive with the private sector, a period of ‘catching up’ becomes almost inevitable.

Our Sunday routines started off a little earlier than normal this morning as our care workers were allocated to come to us 20 minutes earlier. Nonetheless, it was a pair of care workers both of whom have families (i.e. not adolescents) and with whom we get on well. We were not sure whether the Olympics games coverage would push out the normal politics programmes but there was a judicious mixture which suited us. After breakfast, we watched some archery (in which the women were well ‘outshot’ by the Germans) and then some women’s athletics. I must admit that I watched this with my heart in my mouth because whilst we wanted the fairly young GBR team to do well but the margins between success and failure are so incredibly fine. It might have been that one of the young GBR athletes may have received a slight points reduction because they are about a quarter of a second late in transitioning from one leap to another. The GBR team have not performed as well as they might but I think they have a 50:50 chance of reaching the last finals which I think is the last 8 in the team competition. After breakfast we had a visit from our Eucharistic minister after which we had to make Waitrose at full speed to pick up our copy of our Sunday newspaper and then onwards to the park where we were due to meet up with our University of Birmingham friend in the park at 11.00am. At about this time on a Sunday morning there seems to be quite a congregation of park acquaintances so we have a bit of a laugh and joke with each other before going our separate ways. So we came home and Meg watched ‘Mountain Biking’ in the Olympics whilst I prepared the Sunday lunch of chicken, baked potato and some string beans (brought to us from Morocco but I am sure that in our gardening days we would have had a crop of them adorning our bamboo frames by now).

I have started to think about the forthcoming presidential elections in the US, not least because the veteran Labour Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, gave us the immortal dictum that ‘a week is a long time in politics’ It is now just about a week since Jo Biden withdraw his ambitions to serve for a second term, leaving the way open for Kamala Harris, his Vice President, to press her own case. Although Kamala Harris is not the best candidate on paper, the Democratic party have rallied round her cause dramatically within the last week and we are now in a situation where having drawn level with Donald Trump in the opinion polls, the very latest polls do indicate that she may be in the lead. The reasons are not hard to find. The kind of rhetoric deployed by Donald Trump cement him even more firmly in the 25%-30% of the section of the electorate to whom his populism has a particular appeal, largely the economically disadvantaged and largely ‘left behind’ sections of the electorate. Meanwhile the Democratic party was not particularly enamoured with some of the Biden policies and, in particular Gaza. These sections of the Democratic voters are pleased at last to have a much credible candidate behind whom they can rally and there is even a section of the Republican party who have never liked Trump who might be persuaded to lend their votes to the Democrats to get rid of Trump and thereby to get their own party back again. I have also started to think that Trump is a particularly poor politician. For example, he has now chosen Vance as a Vice Presidential running mate who is even more to the right than he is and who have argued that women who do not bear children are an abomination. Many Republicans are starting to doubt the wisdom of Vance as a running mate if only because to ‘balance the ticket’ one chooses a Vice Presidential running mate who can attract support (from the centre) that is less accessible to the main presidential candidate. Trump, it is being said, is running scared of entering a debate with Kamala Harris who, after all, as a state prosecutor was well versed in the art of asking questions in a court of law that those before the court did not want to answer. Already a slogan is being suggested for the forthcoming election that the contest between Harris and Trump might be a case ‘The prosector vs. the convicted felon’. One does get the feeling that Harris could eviscerate Trump were there to be a public debate and Trump has evidently seen the danger of this. Also, we now have the situation where Trump’s age and some of his ‘mis-speaks’ could prove to be a hindrance. Some of the things that Trump is saying are horrendous – one of his latest claims is that he actually won in every single state in the last election.

Meg and I have been watching (again) some of the ‘Pilgrims’ programme shown on BBC TV and available via BBC catchup. Today was focusing on the climb up Snowdon which Meg and have done on several occasions and from most directions as well. The programme also featured the mountain railway which reminded me that the last time Meg ascended Snowdon it was to take Meg’s aged aunt and uncle up to the top on the mountain railway which I think is the only time we have ever used it. On one occasion when we were descending Snowdon with a couple of young German girls as walking companions we all decided to go for a swim in the ice-cold lake called, I think, the Glaslyn as it was a boiling hot day. Needless to say, the two German girls stripped and swam ‘au natural’ and our son and I joined them for as long as we could stand the cold water. We explained to our travelling companions that we had no swimming costumes with us but they exclaimed that there was no need to bother with that, stripped off and dived straight in.

Last night was the formal opening of the Olympic Games held in Paris and we were promised quite a spectacular event. The French had decided to be both bold and innovative and chose to hold the opening ceremony not in the Olympic arena which is customary but to host a succession of craft, usually barges and the French bateaux rouge, which sailed down the Seine with the athletes celebrating aloft. This way, the French reckoned that the craft could go on a six kilometre route and be seen by many more people but at the same time some of the iconic buildings and beatiful bridges of Paris could be highlighted. This was an amazing concept but the weather was very much against them and the ceremonies were held in teeming rain. All countries use the opportunity of the opening ceremony to display some of the cultural and historical event that make a nation what it is but I have the feeling that a lot of what would be displayed might be lost on the wider world viewing audience. For example the way in which the French have a revolutionary tradition and disposed of the heads of many of their aristocratic elites might be lost on many people. I personally was not over impressed by the singing, dancing and gymnastics that took place but I was mightily impressed by the mechanical horse apparently ridden along the surface of the Seine depicting the way in which the Seine might have got its name. But there were quite a lot of technical hitches in such an ambitious project and the howling rain drowned out some of the spectacle so some people who come to watch went home to watch it all on TV. The UK ‘Daily Mail’ was scathing and labelled it all as a ‘farce’ but most of the British press were full of praise for French innovation and quirkiness. I personally would have liked a special programme edited for British TV in which some of the boring bits were cut out but a good explanation was made of all of the cultural references that the French were trying to convey (such as headless Marie Antoinettes lining the banks of the Seine from the prison she was once held whilst figures dressed in red hold severed heads peering out from the windows of the Conciergerie.) The ‘Daily Mail‘ was also delighted to point out amongst several technical hitches in the rain the spotting performer’s testicle hanging out during the ceremony as a dancer suffered an x-rated wardrobe malfunction. Today is filled with all kinds of competition and Meg and I have enjoyed some of the sculling and cycling competitions we have seen so far but the rainy conditions are making things nightmarish for the cyclists performing on the roads of Paris where obstacles such as wet pedestrian crossings have to be negotiated. Whilst on the subject of the Olympics, something was reported in the columns of The Times and then picked up by some of the other media. The French have equipped the Olympic village with some 3,000 beds made of an enhanced cardboard like substance. This has led some to complain that the French have provided athletes with ‘anti-sex’ beds as once athletes have completed their competition they are in the company of thousands of other athletes equally divided between the sexes and feeling free to party to their heart’s content once they have gone as far as they can in their own competition. After all, a sprinter could fail in their heat which means that their Olympics might be over in 10-12 seconds. One American athlete has claimed that some 70%-80% of athletics engage in amorous liaisons whilst at the Olympic games and therefore the question arises whether the beds provided are fit for purpose. As the sportsmen and women began arriving at their accommodation in the ‘city of love’, they were being directed to a ‘mattress fitting’ zone. They are measured for size and weight and an AI computer tool personalises their mattress’s density – to provide what the Japanese inventor claims will give them the comfiest night’s sleep an Olympian has ever had. Motokuni Takaoka, founder of the Airweave mattress company, told the Mail: ‘I was a marathon runner so I appreciate how important it is to have a good sleep before an event.’ The cardboard beds provided in Paris’ Olympic village are sturdy enough to hold up to three, according its inventor. A former marathon runner, Motokuni Takaoka said the beds were ‘very robust’ and ‘tough’ so athletes could do whatever they wanted on them. Yesterday Team GB diver Tom Daley, 30, was among those eager to debunk the myth, as he leapt about on his cardboard bed in a TikTok video while saying: ‘As you can see, they are pretty sturdy.’

As we went out this morning and I was wheeling Meg towards the main Kidderminster Road, we were intercepted by one of neighbours who lives around the corner but we have not seen for several months now. She was explaining to us how her daughter-in-law had lost a baby in the middle of the COVID crisis but now she is expecting twins shortly and is due to give birth in a couple of months. I explained the situation with myself and Meg and she told us to call around on a Wednesday when she is not at work. This we will almost certainly do because even though our domestic help calls around on a Wednesday, I often take Meg for a little walk somewhere so tea with a neighbour sounds pleasant. Our son and daughter-in-law are off on a break for the next ten days or so Meg will and I will certainly seize the opportunity to chat with people as and when we can.

In the American presidential campaign, I came across an interesting quote from ex-adviser to Donald Trump. According to this source ‘If I were on the Harris campaign, I would attack Donald Trump on his record with immigration. It was a total failure. Barack Obama deported more people than Trump. Trump said he was going to have Mexico pay for a wall. I would go in and say he has the greatest failure that we have had. And that is what the Biden administration handled’

I generally look forward to Fridays but today was a little unusual in the way it started off. I was expecting one of our regular care workers, who was going to be accompanied by a manager who often puts himself ‘on shift’ when they are short staffed. Today, though, the young care worker had been in a car crash which was not her fault. The offending driver was drunk and refused to undertake a breathalyser test and I wondered what the consequences of this could be. In short, it probably means the suspension of a licence for a year and the possibility of increased fines and/or a prison sentence if convicted. Our young care worker was OK but somewhat shaken and I feel for her. So I acted as the ‘assistant care worker’ for the manager, not for the first time and I suspect not the last either. But when we were all done, I could get Meg her breakfast and we could prepare ourselves for a trip down the road to the Waitrose cafeteria, as we often do on a Friday, where we meet up with our University of Birmingham friend. Our trip down appeared a little different to me today for the following reason. In the last few days, I ordered a couple of Hi-Vis (high visibility) vests that were on sale for less than £6 the pair. I wore one over my normal outdoor apparel this morning and it may be my imagination but I got the distinct impression that the traffic was much more inclined to stop (one even stepping on his brakes) when I was observed standing at the kerbside. Whether this is or is not the case, when the mornings get darker and gloomier in the autumn, these vests will come into their own. We had to have rather a hurried coffee with our friend this morning and would have liked to have tarried a little longer but the care workers late morning call was scheduled about 30-40 minutes earlier than is usual so we had to make full speed up the hill. After I had got Meg home and the care workers had paid their morning call, as it was a fine morning and we had some time in hand, I decided to give the back lawn a much needed cut. This opportunity was well taken because it did not delay our lunch hour at all and the cut was badly needed, having been missed for a week or so.

This afternoon, the Olympic games will have their very original opening ceremony starting at 6.30. The opening ceremony is going to be very different from the norm, not to be held in the arena itself but rather on a succession of craft which will process down the Seine for about 6km in total. The advantage of this is that many more people can see the athletes from a variety of vantage points most of which will be free. I get the impression that the French are not quite as enthusiastic about their own Olympic games as we were about our own games held in London. What amazed the world on that occasion was the way in which Danny Boyle highlighted and celebrated our own NHS which we used to think of as being the envy of the world. Of course we could not say that nowadays and I did not fully appreciate that the last Olympic games held in Tokyo may have had an opening ceremony but it was at the height of COVID (or was it postponed for a year?) and consequently the number of people allowed to attend was minimal. The French have been promising a spectacular and innovative opening ceremony showcasing the best of France – what aspects of their history will they choose to celebrate on wonders. But there has been some rather devastating news overnight. So many police and military have been detailed to police Paris particularly for the opening ceremonies when all of the athletes process so the rest of the country might be lightly policed. Anarchist groups (one assumes) have chosen this moment to sabotage practically all of the major high speed (TGV) lines running out of Paris. Lines to the North, East and West have been subject to arson attacks but the one running south to the Mediterranean might have been spotted just in time. As the celebrations start at 6.30pm this evening and Meg is put to bed shortly afterwards, I am going to bring into commission our little portable TV so that we can watch the opening ceremony together from Meg’s bedside. So I am especially glad that I have equipped myself with a nice comfortable bedside chair from which to view the TV.

This morning, a report into the Care Quality Commission commissioned by the Tories but now received by Labour has been received. The new Labour Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, has declared the CQC not fit for purpose and some of the findings are shocking. Some hospitals have not been visited in 10 years and one of the care inspectors had never been in a hospital in his life. About 10-20% establishments had never been visited and so on. So the Health Secretary had labelled the CQC as ‘not fit for purpose’ because it is quite possible that members of the public were relying upon reports that were superficial or based upon the most inadequate data sets. I asked the Care Agency manager what he thought of the setup and he said that when he was last inspected, it was six years ago and just relied upon a telephone call. For this his organisation had to pay several thousands of pounds a year. Listening to a debate on Radio 4 this morning, it was said that the CQC could not afford to conduct in-depth inspections and therefore relied upon more artificial reports to which my retort is that if you are going to rely upon an inspection routine, it either gets done properly or not at all. Much as I am interested in issues of Quality Management, I abhor the tick box culture which pervades quality measurement these days wherever one looks.

Thursday is my shopping day but we had a slightly different timetable of events in prospect for us today. For a start, the two carers who were detailed to get Meg up washed and dressed in the morning were detailed to start 45 minutes later than usual. But one of the carers (a young psychology graduate with whom Meg and I get on particularly well) was detailed to stay on and be Meg’s ‘sitter’ whilst I go out to do my weekly shop. This new arrangement seems quite sensible to us so I was happy to go along with the slightly changed regime. Shopping ought to have been quite straightforward but turned out to be quite fraught. This was because this week is the first full week after the children had been let out of school and the long summer holidays started last Friday. I do not want to sound curmudgeonly but the store was a bit of a nightmare to go around this morning. There seemed to be quite a lot of excited 6-9 year olds careering round the store with empty shopping trollies and I even heard one exasperated father exclaiming to his two young children that he never intended to come shopping with them ever again if they continued behaving in the same way. The children seemed to be under the temporary control of grandmothers as well as mothers (hardly any fathers) and the net effect of their behaviours was to slow down the shopping process considerably. Perhaps by next week they might all have gone off on holiday to theme parks or the like but we shall have to wait and see.

I have been doing a certain amount of research how to clean one’s silver (or in my case, recently acquired EPNS soup spoons) using simple ingredients. My web-based searches have recommended the following, some of which I vaguely already half remembered but all of which are simple remedies which means one does not have to have recourse to commercial silver cleaning solutions. The first of these is to wrap the articles in tinfoil and then place them for a few minutes in warm water in which some baking power has been dissolved. I do not have any baking powder to hand and it sounds a bit complicated so I will pass over this one. The second method is to use tomato ketchup (the cheaper the brand with a higher vinegar content the better) where the acidic content combats the tarnish on the silverware. A third method is to use toothpaste and a worn out old toothbrush and I have used toothpaste before to remove slight blemishes from the paintwork of cars. Toothpaste itself contains both a bleach band a mild abrasive agent so this appears to be quite an effective remedy. The final method is just to deploy coca cola which again has a fizzing and an acidic mode of action. I have seen videos of how to clean toilets using coca cola and when you consider the effective job that it does to clean the enamel from toilet bowls, it does make you wonder what it does to your insides if you consume a lot of coca cola regularly. Of these various methods I am inclined towards the tomato ketchup home made remedy as less likely to be as aggressive in its cleaning action as some of the other suggestions.

The US presidential elections have now been transformed as Joe Biden has dropped out and suddenly Donald Trump is bearing the burden of being by far the oldest candidate. I must say that I have been quite impressed by the showing that Kamala Harris has made so far and i thing the various factions and groups within the Democratic party are delighted to bury their differences and to back a candidate who may just about be able to beat Donald Trump. But there is one factor that has not received much attention over here in the UK but which may prove to be vital. I decided to enter the search term ‘Will the issue of abortion rights win the 2024 election for Harris’ or something similar and discovered that this is a raging issue on the other side of the Atlantic. The Trump nominees to the United States Supreme Court effectively overturned the ‘Roe vs. Wade’ ruling which regulated US abortion for over half a century. This means that the women in several US states have less abortion rights than even their grandmothers. Democrats are pretty united in trying to preserve the rights to abortion in the US but the Republicans are more divided on the issue. The extreme fundamentalist, pro-Life groups in the Republican family have chosen to weaponised abortion as a stick with which to beat the Democrats and to win elections. But even Trump himself is wavering a little on this issue seeing how unpopular the abolition of the Roe vs Wade ruling has become with about two thirds of Americans (and particularly young and female voters). So I think that this issue alone might give Harris the extra 2-3 percentage points that will enable Harris to sustain a lead over Trump in the November elections. I would predict that this issue, which is the Democrats strongest card to play, will receive hours of airtime and debate in the months ahead.

There are two news event stories running this afternoon. The first of these is the fact that there are now several candidates throwing their hat into the ring to be the next leader of the Conservative party. The party had adopted the process of voting to whittle the number of candidates down to the top four who then go onto the party conference where they will engage in hustings. the four will be then be reduced to 2 and these two will go ahead to the wider Conservative party for a final vote. The second major news story today is a really shocking bit of video which took place as members of the Manchester police were attempting to make an arrest. With their suspect on the floor and I believe already ‘tazered’, then a policeman is shown kicking the prone suspect and then stamping on his head. Needless to day, this case has evoked a collective national horror and the policeman in question has been suspended whilst the case is investigated further by the Independent Office for Police Conduct. Who actually took the video I do not know but with the ubiquity of mobile phones it is not surprising that this clip ad film has emerged.

So another Wednesday dawns and I was pleased to see the carers this morning as Meg, as is customary these days, had not got to sleep by the time I actually got to bed but she was not actively restless so that was a type of blessing. After we had got ourselves up and breakfasted, I popped out to get a newspaper and also to ‘liberate’ some MPS cutlery that I had seen in a local charity store. In one of them there is a collection of largely worthless miscellaneous items of cutlery but hidden in their midst are some magnificent and high quality soup spoons which hold twice the quantity of a desert spoon and which I find particularly useful in my culinary preparations. I managed to buy half a dozen at these at the price of 10p each and promptly donated some to our domestic help whose day it is on a Wednesday. I also found a little knitted crochet blanket which is going to be useful to put around Meg’s knees when I take her out in the wheelchair and the weather is a little chilly. I also bought some seat pads which I intend to use on our outside metal garden chairs now that we are enjoying our own back garden so much. So all in all, it was a very successful little venture out this morning and as there was a slight drizzle, I was not unhappy that I had not taken Meg out for a spin this morning. As it was, I bumped into one of our Waitrose friends but we could only have a brief conversation in the rain and with my needing to get back to Meg as soon as practicable. Meg was feeling a little wobbly this morning but our domestic help was very good in helping Meg to cheer herself up somewhat. We lunched on ham, baked potato and the remains of an onion gravy and delicious it was as well. Then this afternoon, we thought we would settle down and watch ‘Chariots of Fire’ which,in anticipation of the Olympic Games that open in Paris on Friday, was shown at the weekend and which we thought we would access on the BBC iPlayer. We originally saw this film decades ago and there seems to be a very long build up as we view it today but one can see why it was scheduled to be shown last weekend (as the theme of the film was the Olympic Games held in Paris in 1924)

There are just a few indication that the American presidential race may be getting very exciting. Jo Biden finally decided to withdraw, The Democrats have united behind Kamala Harris and one feels that the Democrats feel like a part reborn. I saw some clips of Kamala Harris speaking with campaign organisers and she was unscripted but seemed to hit all of the right inspirational notes. Practically every significant Democratic leader has now endorsed Harris with the exception of the Obamas and this is still fuelling suspicions that Michelle Obama might enter the race if it looks as though Kamala Harris faltering. I thought I saw one poll (amongst many, no doubt) which is now indicating that the Democrats have enjoyed a ‘bounce’ in the polls and may now be narrowing the gap to 1%-2%. Almost certainly, the black voters who were not enthralled by Joe Biden’s support of Israel in the conflict in Gaza may now come back into the fold. And another ‘straw in the wind’, Kamala Harris and some Democratic leaders are not rushing to meet Netanyahu who is currently on a visit to the States. I also saw a report that some of ‘MAGA’ (Make America Great Again’) lobby in the US are worried that Harris may appeal to younger voters as well as black and Hispanic voters and this does not help the Republicans to win over some of the centre ground (not that much of a centre ground exists in the US at the moment)

I have recently started to reflect on the ‘several ages’ which it is said most of us exhibit. It is often said these days that we all have three ages – a chronological age (years we have inhabited this earth), a mental age (our mental acuity which might be in advance or behind our chronological age) and finally a biological age (what a pathologist might judge from the state of our internal organs were they to be subject to a pathological examination) I have generally bought this analysis but I think that I would want to add a fourth age. This is the age that one thinks of oneself as being but even this may be a bit more subtle than I have suggested. Given that we may incorporate the ways in which others react towards us and we absorb these reactions of significance others into our own psyche, then perhaps it is more accurate to say that it is our perceptions of other peoples perception about ourselves that we build into our own self image. Some of this is drawn from some of the American social psychologists and I have thinking in particular of the work of them. The term looking-glass self was first introduced by Charles Cooley (1902) who refers to the dependence of one’s social self or social identity on one’s appearance to others. I have tried out some of these formulations with a couple of the younger care workers who are studying psychology at ‘A’-level so some of the care sessions whilst they are ministering to Meg are taking on some the appearances of an academic seminar. In general, the care workers like to chat and to joke with each but a lot of their conversations revolves around how they are going to cope with the rest of their rota which tends to change endlessly around them and they consult their mobile phones to see what are the allocated jobs for that day.

The first Labour rebellion has been, quite predictably, over the issue of the abolition of the cap on extending universal credit support to children beyond the first two. This was a policy adopted by the Tories and which Labour inherited, as it were. No one in the Labour party likes this policy but it will cost about £2.5 billion to get rid of the cap so that Labour party policy is to wait until it can be afforded. There were seven MPs who voted against the government last night and the Labour whip was immediately withdrawn from them. One of the rebels representing the Tower Hamlets constituency (one of the poorest in the country) was arguing today that she was elected on a policy of ‘Change’ but keeping the existing Tory policy is not to change anything and the voters had voted for ‘Change’ (the Labour Party slogan) in the General Election.

So Tuesday dawns and it is a day to which we always look forward being the day when we meet up with our friends in the Waitrose cafeteria. We anticipated that we would be one short in number today, as indeed we were because her flat was being redecorated and this involved the supervision of items of furniture as they were moved around the room. It was a pretty fine day today so we were happy to get out and have a pleasant walk down the hill with just the hint of a cooling breeze to keep us comfortable as we walked. One of our favourite Waitrose partners whose job it is to attend to the flowers section of the store and to throw away dead or dying stock presented us with a bunch of roses each so Meg and I came home with a beautiful bunch of yellow roses. Once we had returned we had the late morning comfort call for Meg and after that the carer came along who we know quite well who was on sitting duty today. I received a telephone call from a person in the Transport and Highways department of Worcestershire County Council who explained that he had some good news about our pavement problem. But the good news turned out to be telling us about about a road reconfiguration which is going to take place near us at some time in the future and might be of some assistance to us. The officer from Worcestershire explained that the day-to-day management of the plan and the scheduling would now rest with the planing department of the District Council so I should contact them for any more up-to-date news. As the road reconfiguration is probably not scheduled for several months if not years ahead then the net result of all of this is that we would get nowhere. So the next result of all of these activities is that everyone concerned at official level seems to be passing the buck and the responsibility for someone else to solve and always at some indefinite time in the future. I cannot be surprised by all of this but I think I think it is faintly amusing that if a ‘problem’ arises on someone’s desk, the first response is to pass it on to someone else so that from their point of view, the problem is sorted and so on, ad infinitum. I am reminded of the story of the communication between a GP and a consultant, both noted for the terseness and brevity of their communications. So the GP wrote to the consultant regarding one patient ‘Please see and treat’ to which the response came back shortly ‘Seen and treated’

The carer who came to sit with Meg gave her a spin around the house in the wheelchair and upon my return from a mini shopping expedition was intrigued by the wedding photos that we have on our iPhone dating all the way from 1967 (i.e. the date of the actual event but the digitised versions only appeared in time I think for our 50th anniversary nearly seven years ago now) I managed to get out on the road for half an hour buying some important non-food shopping and managed to obtain a supply of much needed toiletries as well as seizing the opportunity of buying a couple more cushions. These happen to be just the right size and shape to fit behind Meg’s back to help to keep her vertical and not slumping in her wheelchair and were were quite a useful buy. Once returning home, we finished off the meal of fishcakes which turned out to be a fairly delayed lunch and then what should have been the mid-afternoon career’s call came an hour or so earlier than we would really have liked. So we made the best of a bad job of scheduling and Meg and I then spent some time in the back garden where we sat in the shade and enjoyed some cooling ice-cream to boot.

Last night, Meg had another rather disturbed night again which seems to occur every other night at the moment. So this means that various domestic jobs that I have lined up to do in the evening now get neglected or postponed as I have to supervise Meg in the evening to ensure that she does not attempt to get out of bed or to fall out of bed. Were Meg to actually ‘fall’ or should I say slither out of bed, the the carers are not allowed to pick her up and put her back into bed again. They are instructed that they must call the ambulance service and/or the falls team and these carers also are instructed that in the event of falls (or rather slithers) people have to be admitted to A&E. So I try very hard with a combination of techniques to ensure that Meg stays intact in bed each evening and if she is asleep this is not a problem. If on the other hand she gets agitated and attempts to get out of bed, then we are living dangerously, not to say on a knife-edge and, of course, I cannot convey the seriousness of all of this to Meg who cannot understand fully why it is essential that she stays put when put to bed for the evening. A request had gone in to the Occupational Therapists for a bed with sides but we are awaiting for an assessment, and then a recommendation and finally perhaps some provision but this might be some weeks away. I think the month of August is going to be a nightmare month as so many services are short whilst the largely female staff with families are taking them off on holidays in the six week period between the third week of July and the first week of September. I often wonder if these carers look forward to the summer holidays in the same way that turkeys look forward to Christmas i.e. with a degree of excitement but some trepidation about the weeks ahead.

So today, being a Monday, we pop into our Monday morning routines. After we had got up and breakfasted, we start to think about our routines for a Monday morning. I whizz down the road in the car leaving Meg to watch the Voces8 (Dutch) group singing Fauré and similar works that we regularly view using YouTube. After I had returned home, we prepared our elevenses and then set off down the hill at which point we enter the park and occupy our usual bench overlooking the lake. It was a fairly gloomy day but one in which the clouds were being drifting away. Whilst in the park, I received a phone call on my mobile from the County Councillor with whom I am in contact who informed me that she thought that our request to the County Council (for amelioration of the absence of a pavement) should be directed to a different councillor. As it happens, I know the colleague very well because he was tremendously helpful to us when we were attempting to prevent the development of the orchard immediately next to our house into a housing development of 18 houses. Just for the record and without revisiting past traumas, if the orchard had been under the remit of Worcestershire County Council more directly rather than Bromsgrove District Council, then the orchard would have received an automatic protection i.e. the development would have been prevented. And for the record, we did win at the planning application on three separate occasions but eventually lost on the fourth occasion. If a developer loses a submission despite their being a presumption of favouring all such applications, then they can appeal, appeal and appeal again until they are ultimately successful. The wider point here is that ‘Nimbyism’ (Not In My Back Yard) may succeed on many occasions but more than not, individuals and communities are not in a position to resist the encroaches of large building firms who can employ KC’s and have larger pockets than a mere individual. So when I returned home, I copied the entire email trail of my contacts with Worcestershire County Council to Councillor No. 2 and I now await a reply and further developments. Just as an aside, I started off this query over a month ago and wrote to a District Councillor who forwarded my request to a County Councillor and then waited two weeks whilst she was on holiday and then awaited a further week before I had our video clip shot and chased again only to be told I should be contacting another person who still has to liaise with the Highways Department. Perhaps no wonder that people lose faith in the democratic process if all contacts with one’s elected local representatives follows a similar pattern.
I then prepared a lunch of ham cooked yesterday, some sugar snap peas and a baked potato, followed as is customary by an after dinner yogurt.

After lunch which was a little delayed, we thought we would some good ‘live’ TV. Republican members of Congress are focusing on the role of the Secret Service, as their frustration and anger grow over the agency’s response to an attempt to assassinate presidential nominee Donald Trump. A House committee hearing will on Monday grill its Director, Kimberly Cheatle -something Speaker Mike Johnson said would make for ‘must-see TV’ for Americans concerned about security lapses at a Pennsylvania rally earlier this month. ‘She has got a lot to answer for. And these concerns are bipartisan’ Mr Johnson told CNN. Ms Cheatle’s agency is charged with providing protection to the president and his family, former presidents, those in line to the White House and other political candidates. Meg and I watched the start of these proceedings wondering what on earth the chief of the Secret Service would say. Under the most detailed of questioning in which Congress members spoke about the man seeing using a ladder to ascend to the roof a nearby building, taking his rifle with him, Kimberley Cheatle tried to make a distinction between a ‘person who was suspicious’ and ‘a person who was a threat’ trying to argue that the would be assassin was the former and not the latter. To every single question she basically gave a non-answer saying that the matters were subject to an investigation within the agency itself and therefore no responses could be made to the Congressional Committee until the Secret Service’s own investigations were complete. It is no wonder that so many members of this bipartisan committee are calling for her immediate resignation.

After Joe Biden has retired from the presidential race, there has been a coalescence of support for Kamala Harris, the existing Vice President to become the new Democratic nominee. But Barak Obama has failed, so far, to specifically endorse Kanala Harris and there is some speculation at the moment that Michelle Obama might be persuaded to enter the race. This is on the basis of he fact that polls show that Michelle Obama could decisively defeat Donald Trump in all of the key ‘swing’ states but the same is not true of Kamala Harris. Speaking personally, I would be absolutely delighted if Michelle Obama could be persuaded to enter the race but the probability of this actually happening is very small at the moment. The Democratic party has several good potential candidates but not one of them wants to set forward to wrest the nomination away from a female, ‘person of colour’ in Kamala Harris. Kamala Harris has an interesting professional history- in 2010, she succeeded Jerry Brown as California attorney general, becoming the first female, Black and South Asian attorney general in the state’s history. In view of this, one of the slogans that has already been bandied about if Kamala Harris does secure the Democratic nomination is that it would be ‘The Prosecutor versus the convicted felon’ and can only imagine what social media would make of all of this if Kamala Harris does secure the nomination. This afternoon, it looks as though some big money is swinging the way of Kamala Harris and thus we may eventually see a quasi ‘coronation’ of her as the Democrat’s nominated candidate to do battle with Donald Trump.