Today we knew was going to be the start of a busy day but we both had a good night’s sleep last night so were ready to face the day. After the carers had got Meg up and we had breakfasted, we had a good chat and exchange of some Christmas presents and cards with our domestic help before anticipating the call of our ‘sit’ carer who was due later in the morning. Then the Eucharistic minister called around and we held our little service, made a little more poignant because she, too, had lost her brother-in-law within the last week. Then I knew it was time for me to face the multitudes whilst the Christmas shopping needed to be done, postponed since yesterday. But just before I went out, our domestic help and I amused each other by getting Alexa to sing some silly Christmas songs. The one which I had not heard before was ‘I want a hippopotamus for Christmas’ whilst, for my part, I remembered ‘All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth’ But more seriously, I remembered that my sister and I had jointly bought a record of a modern Christmas carol called ‘Mary’s Boy Child’ which was written by Jester Hairston in 1956. The Christmas song is, due to its religious lyrics, also considered as a Christmas carol. But the version that my sister and I bought in about 1960 was by the Cuban/American Harry Belafonte. He lived to the ripe old age of 96 and only died last year in 2023. Harry Belafonte was a legendary singer and actor who broke racial barriers in the US and campaigned for black civil rights. He was also a friend and ally of Martin Luther King, and organised the charity single ‘We Are the World’. So eventually I hit the road to do our Christmas shopping, fearful of what was going to meet me. Ads I expected, I needed to circulate around the car park three or four times to get a parking space but, in the event, the store did not seem too crowded inside and the whole ‘Christmas’ shop was not quite as stress-filled or as expensive as I thought it might be. I finished up buying several varieties of mince pies not only with our own consumption in mind but also thinking ahead to the nibbles to be put out for people to enjoy in the Christmas party which the carers will hopefully enjoy next Monday.

When I got back home with my six bags of shopping, Meg had been cared for both by the ‘sit’ carer who was complemented by the midday carer who makes sure that Meg is comfortable. Then I started to unpack the voluminous shopping but stopped halfway to make some lunch. We were running somewhat late by this time so I cut some corners by doing a sort of stir-fry using onions, peppers, fragments of ham and some tomatoes. I then made a sort of Spanish omelette by beating up four eggs and making a sort of mixture. In the afternoon, I hunted out a program first broadcast yesterday on the life of Caroline Aherne (aka ‘Mrs Merton’) who died at the tragically young age of 52. After this biopic was broadcast so too was one of the Mrs Merton shows so this provided some interesting entertainment in the afternoon. To get a little more in the Christmassy mood, I have started to play Handel’s ‘Messiah’ on my smart speakers and am enjoying a performance by ‘The Sixteen’. I always associated ‘The Messiah’ with the Huddersfield Choral Society who must have made some of the definitive recordings. As the carers come and go, I need to ascertain if I am due to see them again before Christmas day. If not, then I give them one of the collection of Christmas cards but most will get them next Monday on ‘party’ day. I feel that I have just about variety of soft drinks to suit almost everybody – paradoxically, alcohol is no problem but hardly any of the carers will be drinking it. But I have stocked up on about four different varieties of mince pies as well as stollen and some crisps so should have enough to eat. Two of the younger carers are coming along, perhaps in their party gear, to help me to prepare things on Monday and I do know that they secretly love coming here and feel at home here (as we are almost like kindly grandparents to them)

There are real shenanigans occurring in the US where some hard line Republicans are threatening to effectively shut down the government. The US government could shut down in a matter of hours unless politicians agree on a spending deal.A compromise put forward by Republicans and Democrats collapsed on Wednesday after billionaire Elon Musk publicly hit out at the proposal. The tech tycoon’s stance was backed by president-elect Donald Trump, who wants to increase the debt ceiling, which caps the amount the federal government can borrow. But his revamped plan to suspend the cap for two years lost in a vote on Thursday. If a deal is not reached by midnight – 5am on Saturday UK time – the government will shut down, meaning federal employees and military personnel will not be paid. Several Republicans had said they were not interested in getting rid of the debt ceiling if they did not also cut spending.The outcome is a massive setback for Mr Trump and his billionaire ally Elon Musk, who has been tasked by the incoming president with pruning the federal budget. This is not the first time that we have a scenario like this and the issue is nearly always the same – either agree to increase borrowing to finance necessary state spending or effectively shut down the government. But some commentators are saying that Elon Musk, an entirely unelected private citizen, is practically acting as a co-President by intervening in governmental decision making and all of this before inauguration day. We are used in this country to extraordinarily fast transfers of powers when a general election is won or lost with the defeated Prime Minister exiting within hours and the newly elected Prime Minister moving in that day. The removal vans are typically sent to the back of Downing Street to restore a bit of dignity to the proceedings. But the American system has this long gap between election day and inauguration day so that newly appointed officials can be briefed on their new role by the outgoing administration.

Today has been rather a strange day if only because our by now established routines have been disrupted somewhat. Thursdays are the days when I normally get my shopping done but today we had no ‘sit’ carer allocated to is because it was the agency’s Christmas ‘do’ and all of the staff were expected to attend. Our sit function has now been moved to Friday when I am sure the supermarket will be heaving but at least we are getting a sit services from the agency. After breakfast, I pushed Meg down the hill and the weather was cold but not too unpleasant. Once inside Waitrose, I needed to buy two separate kinds of milk and I also treated ourselves to some more ‘stollen’ which to my mind is much nicer than Christmas cake. Meg and I quickly consumed the stollen I bought last week and we hope to replenish supplies tomorrow, Then it was up the hill but there was a cold and icy blast which made the journey really unpleasant. Then we regaled ourselves with some soup and eventually, after watching some news programmes, thought about lunch was quite a specialised quiche which I cooked with some spaghetti hoops and green beans. I had my lunch just before the carers paid the midday visit to Meg, after which she had her portion. In the afternoon, we took the entire collection of Christmas cards that we had received and went through them carefully one by one.

We are not too far off the shortest day – and the longest night of the year. Normally, I look forward very much to getting 21st December behind us because I can then tell myself that it is getting lighter and lighter by a tiny smidgeon each day. But the coldest night of the year is often in late January or even mid-February. This afternoon, after Meg and I repaired to our main (traditional) sitting room, we watched a ‘Private Eye’ review of the year 2024 which was quite entertaining. ‘Private Eye’ is an interesting periodical not least because it survives by employing hardly any staff or journalists at all. What happens is that investigative reporters come back to their newspapers with stories of juicy scandals but often the sub-editors are wary of running a story lest it run foul of the legal process. Having uncovered a scandal and then discovering that the story had been ‘spiked’ (literally out on a spike in newspaper offices which is what happens to stories that cannot be published) the journalists in frustration telephone Private Eye who then publish the story willy-nilly. Of course, Private Eye used to be sued regularly but they could rely upon the generosity of the public and sometimes other wealthy donors to pay the fines. Very occasionally, the ‘Eye’ does win a libel case but it expects to lose these cases quire regularly and devotes about a quarter of its revenues to pay the fines handed out by the courts.

One of the greatest reform to how Parliament works have been the Select Committee, often staffed by very knowledgable MPs who can grill witness, civil servants and ministers. About twice a year, the Prime Minister is asked to appear before a Liaison Committee which I think is staffed by the chairs of other committees and is consequently quite a high powered body. Defiant and across the detail, but uninspiring and a little spiky at times, is how the PM navigated his first Liaison Committee appearance. The 90 minutes of intense questioning by committee chairs was not a source of much festive cheer as Keir Starmer joylessly ploughed through the session – taking on topics from temporary housing to global stability. From Number 10’s perspective it will be considered a success, with hours of preparation meaning he avoided any nightmare moments before Christmas. From the MPs perspective, some appeared frustrated at Sir Keir’s refusal to admit mistakes and his defence of unpopular policies. Another theme was his government’s ambitious targets and the lack of obvious roadmap to achieving them – primarily on growth, defence spending and immigration. His answer was always to blame what he inherited from the Conservatives and to insist that he would meet his goals given time. A particularly illuminating moment came at the end, when he was asked three times by committee chair Meg Hillier if he had any regrets looking back on his time in office so far. The reply, after some pressing, was ‘no’ – displaying a level of stubbornness and inflexibly that will either drive or ultimately destroy his premiership. This is an interesting observation to make. Evidently, no Prime Minister would want to see themselves portrayed as constantly vacillating, changing their minds on policy and thereby appearing weak and indecisive. But Keir Starmer seems to have got himself into a position (with withdrawal of the winter fuel allowance to pensioners, the row over inheritance with farmers and finally the ‘Waspi’ women) where there is a very clear case to be made for at least looking again at issues to try to defuse them. Starmer’s categorical refusal to examine the cases on their merits but to stick rigidly to their first position does not, to me, look like the hallmark of a strong Prime Minister. Admittedly, there are tremendous political difficulties in even half admitting that one might have got things wrong but the politics is fundamentally an art rather than a science and there are ways in which can refine a policy whilst maintaining the principle involved. I have the feeling, though, that these three issues are going to stick in the minds of many people for a long time to come and it is probably the case that the political cost of sticking to one’s original position gets higher and higher. One can almost see the next Tory manifesto being written and there are important elections looming ahead in the Spring on 1st May, 2025. Some 2,240 councillors across 1,968 wards will be elected in 32 Councils, including all 21 County Councils, 10 Unitary Authorities, and 1 Metropolitan Borough and these will be the biggest test of public opinion since the general election held earlier this year. One of the great unknowns at this stage is whether ‘Reform’ armed with a war chest of money from Elon Musk could help to give the Tories the bloodiest of bloody noses. But this oddities of cash heading towards our shores will probably be declared ‘legal’ if it comes from a subsidiary branch of a British company. But a clear case of buying political power and influence and subverting the democratic process seems to be unfolding before our eyes.

Both sets of care workers arrived on time today which is something of a record these days. The company has been adversely affected by lots of workers calling in ‘sick’ at the last moment and I wonder whether all of this is a product of the ‘zero hours’ contracts that are in place. The first workers were scheduled to be 35 minutes later than usual so this meant that we had a somewhat delayed breakfast time. Our domestic help normally calls around on a Wednesday but she was feeling pretty exhausted so is delaying her visit to us until Friday. Friday will turn out to be quite a busy day because we are expecting our Eucharistic minister on that day (despite a death within the family) and then we have a delayed ‘sit’ call whilst I can off and do our Christmas shopping. I expect Friday will be rather a hellish day at the supermarket but at least we now have a ‘sit’ organised for that day. Meg and I went down the hill to collect our newspaper in pretty mild weather so the journey there and back was uneventful. For lunch, I thought I had better finish off the two remaining chicken thighs so I seared them well and then popped them in the oven with the last third of a bottle of lasagne type sauce. Some time ago, I purchased (in a charity shop) one of those old fashioned but heavy oval oven dish. I find it is excellent not only for cooking but also things do not seem to burn in it and it washes fairly easily despite long bake times in the oven. In the afternoon it is necessary to remember to put the right bins out for the refuse collection vehicle which calls very early on a Thursday morning. I like to get this job done in the light – and of course we are soon approaching the shortest day. Miggle, our adopted cat, heard the back door open and hastened towards me, expecting titbits no doubt (he already knows how to identify the carers and their cars and sits patently on the doorstep until the front door opens). Today, whilst wheeling the dustbins along our access road, the cat accompanied me to a half way point whereupon he sat down, perhaps sensing dangers on the actual distributor road. Then having delivered the dustbin to its correct collection point, the cat trotted alongside me until we got to the back door where he was no doubt expecting some more treats. I was reminded of the mediaeval stories of a black cat accompanying older women who had them as pets although to the mediaeval mind, they were known as a particular i.e. the devil or devils in disguise.

Our culinary discussions carried on apace when the two care workers arrived for Meg’s teatime call. One of them had undertaken all three levels of (presumably) BTEC or NVQ qualifications in cheffing and might indeed have worked in a kitchen. So we carried on our discussions of rice preparation and cooking and what he had to impart generally reinforced what I now know about cooking rice. In the middle of the day, Meg and I watched PMQ (Questions to the Prime Minister) and as usual the Commons on this occasion was full of a certain degree of bonhomie before the barbs were out. The case of the ‘Waspi’ women caught in the pensions shortfall because of some mal-administration in the past is annoying the left wing of the Labour Party. The Tories, for their part, are rubbing their hands in glee crying at every opportunity that the Labour would say anything to be elected and then reneges on promises (or at least half promises) once elected. On the UK front, there will now be a period when Parliament is having its winter break when nothing appears to happen but there is still time for a crisis to occur or a scandal to emerge.

Denis Healey (later Lord Healey) the veteran Labour politician used to say that ‘in war, the first casualty is truth’ Reports from the battle field probably fall into this category with one party to the conflict over-claiming and the other remaining silent. Nonetheless, there are reports about the deployment of a contingent of North Korean troops on the front line in the Ukraine. It is reported that North Koreans do not understand what is happening on the battlefield and that North Korea has suffered ‘several hundred casualties while fighting alongside Russian forces in the Kursk region’.A senior US military official speaking on condition of anonymity, said the figure included everything from ‘light wounds up to being KIA (killed in action)’, with soldiers of all ranks among the casualties. Yesterday, Ukraine’s special forces said 50 North Korean soldiers had died in three days of fighting in the border region. Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said as many as 10,000-12,000 troops from Pyongyang had been sent to fight in Ukraine. Kyiv’s forces have been able to distinguish North Korean troops from Russian forces on the battlefield due to them moving in large groups, a Ukrainian drone commander told The Washington Post. ‘The North Koreans are running across the fields, and there are so many of them. They do not understand what is happening. I do not know if they do not understand what is going on or if the Russians are deliberately sending them like that. I cannot say.’ he said. He added that Ukrainian drones, artillery and other weaponry easily found their targets ‘because they were moving in the open field.. We were very surprised, we had never seen anything like it — 40 to 50 people running across a field. That is a perfect target for artillery and Mavic (drone) operators. Russians never ran like that’. This would not be the first time that soldiers had been caught up in a conflict without the soldiers being at all aware of where they were, who they were fighting or even why. One report from the early days of the conflict said that the Ukrainians rounded up the largely young, frightened and inexperienced conscripts amongst the Russian troops that they captured, put a cup of tea in their hands and then a mobile phone with the instruction ‘Phone up your mothers and tell them where you are, that you have been captured and how you are being treated’ If this story has any truth to it, it is interesting because it was certainly true that in the early days of the conflict, the only really significant opposition to Putin was provided by the mothers of dead, missing or injured young conscript soldiers.

The previous evening when Meg was well and truly asleep, I ran off a little message onto 20 address labels and then ran off a series to paste into the cards I am preparing for my carers. I have put the same message into the same card (a ‘Peace’ card) for each of the twenty possible carers and then I will make sure that everyone receives one by one route or another before Christmas Day itself. Tuesday is the day when we meet up with our Waitrose friends so we popped down the hill in quite pleasant weather. As we got to Waitrose just about on time to meet up with our friends, Meg was feeling a little agitated and anxious. However, after we had had a chat and a laugh Meg’s mood lightened considerably so this tells you something about the power of social contact vs. medications. We had a fairly fruitless trip along the High Street and then walked home in a rather unpleasant cold and biting drizzle that just seemed to have arisen since we had walked into town. Nonetheless, when we hot home the carer was waiting for us – we were a little late as was she so we coincided in the porch of our house. Getting Meg indoors is a bit of a performance because it involves cleaning off debris from the wheels of the wheelchair, first outdoors with an ‘outdoor’ brush and then once again inside with a sponge. We then have to divest Meg of her ‘going out’ outfit with lots of outdoor clothing and heavy blankets involved. I was feeling pretty tired so Meg and I exchanged stories about our lives with the carer who is fairly new to the agency but is rapidly gaining experience. The client to whom they had been administering extraordinary mounts of care had been taken into hospital shortly after their last ministrations and had then died within a day or so which sounds dramatic but she was in her 90’s and extremely ill with cancer. After the ‘sitting’ carer had departed and the lunchtime carers had come and gone, I set about preparing lunch for us which was mackerel fillets poached in milk, green beans and a baked potato. Although lunch had been somewhat delayed, it did not take long to throw together and was actually very tasty as well as being nutritious. After lunch, we thought we would watch the (ITV) catchup of Maggie Smith’s life. But the transmission kept freezing with an internet connection error so we turned to the BBC catchup and started watching the life of Leonardo da Vinci. Although this was very interesting, I promptly fell asleep in front of it and was awoken by the sound of the front doorbell as the afternoon teatime carers came along. It was the two jolly lads with whom we always get along well (in fact they call Meg ‘Queen Meg’ once she is ensconced in her favourite armchair/throne) Then we listened to J S Bach’s ‘A Christmas Oratorio’ which we enjoy all the more so as Back recycled bits of Matthew Passion into it.

There was a throw away line by Sky News political correspondent that Musk absolutely hates Keir Starmer and I was intrigued to try to find out why. This is what I found out on a social media platform. Like most social media spats, it seems to have escalated by degrees. Elon Musk tweeted something about Britain being a violent Muslim country. Keir Starmer tweeted a rebuttal. So Elon escalated. So Keir Starmer dis-invited him from some public shindig for tech giants in the UK. So Elon escalated again. Honestly, it is just like two teenagers fighting over social media, but with bigger stakes and bigger audiences. Another contributor shared his view that Elon Musk’s ego was so big that he hated being contradicted and was doing everything he could to spread his extreme right wing views on Twitter/X and anywhere else. The fact that Trump has given him an important position theoretically in charge of eliminating waste from American public services but in practice with a much wider remit must make all of us shudder. Nigel Farage has pictured with Elon Musk at the Trump mansion in Florida and, by all accounts, is cozying up to the multi-billionaire hoping to extract a donation for the Reform party that is rumoured by some to £85m. Whether this will come to pass is interesting but it adds to the pressure on the Tory party back in the UK.

All war is terrible and the loss of human life is always to be deprecated. But the latest news from Moscow gives one pause for thought. The Ukrainians have successfully targeted a Russian general by detonating a bomb hidden within a scooter that was detonated as the general and an aide were emerging from a Russian apartment block. The act that this assassination was successful in the heart of Moscow and only a kilometre or so from the Kremlin must be a wake up call for Muscovites to whom the war in Ukraine (or ‘Special Military Operation’ as the Russians insist on calling it) might seem distant. The war is going against them in Ukraine but this must be a massive psychological boost for the Ukrainians. The Russian general was targeted because he was the general with oversight of nuclear (i.e. radiation), biological and chemical weapons. If these weapons have been used (and they probably have in Syria, at the behest of the Russians) the this must be in contravention of the several international treaties banning the use of such weapons in modern warfare.

The government has said it will be compensating women hit by changes to the state pension age, despite years of a campaigning and a watchdog recommending payouts for those affected. It has sparked backlash across the political divide, including from Labour MPs. The story is a tangled one but basically, in the efforts to equalise the retirement ages of men and women, there were a particular group of women who were disadvantaged by this change, some having retired earlier to take on a caring role for aged parents and therefore lacked the ability to plan ahead for any shortfalls. Some of these women may have to work for extra years if they had not already retired or suffer the indignity of a much reduced pension. This again is one of those instances that could not be too difficult to fix but whilst the Labour Party supported their claim when they were in opposition, now in government trey are repeating the mantra (much used by the Tories, incidentally) that they had to be fair to all other taxpayers in resisting the claim.

Last week when I went shopping in Asda for the first time in months, I managed to buy two or three of what I call ‘thin strip’ calendars that just fit inside the kitchen door jam and upon which I record birthdays and so on (when I remember) But for reasons that will become apparent, I felt I could do with a calendar printing off just this last month of 2024, December. Finding a website that would do this for me, I could also print out some complete calendars for the whole of 2025 which I proceeded to do as I have several uses in mind for such documents. According to the schedule of care workers, the two workers allocated to get Meg up this morning should have arrived at 8.45 so I was bobbling about, just ready to go and get showered when the two workers turned up at 8.00am i.e. three quarters of an hour early. I think I must have shown my displeasure because one of the care workers communicated with HQ and apparently the schedules were changed last night and the care worker who was a team leader should have communicated the change of time to me. I subsequently got a telephone call with a half apology and the information that the relevant team leader had been ‘spoken to’ whatever that means. So I am going to utilise one of the home made calendars which I printed off this morning to assiduously record every time that the agency falls short by only sending one care worker when two were allocated. Meg certainly needs two workers to get her up and dressed in the morning and the reverse process to get her ready for bed in the evening. As for the other two calls during the day, then if it is necessary to utilise the hoist to get Meg out of whichever chair she happens to be occupying, then health and safety demands that two workers should be utilised, one to operate the controls of the hoist and the other to ensure that Meg is not made uncomfortable by the hoisting process itself. I am quite prepared to lend a hand when necessary on an occasional basis but the occasions when I am becoming the ‘de facto’ second care worker are multiplying so that they now number about every other day. So this is going to be carefully documented and I intend to inform the manager that careful records will be kept and a more formal report submitted to the care agency management about once a month from now on. I am hoping this shot across the bows might have desired effect but the toll of the winter pressures is certainly making its presence felt.

After breakfast, it seemed a fairly fine day so Meg and I set off down the hill but a principal task was to deliver some nine cards to near neighbours and friends. This having been done, we picked up a copy of ‘The Times’ and then set off along the High Street. Actually, we got no further than the Salvation Army (charity) shop because this store provided me that everything that I needed. When I sent our Christmas cards, I send religious cards to the definitely religious of my friends, secular cards to the avowedly none-religious and a variety of cards to everybody else. When I looked at the cards left over, I had only religious cards so I felt I needed some more but secular cards for recipients such as the care workers that we have. But my search only went as far as the Salvation Army because I found packs of cards with the ‘Dove of Peace’ which fitted the non-secular bull perfectly and I bought a couple of these. I also found a specialist knee support on sale on a ridiculously cheap price because my left knee occasionally plays up in the bad weather following an accident at Leicester Polytechnic when I was hit by a run-away car on the Polytechnic campus in about 1974 which is, of course, half a century ago. I was warned I might have some osteoarthritis in my knees later in life but I regard myself as fortunate in having survived this long with my knee(s) in a tolerable state. I also bought another thing singlet which I want to wear under my pyjamas to keep me war at night. This particular garment is decorated with a couple of cute little kittens which are not exactly to my taste but I am prepared to overcome my scruples as the garment is the right size and material and had been massively reduced to £1.00.

Around lunchtime, we received a call from our friendly chiropodist who called around for her month visit. After this we had our chicken and broccoli which had been in the oven for longer than I had intended but was nonetheless very tasty. I had parboiled some broccoli and then put it in the oven, whilst the oven was already on but when we came to eat it, it was decidedly crispy. But it was delicious and had the taste and texture that I sometimes associate with a crispy seaweed which I have occasionally eaten when visiting Meg’s cousin in South Wales where it is considered a local delicacy and known as ‘lavabread’.Originally, Laverbread hails from Pembrokeshire, but it can also be found growing in the Gower Peninsula in Swansea. After harvesting, the laver is boiled for around 10 hours, before being minced or pureed into a dark greenish-black, viscid substance. While it may not look or sound overly appealing, many people find that the marine, slightly salty taste tends to grow on them. It is boiled down and made into a green paste, usually enjoyed with a traditional Welsh breakfast. Contrary to the name, it is not bread, although it can be served on toast or with a Welsh breakfast.

After lunch, Meg and I watched the original 1939 edition of ‘The 39 steps’ although I must say that I did not enjoy it nearly as much as the remake of the film made in, I think. the 1970’s. The film we watched this afternoon did not match my memory of it very well and I wonder if the original version and the remake differed quite a lot. Then we followed this up with a natural history film upon polar bears which Meg is quite enjoying but it fills in an odd 20 minutes before the carers arrive for Meg’s teatime call. In the House of Commons, the Chinese ‘spy’ has actually been named under the terms of Parliamentary privilege and I am pleased this has happened. The extent to which the Chinese have burrowed into the elite of British society to obtain influence rather than direct spying activities as such. The activities of the Chinese state in sponsoring this type of ‘soft power’ is quite extraordinary but, of course, China is such an important trading partner this has not been ‘called out’ by the UK until today.

Our two care workers arrived this morning, both looking exhausted even before they started their day’s work, suffering from a variety of ailments. As always, I offer them whatever medicaments are likely to soothe their present troubles but this is invariably politely declined. Nonetheless, we had a jolly little chat over Christmas related issues and they gradually came round and then left whilst I prepared breakfast for Meg and myself. Then we received the most welcome invitation to meet up with our University of Birmingham friend who we tend always to meet up with on a Sunday morning. We took the opportunity to buy some soft drinks and then had quite a dismaying time when we came to present the voucher for our copy of the ‘Sunday Times’ at the checkout. The polite young lad who was acting as a Sunday job informed us that is was now Waitrose policy not to accept these vouchers any more and the system would not accept them. When I protested about this change of policy and informed the lad that I had been presenting vouchers every day for the last six months, he apologised and said I could have my copy of the paper ‘just this once’ I happened to see what one of the oldest established of the ‘partners’ as the Waitrose staff are called and asked him whether it was true that these pre-paid vouchers were no longer being accepted. The partner checked with a colleague and the vouchers in the event are being accepted, at which news I gave a great sigh of relief. As there are no newspaper shops on the High Street any more (a sign of the times?) one has to go to a supermarket to buy a newspaper in Bromsgrove these days and this would have been a severe disruption to my daily routine. But the Sunday boy has misinterpreted some information he had been given so all is well that ends well. On the way home, I noticed something quite extraordinary. I had two large bottles of soft drinks and some cans of ‘Red Bull’ for the youngsters and these I hung from the handles of the wheelchair. But being quite weighty, they evidently acted as some kind of counter balance to Meg’s weight in the wheelchair and actually made it easier for me to push her up the hill. I suppose this is akin to the principal that it is easy to walk up a hill with a heavy bag in each hand rather than just one bag in one hand so my journey home this lunchtime was just that tad easier than might have been expected. Once we got home, we tuned into ‘Songs of Praise’ which was mainly traditional English carols but the presenter is Aled Jones (who also is a presenter on ClassicFM) and whose easy style I can quite take to. For lunch. I seared off some chicken thighs and then baked them in a lasagne sauce in the oven and I also put some parboiled kale and a cooked potato in the oven to give us some oven baked vegetables. I nearly gave myself a nasty burn by getting hold of the handle of an oven-proof saucepan which I had forgotten had been in the oven but in a second or so immediately ran my fingers under a stream of icy cold water which averted the potential disaster. One of the most miserable Christmas dinners that I ever ate occurred when we having Christmas in my mother’s house in Leeds and she handed me a dish straight from her mini-oven which burnt all of the fingers on one if not both hands. Naturally, my mother did not have any ‘Acroflavine’ to hand of which we normally have a tube in the cupboard next to the oven ready to slap on in the case of emergencies. In the afternoon, we re-ran the program on Alan Bennet of which we had only seen half yesterday. I particularly wanted to see again the shots that had been taken inside ‘The Crown’ hotel which was our most recent abode when Meg could get into a car and we could visit Harrogate – but those days are now over. To be saved for another day is a program on the life and career of Dame Maggie Smith (who was absolutely marvellous in the way she played ‘The Lady in the Van’ who had camped at the bottom of Alan Bennet’s garden for some 15 years)

The other day I indulged myself in ‘once a year’ purchase of the ‘Radio Times’ which details all of the programs across a wide variety of channels for a two week period over Christmas and the New Year. Although expensive, this issue of the weekly is generally worth having as it helps one to map out the programs and perhaps films that are not to be missed over the Christmas period. Also, it has its uses on the newspaper non-publishing days over the festive period. In the past, I am sure that have made a feature of the entire lost of films (often totalling over 100) that are to be shown and it can be useful to either plan ahead or view a program on iPlayer if there is a not-to-be-missed program. One one occasion I remember an anguished letter being published which pleaded for the program planners to show ‘High Noon’ (a regular Christmas favourite) because the viewer thought that they might have ‘forgotten some of the words’ But I looked in vain for this feature and did not find it so it might be a case of browsing through and then marking things up day by day. In the past, some fascinating replays have been done on Radio 4 when they tend to raid the archives and to run some of the BBC classic recordings some of which can be hilariously funny but the BBC allows to broadcast on festive occasions.

What is happening in Syria at the moment is disturbing in the extreme but the world’s attention is focused elsewhere.As well as positioning troops inside Syrian territory, Israel has also unleashed air strikes on military targets across the country. It says it is doing this to stop weapons stockpiles falling into the hands of extremists. The chief of staff for Israel’s military, Herzi Halevi, for his part has dismissed the idea that Israel has no justification for its involvement in Syria. But for one country to send its military across an international border must surely be a violation of international law (although the Israelis and the United States have shown scant regard for the principles of international law in the past)

So yesterday started off with a familiar story. I was already well up and showered and gave Meg her early morning cup of tea expecting the two carers to turn up at 8.00am. But after a non-appearance after ten minutes, I got a telephone call from the agency that two workers had phoned in as sick and therefore unavailable for work and so Meg’s ‘getting up’ call would be delayed until 9.00am. This, of course, I have come to expect and may get even worse over the Christmas period. I suppose I am resigned to this by now – the one consolation is that I can use my smart speaker to play a selection of Mozart for me to help to sustain my equilibrium. The fact that the care workers are an hour later than normal means my breakfast routine will need to be re-timed so that we can still see our Waitrose friends at the normal time. The night before, I felt I had just averted a potential disaster. The water levels in our downstairs toilet rose ominously after a flush and this always suggests a blockage. So I plucked up my courage, put on a rubber glove and prepared to reach as far as down the toilet as I could to relieve the probable obstruction. But I could feel nothing but after I had completed this manouvre, the water seemed to give an enormous ‘belch’ after which the toilet flushed normally. I suspect that a care worker had put a not very disposable wipe down the toilet and this has had created the temporary blockage but the action of putting my hand and arm up and down it had created sufficient movement of water for the blockage to clear. Evidently, I was mightily relieved and normally I dispose of waste destined for the toilet myself to prevent this kind of occurrence but I imagine a care worker was trying to be helpful and did this for me, inadvertently creating the problem. So I know now to always do this myself and I know both how to prevent problems and to solve them when they do occur. Breakfast was a rushed affair in front of the lateness of the carer’s call so the minute it was finished I pushed Meg down the hill- fortunately, we had a clear blue sky and some sun plus a smidgeon of the warmth of the sun. In Waitrose, we met up with one of our friends but not the other but nonetheless had a jolly time. Afterwards, I relieved the store of some of its supply of porridge and also a supply of orange-based soft drink in anticipation of our party in a few day’s time. Then it was a case of getting home and watching some quite interesting TV. There is a series called ‘Villages by the Sea’ and today they were focusing on a little community called Bucklers Hard which is on the other side of Southampton Water. Probably because of the proximity of several acres of oak forest, this location had been used in the past for the construction of wooden warships for the Navy, particularly in the 18th centuries. Warships were basically built here and then sailed down the river into Southampton or more probably Portsmouth where they were fitted out with superstructure and, presumably, armaments. But having falling into relative quintessence for a century or so, apparently Bucklers Hard was pressed into service again in the preparations for the ‘D Day’ landings. At the conclusion of WWII, this was probably the greatest invasion fleet every assembled and all kinds of support ships were required, not to mention innovative structures such as floating harbours that could be towed across the Channel and then used as a temporary harbour against which big ships could moor whilst smaller ships carried supplied inland. This part of the history of Bucklers Hard was totally unknown to me, even though we had visited it on at least a couple of occasions when we lived in Hampshire.In fact, modern archaeological methods such as ground penetrating radar is revealing the slipways that were used in the past to get the wooden warships from their construction site into the Beaulieu River, in the New Forest.

After we had lunched on some quiche, tinned tomatoes and broccoli we settled down for a Saturday afternoon’s TV viewing. As Christmas is approaching, some more classic films are being shown. Today it was the turn for the Ealing Comedy ‘The Lavender Hill Mob’ which is amusing without being rib-ticklingly funny. When this was over, we watched the broadcast from last night of ‘Have I Got News for You’ which is, of course, always topical. I then consulted the schedules to see what had been broadcast last night and my attention was immediately drawn to a retrospective on the life and works of Alan Bennet the Yorkshire playwright, wit and raconteur. But what was so very interesting for us was Alan Bennet’s used occasionally to stay in ‘The Crown’ hotel in Harrogate which is the hotel which latterly, despite my apprenticeship in the ‘Old Swan’, became our favourite hotel in Harrogate. They always offered us very good deals and no-cost parking right in the town centre which is why we used to frequent it. So it was wonderful to see the shots of the interior of the hotel and it brought back some poignant memories for us. Like the other large hotels in Harrogate, the buildings were requisitioned by the various Armed Services during WWII and I believe the Crown was commissioned by the Air Ministry and only released back to the public in the early 1950’s. The dining room was I think in an art deco style and was magnificent although we only ever breakfasted in it. My mother when she was alive had, I think worked for a spell at the Air Ministry in ‘The Crown’ and it gave me a rather curious feeling when I was breakfasting there to know that my mother probably had feasted her eyes on the same scene. One could well imagine it in its Air Ministry days and there were some still some photographs adorning some of the hotel corridors detailing stories from the hotel’s past.

Now that the economy has shrunk by 0.1% as last month, then the new Labour government has got off to a rather shaky start. The rise in employer’s NI contributions might have fulfilled an election pledge not to raise NI on the rest of the population but as well as taking such much money out of the turnover of firms and charities, it has also dealt a blow to business confidence. So all of the hard work that Rachel Reeves may have put in before the election to reassure business leaders about an incoming Labour government will have been set to nought.

So today has been a rather different day. The two carers came along at 8.20 and one of them, although new to the company, is tremendously experienced having worked as a psychiatric hospital and it was immediately evident that he knew exceptionally well how to communicate with patients so this fills one with confidence. Once Meg had been breakfasted, we decided to set off for town but decided to visit the large Asda store in the centre. This is because I know that there are a variety of things sold within this store that are not easily obtainable elsewhere so I had a little shopping list in my head. Although the store is large, I was pretty successful in obtaining almost everything that I wished to obtain including some things that I happened to buy when I say them on the grounds that they might prove useful. The principal things that I wanted to buy are some of those what I termed ‘strip’ calendars which are quite narrow and thin and which I just happen to have in one or two convenient locations around the house. Often these are animal designs (cute little puppies) that are not really to my taste but beggars cannot be choosers as they say. But I also managed to renew supplies of some other items which I find particularly useful. One of these is a supply of Asda’s own ‘instant mashed potato’ and I tend to use this for one cooking function only which is to supply a thickening agent to gravy. So instead of using cornflower which is typically used for this purpose, I find that a few sprinkles of instant mashed potato does the job for me. I also managed to buy some light bulbs and one or two items of party stationery thinking ahead to our little celebration which is now about ten days off. After we returned home, I made us a risotto and tried hard to follow exactly the recipe used by chefs which does involve sprinkling some of the arborio rice into the clarified onions to toast the rice a little before adding the chicken stock. This worked out fine and I even had some spare which I have frozen up ready for the delectation of my carers who I know particularly likes this. During the afternoon, we treated ourselves to ‘Question Time’ which is broadcast on Thursday evenings and usually runs for the best part of an hour,. As it happened, I saw the first 20 seconds of this and the last minute and slept during the whole of the rest – which is not an uncommon occurrence these days. Whilst on the subject of extreme tiredness, I am finding these days that when I am particularly tired, I tend to put things down and completely forget where I have left them. A case in point was the beautiful striped mug for which I have already have a huge affection even though it was only purchased yesterday for the princely sum of 50p. This seemed to have disappeared off the face of the earth and the same sometimes happens with articles of clothing. But experience has now taught me that in the case of pottery to look in the microwave (in which they almost inevitably are) or in the washing machine or dryer (where clothing is often to be found).

Almost inevitably, one’s own life becomes intertwined with that of one’s carers. Without wishing to be obtrusive, carers often talk about their children and domestic activities. We have had a fairly new carer for the past two to three weeks who is a resident of Bromsgrove and is the mother of a young child of about four. She is a fairly slightly built person ad certainly not as hefty as some of her colleagues. She has a fairly shy nature but is eager to learn and evidently is growing in self confidence as she gets more and more successful episodes of care under her belt. So I was amazed when she let slip that she was actually a kickboxing champion of the UK, presumably in her weight allocation of that is how the sport is organised. Of all of the carers that we have, this lady is one of the least likely candidates to be a kick boxing champion. It rather reminded me of a mature student that I used to teach at the University of Winchester. This particular student was a little short and. not exactly podgy but she once let me know that she was the long jump champion of Dorset. Normally, one things of long jumpers as long-limbed, quite tall and lean and with a fair burst of speed down the athletics track so this student, too, surprised me at the time.

Reform UK could replace the Conservatives as the second-largest party at the next election, former Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman has predicted. The peer said Nigel Farage’s party ‘seem to have an argument and they seem to know what it is’. Speaking to Beth Rigby on the Electoral Dysfunction podcast, she opined ‘I feel quite conflicted about this because I do not want to talk up Reform,’ she said.’But I actually think that Reform are going to replace the Conservatives at the next election because they seem to have an argument’ Her words highlight the increasingly bitter battle between the Tories and Reform following the general election, which saw Mr Farage elected to parliament for the first time. We have seen political parties come and go before e.g. the SDLP but whether the Conservatives will ever be replaced is a tall order – after all, the Conservative party has been one of the most successful political forces for a century or so now. We could, though, end up with a divided centre-right. One of the reasons why Margaret Thatcher was so successful was that the opposition to her was divided between the Labour Party and the Liberals/SDLP and only about 2 voters in 5 actually voted Conservative. So we may yet see the ‘mirror image’ of what was witnessed in the 1980’s.

Last night, I spent about an hour searching for one of my favourite jumpers only to find it this morning draped over the edge of Meg’s bed which I evidently did not search last night as it would have meant putting on the light and probably disturbing Meg’s sleep. As soon as I got up this morning, I received a text from the super-reliable young male Asian team leader to the effect that there were staff shortages and he would himself would be doing Meg’s morning call but he would be delayed. It turned out that he had been alerted at 4.00am that one of his co-workers needed to take his own mother to A&E which rather took him out of the reckoning for the day. Consequently, the young team leader needed to start all types of rescheduling of work commitments which he succeeded in doing but at some personal cost of the absence of sleep on the one hand.

Fortunately, as it turned this young male carer who knows Meg very well as he attend to her almost every day had detailed himself (being a ‘team leader’) for Meg’s sit call. I raced out to do the shopping but as one does just before Christmas, I was tempted to buy some extras. Thinking about our careers’ [party, I bought standard white wine (Pinot Grigio) and what seemed to be a reasonable rosé. Being Aldi, I also bought a bottle of Glühwein (mulled wine) as this always goes down well at Christmas parties. After I had got back, we got the shopping half unpacked and then Meg and I made our way through a slight drizzle down the hill. We picked up a copy of the newspaper and then made our way to the Post Office where I bought the stamps for the 42 cards I was about to post which included four destined for Spain. In view of the tremendous price hikes and as I was so far ahead of myself this year, I only bought second class stamps supplementing these with a book of first class stamps for the inevitable late card I will probably need to send. Upon enquiring whether my cards would reach their destinations in Spain in time for Christmas. I was told that the last date for guaranteed delivery is now the end of November. I expressed my disappointment and dismay to the counter staff member who took it in good part but I needed to explain that what had been two weeks beforehand has now become about four to five and the levels of service in the Post Office were dropping enormously (since privatisation, of course). On our way home, I bought some ointment for cracked heels which I always seem to need at this time of year and could not resist a Sainsbury’s ‘Home’ range striped mug being sold for 50p in our local Salvation Army charity shop. By the time the care workers had called around for Meg’s delayed lunch time call it was way after 2.00pm and I did not fancy an extended period of cooking. So I diced up some meat and threw it into a ‘quick’ rice with petit pois for some green veg. This was both tasty and quick, after which I resumed doing the unpacking of the shopping from this morning that seems to be taking all day.

At least one of the care workers is taking her very young children (aged 3-4) to a ‘Santa Express’ which goes to the ‘North Pole’ (although it is only 12 minute ride from the start in Tamworth (in a country park) At the destination, you can visit the elves in their workshop, receive a present from Santa Claus himself and even help Mrs Claus prepare some cookies that are then given to the children. The whole of this trip takes about 2 hours after which the little ones are exhausted with the excitement of it all and, of course, the belief is total. Sometime this type of activity lends itself to scammers as happened a few years ago when the winter experience was a few plastic bags draped around one or two scanty bushes trying to simulate a winter landscape but when it is done ‘professionally’ it seems to be very well done indeed. The reviews, for what it is worth, are very favourable. Down the road, of course, we have the hugely popular (and presumably money-spinning) trip on the Santa express from Kidderminster to an intermediate station (Arley) where there is a pantomime experience and the chance to receive a visit from Santa Claus himself. My own Santa Claus simulating days are unfortunately over but I played Santa (and Meg, Mother Claus) for several years at my daughter-in-la’s primary school until a hospital induced thinness on my part meant that pillows could not disguise my lack of a Santa physique and my stint came to an end.

I received a text late in the afternoon that the two care workers had been delayed and would be half an hour late for the putting to bed call this evening. When the two young care workers arrived, they looked absolutely shattered having just had another really traumatic experience with a very ill elderly client who has just come under the care of the agency and it took the two of them over an hour to clean up the mess (and this has happened every day this week) I gave them some coffee to help to revive them because they really look practically dead on their feet. Social Services and the allocated OT is of the view that only carer is required for 30 minutes but they seem to have no idea of the enormity of the task that the care workers have to face. So I give the two lads as much moral support as I can but their lot is not a happy one at the moment.

The NHS is under the most enormous pressure just before Christmas. A ‘tidal wave’ of flu infections has led to a 70% increase in hospital cases in England in just seven days, the NHS has said. An average of 1,861 patients with flu were in hospital every day last week – up from 1,099 in the previous week and 402 at the same time last year. Flu cases are currently highest among 5 to 14-year-olds, according to the UK Health Security Agency, but adult cases are expected to rise when schools and nurseries close. Cases of norovirus (the winter vomiting bug) and RSV (a common cause of coughs and colds, and a cause of chest infections in babies) are also on the rise. NHS England said an average of 837 beds were occupied last week by people with norovirus symptoms – up 10% on the previous week and 64% on last year. These figures look dire but on a personal level, I am relieved that my son’s hospital stay was a week or so ago and not at the moment

The previous evening, as soon as Meg was safely put to bed, I turned my attention to making a start on my Christmas card list – or at least those items that I knew would have to be posted. Altogether there were about 40 cards to process and I thought I would divide this into four tranches of 10 – in the event, I pushed this up to 14 before I went to bed so that I knew I had done a third. Early yesterday morning, I woke up just after 5.00am and rather than going back to sleep, thought I would make some more progress on the remaining cards. By the time Meg was ready to be got up and breakfasted, I had done all but five of the cards because, as I was making good progress I felt the impetus to press on. Our domestic help called around today and we had already planned to make a major focus of this morning the erection and dressing of our Christmas tree. My son and I had ensured that we had taken everything from its storage place in the loft so after our domestic help had done some of the essential tasks oh her stay with us, we turned our attention to the Christmas tree. A certain amount of furniture rearrangement is called for so that we can locate our tree in its eminently suitable location in a corner of our hall and near a plug point. Our domestic help actually rather likes dressing of Christmas trees and she made a superb job of it. After the tree was put into position and clad with its lights, we then started to dress the tree with a fairly large supply of baubles in our possession. We seem to have a huge supply of baubles because we have inherited some from the family tree that we used to adorn in addition to which our domestic help added some of her own excess and finally a job lot which she bought in a charity shop when, in the past, Christmas was over and the store wanted to dispose of them. Dressing the tree and then some of its immediate environs seemed to take most of the morning but I am pleased to say that the result is as stunning as always. Meg and I did not venture out this morning but just before lunch I sat with Meg whilst I finished off the last of the Christmas cards that I needed to write. I had sent off an email late last night to one of Meg’s cousins to check the most recent address of another cousin and then I did a thorough check that I had an up-to-date definitive list of the Christmas card list with a tick against each item to delineate that I had actually sent a card this year. Incidentally, when I first started to computerise my Christmas card mailing list several years, I handed a copy of it to my son and daughter-in-law so that at the time of our actual demise, they know exactly with whom they need to communicate. This so-called ‘death list’ actually needs to be updated year by year as some people on it almost inevitably have succumbed to the grim reaper.

Almost inevitably at this time of year, a lot of the focus of attention of all of us is the forthcoming Christmas festive period. The carers in particular know that they have to cope with the demands of both work and family and they are busy planning how and what presents they are going to give to their children. In bygone days, when belief in the Santa Claus myth was almost total, we used to shout up the chimney to indicate what presents we hoped would be brought.The giving of presents at Christmas time is an interesting tradition. The term Boxing Day actually dates back to the 16th and 17th centuries. The giving of presents is linked to an older British tradition in which the servants of the wealthy were allowed the next day to visit their families since they would have had to serve their masters on Christmas Day. The employers would give each servant a box to take home containing gifts, bonuses, and sometimes leftover food. During the reign of Queen Victoria, the wealthy would give gifts to servants and trades people in boxes as a thank you for their service. The gifts would often include money, goods, and Christmas leftovers. However, Meg and I rather like the traditions that are followed in Spain. Here whilst Christmas is important, some symbolic presents might be given on Christmas Day itself. But the major feast in these times is ‘Reyes Magos’ or what we term the ‘Three Kings’ who traditionally brought presents of gold, frankincense and myrrh to the newly born Christ. In the small fishing communities around Spain, the young children are brought along to the dockside or landing area here they can actually observe the Three Kings, in all of their fine robes, descend from the fishing boats, evidently from overseas. In some of island communities, the Three Kings actually arrive by camel as well so no effort is spared to impress the very young. Traditionally, too, there is a procession throughout the town where small sweets are thrown into the crowd. So most Spanish children would expect their principal presents to arrive on January 6th (‘Reyes’ in Spain) and not on Christmas Day itself.

Of course the other thing about the days before Christmas is the Christmas music. Since we have bought our two ‘Alexa’ smart speakers, we have been playing some wonderful Christmas music to ourselves. In particular, I quite like Bach’s ‘A Christmas Oratorio’ whilst Handel’s ‘Messiah’ and Haydn’s ‘Creation’ are perennial favourites. There are still some communities in the UK where you can turn up, be identified as a tenor, baritone or bass and having had the score of ‘The Messiah’ thrust in one’s hand, carry on and sing your way through the whole oratorio. I think this used to happen outside Leeds Town Hall, for example. This morning whilst we were putting up the Christmas decorations I played Harry Belafonte’s ‘Mary’s Boy Child’ which my sister and I bought as an Extended Play (EP) record between us when I was about 14 years old. I also remember some Johnny Mathis songs from about this time period as well and, in particular, ‘Let it rain’ which I often sing around the house when it is pouring with rain outside.