I spent some of the time first thing yesterday morning completing the documentation for the various HTML scripts for the display of Meg’s photos. This task is now completed and means that if I have in future a little project in view (e.g. a holiday) then I have everything in place to make a complete slide record of it. I used to do this before Meg became very ill but evidently had to stop doing this in the last few years of her life, not least because we had no holidays to document. But now I have put the 4-5 scripts and the documentation into their own little table so that a viewer could select which they preferred to watch and even use themselves. I calculate that each script and its associated photos takes about 50Mb but I have some 25Gb free in my webspace so plenty of room for expansion (for example, 500 more scripts and associated photos, although this is only a theoretical calculation). I consulted ‘Sky News’ quickly for the latest news of the war and came across an interesting calculation. Whilst missiles are being thrown about all over the Middle East, it has been calculated that the UAE, for example has successfully shot down over 90% of incoming missiles but at a cost some 25 times more than it costs to launch. So one calculation is that the Middle East countries will beg Trump to curtail his war, not least because they will run out of missiles/money to defend themselves if the war continues unabated. By this calculation, the long-term mathematical odds are on the side of Iran. In America itself, the focus of the debate is whether Congress will approve or fail to approve authorisation for Trump’s adventures. But even if a resolution were passed denying Trump the funding, Trump could override this with a presidential veto which is a chilling thought. What is troubling the Americans is the absence of any clear plan what to do about a post-war Iran and the fact that America might be embroiled for years and the turbulence created in the Middle East may take years to subside. But what is crystal clear at the moment is that the campaign so far is both illegal and unconstitutional but when allies such as the UK point this out to the American administration, they are lambasted. However, at the point of time when it just appeared that the UK economy had at least turned a corner, we now have the destabilising effect of rising energy prices, a rise in inflation and military action into which we are sucked and cannot avoid, all of which was not predicted. Trump is saying that the war will last for months but although Trump has used the word ‘war’ there are some on the American right who are arguing that this is not, actually a war and as such, the opinion of the Congress is irrelevant. I wonder though whether the Americans might actually take to the streets in millions to try to force an end to the conflict and this fact alone may change the mindset of some Republicans who hold the key (and the votes) to alter the progress of the conflict.
After a chat with some fellow coffee drinkers in the Methodist Centre, I went off to do my weekly shopping which I have now started to do a day earlier in the week. My son and daughter-in-law were due to come round in the afternoon to assist in the clearance of several items we had rescued from the eaves of the house. Our principal task today was to go through a box which contained packets of old photographs dating mainly from the 1970’s and 1980’s. In those days, you took your film to an agent such as Boots who developed the film for you and actually gave you back the reel of film should you wish to have more copies. Most of the photographs were in the nature of ‘holiday snaps’ so we jettisoned these quickly retaining only those containing images of family members which we duly duly labelled up, dated and retained. We did discover some photos of my mother’s garden in Leeds which I will pass on to other family members in Yorkshire when next I see them. In my little trip down into the town, it is rather a sight for sore eyes to observe the flowering of the Japanese cherry trees which adorn some of the front gardens in the houses along the Kidderminster Road. This is a reminder to me as well that spring is in the air and that grass mowing activities will start in about three weeks time. Our garden has got somewhat overgrown since I devoted all of my attention to looking after Meg in her final months and did little gardening apart from a regular mowing of the grass. One of the carers that used to look after Meg has a partner who does not mind turning his hand to what I call (not perjoratively) ‘rough gardening’ which is basically taking an over-grown garden and getting it back into reasonable shape. As the weather improves, I need to get into the habit of about 30 minutes a day of regular gardening and I probably need to engage a proper gardener as well. At the same time, I need to get into a good de-cluttering mode – when one moves house, then a lot of stuff gets junked into a skip and in Hampshire I think that we filled at least three before we left. But I have now lived in this house for more than 18 years and retired as well so the house has gradually accumulated more and more ‘things’ that need a degree of rationalisation. At the time of COVD, when we were confined to houses, we thought this would be a good time to go through the house room by room decluttering but it never actually happened, despite our good intentions. However, with the help of my son and daughter-in-law, we have made a start in throwing away or recycling some of the materials we had stored. We did find a suitcase with some rather fine curtains inside and my domestic help and I are going to decide whether some of them would be useful to her or it could be that we can bring them into use in this house. But we have to examine them for the ‘drop’ sizes before we can come to a decision on that.