The principal activity in which I engaged in the late afternoon before last was to carry on clearing the moss and weeds from the patio that we have in our back garden. This is actually quite a mammoth task because with Meg’s lingering illness, the task had not been completed for a couple of years and perhaps even longer. The patio is actually constructed out of reclaimed paving stones of which there are a great variety in colour and (rectangular) shape and is therefore well worth some attention to restore it to a better condition. But there is no substitute to kneeling down and performing a painstaking stone by stone clearance. I am using a variety of tools which include a narrow pointed trowel, a wire brush, a scraper and a more standard brush. I devoted an hour to this task which was quite enough but it as to be done on a fine day and not with a cold wind whistling around you. I estimate the initial clearance is about 50% done and then, after that, there are two major tasks to be performed. The first of these will be a major re-grouting work as much of the existing cement work has perished. After that, my domestic help knows of a very good stone and patio cleaning company who will do an excellent job – but there are many ‘cowboys’ in this business o which one must be aware. I am devoting attention to this because one could not really invite guests to sit I the back ha=garden until the patio has been restored, a complicating factor being that moss accumulates on the roof of our dormer bungalow on that side of the house and some of this tumbles onto the patio, making even more mess to be cleared up. But some patience and devoted hard work will get the task completed before I turn my attention to other gardening activities. In the evening before last, I viewed some of the American liberal podcasts on YouTube and saw a video on the massive corruption in which Trump and his family are engaged. Much of this involves investments by the UAE (United Arab Emirates) into a crypto-currency venture established by Trump and his immediate family. As I write it looks as though the USA government are due to shovel barrowloads of cash towards the UAE as ‘compensation’ for the Iranian war and much of this will find its way into the Trump family coffers. Donald Trump has been accused of corruption, plain and simple after it was revealed that a member of the Emirati royal family was behind a $500m investment into the Trump family’s cryptocurrency company. Ethics experts say the deal – struck just days before the US president’s inauguration last January – amounts to a deep conflict of interest for the White House, amid calls for a congressional investigation into the transaction. Months after the deal, the Trump administration announced that the United Arab Emirates would be allowed to import 500,000 of Nvidia’s powerful AI chips – overriding concerns that the deal could eventually allow China access to the technology. Donald Sherman, president of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a powerful government watchdog group, said the deal is a ‘blatant, disgraceful conflict of interest and a possible violation of the Constitutions Federal Emoluments Clause. Thanks to this latest monetisation of the White House, the American people will have to question whether Trump administration policies affecting the UAE … are in the best interest of the public and American workers, or a foreign nation that padded the president’s bottom line,’ Sherman said. Four days before inauguration, Tahnoon’s emissaries agreed to acquire a 49% stake in World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency company co-owned by the Trump family, for half a billion dollars, according to the Wall Street Journal, which first reported on the deal. Normally the American Department of Justice would have a watching brief over these kinds of illegal activities but the Department of Justice is now little more than an extension of the White House and subject to Trump’s biddings. So the video report I read indicated that the level f corruption and personal enrichment of the rump family is both astounding in its scale and in pain sight as Trump and his family do not even bother to conceal the extent to which the war has enriched. By announcing the end to the war or its continuation, Trump and his family are aware of the subsequent movement of the stock markets and hence the opportunities to ma money lies in their own pronouncements. Of course, all of this flows from the Trumpian view that the law applies to other people and not to him and his family and is used as an instrument to pursue political enemies. If liberals were to think that a day of judgement will surely come when the Trump regime falls, which it must, this ignores the fact that Trump through presidential pardons to excuse any wrong doing before he actually leaves office, distant though that date may be.
I went into town by car and visited my ‘Gifts of Love’ venue as I usually do at the end of the week .It is not you typical coffee bar where you greeted with a hug and a kiss, have some homemade cake and coffee and leave with another hug and a kiss but that is why it is part of my normal routine by now. I had made an arrangement for my American friend to call around and we had agreed a very simple dinner of gammon steaks, cabbage and baked potato but tis was fine for both us although I did prepare a starter of melon and ham. After lunch, our son popped round and soon my son and American friend were engaged in discussions about the delights of the Severn Valley railway in general and diesel electric locomotives in particular. We then settled down and watched the film ‘Captain Corelli’s Mandolin’ which is a particular favourite of mine. This is a love story, a war story and plenty of funny as well dramatic incidents in between and my friend enjoyed it tremendously not having seen it before.We enjoyed a little supper of melon. blueberries and yogurt and played my friend my videoclip of Me at her best over eight years ago now in a 50th wedding anniversary speech.