Wednesday is always a day when we are running a little hard to catch up with ourselves because it is the day when we have to refine our Waitrose order, ready for delivery the following day. Upon my son’s instigation, though, we decided to see if we could book a special excursion on the Severn Valley Railway in one month’s time on the occasion of my birthday on Tuesday, May 11th. The arrangement is that you can book a carriage which can contain four people. So my son can take a day off work and make up a party of four which will include  the three Hart family members and also include our University of Birmingham friend who has also been looking forward, we know, to a trip on the railway. Basically we start off at Kidderminster and make our way through five interesting stations before arriving at Bridgnorth, where they have a pub with lots of real ale at the very end of the platform. So we are all looking forward to this trip immensely – even if the weather is bad, we are under cover for a lot of the time. Also, as a bonus, because of my son’s membership of the SVR, we managed to secure quite a substantial discount for our day’s excursion. So our walk to the park was a little delayed, as is typical on a Wednesday even without the railway booking.  On our way down we were stopped and engaged in a conversation with an acquaintance  which eventually led to a discussion of military matters and why firearms that are ‘rifled’ are more accurate. The process of ‘rifling’ means that a system of helical grooves are incorporated into the body of the rifle which makes any bullet basically spin. This spinning motion effectively neutralises any slight variation in the weight of a bullet (and there is no longer a ‘light’ side or a ‘heavy’ side) and makes it more accurate both in flight and the ability to reach an intended target. Actually, for someone who is totally ignorant about all things military, I knew all of the facts that our acquaintance was trying to convey but I couldn’t say how and where I acquired this esoteric knowledge. Eventually, when we got to the park we could see at a glance that all of our more normal benches were occupied so we had to make do with a seat by the side of the pond/lake so we ate our comestibles without any chats with anyone. The weather was starting to look a little threatening and it had clouded over quite markedly – however, by the time we got home the weather had brightened again and it looked as though we were set for for a fine afternoon.

After lunch, I started another bottling process and in this case, cooking oil. We buy our cooking oil in 5-litre containers and buy a rapeseed oil which is half the saturated fat of Olive Oil, rich in Omega 3, 6, 9 and Vitamin E. This has the advantage that I never run out off cooking oil when I need it as I generally have a stock of about a dozen bottles in stock. Also our domestic help (and her husband) loves this oil to cook with as it has a much superior ‘fry’ temperature to other oils and quite a delightful nutty flavour.  In addition, we are cutting down on food miles and utilising an ‘almost’ local product.

In the late afternoon, we had a visit from our local chiropodist who provides a domiciliary service for Meg and myself. We tend to have our hooves ‘done’ about every 4-5 weeks or so and this keeps us mobile. As the weather was so fine this afternoon, we decided to sit on our bench at the front of the house as it was a beautiful spring afternoon – this proved to be so pleasant that we might chose to have our feet done like this for the rest of the summer.

The political news this afternoon is quite interesting. In the House of Commons, Boris Johnson has successfully beat off a challenge from the Labour Party to establish a special Commons committee to investigate what is being called ‘Tory sleaze’ i.e. David Cameron, the ex Tory PM attempting to get a commercial firm with which he was associated to be awarded some privileges by the Treasury. If successful, David Cameron would have made a great deal of money – but instead the firm involved, Greensill Capital, has collapsed. However, a very powerful and influential Commons Select Committee, the Treasury Select Committee, has decided to investigate the whole of this affair formally and they would have the power to call whatever witnesses they required which would include both David Cameron (ex-PM) and Rishi Sunak, present Chancellor off the Exchequer, whose hands do not seem to be entirely clean in this affair. We shall have to sit and see!

Well, this is the day after our second jab so the interesting question is whether we will get any side-effects after the second jab or not. Last night, I just had the hint of a temperature rise but this could have been imagination. Similarly, this morning, I felt that I had the slightest bit of tenderness around my jab site but this, too, could have imagination. There is rather an odd feeling about the state of the anti-lockdown this evening. Boris Johnson is saying that people must just understand that ‘we will have increased infections and increased deaths’ as we un-lockdown. He also gave us the news, if it is news , that all of the benefits we have seen is largely the result of the lockdown and not the effects of a mass vaccination campaign – I wonder what the science is behind all of this? The sight on the TV bulletins of lots of youngg people going out to drink and celebrate and not observe any social distancing does not exactly fill me full of joy. It seems to be an odd paradox that those who have vaccinated and even double vaccinated (like Meg and myself) are staying at home in the evening whereas the streets are generally filled with the younger elements of the population who have not been vaccinated. I know that some in the epidemiological community are watching current developments with a degree of apprehension. After all, what we are doing is really a massive social experiment which could go horribly, horribly wrong but is now a certainty that Boris Johnson is following ‘the dates, not the data‘ The fact that as a democratic society, we are going to have national elections shortly is probably not in our long term interests as politicians choose policies that they imagine will bty some them some short-lived popularity and votes.

Today, though, was. a beautiful day for us to walk down into town. We picked up our newspapers and then headed off to the park, noting that there were a lot of cars parked in the vicinity of the park which is usually an indication that the park’s car parks are full and people are parking in the streets nearby. But as we got into the park, it seemed not particularly busy and we were soon involved in lots of conversations with a variety of our park friends and park acquaintances. This even extended as far as the two COVID wardens who patrolling order to give ‘advice’ to members of the population who may be transgressing the rules. Some friends who live any the bottom of Kidderminster Road told us of a terrible car  crash that had happened quite near to their house. At least one car was severely damaged, several young men tumbled out of the car and the police almost had to close the road until the accident debris was cleared up. One can only speculate but I did wonder of some younger people had consumed too much alcohol and pushed their car beyond sensible limits (the accident occurring on a corner)

In the meanwhile, we have yet more horrifying stories from Mineapolis where another young black man was shot dead by the police. The young black person was pulled over by the police for a minor offence and when he struggled to get into a (police) car he was shot by the policewoman – who thought she was firing her taser and got ‘mixed up’ between that and her regular firearm. The police officer, herself experienced, has resigned as has the chief of police whilst the black population of Mineapolis is literally up in arms (being met with shows of force and arrested by members of a white police force) One has to wonder whether the deep racism in American society together with a rampant gun culture makes the whole society a deeply unattractive one. It is also interesting to speculate what influence this is going to have on the minds of the jury in the George Floyd case (black man whose neck was knelt on by a white police officer and who subsequently died) This case is being heard in a court house a few miles away from the present shooting and the defence are starting their case shortly.

Tonight, I finally got to work bottling a lot of the remainder of my damson gin. This is not a difficult process but is a little fiddly. First, my little wine bottles have to be sterilised and I do this with a Milton solution (or the Boots equivalent). Now the tricky part – kilner jars full of damson gin (and damsons) has to be emptied into/filtered into a jug. I generally use an old man’s vest (the type with little ‘vertex’ type holes in it) with a thickness in which the vest material is at least doubled, it not quadrupled. The to the top of each jar, I add literally 1-2 drops of concentrated almond essence which gives the final product a little extra kick of flavour. Then I will label up my 27 extra bottles of gin before they get distributed again to friends and neighbours.

Well, this is quite a significant date. For most of the population, today’s date is memorable because it is the date when some of the COVID-10 restrictions are being lifted. Of concern to many people (especially the younger elements) is that you can now have a drink with friends but only in a pub garden (and today, as it happened was the most unsuitable day for it as the weather is still pretty cold for April) But of most use to many people is the fact that ‘non-essential’ retail can now open. In particular, this means that hairdressers are open and if reports are to be believed, many have bookings that extend anything up to a month into the future. In addition, those retail outlets that haven’t gone bust are cautiously re-opening and with the restrictions on numbers entering a shop, this might mean that shops do not so much make money as minimise their losses. Gyms are open but only for individualised sessions – they are not open for group sessions which means that I will probably have to wait until May 17th (i.e. five weeks) for my Pilates class to reopen and, even then, I expect we shall be restricted to the four corners of the room. Shopping for the sake of shopping does not hold any particular attractions and it does make one wonder how many people having got used to shopping on the internet will ever want to go back to their old habits.

I mentioned in the past that I managed to put Windows 7 onto my IBM ThinkPad but without any drivers either for the WiFi or for the sound card. Anyway, I discovered a local firm that advertised ‘No fix,no fee’ and having ascertained that there was no call out charge as such, I decided to give it a go. A computer technician called round to the house this morning and confirmed for me that Windows 7 is no longer supported (hence, no drivers) and that Windows 10 basically could not run on such a machine specified at least 15 years ago. However, he took my machine away and was going to put some of the missing drivers on it but now I know that it is basically un-upgradable and also that Windows 7 has as many security ‘holes’ in it as has XP which it replaced. However, I am much better informed than I was having spoken to an expert so now I know that if/when I get this machine back, I should only use it for looking at my statistics programs (written in the 1980’s) and my PhD (written in a version of Word in 1995)

However, today’s date was a much more significant date for Meg and I because it was the date, eleven weeks on from the date when we received out first vaccination, that we were scheduled to receive our second vaccination. Accordingly, we altered our routines somewhat for the day. We went down in the car to collect out newspapers and then on into the park where we had a little walk and a quick elevenses. The we made our way to the Artrix Centre (= repurposed Arts Centre) in good time for our re-vaccination at 12.00pm. There all of the systems worked like clockwork, all the way through from being checked in at the door, then at another check-in desk and finally to the vaccination point. The staff were very caring and cheerful – we expressed our delight in getting our second dose of the vaccine and they mentioned that many people had mentioned the same thing to them. We wondered how many people had got ‘over’ concerned about the 1 in a million chance of dying from a blood clot and they mentioned to us that they had heard that A&E departments were being inundated by people worried about possible side effects. We received our vaccine jabs which we scarcely felt at all and then made our way home where we could have a leisurely lunch and afternoon, just in case we felt poorly. We were meant to be having a Skype call with one of my ex-Hampshire colleagues but this had to be called off at short notice which gave us a clear afternoon. The sun was shining and the weather looked set fair so we immediately thought it was a good opportunity to get the lawns cut. If we were going to feel poorly, this would be in a day or so and not immediately so this was an ideal opportunity to get the lawns cut as it was now ten days since the last cut. Without wanting to sound too neurotic about this, it is necessary to keep up a weekly schedule of lawn cutting until about mid-June as the grass grows so quickly at this time of year. Anyway, this was all done in plenty of time. As a nice bonus to end off the afternoon, my son and daughter-in-law went off to get their own vaccinations a couple of hours later than us. In the absence of anything else, we have some little cards with both our vaccinations dates on it which is the only ‘proof’ that we have been jabbed twice. Our daughter-in-law kindly laminated our cards for us whilst she was doing their own so it is nice to have this record until a more official ‘vaccination certificate’ will be in place (which it surely will be).

It was our normal Sunday morning routine this morning where I go and collect the newspapers almost first thing in the morning and then we watch the Andrew Marr show before setting off for the park. Today when we walked down, there were the occasional blasts of very Arctic feeling air – when these moderated, there was some nice but pale spring sunshine but often so often the icy blasts would return chilling one to the marrow. Not sooner were we seated on our customary bench but we had to ensure a hail storm which was not pleasant to put it mildly. Then we almost had a gathering of the clans with lots of us regulars all coinciding so we had multiple conversations all round. We did have considerable sympathy for an elderly Irish couple that we meet almost every day in the park. Yesterday, we bumped them in Bromsgrove High Street  as they were looking for a local Ladsbrooks so that they could place a bet on the winner of the Grand National. They intended to bet on the woman jockey (who may have been riding an Irish horse) In the event, we heard subsequently that this particular jockey had won – the first time a woman jockey had won the Grand National. When we saw the Irish couple, we assumed that they would be flush with their winnings but it was not to be – they hadn’t managed to find the bookies and hence had not placed their bet (and hence no winnings). Then as we were absolutely chilled we made for home where we had some lamb being prepared in the slow cooker. This I prepared last night before went to bed – coating the lamb in flour and then searing in a frying pan before transferring it to a slow cooker, adding some quickly prepared chicken/vegetable stock and the cooking overnight for some 6 hours. Then I chopped some carrrots and parsnips into minute squares before they got a good boiling (as they were due to be mashed eventually). Finally we washed some ‘pimientos de Padron’ and had them slowly cooking in some olive oil/rapeseed oil before we brought all of the elements of the meal together into our final dish.

As you might imagine, the Sunday newspapers were filled with end-to-end coverage of the death of the Duke of Edinburgh. Most of his numerous ‘gaffes’ were repeated again (probably for the last time) Of the may indiscreet stories that were told about the Duke, I rather liked his quip when Kenya was just about to declare independence. The formula is nearly always the same i.e. just on the stroke of midnight, a spotlight will illuminate the fluttering Union flag, shortly to be replaced by the flag of the newly independent nation. Just before the Union flag was lowered for the last time, The Duke of Edinburgh turned towards Jomo Kenyatta (the first president of Kenya) and quipped ‘I don’t suppose you would like to change your mind?‘ – his reply was not recorded. The second and more contemplative post I got from the newspapers related to the Queen herself. There was some very sympathetic coverage of the grief that the Queen might be experiencing and some analysis that after 73 years of marriage, she might find her few remaining years without the presence of her life long companion very difficult to bear. Let us hope she finds the resources from somewhere to manage the years ahead.

As I was checking the actual date of my graduation with an MSc (see last night’s blog), I discovered one or two things I had forgotten about. The first was a Certificate in the Schools Religious Certificate in which I gained a distinction just before my GCE ‘O’-levels and this certifies me as competent to teach religion in any Catholic school (but this would have to be seen to be believed) The second thing I discovered again was the results sheet from the Civil Service Open Competition examinations I took in 1964 ( which largely mirrors ‘O’-levels – five papers in English, Arithmetic and three voluntary subjects of French, Chemistry and Physics) In these examinations I gained exactly 600 marks out of a total of 900 which evidently gave me an average grade of 66.7. All of the results were placed in order from the highest to the lowest and I remembered that I had been placed 77th/6085 (which is 1.27% in the distribution). The numbers who passed (i.e. gained 400 marks or more which is about 45%, the same as GCE ‘O’levels) was 2662/6085 or 43%. I suppose that in today’s scales of A,B or C these results might have been classified as an ‘A’. Before the GCE was amalgamated with the CSE to produce GCSE, there were five grades of pass (A-E) and it possible, but I can’t be sure, that these marks would have given me an ‘A’ in the old system as well. The first time around, I did actually fail my ‘O’-level Physics which is a bit strange as I had good marks in my mocks, secured a 60 when I reset the exam the following year and it was one of highest grades when I sat the Civil Service exams two years later. Strange but true! Perhaps the examiner had turned over two pages at once but you did not (and were not allowed) to challenge results in those days.

After being told of the death of one of our ex-colleagues from the then Leicester Polytechnic (now De Montfort University), I decided to have a rummage through one of the drawers of our filing cabinet where I suspected that I might have some photos from our Leicester Polytechnic days. My rummaging efforts were rewarded in that I managed to find one photo in which there were ten of us featured, standing up (i.e. not in front of a dining table) in a posed photo with Meg and myself and some 8 other colleagues from the Business School at De Montfort. I am trying to work out from various clues when the photo was taken – we were dressed in rather late 70’s clothes but there again, it was a student ‘do’ so we would all have raided our wardrobes and grabbed some smart-enough clothes i.e. not just especially bought as if for a wedding. If I had to put a time frame on it, I would date it between 1985-1990 but that is still the order of 35 years go. I then established an email contact with the son of our recently departed colleague and told him about the photo I had unearthed. I am probably going to scan it and then make a PDF of it. If I can I will also make a copy of it on some glossy paper and then I can despatch the whole towards Leicestershire. The family may be making some kind of archive of their father and, as we know, it is quite interesting after somebody’s death that the recollections of the departed one very much depends on the role occupied (family member, friend, colleague and so on) In the fullness of time, it might be that we meet with the family and share some reminiscences but this will have to wait until the lock-down measures are such that we can all meet indoors to have a lunch-time meal in a restaurant.

After all of this, we walked down into town and got our newspapers as well as a visit to Poundland to pick up some of the routine things that only that store seems to sell. We then made our way into the park and eventually located ourselves on one of the top benches where we were soon joined by some of our park ‘regulars’  We were all discussing the latest debates concerning the Oxford/AstraZeneca virus and whether or not the ‘brouhaha’ over the blood-clotting dangers are a significant risk or not. One of our regular friends told us that some of the doctor’s clinics were being overwhelmed by people phoning up to enquire of their doctors the relative risks of the AstraZeneca virus and they had neither the time nor the resources to cope with a flood of enquiries like this.

This afternoon when we turn on the TV there is still yet more coverage of the death of the Duke of Edinburgh. But even as I blog tonight, there is a somewhat more critical tone being displayed by some aspects of the media. For example, Channel 4 is broadcasting a documentary revealing things that could not (tastefully) be discussed until an event such as this. For example, Prince Philip felt incredibly excluded from the royal protocols as his first two children were only known by the surname of ‘Windsor’ But how many knew that Prince Philip with the aid of Louis Mountbatten managed to get the family name changed to ‘Mountbatten-Windsor’ before the birth of the 3rd royal child. So it is now being revealed how Prince Philip as the ultimate ‘outsider’ was managing to transform some of the more conservative elements of the Royal Family into something more akin to the 1960’s. Another fact that is emerging is that several films were shot of the royal family in a more ‘domestic’ and less ‘regal’ role – but many of these films having been made have not then been shown – until now that is. Channel 4 might be quite an interesting watch on this subject in the next few days (the BBC would never dare do anything like this of course)

Tonight, we went to church as usual and were part of a congregation of about 45 or so (the current limit) As it was raining cats-and-dogs when we came out of church and we are encouraged to depart quickly, all we managed to do was to wave to some of the regulars that we recognised but at some time we will no doubt be able to socialise a little more easily (e.g. there are occasional functions in normal times in the adjoining parish hall). We will have to wait and see what tomorrow brings, weather-wise, but I want to get the lawns cut again as soon as I can. And, of course, the Sunday newspapers may be full of some reflection and meditation upon the life of Prince Philip and future directions for the monarchy which may be worth a good read.

Today started off as what you might term a ‘normal’ day but it was not to end that way, as we shall shortly see. The day started off with quite a lot of rain in the air and developed into kind of thin drizzle when we started off to go down into the town. We picked up our newspapers and then made for the park where we were pleased to unite/coincide with our University of Birmingham friend who we had not seen for several days. We had quite a lot of news to exchange with other – in particular, we recounted the stories about our ex-Leicester Polytechnic colleague about whom there were many stories to relate, many of them amusing in nature (as yesterday’s blog reveals). On our walk down, we received a call on my mobile from our visiting hairdresser who had been trying to make contact with us for some time. We have an appointment now in our diaries for about a month’s time so we will have to endure our shaggy locks for some time yet. We were exchanging a lot of stories with our friend about what is often known as school boy ‘howlers’ i.e. things written by school children which are the results of stress and half-remembered facts but which now are incredibly amusing. One of these that springs to mind is the story that ‘Sir Francis Drake played with his bowels whilst the Armada sailed up the English Channel‘ whilst yet another reveals that ‘Migration is a headache that birds get when they fly south for the winter‘  Whole books have been written full of stories like these and a few are still genuinely amusing, even to this day.

Whilst we were in the park, I turned on my phone to check something or other and received the news flash that the Duke of Edinburgh had died. Like the rest of the population, I felt a sense of loss for the other members of the royal family but knew that the minute we got home we were going to get ‘wall-to-wall- coverage’ of the sequelae to the death of the husband of the monarch. I was prepared for the fact that the news channels would be dominated by this but not that the BBC went into blanket coverage, broadcasting the historical tributes and stories of the Duke’s life in the most extreme detail on every single channel. I suppose that they must have masses of material ‘in the can’ waiting for this event to occur because it was evident that the Duke was getting increasingly frail. At the age of 99, there were some of who thought that he would not survive his latest stay in hospital where he had yet another heart operation designed to keep him going (was it another stent, I wonder?) I did have the feeling, though, that is he had managed to hold on for another couple of months or so, then he might just have made it to his 100th birthday (on which occasion, the Queen would no doubt have to send him a special letter of congratulations) But having said that, he has probably got at least one letter of congratulation having married to the Queen for over 70 years (73 in fact).

I have a very slight personal recollection of the Duke of Endinburgh as follows. His mother was known as ‘Princess Alice of Battenberg‘ although she had many other titles by which she was known, including Princess Andrew of Greece and Denmark. (Her story is quite a long and convoluted one if you want to follow up that sort of thing via Wikipedia). She had suffered several traumas in her life including deafness and schizophrenia and was given shelter by the present Queen and Prince Philip in quarters in an obscure part of Buckingham Palace. Anyway, she died in December, 1969, three days before the Duke if Edinburgh was due to attend  a graduation ceremony at the University of Salford. Although we had been looking forward to receiving our MSc’s at the hand of the Duke when we heard about the death of his mother three days beforehand and we said to each other ‘Well that’s it – he will never come to Salford now‘. (I checked out the veracity of this statement by rummaging around to find the exact date when I did graduate with my MSc and my recollections were correct) Well, he did come to Salford University and gave us our degrees, exhibiting, no doubt, the old-fashioned sense of duty and devotion to the advancement of the young that we have by now come to expect.

Last night, I was attempting a procedure on my newly acquired IBM ThinkPad and succeeded in somehow messing it up so much that it became unusable. Thinking that I had nothing to lose, I decided to reformat it with a copy of Windows 7 which completely overwrites the version of XP on the hard disk. This has just about succeeded and the version of Windows 7 works OK except it cannot establish any wireless contact with the internet and also seems to have lost all of its sound drivers. Whether this reparable or not, only time will tell.

Today was a sad day in the way in which it started – Meg and I received a phone call from the son of an ex-colleague to inform us that his father had just died the day before. As it turned out, his father was 98 years of age  but in his later years had suffered from dementia but was also both deaf and blind so I suppose his existence may have been a pretty miserable one. His son and I exchanged some reminiscences about how his father – an ex-Royal Navy Commander- never entirely got rid of his military ways and some of his ‘bon mots‘ went down in the annals of our department’s history. One of the most famous of these was the example of a how a group of female students who had just returned from their year of work experience (in which the Polytechnics specialised) were chattering excitedly around a noticeboard when our colleague espied them. He then announced ‘Ah! young ladies! Come into my office and let me debrief you all!’ The students all giggled and I said to him ‘You can’t say that‘ whereupon he responded ‘Well, I really do want to debrief all of these students here and now” Collapse of stout party. We could multiply these tale over and over – but Meg and he worked very closely on the placement of students for about 10-15 years. We expect that the funeral arrangements will consist of a video link into the crematorium proceedings but this will not take place for some time yet.

The morning walk turned out to be more pleasant than we expected – certainly better than yesterday. Having picked up our newspapers, we made our way into the park where the fine weather had brought out the families with masses of young children on their scooters. A glance at the ‘top row’ of seats showed that they were all occupied so we had to satisfy ourselves with our erstwhile resting place by the side of the boating pond. But then one of our park (wheelchair) friends espied us and as we had not seen each other for several days we exchanged our various bits of news. Our friend was due to have second dose of the vaccine tomorrow and as she had been a little poorly after her first dose was not looking forward to the experience. We tried to reassure her that all would be well and we passed on the nostrum that ‘there is nothing to fear but fear itself‘ We gave her our best wishes for the day ahead and got home a little later than usual (our morning walk having been delayed by the Waitrose delivery and by the telephone call concerning our ex-colleague’s demise). 

After lunch, we did a most unusual thing and stayed glued to the TV all afternoon. Sky television are broadcasting the live proceedings of the trial of the policeman who murdered George Floyd. This was the famous (infamous!) case of the policeman who knelt on George Floyd’s neck for 9½ minutes after which he was pronounced dead. The prosecution had called as a witness a world expert on the physiology of breathing (who had written the standard textbook on the subject) and he gave a very detailed and fascinating account of the anatomy and physiology of one’s neck. His conclusion at the end of a long and detailed explanations complete with diagrams, annotated video-stills and even mathematical equations showed the relationship between force and constriction of the windpipe and that the death was due to an absence of oxygen. This expert witness – Dr. Martin Tobin- may prove difficult to challenge but we shall have to see what unfolds tomorrow. As it stands the evidence seems to be beyond compelling. The second piece of TV which absorbed us was the the new US President, Joe Biden and his deputy, intending to row back some of the excesses of the gun lobby and a bring some degree of moderation to the American obsession with guns. I had not fully appreciated the ways in which the controls on guns are easy to evade in the USA – for example, if you buy a gun at a gun store you have to prove documentation on ID and place of residence but none of these restrictions apply if you buy a gun from a gun fair! Also you can buy a ‘ghost gun’ in which you purchase the various parts and assemble them yourself. This is all quite legal and there are no serial numbers on any parts of the guns so can be used by criminals and others. Jo Biden is seeking to use executive orders to order an immediate ban on some of these practices but other measures will require the support of Congress where he is liable to make very little progress, if any at all. So it may be that the mass shootings continue as well as the appalling death toll. Some of the facts Biden adduced are incredible to us in the UK. For example, every day in the US, 316 people are shot, with 106 of them dying. The cost of gun violence, according to the president, is $280bn every year – that’s in hospitals, lawyers, prisons, physiotherapy and lost productivity.

Today it was evident that we were going to get some cooler days – but not the biting artic winds of a few days ago. We collected our newspapers and popped into Waitrose for the odd one or two things we needed before our on-line order arrives tomorrow. As the weather conditions were quite cool, attendance at the park was down this morning but we fortunate just to have a brief respite from the winds whilst we drank our coffee. So it was no great surprise that none of our normal friends would made an appearance today although we did bump into some friends of friends just outside the park gates. So we made our way home in plenty of time for a much anticipated  lunch of fish cakes (which we tend to have about once a week) In order to give our fish cakes a bit of a boost in flavour, I have developed a quick little sauce which just provides a piquant touch (equal quantities of mayonnaise and ‘1000 Island’  dressing with a good squirt of tomato ketchup) then heated up for about a minute in a little glass tumbler in the microwave. This afternoon, we devoted ourselves to glancing through a pile of newspapers and then throwing all of them away as there was nothing of worth to note – this is done at quite a timely time as our ‘green’ recycling bin ia due for emptying tomorrow on a 2-weekly schedule.

The news this afternoon has been dominated by the view of the regulators that there may be an incredibly small risk of a blood clot (approximate risk of 1 in a million resulting in death) with the AstraZeneca virus. There will be a lot of ‘I told you so!’  from some of our continental rivals who always seem to have had their doubts about the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine. The UK advice is now to offer an alternative vaccine to those under 30, probably the Moderna variant. However, the regulators are trying to reassure the population that a vaccine preventing COVID-19 still outweighs the risks of side effects for the vast majority of people. One is left with the thought that it will not take much to deter some people from receiving their jab and they may well be putting themselves at risk. When we were nearly home, we passed one of our near neighbours who told us that the local vaccination centre, a re-purposed Arts Centre, was practically closed as they had run out of vaccine. As Meg and I are due to receive our second jab next Monday, we hope that the authorities know about us and that they have some supplies of vaccine held by for us. Apparently, this lull was known about but supplies should increase in a week or so. We know that supplies of the AstraZeneca virus have been impacted with supply problems at the manufacturing centre in India (who probably need every dose they can possible lay their hands on).

The trial the police officer accused of the murder of George Floyd in the USA is still receiving a lot of media exposure with live testimony streamed from the courtroom. The fact that the prosecution is bringing along witnesses such as the policeman’s own Chief of Police (as well as an army of training instructors) to say that kneeling on a suspect’s neck for 9 minutes whilst they lay prone on the ground was not a legitimate use of force. Conviction would now appear to be a certainty but after the conviction that there may be some weeks before sentencing is passed. It may be the first time in American history that a white policeman is judged to be guilty of a black suspect and hence the massive amount of interest in the case. I have a feeling that there will be a lot more to this case as the days unfold.

When this pandemic started, Meg and I said to each other that this would present us with an ideal opportunity to go through lots of things and ‘declutter’ the house (or the parts of us that we live in). Now that we have been over a year since the start of the pandemic, we might reflect how much progress we have actually made, The answer is ‘ Zilch’ i.e. nothing. One way or another, we seem to be busy as our walks to the park and chatting with friends and acquaintances has assumed a higher priority (as it should, of course) rather than tidying up old cupboards. When I used to speak with people who had to move house for occupational reasons (in the 70’s-90’s), they used to argue that moving house proved to be the best way of not accumulating too much. We have now lived in this house for 13½ years which is quite long enough to accumulate more than we should. There must be a moral in that somewhere.

Today our weather had evidently moderated somewhat – the very clear skies of yesterday had given way to some interesting clouds (some white and fluffy, some evidently moisture-bearing) and whilst there was a coolish breeze, it did not have the severity that we experienced yesterday. So our walk to gather our newspapers was quite pleasant and then we made our way into the park where we thought we would coincide (as we did) with our University of Birmingham friend. After quite a chat and joined by one or two others of our acquaintances (including some who have actually read this blog), the weather suddenly seemed to take a turn for the worse so we willingly decided it was time to return home. On our way home, though, we paused outside the house of one of our oldest friends down the street. We discussed the likely date of  the funeral arrangements for a near neighbour whose husband had died and we speculated that, as soon as the weather improves, we would be in a position to drink tea (or champagne!) in the gardens of each other’s houses. I must say that with the plethora of spring flowers and with all of the flowering trees and shrubs in profusion then all of the gardens down to road are looking a treat. However, there were certainly flurries of snow in the wee small hours of the morning as well as another flurry of snow in the late afternoon. I suppose that it is quite within the bounds of possibility that in a few day’s time we have ‘snowstorms’ which are a strange mixture of actual snow flakes mingling with the blossom from the various trees that are swept off by a gusts of wind.

After we got home, we had one of those rare moments when all of the family members were starting to think about their prospects in the year or so ahead. I suppose there is something about both the time of year and also the start of the end of the lockdown that encourages one to start to raise one’s eyes slightly towards the horizon and wonder what our various prospects for the year or so ahead. Meg and I know that in the fullness of time we will eventually move into our very last house where all the relevant goods and services (not to mention friends) are well within walking distance. This is assuming, of course, that one no longer uses a car (the occasional taxi can be cheap enough) and that you have a house that is perfectly adapted to one’s needs. Why some English people think that retiring to a little village which I could call ‘Little-Puddleton-by the-water’ with one bus a week and no village shop or other services is beyond me. I suppose that the ‘rural’  ideology is strongly implanted in the minds of the populace by estate agents amongst others. I am always amused by the fact that when a new bit of ‘infill’ occurs, there is a desire to advertise it with the symbolism of oak trees and squirrels and exotically sounding names, preferably with the name ‘Orchard’ in it – and this evocation of a rural idyll will sell the houses. I am not sure that other countries romanticise the countryside to quite the same extent that the English do, but I may be wrong in all of this.

Last night, I was playing about with my IBM ThinkPad and wondering if I could get some virus protection on it. Having trawled the web I downloaded an apparently ‘free’ antivirus program with excellent reviews and decided to try it out. It turned out that the ‘free’ bit was only the ability to use it ‘free’ for about three days of evaluation built into it before some money was demanded of you. However, it did have within the suite various functional bits that removed some redundant programs and ‘clutter’ from the computer (which seemed to work very well), as well as removing some ‘start up’ programs which one did not need but which slow the whole start up time. I vaguely wondered if I might happen to have an installation disk for Windows 7 which, indeed, I did locate. However, if you try to install this over XP you have to physically remove all of the XP first and then install Windows 7 in the empty space. I contemplated this for a moment and decided it was better not to upgrade but to be happy with a limited system which I knew did work rather than one which aborted, leaving you with nothing. I also found a legitimate copy of a Norton Internet Security 2011 (complete with its cellophane wrapping) and gleefully installed it – only to discover that the Norton system refused to accept its own Product Key (indicating its authenticity) Nonetheless, some of this suite works as intended and when I have time I will take a camera shot of the product key, send it off to Norton, and ask them to supply me with a code that works (or an updated product).

Today has been a kind of day to defy all expectations. According to the weather forecasts, we should have had an incredibly stormy day with a blast of Artic air to boot. We certainly got the blast of Artic air all right but the skies were blue and clear. The wind was bitingly cold and our hats were anything but secure – but we obtained our newspapers and then went on our way to shiver in the park. We met up briefly with out 10-mile-a-day walking octogenarian but as it was so cold, none of us wanted to stand around for too long chatting. In fact, there had been flurries of snow earlier on this morning and some is still possible in the hillier regions of the country. It was still quite late when we got home and we had to throw together a quick kind of lunch (thank goodness for some Quorn which appears as type of simulated mince – tasty enough with a few spices and brown sauce!)

This afternoon, I spent a certain amount of time trying to configure the versions of Outlook which I have found on my ThinkPad to work with an email account I already with Outlook.com. This ought to be straightforward and despite a plethora of advice on the web I haven’t yet succeeded. I know it is possible to have a web-based email client but I am trying to avoid the web on the XP to avoid the ‘virus storm’ which is out there. I have one or two more options yet to try before I give up entirely.

We have had a further announcement from Boris to the effect that the Roadmap to the gradual end to the lockdown is still on schedule. This means that as from next Monday, shops, hairdressers and pub beer gardens will all be allowed to open. Mind you, Boris is urging a degree of caution and I suspect that as well as socially distancing, we shall all be wearing masks and providing contact details when we enter any establishment. We still have still to make contact with our visiting hairdresser to make sure that we are booked into her schedules. Together with most of the population, I am sure we cannot wait until we get ourselves well and truly shorn. It also appears that gyms will be allowed to re-open so I imagine that means that my Pilates class will resume – I must remind myself to get in touch with my teacher to see if she is going to get us all organised.

Almost inevitably, with the end of lock-down in sight and spring just about upon us, our thoughts are beginning to turn to the next few months ahead. Many of us would have organised holidays, preferably in warmer climes for our major summer break. But the difficulty here is that foreign holidays now seem quite a distant prospect. Even if we had been vaccinated with a couple of jabs and the rate of infection was reassuringly low, what would be the situation in whatever countries we intended to visit? Even for an ardent Francophile, France seems to be absolutely not the European destination of choice. On a similar vain, we cannot start to think about when we can see our closest Spanish friends again. Meg and I have an option for 10 days in Rome (a pilgrimage, no less) in late September but we are putting the possibilities of this coming off as well below 50:50. So forgetting our foreign holidays for a moment, the word of the moment is a ‘staycation’ in which many will stay at home and have lots of trips out. Many of the holiday destinations in England and Wales that have been abandoned in an era of cheap flights are now almost full to overflowing with bookings (so we are given to understand) and I am not sure I particularly want to holiday in over-crowded resorts with lots of my fellow countrymen. Apart from holidays, though, we will probably take the opportunity to visit various parts of the country to visit relatives who got missed out last Christmas. We have at least four trips that we need to make in the next few months ahead but one is wary of booking them at this stage. Meg has three cousins/uncles that we need to see and I have my family in Yorkshire to see but planning is somewhat difficult, in view of the fact that a ‘third wave’ could suddenly rear its ugly head and put all of our plans into the melting plot again. Turning to the world of work again, one wonders how after a year may people will retain a pattern of working for at least one if not two days at home and office attendance will be as valued as ‘gatherings around the water cooler’ i.e. social gossip as well as the work for which one is ultimately attending the office. And if we wanted to really depress ourselves, there is a hidden tide of undiagnosed but developing cancers that might be afflicting some of the population as well as the thousands of children who will be attending secondary schools with depressingly diminished standards of literacy (and numeracy).