It was a beautiful spring day but we had things to do so we did not have much time to enjoy it. Last night, after the church meeting (which ran on for half an hour) I dropped my friend back at his house where Meg had been entertained by his wife in my absence. We did succumb, though, to the temptation of some Jamieson’s whisky on ice as a night cap and I had forgotten how much I actually enjoyed Jamieson’s (Irish) whisky. When we got home it was twenty minutes to midnight so we must have been chatting for the best part of two hours. Needless to say, it was a case of just dropping into bed the minute we got home. This morning we had a couple of telephone calls to make, after which we set forth along Bromsgrove High Street where we needed to consult with our bank over some financial transactions we are shortly to undertake. The Bank gave us some good advice and it was worth having a chat with them. Then we returned home and set to work making lunch from a series of ‘left-overs’ We were expecting a visit from a pysiotherapist (for Meg) but were slightly unsure about the timing. We are just getting to the end of our meal when the physio turned up and he seemed a presentable young man. He gave Meg a range of balance and some other routine tests, each one of which Meg managed to perform much better than when she is left alone with me. We ended the consultation with the promise of some information sheets with balance exercises on them and the possibility of attending some classes which may assist with some of Meg’s balance problems. One bit of advice which may or may not be useful was to experiment with a trekking pole when she walks outside so we will dredge these out of whereever we have stored them and then give it a go. Frankly, I am a little sceptical but it is worth trying anything once.

This afternoon was beautiful and sunny so it was a good opportunity to get the grass mown, which I did. At this time of year, the grass seems to shoot up in front of your very eyes and each day that it remains uncut, one can see the difference. I am reminded that once you start to cut the grass, the very act of mowing releases a hormone which stimulates further growth. The dandelions received their come uppance but I know that it is quite commom to mistake dandelion for another weed known variously as cat’s ear, flatweed and even false dandelion. The last time I studied the profusion of yellow flowers in the verges which border Kidderminster Road, I came to the view that they were cat’s ear and not dandelions but the ones in my own garden will need further study before I can come to a firm conclusion.

There has been an extraordinary foreign affairs story this afternoon. A couple of drones have attacked the Kremlin but it appears they were intercepted and destroyed before they could do very much damage. This has the hallmarks of an assassination attempt against Putin and the Russian military authorities have immediately blamed the Ukrainians and promised an immedate retatiation. For their part, the Ukrainians have categorically denied that they were responsible. Many analysts are of the view that Russia itself was responsible for staging the attack as it would then enable them to pursue the Ukrainianian leader with a vengeance. Whether the truth will emerge is unclear at this stage but certainly the Russians have plenty of incentive to stage such an attack upon themselves so as to mobilise support for the war, particularly in view of the fact that there is to be large military parade in the next few days to celebrate their victories over fascism ie. the end of World War II.

Tomorrow is Election Day and there is an innovation at play in the election process that is likely to provoke masses of controversy. Voter identification is to be required for all those voting in person at a polling station to combat a scale of voter fraud which is practically a non existent problem (of the order of one or two prosecutions per election) This is really just a case of voter suppression which the Republican party in the US have used to good effect to minimise the effect of the Democratic (largely black) vote. Just 50,000 out of an estimated two million voters without ID have applied for the new ‘free’ voter identification certificate ahead of England’s local elections. To compound the problems, in recent days, government ministers have refused to say whether those denied a vote because they have no ID will be recorded. It could be that the big story tomorrow night/Friday morning as well as the normal counts of gains and losses will be the prospect of thousands and possible hundreds of thousands of people denied the opportunity to vote. We are very unknown territory as things stand at the moment but the possibilty remains that this ‘voter suppression’ may become the really dramatic story on election night. Research commissioned by the government found nine per cent of people did not have ‘in-date and recognisable’ photo ID. And certain groups were less likely to have photo ID, making them more at risk from the new measures. Unemployed people, those with a severely limiting disability, and older people were all found to be less likely to hold a form of photo ID. Tomorrow night, we may find out the worst.

I feel that this whole week is a countdown to much more significant events happening at the end of the week (the local election results, the Coronation, our coronation party) Nonetheless, today was going to be quite a busy day but we started off as we always do with a chat with the couple of old ladies who are our pre-pandemic friends, meeting of course in the Waitrose café. We always have a jolly time and today was no exception. One of the things we discussed was what we were going to wear to whatever social events were being organised in connection with the coronation. Principally, it was a matter whether to be patriotic and to wear something red, white or blue or not to bother at all. In my own case, I was already contemplating whether to wear the batik shirt, I acquired whilst I was teaching for a term in Indonesia whilst I was working for De Montfort University. Batik is a traditional method of fabric dying and by applying wax, waiting for it to harden, and then submerging the fabric in dye, the batik method produces beautiful and unique designs and patterns. If the weather is fine, I shall wear this shirt but if we are forced indoors, I have an alternative which is a completely over-the-top psychedelic tie I just bring out for occasions like these, when it is often a conversation stopper. Before we went out this morning, I received a telephone call from our Italian friend down the road and she informed us that she had been invited to the party on Sunday. As I was passing the house of the organisers, I said that I would pay the small financial contribution we are throwing into the kitty to pay for the costs of the food whilst we are all bringing along our favourite tipple, either for our own consumption or those of friends. On the way back home from Waitrose, I popped off at the house where the party is to be held to hand over our friend’s contributions and find out exactly at what time the junkettings were due to start. Then I went down to my Pilates class and apologised for missing last week’s class at short notice as it was the day that Meg and I seized the opportunity to go and lunch with the ‘Old Fogies’ down in Winchester. Walking back up the hill, I was stopped both by our Italian friend and another acquaintance who is going to be at the party as enquiries were being made of Meg’s state of health. Naturally, we are looking forward to the party and there will be about 15-16 of us, most of whom we already know quite well. As an example of ‘wheels within wheels’ the couple who came to the house for afternoon tea just over a week ago are also going to be at the party so this is a good time for us to extend the chats that we had with them the other day. One must say that as summer beckons, there are more and more opportunities for social events and in particular ‘garden party’ type events that are always so enjoyable as we can generally walk to them so not have to be unduly concerned with drinking and driving conflicts.

This evening, I am scheduled to attend the church committee meeting which takes place every two or three months. These are generally quite business-like events but whilst I am out of the house, I am dropping Meg off with our Irish friend whilst I am out of the house for a couple of hours. One never quite knows how these meetings are going to pan out but generally if agenda seem quite light, then discussion expands to fit the time allocated – but if the agenda is full, then it is similarly curtailed to fit the space available. Tonight we are going to be discussing, inter alia, refurbishment of the Parish community centre which would appear to be a simple matter but, in practice, is surrounded by a thicket of planning applications over issues such as windows.

Almost inevitably, a lot of our thoughts are turning to the Coronation of King Charles on Saturday. One little issue which is quite amusing is the famous ‘Stone of Scone’ which traditionally had been purloined by the English from the Scots in centuries past and was incorporated into the Coronation throne. This was being ‘lent’ by the Scots and is now on its own bed of velvet looking material surrounded by two Scottish guardsmen. This is just as well because the Stone of Scone was stolen from the Coronation throne. On Christmas morning, 1950, the stone was stolen from Westminster Abbey by Scottish nationalists who took it back to Scotland. Four months later it was recovered and restored to the Abbey. This event hit the news again quite recently as the last of the Scottish Nationalists who had been involved in rescuing the stone for the Scots and getting it back to Scotand again died recently, being in his 90’s. There is a long range forecast for Coronation day next Saturday and it looks as though we may have a lot of rain in the afternoon – seventy years ago, it poured with rain all day long when Queen Elizabeth was crowned.

Today being the 1st of the month, I chanted the mantra ‘White rabbits!’ three times over to my wife but it had little effect so I got up, resolved to put into effect a few health hints I thought I would commence from the start of the month. I weighed myself for the first time in a week or so and was slightly relieved that I was a quarter of a pound lighter than the last time I weighed myself. Although this is well within the margin of error, it is at least on the right side of the line and I hope to keep my weight drifting slowly downwards as the weeks roll by. But a Danish study conducted at the start of the millenium showed that in the period 2003-13, there was no difference between the death rates of people with a BMI of 18.5 to 24.9 (healthy) and those with a BMI of 25 to 29.9 (overweight), which were 4 per 1,000 per year for both groups. The same study indicated that a BMI of 27 was associated with the lowest death rate – yet this figure is regarded as overweight. Medical researchers and statisticians recognise that the BMI is an incredibly blunt measuring tool and for men the ratio of waist size to hip size is much more important. This is because excess fat in males is likely to accumulate around the midriff and this is not only hard to shift but is the ‘wrong’ type of fat which I will not go into here. After we had breakfasted, I knew that we needed to get to the paper shop before it closed at 11.00am being a Bank Holiday. This we did and then set off for Droitwich where I had an idea for a little trip out for a change. My idea was to explore the path alongside the canal and the River Salwarpe which run parallel to each other at the edge of the town. But today the river and canal banks were teeming with a local fair that had evidently been organised for some time to coincide, no doubt, with the Bank Holday this week and the one following the coronation next Saturday. So we made a circular tour of the kinds of stalls one expects – quite a lot of junky food and a huge bouncy castle-cum-slide for the younger children. The modern exemplars of this have a series of steps up one side and then a long slow slide down the other and it seemed very popular with children aged about 4. So having seen all that we wanted to see, Meg and I made for home where we enjoyed some coffee and elevenses in the comfort of our own home. Then it was time to cook lunch which was a further tranche of our spatch-cocked chicken cooked yesterday but served with a different accompaniment of vegetables today.

Although I do not normally comment upn the TV programmes we have watched, the build up to the coronation next Saturday is providing some opportunities for the programme makers to exhibit their wares. The first of these was a serious programme on King Charles told in his own words and with a lot of unseen footage, mainly from handheld cameras that the Royal Family seem to have used quite extensively to record their family activities in the past. But the second programme in the evening was entitled ‘The Windsor’s Coronation Special’ and was savagely both biting and funny throughout. Two particular moments stand out. One was a reconcilation between Harry and Meghan on the one hand and Will and Kate on the other. This ‘reconcilation’ attempted on about two or three occasions was well rehearsed and was put on only for the benefit of Netflix photographers, conveniently hidden behind adjacent sofas, who needed some footage for the next series they intended to show. I also rather liked the fact that is was decided to scale back the whole of the coronation on economy grounds and to stage the whole event in a Holiday Inn Express in Slough (or was it an empty office block in Basingsoke that was mentioned on one occasion) Camilla was portrayed as so incensed that she was to be denied an ermine robe but was offered a Marks and Spencer utility woollen suit that she had the Corgis slaughtered in order to provide her with some real (and not fake)fur. Meanwhile the two sisters of Beatrix and Eugenie had charge of the dogs whilst they were alive but thought they should be sustained on a diet of sushi. Naturally, this was a Channel 4 production an one could only imagine that the BBC would have lost its license fee method of financing had they even thought about putting anything quite so scurrilous. More is promised tonight on Channel 4 with an examination of the life and times of Prince Andrew.

The Sudan situation is reaching a grisley climax. At one stage it was said that there were 4,000 passport holders waiting to be evacuated. But by today, some 2,122 people have been evacuated on 23 flights from the Wadi Saeedna airfield near the capital Khartoum but more than 1,000 British passport holders may remain. So the 4,000 figure of a few days has mysteriously diminished although I suppose some might have made their way cross country, if possible, to be evacuated from Port Sudan. Denis Healey, the veteran Labour politician who never made it to PM used to say that ‘in war, the first casualty is truth’ which is all too true.

Today marks the start of what is going to be quite a busy week. Tomorrow is the Bank Holiday where we intend to do absolutely nothing and to go nowhere unless the weather turns unexpectedly mild in which case I will get myself outside and finish off the weeding job I started the other day. But being a Sunday, we watched the Politics program at 9.00am which is really just a ‘holding’ program until the results and the implications of Thursday’s local elections can be well and truly chewed over. But we were very pleased to get ourselves installed in Waitrose and in no time at all, our University of Birmingham friend turned up. I managed to surprise him because I took with me a copy of one of the local ‘free’ newspapers that we do not usually see. In this, there was a match report followed by a quote on a noteworthy retirement from Bromsgrove Rugby Club. We asked our friend about this and he was a little intrigued as he had written a match report and included the quote at the end of it on the Club’s website. The local newspaper had evidently visited the website and extracted the quote which was properly attributed but our friend had never actually seen any of what he had posted on the website appear in print in the local newspaper. After this, we amused ourselves by remembering the list of famous adverts that we could remember over the years. I am sure I have seen a programme in the past which has shown the most famous adverts in reverse order (to build the excitement) I think I can remember the top two but I have forgotten the order. One of them is the Guinness advert which is a video ‘tour de force’ in which huge waves are turned into race horses (which sounds odd but is actually very impressive) The second memorable advert is ‘For Mash, get Smash’ which shows little extra-terrestial creatures laughing that anyone would eat actual potatoes rather than buying the product. (Incidentally, I buy cheap packets of mashed potato in Asda when I can see it to act as an instant gravy thickener but being a low cost item it is not always in stock or easy to find) Another memorable advert was the National Coal Board’s ‘Come home to a real fire’ showing a dog, a cat and a mouse lying peacably side by side in front of a fire. Incidentally, I remember the artistic director of this advert explaining how the making the animals cooperate was a piece of cake compared with the squabbles and arguments that arose between the various pet owners as to whose contribution was the greatest. The advert that the Marketing textbooks quote as one of the greatest flops of all time was the ‘You are never alond with a Strand’ cigarette advert. This was shot by Carol Reed, who directed The Third Man and is regarded as technically brilliant. But the image of a man, alone on a rain-filled street, lighting up his cigarette, made viewers think that the cigarette was aimed at lonely, isolated men and sales actually plummeted – hence, the advert had a marked effect but in the wrong direction.

So we got home and had our Sunday lunch of ‘spatch-cocked’ chicken which was actually delicious and not especially overcooked. I made some onion gravy to help make the meat a little less dry and served it with a baked potato and some broccoli. We have a lot of it left over for later on in the week as we only consumed one breast (incidentally, the Americans with a degree of uncharacteristic prudishness call this ‘white meat’) leaving the other and the two legs for later meals during the week. This evening there is going to be a ‘serious’ program on King Charles III which is promising as some never before seen footage is to be shown which might be worth a brief watch. But we are actually more looking forward to two hours of a more irreverent look at the coronation to be broadcast on Channel 4, catering no doubt, to minority views within the viewing public as a whole. I think it is interesting that it is rather an endearing feature of British life that we have an ability to laugh at ourselves and hence a spew of comedy programms which other nations would find offensive. One thinks of ‘Spitting Image’ as the best example of this genre and, sometimes, although they say they do not mind being lampooned, some politicians never actually recover. For example, the example the way in which David Steel was portrayed as a little manikin who fitted in the top pocket of David Owen in the ill-fated alliance of the Liberals and the SDP dealt a blow to his reputation from which it was hard to recover. I can also remember the point at which Margaret Thatcher was portrayed on Spitting Image as absolutely mad (‘staring eyeballs, odd gesticulations’) and which marked the point, to the second, where Tory MP’s started to panic and realised that Margaret Thatcher could not lead them into another election victory and hence her de-fenestration when she failed to secure enough votes to secure an outright victory in a ballot for the Tory Party leadership all of those years ago.

Today was a beautiful and bright spring day but Meg and I nonetheless had a little lie-in this morning. Then it was a case of showering, breakfasting and getting ourselves down to the park. We picked up our copies of the Saturday newspapers and I ascertained what time our local newsagent would be open tomorrow and Monday as opening times can be very variable when Bank Holidays are around. We lunched on some tuna salad which was easy to prepare and just as well because the real ‘shoot-out’ match between the English and French Rugby teams was scheduled to start at 1.00pm. There has been a big build up to this match as Engand and France completely dominate the rest of this year’s opposition. The match started with the French holding a lot of possession, awarded several penalties and hardly let the English team have sight of the ball for the first quarter of an hour. But then the England team ‘clicked’ and suddenly discovered their game plan and natural form and ran in about five tries before half time so that when the interval came, they were beating the French 33:0. But in the second half, the French became a lot more fluent and inventive and also there is a sporting cliché that it was a game of two halves, this was particularly true today. England scored one try but the French scored 33 points (which equalled the England half time score) by running in try after try. But the clock was against the French women and they ran out of time before they could have overhauled the English. One did get the impression that if another 20 minutes was played, the French could well have won this match. But as it stands, the English team were the Grand Slam champions this year which they deserve when putting all of their performances together.

Looking forward to next week, it is going to be quite an eventful week one way or another. After we have the Bank Holiday over on Monday, I have a Committee meeting at the church committee on Tuesday. This meets about once every two or three months and we hope to get all of or business transacted by 9.00pm in the evening which is late enough. On Wednesday, we have a physiotherapist calling round to the house to give Meg an assessment – this had to be ‘pushed for’ through our doctor so it will be interesting to see what he has to offer. Thursday is election day and, of course, nothing happens until the election results start to pour in in the wee small hours of the morning. These are actually local elections upon which the conventional wisdom is that one cannot read too much into the results. But on this occasion, the contests and the results are almost being treated as a ‘dry run’ for the general election which wil be held probably next year. The next United Kingdom general election is scheduled to be held no later than 28 January 2025 but winter elections are never favoured because of the difficulties of campaigning in the winter months, and there is Christmas to contend with. So the political parties may decide that it is better to hold the next General Election in the late autumn of 2024 so the local elections held this year may well be the last big test for all the political parties before the next General Election.I will probably stay up until about 2.00am by which time the general trends should be clear. Of course, some authorities may not start counting until the next morning which means that a lot of the results trickle through on Friday morning. Saturday, of course, is the day of the Coronation so these junketings will take place all day long. The ceremonial parts of these displays of pagentry leave me a little cold but I always look forward to the musical contributions which promises to be a blend of the ancient, the traditional and several new pieces composed for the equation. This coronation is going to be quite scaled down in comparison with 1953 but I think this is quite a sensible policy. For a start, we are living through a period in which living standards are severely depressed and over-ostentation does not seem to be a sensible policy. Also, of course, the degree of monarchial sentiment amongst the young is fast diminishing so that is probably another good reason to keep things within reasonable bounds. On Sunday, Meg and I hope to attend a Coronation party with our friends down the Kidderminster Road – I imagine there will be abot a dozen of us altogether.

This afternoon, as the weather was so fine and the rugby match over by 3.00pm, I thought I would make a start on a little bit of outside gardening. My maim object of interest was to attack the overhanging grass and the weeds in the kerbing which separates our communal green area from the roadway – as this is what visitors to the house might notice when visiting the house, I do have a vested interest in making it look at least tidy. I managed about half of the long length abutting the roadway which is a little more progress than I thought.The other half can be finished off tomorrow if the gods of the weather smile upon me.

Today dawned quite bright and clear and there were several things to which to look forward. Of course, the weather being quite bright although slightly on the chilly side always helps to improve the mood. Friday is the day when our domestic help calls around and we were particularly looking forward to a chat this morning as last week, it was a quick ‘Hello and Goodbye’ to her before we set off for Cheltenham to see Meg’s cousins. After exchanging our news, we made for Waitrose as we knew we would have a meeting with our University of Birmingham friend which is rapidly becoming the norm for our Friday mornings. This was a jolly occasion as always and we chatted about our various comings and goings during the past few days. We needed to buy some bread and was delighted when the Waitrose staff took several high quality loaves and marked them down to 50p – they are going straight into the freezer in any case and we extract one slice at a time when we need it which stops the rest of the bread going mouldy and having to be thrown away. When we got home, we discovered that it was our domestic help’s wedding anniversary the following day. By good fortune we had one or two little items some of which we had just bought on a whim, others of which we had in stock so she had a little bundle of things with which to go home and to contribute just a few rays of sunshine to her wedding anniversary celebrations. This afternoon, I completed putting some refining touches to the configuration of audio that we have in our various living rooms and have now reached the stage where no further improvements can be made. Of course, Monday is a Bank Holday but we have no plans to go anywhere or do anything except that we may take the opportunity to get some gardening done, if the weather improves and we have a nice warm spell. I think that if you can have a good go at any perennial weeds before May appears, then it saves an enormous amount of remedial work later in the season, and vice versa.

Of course, next weekend is the day of the Coronation followed by another Bank Holiday. Our University of Bormingham friend pointed out to us the official ’emblem’ I suppose you could say of the Coronation and we spent one or two minutes decoding rhe elements of it. The first thing to be noticed in the emblem are Scottish thistles at the two ends of a diagonal. Using this as a cue, it becomes evident that the other diagonal has a daffoldil at each end (for Wales) Along the bottom are a row of Irish shamrock and then, you might say, is the Tudor Rose which is placed atop all of the other elements. The Tudor rose (sometimes called the Union rose) is the traditional floral heraldic emblem of England and takes its name and origins from the House of Tudor, which united the House of Lancaster and the House of York. The Tudor rose consists of five white inner petals, representing the House of York, and five red outer petals to represent the House of Lancaster.

There are two big political stories today. The first of these occurred this morning as soon as the report was published on the conduct of the BBC Chairman, Richard Sharp, who subsequently resigned. An independent report found he broke the rules on two occasions by failing to disclose the role he played in helping Boris Johnson secure an £800,000 loan. Adam Heppinstall KC’s review found the former Conservative donor twice breached the code governing public appointments, risking the perception he was not independent from the then-prime minister. Most informed commentators thought that Sharp was almost bound to resign as soon as the report was published. The interesting thing about this case is that Sharp himself was adjudged to be ‘guilty’ and had fallen on his swords as the ancient Romans used to do. However, it was Boris Johnson’s government that engineered and recommended to the Selection Board that Sharp be appointed in the first place, so should the government not itself be censored for trying to ‘nobble’ the impartiaity of the BBC? It seems a strange quirk of the British constitution that the Chairman of the BBC whose role it is to maintain the independence of the BBC should be appointed by the Prime Minister of the day who has an evident interest in making sure that the BBC is at least ‘on side’ and does not overtly criticise the Government of the day.

The second big news story is that a policy of ‘divide and rule’ is seen as paying dividends for the government in their dealings with the Health unions in their dispute over pay. Members of the GMB unions have voted narrowly to accept the Government’s pay offer whilst members of the other two unions, Unison and the Royal College of Nursing have voted equally narrowly to reject the offered deal. What happens now is slightly unclear but it may be that the GMB ‘vote’ outweighs the other two and the pay deal is enforced upon the whole of the NHS striking workers. The situation may clarify in a few days time but ‘divide and rule’ seems to be the order of the day.

Our routine is nothing if not predictable so being a Thursday, it is our supermarket shopping day. I get some money out of the ATM in a nearby supermarket and then proceeded to my normal haunt. This week, it is a ‘chicken week’ and I was briefly tempted by one of those little ‘poulet’ that you can buy – but opted instead for a spatchcocked chicken with rosemary and thyme already in its tin tray so that all you have to do is to bang it into the oven and forget about it for an hour and a half. I tend to overcook chicken in any case becase I have a sneaking suspicion that there might be a fair degree of salmonella around in half-cooked chicken so I prefer to be safe rather than sorry. Then it is a case of getting home and getting the shopping unpacked and Meg washed and dressed. I must confess that I really wanted yesterday to be a quiet day after the long drive to Winchester on Tuesday. But that was not to be as the weather was so fine that I took the opportunity to get the lawns all mowed. But in consequence, I have felt a little tired all day so decided to have a nice quiet day at home. One little thing that I did get done, though, was to consult Google to discover how to turn off the ‘Tyre Pressure Warning’ light on my Honda. It seems that the pressure indicator is very sensitive and quite easily tripped ‘on’ but then it stays on because the system assumes that you have done something to fix the low tyre pressure and then also assumes that you ‘reset’ this warning signal by reinitialising it. Judged by the queries on the internet, it seems that a lot of Honda customers are caught out by this and need to know how to fix it. Anyway, after consulting one or two little video clips, I wrote down the instructions and went out to the car where I got the warning light fixed. I did take the precautions, though, of writing a little email to myself with these instructions written out and I can then run them off on the printer and keep a copy in the glove compartment for next time – assuming there is a next time.

Last night, and completely fortuitously, I switched onto ClassicFM and heard the theme tune from ‘Captain Corelli’s Mandolin‘ – a film I think I have seen twice before. On the spur of the moment, we decided to access Youtube on our Amazon Firestick and got the film in its entirety and without any buffering problems moreover. There were quite a few scenes in the film that I honestly could not remember from a previous viewing and so either my memory is failing or I wonder if previously broadcast versions of the film had been edited a little to fit in to the broadcasting schedules. The film does not receive a very good rating from experienced film critics but I must say that I enjoyed every minute of it and thought the performances of Penelope Cruz, John Hurt and Nicholas Cage were outstanding (but only in my view – the professional critics panned it and thought some of the acting was awful) The interesting historical event portrayed in the film is what happened at the end of the last war. Briefly, the Italians who had occupied parts of Greece surrended and gave their weapons to the local Greek fighters. This was perceived as an act of treachery by the Germans who promptly massacred the Italians. A total of 1,315 Italians were killed in the battle, 5,155 were executed by 26 September, and 3,000 drowned when the German ships taking the survivors to concentration camps were sunk by the Allies. I do not suppose that many people in the UK are cognizant of these happenings but the endgames to wars are always messy.

The political news today has been dominated by the fact that the Government took the Royal College of Nursing to the High Court, arguing that their mandate for a strike runs out half way through the next planned days of strike. The High Court agreed completely with the government and even ordered the RCN to pay the Government costs, which strikes me as being vindictive. It seems to me that this a classic case of winning the battle but losing the war. Winning a court case against the RCN and forcing members to forego going on strike is not going to calm tempers before the dispute gets resolved, the Union will have saved a day’s strike pay and the risk of patients will be mitigated somewhat. Another big story today has been the publication of proposed legislation to update Gambling and Gaming – the last Act was passed before smart phones and online betting beamse prevalent. The Bill has been long delayed and its provisions are generally seen as being weaker tham some MPs anticipated. The gambling industry has spent £200,000 on lobbying Tory MPs to water down the new legislation and it seems as though this money has not been wasted. This is almost as clear a case of corruption as it is possible to see and perhaps is one of the reasons why so many are disillusioned with the curent state of politics in the UK.

Today was evidently the ‘day afer the day before’ so Meg and I resolved to have a fairly quiet day after the long drive of yesterday. This morning, we picked up our newspaper, popped into Waitrose for a few items and then made a journey into the park which we have not visited for a few days. In our trip towards the bench upon which we normally sit, we were greeted by two separate couples who had enquired about our whereabouts. During the height of the pandemic, of course, we tended to come to the park every single day come rain or shine but with the onset of inclement winter weather and the call of acquaintances from Waitrose, we have tended to congregate there several times a week to have our coffee. The two couples who greeted us in the park today were used to seeing us, if only from a distance, on a daily basis but as we have not made our presence felt quite so much in the park of late, they hoped that nothing had befallen us. It is really quite heartwarming that others that you scarcely know should look out for you but we were at pains to reassure them that apart from the ravages of time that slows all of us up, no particular misfortune had befallen us. Then we met with a very interesting chap who observing Meg’s mobility difficulties showed us a very special type of elbow crutch which he was using obtained from Amazon. This chap had been a very keen walker as the local leading light of the Ramblers Association but had suffered some health problems which involved a lot of pain walking as his sciatic nerve was badly affected. But he argued that this particular piece of apparatus had made a dramatic difference to him and he could now walk pain-free for much longer distances. I have found the particular unit to which he was referring on Amazon and it was not inordinately expensive and as it had received such a glowing endorsement, I will have a dicsussion with Meg about it. We anticipate having an in-house visit from a physiotherapist so we can have a discussion about this particular piece of equipment once he has observed Meg in action, as it were.

We had a fishcake lunch and by the time that lunch was over, the cloudy skies had cleared and we started to get some much more evident springtime sunshine.So this was a heavan sent opportunity to get the lawns cut so I seized the moment. Miggles, the local tabby cat, who has adopted us made his presence felt and as we have not seen him for a couple of days I gave him a little treat. The cat tolerated the mowing and then trotted round the back asking for more which is a bit like Oliver Twist personified. The weather is still quite cool for late April but the weather forecasters tell us that a blast of Saharan air is due over the next few days. I am just getting my head around the fact that we are to have three Bank Holidays in May: Early May bank holiday on 1 May, Bank holiday for the coronation of King Charles III on 8 May, Spring bank holiday on 29 May. I find that Bank Holidays tend to play havoc with one’s prescriptions and the like so this year, I shall try to make sure that I am well organised.

There are enormous rows going in Parliament this evening. The immediate sources of conflict are the final stages of the Illegal Migration Bill which will pass through the Commons this evening but in all probability will receive the rockiest of rides in its passage through the House of Lords. Today, in an interview with Sky News this morning, Suella Braverman said there was no good reason for someone to leave Sudan and claim asylum in the UK after travelling on a small boat across the Channel. She said the UNHCR was operating in the region and ‘they are the right mechanism by which people should apply if they do want to seek asylum in the United Kingdom’. The UNHCR has immiately hit back and has issued a statement about claims that refugees can apply for asylum in the UK through the UNHCR. The agency said it ‘wishes to clarify that there is no mechanism through which refugees can approach UNHCR with the intention of seeking asylum in the UK.’ So there is a direct conflict of evidence here. Meanwhile, in the debate itself figures such as Teresa May and Ian Duncan-Smith have given Suella Braverman what is claimed to be a ‘torrid time’ on the floor of the house. The most immediate concern is that Suella Braverman is absolutely ruling out a ‘safe and legal route’ out of Sudan (and just a reminder that the UK was an ex-colonial power in this area) This means that any child or victim of modern slavery who manages to escape from the conflict in Sudan will be deported to Rwanda if not immediately then the minute they are judged to be 18 years old. Although Rishi Sunak is said to have made a series of compromises to help to buy some of the rebels, the stark fact is that refugees from the Sudan face a most unwelcome time if they attempt to enter the UK.

Today has been one those really life-affirming days, as I shall shortly recount. Last night, fairly late in the evening and with a very heavy heart, I emailed the members of the ‘Old Fogies’ dining club (ex-University of Winchester colleagues) with the news that I would not be able to make our planned reunion in Winchester the next day (being today, Tuesday) But Meg and I felt really buoyed up by meeting for afternoon tea with our new-found friends yesterday and Meg felt that she was quite up to making the trip today. We decided to see how Meg felt in the morning after a night’s sleep whilst I did some research on nearby car parks nearby to the restaurant. The restaurant was more than helpful as its website had a clickable link with the location of nearby car parks. There was one about half a kilmetre away with space for over 400 cars so I suspect there would always be some spaces available in this. The car park itself was probably built to serve the needs of the County Council Offices which used, when I worked in Winchester, to have premises almost adjacent to this multistorey. Much later in the night, I accessed my emails and was incredibly touched by the very heartwarming emails I received in response to my earlier email notifying colleagues of my non-attendance. So encouraged by this, Meg and I were quite keen to make the journey by car and it was a beautiful fine spring day which ought to make motoring easy. The journey itself was uneventful apart from a section where they were renewing the central reservation barrier and had squeezed the other lanes so that the presence of large lorries adjacent to one encouraged a degree of nervousness. When we got to half way point we stopped and had our elevenses in one of the numerous parking areas which are quite common along the dual carriage way of the A34. The only slightly unfortunate blip on this journey was trying to make a toilet visit at one of those service areas where you actually have to leave your the carriageway to access a service area which is off a roundabout off another roundabout i.e. not properly contiguous to the carriage way as is the case with ‘proper’ service stations along the course of a motorway. I must say I have a particular dislike of wat I might call these indirect service areas. My dislike was intensified when the one that Meg and I decided to access seemed completely closed with cones across the access roads, yellow stickers over the doors and occasional personnel calling out to the odd intrepid souls like ourselves that the whole site was closed. But the car park for which we were destined had a post code which meant that our SatNav could locate it easily which it did. When we got to the carpark, we found one space available on the ground floor which I seized but then quickly worked out why the space had been left vacant as once you were in the space, its proximity to a pillar meant you could not actually get out of the car. But I looked across one of the roadways and noticed someone who looked as though they were just about to leave as they seemed to be fiddling about in the space. Eventually, though, it transpired that it was one of our University of Wichester friends, parking his car for the same lunch appointment. Needless to say we were both delighted, and amazed, to see each other as of all of the people you might meet in the carpark, we were not expecting to see each other. Then we made our way as a trio to the restaurant which was very helpful as Meg had two males to support her over any tricky kerbs.

When we got to the restaurant, we were greeted with mutual delight by one of our number who was there early and, of course, having received and replied to my email of last might was not expecting to see us there. I think we were a group of 8-9 altogether and I thnk it is fait to say that a marvellous time was had by all as we enjoy each other’s company so much. Incidentally, this little dining club started off as a joint birthday meal some twenty years ago as by coincidence there were about 5 of us who all had birthdays in May and pretty close to each other. Of course, over the years we have all gradually relinquished our links with the University of Winchester but, as a matter of interest, I wonder how many groups of ex-colleagues are still in regular contact on a twice yearly basis after so many years? I am sure that it must happen but I do not suppose it is a very common event. We finished off the meal at about 3.00 having started at 12.15 and we made our way home in glorious sunshine. The only thing to mar my journey home was a warning light indicating a low trye pressure. I called in at a garage attached to a service area and ensured that all of the tyres were correctly inflated. But the warning light did not go out on the dashboard – I have a vague memory of this having happened before but I think the not very intelligent sensor system does not reset itself once a warning light as been triggered even though the type pressures have been checked. I think a quick visit to QuickFit might ensue tomorrow morning.

Today dawned somewhat wet and gloomy but it could be that some better weather will be with us in a few days. After we had breakfasted, Meg and I made a journey along the High Street because we needed to pay a brief visit to the bank and we also, en route, collected one or two stationery items that I need. Then we popped into Waitrose to buy some provisions for our little tea party this afternoon. After we had bought a basket of goodies one of the shop assistants well-known to us pressed a bunch of roses into our hands to help to make the party go well (if there is any doubt why we continue to shop in Waitrose, perhaps all is now explained). When Meg and I got home, we treated ourselves to a big bowl of tomato soup, anticipating that we might be chomping on some tea-time goodies half way through the afternoon. I spent the latter part of the morning preparing some dainty little sandwiches (beef, tuna, cheese) that I made the centrepiece of our tea-time offerings, supplemented by some cake, biscuits and other treats. Then our friends arrived just after 3.00pm as arranged. We had a very interesting afternoon, as it turned out. The daughter of our friends had lived both in Spain and also in Mexico – as our son had spent a year’s scholarship in Mexico before he went to university in the UK, we had a lot to chat about. We explained how a series of accidents had, in essence, led to the interests that Meg and I have in all things Hispanic and a couple of hours seemed to speed by so rapidly. It may well be that we will have further meetings in our garden if and when the weather improves.

The news is still dominated by the terrible conflict in the Sudan which seems to be being torn apart. It appears that the French, Germans, Italians and Spanish have all managed to evacuate all of of their citizens but there are many, many British citizens in the Sudan and they number about 4,000. The official government advice is for them to ‘stay indoors’ as the streets are so unsafe which is understandable but the government is tight-lipped about whether there are plans afoot to try a mass evacuation. One can see a disaster of Afghanistan type proportions starting to build up here. If the government do attempt a mass evacuation, it will logistically be incredibly difficult and no doubt many will be left behind to fend for themselves. On the other hand, to do nothing would appear to be the most enormous dereliction of duty by a state towards its own citizens and one is left with a feeling that not for the first time, the Foreign Office will be shown to be completely negligent.

The Coronation of King Charles III is to take place on Saturday, May 6th and there is an increasing momentum of interest in this event. It looks as though much of the population will follow the events of the day in TV but there are some parties and communal events planned around the day of the Coronation itself. Speaking for ourselves, some of our close friends who live down the Kidderminster Road are planning a Coronation party for friends and neighbours, probably out in their garden if the weather is as fine as the weather forecasters seem to think that it might well be. To some extent, this is quite a communal event because we are sharing the costs of all of the food and will be responsible for bringing along some of our favourite tipples. Today, I called in at our neighbour’s house to the way back from town to make sure I was up-to-date on some of the final arrangements for this get together. Almost inevitably, my mind goes back to the events surrounding the coronation of the late Queen in 1953 when I was only eight years old. In those days, only 14% of the population had a TV set in 1952 and this proportion increased very rapidly to 21% in 1953. But as these bald statistics show, four out of every five people did not have a TV but I imagine that lots of family, friends and neigbours invited others inside their houses to watch on little 14″ black and white sets. My own family circumstances were such, at that time, that I think I probably listened to the Coronation service on our family radio. My memories at the time were that at school we seemed to spend an awful lot of our time colouring in cardboard cutouts of the coronation coaches and the uniforms of some of the various ceremonial guards in the procession. But about a week or so afterwards, all of the schools were taken to the cinema so that we could then see all of the glories of the coronation in full colour. Also announced on Coronation Day was the news that Everest had been climbed for the first time by Tensing and Hillary. A film was also shown called ‘the Conquest of Everest’ so this made our cinema visit doubly exciting. Each child was also given a special Coronation Mug and we used ours as a daily piece of crockery for years into the future. I am sure that many of these coronation mugs, of which there must have been millions, are lingering at the back of some kitchen cupboards but I must admit that I have not actually seen one for a long time.