Last night, the two carers putting Meg to bed were the young Asian male worker who we have got to know very well over the months and a new recruit who was assisting him and was on only her second visit to our house. However, she is the mother of three young children so there are practically few problems that she not yet encountered and although she was learning the intricacies of her new role, we thought she was a ‘natural’ and did all of the right things. Now I am asking all of the carers who come to the house if there is any of my book stock that might interest either members of their own family or nieces and nephews a generation below them. As part of the shelving that I am shortly to clear, I found two little books, one a pocket-sized encyclopedia and the other a ‘Little Book of Facts’. I also had in my possession an absolutely beautifully illustrated children’s encyclopedia which I bought from a charity shop for Meg over a year ago now and which I thought would engage her interest in her then state of health. But, sadly, this book is now beyond the comprehension of Meg and so, with a slightly heavy heart, I added this book to the other two and then offered all three to the care assistant for her children. She told me that all of her children were avid readers and she looked absolutely delighted at the gift of the books and thought that her children would really enjoy them. Needless to say, it gives me a great deal of pleasure that these books will be removed (unread) from my bookcase and put into the hands of a younger generation who will appreciate them so I am off to a start with my book disposal activities. I roughly estimate that we have about 700 books in the study and another 300 split around various locations in our main lounge so now only another 997 to go. I think one of the newer care workers who is due round later on in the day might be interested in the odd one or two. The last time I got rid of a whole series of books was when my collection of sociology books had been relegated to the garage where we used to live in Leicestershire. It always amused me that in the garage, one of my social policy books which might be regarded as ‘soft and pappy’ by some academics had been well and truly chewed by a mouse but the much harder and more analytical hardback book on the principles of Marxist economics had proved indigestible to the said mouse who had left it unscathed. I made a start on tackling one of the corners of my study where I have several files of papers stored on a high stool. Making some progress in this direction I even went out to where I had dragged my paper collection bin at the end of our drive, ready for collection the first thing the following morning, to ensure that even more redundant printouts could join the almost overflowing bin.

Yesterday morning, I was just about finishing breakfast with Meg when the carer turned up as the ‘ sit’ session whilst I go out and do the shopping. Whilst I was out, she entertained herself a little by reading ‘The 100 – a ranking of the most influential persons in history’ written by a certain Michael Hart. After she had departed, I put on YouTube to see what they had to offer and started to enjoy the first selection that the channel had made for me which was a rendition of Bach’s Matthew Passion. This was playing when the two carers came to make Meg comfortable in the late morning and, as we had some time to spare, I pointed out to them that I was introduced to Matthew Passion at an early age of about 14 and explained how we had two music lessons a week, one being standard musical theory and the other being a life of a great composer. I explained how the school I attended had a reasonable but certainly not outstanding musical tradition and that I was in the choir and ‘de facto’ leader of the 2nd violins in the school orchestra. But the outstanding part of the school’s musical tradition came from the brass band of which I was not a member. I explained how the band used to participate in the ‘Whit walks’ held in all of the Lancashire cotton towns. Not having heard of the Whit walks, I took the two carers into our study to show them the illustration of the Whit walks in a Lowry print that we had, explaining the Lowry style (adored by some, hated by others) This led onto the explanation that our son played the clarinet (cue a quick YouTube rendition of the Mozart clarinet concerto) before his interest in the clarinet waned under the combined influence of young women, railway engines and photography. I explained also how in the 6th form the all boys school Martin attended joined forces with a nearby girls school to produce a play one year and an operatic production the next. Our son had a part in an Offenbach production where much to the horror of some of the more prudish mistresses the highlight of the girls contribution to the opera was a performance of the can-can. The masters of the boys school, the male pupils and the female pupils all enjoyed this tremendously whilst the prudish mistresses of the girls school had to endure the sight of what they imagined to be the pure and virginal girls under their charge perform a high kicking can-can. All of this was eye-opening to the two carers, one quite young and other in her thirties and I appreciate now how very non-uniform of the different cultural influences at work in the UK. I honestly did not want to be a show-off but just to provide an explanation of how one’s tastes came to be formed. And so, we came to lunch which was an interesting combination of various elements being some Ravioli (from Italy), some ‘Spicy Chorizo and Chilli Cheddar rollitos’ (from Spain, ex-Aldi) and supplemented by an Indian samosa ( donated to us by our Asian neighbours).

We learn today that the White House is negotiating ‘trade deals’ with more than 15 countries, including the UK and after the USA vice-president J D Vance issued some helpful comments, there are fingers crossed within Whitehall that something better than the 10% general tariff announced for the UK might emerge as trade between the USA and the UK is approximately in balance anyway. But proper trade deals take months of detailed negotiations so one wonders what is being cobbled together at great haste by the current American administration. What we do know is that the Republican party had been spooked after the initial announcement of sweeping tariffs which led Donald Trump to announce a 90 day pause after the new policy had only been in effect for a week. All of this might sound very remote from our shores but it is real British jobs and the British economy that is being impacted so it is no wonder that a degree of nervousness abounds. It s being said by some commentators that here in the UK we have a strategic choice to make which is whether to ally ourselves with our nearest and biggest trade partner (which is the EU) or rely upon negotiated with a widely unpredictable USA. The word ‘on the street’ is that, despite Brexit the UK’s best interests are served by a quiet alignment with EU standards so that our trade with the EU can be consolidated and attempt a more distant relationship with the USA. After all, economists and analysts at Cambridge Econometrics found that after Brexit, by 2035, the UK is anticipated to have three million fewer jobs, 32% lower investment, 5% lower exports and 16% lower imports, than it would have had been had we not withdrawn from the EU. If one wants to be truly pessimistic, hen there is no point wishing for an end to Donald Trump and what we might term ‘Trumpism’ There is quite a strong feeling that in four years time, the current USA vice-president J D Vance, who is a real nasty, will carry forward the Trump agenda with a vengeance and may well serve for two terms meaning that we have about eleven years of Trumpism to endure. Although we like to think of a ‘special relationship’ with the USA, this is not readily manifest.

I am still in my ‘decluttering’ mode and have turned my attention to the study, now that my desk and the neighbouring ‘stationery’ bookcase have been tidied up. I think that is best to tackle this task one shelf at a time on a daily basis and I may take the opportunity to prune some of books (approximately 700) I have accumulated after nearly 40 years in Higher Education. I did once throw an academic book away (entitled, as I remember ‘Local Government in England and Wales’) which was dated as 1946 assuming it to be worthless. But it is possible that there are historians who might found things of value and some of the books, for example in statistical theory will still have valid content. I did have a thought that a nearby university might have some interest in some of the book collection but I need to do some investigations to ascertain whether this would be the case or not. I have already given away any of the psychology books that I have to any of the carers studying psychology as part of their BTEC courses and I think I should see of any of them would be interested in any of the management books that I have. After a very rapid Google search, I think I have discovered a source that is interested in collecting the library of ex-academics (for a fee) with a promise that no books will end up in landfill but I will investigate this further when I have a chance.

The morning started off quite frantically as our domestic help called around this morning and this coincided both with the visits of the carers and also with our son who popped around. I was pleased to have purchased the Easter chocolate for him and his wife before they journey south for the weekend. In the middle of the morning, the hairdresser called around and as I had this well and truly calendared, I ensured that the care workers washed Meg’s hair before the hairdresser had called around. Then Meg was wheeled in her chair into the kitchen where it is easier to sweep the hair clippings off the textured flooring. After I had lunched, a district nurse called around but after a quick consultation, it became apparent to both of us that Meg needed to be hoisted (by the care workers) onto the bed so that the district nurse could do a proper examination and reapply any dressings that proved necessary. So we agreed a time that the nurse would return to coincide with the afternoon visit of the carers, which she did and reapplied three dressings to pressure sores

This morning, I received a text from our friends down the road indicating that they had not forgotten that next month is a significant birthday and they were thinking about organising a meal for us at a local Holiday Inn which does Sunday lunches and only a few hundred metres away i.e. within walking range of a wheelchair for Meg. I discussed this with my son and our domestic help, and we think it is a marvellous idea – as my son is now retired, it could be that we have a family meal on one day and another meal with friends on another day. Falling on a Sunday actually gives us some good options – sometimes restaurants are closed on a Monday if they have been open during the weekends, for example. Thinking about my age reminds me that we should really think of ourselves as being three ages (at least) The first of these is the chronological age dating from the year in which an individual is born. A second way of looking at age is biological age which is the condition of your internal organs were a pathologist to perform a post-mortem on your dead body. Finally, we might add a mental age – some people think of themselves as being much younger than they actually are. No doubt we could extend this further with things like emotional age but three ages is enough for most people.

Yesterday, I was completing my tidying-up activities by going through a cardboard box containing some Christmas cards from years before. Why I had retained them, I am not sure but I did glance at each one before throwing them away. Towards the end of the pile, if not at the very bottom, one particular card caught my eye and it was not a Christmas card but a card some 8″x 4″ in landscape mode and on the front was a pen-and-ink illustration celebrating the 1000th year anniversary, and some of the classic buildings, of the town of Krems in Austria. But what I found inside amazed me. It had evidently been signed by all of the participants in a linguist’s ERASMUS (= European Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students) conference. It had been signed by 20 participants which I should imagine was everybody attending the conference and was addressed to Meg and apart from English, there were messages in German, Dutch, French, Italian and Spanish. What brought tears to my eyes, and made this find so remarkable, is that so many of the conference delegates said how much they missed Meg and they hoped she would soon be restored to health. I think that Meg realised, even at the time, that her back would get her in the end and it did indeed force an early retirement. At a previous conference, held in Thessaloniki, Meg had even engaged in the Greek custom of dancing on the restaurant table (a local custom) after the conference dinner and one of the contributors to the card made reference to this. Meg even informed me at the time this event was photographed but I think neither Meg nor I ever saw the photo. What I found so incredibly poignant about the card, which had lain at the bottom of this box for about thirty years, was the evident affection and esteem with which Meg has held by these conference colleagues. The group was incredibly supportive of each other and I know that Meg was particularly friendly with a Flemish delegate (called, as I remember Martine) and Meg had helped to care for her when her friend was confined to bed with a stomach upset. So I shall treasure this card and will, perhaps, with write out each of the contributions (with a translation) in such a form that family and friends can read it. Looking back on these times, I suspect that Meg was really in her element with this international group. The Erasmus network organised exchanges pf students and sometimes staff (including myself on one occasion) organised and the ‘rules of the game’ were that there had to be a network of universities participating in any particular scheme to avoid too cozy an arrangement if only pairs of universities were involved. And, as a reminder, when the invitation came to Leicester Polytechnic (later De Montfort University) to participate in an Erasmus network, it was Meg who translated the letter as it was written in Spanish. Later Meg was to organise the Erasmus scheme for our students which generally involved getting them up to a working knowledge of Spanish after a year’s intensive study and this was an addition to her ‘normal’ job of a placement tutor of the Polytechnic’s sandwich degrees. I am glad now that I had glanced at each card as part of my clearing up activities because had I thrown away the whole bundle without perusal, then this really valuable artefact and reminder of Meg’s life would have been thrown away- as it was, it had lain hidden at the bottom of a box for the best part of 30 years.

After we had breakfasted, I tucked Meg well into her chair and we set forth down the hill. The weather was a little overcast and cloudy and cooler than of late but not really cold. We met up with our friends in Wetherspoons as we normally do each Tuesday and I told them about the discovery of the signed card for Meg that I had made the previous day. We had a little time in hand so I bought some cosmetics as well as Vitamin D and calcium tablets and then made off for Waitrose. It is an interesting philosophical question how old one’s children have to be before they become offended by not receiving an Easter egg so I made for the Waitrose selection that I knew would be expensive but of high quality. I bought a couple of innovative chocolate products for my son and daughter-in-law and was also treated by one of the staff (known as ‘partners’) who knows us so well with a gift of yellow roses for Meg and then we made our way slowly up the hill. We had not been in for very long before the lunchtime carers turned up and we made Meg comfortable in her specialist chair. We also put on Meg some specialised therapeutic boots which I have christened Meg’s ‘elephant feet’ because they keep her ankles and feet beautifully cushioned whilst she is in her chair. I did not feel particularly hungry today and did not feel like starting to cook our normal risotto as it was getting a little late so I made do with a baked potato and some melted grated cheese.

Trump has a policy of seizing people who he wishes to deport and entrusting them to a notorious prison in El Salvador. Some days ago,, because of an administrative error, a US citizen was deported to this gaol and the Supreme Court has ordered that Trump should facilitate his release. But Trump and his lawyers are arguing that the USA has no legal power to order the release the inmate of an El Salvadorian gaol even if there because of an administrative error that caused the inmate to be there in the first place. So now we have a situation in which Trump can consign to an El Salvadorian gaol whoever he likes and, once they are there subject to no trial or legal process, they could remain for the rest of their lives. One can imagine this happening in the most autocratic and totalitarian of regimes but the realisation that it is happening in contemporary America makes the blood run cold. After a recent onslaught by Russian missiles of a city in the Ukraine, Trump is now saying that ‘Ukraine started the war’ and therefore must accept anything that Russia throws at it. Modern warfare is dominated by drones (on both sides) and one can predict that the warheads that they carry will only get more powerful as the technology advances.

It was particularly pleasing for me yesterday that I managed to get the back lawn cut and the mower, even with its temporary ‘girlie hair band’ repair, behaved itself. I am ultra careful, though, these days when I need to manoeuvre the mower under low hanging bushes with the left-hand side of the mower because I have learned, from bitter experience, that this is most likely to cause problems in the future. We only had a few spots of rain in any case and so the weather was kind to me. Yesterday was ‘Boat Race’ day and this was held on a Sunday rather than a Saturday this year, probably because of the tidal forecast. I always think that the boat race is often decided within seconds because whoever establishes a lead rarely has it overtaken. Before the race, there was a lot of talking up of how close the race was going to be this year but, in the event, Cambridge established an early lead which they gradually increased and increased and won by some five and a half lengths. What I found interesting this year was the commentary to account for the success of Cambridge for six times in the last seven year. Although both teams will have trained incredibly hard physically, the Cambridge success was attributed to their superior team spirit which shows that the race is as much played in the head as it is on the river.

The latest trade in tit-for-tats in tariffs between the USA and China implies that trade between the two economies will effectively sink to near zero. The big tech chiefs who rely so much upon China for iPhones and other electronic components are getting seriously worried and have forced exemptions on the Trump regime for iPhones and other critical components. The thought that the manufacture of iPhones could be brought in-house to the USA is ridiculous. The reality is it would take three years and $30bn in the estimation to move even 10% of its supply chain from Asia to the US with major disruption in the process. For US consumers, the reality of a $1,000 iPhone being one of the best-made consumer products on the planet would disappear as the cost an iPhone would practically double. The electoral consequences of this are so severe that it looks as though the Trump regime capitulated quickly. Another thought is circulating that in the face of practically zero trade between USA and China, all hell will break loose once the three months supply chain is gradually emptied and America would head for recession and even more massive disruption to its economy. Here in the UK, the powers that be are starting to re-evaluate the trade relationships that we have with China in view of what has happened to our steel industry. There is a suspicion, as yet unproven, that the Chinese owners of the British steel industry may have deliberately ‘pulled the plug’ on the Scunthorpe steel works because by doing so they have harmed the economy of a major competitor and, more importantly, opened the way for a flood of cheap Chinese steel imports. There are also concerns that allowing the Chinese to build some of our nuclear reactors was a big mistake because there is the opportunity of embedding chips which could threaten the integrity of the whole.

In the morning, we were not destined to have a morning out and the weather was a bit dismal and overcast on any case. I busied myself with the bookcase tidying and filed away some of the Christmas card paraphernalia in a space I had located in our filing cabinet. To make sure I do not forget where I have put things, I made some quite conspicuous labels for inside the filing cabinet and am also going to make a note of where things are which I will enter in a special little book which I am bringing into use. Lunch consisted of a chicken breast, seared and then cooked in a lasagne type sauce and served with a baked potato and some Cavolo Nero kale. I was pleased that Meg managed most of her portion. In the afternoon, our son called round and it was particularly nice to see him after a gap of a few days. He came bearing a Lindt Easter chocolate bunny to which we will look forward in a few days time. My son and I had a fair amount to communicate with each other what with one thing or another and he had not departed long when the afternoon carers called around, a little early as it happened. The same pair were due back later on tonight but a bit later than I would have liked so I am negotiating a slightly earlier than scheduled visit from them if this can be arranged.

In the USA, several cases in which Trump has been challenged are ending up in the Supreme Court which is dominated by Trump nominees. One case on the deportation of ‘undesirables’ to El Salvador are among several which, collectively, represent legal checks and balances on the power of Mr Trump. He has been told he can use an archaic law to deport people, but they have the right to a fair hearing. There are more than 200 languishing in an El Salvadorian prison who had no hearing at all. Reacting to the court’s ruling, Lee Gelernt, of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said: ‘The critical point is that the court rejected the government’s remarkable position that it does not even have to give individuals meaningful advance notice to challenge their removal under the Alien Enemies Act. That is a big victory.’ The Court will not give Trump everything that he wants even though it naturally leans in his direction. What is the sticking point for some of the Supreme Court justices is Trump’s total disregard for the rule pf law. When he has been ruled against, he has suggested that the judge trying the case should be impeached or removed and this attack on the principles of the legal system are even too much for the Supreme Court to countenance.

This morning dawned as one of those ‘glowering’ types of days in which the sky appears quite leaden as the country is under a blanket of cloud as rain is due to sweep in from the South West. I was pleased to have got the lawns cut yesterday, even though I was quite tired having pushed Meg up and down the hill to meet with our friends as we typically do each Saturday morning. When I was cutting the lawn to the front of the house, our Asian neighbour came out to have a few words. They are excellent neighbours, but I hardly ever see them as they often away cruising around the world. They had just got back from a trip to Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Japan stopping over at the Punjab (their ancestral home) where they stayed for a month. I updated them about Meg’s state of health, and they were incredibly sad about it. Yesterday, the day after I had spoken with a neighbour he came over with a big box of chocolates and a bag full of samosas which his wife has just cooked for us. They assured me that I could always rely upon their support in the difficult days to come which sentiments were very much appreciated. In the meantime, I would love to make the most appropriate dip to eat with the samosas – I have plenty of Greek yogurt but not the other spices that are often recommended to accompany a samosa. I may experiment a little with the herbs in our spice rack. When the young female Asian carer next calls around, I will ask her advice and take a recipe from her and she may have some spare spices for me to try. The one mentioned most is ‘cilantro’ but I am not quite sure if I have ever seen this on sale.

On our way down the hill, we passed our Irish friends who were deep in conversation with another neighbour, but they reminded me that they had not forgotten my birthday on the 11th of next month and they had in mind to organise an event such that Meg could attend as well as myself. Perusing our calendar for next week, I see that I have nothing more exciting than a visit from our hairdresser and our chiropodists to which to look forward later on in the week but I am very pleased that Meg and I are plugged into these particular networks so that we have session on a regular, monthly basis. I forgot to mention that the day before, the Eucharistic minister had called around from our local church and had brought with her a large box of chocolates for Meg which we can start to consume in about a week’s time after Easter Sunday has dawned. This morning, after the carers had seen to Meg, I popped out to get our Sunday newspaper and had hoped to get a call from our University of Birmingham friend who we often see each Sunday morning. But the call never came so I turned on ‘YouTube‘ to see what was on offer and a selection of Easter music was available. I chose Bach’s ‘Matthew Passion’ which I always find to be unbelievably poignant. I first heard this, and the closing aria (In English, ‘In tears of grief, we leave thee, Lord’) has stayed with me to this day. The way that Bach wrote the musical phrase upon which the word ‘l-e-a-v-e’ is sung is the nearest thing to a musical sob it is possible to imagine. When I first heard this piece as a boarding student at Thornleigh College in Bolton, Lancashire, it was a beautiful bright day probably on Maundy Thursday and I had some time to spare before I went off to catch my train to go back to Harrogate in Yorkshire. I was alone or practically alone in the Music Room (to which as boarders we had access in case we wanted to practice on our various instruments, mine being the violin) and the music made a tremendous impression on me at the age of 14 which has remained with me to this day.

I switched on ‘The World at One’ on Radio 4 (accessed through out TV) and heard the most spine-chilling news. Donald Trump having swung his wrecking ball around the country’s economic system is now starting a similar venture in the cultural sphere. Billions of funding to America’s elite universities are now being withdrawn and foreign students, on a student visa, being rounded up for deportation. This is because the universities are seen as being one of the principal sources of opposition to Trump and his policies and Trump, true democrat as he is (irony here) is intent on wiping out any sources of opposition to his regime. It is no wonder that Trump feels at home with the most autocratic of the world’s rulers and Putin, for a start, is not above murdering and poisoning some of his opponents as a way of maintaining his grip on power.

These elite research universities are crucial to the economic vitality of their surrounding regions, contributing to scientific breakthroughs and technological advancements. Cutting their funding could harm the nation’s global competitiveness, particularly in fields like artificial intelligence and biotechnology. Regions like Boston, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Austin benefit significantly from the economic activity generated by these universities, which produce skilled graduates and drive innovation. These elite research universities are crucial to the economic vitality of their surrounding regions, contributing to scientific breakthroughs and technological advancements. Cutting their funding could harm the nation’s global competitiveness, particularly in fields like artificial intelligence and biotechnology. Regions like Boston, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Austin benefit significantly from the economic activity generated by these universities, which produce skilled graduates and drive innovation. I wonder whether Trump may realise that his days could be numbered and having done what he can to reshape the country’s economic institutions, he is now entering the culture wars with a vengeance. Trump’s activities are being interpreted as sheer vindictiveness in the face of centres of opposition to the Trump regime. Trump and the modern Republican party are particularly opposed to DEI (Diversity, Equality, Inclusion) which had hitherto been embraced by most of the USA’s university sector.

Yesterday, a very rare parliamentary sitting was called so that MP’s were ordered back from their Easter leave to attend a sitting in Parliament. What triggered this extraordinary move was the imminent collapse of the Scunthorpe steel works as the Indian owners were threatening to close the plant completely. The steel making plant at Scunthorpe had been limping on for years but it could be that the tariffs-induced economic crisis proved to be the final straw. The government is going to give itself the powers to take over the running of the plant and to keep it functioning and it could be that there is no alternative but a re-nationalisation of the steel industry. Without such emergency moves, the UK would have been left with no steel when supplies are needed for the railway and other industries, not to mention construction. To be completely dependent on foreign made imported steel would have put vital infrastructure at risk and this no government could contemplate even though the costs are heavy. The last time that I recall the Commons being recalled was on the occasion of the Falklands war and I remember that Meg, Martin and I were listening to the debate when we were making a long journey by car.

The day before,I had ordered and brought into use a faux leather table mat, with which I am highly delighted by the way. I wondered idly why I had not considered something like this before but there is an obscure part of the Amazon purchase website which details when the product in question was first sold. From this, I have gathered that the product only got on the market about two years ago and I imagine that demand has now increased, production methods improved and the costs reduced which is why the product is achieving the popularity that it has. As a way of demonstrating some of its properties, I saw a promotional video in which water was deliberately spilt on the surface (in real life, more likely to be coffee) but this was wiped up within seconds. Over the years, I have only spilt a cup of coffee once on a work surface but this quite enough. On the subject of clearing things up, I did notice when I was a child that my mother always used to wipe her one pair of general household scissors after each use. I now more fully appreciate that the cutting of paper (my typical reason for using scissors) can wreak havoc on the blades. Cutting paper can dull fabric scissors The abrasive nature of paper, especially the fibres and additives in its manufacturing, can quickly reduce the sharpness of scissors designed for cutting fabric. Fabric scissors are typically made to cut smoothly through fabric, and using them on paper can leave them duller, making it harder to cut fabric precisely. So my mother might have known a thing or two by constantly cleaning her scissors. Apparently a spot of WD40 does the trick but I have just requisitioned one of those little cans of oil with a flexible spout to be always on hand in my study (Incidentally, I used to watch in some wonderment as my mother used to put minute drops of oil into the working mechanisms of her sewing machine by letting literally a drop of oil roll off the end of a pin to where it was needed).

Yesteday being a Saturday was the day for our regular meet-up with our friends in Wetherspoons. I was very careful to make sure that Meg was well and truly strapped into her wheelchair and, as it happened, Meg and I and our two friends all arrived within seconds of each other. To one of the friends I gave on a permanent loan a book on the history of ‘The Archers’ which has been on our bookshelves for at least ten years. As she is a keen Archer’s listener, I thought she would really appreciate some of the historical background not least because one of the first producers of the series was a local man. Then, I got our two friends to recite the first verse of Jack and Jill and then make a stab at the second verse. The point about this is that the last two lines of the second verse run ‘Jack went to bed, to mend his head, with vinegar and brown paper’ and I was intrigued by the reference to the folk remedy of vinegar and brown paper. Now most households possessed some vinegar which has got mildly antiseptic properties so is not a bad way to treat minor cuts and grazes. Now before the days of plastic bags, many packages were wrapped in brown paper (and sometimes tied up with string and sealed with sealing wax, to boot) The point is that many households had quite a copious supply of brown wrapping paper (unlike today) and this was often used to form a type of poultice. So after a minor accident dressing one’s cuts and bruises with vinegar and brown paper might have been quite common.

The middle of the day should have seen two carers turn up but only one of then did so, the other having been detained by the police. Now whether she caused the accident or was involved in an accident, we shall have to find out. But as soon the one carer had departed and I got a modicum of food inside Meg, I thought I had better press on and get the front grassed area cut. We know that showers may well come along tomorrow but the back lawn is more easily fitted in between the showers but although pretty tired after this morning’s push up and down the hill, I pushed myself on to get the grass cut with only two minutes to spare before the carers arrived for the afternoon call. Having had 2-3 lots of ice cream today, I am at a bit of a loss what to prepare for our evening repast. I will probably just revert to the standby of some apple pie and custard which is one of our regular stand-byes. Tonight having had a fairly busy day I am looking forward to the period after Meg is in bed when I can have a good read off the newspaper, watch the news a little and probably have a nap as well.

A little twist to the tariffs saga has just emerged. Democrats in Congress have questioned whether President Donald Trump and his allies may have acted improperly on his suggestion on Wednesday that it was a ‘great time to buy’ stocks. He made the comment shortly before announcing he was cutting back on some of his new tariffs – a move that made markets go up. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Democrats ‘need to get to the bottom of the possible stock manipulation that is unfolding before the American people’. He added: ‘What if any advanced knowledge did members of the House Republican Conference have of Trump’s decision to pause the reckless tariffs that he put into place?’ Jeffries said several members of congress will be ‘aggressively demanding answers and transparency’. The White House denied that Trump was engaging in market manipulation and accused Democrats of ‘playing partisan games.’ But what is undoubtedly true is that any of Trump’s coterie with some spare cash could have made a fortune knowing that the stock exchange was bound to score spectacular gains the minute that Trump announced his change of policy.

My tidying-up activities have continued apace yesterday. Our domestic help had changed her day this week from Wednesday to Friday, so I am interested in observing her reactions to the restoration and transformation of our dining room, which I now intend to keep in its pristine condition. I had a near disaster when moving a heavy box of my published papers caused one of the bookcase shelves to completely collapse, shedding its contents onto the floor. So an instant repair had to be made and some of the contents restored but I had the opportunity to throw away some computer software and out-of-date manuals. I have taken the opportunity, though, to purchase a new leather (actually artificial or PU leather) desktop mat to enhance the appearance of my desktop. It seems that a more modern concept is to utilise these desk mats which have the advantage of being able to dispense with a mouse mat, are wipe clean (in the face of the almost inevitable coffee spills) and are often two-tone colour reversible as well. The one I have purchased is a deep olive green and, I must say, adds an air of class to my desktop as well as dispensing with the mousepad. You can even buy an ultra-thin one which can be rolled up, held together with its own little leatherette clasp and then transported together with one’s laptop if you were going to use a laptop in a friend’s house (or even a hotel bedroom). It is the kind of little innovation which makes you wonder why it had not been thought of before but in the days when Meg and I used to stay in hotels, it would have proved to be a boon. The prospect lies before me of attacking some of my cluttered bookcase shelves one by one, but this does have the advantage of cutting a huge task into a smaller one as one can tackle it shelf by shelf on a daily basis. At some stage, I need to dispose of a lot of my academic books and did find an organisation that would have taken them off my hands for free (rather than just dumping them) But they wanted full bibliographical details on each book and the task of doing this for each of several hundred books would have been too daunting and time consuming and so it never happened at the time. However, it is a longer term prospect that I know must be done in the fullness of time.

Yesterday morning our domestic help arrived but I was a little fraught when she first arrived because the care agency had three staff reporting ‘sick’ and could I help? Actually, the morning call is pretty exhausting as Meg is quite a dead weight and still half asleep so getting her washed and dressed is no easy task. But the young female carer and I managed it all right but it took us the best part of 50 mins and it was not the best way to start off the day. But I took great delight in showing our domestic help our restored dining room which she can now clean so much more easily and also took the opportunity to let her have a set of beautiful dessert glasses that we originally had as wedding presents and only use on the most special of occasions. They had been recently washed before they had been put away and were therefore in a nice condition to gift but our help is very fond of this type of glassware so I know it is going to a good home. I have managed to tidy four shelves of the large bookcases I use as a quasi-stationery store so only two more to go. The weather continues to be glorious sunshine and I feel I should really be outside doing some much needed gardening but I also need to keep a watchful eye on the Meg. The weather is shortly to break down bringing some much needed rain to these parts. I need to re-seed some of the bare matches in our front grassed area, denuded somewhat by the activities of either one or several moles. I have the grass seed standing by in readiness but I do not want to dash out and sow it until I know that rain is imminent (as otherwise it might just provide food for the birds)

Having a baby is expensive, but it’s even more so when you are spending almost £400 on items you don’t need. According to data released last year by iCandy, UK parents are collectively spending £7bn on unused baby items, from cuddly toys to shoes.Almost 60% bought stuff that never got used – or were used less than twice – wasting an average of £379 in the first 12 months. Cuddly toys top the list – though they’re super cute and look great in a baby’s nursery, one in three UK parents who have kids under 10 (31%) admitted they did not use them.

So, it looks as though Donald Trump ‘blinked’ (i.e. panicked) and reverses all of his tariff increases of the past few days with the exception of China and set a rate of 10% for everyone. The inside story is that it was the operation of the bond markets that forced a change in strategy and what we are seeing is very similar to the financial moves that brought down Liz Truss ad Kwasi Kwarteng After a week of economic chaos and criticism from allies, what changed? Not just pressure from businesses or Republicans —Trump was rattled by a bond market in meltdown mode. The bond market is where the US government borrows money by selling Treasury bonds. These are usually seen as ultra-safe investments. If investors stop buying them—or worse, start selling them—it is a sign of deep concern. Without steady demand for these bonds, the government could trouble funding everything from infrastructure to defence. That’s why a selloff in this market causes panic—it suggests serious instability, and potentially, a crisis. By Wednesday, however, it had become evident the campaign to convince Trump to change course would not let up. It had also become plain after a sharp sell-off in US government bond markets — usually a safe corner for investors — that the economic ramifications of the president’s strategy were potentially catastrophic and worse than his advisers had previously predicted. The growing alarm inside the Treasury Department over developments in the bond market was a central factor in Trump’s decision to hit pause on his ‘reciprocal’ tariff regime, according to three people familiar with the matter. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent raised those concerns directly to Trump Wednesday in a meeting that preceded the pause announcement, underscoring concerns shared by White House economic officials who had briefed Trump on the accelerating selloff in the US Treasury market earlier in the day. Calls to top White House advisors from key business community allies also increasingly focused on the troubling developments in the bond market as they made the case for Trump to pull back. No doubts, whole books and PhD theses may be written on the events of the past few days but at the risk of an extreme analogy, it looks as though the ‘immune system’ of the capitalist system (the bond market) has activated procedures to defend the whole of the system. The rate set by the bond markets is what governs mortgages, credit card payments, car purchase and other day-today financial transactions and if ever single America citizen were to be suddenly hit in the pocket, then perhaps it is no wonder that Trump realised that the game was up. A 90 day pause seems an eternity given what has happened in the last few days and the big question remains as to what happens at the end of the 90 day period. But a period of stability that pause brings might allow cooler and more rational decision making to be made and we might be saved from an economic and financial armageddon.

To return to more mundane matters, I save a lot of useful material in A4 document wallets which are readily accessible on the shelves of a proximate bookcase. Some of these are of great importance such as income tax records, council tax transactions, a ‘household maintenance file’ and so on. But others are a lot more transient such as a recipe I wish to keep or some health/diet related press cuttings. I took the opportunity to throw away a lot of the transient material by keeping that which I still considered relevant and discovered, by the way, some notes on the preparation of a haddock fish pie. But the other ‘big’ files do require a more radical thinning but this is not a case of simply throwing away as, in general, there are names and address that end to be excised and then shredded and this slows the whole of the thinning process down somewhat, But I have made a very good start and my shelf full of files looks altogether much more manageable and fit for purpose.

Yesterday was my ‘sit’ day when a carer comes to sit with Meg whilst I go out and do my weekly groceries shopping. But I got a message from the agency telling me that the carer allocated to the sit session would be delayed by a couple of hours. Then this message changed and I was expecting someone at 11.15 but it actually turned out to be half and hour later so I did not get out and do my shopping until practically midday. However, I usefully occupied my file by going systematically through twelve years of financial records that I wished to junk. But I needed to go through several inches of paperwork to ensure that names, addresses and any identifiers were excised from each document (my scissors were working overtime) before I felt I could safely throw the out-of-date documents way. Even so, I ensured that all of these papers were secured into one stout envelope and then again bound into an old file before they were consigned to the green recycling bin. I have two more large files to go through but in the case of the ‘House Maintenance file’ there may well be suitable addresses of tradesmen who have jobs for us in the past that I would want to keep.

The USA media are reporting that ‘Liberation Day’ just gave way to ‘Capitulation Day’. US President Donald Trump pulled back yesterday on a series of harsh tariffs targeting friends and foes alike in an audacious bid to remake the global economic order. Trump’s early afternoon announcement followed a harrowing week in which Republican lawmakers and confidants privately warned him that the tariffs could wreck the economy. His own aides had quietly raised alarms about the financial markets before he suspended a tariff regime that he had unveiled with a flourish just one week earlier in a Rose Garden ceremony. The stock market rose immediately after the about-face, ending days of losses that have forced older Americans to rethink their retirement plans. However, we are not out of the woods yet and the UK economy is still to be hit by the 10% tariff and the challenge has not gone away. The EU has also announced that it will suspend retaliatory counter tariffs for the next 90 days but reserves the right to re-introduce them unless a satisfactory deal is negotiated.

The evening before once Meg was safely abed, I made sure that we had an assembled together a range of NHS provided aids which has been loaned to us over the past year or so in efforts to make life more tolerable for Meg. But a lot of this equipment is not only taking up space but also needs to be got into the hands of people who desperately need it. The principal piece of equipment is a ‘Sarah Stedy’ much used in hospitals to transport patients from their beds or bedside chairs to a toilet and back again. This is a marvellous piece of engineering, but Meg did not possess the upper body strength to hang onto the framework as she was required to do so the cate agency a year ago moved Meg onto a regime of hoist and wheelchair which Meg has used ever since. There is an appointment made for all or most of this equipment to be picked up during the day, but we have no idea when, so it is a bit of a waiting game. There are two wheelchairs in this collection and one is definitely NHS provided whereas the other I believe I successfully bid for on eBay. My first thought was to ‘gift’ this back the equipment store but I have an idea that they may refuse to accept it so I am left with the option of selling it, giving it away or even retaining it. As it folds up for ease of transportation and I still have a storage box for this in the garage, I am minded retaining it should I need to use it myself in the years ahead. Part of my decision making here despite my evident desire to declutter is that I might need it myself in the years ahead. If I were to retain it, then according to the way in which ‘Sod’s Law’ operates, I might not need it for years whereas if I were to dispose of it, I might have need of it tomorrow.

The first cracks in the Trump regime are starting to appear with Elon Musk probably about to depart government but not before he had called Trump’s principal tariffs a moron who is saying things that are demonstrably false and also calling him as dumb as a sack bricks. There is actually a deep philosophical rift at the heart of the tariff disaster with some believing those who believe tariffs are a good thing in themselves and that the USA has been disadvantaged and exploited in its international trade arrangements and others who believe that the erection of tariffs is the start of a negotiating process. This rift can be seen in Trump’s pronouncements that the announced tariffs are immutable as against the fact that according to the White House countries from all over the world are clamouring to negotiate a better deal with the USA, on the presumption there can be some negotiation. There are some commentators in the middle ground who are convinced that the whole Trump experiment will end in disaster (like Liz Truss) and the Republican party may well split over this issue. But there is plenty to happen in this scenario and one can argue by analogy that although cracks can be seen to have appeared in the dam walls, the dam is still holding for now. However, it is true to say that every country in the world (with the exception of Russia) is having to make economic adjustments to deal with the crisis. Here in the UK, for example, in a bid to assist the motor manufacturers, a slight relaxation in the transition period to full EV (electric vehicle) status from 2030 to 2035 has been announced.

Yesterday morning, the carers were getting towards the end of their session with Meg when the Worcestershire equipment agency turned up to collect the various items of which we no longer had any use. The person who turned up was somewhat dismayed to see the numbers of items of equipment much of which he had not been told about and, moreover, as the two care workers were occupying the space in the front of the house he had to trundle it all a fair distance away to get it into his vehicle. He would not accept the return of the wheelchair either but that might be provided by a somewhat different service. I have finished up with two almost identical so-called ‘transit’ wheelchairs, one of which I almost certainly paid for myself as I acquired it through an eBay bid but the other supplied to us. However, this morning I did get a letter confirming the fact that in two weeks’ time a specialist would turn up to re-assess Meg’s needs in view of the fact that she is danger of slipping out of her current chair if the journey is of any length. I have managed to find a home (under the stairs) for the two wheelchairs I am retaining, and I thought I would offer one or both in a sort of trade when the wheelchair specialist does pay a visit. In the morning, I had set myself a little task of taking one of the bookcase shelves that I use for stationery items and giving it a thorough sort-out. One thing that we had was a couple of boxes of face masks from the COVID days and we shall retain for further pandemics and I also rediscovered some joke spectacles that I sometimes have worn to persuade people that they prescribed by my optician for computer use. On the same shelf are series of A4 folders in which I have various documents and saved papers filed but my technique for dealing with this pile (as with paperwork in general) is to turn the whole pile upstairs down and then start throwing away from the bottom upwards. Generally, things at the bottom of the pile can be dispensed with in any case but I may have to leave a lot of this activity until later in the day. I am trying to fulfil my objective of decluttering by choosing a fairly simple task e.g. one shelf of a bookcase, and making sure that it is completed by the end of the day. Another district nurse called around, as scheduled, in the afternoon and she brought with her some specialised medical supplies for future use with Meg as her condition progresses.

Yesterday, to continue with my spring cleaning and decluttering zeal, I decided that the next priority along should be the desktop in my study. To describe this as a cluttered eyesore would not be an inaccurate description so after lunch, I set to work on this as I put any of the desktop items into one of those vegetable boxes with low sides beloved of supermarkets because the fruit that they contain (apples, pears and the like) can both be transported and displayed. I like to have one or two of these available to me if I have a clearing up job to do because I keep the original approximate location of an item so that can be restored to its proper place. Ad so armed with my vegetable box, I set to work in our Music Lounge where I could sit next to Meg whilst I worked and the whole job took me the rest of the afternoon and most of the evening after Meg had been put to bed. Part of the origin of the problem is that I have a table rather than an actual desk to house my computer and associated peripherals. If I had an actual desk, it would have had some drawers in which stationery items could be stored- instead I have a series of little functional containers to hold each stationery type. When I have a completely free desk top I treat it to a clean it with a dose of furniture polish and it might be a year or so until it gets its next one. Bu the overall result was pleasing to me. The large computer table is ‘de facto’ organised into quadrants. One is filled with the Apple Mac and its keyboard whilst behind it lies the scanner, backup storage drives and cables in variety. The third quadrant is now filled with well organised stationery whilst the fourth is my functional work area protected by a series of mats that may have started off life as one of those huge blotters you occasionally see. In an utterly nerdish way, I counted the number of different stationery items (think of everything from paper clips to Tippex to scissors) and it cane to 4 dozen. But, of course, now that it is in pristine condition, it is quite an easy to remove any one of the containers and reassess its contents. For example, one of them contains felt tip pens in a variety of colours and point sizes so one little job for this afternoon will be to go through the lot and ascertain which are functional and to be retained and which are dried up and need to be thrown away. Actually, below the desk I store some actual tools which I deploy on quite frequent occasions including some long nosed pliers (excellent for removing paper jammed into a printer for example), a fine long bladed screwdriver (for multiple purposes), some pliers (for flattening staples) and a supply of that stretchy elasticated fabric you sometimes see in hardware stores. Needless to say, I am filled with good intentions to keep my desk as neat and tidy as I can and perhaps only engage in one of these more radical cleanups about once a year. I did resurrect a rechargeable Apple mouse which tends to be a bit particular about the type of mouse mat on which it is used whereas the Logitech alternative mouse which I now use is so much more precise and reliable and cost about a quarter of the Apple version (incidentally, a quick perusal of the web shows that other Apple users had the same experience as myself)

In the morning, Meg seemed a little more alert and a little less sleepy than in past days so I was happy to get her well strapped into her wheelchair ready for the journey down to Wetherspoons. I always approach these journeys with a certain degree of trepidation because as the journey progresses, Meg having no body strength remaining does have the tendency to gradually slump in her wheelchair assuming a sort of ‘hypotenuse on the triangle’ orientation instead of an ‘h’ type of orientation and over the course of a two and a mile round trip (down and up the hill) there is always the slight danger that she might end up on the floor again as she did about a month ago. I have made several improvised adjustments to the wheelchair by inserting thin triangular type wedges designed to throw the seat backward somewhat. In addition, Meg’s ankles have the approved wheelchair velcro ankle straps and there is a lap belt as well. To these, I have added a luggage strap which goes around Meg’s torso and then to the back of the wheelchair, so this is a third anchorage point. I really need an extension or an adaptation so that Meg does not allow her head and neck to go backwards over the back of the chair but I improvise with a ‘V’ shaped cushion, put upside down which half does the intended job, at least at first. In two week’s time, we have an appointment when a wheelchair specialist is to call around to see what adaptations can be made. I suspect that at the end of the day, we need a more specialist chair because the wheelchair that we have is officially designated as a ‘transit’ chair and the assumption is that you are going to use for this short journeys, either within or outside the house and certainly not 2.5 mile round trips over what can be appallingly bumpy pavements. Whatever. the wheelchair experts recommend, it will probably be some time before we can see any improvements and in the meantime I feel that I have to take a calculated risk each Tuesday and Saturday and it is true to say that Meg is in a fairly slumped state by the end of the journey.

This afternoon we are both enjoying a concert of the Beethoven Violin Concerto played by Sophie Anne Mutter, one the world’s finest violinists. The quality of the concerts – generally European artists and performances- available to us on YouTube makes for a very pleasant and restful afternoon while I am generally engaged in other tasks with the music playing in the background. It certainly makes a change from some of the depressing economic and political news but we have the local elections to which to look forward on 1st May when I expect to see the Labour Party get punished for their stance on the Winter Fuel Payment as well as their current ‘bash the poor’ agenda. As the Greens are rightfully saying in their local election campaigns launched today that the Labour party has proved to be a ‘crushing disappointment’, a view shared by many of us at present.