Today is the day when our domestic help generally calls around but this week her visit to us was being postponed until Friday. So after breakfast, I popped down into town to collect our newspaper and then Meg and I made our way to the park, where we consumed our elevenses. On the way down the hill, we chanced across our Italian friend and had a few words with her about the crash across the road from her house before we made our down the hill. On the way we received a call on our mobile from one of the occupational therapists so I was having to conduct quite a lengthy conversation with her on the one hand whilst steering Meg down the hill in the wheelchair on the other. The upshot of all of this is that we are to expect a visit from one of the OT team next Wednesday so we will need to prepare ourselves and make sure that we are ‘at home’ for when she calls. There are a few issues that we need to discuss but I am glad that we are actually getting a face-to-face visit as there is a limit to what can be communicated over the phone. When we got home, one of our neighbours had pushed a copy of the local newspaper through our front door where the crash that we witnessed last week was the front page news. Having passed the crash site several times in the past week, I have now calculated that if we had arrived on the footpath some two seconds earlier than we did and if the crashed car’s steering wheel had veered to the right rather than the left then Meg and I would almost certainly have wiped out by the oncoming car. The other experience in my life that was vaguely similar to this was the incident that occurred in 1973 when I was employed at Leicester Polytechnic where I was moving from a lecture in one part of the campus to a seminar in other building. The Polytechnic campus straggled a main road and at a ‘T’ junction, the driver of a Hillman Imp fainted at the wheel, crossed straight over the ‘T’ junction and sent me flying (breaking both legs in the process) and carrying the two students with whom I was conversing on its bonnet through some iron railings and piling them against the wall of an adjacent building. Meg’s father to whom we recounted the accident in all of its gory detail asked the rather naive question why I did not jump out of the way in time. We had to point out that a car travelling at 40mph is covering approx 60 feet per second and as I saw the car crossing the centre line of the road I had approximately a quarter of a second to jump out of the way. This was just about enough for my brain to register to my legs to not continue walking forward and thus I was dealt a glancing blow and thrown in the air and out of the way of the body of the car which probably saved me from even more serious injury. I have a further two instances where the coordination between eye and brain assumes some importance. At Leicester Polytechnic, there was installed what was known as a ‘pater noster’ lift which resembles a series of cubicles strung together in a long elliptical chain and which made its progress up and down the building. To use the lift, one was meant to approach it and then step into it (to ascend) or of it (when alighting at the appropriate floor) Sometimes, if one was in a hurry, there was great temptation to jump onto a rapidly ascending cubicle but by the time one’s eye had judged this and the brain activated one’s jumping muscles, then the pater noster lift had ascended by several crucial inches by the time you actually arrived at. Consequently, one had to learn to ‘over jump’ i.e. to jump to where you learnt to judge the cubicle had actually arrived rather than one’s first sight of it. We also had a paster noster lift installed at Salford University where I studied for my MSc and where the Duke of Edinburgh as Chancellor was called upon to open a new building where the lift was installed. The story was often told how some adventurous postgraduate students stood on their heads as the cubicle went ‘over the top’ (which was itself quite a nerve wracking experience) to the astonishment of the visiting royal party to whom the innovative new lift was being shown. One of these lifts was installed at Newcastle University and it had the most tremendous crash but in July when all of the student population had departed – but if the lift had been populated there would have been several casualties. The Health and Safety Executive immediately slapped a ‘stop’ order on all of these lifts throughout the country and subsequently they were judged to be too difficult to maintain or dangerous to operate so they were withdrawn throughout the country. A second instance of ‘eye and ‘brain’ concerned running for a bus where one made a leap for the wide platform towards the rear of the bus. Again, one had to learn to ‘overjump’ as the bus had moved on a foot or so by the time your body actually arrived at it. I am sure there must have been accidents all over the country with people running for and not quite catching their intended targets.

This afternoon, Meg and I were just settling down to enjoy the last episode of ‘Pride and Prejudice’ when the doorbell rang and it was hairdresser who had arrived to cut Meg’s hair and my own but which I had failed to put on our planning board. The hairdresser and I put our heads together and we scoured the internet to find a special hairdressing bowl so that Meg’s hair can be washed ‘in situ’ the morning before the hairdresser actually arrives. Our hairdresser had been coming to us for the best part of fifteen years now and so knows our situation intimately so it is easy for she and I to collaborate to give Meg’s hair the attention that it needs. Meg and I have a planning whiteboard in our kitchen upon which we mark up forthcoming appointments but on occasions, the writing of a new entry can rub out an existing one and I think this must have happened on this occasion.

Tuesdays are our traditional Waitrose gathering days and today was no exception. I was particularly pleased to welcome back our inveterate fell walker who had been confined to her own house after a fall had rather incapacitated her shoulder. On the other hand, one of our other regulars did not make it into our company today and this is always a source of concern less she has a bout of illness. After our elevenses and the purchase of some excellent low alcohol lager which is stocked in the store, we made our way home getting ourselves for our ‘sit’ visit which is, in theory, is devoted to my Pilates session. In practice, I tend to go out and do some crucial non-food shopping in the High Street. I had a particular mission today which was two fold. First I needed to go to the Post Office to return a watch I had purchased back to Amazon as when it arrived, the hands were almost unreadable across the face of the watch and distinctively different to the illustration on the web. Amazon now has a system where one takes the item to be returned back to the Post Office where, facilitated by the QR code on one’s iPhone, it gets returned directly to Amazon and a refund is offered immediately. Then I needed to go onto the High Street to buy myself a new watch as my previous one seems to have given up the ghost after about seven or eight years of daily use. There is a stall on the High Street that sells cheap watches and I needed to make an instant decision between a dark face with silver hands and a white face with black hands. On the spur of the moment, I chose the latter so I now have a watch which looks exceptionally plain but is absolutely functional and has a warranty both on the watch and also on the battery. I was also pleased to be able to purchase a watch with a leather (rather than a metallic) strap already attached and so I dashed back home again. Then it was time for a quick burst of watching the diving on the Olympics before I prepared our conventional lunch for a Tuesday of fishcakes accompanied by microwaved vegetables. The afternoon turned out to be very fine so immediately lunch was over, I seized the opportunity to take Meg into the back garden and to get the back lawn cut. This we managed to do before the care workers were due to arrive to organise Meg’s afternoon comfort call after which Meg and I resumed our viewing of ‘Pride and Prejudice’ on the BBC iPlayer, the first part of which we so enjoyed yesterday.

I have been reflecting upon the wave of riots sweeping the country in which the Far Right have taken the opportunity to capitalise upon the discontents in the country as a whole. To my mind, there seems to be quite an association between the towns and cities experiencing the riots and the Brexit ‘Leave’ voting areas – Hampshire and Surrey are hardly going up in flames. The common factor is evidently those communities that have felt left behind and the last government’s rhetoric of ‘levelling up’ never seriously addressed these inequalities. The most that levelling up seemed to achieve was to invite one deprived community to vie with another for some limited funds to improve town centres which hardly started to address the scale of the problem. Like many others, I am appalled at a personal level at the levels and scales of violence we have seen displayed nightly on our TV screens and I also am in favour of the policies that the present government is adopting of having enhanced role for the courts in quickly arresting, charging and convicting those guilty of the rioting. However, it must be said that these policies are treating the symptoms rather than the causes of the present discontent. The question has to be asked whether once the rioters have been dealt with appropriately and expeditiously by the courts, what is being done to remedy the more fundamental causes. I am reminded of a remark associated with an early 20th century reformer that his aim was ‘to drain the swamp, not pull people out of it’ and of course what is implied here is a massive shift in the economic and social fabric of the country which I do not think is part of the agenda of the modern Labour party even with its huge majority. I have always found it interesting that when asylum seekers were dispersed to various hotels in towns and cities across the country, those communities were chosen in which not only were costs kept down but also the communities so chosen had the least amount of political power to resist. For example, Stoke on Trent and the Potteries have experienced a fairly massive decline over the past few decades and it is perhaps no accident that areas such as these often housed both asylum seekers on the one hand and were the highest voting Brexit areas on the other. So the affluent middle classes may feel quite justified in throwing up their hands in horror at the rioting that has been experienced but their communities have not been asked to accept asylum seekers in their midst. There are many communities in which asylum seekers are accepted by the local community and the indigenous population has made the greatest of efforts to make asylum seekers welcome but it is equally the case that this is not universal.

Kamala Harris has now chosen her Running mate for VP, a relative unknown called Tim Waltz. But he has already made considerable waves by attaching the appellation of ‘weird’ to Donald Trump and his coterie and this notion of ‘weirdness’ is certainly gaining a lot of traction. At the same time, doubts are being cast upon Trump’s mental facility not to mention his emotional outbursts and there even some hitherto loyal Republicans who had hitched their wagons to the Trump star who are now seriously thinking of ‘unhitching’ them. Whereas a month ago the Republicans looked strong and united and the Democrats in complete disarray, the positions seem to have completely reversed and the Trump camp is showing some indications of starting to panic. The view that Trump is himself too old and his mental health as problematic is gaining quite a lot of ground. Of course, there are three months to go before the election in November and much can happen between now and then. But it has to be said that the Harris campaign seems to be slowly gaining ground whilst the Trump campaign is slowly losing support.

The day started off a little overcast this morning but after we had Meg up and breakfasted it looked as though the weather was set to improve. Just before we did the breakfast washing up, we decided to treat ourselves to a little relaxation to see that the YouTube algorithm has got to offer us and we were given a rendition of Mozart Piano Concerto No 24 which we actually know quite well but didn’t realise it until we heard it once more. YouTube is a constant source of delight to us with the occasional irritation that you can be ten minutes into a performance and then the display ‘freezes’. This happened twice to us this morning and I generally back out of YouTube altogether and then pop back in again to see if the internet connection has reset itself which it quite often does. It makes a bit of change to the succession of depressing news from the wave of violence sweeping the UK and the wall-to-wall Olympics. So after breakfast, we decided to engage in our new ‘Monday routine’ which involves a longer walk than usual and includes the ascension of a small hillock upon which the local Anglican church is built and where the cemetery path leads into town. We took the opportunity whilst traversing the High Street to get to our local bank where we could access its ATM and then proceeded on the ‘Lemon Tree‘ cafe which is a new find for us. When we got into the (deserted) coffee bar, the grandmother of the two girls who now run the shop greeted me and said she recognised my voice from last week at this time. It turns out that we were both members of the our church’s parochial council although I have had to resign from the same. We then chatted quite a lot about our various experiences in catering where I could recount some stories from the various part-time jobs I had at the Old Swan hotel in Harrogate. Then we were a little short of time so had to make a rapid exit for home but got a telephone call from the care agency when we were half way home asking us if we could make do with one carer rather ham two in the middle of the day as their schedules had been thrown into disarray by a local road closure. But when we got home, the two care workers were already waiting for us as they had used their SatNavs to negotiate a way round the road closure. By the way, this type of event does not seem that unusual and there seems to be some kind of traffic problem for the care agency staff at least once or twice per week.

This afternoon after lunch, Meg and I thought we needed a break from the Olympics and sought out a version of ‘Pride and Prejudice’ on either YouTube or the BBC iPlayer. We had to navigate our way around clips from the film or ‘paid for’ versions on YouTube. We did start to watch an American made version on YouTube so the acting so unbelievably bad we actually wondered whether the whole thing was a parody and was designed to be laughed at rather than enjoyed. So it was relief that we found on iPlayer the Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle version which is regarded by some as the definitive and finest version ever made. The actors playing the part of both Mr and Mrs Bennett senior are also excellent in their way and added tremendously to our enjoyment. There were some wonderful lines delivered with real panache which showed off Jane Austen’s wit to the fullest. The pomposity of Mr Collins is brilliantly portrayed and one can imagine Jane Austen giggling to herself when she put the words into her character’s mouth. When I was 15, I was exposed to ‘Emma’ and although I enjoy the book now, I certainly did not then. In fact, I sometimes wonder whether Jane Austen’s work is a little too subtle for adolescents unless one has a very skilful teacher of English literature. Once when I was in a Winchester bookshop, I saw a book evidently written in the Austen style called ‘The unexpurgated Jane Austen’ and this was hilarious. The style of the dialogue mimicked Austen’s beautifully but there were some wicked lines in it. I remember the conversation between Jane Austen and her publisher in which the latter was admonishing the author by indicating that phrases in it such as ‘That ****** [obscenity] Mr Bingham’ really had to be excised before publication.

Now that the British general election is well and truly over, my attention is very much engaged with what is happening over the water. Kamala Harris is holding last interviews on Sunday to test the chemistry with her final vice president contenders as she gears up to announce her 2024 running mate in the next 48 hours. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro will meet with Harris at her Washington DC residence,The New York Times reported. Harris’s final meetings are intended to test the chemistry with the prospective veeps before heading out on the campaign trail. They all hail from states considered to be battlegrounds this November, giving them an edge in the selection process. Walz, Kelly and Shapiro have been highly visible across cable news in the past few weeks, defending Harris’s record and taking on the traditional VP role of attack dog. Walz in particular has had success by labelling Republican rival Donald Trump and his running mate JD Vance as ‘weird’ in reaction to Vance’s old comments – describing Democratic politicians as childless cat ladies’ and arguing that Americans with children should have more influence at the ballot box – resurfacing. Meanwhile Senator Lindsey Graham has a clear message for former President Donald Trump: Stop targeting Vice President Kamala Harris over her race and focus on her political record instead. In a recent interview on Fox News Sunday, the South Carolina senator, who has long supported Trump, expressed concern over the former president’s ongoing attacks on Harris’ race and heritage. Graham made it clear that his issue with Harris is her ‘bad judgment, not her background.’ So, here’s what I would say to President Trump, Graham advised, as reported by Business Insider. The problem I have with Kamala Harris is not her heritage; it’s her judgment. Every day, we’re talking about her heritage and not her terrible, dangerous liberal record throughout her entire political life.’

This morning we awoke to a gloomy day but we were well prepared for the couple of cheery care workers when they arrived promptly just before 8.00am to get Meg up and dressed. Then it was case of watching some depressing news about the waves of violence and the political dilemmas posed by this. With his background as the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Prime Minister’s most immediate response is to organise a series of special courts sitting 24 hours a day if necessary and to get lawbreakers processed as rapidly as possible. In the face of the violence that has sweeping across the country over the last night or so, I have been reflecting upon the role of social media in helping to distribute fake news around the country. I have to say with a certain degree of sadness that most of my professional life, I have been inducted and reinforced into a belief system which constantly stresses ‘Evidence! Evidence!’ This, of course is the hallmark of the scientific community and I have always been impressed by the work of Karl Popper who stressed the importance of ‘falsifiability’ and we should frame our scientific hypotheses in such a way that they are capable of disproof (to ensure we do not selectively adduce evidence that reinforces our own world view) So the principle of falsifiability is best illustrated by the observation that the existence of one black swan (in Australia) is sufficient to show that the logical proposition ‘All swans are white’ is, indeed, false. Through a career in sociology but with a strong interest in research methods, reinforced by an MSc in the Sociology of Science and later elaborated by an interest in, and some facility with statistics, I have always tried to follow the evidence wherever it might lead. But social media is more concerned with disseminating what are called ‘narratives’ where scientific evidence is just regarded as one ‘account’ to be set alongside other narratives or accounts that propagate a different world view. But to return to the riots sweeping across the country, so many of our citizens are regarding what they are read on social media as ‘the truth’ then fairly ugly rumours which can be proved to be demonstrably false form the backdrop which informs the violence of the mobs across the country. Whilst using the word ‘mob’ I seem to remember from my undergraduate days there was a fairly academic discussion in the 1960’s that whatever happened to ‘the mob’ that seemed to dominate the 18th and 19th centuries and against which the ‘Riot Act’ was framed. The ‘mob’ is populated by what Marx would have called the ‘lumpenproletariat’ but in which today’s language we would classify as those depressed and deprived areas often in inner cities that have felt left behind in the economic history of modern Britain. After we had our weekly visit from our Eucharistic minister from our local church, we journeyed down to Waitrose from where we picked up a copy of our Sunday newspaper and then made our way to the park to meet up with our University of Birmingham friend. With him, I discussed some of the themes mentioned above as we both profess an adherence to the scientific method and are equally interested in how widespread is the scientific ethic in today’s age and times. I recall to mind that there have often debates in our national life about the role to be accorded to science in today’s society. In the nineteenth century, there were massive debates over the primacy of science over religion and one is reminded of the huge debates following the publication of Darwin’s ‘The Origins of Species’ and nearer to our time there was a massive debate popularised by the novelist C. P. Snow on the ‘Two cultures’ Its thesis was that science and the humanities, which represented ‘the intellectual life of the whole of western society’, had become split into ‘two cultures’ and that this division was a major handicap to both in solving the world’s problems.

On our way up the hill, we popped in to see our Irish friends that we had seen on the way down to the park this morning. They had requested that we visit them on the way home but we had not expected a surprise ‘mini party’ which they put on for us (ham sandwiches, cake). Knowing that Meg’s wheelchair was difficult to get over their threshold, our friends had set up a table of chairs and chairs at the entrance to their garage and also invited along a neighbour who we have come to know very well – a French lady who used to teach both French and Spanish in her working life. It is always very refreshing to talk with this lady but then she gave us the sad news that she had taken the decision to sell up her house and then move to Sandbach in Cheshire so as to live much nearer to her daughter. She explained to us as practically nearly 90 years of age and in full possession of her faculties, nonetheless her present house and garden were getting too much for her to maintain so she was going to de-clutter, rationalise her possessions of furniture and then move in the Spring. Meg and I were saddened by this news and, in particular, the thought that a very kindred spirit would be moving away but we could admire that our friend was taking absolutely the right decision and doing the right thing whilst she could instead of being forced into doing things too rapidly which might happen in an emergency. We had to race up the hill to be in time for the carers late morning call which we were. Then they informed us that there had been another large car smash occurring at the other end of Kidderminster Road and this time near to the entrance of the park. We had not noticed this morning but had we glanced left rather than right as we were leaving pour friends, then we might have noticed some more road mayhem around us. Reflecting upon the terrible crash that we saw last Wednesday, I have made some back of the envelope type calculations and now know that we were only 2 seconds away from the point at which the crash occurred. Had the car veered to the right rather than to the left when the driver evidently and ultimately lost control, we may well have lost our lives or been severely injured. So, as one of the carers opined, there must be some being ‘up there’ looking after us.

This morning when we awoke after a good night’s sleep, it was evident that it had rained locally overnight and so the day had quite a nice feel to it. As I was getting washed and dressed, I noticed with some dismay that my watch in which I had just put in a new battery had stopped once again as it did twice yesterday. I must have had this watch for 7-8 years I would imagine so I have to bow to the inevitable and buy another one. I went online and purchased a watch quite similar in design to my now defunct one and it ought to arrive within a day. I am making do with an emergency self winding watch which is a bit chunky but seems mega reliable.This morning, we are looking forward to a nice journey down into town where we can make contact with our Saturday crowd friends, all being well. The journey down was pleasant and we made contact with two of our friends, the third still having problems with her shoulder which stops her from getting out and about.

I suspect that the BBC has realised in its programming of the TV schedules that they should provide some alternatives to the wall-to-wall coverage of the Olympics games. So last week, as Meg and discovered at the very last moment, there was a showing of the classic film ‘Dr Zhivago’ which is the all time favourite of meg and myself. This week there was a biopic of ‘The Great Caruso’ made in 1951 and starring the acting and singing of Mario Lanza. The reviewer for ‘The Times‘ was faintly scabby about the picture calling the plot plodding and Mario Lanza’s acting wooden. But Meg and I enjoyed it tremendously if only because in both brooding appearance and in the range of voice, Mario Lanza was a fairly good match for Enrico Caruso himself as it was said of both the opera star and the singer portraying him that their careers first burned bright and then became burned out. The trouble with biopics is that one never knows how much is accurate biography and how much is invented for the sake of artistic license. But the thing that we did learn from the film review was that the Caruso family hated this biopic when it was released but, on the other hand, both Jose Carreras and Placido Domingo (i.e. two of the three of the ‘three tenors’ fame) were inspired to venture into opera as a career having seen the film.

Whilst the country is either on vacation or else glued to the Olympics, there is a surge of Far Right violence sweeping across the country. More than 30 protests – many of them organised by far-right activists – are set to take place this weekend in the wake of the Southport stabbings, according to Sky News analysis.They would follow violent protests earlier this week, which saw more than 100 people arrested outside Downing Street on Wednesday and 10 arrests in Sunderland on Friday night after a building next to a police station was set on fire and objects thrown at officers. The spark that set off these incidents of violence across the country was the stabbing and death of three young girls in Southport and the injury of several more and the adults who were trying to protect them. There was a certain of fake news that spread across the social media and the crimes were said to have committed by an illegal asylum seeker. When the identity of the disturbed 17 year old who perpetrated these acts of violence was allowed by court order to be released to the press, it turned out that much of the social media speculation was completely misplaced. But the fact that the disturbed young man came to these shores from Rwanda was enough for the hundreds of violent young thugs to wreak mayhem upon many British cities. The response of the government is to threaten harsh penalties for those successfully caught and then then successfully prosecuted but one suspects that the face recognition technology deployed by the police will be utilised to the utmost and there is always the possibility of miscarriages of justice if the technology is not 100% reliable.

The reports from the other side of the Atlantic are speculative in the extreme but fascinating nonetheless to those of following the US elections. Donald Trump’s selection of JD Vance as his running mate ‘may be one of the best things he ever did for Democrats,’ according to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. Seemingly every day, the Republican senator from Ohio has made headlines for resurfaced misogynistic comments, awkward campaign appearances and fringe policy positions on issues that the former president’s campaign has desperately been trying to avoid. Vance stepped off the stage of the Republican National Convention with the worst favourability ratio of any non-incumbent vice presidential candidate in nearly 45 years, while presumptive Democratic nominee Kamala Harris erased Trump’s leads in crucial swing states and saw a surge in donations within just weeks of her candidacy. He later was revealed as a close collaborator with the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 authors and a natalist evangelist with a history of supporting extreme ideas about abortion care and IVF. So the speculation is arising by the day that Vance may be such a liability to Trump that it is quite possible that he gets replaced before the election. This is quite a dilemma for Trump because to keep Vance will only hurt his cause whilst to get rid of him shows that he made a very bad judgement call in the first place. I doubt that the Republican’s system will allow Vance to get replaced at this stage but the Democrats must be rubbing their hands in glee as every new day more indiscretions seem to appear. But Trump has finally decided to undergo a TV debate with Harris on Fox TV which, one might imagine, might be slightly kinder to Trump than to Harris but we shall have to wait and see.

Today dawned as a nice bright day with temperatures still warm but just a tad lower than yesterday so a very pleasant day upon which to make our trip into town. Now I am going to talk about the unlikely subject of cushions. Now there are cushions and cushions but that is only the start of the story. I should point out that the venues that Meg and I can now visit are so much more restricted since I cannot get Meg into the car any more – subsequently, our world view is confined to what we can reach by by pushing Meg in her wheelchair either to the park or to our local Waitrose. Consequently, our home environment means a lot more to us that formerly. My cushion story starts with a chance discovery in our local Salvation Army charity shop (not a purveyor of many fine goods as charity shops go, I have to say) where about a year ago I came across an absolutely stunning cushion. This has an owl appliqued onto a midnight sky background but as the owl has a degree of padding there is a slight 3-D effect. The whole cushion has a series of baby owls appliqued on the back and must have taken some hours of dedicated and expert needlework to produce, The extraordinary thing is that I discovered this cushion in the midst of several other quite pedestrian pieces so its true worth stood unappreciated. Now this cushion forms the backdrop to a little surface area which I call ‘owl corner’ as I have several owls to sit here including some pottery owl night light holders, some wooden carved owls and some of the more conventional plaster pieces. Around this collection, I have assembled a series of cushions with a similar feel. The next piece along is a decorated ‘golden goose’ and I have another specimen decorated with what could be canaries or yellow hammers. To complete the collection, I have an Artic fox cushion and finally a red squirrel ‘Squirrel Nutkin’ specimen. Those familiar with the Beatrix Potter story will be aware of the affinity of owls and squirrels in any case. So when Meg is in need of a little diversion other than the TV, I sit her in her wheelchair in front of ‘owl corner’ and she can admire the slight panorama that I have assembled just here. I must admit, I had not realised how popular animal themes are on cushion covers but I still keep a sharp eye out for a good example when I see one of the genre. This is the first part of the cushion story but the second chapter concerns some of the superb quilted cushions which Meg’s very talented cousin, Margot, made for us when she was still alive. These are superb examples of the quilter’s art and Margot became very talented even being part of a demonstration of her craft in, I believe, Westminster Abbey. The two pieces that Margot has bequeathed to us now adorn the one of the captain’s chairs and the monk’s bench which sits in our hall and can be admired by any/all visitors to the house. The third category of cushion covers are the more abstract designs the colours and textures of which just happen to match well some of the wooden furniture pieces we have assembled over the months. Whereas one is used to the nation of ‘scatter cushions’ often in one colour and material, which can go anywhere, the cushion covers I have accumulated are in a different league. Some cushion covers because of their texture, design, colour and materials look absolutely right on a particular piece of furniture but others less so. So one of the minor ‘avenues of pleasure’ that remain to me (to borrow a phrase adapted from John Cleese in Fawlty Towers) is to make a careful judgement as to which of our collection looks best where. for example, I only decided this morning that the red Thai silk cushion cover (all 95p of it) decorated with a procession of elephants looks best on one of our recently acquired ‘good’ chairs but just a little silly elsewhere.

As we had planned, we were preparing to go for a longer wheelchair walk into town this morning but first our son called around to see us which was a very welcome sight after he had spent some days away. Then we popped into town but as we passed the crash site of a couple of days ago, I was a smidgeon disappointed that my single, now wilting, rose was the only floral tribute left for the casualty and I expected more of the good heartedness of the local residents. We made our way to our new found cafe via the Bromsgrove Cobbler where we left them our two watches both Meg’s and my own having given up the ghost within a day of each other. In the cafe we were joined by our University of Birmingham friend and his new found squeeze and I updated them with the happenings of the past few days. Meg and I had a sort of bacon baguette between us, served with a few croquettes for good measure and a cup of tea. After that we visited our favourite AgeUk store and relieved them of a few more cushions to add to our stock and then made our way home, via Waitrose where we collected our newspaper. We had just about got back in time before the late morning carers were due to call and then immediately consumed some salted caramel ice cream to cool us down as it is still pretty warm and humid. We neither of felt particularly hungry so I prepared a type of Spanish omelette which was onions, peppers, petit pois and a tin of tuna all spiced up nth a little sweet chilli sauce which served the purpose well on a hot day and was all we fancied. Immediately after lunch, Meg and I really enjoyed watching the British team taking the team showjumping gold medal which was all the better for being somewhat unexpected. Thinking about the sports at which we do excel, I do remember how at the time of the last Olympics a rather grumpy Australian commented that the Brits seemed to exceed at any sport in which you sat down (horseriding, rowing, canooing, cycling) and I suppose there is something in that. We also observed some of the sailing races which seem baffling in their complexity and in the race that we watched there was a lot of confusion as to where the actual winning line was meant to be.

Today is our shopping day but after a fairly good night’s sleep, Meg and I were up and breakfasted but there I was a little project I needed to undertake before we start on our trip out. I had been thinking about the events of yesterday where I learned by consulting social media that the motorist whose car had crashed and overturned on top of him was pronounced dead at the scene by the paramedics who attended him. Conscious of this, I went into our garden and picked a single red rose to which I then attached a card expressing condolences to any family or friends who might have sight of it. Then on my way out to do the shopping, I revisited the scene of the accident (easily visible because a lot of glass had just been swept into the gutter and the highways authority had not replaced the street light but just reduced what remained of the upright into a fairly ugly stump). I then left my single flower and message on the site of the accident expecting to see that there had already been a number of contributions. But my solitary flower was the only acknowledgement that the accident had taken place. Before I left to go shopping, I left a message on the dedicated voice mail of the investigating police officer indicating what I had heard (a huge and sudden large bang) and more specifically, when I thought about it, there was no screech of tyres an a hot road, horns of other motorists or other signs apart from the fact that the car had evidently left the road and hit the lamp standard a glancing blow which toppled it over and evidently led to the death of the sole occupant, a male driver in his 50’s. The investigating officer responded to my telephone message and thanked me for it, indicating that the little that I had to say was completely consistent with all of the other accounts of the accident. He did intimate to me, though, that the police were working on the presumption of a sudden medical emergency event (such as a heart attack or a stroke) as the probable cause of the accident which actually made it as to the evening news bulletins.

In the middle of the day, we received a visit from the specialist nurse who is an expert on Meg’s condition. She arrived by appointment with a colleague and whilst her colleague diverted Meg, the nurse and I have a chat over how things are proceeding. We did not have a lot to report on today but nonetheless the nurse thought she would activate the OT (Occupational Therapist) as there are two or three little tweaks we can adopt to manage Meg’s condition. It is always good to see this nurse and I know that either she, or colleagues, are available at the end of a telephone were there to be an emergency or an event which would be too difficult for me to handle without advice or support. After they had left, Meg and I contemplated lunch in the event of another really hot day. We did not fancy a salad as such but finished off with quite a tasty dish which was a quiche freshly purchased this morning, supplemented by some tomato and fresh beetroot. As lunch was a little delayed, we were just about to enjoy a little post prandial repose when two young care workers turned up about an hour and a half early to gave Meg her afternoon comfort call. This did not please us at all because the scheduled visit had been altered without anybody really noticing and this leaves a long gap to manage before Meg has her final bednight call at about 7.00pm. So I had to think how to handle this unexpected situation but decided an a three part strategy. Firstly, I took Meg into the back harden and we both had some ice cream which was very welcome given the hotness of the day. Then I brought Meg indoors and we watched a ‘catch up’ programme on the BBC iPlayer about the construction of the Eiffel tower and the life and work of its famous creator. Meg and I found this really fascinating and as Meg was having a rather anxious spell during the afternoon, I was relieved that she found this programme to be so interesting and diverting. The second part of the strategy will be to take Meg down into our ‘normal’ lounge where we might be able to access a classical concert by virtue of our YouTube subscription. We are generally quite fortunate when we try to do this so this is the second leg of the strategy. Then we will go onto either Sky News of the Olympics. I must say that in the early part of the afternoon I was totally ungrabbed by the vista of (male) beach volleyball which was the contribution from the Olympics or endless discussions of either the Southport stabbings with heavy dollops of the Hugh Edwards scandal all of which is somewhat depressing for us both.

The events on the other side of the Atlantic still raise an eyebrow. Donald Trump had decided to address a conference of black journalists and chose to abuse Karmala Harris’s racial origins by casting doubt whether she was ‘black’ or not to the gasps of the assembled journalists. There are indications that Donald Trump is really flipping his lid to coin a phrase and is in a blind panic how to react to the Harris phenomenon. One analyst has asserted that ‘I think lately, Donald Trump has been trying to do his best impression of someone who actually respects women and likes black people. Now that Kamala Harris is the front runner and there is so much energy and momentum behind that campaign and really excitement about someone who represents the future of the United States, a multiracial democracy, biracial people are the fastest growing segment of America, I think now Donald Trump is afraid.’ Evidently Donald Trump has a real problem how to cope with intelligent, black female journalists and one does sense a real turning of the tide that has flowed for so long in Trump’s direction. It is of no surprise that he has refused a live TV debate with Harris and this very act alone speaks volumes. Also, the dollars and the social media campaigns seem to be behind Harris so we are seeing a real fight on our hands. Some recent polls have Harris ahead in all of the key swing states but we will have to see if this trend is both real and sustainable until November, the date of the election.

Today has turned out to be quite an eventful day. But I am pleased to say that last night, Meg seemed to fall soundly asleep which is a relief all round. The weather is so warm these days that Meg’s carers and I have to judge that Meg does not have too many bedclothes on so as to feel uncomfortable in the heatwave that we are experiencing which is reaching the stage of being quite humid. The weather forecasters are telling us that the spell of really hot weather will break down in about 24 hours leading to some thunderstorms across the country. Personally, I cannot wait until we get a really good thunderstorm which will clear the air for us as well as watering the gardens. When Meg was soundly asleep, I took the opportunity to finally fill the nice cushion covers which I purchased from the AgeUk shop earlier in the week. I am pleased with the results as I happened to have some material in which one of my recently purchased chairs had been wrapped. I assumed that this was a type of carpet underlay but our domestic help who is knowledgable about such things looked at one of the little offcuts that I had left over and announced it was probably furniture padding foam which is exactly what I needed. After a little experimentation, I now have locations sorted out for where all of these newly filled chair pads are going to go.

Wednesday is the day when our domestic help calls around and so this is always very welcome to us. Today, I took the opportunity to pop down into town in order to pick our newspaper and then after my return home, Meg and I viewed the women’s high diving competition where the Chinese and the North Koreans took an outstanding gold and silver. But the British pair managed to cling on to secure a bronze medal fighting off strong challenges from Mexico and the Ukraine. When this competition had been completed, Meg and I got ready for a trip down the road to the park. On our journey down the hill we had just accessed a little service road down which we regularly walk when we heard behind us the most tremendous bang. We turned round to see a large car that had collided with a lamp standard and had completely overturned at a distance about 80 metres away from us. What exactly had happened we cannot say as the accident had happened behind us. The car was at the entrance to a small gated estate on the other side of the road and whether it had reversed at speed into the lamp standard or gone into it forwards we could not tell. All the traffic stopped and people seemed to run from all over the place – we could see a man’s legs pocking out from under the car who we suppose was the driver. The emergency services were on the scene within about three minutes and we counted five ambulances, 2-3 police cars and a fire appliance that had turned up which would have been necessary to either jack up the car or to cut into it to free the occupants. We did not stay to stand and gawp but let the emergency services get on and do their job and we carried onto the park which was a haven of peace and tranquillity after the scene we had just witnessed. So we only decided to stay for about 15 minutes because we needed to get back in time for the carers and, in any case, we suspected that there would be absolute chaos in the road as the emergency services had to cope with the consequences of the crash. No other vehicle was involved and the lamp standard had been bent over to a most crazy angle and we would only speculate as to how the accident could possibly have happened. But as we were passing the scene, we got a call on our mobile from our niece was returning form a camping vacation in Somerset and was coming us quite close to us as she had to journey along the M5. Of course we were delighted to able to see her so unexpectedly and at such short notice – the minute she had put our post code into her SatNav, the system had taken account of the crash and immediately made a new route for her which was a little circuitous but meant she was not unduly delayed before she got to us at about 1.00pm. Immediately, I had got Meg home and told both our domestic help and the (delayed) carers the news about the traffic accident, I raided the fridge to get a quiche warmed up and put got some soup put into a saucepan, gently warming. So when our niece arrived, I managed to give her a little bit of sustenance and we all spent a very happy hour and a half in each other’s company. Then it was the time for our niece to leave to get back home and we took a tearful farewell of each other, wondering how we could possibly organise some logistics so that Meg and I could meet up with other members of the family for the first time in months.

After the terrible stabbings that have taken place in Southport, the far right have organised a huge riot in the vicinity of the mosque in Southport. The police have been attacked by stones larger than bricks and the latest count is that some fifty police officers and three police dogs have been injured by the rioters. The motivation seems unclear at the moment but one can only assume that the Far Right have in their heads that there is an ethnic dimension to the stabbings and have reacted accordingly. Of course it is not the first time that fake news has dominated the social media and the nation is holding up its hands in horror at the further suffering inflicted upon the inhabitants of Southport.

Today being a Tuesday, it is the day when our ‘granny gang’ meets up in Waitrose and Tuesday mornings always hold a particular significance for us. But our numbers were a little depleted this morning because we knew that one of our number had a social worker appointment and one of the others has injured her shoulder somewhat in a fall she sustained last Friday. I don’t think the injury is a serious one but one to keep her out of the normal swing of social events for the next few days which I know she is going to find annoying. But today for the benefit of one the long term partners in Waitrose who is responsible for the plants and flowers section of the store, we brought along our little mechanical toy bear which sings ‘When I am 64’ (Yes – the Beetles song) and sways in time to the music. I had threatened to bring the toy doll along loaned to us by our domestic help so today was the second time the toy has been inflicted upon the store. So this all good fun and on our way home, we were happy to bump into two sets of our friends. The first was our Irish friend who was proceeding down the road with her daughter and two grandchildren and the second was our Italian friend. We had brief conversations with each of them and it always gladdens the heart when we have a chance of chat. Today the journey back was threatening to be particularly hot and humid so we were quite pleased to have two little mini-breaks on the way back. Practically as soon as we got back and inside the house (quite a procedure as the wheelchair wheels have to be cleared of the gritty particles they acquire whilst on the public roads and pavements) it was time for the midday carers to arrive which they did promptly. After Meg had been made comfortable and as they had about ten minutes in hand before they had to dash off to their next job, we all made a sojourn into our back garden where I treated all of us (five of us – Meg and myself, the two carers and the ‘sitter’ who arrived early) to a treat of some vanilla ice cream. This was very much appreciated and not the kind of treat which carers typically enjoy but I like to do my little bit to make them welcome whenever they do come. But the weather was so warm and humid today that I was driven to put on a more cotton-rich shirt which I only do in the most extreme of temperatures. A good thunderstorm may help and one may be on the way in a day or so. As is was so hot today, we could not fancy another hot dinner so threw together a salad like we did yesterday but added some hardboiled eggs for a little variety in place of potatoes.

The British media is obsessed with two huge current stories. The first is a horrid stabbing in Southport where a 17-year old male youth has run amok killing (at the last count) three young chidden and with another five still on the critical list together with two adults who were trying desperately to defend them. One really does wonder what extreme of mental illness or a drug-fuelled addictions which is the animus behind trying to stab so many people to death – and children at that. The other huge story is that yesterday the new Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced £22 billion of budget cuts to fill the so-called Tory ‘back hole’ I say ‘so-called’ because the Tories are saying the whole thing is a Labour party invention to justify the tax cuts they had planned all along. The Tory government had announced a policy of ensuring that people in long term residential care (such as Meg might be) would not have to sell their houses once they had contributed a total of £86,000 towards their own care costs. They then postponed the implementation of this for two years from 2023 until 2025 (i.e. October next year) but Labour have gone one better by abandoning the policy of an £86,000 cap altogether. The Labour argument, no doubt, is that the policy, if implemented, would disproportionately benefit middle class home owners but I feel this misses the point. In my own extended family, my mother and Meg’s mother and my sister’s mother-in-law all funded their own care by the sale of their own houses leaving nothing for their children to inherit, surviving just long enough in each case for the entirety of their capital to be exhausted before they met their Maker.

Meanwhile I learn from my internet browser, Microsoft Edge which is tuned to give ‘American’ news prominence that the internet has been set alight by a Fox News (i.e. extreme right wing and hitherto Trump supporting media channel) that according to the latest polls Harris is leading Trump in each of five key swing states. There is another, altogether more academic analysis, which is pointing in the same direction. After predicting decades of presidential elections with near-perfect accuracy, historian Allan Lichtman revealed that Democrats have the edge using his time-tested formula. Lichtman told Fox News that he used 13 true-false questions — which he calls ‘keys’ — to determine who will win the presidency. A candidate receives a ‘key’ if a question is true. Lichtman has a checklist of items on which each candidate holds the key and these include such as the short and long term prospects for the economy, foreign military success/failure and incumbent/challenger charismas (from a list of 13 items) So far, Vice President Kamala Harris has held the lead over former President Donald Trump. The historian said that Democrats held six ‘keys,’ including the primary contest, the short-term and long-term economy, policy change, no scandal, and no challenger charisma. Meanwhile, Republicans held three ‘keys,’ according to Lichtman. The keys included the Republican 2022 primary win, the current incumbent’s not seeking re-election, and the current incumbent’s lack of charisma. Lichtman’s analysis has been highly accurate in its predictive ability in the past so this is a very significant pointer for the future. But I do see a case where Trump ‘blows up’ i.e. makes more and more outlandish claims and more and more extreme statements as he feels more threatened which might further alienate the moderate centre. Last time the so-called ‘double haters’ who disliked both of the main candidates tended to fall for Trump in the last analysis but in this election it is said that the balance is much more even – if some of the ‘double haters’ are republicans. And of course, those who actually turn out and are not disbarred from voting is a critical factor in this election as well.

Last night whilst Meg was fortunately asleep in her bed, together with many other millions of viewers I tuned in to the Olympics broadcast to follow the progress of Adam Peaty who has gained gold for two successive Olympics and is now in a quest for a third gold medal. I was fearful about this young man’s prospects as there had been an enormous amount of pre-match buildup with emotional interviews with his family members and the like which could only have added to the pressure he was already under to perform. When the final did take place, he was beaten by an Italian who came from seemingly nowhere by 0.02 second which is about the equivalent of a fingernail. Peaty himself seemed philosophical about his silver medal under the circumstances but one wonders whether to be beaten by so narrow a margin will prey on one’s mind for evermore. One theme is emerging from the Olympics on this occasion and it is the mental health of the elite athletes. The issue has been highlighted this year by the return to the Olympic arena of Simone Biles regarded as one of the most superb gymnasts the world has ever seen. Biles, the most decorated gymnast in history, is back for her third Games after withdrawing from most of her events at the Tokyo Games in 2021 with mental health issues. Apparently Peaty had his battles also and it seems to be that once has achieved the pinnacle, it puts the most intolerable pressure upon athletes to stay at the top. I think this issue is being taking more seriously in the sporting world but in the case of Olympic athletes and even more so in the case of the gymnasts the pressures put upon their young charges can be immense and sometimes goes ‘over the line’ It was said that the outstanding Romanian gymnast, Nadia Comenci was slapped and starved (and worse) by her own coach which story only came to light well after the event and Comenci fled to the USA from her native Romania.

This morning, being a Monday and with no particular routine in mind, I decided that we should try something a little different. Since Meg cannot go anywhere in our car, her journeys out have been confined to Waitrose on the one hand and the park on the other. Today, I thought it would be a good idea to access the High Street in Bromsgrove and to do this I wheeled Meg along a road which leads to a large cemetery attached to St. Johns which sits atop a little hillside and overlooks the town. A footpath used by lots of the local residents (including myself almost every day in the not so distant past) cuts across the cemetery and I know that the principal path needed to be accessed via two large steps which made this route inaccessible to Meg in her wheelchair. But there was another curving path which had no steps to negotiate but was incredibly steep for a short distance. Nonetheless we braved this and evidently once atop the hilltop, the journey down into the actual town was quite easy. We popped into the local AgeUk furniture store which also sells other charity items and acquired five cushion covers of which two are an antique gold design, one a tiled design, one a design with a heart motif and the final one decorated by some elephants motif. On the High Street, I knew that the local Greggs had been extended but I did not particularly want to patronise them. There is another newly opened coffee bar of which I have received good reports but I actually diverted down into a little square off the High Street and popped into a folksy little cafe called ‘The Lemon Tree’ This cafe has actually been there for several years now but the two new owners told us that they had only taken it over three weeks ago and had given it a ‘refurb’ Their menu was not just coffees but light lunches as well which might prove an attraction for us. When we got there, we were only the patrons of the cafe and we ordered a toasted teacake (dripping with butter) and a pot of tea served in some beautiful little china cups for which we were only charged £5.00. We chatted with the sisters running the establishment, both of Italian extraction, and started talking about some Italian cities that we had visited. All in all we had the most delightful little sojourn and chat and I am wondering whether to introduce our University of Birmingham friend to it when we coffee with him next Friday morning. So we have determined to make this into a regular little Monday morning ‘slot’ in our weekly timetable because it means that with a walk along the High Street we can occasionally dive into stores to buy toiletries and the like.

It was a beautiful and indeed hot afternoon. I thought I would seize the opportunity to get the front lawned area cut and although this was a real dash, I had in mind to get it all done (which I did) so that I could sit down and listen to the Rachel Reeves announcement of how the £22 billion black hole she reckons has been left by the outgoing Tory government can be filled. But when we turned on the TV in time for the announcement in the Commons at 3.00pm, the news was dominated by an horrific mass stabbings in Southport so I wonder whether this delayed the Commons announcement. Anyway, we will catch up with all of the relevant details which no doubt will be analysed to death in the days ahead. The pay rise for public sector staff of 5.5% looks as though it is going to be accepted in full following the recommendations of the independent Pay Review bodies. No one seems to be making the point, though, that this pay increase for many public sector workers only serves to reduce a little the impact of the pay cuts that have been inflicted upon public sector workers in the past ten years or more under the regime of ‘Austerity’ by the outgoing Tory administration. When pay is squeezed for year upon year like this, a point always comes at which that in order to attract and retain staff and to remain competitive with the private sector, a period of ‘catching up’ becomes almost inevitable.