Today was quite a dull, cloudy and not particularly warm Monday morning so it was not a day for too much lingering in the park or anywhere for that matter. Meg and I decided to go down into town by car because we needed to make an optician’s appointment with the optician who has been testing Meg and I for years now. We got the appointment made without fuss and then I made a favourite foray into Poundland where I bought some cleaning products and one or two items for Mog’s Den. We had rather a hurried lunch because we knew that our chiropodist was due to call at 2.00 pm in the afternoon. I had bought a huge cauliflower over the weekend and didn’t want to cook it over the weekend lest it smelled the house out (a potential problem with cauliflower) I overcame this to some extent by adding a layer of brown sugar on top of the cauliflower before I steamed it and had the kitchen window wide open. I made a cheese roux to go over the cauliflower and I am not sure that I made it correctly as I haven’t made a roux for a year or so. I started off with some melted butter and then added the grated cheese and some full-cream milk but I substituted some white gravy thickening granules instead of flour which I think now was a culinary mistake. However, it tasted OK and used it together with some carrot-and-peas mixture accompany the chicken breasts of which I cooked half yesterday. All of this was quite tasty and everything would have been OK but our chiropodist, uncharacteristically, arrived at our house about ten minutes earlier than anticipated and this really messed up our luncheon timetable. Meg had her dinner after she had received her treatment and I ate mine far too quickly than is good for me, trying to get it eaten on time.

This morning, I put into effect something I have been meaning to do and today was the day. After about 56 years of reading The Guardian, I have finally decided to cancel my subscription. I get the  Times and the Guardian every day and I tend to read the Times quite carefully but the Guardian only in a more cursory fashion. I am rationalising some of my expenditures to fit in better with my anticipated saving and spending plans and I reckon the £54.00 I spend each month can go to a much more worthy cause. I often read the Guardian’s News headlines and Comment section but I am pretty sure these can be accessed via the internet so I am not really losing out. What was interesting was the fact that the sales team at the Guardian subscription department  tried to keep me within their scheme by offering me a half price deal for three months but I was not to be tempted. I have a term (time limited) assurance that is due to run its course by the start of December so that is a bit more money that can find a better home. I did feel a slight pang of regret after ending an association that had lasted so many decades but now is not the time for undue sentimentality.

This afternoon was not devoted to anything very much apart from a doze and a read. Naturally, the news media is still full of the news of the fall of Kabul which is so redolent of the images that we remember of the fall of Saigon at the end of the Vietnam war. On the occasion, though, there were scenes of hundreds of desperate citizens trying to escape the clutches of the Taliban and trying to get into the plane by whatever means they could. There were some rumours that some desperate people hung onto whatever they could from the plane’s fuselage and fell to their deaths once the plane had taken off. The scenes from Saigon were of people trying desperately to climb into helicopters whereas this time it was transport planes but the motivation was the same. Everybody is speaking of the speed of the collapse of the existing Afghanistan regime and, according to reports, even then Taliban themselves were somewhat amazed  at the pace of events. Of course, the interesting question is whether ‘the leopard has actually changed its spots‘ and whether there will be reprisals galore for having collaborated with the Americans or whether the Taliban are going to offer a different public face to their reputation since the 1990’s.

In the late afternoon, I popped into Mog’s Den to do a frenetic 15 minutes of weeding. I reasoned that if I removed the largest and more persistent of them, I would solve the problem getting worse. For the more minute weeds, I am going to use a combination of vinegar (acetic acid) and washing up liquid (just a splash) This is an incredibly effective low-cost and ecologically friendly weedkiller. The acetic acid in the vinegar dries up and desiccates the plant whilst the bit of washing up liquid helps to reduce the surface tension and therefore makes the whole solution that bit ‘wetter’  A bit of hot sun an hour or so after spraying is ideal for this system to work completely effectively.

Another Sunday has come round again and, as always, I went off to collect our newspapers early. Normally, I get back before 9.00 in order to watch the Andrew Marr show but today it was watching the events unfold, hour by hour, in Afghanistan – more of this later. After we had breakfasted and got ourselves turned around, we were off to the park where there was an open session of the Bromsgrove Literary and Philosophical Society– Meg and I brought the numbers uo to four where we were regularly inspected by the local dogs and their owners who stop by for a chat. I think this morning the subject that engaged us was interesting films we had see recently as well as the news story which lead the Sunday Times in which it is argued that the Chinese had effectively nobbled the World Health Organisation and ensured that a full investigation of the origins and history of COVID-19 will now never be known. After we got home for lunch, we cooked ourselves a chicken dinner (made easy by Waitrose where you merely pop the tinfoil container into the oven) After lunch, I needed to gird my loins and get the lawns cut – postponed from yesterday. When I started off, the weather was a little cloudy but as I was finishing off about an hour later, it started smattering with rain. Fortunately, it was nothing much to worry about and did not hold up the proceedings at all.

Throughout the day, we have following the fall of Afghanistan (or more accurately the fall of Kabul) to the Taliban which seems to have happened with the most extraordinary rapidity. It is not as though the Taliban have forced a victory – rather whatever opposition there might have been has just melted away so they seemed to have into walked into provincial capital after provincial capital (and eventually Kabul itself) with hardly a shot being fired. First thing this morning (UK time) we learned that the Taliban had entered the suburbs of Kabul, then that they had actually entered the presidential palace and eventually that the President himself had fled leaving only his generals behind who were no doubt wondering what to do. The whole speed of the take-over rather reminds you of the fall of Saigon all of those years ago – The British and Americans are sending troops not to fight  but to oversee the evacuation of their nationals as fast as they can. The reaction of the British government is interesting and quasi-comical – Parliament is being recalled next Wednesday but by that date everything will be a ‘fait accompli‘ so what is the point, I ask myself? The Foreign secretary is actually on holiday at the moment but is making his way home (as I suppose he feels he ought to be at his post given the circumstances). I seem to remember standing in the basement of a stately home somewhere and reading some archived documents which detailed how badly British army had fared in Afghanistan in the 19th C. If we go back to 1842, of course, we can read about the ‘1842 retreat from Kabul‘ which ranks as one of the worst military disasters in British military history. In total the British army lost 4,500 troops, along with about 12,000 civilians: the latter comprising both the families of Indian and British soldiers, plus workmen, servants and other Indian camp-followers. It does make you wonder if our policy makers have read any of this history and one suspects that the Americans have certainly not done so. I am also noting that the Americans do not like losing – hence all kind of blame is being thrown about at the moment and Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw from one of the USA’s longest wars in history, being some twenty years, may lose him a lot of popularity in the American opinion polls. Of course, once the Americans withdrew, then the British had no option but to follow suit, appearing as always as nothing more than the lapdog of the Americans. How one must feel if one had a son or a daughter who had lost their life during the Afghanistan conflict, one must inevitably ask the question whether it was remotely worthwhile – and whether such a young life had been lost in vain. Being of a particular age, I can remember how Harold Wilson when he was the Labour Prime Minister skilfully kept the UK out of the Vietnam conflict, although the Australians and the Canadians contributed forces. And in case you happen to be wondering, Donald Trump successfully evaded the draft on at least five occasions, four of them whilst he was at college and on the fifth occasion arguing successfully that he had ‘bad feet’ caused by the growth of bone spurs. There is some talk that this last medical condition was not verified and could have been entirely fictitious.

Today was a fairly conventional Saturday with no particular things in prospect for us, apart from going to church in the late afternoon. Having completed a few household chores, Meg and I wandered fairly slowly down into the town and thence to the park. Here we were delighted to  meet up with our University of Birmingham friend and another of the park regulars – I quipped that we are now the Bromsgrove Literary and Philosophical Society having their weekly meeting. Having had our coffee, I started off to collect our weekly supply of newspapers and it started to smatter with rain. So I organised an emergency umbrella and having ensured that the rest of the group could more or less keep themselves dry, I set off to collect our weekly ration of newspapers. Upon my return, the little group had relocated themselves to a spot where the trees afford a little more cover and the bandstand was in close proximity in case we need to make a sudden dash for it. Realising that the weather may be worsening, Meg and I struck off for home and our two friends were going off to the little cafe in the park to treat themselves to something warm. As we set off, though, the rain stuttered to a halt so we did not get really wet on the way home but just a little damp.

Lunch was a little special today because I had ordered some lambs’ liver for lunch. Having cubed this and dried it off, I then panfried it but added a goodly layer of onions and some onion gravy I had made to complete the meal. As vegetables, we had a baked potato and some Cavolo Nero (kale) which is particularly delicious. In the past, I am pretty sure that I have added a little red wine to my lambs liver but I forgot to do it today and the results were still pretty good. After lunch, I had intended to give the lawns their weekly cut but, in truth, whilst the sun was shining the grass was still pretty wet from this morning’s showers so I decided to postpone this particular treat until tomorrow. 

Halfway through he afternoon my small-scale dustbin arrived, courtesy of Amazon and well before the anticipated delivery date of next Tuesday and Wednesday.  I have bought one of these mini dustbins before and it is now residing in Mog’s Den, filled with a large bag of gravel. I now intend to use this new one as a storage container for garden peat and/or topsoil. They are about 18″-19″ in height and have a lockable lid with some clips to hold on the lid. Whilst these are a little ugly to the purist, it is well worth having something with a completely secure and lockable lid as I know to my cost that light plastic dustin lids can easily blow away in the winter gales. Also they are superb height and have a capacity of 50 litres. My original intention was to mix peat and topsoil in approximately equal proportions so that I would always have a handy supply when it came to planting out. But then I had some second thoughts and thought it would probably be a better idea to have peat in one container and topsoil in another so that I could mix them in absolutely the proportions that I needed for any particular planting. Although they are cheap enough at less than £12 (delivered), I toyed with the idea of buying yet another but decided to improvise. Going to my compost area (nicely hidden behind some tall fir trees), I resurrected an old builders bucket and found one of these plastic trug affairs that would serve as a huge but highly effective cover and so I utilised this for my topsoil whilst keeping my shiny new dustbin for garden peat. I wanted something a bit more professional than half-filled plastic bags which however well you try to close them always seem to attract slugs and snails from somewhere.

This evening we went to church as we always do on a Saturday evening and attendance was a little down as you would expect in the middle of August when so many are on holiday. I had brought with me a little bottle of damson gin which I intended to bestow upon on of our chatty Liverpudlian parishioners to whom I promised it last week – as she wasn’t there this week, I shall have to used to taking it along each Sunday until she reappears. Tomorrow, I hope that the weather is a bit better because I want to get a little bit of planting done and the lawns cut. Our lawns generally look OK and then suddenly look straggly and overgrown and I have to, as the gardening books say, ‘Choose a fine day‘ to get the mowing done.

We woke up to a nice bright day this morning and although it was a little cloudy this morning, the day seemed to be set fair. In a wakeful period during the night, I attempted to use the cPanel system to investigate a couple of websites that I have. To my display, I kept on getting a ‘login not valid‘ message so I had to have a think about how to put it right. Eventually, I hit upon a solution which was to use my conventional FTP transfer program on my IBM portable where I was relieved to discover that an updated password seemed to be working OK. I am pretty sure that cPanel uses the credentials from an FTP program and this did the trick for me. Once I gained access to the site, you can have a fish around and use Disk Statistics to discern (up to a point) which applications and programs are taking up most space. There is also a utility called File Manager which enables you to explore features of the website not accessible to a browser. However, some of these are system statistics, log files and web statistics so some of these ‘housekeeping’ files can be deleted but some evidently need to be preserved. I managed to do a certain amount of tidying up and eventually recovered a little of disk space so now the I am using 1.5Gb of my 2.5GB allocation – so I think 1Gb should be enough for the immediate future so long as I keep an eye on things.

Meg and I had a pleasant walk down to the park this morning. Fortunately, the fairground activities of yesterday have all been packed away so we were relieved to enjoy the pleasant and more tranquil ambience off the park again. I collected our newspapers whilst Meg read the edition of yesterday’s Guardian and then we made tracks for home,knowing that our hairdresser was due to call at 1.30 so lunch would have to be delayed. By the time Meg’s hair and been done and my own fixed in-between sessions, we had to work out how to have a really fast but delayed lunch. This dilemma was solved by toasting some of the sandwiches we bought for yesterday’s afternoon the but did not use and this proved to be tasty warm snack finished off by a chocolate ice cream in which Waitrose happens to excel.

One little thing I did in between the hairdressing sessions was to get onto an insurance company who sold us some term assurance (i.e. they only pay out if you die before the end of the time) This  ‘expires’ at the start of December and I needed to know exactly at what point the direct debit should cease – after all this was set up 20 years ago. The personnel in the insurance company confirmed that the direct debit should cease after the last payment had been made in the month before expiry which sounded reassuring – nonetheless, a bit nearer the date, I will probably do a check to ensure the direct debit is well and truly cancelled and the money saved diverted to a more worthwhile savings ‘pot’.

This morning as we went down on our walk we noticed that some of the relatives of our recently deceased neighbour are clearing out the contents of the garage. As is often the case of people who pride themselves on their handyman skills, the garage was stuffed full of tools some conventional and some esoteric collected lovingly and used over the years. As I saw tin after tin of god-knows-what  get disposed of I did feel a quick pang – I am sure that some of the chemicals were out-of-date and needed a rapid disposal but I wonder what was going to happen to the clamps, lathes and sometimes faintly exotic (not to say quixotic) tools that were lurking within.

My son and daughter-in-law having returned from holiday are busy throwing things away, recycling them to charity shops and generally de-cluttering themselves of years of impedimenta. I suppose I ought to feel really inspired by their example and start to do the same. Up to a point the ‘mañana’ syndrome strikes and tomorrow always seems the better day to start. I had intended to get our lawns cut day and to do a little bit of pottering which means taking a few of the cuttings I have been nurturing and putting them into more conducive surroundings. But our French friend who we entertained in the garden yesterday brought along a beautiful little patio rose so I know exactly the spot in which I want that to grow. I have a series of herbs (coriander, basil and the like) that in theory you can start off on a kitchen window sill and then transplant out later but it is really getting a little late in the year, even for fast growing herbs like that.

We had made plans for today several days ago along the following lines. Down at the bottom of the Kidderminster Road and neighbour to some of our closest friends is a French lady who has been widowed quite recently. With walking up and down, we have had snatches of conversation with her but felt it would be nice if we had the opportunity for a more extended and leisurely chat. So about a week ago, we agreed that we should meet for tea in our garden and, of course, today is the agreed date.We decided to go down in the car because we thought we would pop into Waitrose and get a few things necessary for this afternoon and then we would make our way to the park. When we got to the park it was absolutely teeming with a huge fun fair that had been organised primarily for the benefit children of  the younger school children. So there were masses of organised activities for the children as well as the more usual collection of slides, bouncy castles and the like. The park was so busy that some of the local authority staff had had to tape off various areas of the grass to act as an overflow carpark and, as you can imagine, the whole park was teeming. With a heavy heart, we suspected that every bench would be occupied but we were fortunate enough to find an unoccupied bench so we sat down to have our elevenses in the midst of the hustle and bustle. We were quite pleased to start off on our way home and have an early light lunch, knowing that we were going to eat again during the afternoon.

Our guest arrived at 3.00pm, absolutely on cue. We have a well-worked routine by now where we throw some cushions on the metal garden chairs, a table cloth on the table and then prepare the food for the afternoon. We had a very entertaining chat with our guest who had come over to England as a French ‘assistante‘ and then met her future husband in the school in which she was employed teaching Modern Languages and where she carried on working for much of her professional life. We exchanged a lot of stories about the places in Europe that we had both visited in our earlier lives and then wistfully tried to imagine what trips we might make in the future. However, her son had visited Italy recently so perhaps there is hope for us yet. The Foreign Office website mentions the necessity to quarantine until August 30th so perhaps this restrictions are time limited and might be lifted after that date.We shall have to wait and see.

In the late afternoon, we received some very sad but not completely unexpected news. Our near neighbour who lives across the way from the communal green area in front of our house had had quite a severe stroke but was currently in an assessment unit in one of the local hospitals. This afternoon, her son called around to say that his mother had had another massive stroke from she had died at about 5.30 this morning. Apparently, the doctors had told the family that they were surprised given the severity of the first stroke that she had actually survived it – she appeared to be making some progress as recently as yesterday as she was walking about and her power of speech was gradually returning. However, I sensed that the emotions of the family as well as a natural grief were a sense of relief that their mother had not lingered on for months in a kind of twilight world. 

Our neighbour had introduced me to Pilates several years ago so we used to walk down the hill to the class together every single Tuesday, without fail (but of course the pandemic put to a halt to all of that) She came from Huddersfield so we shared some Yorkshire roots in common and indeed found that we shared many similarities inner outlook on life. As well as our Pilates classes, we joined with each other to attempt to stop the housing development which took place immediately adjacent to us when an apple orchard was mercilessly chopped down (but paradoxically would have an automatically protected status if it had come under the jurisdiction of  Worcestershire County Council rather than Bromsgrove District Council.) We were actually very successful in opposing the planning application and were successful on the first three occasions but ultimately lost on the fourth one. A developer is allowed to appeal  a decision for ever more until successful whereas residents are not allowed that right. We also, with another neighbour, bought the communal green area in the middle of our houses and this effectively stopped any would-be developers from driving a roadway straight past our houses which would have made our lives hell. I also wonder whether the additional stress of having to cope with the vibration cracks that appeared all over her bungalow as a result of heavy earth moving vehicles moving in the vicinity whilst the new estate was being built actually contributed to her ill health. She will be sadly missed.

Today was an ‘ordinary’ sort of day in which it looked as the weather was more-or-less set fair but with the threat of a shower. Meg and I decided to risk going down for a walk without the benefit of rainwear as it so potentially humid that outerwear can make you feel quite uncomfortable. We were a little delayed going down to the park as we needed to update our Waitrose order and I also needed to spend some time getting my accounts up-to-date. I left Meg on the park bench, complete with a copy of yesterday’s Guardian and this works out very well as Meg can immerse herself in the newspaper for the 20 minutes in which I am away. Also, if she looks up from the newspaper, she can probably see me enter the park by the main (lower) entrance and observe my progress up the hill to our traditional bench. On the way home, I called in at the house of our South African friend who had texted me the other day desperately searching for a handyman who can do a few jobs for her. I ws delighted to be able to recommend someone who does little (and not so little) jobs for us when the need arises. This afternoon, I gave my rusted spade a final attack and that is all I now intend to do with it – practically all of the blade is now in a sufficiently good condition for me to want to keep it that way. 

There have been several reports in the last few days of people who are critically ill, and some at the point of death, who have been active COVID deniers but have now seen the error of their ways and are pleading with medical staff to give them a vaccine now in the hope that it save them (which of course it won’t) This, for me, raises the interesting question of why many people believe, almost implicitly, in social media rather than the views of the ‘experts’ who often appear on the Main Street Media channels.  For me, the problem is not who some people believe in the social media – after all, there have always been pockets of society of groups who are prepared to believe conspiracy theories. Perhaps some of the explanation here is that in a world where individuals perceive themselves to be always at the ‘receiving’ end of the system, then a belief in what might seem to be outlandish is a way of exerting some degree of power or even control against the over-arching belief systems within a society. The problem for me is not why some people over-rely upon the social media but why a substantial minority (and, according to some reports, a majority) of people have such implicit faith in social media. Without descending into huge academic debates about the presence of culture wars, the following explanation I believe had a lot of traction. The point about social media is that views are promulgated not just by a few powerful sources (the Main Street Media) but stories are shared between friends, colleagues and family members. This can then boost the credibility of the contents of social media  with readers. This may be  due to the fact that people may simply “think differently” when using social media from how they might think when watching the evening news. Why wouldn’t we want to believe a story our friends shared?

Meg and I feel we have had a pretty ‘good’ day today and it is an interesting question of what makes for a ‘good’ versus a ‘not-so-good’ day. I think the answer is that is a good thing to set yourself some limited objectives of what you want to achieve in a day (which might be as mundane as completing a set of household chores) or doing some tidying up (or de-cluttering might be a more accurate term). Then if you complete your limited objectives you are left with a slightly virtuous feeling – conversely, if you had set yourself fairly ambitious objectives, then you might only manage to achieve some of them and are left with a vague feeling of dissatisfaction that one has not achieved more. So the secret of contentment might be to set yourself certain goals (e.g. a walk of a certain length – but not too far to leave you feeling exhausted for the rest of the day) and take satisfaction from achieving them.

Tonight as I was reading my emails, I received a letter from my consultant giving me the results of the investigations I had about a fortnight ago. The letter was generally reassuring but he does have a tendency to write things like (but ‘nothing for you to worry about‘ which does indicate some anomalies of which one is ignorant) One test result has still be returned but so far, so good. I must say I am impressed by the level of monitoring that the NHS provides – one does wonder, though, about the fate of those with lingering or undiagnosed symptoms that could have been targeted much earlier were it not for the pandemic.

Today was the day when our son and daughter-in-law were due to return from their holiday in Jersey. We knew that they would be returning today but assumed that the flight would be later on in the day and we would expect to see them in the evening. However, we got a text early on telling us that their flight from Jersey was at 9.00am this morning and therefore we should expect them home from Birmingham Airport at about 11.00am. This stimulated me into an activity I would rather have done without. I suspected that there ws a slight odour of something going ‘off’ whenever I opened the fridge door. The only thing to do was to strip bare the whole of the fridge, see if there were any offending articles (and I did find something in a bowl that I think was the source of the problem) Then, of course, you have to take out all the shelves, give them a good wash down, replace them in the right order if you can remember what that is and then replace all of the food items. This I now have done but the whole process took an hour and a half and I finished it a few seconds before 11.00am which is when my son and daughter-in-law were scheduled to return. I was glad, in a sort of way, that this had happened as you do need to do it periodically, particularly in the summer time. I am also determined to keep the fridge somewhat understocked in future so that errant items are less likely to be forgotten and I also decided to introduce a more logical order for things such that they can be located more easily.  We have another little domestic drama which is causing  some annoyance. One of the taps in the utility room adjoining our kitchen sprung a leak from somewhere around its base. Eventually the seepage became a drip and then a more-or-less continuously running tap and I had to report to all kinds of binding cloths to attempt to stem the flow and stop what what was rapidly becoming a type of Chinese water torture. Evidently, I had left messages for the plumber last Thursday and Friday but in the nature of the beast, a dripping tap is the very last of a plumber’s priorities when there are boilers to service. The refrain from Woodie Allen kept running through my head ‘not only is God dead but you try finding a plumber on a Sunday!‘ My son took charge of the situation and gave the tap unit as a whole a tweak which I dare not do for fear of making a bad situation worse. We have finally got a time for the plumber to call round but we will have to wait until Thursday afternoon. As we were running a bit short of time, we raced down in the car to pick up our newspapers, had the briefest of elevenses breaks in the park, raced back home again in the car and then I do a quick change before heading off for my Pilates class (routine every Tuesday) Perhaps because of all of the running around this morning, I was not feeling in top form and subsequently the Pilates session proved a bit more difficult for me than is usual. Then it was home and a lightning quick lunch which we just about finished by 3.30pm

By arrangement, I then Skyped one of my ex-colleagues from the University of Winchester. We tend to have an extended chart every fortnight or so but this time round it had been a longer gap than this and we had a lot to say to each other (and not the kinds of things to go into a blog anyway) All in all, by the time we had exchanged accounts of what had happening to us in our day-to-day lives we spent the best part of a couple of hours together which absolutely flew by. We will probably chat again in a fortnight’s time but we reminded each other go jokes, stories and reminiscences which permeates our chats with each other.  

There are two news stories dominating the media this evening, one foreign (sort of) an the other domestic. The ‘foreign’ story concerns Prince Andrew where a woman claims she was sexually assaulted by him when she was 17 twice at locations in the United States and once at Maxwell’s home in Belgravia, London. Sky news incidentally have an amazing graphic dawn upon the flight logs of various aircraft in which the young woman question had been flown all over locations in the US as well as London, Paris and southern Spain as part of the Epstein sex-trafficking operations. The interesting question is actually the writ can actually be served upon Prince Andrew given his policy of non-cooperation and non-availability. Also, once entered into the legal system, the rich and powerful have tremendous options to delay and hinder a full court hearing so one imagines the this particular scenario will go on for months or even years.

The second domestic story today is that it is ‘A’level results day and the headline figure is that practically 45% of pupils entered for the examinations have achieved a grade of ‘A’or ‘A*’ Those responsible for teaching the pupils argue that the results indicate a lot of incredibly hard work from pupils whose educational progression has been far from smooth in the last couple of years given lockdowns, distance leaning and the innovations having to be shown to deliver education in the most trying of circumstances. On the other hand, are these results fair when measured across the generations (people might not have got into course/ universities of their choice last year when they would have done this year)?

Well, the start of another week and at least some of our friends should be returning from their holidays. After we collected our newspapers, we made a quick call into Waitrose because we had run out of one or two things that I forgotten to specify in the last order. As always, the staff in the store were delighted to see us (and us them) and we managed to tell a joke to brighten up their lives a little.  When we got outside, we encountered one of the Waitrose regulars we used to see regularly once or twice a week but we have hardly seen her at all in the last year (with the COVID-19 restrictions in place).  We now know that she often goes along to the cafe on a Saturday morning so we can visit and coincide a bit more frequently from now on. Once we got to the park, we bumped into  one of the park regulars and we exchanged news and pleasantries. The weather forecast today indicated that we might have heavy showers in the morning but they would moderate in the afternoon. Asa it turned out,  the morning was a quite fine although a trifle humid – as Meg and I had put on anoraks in case we had a violent shower, we were feeling a little over-dressed considering the weather.

In the afternoon, I decided to take the car and go for a mini-shopping trip to Asda. I started off with a little list of about nine items and they are all things that I can only get in Asda and nowhere else. The first few items on the list I managed to get very easily but the last item  took as long to hunt for as all of the rest. In the past, I had bought an excellent LED torch from Asda which I use constantly (I use it if I need to get up in the middle of the night but I don’t to wake Meg, or myself, up too much with a bright light). Needless to say, it wasn’t stocked any more and Asda had reorganised the section from which I last bought it so I drew a blank. On the other hand, I did find one or two very useful things including a miniature (and cheap) sort of wastepaper basket which I am going to use in Mog’s Den to store things that will clean up my tools such as an old washing up brush, some volatile oil (think WD-40) which I can use to clean off the tools before they get stored. Evidently, this needs a lid to prevent the Ingress of rain but I have liberated a plantpot ‘saucer’  which complete with a handy brick will serve the purpose of a lid. I also bought some extra bits and pieces from Asda I did not realise I needed until I happened to see them so, all in all, it was quite a worthwhile little trip.

One thing I am trying to do for a variety of reasons is to try and increase the amount of fibre in my diet whilst also incorporating some protein. One of the best sources of fibre plus protein are beans and I seem to remember, years ago, I used to particularly enjoy little tins of Heinz curried baked beans. As I remember them  they were a combination of beans, some sultanas and a subtle, i.e. not overpowering, curry sauce. When I hunted around in Asda, these did not seem to be in stock (or even manufactured any more) soI am going to try and recreate the same. Whilst in Asda I bought a tin of mixed beans as well as a jar of Chinese curried sauce and I already have some sultanas in stock. So tomorrow breakfast time will be an experiment. Incidentally, buying half-size tins of food is always what I call ‘sad’ food. This is is because when I was commuting between Leicester and Winchester, staying in lodgings in Winchester during the week and coming home for the weekends, I needed to go shopping to buy ‘meals for one’ which is generally a half-size tin. You could tell the males who were in a similar plight because at about 5.30 on a Monday morning, you would see a succession of cars with shirts hanging up in the back of the car and evidently a lot of people on the road at that time were on a similar commuting experience to myself (Annie Nightingale on Radio 2 produced the most empathetic radio broadcasts as well just for this group although I am not a regular Radio 2 listener). In the late afternoon, I finally completed the renovation of my spade involving a radical de-rusting. Now that I have got it into good condition and protected by a volatile oil, I am tempted not to store it outside again where it acquire new patinas of rust.So now I have got my Mog’s Den garden too;s on gapped condition, I really do intend to keep them that way.

So it was my Sunday morning routine this morning where I go down early in the morning to collect my Sunday newspapers and I treated myself to a Mozart concert on my old iPhone en route. On the way back, I had espied two escaped plants that I thought I would ‘liberate’ and for this purpose I took with me a gardener’s knife which is basically like a penknife but has an incredibly strong blade once it has been successfully locked into position. The first one of these was a piece of errant mint that had escaped one of the gardens so I cut off a little section of root and put it into a plastic bag I have brought with me.  I then progressed onto the second of my ventures. In a nearby garden, there is a very old and mature sycamore tree (I think() which has evidently cast its key-like seeds all over the place. A cluster have evidently landed in the loose gravel of a neighbouring garden where the seedlings have taken root (simulating what happens when a gardener is trying to develop cuttings – the young seed/plant reaches through the gravel in search of water and nutriments and tends to develop good root systems. Anyway I liberated about three of these and into another plastic bag they went, waiting to be popped into a spare bit of pot or earth as soon as I have the opportunity.  After breakfast, Meg and I walked down to the park and we were delighted to see with our University of Birmingham friend as we often do at the weekend as well as out 86 yr old avid walker who fits in a circuit of at least 9km a day. Today was the last day of the Olympics and we watched a Welsh girl win a boxing gold, Jason Kenny win yet another gold to add to his collection and Laura Kenny  endure a terrible crash in the ‘Omnium’ bike race. Several riders were involved in the crash which looked horrendous : Laura Kenny herself had her bike fly in the air and then on top of her, two other riders ran over her (from what I could tell) and she slid down the track until her (helmeted) head hit the side of the track. The amazing thing is that after this she was expected to get on her bike and complete another series of races including a sprint which she may have won. Under the circumstances to come 7th was an absolute miracle – I think shortly afterwards as well she was expected to be the Team GB flag-bearer at the closing ceremony. And so we bid a restrained and dignified farewell to Tokyo – I was rather expecting to see hordes of young athletes invading the arena to party but I suppose the numbers (and celebrations) had to be severely curtailed because ofCOVID. On to Paris in only three years time and then the Paralympics starts in a couple of weeks of time.

This afternoon after lunch, I had just one little project to do which I thought would take 5 minutes but turned out to be a hard half hour. I have a spade which I keep outdoors for easy accessibility  in Mogs Den. This had got rusted so I treated it first with raw vinegar and then a specialist rust remover which is really Phosphoric Acid (almost completely) Although the spade had been brushed with the rust remover several times I though the residues would be easy to move but this proved not to be the case. I attacked it with a combination of wire brushes, Brillo pads, Chemico (which is just being re-manfactured again after being common in the 1950’s) and half an hour’s elbow grease. It is still not absolutely right so I will give the stubborn patches another ‘working over’ and that will be that – I will condition it with oil and put it back where it lives tomorrow.

Some interesting COVI+D news has emerged today. It seems that researchers have found a clear link between the Scottish participation in the Euro finals and the rise (and fall) of COVID infections. The rate of infections dropped quite dramatically once Scotland had failed to progress any further – it will be interesting to see if there is  an ‘English’ effect once the data is analysed.  The overall rate of infections seems to be fairly stable at the moment but the scientist have calculated that the ‘R’ rate may well have topped below 1.0 which if it sustained, means the pandemic is somewhat on the retreat (for now!) The Health Secretary is concerned (like the rest of the us) at the huge disparity in prices for a full PCR test (required if one is going abroad on holiday) – another example of the private sector ‘making hay whilst the sun shines’ whilst the government’s showing no interest at all in any degree harmonisation or regulation.

We suspected that it would be fine this morning and might rain a little later in the day and so it turned out. On our way to collect the newspapers, we ran into our University of Birmingham friend whom we have not seen for almost a week (as most days of the week he is off playing tennis) Meg was feeling a little tired so I handed Meg her to our friend to accompany her to the park whilst I went to collect the newspapers. In the park, we met up with one of our park regulars  and carried on conversations regarding the Olympics. One thing I have noticed, which has received a little but not an enormous amount of publicity, is the impact of technology on both running shoes and the track itself. The modern running shoes are incorporating some carbon fibre and the effect of this is to add a little bit of ‘spring’ to the athlete as well as lowering impact resistance. Various kinds of technological improvements have also been built into the track. Immediately ‘below the surface’ is a type of honeycomb or lattice arrangement (filled with what?) which has the effect of making the track operate like a series of miniaturised trampolines. The effect of these two technological improvements (running shoes, track) is that world records are being broken quite regularly. In one of the men’s races over hurdles ( I cannot remember which) then the world record was broken in the heats and again in the final. The person who came in second (i.e. silver) would have broken the previous world record whilst not winning the race. Whilst not arguing against the march of technological advance,  I am left with a slight feeling of unease that world records are being broken with the aid of thee technological advances as well as the individual efforts of the athletes themselves.

As we made it home for lunch, a little earlier than usual, the smattering rain looked as though it was going to intensify during the afternoon so I made sure that I applied one of my ‘rust-removal’ routines to a spade which I store in Mog’s Den. This is basically a wire brush, followed by a brillo pad treatment and then a sponge off and clean and dry with kitchen paper.When all of this settled down, I will give it (and my other gardening tools) a good spray with WD-40 (or a near equivalent) which helps to build up a degree of rust protection if I apply every time the tools get used and ‘put to bed’. Halfway through the afternoon, an order arrived from Amazon which was a complete collection of  hand tools for £17.00  Evidently, at this price it is Chinese made but you get about three   different kinds of hand rakes, five different trowels in a variety of shapes and sizes, some secateurs, a miniature garden spray, some gloves, a series of coloured labels, some wire twists complete with cutter and finally. a fabric gardening basket to hold all the tools. All of this lot is destined for the toolbox in Mog’s Den so now there is no excuse for not keeping everything well trimmed and cultivated.

This afternoon, we were generally watching the culmination of the Olympic Games. Team GB seem to be winning medals until the end with a boxing gold for a local Birmingham lad and a gold in the modern pentathlon. This was invented by Pierre de Coubertin (father of the Modern Olympics) and was a variation on the military aspect of the Ancient pentathlon. It focused on the skills required by a late-19th-century soldier, with competitions in shooting, swimming, fencing, equestrianism, and cross country running. I also watched some of the obscure events such as artistic swimming and artistic gymnastics and have to say I was incredibly impressed by the athleticism and gymnastic skills displayed. In the late afternoon, we went to church as we always do early in the evening on Saturday. There we made contact again with a lively Liverpudlian lady who can talk for England but also, at a fairly advanced age makes regular round trips in her car visiting members of her family in Sheffield and Liverpool. We had not seen her for the best part of a year (although she says she has seen us whilst we are walking up and down the road towards the park each day).  I promised her a bottle of our damson gin to which, I gather, she might be somewhat partial. Tomorrow evening will no doubt be closing ceremony of the Olympics and I may well watch this as I am sure that the Japanese will stage it particularly well. In addition, I do like to see the faces of the genuinely happy athletes as the pressures of competition are behind them and they can party for the first time in years. I wonder how many cross-cultural liaisons are made during events like these?