Month: July 2024

Sunday, 21st July, 2024

A warm, Summer’s day but …. at home. All around us neighbours are away in Dubai, Parma, France, Spain. We are deserted. It is quite a little community here. This morning a girl 6 houses down who I have never actually spoken to before, put out an urgent request for help to weigh her suitcases because she didn’t know how to do it and they were rushing off to the airport. This went out on our Development’s social media page which flashed up on my watch and I jumped to the rescue with our luggage scale. Turned out to be a really nice girl with two, young children.

We heard from a friend from nearly 9 years ago this morning. In the days when we lived in Surrey, she was our next door neighbour. After all these years, their cat is still alive and their little lad is in the middle of his A Levels. Scary or what? We bought there when we were travelling to Sifnos each Summer and sold when we sold our Greek house. Nostalgia and loss ….

https://youtube.com/watch?v=LiRk_fijDu8%3Ffeature%3Doembed

Filmed recently, this video of Sifnos, takes us back there immediately. We know every inch of ground, every house and shop, every island person. We even spotted ‘our house’ in the first few minutes. We were there for 40 years. We bought a 4 acre field above this bay and built our house in the foothills. It was home for 15 years.

Got your picture on my wall
and, maybe, you will get a call
From me, when I needed something …

So many things to go back to and touch again .. just one more time. Will there be time? There has to be time ….

There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;

There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

T.S. Elliot: ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ 

Forgive a sad, old man his musings. Sundays seem to do that to me. Outside, the only sound I hear is the gentle hum of the hedge trimmer wielded by my wife. I am gradually starting to nod off. Ah, perchance to dream.

I have thought a number of times of moving our investments into property with the hope of a better return. What has always put me off is the work involved unless I employed a letting agent which would eat into the returns. Well now, all my cash is earning above 3 x the rate of inflation and the property market is under threat particularly the second home market.

Very sensibly, Labour is addressing the housing crisis as a priority. They want to force Local Authorities to facilitate the building of thousands of new homes, affordable homes, council homes with new towns and stronger planning arrangements. This has to be the right thing to do for the have-nots struggling to get on the housing ladder but it will have downsides for the haves like me. The increase in property availability will tend to depress the current values of properties and the discouragement of owning more than one property will come by severely making people pay for the privilege. I agree with it all even though it limits me personally …. and this is the essence of democracy and the Labour Party. Country first. Party second.

Monday, 22nd July, 2024

A grey and overcast morning but very humid. I have become a dustman for the day. Today is all three bins day – Black (general), Green (recycle) and Brown (garden) – which happens every other week. I am responsible for the bins of 4 absent neighbours plus my own. Controlling 15 bins of different colours with different numbers on as three different bin lorries move them around is …. a nightmare! Still, even at my age, I’m up to it.

Chef is preparing for a Lunch Party and has been planning for a day or two. Today, we have to source the best, naturally reared chicken that we can find. Chef has decided that we are going to drive miles to a Speciality Butcher’s shop in Yapton. Let’s hope it’s worth it. An old favourite is being served – Coq au Vin. Haven’t eaten that for years.

Organic, corn-fed chicken legs, slowly cooked in a bottle of red wine with baby onions, mushrooms and garlic and served sprinkled with fresh parsley. To follow that Chef will make Tarte Citron and vanilla ice cream made with double cream in an ice cream maker that I bought her in Manchester in 1984. The trouble is, I’m supposed to be on a diet. I’ve got to lose weight. This isn’t going to help.

Yapton is a rather scruffy, agricultural community of linear, village development. It is not somewhere you would volunteer to visit if it were not for their excellent butcher’s shop.

I’m not sure which Kings are close or if there should be an apostrophe identifying one, particular king but I think he hasn’t visited for a long time in spite of the fine meat.

Tuesday, 23rd July, 2024

Is this really Summer? Fleeting hints of sunshine this morning. Our neighbours out in Spain and Greece have temperatures in the low 40C. Here, we’re barely above 20C. Chose the wrong year to stay at home.

Chef is pursuing her menu ingredients with tenacity and enthusiasm. After Breakfast, she was in the garden picking another Kilo of green beans and later she will be sourcing Jersey Royal Potatoes. We never nowadays eat potatoes but, if we did, it would be Jersey Royals. For those who don’t know, Jersey Royals are grown mulched in seaweed and that gives their wonderfully distinctive flavour.

Unfortunately, these potatoes have a very short season and we are coming towards the end. We can only source them in small, supermarket packs so that is what I will be sent to get – a lot of.

I grow old … I grow old …
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
Shall I part my hair behind?
Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.T.S. Elliot: ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ 

My friend in Leeds said to me the other day that he was suddenly feeling really old. He cycles out in the Yorkshire countryside two or three times a week and regularly swims. It chimed with what we had been saying to each other. We both exercise in the Gym but, getting up, I’m increasingly feeling creaky and stiff. I don’t like it. I’m not going to accept it. Admitting it is the start of a downward spiral.

Often for women more than men, bone density is a concern with age. A common but really dangerous problem is a fall which breaks the hip. A friend, a girl from school. I say a girl but she’s in her mid-60s and this week she’s broken her hip in two places having tripped over one of her dogs.

She’s had a terrible time in the past few years with her partner and her Mother both being diagnosed with dementia and having to go into specialist care. Isn’t getting old great, Dear Reader? I can see in myself how careful I’ve become compared with the devil-may-care younger man I was.

I was laughing at myself this morning and how over-cautious I am about backing up my digital material – files, photographs, vide clips, etc.. I have the original copy on my hard drive (which can fail) and a copy in the OneDrive cloud that comes with MS365 which is reassuring because I can access it from anywhere in the world although it costs me £80.00 per year. I have 2 legacy USB drives -E & F – which are transportable but can also fail. One failed this week and I went into panic mode. Only 2 backups left!!

I’ve ordered a portable Solid State Hard Drive to back up my backups. Should stop me worrying. It will be here tomorrow. Hope nothing goes down before then.

Wednesday, 24th July, 2024

A pleasant, bright morning but hardly Summer. Anyway, I’ve got my orders. Cleaning and tidying while Chef gets on with cooking.

Staycation in Britain? This was Brighton Beach yesterday in the last week of July! What is happening?

Growing up in Repton, our house had 5 bedrooms but always about 8 – 9 occupants at any one time. Consequently, I shared a bedroom with my brother, Bob, who was just 10 months younger than me. I wasn’t easy to live with, I’m sure and Bob and I had very different characters. Bob was technical, mechanical, dextrous. In those days, I showed very little intellectual prowess at all. I was physical, challenging, sporty, aggressive.

I would impatiently break things because I couldn’t get them to work. Bob would patiently repair and reconstruct things because that’s how his mind worked. It would be hard to say we got on. I passed my 11+ and went to Grammar School. Bob failed his and went to Secondary School. We just allowed ourselves to co-exist in different spheres. While I played Rugby and was Athletics captain I’m not even sure what Bob did although I have seen a picture of him in Basketball kit.

Where we clearly divided was in music. I was strongly into Pirate Radio of the 1960s – Radio Caroline and Radio London. When they were threatened by the government, I was involved in lobbying the minister for making them illegal. I was absolutely stunned by the Moody Blues – Go Now. Bob was into blues and rock. He tried to learn the mandolin and loved John Mayall’s Blues Breakers. Today, John Mayall died and I was transported back to the bedroom I haven’t been in for more than 50 years.

Bob lives in Maidenhead but is currently in Yorkshire. He sent me a photo of his wife this morning because he is shy.

Thursday, 25th July, 2024

Guess what? It’s raining. Horrible, low cloud fine rain that soaks you though the moment you go out. Guess where I’m going? Out. But not before a session of Home Chiropody from Chef. She does my feet and then her own. I’m not trusted with sharp things especially scissors and files. I have my feet checked and creamed every morning after Breakfast. All the walking we do can lead to drying and cracking of the soles.

Chef is going to pick a batch of Basil from the garden this afternoon while I’m in the Gym and she will make another batch of Pesto for the freezer using pine nuts, garlic, olive oil and salt. I absolutely love it especially with fish. It tastes like an entirely different thing compared with the rubbish sold in jars and it freezes so well.

Heard from some of my past pupils today. The pupils I last actually taught are now 46. I was quite a good teacher (I think) and was reasonably popular with pupils (I think). I like kids. I enjoyed the process of watching them learn and not just academic things but growing up things as well. Some of them contact me still about all sorts of relationship advice … because I am notoriously good at relationships. (Not). One of my girls (Old Ladies) asked this morning about what to do about the driving mirrors on her Audi because they wouldn’t fold back out when she turned on.

Another one posted a picture of her legs. Why do they do this? Is anybody improved with this sort of graffiti? I hate it. Her legs aren’t as nice as mine but they’re not that bad. They just have to do what every one else does and I spent all my teaching life telling them to think for themselves and not necessarily do what they’re told. Not good for discipline but fantastic for life and that is what’s important.

An Asian lad who I haven’t heard from since he left school in 1994 contacted me on Direct Messenger this morning asking how I was and I answered quite blandly that I was fine. His name is Amjad and he was affectionately known as JamJar in the 1990s. Wouldn’t be tolerated now but he loved it. It anglicised him and made him acceptable to other kids. He was a perfectly pleasant lad who wanted to do well as so many Asian kids did. He told me that there was a Whatsapp group from his year at School and I was regularly talked about. I didn’t like to ask in what way. He said he knew it was cheeky and I probably wouldn’t but could he have a couple of current photos to show the others. I surprised him by sending him a couple of current and couple from my College days which were long before he was born. His parting words were, Stay safe and healthy big man! He thinks I am his friend for life now.

Because Chef is making Pesto, I’m cooking Supper. It will be a simple Bruschetta of a Tomato and Shallot with Pesto and Parmigiano on toasted Olive Bread. Might need some wine with that. Got to get back on our diet!

Friday, 26th July, 2024

The sun is up; the sky is blue; the grass is green …. but where are you, Dear Reader? Hope the world looks good for you. My photo memory box threw up two evocative photos this morning. They are both from Greece 2010 in the grounds of our home.

There is nothing more evocative of the Mediterranean than the bright colours of a Bougainvillea in brilliant sunshine. The most common is a magenta colour. We had to be different.

I took this photo for the fly rather than the gorgeous colours of the flowers on the Pomegranate trees around our house. I don’t even like Pomegranates. I think the fly is probably dead now.

And then I found this photo from the Winter of 1982 on our route to work across the Pennines. You can see why I gravitated towards Greek Summers.

There must be something in the air at the moment because I was contacted out of the blue by another of my former students last night. He was a lovely, boisterous lad who was not particularly academic but definitely popular with the girls. Now, he is a mature – ish citizen with a lovely daughter who he dotes on and he promotes pop concerts or whatever you call them nowadays. He said:

It means a lot to speak you. I was always gutted when I felt I had let you down because you were always fair and looked out for my best interests.

His words to me were something of a shock because teachers rarely really know the effect they have. I am constantly humbled by news of kids who I had virtually written off but have become perfectly good family members and sensible citizens.

Saturday, 27th July, 2024

Lovely morning and we’ve got a run of great weather to look forward to now. Well, it is nearly August, for goodness sake. Haven’t seen the grass looking so lush and green at this time of year before. Anyway, I’m going to mow it today.

Last night, I kept getting Whatsapps from old friends about events in Paris. While I was was watching a Drama on C4, they were all watching the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games – all 5 hours of it. Even though I love French people, their history and culture, you’ve got to be desperate, haven’t you?

Over Breakfast this morning, I had it played on Catchup fast forward until Celine Dion sang and then it was played real time. I like Celine Dion’s voice with its emotional depth. It appeals to me.

Yesterday, when I was remembering Greece in photos, a video from Kamares last Summer came up and I was amused to see the Poison Dwarf featured. My goodness, she’s put on some weight – not good at her height.

Oh, it brings it all back – bit like a nasty medical condition.

We have been in our house 8 years now and all the white goods came with it. It was guaranteed for the first 5 years under the house warranty. Nothing has needed replacement …. until now. When we bought the house Off-Plan, we were offered two levels of completion – Basic and Upgraded. We knew we would be here for a while so we chose Upgraded. It cost about £30,000 more but it came with better quality fittings in the bathrooms and the kitchen particularly. The kitchen units were nicer and it included better dishwasher, double oven and large gas hob plus a built-in Wine Cooler.

When we had guests for Lunch recently, we suddenly realised that the white wine in the cooler wasn’t much cooled and we now realise the whole thing is not doing its job. It was turned down to 5C but, when we tested it, found it still measured 19C. I have immediately looked for a replacement. Can’t believe the price!

This is the immediately replacement cooler from the same company – Caple. What is there about a simple cooling mechanism that costs £832.00? It seems crazy. I’m going to see if I can get this one repaired first.

Sunday, 14th July, 2024

There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.Vladimir Lenin

The last 7 days feel a bit like that. A new Labour Government, Trump gets shot, England (may) win a football championship. Before you know it, the sun will come out in the North of England and the rain in Wales will turn to drizzle. The sun is certainly out here again this morning. Clear, blue sky and warm sunshine. It’s going to be a nice day. Come on down, Dear Reader.

Exactly a decade ago yesterday, I was sitting in a hotel room of a Patras hotel on the Greek Peloponnese watching Germany win the World Cup. Time for a change, to coin a phrase. The old men’s Whatsapp group is full of over confident optimism. I must admit that I am naturally pessimistic and I’m unlikely to change now.

You know, Dear Reader, that I am normally far too sophisticated to drink beer. Well, I am going to make an exception tonight. In fact, last time I was in France, I bought some just in case. Can you believe it? What on earth am I going to do with 40 bottles of French beer?

Monday, 15th July, 2024

The world is grey this morning. Warm but overcast. The men in my Whatsapp group are Depressed/Gloomy/Philosophical this morning. They sent me this summary of their feelings.

It really wasn’t as important to me as a Labour victory or a Trump defeat. That seems like a 1-1 draw in the hard light of day. The War of Trump’s Ear may have swung the balance but we’ll see.

I must admit that I’m not big on Environmentalism per se. I am not going to live more than 30 more years. I have no children. Other people can do what they see fit but I still think human ingenuity will solve the problems without having to turn back our technologically developmental clocks. We shouldn’t have to limit our travel. We shouldn’t have to cut back on heating or cooling, on washing or drying. We need to find solutions that enable us to do all those things.

However, I’m entirely behind the march of progress and harnessing the natural elements, sun, wind and sea to produce power. Ultimately, after we have gone, future generations will have unlimited and largely ‘free’ power released by atomic fission but, until then, we really should use these alternatives.

We have gone over the possibilities and economic viability of installing solar panels on our roof but, although we get enough sun to justify it, the cost of installation makes the economics barely worth it. If a Labour government want to persuade us with big grants, that would be enough to tip the balance. They are also installing fields full of solar panels across the country which will be enough to generate 65% of our solar energy for the whole country. The Tories had refused to sign off on these plans for fear of upsetting Tory, Shire voters but still blamed reliance on Russian oil for the rise in costs. This is a workaround the works all round.

All will be announced in the King’s Speech to Parliament on Thursday where Labour’s Legislative Programme will be announced. Looking forward to it. What I’m not going to do is trust the weather forecast. We were told it would rain all day. We had a few minutes of light rain and then dry for the rest of the day. How can we plan? Who pays these people?

Actually, the day has turned out to be very hot and humid day and has ended in darkness and a cloudburst. I won’t need to water for a week after the skies have opened and dumped gallons on every square inch.

Tuesday, 16th July, 2024

For most of my adult life, I have seen T.S. Elliot as speaking for me. He wrote so many lines of poetry which fit my life perfectly.

Here I am, an old man in a dry month,
Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain.T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets 3: The Dry Salvages

I’m not sure Elliot would be writing these lines this year. Yesterday, St Swithin’s Day, featured rain and some more rain. If you believe in ancient, ecclesiastical proverbs, which I don’t, you’re going to need an umbrella until August 24th especially if you live in the North and Wales. Thank goodness I’m flying to Athens where the daytime temperature will not fall below 38C/101F for the next two weeks at least.

Water means a whole new thing in this situation. In the early days, our island ran dry in the summer and water ships arrived to replenish tanks. Now they have a de-salination plant and we had our own well.

I went to Burton on Trent Grammar School which was founded in the 16th Century. I followed my Father who was there in the 1920s – 30s and my cousin, David Pritchard, who had just left as I arrived in 1962. A number of the teachers mentioned there still remembered Dad – Frank Tusky Read and Major Dai Taffy Davies. They both taught me as well although I definitely didn’t join the cadets.

It is incredible to understand, however, that this photograph was taken only 13 years after World War 2 ended and that explains the military focus. My total sex education at school was a 15 mins film of Major Jo Grimond (later Liberal Leader) with a lecture to army cadets about avoiding venereal disease. I could have done with more effective advice but then it all feels so, so far away. Anyway, David is 80 today and we wish him a very happy birthday.

Wednesday, 17th July, 2024

Going to be a good day. A lovely sunny and warm day. A day for the King’s Speech setting out the new Labour Government’s legislative agenda for the coming months.

I’m looking forward to poor people not subsidising well-off people by putting VAT on their school fees. I’m looking forward to the returning of Workers’ Rights, to the instigation of GB Energy,  a new state-owned energy company with increased renewable generation, to Rail Nationalisation, to greater Devolution of powers to regional Mayors, to the start of the dismantling of the House of Lords and much more. Whoever wins US election, Britain will change for the better.

Time is a strange thing, isn’t it, Dear Reader. While I was looking for a school photo of my ancient relative, David Pritchard, I stumbled across this photo from 1930. The central figure at the back leapt out at me. It is my Dad – Eric Richard Sanders 1915 – 1965. – when he was aged 16 and in his final year at Grammar School. It took my breath away. (Click on the photo to enlarge it.) Look how ‘correctly’ he stands, upright and determined to be his best. Sloppy, old man that I am, I almost shed a tear. It reminded me of me.

We try to fight off aging, don’t we Dear Reader, and some of us are successful and others less so. Here is my photo in the same school in 1967 as I became a Prefect in the Lower V1 with my Rugby 1st Team colours on my breast pocket proudly displayed. Just 37 years between us but Dad was already dead. Time is so cruel. It separates us unnecessarily. It isolates us harshly. It crushes us needlessly.  

When I’m out – in the supermarket watching an old woman bent over a shopping trolley as a walking aid, walking in the neighbourhood as I pass a shuffling, old man – I always want to know how their age compares with mine. I often muse that retired people should wear their ages on their backs for all of us to compare. We might consider ourselves old. Born halfway through the century and in our 70s but do you know the age of this old lady? I couldn’t guess it. Linda Bassett, star of Call the Midwife and born in 1950. Do we look that old? Do we just kid ourselves we don’t? Is it all in the genes or the presentation?

Shocked by these thoughts, I feel compelled to try harder. To get fitter. My wife tells me that we don’t look 73. She certainly doesn’t. She could easily pass for 10 years younger even though she worries about her looks constantly. Perhaps that is the answer. She has always worried about it. I know. It has cost me a fortune in face cream, body cream …..

Thursday, 18th July, 2024

Hot, sunny and quite humid today. Strange day. We went to do our weekly Sainsbury’s shop. The roads were silent. The supermarket was empty. It was almost like those Sci-Fi movies where the world has been visited by some lethal bug and only a few people have survived …

Europe generally and Greece (104F) in particular are entering their third heatwave of the summer. We even hit 82F today and there is hotter to come tomorrow. Really enjoyable feeling as the day wore on although exercise in the Gym was quite sweaty this afternoon.

Lovely to see the enthusiasm of Andy Burnham in interview yesterday as he reacted to the Labour Legislative programme set out in the King’s Speech which included devolution of additional powers and responsibilities to Mayors and local areas. Of course, one of these responsibilities will be to push the house building programmed ahead. More than 10,000 new homes a year every year for the next 5 years under the Places for Everyone plan plus vastly improved transport links including extension of the tram service.

Of course, Andy Burnham is just one of an increasing number of mainly Labour executive mayors who will be now charged with levelling up because it cannot be a top-down process. It had to be ground roots up like all natural growth. Great to see Starmer addressing European Leaders this morning at Blenheim Palace – birthplace of Churchill – and talking about closer union and increased co-operation.

We retired in 2009 and I always worried about the natural erosion of the value of pensions over time. Although our (gold plated says The Telegraph) Pensions are automatically inflation proofed, usually people feel another sort of erosion by the increase in earnings which, over time, exceed inflation and make pensioners feel relatively less well off.

As this graph starkly illustrates, we could not have retired at a more fortunate time, economically speaking. Since 2010, Teachers’ Pay has declined by 9% (inflation adjusted) while Teachers’ Pensions have increased by 20%. There are reasons to be cheerful, Dear Reader. Things can only get better and they will.

Friday, 19th July, 2024

Another Bikini Day. I’ve got mine on – just. At 9.00 am, the temperature is 23F/75F and the hottest time of the day down here is around 3.00 pm. I watered the garden yesterday in preparation. A couple of hours lawn mowing this morning if I can cope.

I can honestly say, I’ve never had my hair ‘Done’. I have it trimmed occasionally by my wife but it is a minimal performance apart from me complaining that it takes too long. I don’t like sitting still under a hairdresser’s cape. Pauline has her hair ‘Done’ but even there, it is moderate and natural. Her hair is very ‘fine’ and only needs trimming and shaping itself. She has never had it coloured, permed, rollered, or anything artificial.

I was reminded of this today by an article extolling the virtues of the ‘Big Hair’ of former MP Penny Mordaunt which is apparently achieved by a blow dry. I thought that was a sexual act but I now know it is done to your head. It makes the hair stand out and look bigger than it really is and it accentuates an appearance of strength and power. Of course, the adoring article was in a Right Wing newspaper which is struggling to stay relevant. Look at what the body language in this photograph is attempting to say. Mordaunt on the Right jabbing a finger aggressively towards her opponent as she dresses in padded shouldered power jacket and Big Hair.

Of course, Mordaunt lost her seat. Lots of time on her hands now to cultivate even bigger hair. Her opponent on the Left is Angela Rayner, a Northern girl who grew up in poverty on a council estate with a bi-polar mother. When she was young, she didn’t have books in the house. Her mother could not read or write. And here she is, Deputy Prime Minister. You only have to look at her body language leaning back, open hand and no ‘Big Hair’ – total contrast to her aggressive loser. I have heard people denigrate her for her Northern voice. Mistake. She doesn’t need to make herself look strong because she is strong. Her strength was forged in struggles of her upbringing. Moral of today’s Blog: Don’t go for BIG Hair, Dear Reader.

Cook has just picked another Kilo of Green Beans this morning. Love Green Beans and they are so good for me.

This week I’ve had a major problem with my Desktop computer. Computers have been a natural extension of my consciousness for more than 30 years and are indispensable to my way of life. It is amazing how shaky it can make me feel when that is threatened as it was a few days ago. Fortunately, I managed to solve my problem which had been caused by an automatic update over night but, this morning, a global MS Windows glitch has been reported which we are told was also probably caused by a badly checked system update. In this event it is affecting global systems which use the MS Windows platform – airports, hospitals, large worldwide corporations, etc. Lots of people around the world are feel quite shaky this morning.

Saturday, 20th July, 2024

The radio woke me this morning at 5.45 am to the story of a woman whose two, grown-up daughters were murdered in a local park. There is something about that time in the morning that I feel most receptive and most emotionally vulnerable and the story, which I was familiar with from the past, evoked emotion in me which I didn’t expect in my waking moments.

We don’t actually fear death, we fear that no one will notice our absence, that we will disappear without a trace.
T. S. Elliot

In talking about it, the girls’ Mother was just making sure that their appalling death didn’t go unnoticed, wasn’t disappearing without trace but remains relevant to today.

I have always been fascinated by bereavement and loss. They are different things but evoke similar responses. Separation through distance or time are no less painful. People who have been married for a long time, for example, find it hard to imagine how they would cope alone. People who are separated by time and space, for whatever reason, long to reach out and touch. Often, one way they can do that is vicariously through physical objects from that connection.

When Pauline went to College in 1970, her Mother, who had no money, scraped together what was needed to make sure her daughter had what they thought was required for her next step. She bought her a lovely trunk – the biggest and best one from a shop on Yorkshire Street in Oldham – for her things to be stored away at the College hall of residence in London. Pauline never forgets the sacrifices her Mother made for her and the trunk came with us everywhere we went to connect her to her Mum. Girls are good like that.

It even came to Greece with us but that was its last journey. We couldn’t fit it in the car when we drove home for the last time. Now some Greek is enjoying it but we have the memories just as we do of the Settle or Pew that I bought Pauline for her 30th birthday from an Antique Shop in Delph. It had come, originally, from Oldham Town Hall so was intimately connected with our lives. The Greek island of Sifnos is the final resting place of a piece of furniture made for Oldham – quite fitting really. That single piece of furniture has seen so much history and quite a lot of it was mine.

I am writing this at 11.30 am and, at this time 7 years ago, I was standing in a Square in the Tuscan city of Lucca. It is the most beautiful place and features one of my ‘heroes’, Giacomo Puccini. We were driving around Tuscany and had stopped for a few days here. It was 7 years ago but it feels like a life time ago and yesterday all wrapped into one. The thing about this memory, though, is that I can go back there any time I want and touch it again. The agonisingly painful thing is that there are others we can never revisit.

Sunday, 7th July, 2024

The first full day of a Labour government and look what we’ve achieved already. England last won the World Cup under the Labour government of Harold Wilson and now, just maybe, we can win a European cup under the Labour government of Keir Starmer.

Not only the football has been facilitated by Labour. The weather I’ve been calling for – strong, consistent rain – has suddenly appeared over night as well. Already, I have very few remaining things to wish for, Dear Reader. I’m going to have to helicopter in the rest.

Talk about helicoptering in, the new Labour government (I love that sentence.) has a primary aim of building more houses – affordable and Council Houses. An emotional Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Manchester was interviewed this morning and pledged to play his part in that building programme. It is what the North has needed for so long and will contribute to levelling up. We’ve had huge, housing development down here for the past decade as demand for commuter homes has grown.

The Telegraph has featured Bosham South Coast village harbour which it describes as a Pensioners’ paradise and somewhere that dreads the warmer weather because everyone flocks there. There are so many second homes that the inhabitants want to go back to the 1950s. I’ve got news for them, you can’t go back but you can revisit and bring the best of the past into the future – hence the helipcopter.

Labour has promised to bulldoze NIBYISM and press ahead with planning reform to enable those houses to be built. An acceleration of the demolition of terrible old housing in the North to be replaced by brand new, well insulated and technologically advanced homes at affordable prices really will contribute to levelling up and growing the economy.

Monday, 8th July, 2024

A depressingly overcast morning. The builders are doing their final day for now. Their last jobs are outside with some re-pointing before the rain starts. Being totally impractical, it’s great to have a friendly team to provide a handful of different skills. It’s even better that we have no outstanding and niggling maintenance problems at all around the property.

It is hard to believe that it is a full decade ago today since we sold our Greek home. A full decade ago since we were part of a vibrant, Greek island community. We have all aged and some have died but these milestones mark the march of history. We have met up with some of our island friends since leaving – in Athens when we stay for a week or so and when they came to London to see us but the cat never made it.

We often wonder what became of the cat which adopted us – rather than the other way round. She was incredibly assertive and demanding but suspicious and distant. Of all those we left behind, the cat was the one we felt we were deserting most.

The concept of Levelling Up which Johnson & the Tories (tribute band) parroted but didn’t deliver is being picked up by the new, Labour government as it pushes out power and decision making to the 4 nations and the many regions. Andy Burnham was quite emotional yesterday about the thought of being handed more resources for Greater Manchester which has gone entirely Labour apart from for two Lib.Dem. constituencies. Unlike Johnson, Labour won’t desert their constituency.

In my reading of local newspapers this morning, two juxtaposed reports hit me starkly. The Yorkshire Live had this ‘shocking’ item of a herd of cows in Ripon sounding like an earthquake as they charged down the street. Must have woken the blue-rinse brigade from their slumbers.

Contrast that with this report in the Manchester Evening News about two gangs rampaging down Yorkshire Street, Oldham, brandishing firearms. Rather shows the differing lives of residents of the shires set against those of the towns and inner cities. These disparities will have to be addressed.

Tuesday, 9th July, 2024

Why does it always rain on me?
Even when the sun is shining
I can’t avoid the lightning

What on earth is happening to the Summer? Another day of warm but damp. Great for grass but boring for humans.

Our street in July looks out of sorts with the year. I’m going to have to work in the Gym. It has been quite a consistent theme recently.

Parliament will open today and the new Speaker elected. All the new MPs will be sworn in starting this afternoon.

The Labour Government …. The Labour Government has hit the road running. Prime Minister off to America. Foreign Secretary negotiating route back to Europe. Morning meeting with all the regional Mayors like Sadiq Khan, Andy Burnham, Tracy Brabin and even the Tory Mayors, Health Secretary meeting with striking Doctors, Tony Blair offering new policy areas to explore. The vibe is GO!

It is 6 weeks until we fly to Athens so my instinct is to go somewhere else with sunshine in the mean time. This greyness is so depressing. We might as well be living in Wales, for goodness sake. This morning, I’ve been looking at the sunspots of Barcelona and Naples. I know the school holidays are starting soon so flight seats may be tight especially with the weather in UK. Watch this space.

Wednesday, 10th July, 2024

One minute we were desperate for rain and now we’re not. Fortunately, the day is dry and bright. Going to get some work done outside. At least I won’t have to do any watering which is just as well because our Southern Water Bill has arrived online today and our annual payment will be about £1000.00 which is double that of 3 years ago. Of course, I am being blamed rather than the person who does all the washing. I am preparing a poster featuring my Management Principle: Less Washing. More Garden Watering. We’ll see if it enters the consciousness.

Of course my choices are cheap compared to my cleaner. Just 15 years ago today, she was going to Vidal Sassoon‘s in Leeds at a cost of £70.00. I store these things up you know. Actually, she was going to go back there when we drive up soon but is shocked to find it has closed. In fact they only have two salons left in UK – London and Manchester. Be interesting to find out what the Manchester top stylist charges this time.

Ten years ago today, we were packing the car in the garage of our Greek house with everything we could cram in. Although we sold a few days before, unlike in UK, we negotiated to stay in it until we could book travel arrangements off the island. Anything we couldn’t pack – and we had sold all the furniture – was collected by our friends to give to poor people they knew on the island.

We had bought tickets for the ferry to Piraeus and booked a hotel on the Peloponnese near the Patras port where we would get a ferry to Italy. From Piraeus, we would drive through Athens, out on to the Εθνική Οδός / National Road across the Corinth Canal, through Patras and on up the coast to Kaminia. It is a drive of about 230 km and takes about 2hrs 30 mins.

We had been using the Poseidon Palace Hotel, Kaminia for quite a few years as we drove down to the house and again as we drove back.

Of course, I had also booked a Superfast Ferry for the 24hr trip up the Adriatic from the new Patras Port to Ancona and then Hotels in Parma (Italy), Mulhouse (Alsace) and Reims and Calais (France).

Ten years, Dear Reader. Ten years. What has happened to you in the past 10 years? In the lives of so many of us of my age, there are so many landmarks of people and places, People from our lives die. We have our own health challenges and retirement allows us the time and money to travel. But can you clearly remember? No? You need a Blog.

I’m working on another 30 years after the news I received this morning. Never let people talk the NHS down. The average man of my age should have a Prostate Specific Antigen number of 4.0 and below. This morning the Oncology team contacted me to say that my PSA was just 0.37. I couldn’t be happier but, not only that, I will be reassessed every 6 months for the rest of my life AND I will get a full body Ct Scan annually. What a fantastic service. How lucky am I?

Thursday, 11th July, 2024

Glorious morning for all sorts of reasons. The weather is warm, sunny and beautiful. The blue of the sky is so full of joy. We have a Labour Government which will see me through to my mid 80s at the least. We are in the football final which will make me (a bit) happy for a couple of days until they lose to Spain. I have had great news about my health and wonderfully reassuring news about the ongoing monitoring of my future health from the NHS. I have lovely, caring people around me and at a distance. There is a nagging pain threaded through this which, like a tooth ache impinges and detracts from the happiness but I have resolved to sort that out.

I put on weight over the year of my cancer treatment and I am having real problems getting rid of it. Particularly, I am having problems punishing myself for that weight gain and forcing myself through the pain of self denial. I think my cancer diagnosis and treatment made me see the shortness of life and freed me to self indulge. Now, I’m struggling to break that lifestyle. Feeling affluent in Retirement doesn’t help. I can have what I want. It doesn’t mean I should. I am struggling to accept that but accept it I must. If I’m going to live another 30 years, the NHS may help but ultimately only I can do it.

I have proved that you can’t do it by exercise alone. I try to stay active throughout the day. This morning, I will spend two hours mowing and gardening. This afternoon, I will spend two hours in the Gym. By the time I go to bed, I am tired. The interesting thing is that the tiredness I feel at the end of a day now in retirement is so totally different from the tiredness I felt while I was working. Brain Dead was the end of a working day but not body tired. Totally out on my feet is how I feel nowadays but my head is still lively as hell. It is an uncomfortable combination.

Great news from Oldham … and you don’t hear that very often but the historic, iconic, Coliseum Theatre which was threatened with closure under a pile of debt and a lack of funding has been saved after a protracted campaign by many of the living alumni including Julie Hesmondhalgh. First opened in 1885, the theatre was the training ground for so many well known actors. Charlie Chaplin, Eric Sykes, Dame Thora Hird and Dora Bryan all performed there and it was the training ground of so many well known actors such as Bernard Cribbins. Sally Dynevor, otherwise known as Sally Metcalfe from her 36-year-long tenure in Coronation Street, wrote: “My dreams of being an actor came from Oldham Coliseum.

I had a brief and tenuous connection with the Coliseum in my early days of teaching when I helped out with the Theatre Workshop which was started there in the late 1960s and which inspired so many to go into acting like Anna Friel, Sarah Lancashire and Suranne Jones.

Of course, just as life is on the sunny side, a storm comes along to douse the euphoria. My computer – the extension of my consciousness – updated its software over night and has failed to start up this morning. Although I save everything up in the cloud, the loss of my machine would be annoying as well as costing me £2,000.00 needlessly. I have spent a few hours repairing it and being something of a genius, Dear Reader …..

….. this is how it looks this evening. Back to full working order. It would have cost me £200.00 if it could be repaired by a technician and £2000.00 if I needed a new one. Joy of joys, my efforts have paid off and all is restored. If only all problems could be so easily fixed. Still, as you will know, Dear Reader, persistence always pays off.

Friday, 12th July, 2024

Almost the middle of July already and Life is running away again. Nothing specific on the agenda today although there are always jobs to be done. It rained over night so work in the garden will have to wait. My Office needs tidying and the Gym needs a bit of attention but I will have to send the cleaner in first. It’s a bit of a problem in Retirement which is why I like to be in contact with people from my past.

I am a member of a Whatsapp group of old friends from College days. It’s called Bookends after the Simon & Garfunkel song of the time. It’s light hearted banter – nonsense really – but some is amusing. This cartoon rather sums up the level of the conversation. I must admit that I am more interested in the concept of talking each day to people across the span of time from more than 50 years ago. I try to steer the threads to Politics but I’m not very successful. This morning at 6.15 am, I was sent a message from an ancient man who lives in Knaresborough extolling the delights of Gypsy Creams – the biscuits.

If you know me at all, you will know that I am data/target/achievement driven. I need it. I need a sense of achievement. I pursue it relentlessly. I will not give up or give in. It was something that someone in Business observed when we announced our retirement. What will you set for achievement? I laughed it off at the time but, after 15 years playing out, it remains a significant theme in my life. I look for and set my own targets however minor.

My morning starts by challenging myself to meet or beat an ongoing target. It’s mad, I happily concede but it has to be done. It involves shaving. Last year, after more than 50 years of shaving badly, I bought a new shaver and it came with an app for my smartphone and an instruction video. It completely changed my shaving action and the quality of my shave. As I shave – using small, circular motions – the app monitors my progress. When I’ve finished, it awards me marks or percentages of success in following the guidelines. After a year, I don’t allow myself to fall below 90% Ninja and I try hard to get above that. My record is 97% Ninja.

The shaver is inverted and placed in the cleaner. It switches itself on and runs through a cleaning program using a solution which last for 30 cleans before it needs to be replaced. My phone app warns me I need to change the cleaning fluid refill pot. The cleaning programme is just long enough to clean my teeth with my electric brush. When the shaver-cleaner says 100% done, I stop brushing my teeth immediately. Isn’t this exciting? If I’m feeling brave, I get on the scales in the hope that I beat my previous reading and then …

Down at Breakfast, testing my INR with the aim of being my optimum 2.5, checking blood pressure with the aim of being a reasonable 120/65. Then I unstack the dishwasher and I try to beat my record time irrespective of how full its is. And so it goes on. Sheer, certifiable madness … but it keeps me sane. And so many of my generation do the same. One has to beat his cycle ride time each time he goes out. Another is trying to visit ever more numbers of ruined churches. Another has her hair done every Friday in an effort to banish time. We all fight to control and measure our lives.

I’m getting a bit worried about my memory at the moment. I am having struggles recalling the names of people and plants that would have come immediately in the past. This woman, as you will all know, is Beatrice Webb, politician, sociologist, economist, one of the founders of the London School of Economics, socialist, Labour historian, social reformer and founding Fabian. She is intricately woven through the weft of Labour History. There was a time I could quote you chapter and verse but yesterday, I could not recall her name.

This plant grows wild all over Greece. It is beautiful. I grew it up in Yorkshire although not as successfully. This morning, I couldn’t for the life of me remember its name. I had to resort to Google to remind me of Phlomis. Should I be worried, Dear …. Thingy? Must try harder!

Saturday, 13th July, 2024

Gorgeously sunny morning with clear, blue sky and really warm. Going to spend the day out in the garden cleaning up after the builders. Got to pressure wash the patio where repointing has left cement staining. Even I can do this. The last of the plants I have been growing on in the cold frames are going to be planted out for late summer colour. So a day at home.

A friend living on the North Yorkshire coast sent me this photo from her morning walk in the driving rain as the yachts appear out of a thick, sea fog. The lottery of location can be cruel.

Of course, there will be time for writing, for chatting across the country and for Gym work. The problem with my computer on Thursday is behind me but the ramifications of that breakdown have been to be extra careful with its maintenance. I have had Gigabit Fibre Broadband since I moved in here. As new houses go up in our area, everyone will want the same. BT Openreach vans are constantly parked in the area as cabinets are installed with new connections.

In the past, the more users come on stream, the slower everyone’s connection speed becomes. This is called contention ratio. In that distant past, internet download speeds of 32 Mbps were thought to be good. Upload would be around 5 Mbps.

Now, virtually everything in my house relies on internet bandwidth from house phone and smartphones to radios and TVs plus, of course, iPads, Kindles and computers. This was long predicted as the internet of things. This morning, I ran a speed test and the results were excellent. Can you believe an upload speed of over 100 mbps, Dear Reader? You can whoop if you want!

I’m going to need a few months of sun this winter so I’m looking at the Canary Islands where that is at least guaranteed. This morning I found a set of managed apartments which offer the quality that you need for a month away. I just want to move my normal life to somewhere warmer and sunnier. It has a good kitchen (✓), broad band (✓), Streamed TV + Netflix (✓), Laundry facilities (✓), a heated pool (✓), a nice, big sunny balcony (✓), and a hot tub (✓). It’s in Adeje and close to Siam Park and all the shops (✓). It will be under active discussion this weekend. Thinking of a month before Christmas and a month afterwards.

Sunday, 30th June, 2024

Warm but a little bit overcast this morning. Wish it would rain but it won’t. We’re not forecast for any until next Sunday. Up late this morning – well 7.15 am – because we weren’t in bed until 1.00 am. I have absolutely no idea why but we watched the last 30 mins of the Glastonbury performance of Coldplay last night. I know absolutely nothing about them, have never listened to them or watched them before. Actually, I was attracted to the pictures of a lit up Glastonbury sky with thousands of wristbands and pyrotechnics. It looked fantastic on a big TV as if we were actually there.

Of course we weren’t. I have never been to a Festival in my life. I hate huge, noisy, sweaty crowds like that. I prefer to watch in comfort as I did last night. When it was over, I had to watch the Newspaper review before going to bed.

If you have been following politics in general and this election campaign in particular as I have, you will be very familiar with the Ming Vase Strategy. Can you imagine the cost of dropping one and seeing it smashed into tiny pieces at your feet. That’s what happened to Neil Kinnock and that’s what happened to Jeremy Corbyn who didn’t take care but went for broke … literally.

This election was always likely to be a Labour victory after 14 yeas of these lunatic Tories and their selfish, greedy politics. However, there have been so few Labour governments in the past 100 years that they have to tread softly and carefully. They have had to avoid dropping the Ming Vase of Victory.

Since I was born in 1951, when the Attlee government (1945–1951), which brought in the National Health Service, narrowly lost to the Conservatives, it wasn’t until Harold Wilson’s win (1964–1970) that I first experienced a Labour government which gave me the chance to properly educate myself through the Open University. After 4 years in Opposition, Wilson and Labour (1974 – 1979) were returned to Office as Callaghan succeeded. Five years of a Tory government were followed by Blair/Brown Labour government (1997 – 2010). Labour hasn’t been in power since.

Labour has been in power for just 24 of the past 73 years. We are about to elect it for the next 15 years. In that time, it will transform Britain and re-join the EU. It will bring in a green economy and nationalise essential services. It will improve public services and reduce cronyism and government corruption. It will broaden the franchise to provide 16 yr olds with the vote and may even bring in Proportional Representation to ensure the Tories never get back into power.

I suspect Keir Starmer will be succeeded by Wes Streeting and by 2039, when I am 88, Dear Reader, the mantra will be Time for a Change.

Monday, 1st July, 2024

Welcome to the new month. Farewell to June 2024. It wasn’t the best anyway. So many things missing! At least this will be a good week. We will vote these dire Tories out and install your caring, sharing Co-op party into government. Then, on Saturday under a new government, England will suddenly rediscover their footballing ability and thrash Switzerland.

If you do nothing else today, do this. Look at your energy supplier’s tariffs and compare them with others you could get. You should do that regularly anyway but, today, Energy prices went down by about 7% nationally because of the price cap readjustment. They will almost certainly go back up towards the end of the year. Fix now and you will save.

I’ve been with British Gas Dual Fuel for the past 8 years (You’re getting excited now, aren’t you Dear Reader?) because they are a class act. Now, they are about the cheapest around and I’ve fixed until September 2025 …. when I’ll be 74!

It’s getting really scary now. Yesterday, I was talking about the Ming Vase Strategy of the Election Campaign. Labour have a huge lead and have been tiptoeing across the weeks, carrying the Ming Vase of public opinion. To all our relief, they haven’t dropped it. They still hold their 20% lead that they started out with. They won’t drop it now but will I? Will we?

Old age is proving very much like the Ming Vase which has to be carried carefully. Our bodies and minds are delicate and increasingly droppable as we age. I am constantly monitoring, checking, trying again. I’ve never had so many things go wrong with me as I have in the past 5 years. Feels like we are fighting off the signs of age in a constant battle.

I do stamina work which raises my heart rate but I need to do more resistance work to increase my muscle mass – rowing and weight lifting. I don’t use our rower enough and I haven’t used the dumb bells for ages. I am going to force myself to follow a programme.

Even more important than that for me is to work on my balance. It’s never been good in my youth but it is definitely weaker now. Can you stand on one leg for one full minute with your eyes closed, Dear Reader? I fall over after about 20 seconds. While it doesn’t matter too much at the moment, it will become increasingly dangerous as I age and my bones become more brittle. You see so many old people who fall, break a hip and never recover mobility. It is certainly life shortening.

Tuesday, 2nd July, 2024

Lovely, sunny morning although not particularly warm for July. Didn’t sleep well last night. To bed at 11.30 pm and awake at 4.00 am. Head full of thoughts.

The next few days are going to be politics, politics, politics. All around Europe and America the populist Right are in the ascendancy. Complex problems are answered with simplistic solutions that they claim will be easy to implement and solve the population’s problems at a stroke. We have seen it in Italy, Holland, Belgium, and we are seeing it in France and USA currently. We saw it in UK with the Farage/Johnson axis. Hopefully, Thursday will mark the start of the fight back of grown up policies and rational solutions to complex societal problems.

People like me have long wondered how people could have been taken in by them but the Manchester Evening News sent me two interesting articles yesterday which goes a long way to explaining the choices. I’ve known for a long time from the analysis but this type of visceral report crystalises the forgotten, ignored, impoverished, second class hurt that the Northern Red Wall seats feel and who thought a Messiah led by Brexit would lead them out of the desert and into the promised land of milk & honey. These mirages of water in an arid land was always just that – a mirage but it has taken all this time for them to realise that they had been taken in by a false prospectus.

Ironically, The Telegraph ran a story on Sunday about East Preston – our neighbouring village – which has the highest density of rich pensioners in Britain. Over 51% of people in our area have above average income and are claiming the State Pension. They are also much healthier than average pensioners in the country. Of course, the right wing Telegraph‘s intention was to argue we don’t need the State Pension which should be considered a benefit and not an entitlement. Good luck with that.

Although we all paid into National Insurance and were told it would fund our safety-net, State Pension and Healthcare free at the point of delivery, the contributions were never hypothecated or ring fenced and were all subsumed into general taxation. That’s why State provision has to be constantly argued for and protected.

Had a wobble when I woke up in the early hours. In so many past elections, Labour have failed to fulfil polling predictions or have dipped in the final few days. I would be desolate if the exit poll at 10.00 pm on Thursday evening shows something like that. Can you imagine 5 more years of the Tories and their appalling management of the country? I think I would just have to buy a property in Europe and leave. We go to Athens soon and I’ve just booked a return trip to Thessaloniki. We’ll see what else we can do in addition.

Wednesday, 3rd July, 2024

Warm but overcast this morning. No rain again. The builders are still working in the house so I will be working in the garden out of the way.

I was talking to an ‘Arty’ girl from the North of England yesterday. I was saying that we had builders in and they are doing work outside the house as well as in the Lounge, Kitchen, Cloakroom and an Ensuite Bathroom. In other words, they are everywhere I go and it winds me up and disrupts my routines. Her immediate reply was that she lived a fairly chaotic life and would struggle to cope with routine.

I reflected on that later and thought, actually, I do allow routines into my life quite extensively. If they are disrupted, I try hard to accept change on principle but I don’t find it as easy as I used to do. My wife says I have borderline obsessive-compulsive disorder. I have written about it before but it is definitely getting more pronounced and it is manifested in my desire to maintain patterns of behaviour and patterns of physical arrangement in my world.

Out in the garden, I like to control nature, to get rid of weeds however well they flower, to trim grass edges, to plant things in straight lines in a parks & gardens style as my wife describes it. She would mix planting of flowers and vegetables in a fashion I couldn’t possibly live with. Guess who wins. Yes, of course I do.

As I’ve written before, my wife and I are like Jack Sprat and his wife. I am obsessed with tidiness and she is obsessed with cleanliness …. and she really is obsessed with it. I’m surprised that we have any floors left she cleans them so often. My (mild) OCD leads to me straightening everything she has just put down, lining up edges and putting things back in their place.

I noticed while I was doing academic work which involved writing papers based on the reading of dozens of books. My Office would start off as utter chaos with notes, pages of books marked for quotes, scattered all over the desk and spilling out on the floor. Gradually, as I wrote and re-wrote the paper, the books and papers would come in towards me. By the time the final draft was complete and the paper printed, the floor would be clear, the books would be back on the shelf (in alphabetical order), the papers would be filed and order would be restored. Order out of chaos. Creation out of anarchy.

Thursday, 4th July, 2024

Well, this is it. The end of the Tories. I’m going to work as a Polling Centre Identity Checker. I can spot a Labour Voter from 100 paces. Few others will be let in. Actually, the most important theme across the country involves the tactic under the banner

because Tactical Voting will be the order of the day right across the country. We would even condone you voting for the racist Faragist party if it helps to defeat the Tory. The most optimistic sign this morning is that it is warm and sunny. The conditions are right to vote the Tories out.

Of course, there are polling centres and then there are POLLING CENTRES. Most of us get drab Community Centres or Primary Schools but one of my friends in North Yorkshire gets a neo-Gothic Cathederal/Priory. Still, it’s the result that counts and I will probably be on an all-nighter as the results roll in.

We will all be looking for those Portillo moments when top cabinet ministers realise they have lost their seats and their jobs. There is little more satisfying than that. The moment when arrogant Tory, Michael Portillo realised he had been beaten by Labour candidate, Stephen Twigg in 1997 was a joy to behold. Let’s have many more of those!

What was very heartening was to find a Labour rep outside the poll asking to have our poll card numbers to crosscheck those that said they would vote Labour were doing so and then, when we got home Labour canvassers on the street going from door to door chivvying people up to get out and vote. Only Labour took the trouble to do that.

Friday, 5th July, 2024

A new day has dawned, has it not? The words of Tony Blair in 1997 are as apposite this morning as they were then. Labour were in power for 14 years then and this time we’re looking for 15.

The hype of the election campaign made me excited and nervous. It was hard to believe it could be realised. The Exit Polls at 10.00 pm last night suggested it wouldn’t be quite as good as we had dared to dream. The thought that the rabid right wing racist party could take 13 seats was a shock.

With 5 seats to declare many of which are so close they are recounts, Labour has already exceeded the Exit prediction, Lib Dems are going gangbusters after a fantastic campaign, Greens are up to 4 seats and reform are back to just 4 seats.

Wales has gone totally Red. Scotland has only 9 SNP MPs – down from 41. Sinn Féin, the political arm of the IRA, have won the majority on Northern Ireland. The move is a step nearer to a united Ireland which should have happened long ago. George Galloway duped Rochdale once but even they saw through him quite quickly and voted him out. All is well with the world.

Went down to the beach to let off steam and scream relief. It was raining, thank goodness. I have been wishing for two things and now I’ve got them both.

Saturday, 6th July, 2024

The sun is out, the sky is blue, the breeze is tugging at the trees blowing away the detritus left by the stale, old Tories and making room for the new brooms of serious politicians. The Labour government under Prime Minister Starmer will meet for the first cabinet today. This is the first day of the rest of all our lives.

Health and Housing will be early subjects to get going on. Reducing waiting lists and building more affordable housing/council housing will feature loudly. I will be more interested in the people in the cabinet. I love people and their lives, their back stories.

1. Rachel Reeves, Chancellor of the Exchequer, MP for Leeds West is a Maths specialist – Oxford and LSE – she played chess and won a national championship. Worked at the Bank of England. Her sister is also an MP and Labour campaign manager.
   
2. David Lammy, Foreign Secretary, MP for Tottenham, Lawyer, Havard educated where he met and became friend of Obama. Lammy has spent the past few years cultivating good relationships with European politicians particularly in France and Germany. Augers well for my hopes of re-entry.
   
3. Yvette Cooper, Home Secretary, MP for Pontefract, Castleford, educated Oxford and Harvard, daughter of a trades union leader. Shadowed the Home Office for over a decade.
   
4. Wes Streeting, Health Secretary, MP for Ilford, grandfather was an armed robber who spent time in prison, and his grandmother became embroiled in his crimes and ended up in Holloway jail, where she met Christine Keeler. According to Streeting, they stayed in touch, and became friends. From that background, Streeting fought his way to a Cambridge education.
   
5. Angela Rayner, Deputy Prime Minister & Minister for Levelling Up, MP for Ashton-under-Lyne, born to a Mother who could not read or write, pregnant at 16, trades unionist.

One of the really pleasing elections for me is that of Paul Waugh in Rochdale. I have ‘known’ him for years. He was borne very near to Spotland, Rochdale football ground. He is a local lad who I have known as the political editor of the Huffington Post, Politics Home, London Evening Standard and The Independent.

Paul Waugh defeated the political chancer, George Galloway, who was only there for a few weeks and couldn’t even be bothered attending the count announcement on election night. Waugh will be a typical Labour MP fighting for his home land.