...I may have mentioned this before, but whereas you will find me a great fan of gardens per se - places in which to sit at ease on a fine summer's day (though not this dank year clearly), pondering the wonder of creation and the perfidy of the created [see previous], armed only with a largish Pimms and a languid mien while one simply is not does - the act of gardening itself has no personal appeal in the slightest.
Sadly, of course, if one has the one - a necessary prerequisite indeed for being at ease in one, one not being able totally to relax in another's ("More tea Vicar" is not a myth I can avow!) - yet lacks the spare change of upwards of a couple of hundred a month to employ some local ferret of a fellow to lean heavily on a hoe whilst not quite managing more than the odd swipe at a weed per hour, despite - or perhaps because - said ferrety fellow is paid more than handsomely by that very same hour - one is forced to defend against ever-threatening chaos (a good working definition of a garden for sure) by deploying any spare time a-hacking and a-hoeing oneself until the back is bowed, the spirit fails and a good lie down the only salve.
This summer having been as frantic as it has been wet, opportunities between monsoon-esque downpours to leg it into the menacing jungle that is our portion of Eden, with weapons of mass destruction to hand for culling the unwanted growth - which is all one really ever contributes - have been few. Too few by far in fact, for though one can give thanks and praise for not having to buckle down this particular freeish yet sodden day to a-mowing or a-chopping, 'tis but a short-term gain for a long term loss.
The Psalmist may have the view that leaves, as grass, will wither in the wind, etc., all by themselves; but clearly King David was too burdened with outdoor servants ever to have noticed the extended human effort required to assist natural forces of entropy. Nor indeed can one attempt the noble Quentin Crisp line on indoor detritus ("Leave the dust for five years and it will get no worse").
That was tried with the hedge for some six years, but the wretched thing kept on growing, refusing rankly to comply with the lawful command of homeostasis and reach some optimum size and no more. Eventually the whole thing was curved over like some great green surfing wave - quite picturesque in its way perhaps but earning an episcopal rebuke for some strange yet of course compelling reason.
Anyway, Canon Pewter was over for the weekend and bless the old salt entirely volunteered to take all Church jankers for the duration, despite being officially retired. "Like to keep the brain ticking over," he offered as an excuse. A worthy and a fine sentiment - not to mention most welcome - though am not sure that in his particular case there might not be rather too much tock these days and not quite the needed balancing amount of tick, for Mildred simply had to pop round after the Morning Service to enquire whether we had gone completely over to Rome just yet, and on being asked by H why the question replied that she [Mildred] had had to assume we must have done, as why else permit a pure priest of a fellow to say the full Tridentine Mass before the assembled and impressed if stunned flock for whom Latin of any kind is a closed book and a cause for some fright.
Ah! A bit tricky that one and deserving of a fulsome answer. Mercifully though I was not in the required position to give it to the difficult satisfaction of Mildred as, Pewter in charge, I had been dispatched to the farthest vast clump of long-neglected wilderness that was our back rockery to get stuck in - by H of course, who positively insisted at breakfast that this must be so; who lurked even over the Sunday sausages with shears in hand as if to make sure there could be no mistaking her meaning or her intention. (When ever was there thus!)
Blowed then if I was to return from this arduous exile merely to be harangued by Mildred. Weeds may not be good company, but they do have the singular vantage - shared by the entire vegetative world - of soulful silence, most quite unlike Mildred when fully bent on an extended rant.
H having imposed thus on me, H could jolly well come up with some satisfactory rationale for Canon Pewter's liturgical anomaly. As and when - or perhaps more fittingly if and when - the garden is returned to its pre-lapsarian pristine condition I will venture in to ask her [H] what excuse she gave, and then later check with Pewter what on earth or by Heaven he thought he was doing!
But first this next weed. A good long lean on the hoe required first for this beauty I can tell!
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Vermin...
From the BBC tonight:
Man admits urinating on ill woman
A Hartlepool man is facing jail after he urinated on a disabled woman who lay dying in the street. The 27-year-old shouted "this is YouTube material" as he degraded Christine Lakinski, 50, who had fallen ill, magistrates heard.
Miss Lakinski, who suffered a number of medical conditions, died from natural causes, an inquest found.
Anthony Anderson, of Raby Road, who admitted outraging public decency, will be sentenced at Teesside Crown Court.
Hartlepool magistrates heard how, on 27 July, Miss Lakinski was making her way home with a box of laminate flooring when she fell ill and stumbled into a doorway.
Anderson had smoked a cannabis joint and been drinking when he and two friends spotted her.
He tried to rouse her by throwing a bucket of water over her, before urinating on her and covering her with shaving foam. The incident was filmed on a mobile phone.
She was later declared dead at the scene, the cause of death being given as pancreatic failure.
Lynne Dalton, prosecuting, said: "Although his actions did not contribute to her death it was appalling behaviour that robbed her of any dignity in the last hours of her life."
She urged magistrates to transfer the case to crown court for sentencing, claiming their maximum powers were insufficient.
Anderson's solicitor did not oppose the application and his client will be sentenced at Teesside Crown Court on 22 October.
After Wednesday's hearing, Miss Lakinski's brother, Mark, said: "We will await the outcome and just hope he gets what he deserves."
...What he deserves indeed. It does make me think of those wonderful medieval Doom paintings in Churches, vividly reminding sinners what eternity of vile punishment they would face in Hell if they did not repent.
Also too, the perfectly proper Hebraic motto of tooth for a tooth or eye for eye: let the punishment fit the crime. Inmates of whatever prison this vermin is sent to please note.
Oh, and also the person who filmed all this on his mobile phone. Let him too suffer in the same way.
Man admits urinating on ill woman
A Hartlepool man is facing jail after he urinated on a disabled woman who lay dying in the street. The 27-year-old shouted "this is YouTube material" as he degraded Christine Lakinski, 50, who had fallen ill, magistrates heard.
Miss Lakinski, who suffered a number of medical conditions, died from natural causes, an inquest found.
Anthony Anderson, of Raby Road, who admitted outraging public decency, will be sentenced at Teesside Crown Court.
Hartlepool magistrates heard how, on 27 July, Miss Lakinski was making her way home with a box of laminate flooring when she fell ill and stumbled into a doorway.
Anderson had smoked a cannabis joint and been drinking when he and two friends spotted her.
He tried to rouse her by throwing a bucket of water over her, before urinating on her and covering her with shaving foam. The incident was filmed on a mobile phone.
She was later declared dead at the scene, the cause of death being given as pancreatic failure.
Lynne Dalton, prosecuting, said: "Although his actions did not contribute to her death it was appalling behaviour that robbed her of any dignity in the last hours of her life."
She urged magistrates to transfer the case to crown court for sentencing, claiming their maximum powers were insufficient.
Anderson's solicitor did not oppose the application and his client will be sentenced at Teesside Crown Court on 22 October.
After Wednesday's hearing, Miss Lakinski's brother, Mark, said: "We will await the outcome and just hope he gets what he deserves."
...What he deserves indeed. It does make me think of those wonderful medieval Doom paintings in Churches, vividly reminding sinners what eternity of vile punishment they would face in Hell if they did not repent.
Also too, the perfectly proper Hebraic motto of tooth for a tooth or eye for eye: let the punishment fit the crime. Inmates of whatever prison this vermin is sent to please note.
Oh, and also the person who filmed all this on his mobile phone. Let him too suffer in the same way.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Our Lady of the Gates of Grace....
...It was quite humbling to hear, the other week, that dear Maurice was shortly to be taking himself off on pilgrimage. Never really saw him as the type. The annual Parish trip for a day's retreat at our neighbouring Priory perhaps, but not an extended hike to some further place of sanctity involving tiresome travel and uncertain beds. Not his thing at all, I would have said, if asked.
But then I wasn't asked, I was told. Mildred had telephoned apologise for and to explain her husband's irresistible absence from last weekend's monthly Finance Committee meeting. A thing near miraculous in itself that the old buzzard would turn down the chance of attending one such spielfest, for put 'Finance' and 'Committee' into a single sentence and usually you would have the fellow positively salivating with glee - the effect not dissimilar to my own fondness for the coupling of the words 'Nicole' and 'Kidman'. (Ah dear lady!)
"Pilgrimage!" I exclaimed in awe. "Yes Rector. It's his weekend for Lourdes. Does it every year. Good for him I think to keep in touch, don't you think? His playing days are long gone and the subscriptions are getting a bit steep on our pensions, but when he walks through them gates of Grace I know he's smiling inside and out."
Fair bit puzzled by all that I had to admit. Didn't realise that you had to stump up a regular payment of any material kind, prayer being all needed to maintain the connection to the place in my book. As for the playing of it - that left me for dead. (The 'gates of grace' motif though was touching. Must use the image in one's next homily.)
But best not to press in such circs. So I didn't. The Finance Committee came and went, and, it must be said, 'twas all the more tedious for lack of Maurice's usual spirited challenges to the chair over some arcane audit procedure or motion to dismiss various - and seemingly sometimes random - committee members for flagrant, if invisible to all but Maurice, rule violations.
And so then spotting the old man this morning I had to ask "How was Lourdes then?"
"Pretty dull the first day - bit of a procession if you ask me, which you just did - but perked up no end on the second. I love the amateur game though don't you? Bring two villages together, give them their one day of glory and watch them play with a passion to shame the pros."
One had to reel, it made so little sense. Now 'procession' I could grasp, one has seen the very moving photos of crowds of the sick and their helpers wending their way to the salving waters. So why that should be seen as clearly not a good thing was beyond me. And as for the rest, I'm sorry I hadn't a clue.
Not wanting though to be found wanting, as it were, I fought for anything else to say, coming up somewhat lamely with "Must take you a deuced while to get there."
"Not at all these days Rector. You'd be amazed. Bus to N, fast train to Town, then a short hop on the Tube and I'm there in under three hours."
Now I may be too long hidden in the rural depths to know much about modern international travel, but even I know that the London Underground does not yet - nor ever likely should - stretch as far as la belle France.
Said so indeed, then wished at once I hadn't. Old Maurice gave me the kind of withering yet pitiful look usually reserved for the poor fool who had tried to last the year as Parish Treasurer without his - Maurice's - backing or support. Happened twice in living memory and on both occasions the respective poor fools failed miserably: the one ending up with a two-stretch for fraud (it was just a technicality, nothing malicious - just very true that there was some serious money missing come Lammas Day) and the other who chose to emigrate rather than face the public's rank opprobrium.
"Since when is St. John's Wood in France then Rector?" thrust Maurice in my very face.
It was then that the the penny dropped and the light shone bright once more. For yes surely this could be the one, true answer. That single tablet of LSD one had taken as a student had indeed - as forewarned it might - so deep-fried the brain that all since had been a continuous, fallacious hallucination. I was not Rector of my own Parish, but a mental patient in some asylum for whom the nurses have long since given up any hope of recovery.
But even hallucinations must be answered, especially the ones positively rocking with mocking laughter in one's - imaginary - High Street, with a throng of cheeky neighbours - dream creatures all for sure but irksome for all that - beginning to gather round.
"I may not have been the sharpest blade in the seminary kitchen drawer," I replied thus most haughtily, "But I can assure you that dear Bernadette Soubirous was never spotted anywhere near North London! So how can your journey to Lourdes have taken you there! Tell me that!"
"Lord's Rector, not Lourdes!", was the howling-with-glee response. "Did you think I were at Lourdes? Ah wait 'til Mildred hears this. She'll be splitting herself."
Oh how we all laughed. All but myself that is.
'Hail Mary,' one silently intoned, 'Full of grace, get me out of this fix please!'
Graceful as ever She is, at once Maurice desisted in his mockery. "Come and have a beer Rector, you looks like you need one, and I'll tell you all about MCC and me. Greatest place in the world - you wait twenty years to get in then are rewarded with some of the hardest seats in Christendom, and most of the worst portraiture in the Western world under one roof. Makes you proud to be British!"
But then I wasn't asked, I was told. Mildred had telephoned apologise for and to explain her husband's irresistible absence from last weekend's monthly Finance Committee meeting. A thing near miraculous in itself that the old buzzard would turn down the chance of attending one such spielfest, for put 'Finance' and 'Committee' into a single sentence and usually you would have the fellow positively salivating with glee - the effect not dissimilar to my own fondness for the coupling of the words 'Nicole' and 'Kidman'. (Ah dear lady!)
"Pilgrimage!" I exclaimed in awe. "Yes Rector. It's his weekend for Lourdes. Does it every year. Good for him I think to keep in touch, don't you think? His playing days are long gone and the subscriptions are getting a bit steep on our pensions, but when he walks through them gates of Grace I know he's smiling inside and out."
Fair bit puzzled by all that I had to admit. Didn't realise that you had to stump up a regular payment of any material kind, prayer being all needed to maintain the connection to the place in my book. As for the playing of it - that left me for dead. (The 'gates of grace' motif though was touching. Must use the image in one's next homily.)
But best not to press in such circs. So I didn't. The Finance Committee came and went, and, it must be said, 'twas all the more tedious for lack of Maurice's usual spirited challenges to the chair over some arcane audit procedure or motion to dismiss various - and seemingly sometimes random - committee members for flagrant, if invisible to all but Maurice, rule violations.
And so then spotting the old man this morning I had to ask "How was Lourdes then?"
"Pretty dull the first day - bit of a procession if you ask me, which you just did - but perked up no end on the second. I love the amateur game though don't you? Bring two villages together, give them their one day of glory and watch them play with a passion to shame the pros."
One had to reel, it made so little sense. Now 'procession' I could grasp, one has seen the very moving photos of crowds of the sick and their helpers wending their way to the salving waters. So why that should be seen as clearly not a good thing was beyond me. And as for the rest, I'm sorry I hadn't a clue.
Not wanting though to be found wanting, as it were, I fought for anything else to say, coming up somewhat lamely with "Must take you a deuced while to get there."
"Not at all these days Rector. You'd be amazed. Bus to N, fast train to Town, then a short hop on the Tube and I'm there in under three hours."
Now I may be too long hidden in the rural depths to know much about modern international travel, but even I know that the London Underground does not yet - nor ever likely should - stretch as far as la belle France.
Said so indeed, then wished at once I hadn't. Old Maurice gave me the kind of withering yet pitiful look usually reserved for the poor fool who had tried to last the year as Parish Treasurer without his - Maurice's - backing or support. Happened twice in living memory and on both occasions the respective poor fools failed miserably: the one ending up with a two-stretch for fraud (it was just a technicality, nothing malicious - just very true that there was some serious money missing come Lammas Day) and the other who chose to emigrate rather than face the public's rank opprobrium.
"Since when is St. John's Wood in France then Rector?" thrust Maurice in my very face.
It was then that the the penny dropped and the light shone bright once more. For yes surely this could be the one, true answer. That single tablet of LSD one had taken as a student had indeed - as forewarned it might - so deep-fried the brain that all since had been a continuous, fallacious hallucination. I was not Rector of my own Parish, but a mental patient in some asylum for whom the nurses have long since given up any hope of recovery.
But even hallucinations must be answered, especially the ones positively rocking with mocking laughter in one's - imaginary - High Street, with a throng of cheeky neighbours - dream creatures all for sure but irksome for all that - beginning to gather round.
"I may not have been the sharpest blade in the seminary kitchen drawer," I replied thus most haughtily, "But I can assure you that dear Bernadette Soubirous was never spotted anywhere near North London! So how can your journey to Lourdes have taken you there! Tell me that!"
"Lord's Rector, not Lourdes!", was the howling-with-glee response. "Did you think I were at Lourdes? Ah wait 'til Mildred hears this. She'll be splitting herself."
Oh how we all laughed. All but myself that is.
'Hail Mary,' one silently intoned, 'Full of grace, get me out of this fix please!'
Graceful as ever She is, at once Maurice desisted in his mockery. "Come and have a beer Rector, you looks like you need one, and I'll tell you all about MCC and me. Greatest place in the world - you wait twenty years to get in then are rewarded with some of the hardest seats in Christendom, and most of the worst portraiture in the Western world under one roof. Makes you proud to be British!"
Sunday, September 09, 2007
"Osama bin Laden is virtually impotent"...
...As a headline it has, you must admit, more or less everything.
The universal monster - and he is that - now suddenly revealed as merely a man who simply - in the coined phrase - can't get it up no more.
You wonder who spilled those beans? A Mrs bin Laden - if there be such a one - would be a strong contender as a sound reliable source, though you would have to question how readily she might let the news slip given the likely come back on herself.
"Hey you, missus, what you been doing telling the world I ain't no good in the piston department no more? You want instant death you shall have it."
You can see the point.
So a girlfriend blags all? We get that here of course. "I bedded five-a-night sex-monkey football god Kevin - but I wish I'd stayed in to finish the decorating 'cos it was an utter washout if you know what I mean." No doubt the archives could raise a dozen or so such revelations.
But yet again over here the totty in question generally is penalised for such smears with just the withdrawal of all season ticket privileges, rather than summary execution.
So if there is someone in the foothills of the Afghan-Pakistan border feeling a trifle let down, shall we say, by big boy my guess would have to be that she too wouldn't want it mooted about thus for fear of ritual stoning or somesuch.
You can tell, mind you, that he is on the wane in that way. How else would you account for the newly-minted black beard that five years ago was shadowy grey throughout? That, I tell you, is a mighty, mighty clue. Show me a man whose beard has miraculously transformed from old-man silver to caveman black and I'll show you a man whose wand lacks that certain sparkle.
There is though, just one other angle to consider that may resolve all puzzles here. And the clue is in the word 'virtually'.
Now two things we all know. The Internet is everywhere, including the Afghan caves. And second 90% plus of men on this planet have used the Internet, plus trusty webcam, to do a bit of virtual wand-waving at some unmet female - mostly - from the other side of the planet.
Some opine this is the very end of all civilisation as we know it, whilst others prefer to see it as the ultimate in safe sex. (Methinks they both be right.)
A 'good friend' once told me - it must have been the fifth malt that brought the matter to our conversational attention, though I acknowledge that to be no excuse - that in such circs. a gentleman - allowing him still to be one - must first, of uttermost importance, confirm that his correspondent is indeed the busty, lusty female she claims to be and not some teenage male nerd pissing himself with laughter at some other's hapless expense. That way You Tube lies.
So there you have it I believe. The universal monster has been at it on the airwaves, or rather more to the point failing to be at it, found himself the patsy for some aforementioned teen male loon and is now thus the subject of global lampooning.
'Al Qaida: my part in its downfall' - Spike Milligan would have been so proud.
The universal monster - and he is that - now suddenly revealed as merely a man who simply - in the coined phrase - can't get it up no more.
You wonder who spilled those beans? A Mrs bin Laden - if there be such a one - would be a strong contender as a sound reliable source, though you would have to question how readily she might let the news slip given the likely come back on herself.
"Hey you, missus, what you been doing telling the world I ain't no good in the piston department no more? You want instant death you shall have it."
You can see the point.
So a girlfriend blags all? We get that here of course. "I bedded five-a-night sex-monkey football god Kevin - but I wish I'd stayed in to finish the decorating 'cos it was an utter washout if you know what I mean." No doubt the archives could raise a dozen or so such revelations.
But yet again over here the totty in question generally is penalised for such smears with just the withdrawal of all season ticket privileges, rather than summary execution.
So if there is someone in the foothills of the Afghan-Pakistan border feeling a trifle let down, shall we say, by big boy my guess would have to be that she too wouldn't want it mooted about thus for fear of ritual stoning or somesuch.
You can tell, mind you, that he is on the wane in that way. How else would you account for the newly-minted black beard that five years ago was shadowy grey throughout? That, I tell you, is a mighty, mighty clue. Show me a man whose beard has miraculously transformed from old-man silver to caveman black and I'll show you a man whose wand lacks that certain sparkle.
There is though, just one other angle to consider that may resolve all puzzles here. And the clue is in the word 'virtually'.
Now two things we all know. The Internet is everywhere, including the Afghan caves. And second 90% plus of men on this planet have used the Internet, plus trusty webcam, to do a bit of virtual wand-waving at some unmet female - mostly - from the other side of the planet.
Some opine this is the very end of all civilisation as we know it, whilst others prefer to see it as the ultimate in safe sex. (Methinks they both be right.)
A 'good friend' once told me - it must have been the fifth malt that brought the matter to our conversational attention, though I acknowledge that to be no excuse - that in such circs. a gentleman - allowing him still to be one - must first, of uttermost importance, confirm that his correspondent is indeed the busty, lusty female she claims to be and not some teenage male nerd pissing himself with laughter at some other's hapless expense. That way You Tube lies.
So there you have it I believe. The universal monster has been at it on the airwaves, or rather more to the point failing to be at it, found himself the patsy for some aforementioned teen male loon and is now thus the subject of global lampooning.
'Al Qaida: my part in its downfall' - Spike Milligan would have been so proud.
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
Nepal Airlines - one to avoid!
Call me an oldstick-in-the-mud with no soul for adventure, or else one lacking in appreciation of the rich cultural diversity that is our human heritage, but I don't take kindly to the sacrifice of a couple of animals as a substitute for a proper re-wiring of the electrics on an aeroplane.
This from the Beeb tonight:
Goats sacrificed to fix Nepal jet
Nepal's state-run airline has confirmed that it sacrificed two goats to appease a Hindu god, following technical problems with one of its aircraft. Nepal Airlines said the animals were slaughtered in front of the plane - a Boeing 757 - at Kathmandu airport.
The offering was made to Akash Bhairab, the Hindu god of sky protection, whose symbol is seen on the company's planes. The airline said that after Sunday's ceremony the plane successfully completed a flight to Hong Kong.
"The snag in the plane has now been fixed and the aircraft has resumed its flights," senior airline official Raju KC was quoted as saying by Reuters.
The persistent faults with one of the planes had led to the postponement of a number of flights in recent weeks. The company has not said what the problem was, but reports in local media have blamed an electrical fault.
This from the Beeb tonight:
Goats sacrificed to fix Nepal jet
Nepal's state-run airline has confirmed that it sacrificed two goats to appease a Hindu god, following technical problems with one of its aircraft. Nepal Airlines said the animals were slaughtered in front of the plane - a Boeing 757 - at Kathmandu airport.
The offering was made to Akash Bhairab, the Hindu god of sky protection, whose symbol is seen on the company's planes. The airline said that after Sunday's ceremony the plane successfully completed a flight to Hong Kong.
"The snag in the plane has now been fixed and the aircraft has resumed its flights," senior airline official Raju KC was quoted as saying by Reuters.
The persistent faults with one of the planes had led to the postponement of a number of flights in recent weeks. The company has not said what the problem was, but reports in local media have blamed an electrical fault.
Saturday, September 01, 2007
Lightfoot, G.
You recall Bilbo Baggins at his farewell party - towards the very beginning of 'Lord of the Rings' if you need a clue - who could not decide if he should refer to the plural of Proudfoot as 'Proudfoots' or as 'Proudfeet'? (His indecision causing as much offence as any choice he might have made, as it turned out.)
Well, I have had a similar moment of name confusion this very day to report.
One had - this is the occasion and the context - to leg it - but one among too many chores - in to town in order to have a new key cut for the side door of the horsebox.
Why so, you reasonably ask? Was not the old key sufficient unto the day?
Well no, as you ask, it wasn't; for the head of it, succumbing to metal fatigue, had snapped off in situ but a few days past and although it had failed in the open position, which was a mercy, one knew at once that the key could not be left unreplaced, not so much because one feared unlawful intrusion but more that the other family with whom the box is shared would not fail to lock the door should they find it not locked, thus locking us out.
You follow I am sure.
So in between doing the horse bed - a different thing entirely from fixing the horse box - the women folk being on a weekend jolly to Burghley's three-day event leaving me with, inter alia, equine cleaning jankers - not to mention dashing to the local DIY emporium in search of the perfect and safe weedkiller for the beweeded front path, pausing only in flight to take condign medication against a raging toothache and to soothe the fevered brow of the 'beloved' sister-in-law (aka 'Countess Dracula'), who having turned up for the duration allegedly to assist the poor Parson promptly fell sick with a heavy cold - thereby adding rather than subtracting to one's already heavy burden of office - there one was legging it in to town as aforementioned in order to have the key replaced.
Where the Proudfoots or 'Feet even in all this you ask once again?
Coming to that.
An ancillary effect of so much dashing had been, not surprisingly, so little eating and drinking - or even plain refueling. (The traditional eight-second pit stop for 'human petrol', which all sadly one has mostly the time for.)
Spotting, therefore, one of those juice bars that so proliferate these days one was about to sprint past, when one had one's Foot/Feet moment of the day.
For, in a highly clever marketing mode, this particular bar had hoisted a sign bearing some obscure song lyrics and offering a free concoction of said juices to any who could guess both singer and song.
Well at once one was on the case - never can resist what must surely be an easy challenge, for one was as familiar with the tune of the thing - even the timbre of the singer - to be able to hum it at once with the very sound of it echoing in the mind.
But could one actually pin it down? Like heck could one! It wasn't him and it wasn't him and it simply couldn't be him one puzzled - and one was, it transpired, quite right on all three counts - but it was Canadian - correct again and it was oh so long ago. True too it turned out.
Finally though one knew one was stumped. The final definitive answer was beyond recall. Buried in the memory for sure and safe keeping, but not for resurrection to active consciousness this side of Dooms Day.
It was less the lapse in intellectual recall that hurt: memory being one of those moveable feasts one more and more finds - you put it down for an instant and it is plain gone, much in the way of car keys or spectacles.
But it was more that one knew that here was a window on a closed yet special past. There had been a time - though clearly one knew not where or when - when this song had been special, some now forgotten past that was clamouring to be remembered. (A bit like the Proudfoots really - happy to be mentioned, but not unreasonably cross that they could not be precisely named.)
The choice then was simple - and what a tribute to astute marketing - either to approach the juicing personnel and say "Look here chaps, I know you're not here for the good of your health, but to make money. Setting though that aside for a moment - a highly personal moment - and not wishing, either, to spoil your impromptu and splendid competition - do you mind telling me what the answer is without me actually buying one of your amazing, nutritious and wondrous cups of fresh pressed fruit?"
Either that, or the more socially astute and commercially sensitive choice of saying rather "OK. I admit I'm foxed. I know I know the answer, but it's not to hand or tongue. Here is my order and my money for a mug of juice and now, while you're at it, could you tell me who it was who sang the song I can sing but not precisely place?"
The latter of course was one's only possible route. And the answer is as in the heading above. 'Twas dear old - by now for sure - Gordon Lightfoot singing 'If You Could Read My Mind' some near thirty-five or so years ago.
Pretty damn decent song as it happens then and now. (And the mug of juice was pretty damn fine too it must be added.)
Wonder if he ever married and had children. Would they be the Lightfoots or the Lightfeets?
Well, I have had a similar moment of name confusion this very day to report.
One had - this is the occasion and the context - to leg it - but one among too many chores - in to town in order to have a new key cut for the side door of the horsebox.
Why so, you reasonably ask? Was not the old key sufficient unto the day?
Well no, as you ask, it wasn't; for the head of it, succumbing to metal fatigue, had snapped off in situ but a few days past and although it had failed in the open position, which was a mercy, one knew at once that the key could not be left unreplaced, not so much because one feared unlawful intrusion but more that the other family with whom the box is shared would not fail to lock the door should they find it not locked, thus locking us out.
You follow I am sure.
So in between doing the horse bed - a different thing entirely from fixing the horse box - the women folk being on a weekend jolly to Burghley's three-day event leaving me with, inter alia, equine cleaning jankers - not to mention dashing to the local DIY emporium in search of the perfect and safe weedkiller for the beweeded front path, pausing only in flight to take condign medication against a raging toothache and to soothe the fevered brow of the 'beloved' sister-in-law (aka 'Countess Dracula'), who having turned up for the duration allegedly to assist the poor Parson promptly fell sick with a heavy cold - thereby adding rather than subtracting to one's already heavy burden of office - there one was legging it in to town as aforementioned in order to have the key replaced.
Where the Proudfoots or 'Feet even in all this you ask once again?
Coming to that.
An ancillary effect of so much dashing had been, not surprisingly, so little eating and drinking - or even plain refueling. (The traditional eight-second pit stop for 'human petrol', which all sadly one has mostly the time for.)
Spotting, therefore, one of those juice bars that so proliferate these days one was about to sprint past, when one had one's Foot/Feet moment of the day.
For, in a highly clever marketing mode, this particular bar had hoisted a sign bearing some obscure song lyrics and offering a free concoction of said juices to any who could guess both singer and song.
Well at once one was on the case - never can resist what must surely be an easy challenge, for one was as familiar with the tune of the thing - even the timbre of the singer - to be able to hum it at once with the very sound of it echoing in the mind.
But could one actually pin it down? Like heck could one! It wasn't him and it wasn't him and it simply couldn't be him one puzzled - and one was, it transpired, quite right on all three counts - but it was Canadian - correct again and it was oh so long ago. True too it turned out.
Finally though one knew one was stumped. The final definitive answer was beyond recall. Buried in the memory for sure and safe keeping, but not for resurrection to active consciousness this side of Dooms Day.
It was less the lapse in intellectual recall that hurt: memory being one of those moveable feasts one more and more finds - you put it down for an instant and it is plain gone, much in the way of car keys or spectacles.
But it was more that one knew that here was a window on a closed yet special past. There had been a time - though clearly one knew not where or when - when this song had been special, some now forgotten past that was clamouring to be remembered. (A bit like the Proudfoots really - happy to be mentioned, but not unreasonably cross that they could not be precisely named.)
The choice then was simple - and what a tribute to astute marketing - either to approach the juicing personnel and say "Look here chaps, I know you're not here for the good of your health, but to make money. Setting though that aside for a moment - a highly personal moment - and not wishing, either, to spoil your impromptu and splendid competition - do you mind telling me what the answer is without me actually buying one of your amazing, nutritious and wondrous cups of fresh pressed fruit?"
Either that, or the more socially astute and commercially sensitive choice of saying rather "OK. I admit I'm foxed. I know I know the answer, but it's not to hand or tongue. Here is my order and my money for a mug of juice and now, while you're at it, could you tell me who it was who sang the song I can sing but not precisely place?"
The latter of course was one's only possible route. And the answer is as in the heading above. 'Twas dear old - by now for sure - Gordon Lightfoot singing 'If You Could Read My Mind' some near thirty-five or so years ago.
Pretty damn decent song as it happens then and now. (And the mug of juice was pretty damn fine too it must be added.)
Wonder if he ever married and had children. Would they be the Lightfoots or the Lightfeets?
Friday, August 31, 2007
"We had nothing else to do..."
That's what these murdering children said: "We had nothing else to do."
But then they found something to do all right: "So we killed someone for a bit of fun."
But then they found something to do all right: "So we killed someone for a bit of fun."
Extra Ecclesia....
"Pope Benedict has approved a new text asserting that Christian denominations outside Roman Catholicism are not true Churches in the full sense of the word."
From the Beeb tonight.
...Well, you have to admit the old trout has a point. Not a happy one to be heard by Protestant ears it must be said, and certainly likely to cause fires to burn in Orthodox circles. Yet "Tu es Petrus..." and all that jazz.
If you understand these things then you will, and if you don't you may walk away now.
Either Christ did found his Eternal Church on Earth - pending His return - or he didn't. That is the essence of the thing. Feel free to believe that the whole thing never happened - and personally I find that a more credible notion than the Muslim angle, which seems to be that Jesus was a Prophet for sure and yet somehow didn't actually die on the Cross because Prophets are meant to be conquerors not dead people - but don't go thinking that just because the Church over millennia somehow fails to live up to your own high moral standards it can be rejected and you start all over anew.
There is the notion of course that the Anglican Church is but the Catholic Church in England and environs. But could anyone other than an unreconstructed imperialist actually believe that holds any water?
H and I are currently holding talks about this whole Rome question. We are not far from an agreement in truth. Time is coming one senses for a somewhat radical move. Watch this space is the best I can offer for now.
'Extra ecclesia nulla salus' as the old text goes. My abiding anchor in all of this is my dear Catlick friend - Prior of Quarr Abbey and friend to the world - who opined that one always knows where the Church is to be found, but one never knows where it isn't present in some form hidden from human eyes but known to God.
We monkish chaps had quite a lively debate one night on the validity or not - in Catholic sacramental terms - of a quasi-communion service that would be celebrated by prisoners-of-war in WWII: said by the senior officer, though but a layman no priest being present, and using the only available biscuits and water for the offerings of the Body and the Blood of Christ.
From the Beeb tonight.
...Well, you have to admit the old trout has a point. Not a happy one to be heard by Protestant ears it must be said, and certainly likely to cause fires to burn in Orthodox circles. Yet "Tu es Petrus..." and all that jazz.
If you understand these things then you will, and if you don't you may walk away now.
Either Christ did found his Eternal Church on Earth - pending His return - or he didn't. That is the essence of the thing. Feel free to believe that the whole thing never happened - and personally I find that a more credible notion than the Muslim angle, which seems to be that Jesus was a Prophet for sure and yet somehow didn't actually die on the Cross because Prophets are meant to be conquerors not dead people - but don't go thinking that just because the Church over millennia somehow fails to live up to your own high moral standards it can be rejected and you start all over anew.
There is the notion of course that the Anglican Church is but the Catholic Church in England and environs. But could anyone other than an unreconstructed imperialist actually believe that holds any water?
H and I are currently holding talks about this whole Rome question. We are not far from an agreement in truth. Time is coming one senses for a somewhat radical move. Watch this space is the best I can offer for now.
'Extra ecclesia nulla salus' as the old text goes. My abiding anchor in all of this is my dear Catlick friend - Prior of Quarr Abbey and friend to the world - who opined that one always knows where the Church is to be found, but one never knows where it isn't present in some form hidden from human eyes but known to God.
We monkish chaps had quite a lively debate one night on the validity or not - in Catholic sacramental terms - of a quasi-communion service that would be celebrated by prisoners-of-war in WWII: said by the senior officer, though but a layman no priest being present, and using the only available biscuits and water for the offerings of the Body and the Blood of Christ.
Was it the Mass? Quite probably - nay definitely - it was not. But was it the Real Presence? I bet my life it was.
Thursday, August 30, 2007
The Matthew 'Tyrell' Appreciation Society AGM...
Not sure how familiar you will be with the wondrous 'Alan Whicker Appreciation Society', and for all one knows it may have lapsed now that its eponymous hero is largely retired from view. But even if not you will rapidly get the picture - and picture essentially it was if not is - of men who loved to mimic the Great Man's style, from smart blazer and immaculate flannels, to buzzing voice via a trimmed yet compelling moustache.
It was parody of sorts, but affectionate tribute the more to someone was who was unique but of a type, of a type yet also sui generis. The cultivated Brit. who could travel the world, observe its strange ways with humour and appreciation, could convey with but a lift of an eyebrow his astonishment at its peculiarities as seen from the abiding Home Counties perspective, and yet treat it all as a modern marvel not to be missed for all the tea in China. (Monty Python tried a spoof, but it could not work as they were not kind in their intent.)
For those in the know, there could as easily be - and should be if not - a 'Matthew Tyrell Appreciation Society.' Who he, you might ask? And if you were to do so I would have to acknowledge first that he is probably not he at all.
For all that one does know is that he is the due husband of the wonderful Miss Rebecca Tyrell, journalist and scribe; and as she is the due daughter of the late John Tyrell, racing commentator sans pareil, one has to assume that said spouse actually carries the name of another bloodstock lineage altogether.
You see my point I am sure.
But leaving aside the current vagueness of the man's full name, why should one wish to honour him with his very own Appreciation Society? For the sound reason that he is a voice of modern masculine unreason. A man who hordes logs against the Apocalypse, a man who understands that the world is off to Hell in a handcart, yet will not accept that no one has noticed that the cart has a flat tyre that must at once be repaired. A man who will run alongside said cart trying to fix it as it trundles by. A man even who will carry this Cassandra-esque burden of prophecy with dignity for the sake of the family, yet will still let rip with the occasional public rant against the very madness of it all.
And what is that if not the epitome of all that modern British man could and should be - dedicated, dutiful, diligent yet also at the same time bouncing up and down with something between righteous indignation and hysterical ire at all he sees around him: a Knight of a new Round Table - established to do doughty battle against truly noxious foes - Sir Matthew 'Fawlty' Fortitude.
One used to read all of this from the pen of the fragrant Rebecca T. herself over at the dear Telegraph. But then she - and so of course did he - vanished from view. That was, sadly, that and no more for some year or more.
But now one has fortuitiously discovered that she - and of course he too - has pitched up at the ghastly Indie. One tried reading the wretched thing when it first appeared, if only to cock a snook at Rupert 'Mordor' Murdoch, but it couldn't take - drying paint possessing the more informative and interesting dynamic. Good to know though that the man continues to rant. For what else is a man to do in these mad, troubled times?
It was parody of sorts, but affectionate tribute the more to someone was who was unique but of a type, of a type yet also sui generis. The cultivated Brit. who could travel the world, observe its strange ways with humour and appreciation, could convey with but a lift of an eyebrow his astonishment at its peculiarities as seen from the abiding Home Counties perspective, and yet treat it all as a modern marvel not to be missed for all the tea in China. (Monty Python tried a spoof, but it could not work as they were not kind in their intent.)
For those in the know, there could as easily be - and should be if not - a 'Matthew Tyrell Appreciation Society.' Who he, you might ask? And if you were to do so I would have to acknowledge first that he is probably not he at all.
For all that one does know is that he is the due husband of the wonderful Miss Rebecca Tyrell, journalist and scribe; and as she is the due daughter of the late John Tyrell, racing commentator sans pareil, one has to assume that said spouse actually carries the name of another bloodstock lineage altogether.
You see my point I am sure.
But leaving aside the current vagueness of the man's full name, why should one wish to honour him with his very own Appreciation Society? For the sound reason that he is a voice of modern masculine unreason. A man who hordes logs against the Apocalypse, a man who understands that the world is off to Hell in a handcart, yet will not accept that no one has noticed that the cart has a flat tyre that must at once be repaired. A man who will run alongside said cart trying to fix it as it trundles by. A man even who will carry this Cassandra-esque burden of prophecy with dignity for the sake of the family, yet will still let rip with the occasional public rant against the very madness of it all.
And what is that if not the epitome of all that modern British man could and should be - dedicated, dutiful, diligent yet also at the same time bouncing up and down with something between righteous indignation and hysterical ire at all he sees around him: a Knight of a new Round Table - established to do doughty battle against truly noxious foes - Sir Matthew 'Fawlty' Fortitude.
One used to read all of this from the pen of the fragrant Rebecca T. herself over at the dear Telegraph. But then she - and so of course did he - vanished from view. That was, sadly, that and no more for some year or more.
But now one has fortuitiously discovered that she - and of course he too - has pitched up at the ghastly Indie. One tried reading the wretched thing when it first appeared, if only to cock a snook at Rupert 'Mordor' Murdoch, but it couldn't take - drying paint possessing the more informative and interesting dynamic. Good to know though that the man continues to rant. For what else is a man to do in these mad, troubled times?
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Whisky Galore....
...Bro. Geo. signs in to report a curious moment's fantasy today. There he was - like the dutiful management consultant he is - seated in a hotel lobby waiting for a group of senior managers to digest the first reading of his searing report into their many and manifest deficiencies.
Awkward moments as you can imagine. Will they fall at his feet to thank him for revealing all, or will they slice his corpse to many silent pieces in the hope of disguising the whole matter from shareholders? Believe me, it can go either in such delicate and fraught situations - or so Bro. Geo. tells me.
A hour or so having passed by - the report was that long and that critical - dear Bro. had wearied of staring meaningfully into space, or sipping a long emptied coffee cup. Turning to the only reading material to hand - all copies of Nietzsche left tucked in his briefcase in the meeting room - he mused on the delicious single malts on offer: Lowland or Highland or Isles, so many from which to choose.
Though it were but ten of the morning, it also being a hotel, the bar was open. Should he order a single glass of each and every one? Should perhaps it rather be a double? Or maybe to take a geographic tour from South to North to West?
That there was pressing need for a de-stressing ingestion of spirits to refresh the spirit was, it seems, quite the matter of the moment. Geo. knowing his report would challenge, Geo. also knowing with what strong emotion such a challenge would be faced by the challenged, a state of alcoholic stupor was terribly tempting.
Consultants though, it would seem, drink less on duty than the most abstemious copper so naked he faced the growlers and the howlers.
Growl and howl it seems they duly did. To an extent that the long-awaited evening snorter turned into a midnight special, leading to a morning's hangover beyond the skill of even a Jeeves. (Not that the Bro. has a manservant as such, but if he did that person would have been - howsoever Jeevesean in resemblance - utterly at a loss to salve his suffering master.)
But with the morning came repentance - theirs not his even. For on reflection, taking it all in all and in the round and under consideration etc., etc., they had accepted, after all, that Geo's harsh words had been as true as they were astute.
Now that does call for a large glass of the finest malt for a job well done that this study can offer.
Awkward moments as you can imagine. Will they fall at his feet to thank him for revealing all, or will they slice his corpse to many silent pieces in the hope of disguising the whole matter from shareholders? Believe me, it can go either in such delicate and fraught situations - or so Bro. Geo. tells me.
A hour or so having passed by - the report was that long and that critical - dear Bro. had wearied of staring meaningfully into space, or sipping a long emptied coffee cup. Turning to the only reading material to hand - all copies of Nietzsche left tucked in his briefcase in the meeting room - he mused on the delicious single malts on offer: Lowland or Highland or Isles, so many from which to choose.
Though it were but ten of the morning, it also being a hotel, the bar was open. Should he order a single glass of each and every one? Should perhaps it rather be a double? Or maybe to take a geographic tour from South to North to West?
That there was pressing need for a de-stressing ingestion of spirits to refresh the spirit was, it seems, quite the matter of the moment. Geo. knowing his report would challenge, Geo. also knowing with what strong emotion such a challenge would be faced by the challenged, a state of alcoholic stupor was terribly tempting.
Consultants though, it would seem, drink less on duty than the most abstemious copper so naked he faced the growlers and the howlers.
Growl and howl it seems they duly did. To an extent that the long-awaited evening snorter turned into a midnight special, leading to a morning's hangover beyond the skill of even a Jeeves. (Not that the Bro. has a manservant as such, but if he did that person would have been - howsoever Jeevesean in resemblance - utterly at a loss to salve his suffering master.)
But with the morning came repentance - theirs not his even. For on reflection, taking it all in all and in the round and under consideration etc., etc., they had accepted, after all, that Geo's harsh words had been as true as they were astute.
Now that does call for a large glass of the finest malt for a job well done that this study can offer.
Monday, August 27, 2007
Nostalgic Nonsense....
Traversing, as one does, the airwaves one has come across tonight this total reported piffle from John Lennon and George Harrison regarding the death, this day forty years ago, of their manager Brian Epstein:
Before leaving Bangor, John Lennon said: "Our meditations have given us confidence to stand such a shock."
George Harrison said: "There is no such thing as death, only in the physical sense. We know he is ok now. He will return because he was striving for happiness and desired bliss so much."
One has, funnily enough, been attending today a local fancy-dress 'Sixties' party. Yet one more hippie type figure seeming out of the question, one posed as a French existentialist revolutionary circa. Paris 1968, replete with texts from Sartre, Camus and Genet. ("Jes Suis Marxiste, Tendance Groucho" and all that jazz.)
A splendid festive occasion, but what did we all grumpy elders do but anguish over the current state of this country and to possibly allow that maybe the Sixties were a better time than now?
Reading, though, the above twaddle, one must question just how fanciful and false nostalgia can be.
Before leaving Bangor, John Lennon said: "Our meditations have given us confidence to stand such a shock."
George Harrison said: "There is no such thing as death, only in the physical sense. We know he is ok now. He will return because he was striving for happiness and desired bliss so much."
One has, funnily enough, been attending today a local fancy-dress 'Sixties' party. Yet one more hippie type figure seeming out of the question, one posed as a French existentialist revolutionary circa. Paris 1968, replete with texts from Sartre, Camus and Genet. ("Jes Suis Marxiste, Tendance Groucho" and all that jazz.)
A splendid festive occasion, but what did we all grumpy elders do but anguish over the current state of this country and to possibly allow that maybe the Sixties were a better time than now?
Reading, though, the above twaddle, one must question just how fanciful and false nostalgia can be.
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Crime and Punishment....
Councillor Robert Parkinson, Lead Member for the Environment, said: "Littering is an offence that blights our streets.
"This is justice for the large majority of our residents out there who respect their streets and particularly those who work hard to keep them clean.
"I hope this gives a stark message that littering is an offence that will not be tolerated."
...This after a man was pursued through the legal system for dropping a piece of paper in Derbyshire.
Thank God say I that our streets are free from litter, if not from actually gangs of evil children who shoot to kill for the sake of 'respect'.
We clearly can all sleep easy in our beds tonight.
"This is justice for the large majority of our residents out there who respect their streets and particularly those who work hard to keep them clean.
"I hope this gives a stark message that littering is an offence that will not be tolerated."
...This after a man was pursued through the legal system for dropping a piece of paper in Derbyshire.
Thank God say I that our streets are free from litter, if not from actually gangs of evil children who shoot to kill for the sake of 'respect'.
We clearly can all sleep easy in our beds tonight.
Friday, August 24, 2007
Public Tears...
Two photographs this morning of people shedding tears in public dominate my Internet server's front page.
The first is of Melanie Jones, mother of the murdered eleven year old boy, recounting to a police news conference how she cradled her unconscious dying boy in her arms begging him not to leave her.
The second is that of some non-person sobbing because she has been voted the least liked 'housemate' by her peers in the television nonsense 'Big Brother'.
The showing of the second is an insult to the first, but the greater insult is our acceptance as a society that the second should be considered a matter of any interest.
Ours is truly a degenerate sinful world and the time is now for mourning, confession and repentance.
The first is of Melanie Jones, mother of the murdered eleven year old boy, recounting to a police news conference how she cradled her unconscious dying boy in her arms begging him not to leave her.
The second is that of some non-person sobbing because she has been voted the least liked 'housemate' by her peers in the television nonsense 'Big Brother'.
The showing of the second is an insult to the first, but the greater insult is our acceptance as a society that the second should be considered a matter of any interest.
Ours is truly a degenerate sinful world and the time is now for mourning, confession and repentance.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Bicycle-By Shooting...
Have you heard?
An eleven - yes eleven - year old boy playing football in a Liverpool pub car park has been shot dead by another young boy - believed to be between fourteen and sixteen - who cycled past on a BMX bike, stopped, struck a pose then shot him in the head.
God help us all.
An eleven - yes eleven - year old boy playing football in a Liverpool pub car park has been shot dead by another young boy - believed to be between fourteen and sixteen - who cycled past on a BMX bike, stopped, struck a pose then shot him in the head.
God help us all.
Sunday, August 19, 2007
All Souls...
It may be a gift - a true charism - or it may be nearer a curse, but the Anglican position is, in theory, that all who are within the Parish bounds are within one's cure - hence curate indeed.
Romans, Non-Conformists (which is most if they but knew it), religious of other faiths or indeed none - rank athiests to the core - are all persons one is charged with seeking to nurture and to point towards Heaven.
This can indeed be taxing if one chooses to reach out to those who are not explicitly attached. By and large, on the whole, taking all as it comes as it were, one does not seek to intrude. One simply lets it be known to any without the obvious flock that one is there if needed.
This is not to say that one is just a soft touch. H will - bless her - give very short shrift to, say, a Baptist farmer who phones to ask whether we would mind minding his chickens whilst he is away preaching the Lord's work to some heathen flock in the benighted North or - more likely these days - the darkest South. There are lines though faint and where those lines are they must be drawn.
So what does one do for passers-by, those who appear but to disappear? One has been called from abed to minister to fallen angels - as we all are in some regard - resting for a night at the Dragon Inn only to discover that the Grim Reaper has come to present the lifetime's bill. A rare but not unknown occurrence it must be said.
I won't, though, do tourist weddings - out-of-town couples who espy our rather lovely ancient Church and insist that it is just the perfect location for their 'OK' nuptials. This is plain silly and easily resisted.
Where then within this wide, if not near boundless, spectrum of catholic - in its generic rather than specialist import - concerns for souls sit Gypsy travellers? They arrive, they inhabit a place - generally unlawfully - and then one fine or misty morning they are gone again, leaving it has to be said most often a trail of unsolved burglaries and thefts, not to mention a multitudinous mountain of domestic detritus.
'Reaching out' is mostly just not the thing. Encampments hardly ever warm to the visiting dog-collar. Round abuse is the most common reply to a decent Rectorial greeting. I state but facts, not expose prejudice.
Would it then surprise you, given the above, that I report a large such Romany settlement not some three miles from her with some deep unease? Settle is perhaps not the word - twenty caravans appear as if from the magician's hat and the Council stands back astonished at such sorcery.
Legal action is to be taken of course and eventually they will go. I the meanwhile will cast my eyes to Heaven - not I admit in search of godly guidance, but rather secularly to check that the lead-roofing of the Church remains in situ.
Does this all sound as if I somewhat lack that fulsome Christian charity for which I should be renowned? I fear it just might, yet no sooner had they come than the entire tack and tackle of a local stable vanished overnight. We are talking thousands of pounds worth of equipment carefully saved for and bought so that darling daughters can ride. Gone in one midnight raid.
I do at that fume I admit. It should not be that way but sadly it is. Gypsies come and saddles and bridles vanish. I again state but the facts.
A parson yes, but first of all a father to a beloved daughter. E is terrified not simply that her saddles will go, but far above that her horse is at risk. Horse rustling is not unknown sadly and must be assumed a possibility.
Local night patrols have been organised and I freely confess that should 'Gypsy Dave' come within but one furlong of our horse with malice aforethought, then he will depart with at least three broken limbs not to mention the lack of a pair of his finest testicles.
This is not quite how I had envisaged the ecclesial role and function, but there you have it.
Romans, Non-Conformists (which is most if they but knew it), religious of other faiths or indeed none - rank athiests to the core - are all persons one is charged with seeking to nurture and to point towards Heaven.
This can indeed be taxing if one chooses to reach out to those who are not explicitly attached. By and large, on the whole, taking all as it comes as it were, one does not seek to intrude. One simply lets it be known to any without the obvious flock that one is there if needed.
This is not to say that one is just a soft touch. H will - bless her - give very short shrift to, say, a Baptist farmer who phones to ask whether we would mind minding his chickens whilst he is away preaching the Lord's work to some heathen flock in the benighted North or - more likely these days - the darkest South. There are lines though faint and where those lines are they must be drawn.
So what does one do for passers-by, those who appear but to disappear? One has been called from abed to minister to fallen angels - as we all are in some regard - resting for a night at the Dragon Inn only to discover that the Grim Reaper has come to present the lifetime's bill. A rare but not unknown occurrence it must be said.
I won't, though, do tourist weddings - out-of-town couples who espy our rather lovely ancient Church and insist that it is just the perfect location for their 'OK' nuptials. This is plain silly and easily resisted.
Where then within this wide, if not near boundless, spectrum of catholic - in its generic rather than specialist import - concerns for souls sit Gypsy travellers? They arrive, they inhabit a place - generally unlawfully - and then one fine or misty morning they are gone again, leaving it has to be said most often a trail of unsolved burglaries and thefts, not to mention a multitudinous mountain of domestic detritus.
'Reaching out' is mostly just not the thing. Encampments hardly ever warm to the visiting dog-collar. Round abuse is the most common reply to a decent Rectorial greeting. I state but facts, not expose prejudice.
Would it then surprise you, given the above, that I report a large such Romany settlement not some three miles from her with some deep unease? Settle is perhaps not the word - twenty caravans appear as if from the magician's hat and the Council stands back astonished at such sorcery.
Legal action is to be taken of course and eventually they will go. I the meanwhile will cast my eyes to Heaven - not I admit in search of godly guidance, but rather secularly to check that the lead-roofing of the Church remains in situ.
Does this all sound as if I somewhat lack that fulsome Christian charity for which I should be renowned? I fear it just might, yet no sooner had they come than the entire tack and tackle of a local stable vanished overnight. We are talking thousands of pounds worth of equipment carefully saved for and bought so that darling daughters can ride. Gone in one midnight raid.
I do at that fume I admit. It should not be that way but sadly it is. Gypsies come and saddles and bridles vanish. I again state but the facts.
A parson yes, but first of all a father to a beloved daughter. E is terrified not simply that her saddles will go, but far above that her horse is at risk. Horse rustling is not unknown sadly and must be assumed a possibility.
Local night patrols have been organised and I freely confess that should 'Gypsy Dave' come within but one furlong of our horse with malice aforethought, then he will depart with at least three broken limbs not to mention the lack of a pair of his finest testicles.
This is not quite how I had envisaged the ecclesial role and function, but there you have it.
Friday, August 17, 2007
Bill Deedes RIP...
...Requiescat in pace dear Bill.
The world has lost a good friend and Heaven gained a fine golfing partner.
Father, Son and Holy Ghost and now Bill - quite a four-ball.
The world has lost a good friend and Heaven gained a fine golfing partner.
Father, Son and Holy Ghost and now Bill - quite a four-ball.
Saturday, August 11, 2007
None
Do you wonder why I despair of all hope?
My prayer is that they will suffer every agony in prison - scalding in the showers would suit - until they each die as she did, tortured and helpless.
Then an eternity of Hell.
What thought is that for an avowed Christian?
My prayer is that they will suffer every agony in prison - scalding in the showers would suit - until they each die as she did, tortured and helpless.
Then an eternity of Hell.
What thought is that for an avowed Christian?
Sharon Wright and Peter McKenzie-Seaton - evil
From the BBC...
Pain of child at mother's hands:
A four-year-old girl who was brutally murdered by her own mother and her partner suffered "unimaginable pain" in the final days of her life. Cigarette burns, bruises and bite marks were among more than 100 injuries found covering Leticia Wright's dead body from head to toe.
Detectives believe the injuries were inflicted during the last four weeks of Leticia's short life.
The abuse continued "until her body could take no more", police said.
Her mother Sharon Wright, 23, and her partner Peter McKenzie-Seaton, 22, were found guilty of her murder at Bradford Crown Court on Friday.
Detectives branded Wright and her boyfriend 'wicked'.
Det Supt Paul Taylor, who led the murder inquiry, said Leticia had been a beautiful, healthy little girl.
"The level of cruelty that Leticia was subjected to beggars belief," he said. "It is unthinkable that her own mother could treat her in such a way.
"I believe Seaton and Wright would have been well aware of the trauma they had inflicted on Leticia, and they chose to continue the abuse until her body could take no more and she died."
Leticia was born in August 2002 in Dewsbury and moved with her mother to Hartlepool in 2005.
After Wright met McKenzie-Seaton, the couple and Leticia moved to Kettering in Northamptonshire before moving to Almondbury Bank in August 2006.
Det Supt Taylor branded the pair "wicked" and welcomed the conviction.
He said: "Sharon Wright and Peter Seaton deserve to spend a long time in prison and I hope they both reflect on what they have done and hang their heads in shame.
"Our sympathies have always been with Leticia's natural father and his family, and they remain so at this time."
Pain of child at mother's hands:
A four-year-old girl who was brutally murdered by her own mother and her partner suffered "unimaginable pain" in the final days of her life. Cigarette burns, bruises and bite marks were among more than 100 injuries found covering Leticia Wright's dead body from head to toe.
Detectives believe the injuries were inflicted during the last four weeks of Leticia's short life.
The abuse continued "until her body could take no more", police said.
Her mother Sharon Wright, 23, and her partner Peter McKenzie-Seaton, 22, were found guilty of her murder at Bradford Crown Court on Friday.
Detectives branded Wright and her boyfriend 'wicked'.
Det Supt Paul Taylor, who led the murder inquiry, said Leticia had been a beautiful, healthy little girl.
"The level of cruelty that Leticia was subjected to beggars belief," he said. "It is unthinkable that her own mother could treat her in such a way.
"I believe Seaton and Wright would have been well aware of the trauma they had inflicted on Leticia, and they chose to continue the abuse until her body could take no more and she died."
Leticia was born in August 2002 in Dewsbury and moved with her mother to Hartlepool in 2005.
After Wright met McKenzie-Seaton, the couple and Leticia moved to Kettering in Northamptonshire before moving to Almondbury Bank in August 2006.
Det Supt Taylor branded the pair "wicked" and welcomed the conviction.
He said: "Sharon Wright and Peter Seaton deserve to spend a long time in prison and I hope they both reflect on what they have done and hang their heads in shame.
"Our sympathies have always been with Leticia's natural father and his family, and they remain so at this time."
Thursday, August 09, 2007
NHS Direct - My Arse!
"It's two in the morning, the middle of August, I'm phoning you now just to tell you I'm sicker..."
The more astute among you will recognise the Leonard Cohen pastiche. Others may leave now.
Well there we had it. It was the middle of the night. We are away staying in a perfectly pleasant B&B. Only it wasn't pleasant as I had succumbed to a recurrence of a raging dental abscess. Beastly thing if you've ever been there.
Of degrees of pain endured - or not - in one's life, first above any and all must have been the time one had ruptured a spinal disc in the neck. Childbirth - not that one has naturally though one has heard - a mere shadow. Passing a kidney stone (number two on the list) a mere bagatelle in comparison.
Having been this place before - dental abscess rather than Kenilworth itself - one knew that the sooner one began antibiotic treatment and pain relief the far the better. One had previously tried the 'bloke thing' and sought to ignore the infection and the pain in the totally vain and silly hope that both would pass of themselves, and from that bitter experience had learnt that medical intervention at the once was the only way to go.
But where to go if to go? Where precisely would one find the required 24 hour walk-in centre? That was the moot and the undetermined question. A man in less distress would have noticed the nice hotel folder on the bedside table providing exactly the information needed.
The man, though, was not acting rationally for he then took the stupid step of telephoning NHS Direct for directions.
The call went roughly thus:
NHS Direct - Hello
Me - Hello
NHS Direct - What do you want?
Me - To find where to go to subdue my raging pain.
NHS Direct - What's your phone number?
Me - Why do you need to know?
NHS Direct - We ask the questions.
NHS Direct - Now you have successfully answered, tell me your postcode.
Me - Postcode? What postcode! I'm standing in the middle of effing Kenilworth High Street at 2.00 in the morning. I have no frigging idea what the postcode is. This is a town called Kenilworth. It is in Warwickshire. It is situated approximately five miles between Coventry and Warwick. Just tell me where I need to go for urgent frigging assistance.
NHS Direct - What's your postcode? The computer won't let me process your call without a postcode.
Me - (All swearing under the sun.) Sod the bloody computer. Help me or watch me get really, really cross.
NHS Direct - Don't take that tone with me. Give me your postcode or die a miserable and deserved death!
Me - You and your system are the devil's invention and I curse you all to an eternity of pain, such as I now have and shall be yours world without end.
NHS Direct - Goodbye.
Me - Goodbye.
(See how we English always manage our intros and our outros so well!)
What utter, utter nonsense. A system that is supposed to help people who are lost to find their way, that cannot function unless you have a postcode.
Someone, somewhere, sometime must have sat down and in all seriousness thought: 'How can we design an IT system to help people who don't know where they are in relation to NHS facilities - say people who are travelling away from home - find where to go? We could of course design a system that lets people say "I'm somewhere in the west of Glasgow", or "I'm about five miles south of Swindon", or even "I'm slap bang in the middle of Kenilworth." But no, we won't do that. Far too obvious and simple that. Let's fox them completely by demanding of people who don't know where they are their postcode!'
Terrific idea in reality of course, for think of all those wretchedly expensive potential patients and consumers of precious NHS resources who will be denied access when they need it.
'Let them eat Aspirin', says NHS Direct.
'My arse!', I can only reply
The more astute among you will recognise the Leonard Cohen pastiche. Others may leave now.
Well there we had it. It was the middle of the night. We are away staying in a perfectly pleasant B&B. Only it wasn't pleasant as I had succumbed to a recurrence of a raging dental abscess. Beastly thing if you've ever been there.
Of degrees of pain endured - or not - in one's life, first above any and all must have been the time one had ruptured a spinal disc in the neck. Childbirth - not that one has naturally though one has heard - a mere shadow. Passing a kidney stone (number two on the list) a mere bagatelle in comparison.
Anyway, so there we were at two in the morning in the middle of Kenilworth High Street - sleeping or sitting still not an option - stifling screams of raw agony from this wretched abscess, the only consoling thought being - and it mattered little - that this pain was marginally less barbaric than the aforementioned neck disc thing.
Having been this place before - dental abscess rather than Kenilworth itself - one knew that the sooner one began antibiotic treatment and pain relief the far the better. One had previously tried the 'bloke thing' and sought to ignore the infection and the pain in the totally vain and silly hope that both would pass of themselves, and from that bitter experience had learnt that medical intervention at the once was the only way to go.
But where to go if to go? Where precisely would one find the required 24 hour walk-in centre? That was the moot and the undetermined question. A man in less distress would have noticed the nice hotel folder on the bedside table providing exactly the information needed.
The man, though, was not acting rationally for he then took the stupid step of telephoning NHS Direct for directions.
The call went roughly thus:
NHS Direct - Hello
Me - Hello
NHS Direct - What do you want?
Me - To find where to go to subdue my raging pain.
NHS Direct - What's your phone number?
Me - Why do you need to know?
NHS Direct - We ask the questions.
NHS Direct - Now you have successfully answered, tell me your postcode.
Me - Postcode? What postcode! I'm standing in the middle of effing Kenilworth High Street at 2.00 in the morning. I have no frigging idea what the postcode is. This is a town called Kenilworth. It is in Warwickshire. It is situated approximately five miles between Coventry and Warwick. Just tell me where I need to go for urgent frigging assistance.
NHS Direct - What's your postcode? The computer won't let me process your call without a postcode.
Me - (All swearing under the sun.) Sod the bloody computer. Help me or watch me get really, really cross.
NHS Direct - Don't take that tone with me. Give me your postcode or die a miserable and deserved death!
Me - You and your system are the devil's invention and I curse you all to an eternity of pain, such as I now have and shall be yours world without end.
NHS Direct - Goodbye.
Me - Goodbye.
(See how we English always manage our intros and our outros so well!)
What utter, utter nonsense. A system that is supposed to help people who are lost to find their way, that cannot function unless you have a postcode.
Someone, somewhere, sometime must have sat down and in all seriousness thought: 'How can we design an IT system to help people who don't know where they are in relation to NHS facilities - say people who are travelling away from home - find where to go? We could of course design a system that lets people say "I'm somewhere in the west of Glasgow", or "I'm about five miles south of Swindon", or even "I'm slap bang in the middle of Kenilworth." But no, we won't do that. Far too obvious and simple that. Let's fox them completely by demanding of people who don't know where they are their postcode!'
Terrific idea in reality of course, for think of all those wretchedly expensive potential patients and consumers of precious NHS resources who will be denied access when they need it.
'Let them eat Aspirin', says NHS Direct.
'My arse!', I can only reply
Saturday, August 04, 2007
Horse Sense...
...as a mother said to me "When they win one of these things it makes the expense all worth while." ('One of those things' is the cherished rosette signifying success in competition.) Well yes, the cost is always a factor to consider. They also serve who only stand and spend, or as my tee-shirt reads 'Don't ask me I only pay for it'. And the 'it' of course is the horse.
My overall knowledge of the animal is strictly limited: the front end bites, the back end kicks and all the rest in between costs me arms and legs in equal and deep measure.
Better though I find than the parent, skilled in the mystery, who will harass her (generally) daughter (almost always) moments before they (horse and rider of course and not mother and daughter) enter the arena for four and a half minutes of stomach churning strain. (A dressage test at a national final for those who do not follow these things.)
Mother will bark out "Give more rein, let her loose, watch she doesn't lean, you're off the shoulder in trot, transition is better but she's still jumping into canter....etc., etc." In reply daughter will inevitably riposte in a crescendo of hysteric vitriol, "Do shut up Mother. I'm riding. You want to have a go?" (The F word will be liberally sprinkled throughout the exchange.)
I, on the other hand, being an ignoramus can only cry out, "She looks lovely. Best of luck daughter", which though not terribly informative is generally well received. There will be times when daughter will moan that all is lost before it's begun as horse is asleep or about to nap. (Funnily enough nap is not nodding off, but more pinging in the air like a vertical take-off jet fighter to demonstrate rank non-compliance with lawful rider instructions.)
Those moments are tricky. If you agree with the comment you are in a hole and if you attempt to refute the sentiment you are roundly sworn at. It's, in truth, pure nerves. We love this sport, but we hate the waiting to begin.
So in she goes and Papa nips off to video the test. 'Enter at A, down centre line to C in walk...' That much is common to any test, but after that it's all over the place. Trot 20 metre circle M to B. At X change rein. Counter-canter C to D. And so forth. (Took me ages to work out that 'X' is not a marker board, but the middle of the arena!)
The test always ends on same note too: 'Down centre line. Halt. Immobility. Salute.' (E salutes with the downward swipe as if scorning the world, the judges and all their works. More nerves.) The aftermath too is invariable: E exits with a sour face and a volley of torment about what a perfectly wretched test it was. More parental dilemma: agree and you risk being trampled; disagree and you are told you are an ignorant parent who would be dangerous if slightly less stupid.
So Stoneleigh came and went this year as before. And how did she do, you naturally ask.
Well, I oh so casually respond: "Well actually she was Reserve Champion [posh horse speak for second] in Jr Prelim and 4th in Jr Novice. Not bad really when you consider that several thousand horses and ponies would have set off in quest of this prize. And by the way, in her first Prelim round she was awarded the highest score of any horse, in any test, on both days."
If you don't know the world of horse, you will merely be expected to respond "Gosh, that's jolly good", but if you do know you'll be bound to reply "Chuffing heck. That's astonishing. Reserve Champ and a Fourth! You must be so proud."
Well yes, I am.
My overall knowledge of the animal is strictly limited: the front end bites, the back end kicks and all the rest in between costs me arms and legs in equal and deep measure.
Better though I find than the parent, skilled in the mystery, who will harass her (generally) daughter (almost always) moments before they (horse and rider of course and not mother and daughter) enter the arena for four and a half minutes of stomach churning strain. (A dressage test at a national final for those who do not follow these things.)
Mother will bark out "Give more rein, let her loose, watch she doesn't lean, you're off the shoulder in trot, transition is better but she's still jumping into canter....etc., etc." In reply daughter will inevitably riposte in a crescendo of hysteric vitriol, "Do shut up Mother. I'm riding. You want to have a go?" (The F word will be liberally sprinkled throughout the exchange.)
I, on the other hand, being an ignoramus can only cry out, "She looks lovely. Best of luck daughter", which though not terribly informative is generally well received. There will be times when daughter will moan that all is lost before it's begun as horse is asleep or about to nap. (Funnily enough nap is not nodding off, but more pinging in the air like a vertical take-off jet fighter to demonstrate rank non-compliance with lawful rider instructions.)
Those moments are tricky. If you agree with the comment you are in a hole and if you attempt to refute the sentiment you are roundly sworn at. It's, in truth, pure nerves. We love this sport, but we hate the waiting to begin.
So in she goes and Papa nips off to video the test. 'Enter at A, down centre line to C in walk...' That much is common to any test, but after that it's all over the place. Trot 20 metre circle M to B. At X change rein. Counter-canter C to D. And so forth. (Took me ages to work out that 'X' is not a marker board, but the middle of the arena!)
The test always ends on same note too: 'Down centre line. Halt. Immobility. Salute.' (E salutes with the downward swipe as if scorning the world, the judges and all their works. More nerves.) The aftermath too is invariable: E exits with a sour face and a volley of torment about what a perfectly wretched test it was. More parental dilemma: agree and you risk being trampled; disagree and you are told you are an ignorant parent who would be dangerous if slightly less stupid.
So Stoneleigh came and went this year as before. And how did she do, you naturally ask.
Well, I oh so casually respond: "Well actually she was Reserve Champion [posh horse speak for second] in Jr Prelim and 4th in Jr Novice. Not bad really when you consider that several thousand horses and ponies would have set off in quest of this prize. And by the way, in her first Prelim round she was awarded the highest score of any horse, in any test, on both days."
If you don't know the world of horse, you will merely be expected to respond "Gosh, that's jolly good", but if you do know you'll be bound to reply "Chuffing heck. That's astonishing. Reserve Champ and a Fourth! You must be so proud."
Well yes, I am.
Monday, July 30, 2007
The Names of Evil...
As promised, the Judge having lifted the restriction on revealing the identity of the juvenile in the case, Sarah Bullock aged seventeen is named as a murderer:
"A 17-year-old girl has been detained for 10 years for the murder of a man with learning disabilities in Cornwall.
Steven Hoskin, 38, from St Austell, was humiliated and tortured by a gang in July 2006 then taken to a viaduct and forced to hang from railings.
Sarah Bullock stamped on his hands causing him to fall 100ft to his death.
Her boyfriend and gang ringleader Darren Stewart, 30, was jailed for at least 25 years. Martin Pollard, 21, was given for eight years for manslaughter.
All three had pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm and Pollard and Stewart had pleaded guilty to false imprisonment. The girl was also convicted of false imprisonment.
The judge at Truro Crown Court, Mr Justice Owens, told Stewart and Bullock they had committed a "...most horrific murder.You literally bullied him to death."
...from the BBC News Website. You may wish to view Ms Bullock's face there. It is not a pretty sight.
"A 17-year-old girl has been detained for 10 years for the murder of a man with learning disabilities in Cornwall.
Steven Hoskin, 38, from St Austell, was humiliated and tortured by a gang in July 2006 then taken to a viaduct and forced to hang from railings.
Sarah Bullock stamped on his hands causing him to fall 100ft to his death.
Her boyfriend and gang ringleader Darren Stewart, 30, was jailed for at least 25 years. Martin Pollard, 21, was given for eight years for manslaughter.
All three had pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm and Pollard and Stewart had pleaded guilty to false imprisonment. The girl was also convicted of false imprisonment.
The judge at Truro Crown Court, Mr Justice Owens, told Stewart and Bullock they had committed a "...most horrific murder.You literally bullied him to death."
...from the BBC News Website. You may wish to view Ms Bullock's face there. It is not a pretty sight.
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Shark Watch...
...We have to date been spared from visitor-deterring flooding, for which great mercy much thanks. Nor are we locally greatly dependent on any passing - or adhering - tourist trade for our livelihoods. There are not a few even, it must be said, of our fine community who would not care much if they never saw anyone not born five miles from the place.
Such insularity may not seem terribly appealing in our diverse social world of today - though if fear of global warming is to replace our desire to live in one great global village by making us journey less rather than more, perhaps we may yet move back to an ancestral way of living that did tend to preclude contact with any but nearest neighbours.
It was said even by Dr Charles, GP and confidant to the village, that within his working memory he attended an old farmer who protested most vehemently when told he must surrender himself to a sojourn at the local hospital. "But Doctor," he said. "I've never touched road in my life nor do I wish to."
He meant, it seems, literally that. Not once in his entire life had he left his home farm for school, nor work, nor pleasure. His feet had only touched grass and mud their entire lifetimes. Utterly extraordinary you would say, but though an extreme case not too far from the existence of many here, and certainly quite akin to how the lives of most would have been led not sixty years ago.
But though then not great travellers ourselves, it must not be thought we don't welcome wayfarers and wanderers. As long as, that is, they do not come from too close to hand, by which I mean we have never cared much for nosey folk - as we would perceive them and they in their turn would perceive us should we pitch up on their front doors - who come by from near by villages, clearly on some devious mission of espionage, thuggery or other villainy.
Happily though will we take them from Scotland, from Swaziland or from even Southend-on-Sea - so long as they take us as they find us. We will feed them, we will water them, we will find them beds for the night and a decent meal at the Dragon Inn. We will even - should they care to attend Sunday Vespers, which few of them of course do - sing rather handsomely to them.
Unlikely that they will come to us by design it must be said, for we have little but our good selves and our mild mannered ways to attract - though I should also not wish to be seen too much to be underplaying such settled, simple goodness.
Not then very much like Cornwall on the whole you would agree, where people flock in their multitudes to partake of sun, sea, sand and now it would seem sharks of the Great White variety!
Let me not mock too much and Lord forbid some poor Cornish camper be devoured by a cruising 'Jaws', but I did have to chortle when some local dignitary opined that rumour of Great Whites was the last thing the Cornish tourist industry needed in this dismal year and would people kindly not mention The Shark!
Oh, how so like the film one instantly thought. Mustn't frighten the horses on any and all accounts was the watchword there, and how so deathly that turned out to be.
So come to The Wolds for your holidays. We may not have much other than our decent selves to give, but at present we can offer the seemly prospect of no floods and not a single Great White Shark!
Cornwall - 0 : The Wolds - 1
Such insularity may not seem terribly appealing in our diverse social world of today - though if fear of global warming is to replace our desire to live in one great global village by making us journey less rather than more, perhaps we may yet move back to an ancestral way of living that did tend to preclude contact with any but nearest neighbours.
It was said even by Dr Charles, GP and confidant to the village, that within his working memory he attended an old farmer who protested most vehemently when told he must surrender himself to a sojourn at the local hospital. "But Doctor," he said. "I've never touched road in my life nor do I wish to."
He meant, it seems, literally that. Not once in his entire life had he left his home farm for school, nor work, nor pleasure. His feet had only touched grass and mud their entire lifetimes. Utterly extraordinary you would say, but though an extreme case not too far from the existence of many here, and certainly quite akin to how the lives of most would have been led not sixty years ago.
But though then not great travellers ourselves, it must not be thought we don't welcome wayfarers and wanderers. As long as, that is, they do not come from too close to hand, by which I mean we have never cared much for nosey folk - as we would perceive them and they in their turn would perceive us should we pitch up on their front doors - who come by from near by villages, clearly on some devious mission of espionage, thuggery or other villainy.
Happily though will we take them from Scotland, from Swaziland or from even Southend-on-Sea - so long as they take us as they find us. We will feed them, we will water them, we will find them beds for the night and a decent meal at the Dragon Inn. We will even - should they care to attend Sunday Vespers, which few of them of course do - sing rather handsomely to them.
Unlikely that they will come to us by design it must be said, for we have little but our good selves and our mild mannered ways to attract - though I should also not wish to be seen too much to be underplaying such settled, simple goodness.
Not then very much like Cornwall on the whole you would agree, where people flock in their multitudes to partake of sun, sea, sand and now it would seem sharks of the Great White variety!
Let me not mock too much and Lord forbid some poor Cornish camper be devoured by a cruising 'Jaws', but I did have to chortle when some local dignitary opined that rumour of Great Whites was the last thing the Cornish tourist industry needed in this dismal year and would people kindly not mention The Shark!
Oh, how so like the film one instantly thought. Mustn't frighten the horses on any and all accounts was the watchword there, and how so deathly that turned out to be.
So come to The Wolds for your holidays. We may not have much other than our decent selves to give, but at present we can offer the seemly prospect of no floods and not a single Great White Shark!
Cornwall - 0 : The Wolds - 1
Friday, July 27, 2007
The Faces of Evil...
Pair convicted of viaduct murder
A man and a teenage girl have been found guilty of the murder of a man with learning disabilities. Steven Hoskin, 38, from St Austell, Cornwall, was humiliated and abused for hours by a gang, a court heard. He was drugged, taken to a viaduct and forced to hang from railings.
The 17-year-old girl stamped on his hands causing him to fall 100ft to his death. Darren Stewart, 30, was jailed for life and the girl detained. Another man was convicted of manslaughter. Martin Pollard, 21, had also been accused of murder but was convicted of the lesser charge by a jury at Truro Crown Court.
All three had pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm and Pollard and Stewart had pleaded guilty to false imprisonment. The girl was convicted of false imprisonment. Two 17-year-old boys, who cannot be named, were also found guilty of assault and false imprisonment.
The jury at the Truro Crown Court heard Mr Hoskin, who had the reading ability of a six-year-old, was burnt with cigarettes, walked around on a dog lead and was forced to confess to being a paedophile. He was also forced to eat 70 paracetamol tablets.
The teenage girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court a plan was then hatched to take him to the top of a viaduct in Trenance Road, St Austell "to scare him". Mr Hoskin was stamped on and kicked in the face as he clung to railings at the viaduct, the court heard.
Det Ch Insp Mike Fowkes, senior investigating officer, said: "The group of five defendants tortured him in the secrecy and privacy of his own home, a meagre home he had willingly opened to them with the hand of friendship. Collectively their behaviour culminated in unparalleled cruelty and evil that has absolutely no place in modern society."
Cornwall County Council has confirmed that a multi-agency review will be held to see if any lessons can be learned from "this terrible incident".
...From the BBC tonight. The face of evil in our world.
Mike Fowkes is right to use that non-police word 'evil', for it is from the very Devil himself that such deeds come; but Mike is too hopeful, too nice, too kind meaning to say such evil has no place in our world. For it is precisely in our world that such evil has taken root. It has its place all right, right in our midst, it is there among us and if we do not act to destroy it it will kill us all.
As for Cornwall and their "multi-agency review" looking for lessons to be learnt, that makes me vomit. Bleeding hearts gathered round a flipchart intoning platitudes. Nothing more. They wouldn't recognise evil if it ripped their heads off and laughed them to damnation. Which it does, only they haven't yet noticed.
The Judge in the case is considering whether to give the names of the juveniles to the public. He will I hope and you shall have them here.
A man and a teenage girl have been found guilty of the murder of a man with learning disabilities. Steven Hoskin, 38, from St Austell, Cornwall, was humiliated and abused for hours by a gang, a court heard. He was drugged, taken to a viaduct and forced to hang from railings.
The 17-year-old girl stamped on his hands causing him to fall 100ft to his death. Darren Stewart, 30, was jailed for life and the girl detained. Another man was convicted of manslaughter. Martin Pollard, 21, had also been accused of murder but was convicted of the lesser charge by a jury at Truro Crown Court.
All three had pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm and Pollard and Stewart had pleaded guilty to false imprisonment. The girl was convicted of false imprisonment. Two 17-year-old boys, who cannot be named, were also found guilty of assault and false imprisonment.
The jury at the Truro Crown Court heard Mr Hoskin, who had the reading ability of a six-year-old, was burnt with cigarettes, walked around on a dog lead and was forced to confess to being a paedophile. He was also forced to eat 70 paracetamol tablets.
The teenage girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court a plan was then hatched to take him to the top of a viaduct in Trenance Road, St Austell "to scare him". Mr Hoskin was stamped on and kicked in the face as he clung to railings at the viaduct, the court heard.
Det Ch Insp Mike Fowkes, senior investigating officer, said: "The group of five defendants tortured him in the secrecy and privacy of his own home, a meagre home he had willingly opened to them with the hand of friendship. Collectively their behaviour culminated in unparalleled cruelty and evil that has absolutely no place in modern society."
Cornwall County Council has confirmed that a multi-agency review will be held to see if any lessons can be learned from "this terrible incident".
...From the BBC tonight. The face of evil in our world.
Mike Fowkes is right to use that non-police word 'evil', for it is from the very Devil himself that such deeds come; but Mike is too hopeful, too nice, too kind meaning to say such evil has no place in our world. For it is precisely in our world that such evil has taken root. It has its place all right, right in our midst, it is there among us and if we do not act to destroy it it will kill us all.
As for Cornwall and their "multi-agency review" looking for lessons to be learnt, that makes me vomit. Bleeding hearts gathered round a flipchart intoning platitudes. Nothing more. They wouldn't recognise evil if it ripped their heads off and laughed them to damnation. Which it does, only they haven't yet noticed.
The Judge in the case is considering whether to give the names of the juveniles to the public. He will I hope and you shall have them here.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Cat Sense...
A US cat that is reportedly able to sense when a nursing home's residents are about to die is baffling doctors. Oscar has a habit of curling up next to patients at the home in Providence, Rhode Island, in their final hours. According to the author of a study in the New England Journal of Medicine, the two-year-old cat has been observed to be correct in 25 cases so far. Staff now alert the families of residents when he sits down next to their ailing loved one.
"He doesn't make many mistakes. He seems to understand when patients are about to die," David Dosa, a professor at Brown University who carried out the research, told the Associated Press news agency. Oscar was adopted as a kitten at Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Centre. The cat is said to do his own rounds, just like the doctors and nurses at the home, but is not generally friendly to patients.
Although most families are grateful for the warning Oscar seems to provide, some relatives ask that the pet be taken away while they say their last goodbyes to their loved ones. When put outside the room, Oscar is said to pace up and down meowing in protest.
...From the Beeb tonight. You know I find that totally and utterly credible, though I can well imagine it frightens the puss out of the inmates if she comes by to say hello and goodbye. And I am rather proud that it is a gentleman cat showing such sensitivity. H will never believe that bit!
"He doesn't make many mistakes. He seems to understand when patients are about to die," David Dosa, a professor at Brown University who carried out the research, told the Associated Press news agency. Oscar was adopted as a kitten at Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Centre. The cat is said to do his own rounds, just like the doctors and nurses at the home, but is not generally friendly to patients.
Although most families are grateful for the warning Oscar seems to provide, some relatives ask that the pet be taken away while they say their last goodbyes to their loved ones. When put outside the room, Oscar is said to pace up and down meowing in protest.
...From the Beeb tonight. You know I find that totally and utterly credible, though I can well imagine it frightens the puss out of the inmates if she comes by to say hello and goodbye. And I am rather proud that it is a gentleman cat showing such sensitivity. H will never believe that bit!
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
"I Am In No Way A Violent Person..."
...said the woman just gaoled for ripping off her ex-boyfriend's left testicle with her bare hands before attempting to eat it.
She choked on it apparently, spat it out and someone else handed it back to man saying "I think this is yours". Surgeons were unable...etc.
These pacifists eh? Just can't trust 'em like you could.
She choked on it apparently, spat it out and someone else handed it back to man saying "I think this is yours". Surgeons were unable...etc.
These pacifists eh? Just can't trust 'em like you could.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Water, Water Everywhere...
...and mindless vandalism in Gloucestershire.
This in from the news: emergency water outlets have been vandalised.
I despair.
This in from the news: emergency water outlets have been vandalised.
I despair.
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Pure Smut!
Our Jo - is she cool or is she clever?
It's Harry's seventeenth birthday. Ron gives him a proper 'bloke book' - 'Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches'.
Handy stuff for a growing lad to know, as you will agree.
Quote Ron: "You'd be surprised, it's not all about wandwork either."
Utter smut or what? What was the woman thinking of!
It's Harry's seventeenth birthday. Ron gives him a proper 'bloke book' - 'Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches'.
Handy stuff for a growing lad to know, as you will agree.
Quote Ron: "You'd be surprised, it's not all about wandwork either."
Utter smut or what? What was the woman thinking of!
Plot Spoiler!
Be warned and look away now if you must...but this is the most magnificent, impossible and singular plot spoiler you will ever encounter:
"Dumbledore’s brother and his fondness for goats become vital to the plot..."
...I say no more, because how could one add to that!
"Dumbledore’s brother and his fondness for goats become vital to the plot..."
...I say no more, because how could one add to that!
Friday, July 20, 2007
Will She Won't She?
In truth it is more has she or hasn't she - has Our Jo killed off Harry Potter or not?
It is a terrible thing to have to consider, but there can be no doubt that any choices made by the author of this book of fiction will have had to have been influenced by the potential actual impact of those choices on real young people.
There is something far too horrid to contemplate, but one does fear that young minds obsessively driven by the books could come to harm. One pictures ritual suicides in peculiar societies in the Far East.
Pray my soul is not prophetic, but if young Harry should 'die' then it will be as an act of total sacrifice for the good of others and others may feel the need to emulate such an act in some mistaken, misshapen way.
Even to be able to think this is too awful.
It is a terrible thing to have to consider, but there can be no doubt that any choices made by the author of this book of fiction will have had to have been influenced by the potential actual impact of those choices on real young people.
There is something far too horrid to contemplate, but one does fear that young minds obsessively driven by the books could come to harm. One pictures ritual suicides in peculiar societies in the Far East.
Pray my soul is not prophetic, but if young Harry should 'die' then it will be as an act of total sacrifice for the good of others and others may feel the need to emulate such an act in some mistaken, misshapen way.
Even to be able to think this is too awful.
Monday, July 16, 2007
Troubled Mind...
...At last, regrettably, I have found someone who affirms what I have long thought to be the case - that there is a link and a form of congruence between the world views and philosophy - in that order - of Nietzsche, Kant and Sartre.
A certain Prof. Downie no less. Some terribly wise guff about 'autonomous will, free but constrained by its essentially rational nature, becoming the totally unconstrained will creating its own values in arbitrarily free choice'. (Couldn't have put it better had I tried!)
This is deeply troubling to the mind naturally: for no longer can one simply muse that the matter might be so, that somehow it seems to fit - and take it as just a personal whimsical notion requiring no further investigation - one ought reasonably now seek to get to the bottom of it through some serious study.
As a thing-in-itself one presumes. Time for that last malt and a swift perusal of the library shelves!
A certain Prof. Downie no less. Some terribly wise guff about 'autonomous will, free but constrained by its essentially rational nature, becoming the totally unconstrained will creating its own values in arbitrarily free choice'. (Couldn't have put it better had I tried!)
This is deeply troubling to the mind naturally: for no longer can one simply muse that the matter might be so, that somehow it seems to fit - and take it as just a personal whimsical notion requiring no further investigation - one ought reasonably now seek to get to the bottom of it through some serious study.
As a thing-in-itself one presumes. Time for that last malt and a swift perusal of the library shelves!
Monday, July 09, 2007
Seeing Straight...
...it didn't need that fourth malt to remind me of the real matter in hand, a mere glance at one's own words on the printed page was sufficient.
Look at that child's face opposite. She matters. Not rules or covenants.
God be with her. All prayer from all for all.
Look at that child's face opposite. She matters. Not rules or covenants.
God be with her. All prayer from all for all.
The New Covenanters...
Oh dear. More trouble at t'Mill.
For we are, it seems, to have a New Covenant to bind us all. Which it won't of course.
And there was me but yesterday or thereabouts complaining that we Anglos didn't have a proper Rule Book about the place to which to refer on needed occasion. Well now we are to have one it seems and more's the pity say I, as one who wasn't asked for his opinion by the Bearded Bard.
Why though do I mourn the coming of the very thing for which I appeared to advocate? Because it won't make a halfpenny worth of tar's difference to the Big Issue - 'Gay: Forbidden or Compulsory?' - nor will anyone actually take any notice of it if it seems to inhibit their chosen line.
Want to hold communion services in saunas? You'll find the permissive interpretation you seek somewhere in the text. Wish rather to introduce public floggings of spinsters of a certain nervous disposition? You'll claim justification from the very same paragraph.
That, after all, has been the Anglo way from the beginning. We've allowed the Bible to mean what we want it to, we've bent over backwards - an awkward phrase indeed these difficult days - forwards and sideways to accommodate any sort of half-belief or indeed none at all. The only common ground we appear to have been left with is some vague yearning that it - the very ground of our communion - might after all exist somewhere in some form or another, though generally faraway and often long ago.
And now some idiot liberal - I use the words as sadly as I do wisely - has objected "But we do not have a hold on truth. We cannot claim an infallible source." Well sorry matey, if that's what you think then hand back your stipend this instant!
All in a huff right now I am. Third malt has not improved the temper I fear, as it ought and generally does. Am even minded to put it to H that we let go of this entire farrago and leg it over to Rome. Can be done these days I am told: Catholic priest, but yet with wife in tow. Would have to surrender the Rectory, but with the draughts that howl throughout over the winter months am not sure either of us would mourn the loss.
Would I swop the Bearded Bard for Benedict? In truth you betcha I would. At least I can understand what he says most of the time. German accented Latin is a breeze compared with Anglo-Celtic meanderings.
Let's see what the fourth malt advises.
For we are, it seems, to have a New Covenant to bind us all. Which it won't of course.
And there was me but yesterday or thereabouts complaining that we Anglos didn't have a proper Rule Book about the place to which to refer on needed occasion. Well now we are to have one it seems and more's the pity say I, as one who wasn't asked for his opinion by the Bearded Bard.
Why though do I mourn the coming of the very thing for which I appeared to advocate? Because it won't make a halfpenny worth of tar's difference to the Big Issue - 'Gay: Forbidden or Compulsory?' - nor will anyone actually take any notice of it if it seems to inhibit their chosen line.
Want to hold communion services in saunas? You'll find the permissive interpretation you seek somewhere in the text. Wish rather to introduce public floggings of spinsters of a certain nervous disposition? You'll claim justification from the very same paragraph.
That, after all, has been the Anglo way from the beginning. We've allowed the Bible to mean what we want it to, we've bent over backwards - an awkward phrase indeed these difficult days - forwards and sideways to accommodate any sort of half-belief or indeed none at all. The only common ground we appear to have been left with is some vague yearning that it - the very ground of our communion - might after all exist somewhere in some form or another, though generally faraway and often long ago.
And now some idiot liberal - I use the words as sadly as I do wisely - has objected "But we do not have a hold on truth. We cannot claim an infallible source." Well sorry matey, if that's what you think then hand back your stipend this instant!
All in a huff right now I am. Third malt has not improved the temper I fear, as it ought and generally does. Am even minded to put it to H that we let go of this entire farrago and leg it over to Rome. Can be done these days I am told: Catholic priest, but yet with wife in tow. Would have to surrender the Rectory, but with the draughts that howl throughout over the winter months am not sure either of us would mourn the loss.
Would I swop the Bearded Bard for Benedict? In truth you betcha I would. At least I can understand what he says most of the time. German accented Latin is a breeze compared with Anglo-Celtic meanderings.
Let's see what the fourth malt advises.
Saturday, July 07, 2007
Rules Is Rules...
...Did I mention that Maurice and Mildred are married? H thinks not and that that is a failing to be rectified at once.
Cannot entirely recall whether it did slip my mind to mention the matter, or indeed whether the matter was indeed mentioned and that it is the very mentioning itself that is passed recalling. (Neither is a pleasing comment on one's mental faculties in truth.)
Too busy to be my own archivist, I must allow H's best guess to be the right one and to inform - or re-inform as the case may be - the wider world of the fine event.
There had been it seems - though as so often in such matters myself the last to know - some deep concern about whether the parson - oneself - would take kindly to marrying a pair of trouts one of whom had a living ex-spouse somewhere in the middle distance. A fair consideration, not least as this parson's soul had not previously been required to wrestle with this deep matter of clerical conscience.
I do in these matters - as in so many - quite envy my fellow catholics, those of the Roman Catholic persuasion that is. They have a rule book and in that rule book it lays out what is allowed and what is forbidden. A simple binary system thoroughly befitting a rule book in my mind.
That local discretion in so many forbidden matters is claimed, is both thoroughly humane and not at all a contradiction of the very purpose and function of the book of rules. I do rather cherish the story of the troubled Catholic priest who visited his local monastery to pour out his troubled Catholic soul about having fallen terribly in love with a wonderful woman and she with him. "What should I do, please tell me Father?" he cried. "Why for God's sake sleep with her, she clearly needs you. You have no right to deny her your love," urged the monk. Wrong by rule but so right by God!
We Anglos sadly lack such clarity to interpret as we choose. (I love too the traditional Catholic legend that a thing is forbidden until the day it becomes compulsory.) We must rather ho and hum in a prayerful sort of way and then deliver some tortuous and complex judgement that is far too often merely a wretched muddled mix of so many meandering messages that is as unwieldy as it is unfathomable.
Which is why in the end - or rather right at the beginning - when H broached the delicate as she saw it subject on their behalf I at once replied - knowing them and their case so well - "Go for it." I was not for getting in their way, bless the funny odd pair of them. And if it were to be a way of ending once for all the curse of The Feud [see so many previous] then that too was not a gift horse in need of dental inspection.
So to it they went with some gusto. Details are in the Parish Mag. for May should you wish them. H as Matron of Honour, George and Patrick both giving away the bride - all natural family now gone - and a pretty rockin' homily on my part regarding the beauty of long-held yet unspoken passion on my part.
References to the early works of Bob Dylan being mixed so well I thought with musings drawn from Confucius, with just a touch of Baudelaire on the wonderful carnality of older love. (E did cringe at that last I noted, but then that is what teenagers are for - to believe that one somehow expires as a sentient person on reaching thirty let alone fifty.)
Reception at the Dragon naturally, with no speeches just a whimsical cabaret act from G & P as - for one night only - 'One Poof and a Sofa' - which did cause poor Sally to pass out from the vapours, but then Chapel is so prone to such fits no one terribly minded.
Honeymoon was in Vegas, which was simply ripping and had E's eyes out on stalks when she heard their destination. Good for them and all the best on the Strip. They came back cleaned out as every tourist always does but utterly thrilled to have been there just the once. Mildred even claimed she sat down with the legendary Doyle 'Texas Dolly' Brunson himself at a poker table, and when he let her bluff him for $100 with an Ace high had then the added charm to compliment her on her awesome might as a player.
Did I never mention that? How odd if not.
Next you'll be asking me for gen on Father Bill and his dreaded parish inspection. That has naturally not been far from my thoughts these past days, though it cannot be near the nib of my pen as I would wish for I am, I fear, under the strictest of all bans from discussing the matter in public until the inspection is over and the report submitted.
Well, that's what they say is in their rule books and who am I to argue with that?
Cannot entirely recall whether it did slip my mind to mention the matter, or indeed whether the matter was indeed mentioned and that it is the very mentioning itself that is passed recalling. (Neither is a pleasing comment on one's mental faculties in truth.)
Too busy to be my own archivist, I must allow H's best guess to be the right one and to inform - or re-inform as the case may be - the wider world of the fine event.
There had been it seems - though as so often in such matters myself the last to know - some deep concern about whether the parson - oneself - would take kindly to marrying a pair of trouts one of whom had a living ex-spouse somewhere in the middle distance. A fair consideration, not least as this parson's soul had not previously been required to wrestle with this deep matter of clerical conscience.
I do in these matters - as in so many - quite envy my fellow catholics, those of the Roman Catholic persuasion that is. They have a rule book and in that rule book it lays out what is allowed and what is forbidden. A simple binary system thoroughly befitting a rule book in my mind.
That local discretion in so many forbidden matters is claimed, is both thoroughly humane and not at all a contradiction of the very purpose and function of the book of rules. I do rather cherish the story of the troubled Catholic priest who visited his local monastery to pour out his troubled Catholic soul about having fallen terribly in love with a wonderful woman and she with him. "What should I do, please tell me Father?" he cried. "Why for God's sake sleep with her, she clearly needs you. You have no right to deny her your love," urged the monk. Wrong by rule but so right by God!
We Anglos sadly lack such clarity to interpret as we choose. (I love too the traditional Catholic legend that a thing is forbidden until the day it becomes compulsory.) We must rather ho and hum in a prayerful sort of way and then deliver some tortuous and complex judgement that is far too often merely a wretched muddled mix of so many meandering messages that is as unwieldy as it is unfathomable.
Which is why in the end - or rather right at the beginning - when H broached the delicate as she saw it subject on their behalf I at once replied - knowing them and their case so well - "Go for it." I was not for getting in their way, bless the funny odd pair of them. And if it were to be a way of ending once for all the curse of The Feud [see so many previous] then that too was not a gift horse in need of dental inspection.
So to it they went with some gusto. Details are in the Parish Mag. for May should you wish them. H as Matron of Honour, George and Patrick both giving away the bride - all natural family now gone - and a pretty rockin' homily on my part regarding the beauty of long-held yet unspoken passion on my part.
References to the early works of Bob Dylan being mixed so well I thought with musings drawn from Confucius, with just a touch of Baudelaire on the wonderful carnality of older love. (E did cringe at that last I noted, but then that is what teenagers are for - to believe that one somehow expires as a sentient person on reaching thirty let alone fifty.)
Reception at the Dragon naturally, with no speeches just a whimsical cabaret act from G & P as - for one night only - 'One Poof and a Sofa' - which did cause poor Sally to pass out from the vapours, but then Chapel is so prone to such fits no one terribly minded.
Honeymoon was in Vegas, which was simply ripping and had E's eyes out on stalks when she heard their destination. Good for them and all the best on the Strip. They came back cleaned out as every tourist always does but utterly thrilled to have been there just the once. Mildred even claimed she sat down with the legendary Doyle 'Texas Dolly' Brunson himself at a poker table, and when he let her bluff him for $100 with an Ace high had then the added charm to compliment her on her awesome might as a player.
Did I never mention that? How odd if not.
Next you'll be asking me for gen on Father Bill and his dreaded parish inspection. That has naturally not been far from my thoughts these past days, though it cannot be near the nib of my pen as I would wish for I am, I fear, under the strictest of all bans from discussing the matter in public until the inspection is over and the report submitted.
Well, that's what they say is in their rule books and who am I to argue with that?
Pottering About...
...If I were to say that I have not read a single line of a Harry Potter Book or seen a single scene of any film, that would not in the strictest sense be true, for I have caught the odd frame or ten of the first film when E and her chums were having a Potterfest at our place some years ago.
That though I've not read the books should not be taken as an intended slur or snobbish slight. Nor indeed should it be thought I, as an Xtian cleric, share the views of others of my trade that too fond a celebration of witchcraft is a poor thing to put before a growing childish mind and soul. I am not entirely adverse to that view either it must be said, but I land safe on a middle ground that says anything that has our children reading cannot be a bad thing entire, howsoever judged on literary or on moral merits.
What I do admire in Our Jo - as poor Mrs Rowling very nearly was made to become on Mr Ross's sofa last night - apart from the quiet demeanour, fine shoulders and dangerously high heels of the lady - is a patent sense of the intensity of relationship between creator and creation. This was not - if you saw it or if you didn't - one of those cringe making moments when an author will loudly trumpet the desperate wracking of their soul in pursuit of the deadly goddess of their art, but rather a simple declaration of a form of a love bond. I made it, therefore I love it.
It - the whole thing - has become quite monstrous in truth. Shall Harry die the world yearns to know? If 'scar' (or Ross's brilliant 'ska') is not to be the last word of all then what shall it be? ('End' would be a fine choice for the target readership, though whatever it turns out to be it shall not be as excellent as Richard Brautigan's wonderfully chosen 'mayonnaise' for 'Trout Fishing In America'.) It is, all told, too big, but we shall survive of that I am sure.
But if the thing be monstrous then Mrs Rowling clearly is not. That really is rather important.
P.S. Harry, it appears, will not die. E has spoken and declared it would be unconscionable. Oh dear. Fingers crossed for Our Jo. Don't be letting us down right at the very end!
That though I've not read the books should not be taken as an intended slur or snobbish slight. Nor indeed should it be thought I, as an Xtian cleric, share the views of others of my trade that too fond a celebration of witchcraft is a poor thing to put before a growing childish mind and soul. I am not entirely adverse to that view either it must be said, but I land safe on a middle ground that says anything that has our children reading cannot be a bad thing entire, howsoever judged on literary or on moral merits.
What I do admire in Our Jo - as poor Mrs Rowling very nearly was made to become on Mr Ross's sofa last night - apart from the quiet demeanour, fine shoulders and dangerously high heels of the lady - is a patent sense of the intensity of relationship between creator and creation. This was not - if you saw it or if you didn't - one of those cringe making moments when an author will loudly trumpet the desperate wracking of their soul in pursuit of the deadly goddess of their art, but rather a simple declaration of a form of a love bond. I made it, therefore I love it.
It - the whole thing - has become quite monstrous in truth. Shall Harry die the world yearns to know? If 'scar' (or Ross's brilliant 'ska') is not to be the last word of all then what shall it be? ('End' would be a fine choice for the target readership, though whatever it turns out to be it shall not be as excellent as Richard Brautigan's wonderfully chosen 'mayonnaise' for 'Trout Fishing In America'.) It is, all told, too big, but we shall survive of that I am sure.
But if the thing be monstrous then Mrs Rowling clearly is not. That really is rather important.
P.S. Harry, it appears, will not die. E has spoken and declared it would be unconscionable. Oh dear. Fingers crossed for Our Jo. Don't be letting us down right at the very end!
Friday, July 06, 2007
"Evening All..."
...Dixon of Dock Green and all that.
Few of you will recall those halcyon days when "Evening All" would be Jack Warner's intro into a half hour of righteous policing in the jolly streets of London town. A few knarled villains to be apprehended, a couple of street urchins to be shown the straight and narrow path by a wise word or two - not even the proverbial ear clipping needed - and home for tea by seven.
Actually, the original film - 'The Blue Lamp' - was nowhere near so cosy. Young Riley is offered a way out of his folly by PC Dixon but panics and shoots the poor man down. It didn't need to happen, but it did. Good hearted copper dies in line of duty. Tough stuff for 1950 but a sad presage of things to come.
So why am I feeling sentimental about policemen tonight? In truth I am not, far from it. Should every member of - in particular - the South Yorkshire constabulary fall down a bottomless pit this evening you would not find me among the first to mourn the occasion.
For a pair of these fell beasts has tonight had the temerity to pull me over for speeding - a mere 85 m.p.h. on an open and clear A1 - to intone the grave caution "You have the right to remain silent....but, etc.", harangue me about video evidence of dastardly deeds, failure to pull over when requested, state of the England cricket team, the weather and any number of putative faults of mine, all resulting in yet one more fixed penalty fine or a day before the beak.
And so forth, and so on.
Well, damn their very eyes say I and if that makes poor Jack Warner wince then I wish it did not need to but it does.
Actually - entre nous - I fully intend to have my day in court, for not once during the whole exchange from "Would you kindly step out of the car" to "Try and keep a bit nearer the legal limit in future Sir" did either one of these desperate rozzers formally confirm that they were officers of Her Majesty's constabulary.
Over a barrel I believe I have them!
Few of you will recall those halcyon days when "Evening All" would be Jack Warner's intro into a half hour of righteous policing in the jolly streets of London town. A few knarled villains to be apprehended, a couple of street urchins to be shown the straight and narrow path by a wise word or two - not even the proverbial ear clipping needed - and home for tea by seven.
Actually, the original film - 'The Blue Lamp' - was nowhere near so cosy. Young Riley is offered a way out of his folly by PC Dixon but panics and shoots the poor man down. It didn't need to happen, but it did. Good hearted copper dies in line of duty. Tough stuff for 1950 but a sad presage of things to come.
So why am I feeling sentimental about policemen tonight? In truth I am not, far from it. Should every member of - in particular - the South Yorkshire constabulary fall down a bottomless pit this evening you would not find me among the first to mourn the occasion.
For a pair of these fell beasts has tonight had the temerity to pull me over for speeding - a mere 85 m.p.h. on an open and clear A1 - to intone the grave caution "You have the right to remain silent....but, etc.", harangue me about video evidence of dastardly deeds, failure to pull over when requested, state of the England cricket team, the weather and any number of putative faults of mine, all resulting in yet one more fixed penalty fine or a day before the beak.
And so forth, and so on.
Well, damn their very eyes say I and if that makes poor Jack Warner wince then I wish it did not need to but it does.
Actually - entre nous - I fully intend to have my day in court, for not once during the whole exchange from "Would you kindly step out of the car" to "Try and keep a bit nearer the legal limit in future Sir" did either one of these desperate rozzers formally confirm that they were officers of Her Majesty's constabulary.
Over a barrel I believe I have them!
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Almost...
"And It's Almost Independence Day..." Well, actually of course it is now beyond the day itself, curses to my watch. Why so? Because unlike these wretchedly modern digital timekeepers my own wristwatch needs to be prompted at month's end as to whether a thirty or thirty-one day month has just passed by. (Just don't get me started on Februarys or, even worse, Leap Years.)
Forgetting this, as one does, one found oneself stuck in the second and not the proper third of July, which is as it must be almost independence day for our dear American cousins.
That in itself matters to one has experienced the delight of so many from there who have been supportive over the years vis a vis the whole damn sarcoma thing. And so whereas in principle one might, in principle, rather somewhat resent nay repudiate their incontinent celebration of separation from ourselves, I have always in these days been perfectly happy in their happiness.
The fourth itself being not a day of mark or remark over here, the third has been the day on which one played the oh so wonderful song for them as a private, personal tribute. Darn it though, this year it has been missed thanks to above mentioned ancient timepiece.
Hey ho. Not too late. Instead now here is one listening to the lion instead. All one's tears like water have flowed. You do - or should - understand my meaning.
Forgetting this, as one does, one found oneself stuck in the second and not the proper third of July, which is as it must be almost independence day for our dear American cousins.
That in itself matters to one has experienced the delight of so many from there who have been supportive over the years vis a vis the whole damn sarcoma thing. And so whereas in principle one might, in principle, rather somewhat resent nay repudiate their incontinent celebration of separation from ourselves, I have always in these days been perfectly happy in their happiness.
The fourth itself being not a day of mark or remark over here, the third has been the day on which one played the oh so wonderful song for them as a private, personal tribute. Darn it though, this year it has been missed thanks to above mentioned ancient timepiece.
Hey ho. Not too late. Instead now here is one listening to the lion instead. All one's tears like water have flowed. You do - or should - understand my meaning.
My Hero!
I can do no better than to quote from the BBC. My entire and utter hero tonight. I am merely consumed with unholy envy that I was not the one (though you are welcome to believe I was). Makes you proud to be British and to be a British clergyman:
Vicar's unholy smoke stunt fails
A vicar who lit his pipe in a Kent police station as a protest against the smoking ban has failed in his attempt to get himself arrested. The Reverend Anthony Carr, of East Peckham, walked into the station in Tonbridge, asked to report a crime and then started smoking.
He said he flouted the ban to protest against the erosion of civil liberties. Kent Police said they did not arrest the Holy Trinity church vicar because it was an environmental health issue.
Mr Carr said: "I said to the officer 'I want to report a crime' and I took out my pipe and lit it. He said 'Will you please put that out as this is a no smoking area' and I said 'I will not'."
When officers told him he would not be "bundled into" the back of a van he said "what a pity".
Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council said the law protected public health and they would follow up any reports of the smoking ban being broken.
A spokesman for the Bishop of Rochester said: "We regard this as a personal matter - the church would not wish to comment on the incident. Officially, the church doesn't condone breaking the law."
Vicar's unholy smoke stunt fails
A vicar who lit his pipe in a Kent police station as a protest against the smoking ban has failed in his attempt to get himself arrested. The Reverend Anthony Carr, of East Peckham, walked into the station in Tonbridge, asked to report a crime and then started smoking.
He said he flouted the ban to protest against the erosion of civil liberties. Kent Police said they did not arrest the Holy Trinity church vicar because it was an environmental health issue.
Mr Carr said: "I said to the officer 'I want to report a crime' and I took out my pipe and lit it. He said 'Will you please put that out as this is a no smoking area' and I said 'I will not'."
When officers told him he would not be "bundled into" the back of a van he said "what a pity".
Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council said the law protected public health and they would follow up any reports of the smoking ban being broken.
A spokesman for the Bishop of Rochester said: "We regard this as a personal matter - the church would not wish to comment on the incident. Officially, the church doesn't condone breaking the law."
Signs Of The Times...
...I was never a great fox-hunting parson until the law made me one. Unlike many of my predecessors, I did not see that chasing a wild animal with hounds intent on a kill across open country was a necessary attribute of a Christian clergyman, until that is the law compelled me to mount up in defence of free will.
A good Jesuit - there are some believe me - once said that you could never persuade a man into faith. That is, you could never compel him to believe by force of argument. It either happened - with any due prompting - or it didn't. That ultimately was a matter between God and the person.
A similar view I hold with all social morality. We may not care for our fellow person or - God willing - we may. But to legislate that we must care is singularly pointless. The external action may be affected by dint of compulsion, but the interior heart will not give sway unless and until it so chooses.
External compulsion in the absence of internal conversion of manner may give the illusion of well-being but it is nothing more than an illusion. (On that, as with so many things - more than perhaps befits a stout C of E fellow - I am with both the Buddhists and the Catlicks.)
This, more than anything, is why I loathe and abhor the legal ban on smoking in public places. By all means let social mores determine it is a habit to be shunned and scorned. Merely though to criminalise the action in advance of the desire to comply is foolish. We simply delude ourselves into believing that we are a society that has rejected smoking when all we have done is compel its suppression.
Suppression by compulsion. The mark and sign of all and any dictatorship. If you doubt let me ask you this: where in the world can you - are you - executed for using a mobile telephone?
North Korea is the answer.
And if you are not surprised then why do you support the banning of hunting or of smoking? Think very carefully before you answer.
A good Jesuit - there are some believe me - once said that you could never persuade a man into faith. That is, you could never compel him to believe by force of argument. It either happened - with any due prompting - or it didn't. That ultimately was a matter between God and the person.
A similar view I hold with all social morality. We may not care for our fellow person or - God willing - we may. But to legislate that we must care is singularly pointless. The external action may be affected by dint of compulsion, but the interior heart will not give sway unless and until it so chooses.
External compulsion in the absence of internal conversion of manner may give the illusion of well-being but it is nothing more than an illusion. (On that, as with so many things - more than perhaps befits a stout C of E fellow - I am with both the Buddhists and the Catlicks.)
This, more than anything, is why I loathe and abhor the legal ban on smoking in public places. By all means let social mores determine it is a habit to be shunned and scorned. Merely though to criminalise the action in advance of the desire to comply is foolish. We simply delude ourselves into believing that we are a society that has rejected smoking when all we have done is compel its suppression.
Suppression by compulsion. The mark and sign of all and any dictatorship. If you doubt let me ask you this: where in the world can you - are you - executed for using a mobile telephone?
North Korea is the answer.
And if you are not surprised then why do you support the banning of hunting or of smoking? Think very carefully before you answer.
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