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.
Monday, July 30, 2007
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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