How can a simple door end up ruining a potentially good day?

Ever had one of those days?

I did today.

My intention was to pop over to Waitrose in the morning and then at 2pm my darling wife and I were off for the treat of the day (NOT), a trip to the surgery for our belated flu jabs.

After that exciting day out I intended to fit a new front door lock tomorrow as our old one was getting difficult, screw missing, hanging a bit loose but still workable until early this morning the whole fixing just dropped off.

Fortunately the new lock had arrived yesterday.

No worries, start the working day a bit early but should still have time to get up to Waitrose (I have just run out of my favourite cheese, a very, very mature Cornish Cheddar) then be back in time for lunch before setting off for the surgery.

All’s well, removed the last vestiges of the old lock and then tried a dry run with the new lock (a Yale, but unlike any Yale I had ever seen before), at which point I realised the piece which attached to the door jamb, to receive the sliding lever, was too wide, which meant chiselling out a recess into the masonry.

I was aware that under the plaster there was some tough masonry (I know because over the years I have blunted a few drill bits while fitting kitchen cupboards or just trying to hang a picture) and, although I had some strong chisels it still took a good 40 minutes just for that.

Next obstacle? The cylinder was too short to reach the outer surface of the door which meant chiseling out a square section on the inside of the door to inset the box of mechanical bits.

Sounds easy but not when it’s some tough old wood and it had to be squared off and to a precise depth.

By the time I had finished this, checking every five minutes to ensure the rebate was not too shallow, or too deep, and also checking, frequently, that the keys (there were four of them) all worked correctly).

By the time I had the whole lot done it was too late to go shopping so we had our lunch and then got ready to go and have the jabs.

Now I mentioned my new (well new to me) Mondeo.

I’m still trying to get used to it. 

The dashboard might just as well be the flight deck of a Jumbo jet.

I’ve managed to get the clock going, plus windscreen wipers, side lights and indicators. The automatic side is coming along and I manage to keep my left foot out of the way.

Today it really threw a wobbly at me.

I had unlocked the passenger door for Marion (still got to sort out getting a new battery for the key so that I can open all the doors my remote control) unlocked my side and got in, but as soon as I put the key in the ignition and started the engine the alarm went off at full volume and the indicators all came on at once.

Now I’m not used to having an alarm so didn’t know exactly what to do. I turned the ignition off but the alarm kept going even when I took the key out and got out. Eventually the alarm stopped but the indicators kept going.

I kept trying to start the car but nothing worked and eventually Marion went back inside to call the surgery and rearrange the appointments.

Every tine I tried to start the car the alarm went off.

In the end I waited for the alarm to stop and then locked the doors.

When I did this the indicator lights went off.

I then unlocked the door and nothing happened.

That’s when I realised that when I initially unlocked the driver’s door I had turned the key the wrong way at first and had delayed actually turning it the other way. Apparently the alarm senses this as an illegal entry.

The sooner I get the key sorted out for remote locking and unlocking the better it will be.

If I could avoid doors I would but they are always there.

Wedding-ring

by Denise Levertov

My wedding-ring lies in a basket
as if at the bottom of a well.
Nothing will come to fish it back up
and back on my finger again.
It lies
among keys to abandoned houses,
nails waiting to be needed and hammered
into some wall,
telephone numbers with no names
attached,
idle paperclips.
It can't be given away
for fear of bringing ill-luck.
It can't be sold
for the marriage was good in its own
time, though that time is gone.
Could some artificer
beat into it bright stones, transform it
into a dazzling circlet no one could take
for solemn betrothal or to make promises
living will not let them keep? Change it
into a simple gift I could give in friendship?

Airly Beacon

by Charles Kingsley

Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon;
Oh, the pleasant sight to see
Shires and towns from Airly Beacon
While my love climbed up to me!

Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon;
Oh, the happy hours we lay
Deep in fern on Airly Beacon,
Courting through the summer's day!

Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon;
Oh, the weary haunt for me,
All alone on Airly Beacon;
With his baby on my knee?

The sun has burst the sky

by Jenny Joseph

The sun has burst the sky
Because I love you
And the river its banks.
The sea laps the great rocks
Because I love you
And takes no heed of the moon dragging it away
And saying coldly 'Constancy is not for you.'
The blackbird fills the air
Because I love you
With springs on lawns and shadows falling on lawns.

The people walk in the street
I love you
And far down the river ships sound their hooters
Crazy with joy because I love you.

The Bagel

by David Ignatow
I stopped to pick up the bagel
rolling away in the wind,
annoyed with myself
for having dropped it
as if it were a portent.
Faster and faster it rolled,
with me running after it
bent low, gritting my teeth,
and I found myself doubled over
and rolling down the street
head over heels, one complete somersault
after another like a bagel
and strangely happy with myself.

TV drama brings major injustice centre stage – time for action

In recent years there have been so many good drama series across an ever-increasing number of channels that gradually they meld into each other and at the start of a second week you have to think which plotline belongs to which series.

Was Detective Inspector Thorogood trying to outwit the murderous acrobat or was the acrobat actually a private detective working undercover in a circus seeking to outwit a completely different villain in another series.

It gets harder when bit part actors turn up in a rerun of an old series and also as the star of a completely new spy series.

My dear wife and I have found the best way round this.

We either wait for a complete series to finish taping and then watch it over a couple of days or, once the first episode has recorded we bookmark the rest of the series enabling us to watch that one over a short period.

The trouble with this is that you have to make sure you don’t get any spoilers from other tv shows, such as BBC Breakfast where the presenters even do stories on new programmes on rival channels.

This is why we came somewhat late to Mr Bates vs the Post Office, an extremely good four-part series about the Post Office scandal which is on nearly everyone’s lips at the moment.

Like most people I had only picked up bits and bobs of the original story as more and more sub-postmasters faced charges of theft or falsifying accounts or other strange charges involving computers and monetary transactions.

I had taken a rather closer interest in this ITV drama because my late mother lived in Craig-y-Don, Llandudno, and my sister still lives there, and Alan Bates, the pivotal character in this programme, ran their local Post Office. Both of them would have been in his Post Office regularly.

As I watched this programme I began to realise that this was far more than isolated sub-postmasters spread across the country fiddling the books or falling foul of a dodgy bit of computer software.

Yes, the computer company may have had dodgy software.

Yes, now and again a sub postmaster might have skimmed cash.

The numbers across the country being hit by a computer glitch is as unlikely as a vast number of people in the same job stealing money.

What really got to me, however, was the arrogance of the Post Office executives lying about the number of cases blamed on the software system, claiming they were isolated incidents and that nobody else had reported similar cases.

Since the programme the publicity around this case has sky-rocketed and a lot of that publicity is centred on the actions of the CEO with a million-signature demand for her to return her CBE.

I am not seeking to defend her in any way. If her actions are as bad as they appear to be then she should not be asked to return her CBE she should be instructed to return it and then there should be a thorough investigation into her possible culpability in the case.

The point is that this has been going on, apparently, for over 20 years and under more than one Post Office CEO. What is more it has been going on under not just one government but under three different ones: Labour, under Blair and Brown; Tory/Lib Dem, under Cameron with Clegg as deputy; then a Tory government under Cameron May, Johnson, Truss and Sunak.

It is time the government and the Post Office were removed from the current investigation and that the whole thing be handed over to an independent investigative body.

Spring

by Gerard Manley Hopkins

Nothing is so beautiful as spring -
When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;
Thrush's eggs look little low heavens, and thrush
Through the echoing timber does rinse and wring
The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing;
The glossy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush
The descending blue, that blue is all in a rush
With richness; those racing lambs too have fair their fling.
What is all this juice and all this joy?
A strain of the earth's sweet being in the beginning
In Eden garden. - Have, get, before it cloy,
Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with sinning,
Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy,
Most O maid's child, thy choice and worthy the winning.

Hopalong rides again

Hopalong, one of our foxes, has been a worry for some time

As I have mentioned, I first noticed his state at the beginning of November.

He had always been a timid fox, peeping out from the undergrowth and checking if it was safe before emerging fully toi feed.

It was November, however, that I noticed that his coat looked manky and his tail sparse, and that he favoured his back right paw.

His coat and tail improved but his leg seemed to give him trouble and towards the end of November he was not even putting it down and soon the lower part of the leg appeared to be dangling and the paw did not reach the ground.

Yet he seemed to manage, even though he was often late to the table.

Towards the end of December he only appeared spasmodically and by Christmas and then the New Year he did not appear at all.

I feared the worst that either the leg had gone gangrenous or, that having difficulty getting around he had been hit by a vehicle or had been unable to get around and had died alone and hungry,

Then, joy of joy, a brief sight of him coming late to the table and then on Saturday he turned up, getting about easily on three legs, and arriving within half-an-hour of the food going out.

Good old Hopalong enjoying a well-earned meal

For the next 20 minutes he had a fine time picking lumps of meat and other tasty treats from the table, nipping off somewhere to eat it in peace before returning for seconds and thirds.

I still worry about him but whatever has happened to his leg he seems to have survived two months, and winter months at that, so I’ll just have to keep my fingers crossed.

Old Botany Bay

by Dame Mary Gilmore

I am he, 
who paved the way,
that you might walk
at your ease today;

I was the conscript
sent to hell
to make in the desert
the living well;

I bore the heat,
I blazed the track -
furrowed and bloody
upon my back.

I split the rock;
I felled the tree:
The nation was -
Because of me!

Old Botany Bay
Taking the sun
from day to day ...
shame on the mouth
that would deny
the knotted hands
that set us high!

Up the River Side

by Frank Foy

A sabbath hush pervades the summer day,
As seated here beside the shining sands,
I gaze on once again the arid lands,
That weed-besprinkled westward stretch away;
The waves that wash the beach about me lay
Smooth mirrors in their track, and vast expands
The stream's majestic breast, to where upstands
Fair Venice in her groves beside her bay.
And so serenely on the sands of gold
I lie and listen to the beat of wave
And boom of wind, and watch the river-gleams;
Then seas of slumber are about me rolled,
And as within their waters deep I lave,
The scene before me fades and floats away in dreams.