Tag Archives: children

Would You Like to be King?

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Well, would you? There are, as with so many things, pros and cons.

The positives are that you don’t have to worry about your pension arrangements, get to live in a castle and have people to run your bath for you. The negatives – you have to marry a woman chosen by your parents, everybody has an opinion about your personal life, and you have to behave politely while Welsh people shout at you.

In the old days he wouldn’t have had to do that, he’d just have locked them in a dungeon. I wouldn’t have minded being King in those days.

The Royal Family have quite a good collection. They have a collection of castles and palaces, for one thing, a famous Stamp Collection and at least one Peace Medal which I covet – a Lancaster 1919 Peace Medal struck in gold. Everyone else got one in aluminium. It’s the third one down on this page.

It might be a problem that I’m not keen on horses and am a poor shot. People expect Kings to look good on a horse and slaughter a wide variety of livestock. You’d think they would just send the butler out to the butchers, wouldn’t you? But no, they have to spend all day sneaking round after a stag on a hillside or having defenceless gamebirds driven towards them.

Then there’s the family. My kids aren’t likely to sell me out to Oprah Winfrey and I can at least look at them without wondering if they are both mine. This has been a bit of a mixed blessing over the years, but I’m now resigned to having to take the blame for their faults.

This is a draft which I started on 31st December and finished today as part of my clearing out process.

Sunday Morning, Fathers and a Haibun

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In literary convention, Sunday morning is a lazy day involving late breakfasts and a leisurely reading of a weighty Sunday paper. I can remember Sundays like that, walking to the paper shop with my father to collect papers because there was no newspaper delivery on Sunday.

As I became a father myself, and the kids started playing rugby, Sunday mornings became more hectic times, featuring lost boots and arguments. I remember one morning in a car park 30 miles from home when a familiar face pulled up with his son.

I said: “You’re in the wrong place Dave, the Under 12s are playing at home.”

“What are you doing here then?” he asked, with the triumphal air of of a man proving an important philosophical point in an argument.

“I’m with the Under 15s today. Julia’s with the Under 12s.”

“Ah!”

Modern Sundays seem so hectic.

Ten years after our walks to buy papers my father and I had developed a prickly relationship. Adolescents, as I would find in my turn, are awful examples of humanity and are barely human. Ten years after that, we still weren’t much friendlier. Ten years after that we had developed a better understanding, as I now had kids of my own. Ten years after that I no longer read newspapers. And ten years after that, having lost many games of dominoes and done a lot of jigsaws, I am left to regret the wasted time spent arguing, and the lessons I could have learned from my father. He may have lost a lot of things through Alzheimer’s, but he retained his competitive edge and his facility with numbers until the end.

To be fair, I wasn’t the only argumentative one (the apple not falling far from the tree) and some of his advice, whilst brilliant for the 1950s, was not so good when applied to the 1990s.

Here’s a haibun I wrote on the subject some time ago – first published in Haibun Today Volume 13, Number 1, March 2019.

 

Eternal Jigsaws

My father remembers who I am (though he can’t quite remember my name) and he’s keen to show me his jigsaw.

It’s one of the puzzles my sister ordered from a specialist supplier. They have larger pieces than normal and depict idealised, almost timeless, scenes from the 1950’s. Before she found these, he used to have jigsaws for children, bought from the Early Learning Centre.

When he clears it away, he puts the edges in a separate bag, so they will be easier to find next time. That could be as early as tomorrow, when it will be brand new as it comes out of the box.

winter afternoon
playing a child’s game
in the fading light

 

Seven Reasons to be Cheerful

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I am feeling particularly cheerful today and decided it called for another list. It won’t run to 10 points, but I’ll try to keep it going as long as possible.

One, I have a wife. She’s still with me after 30 years. I don’t know how, or why, she puts up with me.

Two, I have a sister who worries about my health and sends me face masks by post.

Three, the kids have grown up and become reasonable human beings. I actually quite like them, which wasn’t always the case when they were teenagers. You have to love them, because it’s what parents do. And you have to feed them because that’s the law. But liking them is a bonus.

Poppy
Poppy
Poppies

Four, Number Two Son, currently still in Canada, rang Julia today to say he’d seen a Cardinal and it was the best bird he’d ever seen. Nice to know he has grown up with a proper set of values.

Five, we have enough food. This wasn’t the case a few months ago, when panic-buying was in full swing. I thought of this because I used the last of the pre-cooked rice I’d bought in case things got worse.

Six, after the Mexican style fried rice I made (which was better than it sounds) we had apple crumble using apples from the Mencap garden.

Seven, we had ice cream with the crumble, which was delicious after a hot, stuffy day.

I could get to eight, but seven seem OK, and scans better in the title, so I’m going to call it a day.

The photos are from an old camera card I rediscovered recently.

The Plant Pot Room – Clumber Park

 

A Quiet Day

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The lockdown continues, though in a much diluted form, and Nottingham’s uncut verges continue to be good for bees. I noticed this on the way to work, where the Gas Board continues to dig up our frontage and block access to the shop. I spent all day listing medals of Edward VIII and forgot to move so my legs seized up when I tried to get up.

bee-friendly-logo

We had saag paneer last night using the spice kit Number One Son arranged for us. We didn’t quite have all the ingredients, so we used some kale in place of the spinach. It had a notably different texture but worked quite well. I checked up, and it seems that saag is not, as I thought, spinach, but, depending on who you believe, either a mix of spinach and mustard greens, or simply mixed greens.

Always so much to learn.

We still have three spice mixes to use and will reconfigure the week’s shopping to use them all this week. Unfortunately Julia can’t find out how to cancel the spice subscription. As with so many of these offers (£1 for four spice kits) they make it difficult to cancel. Even worse, if you don’t order your next lot in time you have to take what they send you. That’s how Number One Son ended up making moqueca. I had to look it up – it’s Brazilian Fish Stew. I think I can do without this.

Number Two Son, still in Canada, applied for, and was turned down for, a job as a dog groomer. As he has no experience of dogs or grooming this was not unexpected. However, he has had a call back and they want him to work in some sort of management capacity. He has an amazing capacity for getting strange jobs. If he ever writes a book he will not be short of material for his biographical notes.

I think I’ll leave it there for now. Dog grooming and fish stew is quite enough excitement for one day.

The End of the Day

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Just a few more musings on things I didn’t cover in the earlier post.

I noticed, while shopping yesterday, that my thoughts were turning more to sugar. It tested my self-control yesterday, enmeshed as I was in a shop filled with cake, hot cross buns and chocolate eggs, but I got through it.

Well, I say I “got through it”. I got through it in the sense that I bought Belgian buns, Battenberg cake, two small chocolate rabbits and a bag of mini eggs. It’s not much for a week as long as you spread it out, and could have been a lot worse. I’m hoping that next week will be slightly more disciplined.

Number Two Son rang Julia. He was trying to reassure her that he was OK and back in employment, this time at a bank call centre. It’s nice to know he’s financially secure but now she’s worrying that he’ll catch something off his co-workers.

It seems a local politician has lost her job over remarks she made about Boris Johnson being in hospital. To be honest, though the comments were ill-judged and discourteous I think things are being blown out of all proportion. She was also inaccurate in saying Boris was the worst PM we’ve ever had – we’ve had far worse, though to be fair he hasn’t really got into his stride yet.

As I write this, I have a massive pan of ratatouille cooking. I carried on buying aubergines even though I couldn’t get courgettes on my last couple of shopping trips. They are now starting to go brown in places so I decided to get them cooked now and then store the results.I’m determined not to waste a morsel of food, though it can be tricky with all the fresh veg I’m trying to store.

Despite the pronouncements of this brain-dead mother of two, we aren’t all throwing food away. In the last three weeks we have thrown away a couple of cupfuls of milk that went off. I just couldn’t be bothered to find a suitable use for it. Sorry. I will do better if it happens again.

I note from the article, and the pictures with it, that she “had” to throw stuff away, including Worcester Sauce, Soy Sauce and two jars of pickled onions. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never found that those products actually go off. They certainly don’t go off three weeks after they were bought as part of a panic-buying spree.

That, I think, covers the bits I missed last time. Tonight’s tea was roasted veg (potatoes, carrots, parsnips, leek) with a bought-in chicken pie, broccoli and gravy. Tomorrow’s tea will be fish pie, because we need to eat the fish. On Friday we will start on the ratatouille. If we eat it with something out of the freezer we will have space to freeze some ratatouille.

Inn the garden, poppies are getting ready to bloom and the Red Valerian is preparing to burst out.

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Red Valerian, about to flower

Charity, Children and Christmas

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It’s finally here (which is more than you can say about the promised article on the Gibraltar £20 coin), and in just over three hours it will be Christmas. It seems like a lot of effort goes into just one day.

It also seems like a lot of guilt goes into it, as we are emotionally blackmailed into giving money to the homeless, foreign children and donkeys. Now, I have great sympathy for the homeless, and for foreign children who are needlessly blind, or in need of fresh water, but I don’t appreciate the tactics of the charities in swamping the Christmas TV screens with these adverts.

As for the donkeys, I may sound heartless but compared to a child I don’t really see the suffering in the same league. I also think that on charity quiz shows the celebrities should be prohibited from raising money for animal charities, but that’s a personal view and as the RSPCA raised £81 million from legacies last year it seems there are plenty of people who are happy to give.

It’s an interesting document, the RSPCA report, though I notice that , once again, it fails to call for the prosecution of people who deliberately breed faults into dogs in the name of breed standards. Another personal point there. I must be careful not to rant.

I give to two charities monthly One is for children overseas and one for children in this country. I’ve been thinking of transferring the former donation to the homeless in this country, but after seeing the adverts I’ve decided to leave it. I may transfer the second one, as I’ve had words with the charity over the years about their tactics in trying to bully me to give more. It shows the power, and wisdom, of the TV adverts, where one has stopped me withdrawing support, and the other, which doesn’t advertise, might lose out. On the other hand, as it’s the charity and not the kids that have upset me, I may leave that too.

I’m in better financial shape than I have been for the last few years, so I may just have to give more, as I’m beginning to think about the homeless and the Salvation Army. Their adverts at Christmas always make me feel that way and General Booth came from Nottingham so I should support the local man.

And that, via a circuitous route, takes us back to the beginning of the post. It looks like the adverts, irritating, and cynical as they may be, do serve a purpose.

I will now wish those of you who celebrate Christmas good wishes for the holiday. Those of you who don’t celebrate Christmas can have my good wishes too. If you don’t hear from me tomorrow, imagine me eating a large lunch, with turkey and Hasselback potatoes, and snoozing in front of a feast of variable quality TV.

Dog Show Prize Medal

Dog Show Prize Medal

 

Poppies, Kids, Death and Zen

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I deadheaded the poppies a couple of days ago. It seems to have paid dividends because this morning there were fifteen poppies in a spot where we had never had more than six.

I thought of stopping to take a photograph, but bit was raining, I was in my shirt sleeves and the flowers were not very impressive, being weighed down by water droplets.

It sounds artistic now, and I’m starting to regret not taking the picture, but it was cold and wet this morning and enthusiasm was not running high as I left for work.

By the time I returned they had all dropped. They do that. It’s very annoying.

For those of you who aren’t conversant with deadheading it’s a way of manipulating nature with just a pair of scissors.

Plants flower, set seed and then close down as their job of perpetuating the species is over.

If you cut the dead flower heads off before they set seed they have to keep flowering to fulfill their biological imperative. Tricky, isn’t it?

It’s a bit like kids. Once you have a couple you can stop. And you still end up dried out and dead, just like a flower in Autumn.

I have to go now, I’ve just started on a meaningful poetic thought and it needs nurturing. It starts with raindrops and ends with scattered petals, and has haiku written all over it.

Poppies growing from cracks in concrete

Poppies growing from cracks in concrete

I’m getting a lot of use out of very few poppy pictures. I’ll take some more pictures later in the week.

Scone Chronicles XIX

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Sorry, I decided it didn’t matter if I missed a day posting and, six days later I’m only just getting back to blogging.

I have plenty of things to write about, but no enthusiasm for the work.

However, I will give it a go, as scones have recently reappeared in my life. On that subject, I may dispense with Roman numbering after the next one. That’s what they did with Spitfires in WW2. They got to Mk XIX and the next one was the Mk 20.

I suppose it’s all part of the dumbing down of the world. First we stop using Latin numerals, then, under pressure from Microsoft, we adopt American spelling.

We’re on the verge of electing a buffoon, and have a fine choice, with both Johnson and Farage, so we’re following America in so many ways.

I’m going to fail to post before midnight, but I’m not rushing. It’s a bit late to worry about my posting record.

On Wednesday we went to meet Julia’s brother and sister-in-law who were visiting family in Radcliffe-on-Trent, a large village just outside Nottingham (which I thought was a town, until I checked when adding the link). The Atrium is a converted bank, and is very pleasant, though the name had led me into expecting more glass and plants.

The staff were efficient, cheerful, and very patient, which was good as they had a lot of kids running about. One of the kids was my great nephew, who is just over a year old now. He’s not quite walking but he’s on the verge, and manages to get about well enough.

The scones were large, and light in texture, though a bit sweet and slightly deficient in fruit. It doesn’t make them bad scones, but it does stop me talking of them in glowing terms. I’d happily go back for scones if I was in Radcliffe-on-Trent again, but I wouldn’t necessarily drive all the way from Nottingham for them. Julia had Bakewell Tart. It was a bit lurid compared to last week’s Bakewell Pudding.

Still having difficulty posting using the ancient netbook, so I’ll call a halt there. It’s amazing really, a few years ago I thought this machine was brilliant, but after using a laptop for the last three years it’s like torture.

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Quick Update

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Number Two Son now has a bank account and a mobile phone. Mobiles are more expensive in Canada. He’s now searching for a job.

Number One Son set off this morning, had a few hours in China and is now back on the way to New Zealand.

We had a Chinese takeaway tonight. It’s cheaper with just the two of us. It’s also all the travelling we are likely to do this week.

That’s it for now.

I will have more time tomorrow.

Travellers’ Tales and an Auction Result

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Number Two son is in Toronto, has already arranged his national insurance number and is on the track of a job. This is all good to hear.

Number One son, meanwhile, is somewhere down south preparing to take a flight on Saturday. When he gets there he will be spending the first ten days travelling round in a camper van.

Ah, the carefree days of youth.

Julia had to wake me up the other day when she left me in the car whilst shopping, but it’s not the same thing as camping.

Most of the day was spent researching medals to go on eBay. I found a couple of interesting stories, which I’m writing up.

The Genghis Khan coin sold for £16. It’s cheap for 800 years of history and a link to one of the most famous names in history. But, on the other hand, it’s expensive for a piece of dust-gathering junk. It’s just a question of perspective.