Tag Archives: tanks

Picking out the Nuggets

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Down to the museum tonight and three short talks on aspects of WW1 history. There is always something new to be extracted from talks, and in this case I came away knowing that the Germans only built 20 tanks in the war but captured over 100 of ours and used them against us. Strange, when you think how keen they were on them in the next war. We seem to have scrapped most of them after the war. The Imperial War Museum had one but scrapped it in 1922 and the Americans had one but scrapped it in 1942. That leaves just one survivor, which is in Australia. With hindsight it seems a strange way to treat  an historic vehicle, but I know we also scrapped several of our own in WW2 as we needed the steel.

Julia’s grandfather was a tank crewman in the Great War and survived without a scratch, only to be badly injured in the Coventry Blitz as an ARP Warden, as I’m sure I have mentioned before.

The one that should have been the most interesting talk turned out to be tinged with modern politics. Now, I don’t mind parallels being drawn, but sneering at  the people of 1914 for interning enemy aliens seems a bit rough. It’s easy to be wise in hindsight. Anyway, he clearly hadn’t done all the background research that I have when researching medallions and enamel badges – no mention of nationality legislation, or the Anti-German League, amongst other things. There are great gaps in my knowledge, as I am always aware when listening to specialists,  but it just shows how much you can learn as you potter about picking up snippets of information here and there.

To make it even better I had another acceptance today, which rounded things off nicely.

Robin. I went for a couple of old favorites tonight.

Day 142

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In the end we had sausages for breakfast. It would have been more economical, and probably healthier, to have had them for tea, but it just seemed like the right thing to do. What better way is there to start a week than eating a surprise gift of sausages?

That’s right, following them up with marmalade on toast. Julia bought some nice mixed grain bread yesterday and I allow myself toast and marmalade on Sundays.The rest of the week, I do without it as part of my cheerless diet routine. There are a varying number of calories in a slice of toast and marmalade – let’s go for 150 as an average figure.  Cut out toast and marmalade for 6 days and that’s 900 calories. Cut it out for 48 weeks (allowing myself a little leeway for weakness and holidays) and that’s 43,200 calories if my mental arithmetic is reliable.

As my daily intake is supposed to be around 2,500 calories cutting out a slice of toast and marmalade a day is the same as fasting for two and half weeks (17.28 days). I did that on the calculator, and double checked it all, as that seems a lot. Tootlepedal has told me several times that dieting is all about making small, almost imperceptible cuts in consumption. If a slice of toast and marmalade a day comes to this, you can see how it works.

Lunch was home made mushroom soup and a sandwich made from smoked mackerel pate. Julia likes fish, I am less keen. As a compromise I bought smoked mackerel last week. She ate some of it and I mixed the rest with soft cheese, black pepper and lemon juice to make the smoked mackerel pate. It made two good sandwiches for lunch and will make two more for lunch tomorrow. I normally make it using the small blender (we don’t have a big one these days) but was feeling lazy today so just whizzed it together using a fork. There is less washing up that way. I’m going to add some chopped spring onion tops and sliced cucumber for tomorrow so I can pretend I am on an elegant Edwardian picnic tomorrow rather than sitting in the windowless back room of a coin shop.

Today’s picture is the tank traps at Gibraltar Point. Strange to think how things have gone – Julia’s grandfather was one of the first tank drivers. I grew up seeing tank traps along the coast (and still do) and on the news from Ukraine it seems that the tank is no obsolete on the modern battlefield. A century of ingenuity went into designing a weapon that is now outdated, but we still don’t have a safe and satisfactory way of opening a can of corned beef.

Makes you wonder about the human race.

Trousers, Tanks and Troubles

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This morning, poised like an elegant crane, I stood on one leg, pointed my toes and slipped my right leg into my trousers. I then did the same with my other leg.

This would have seemed unremarkable a few years ago, but one of the things I seem to have lost over the years is the ability to put my trousers on while standing up. This morning, and the my resemblance to a tai chi master, is not typical.

Normally, Julia tells me, I look like a drunken tramp playing hopscotch. This is partly because I have dodgy joints and partly because I have the wardrobe and facial hair of a man who has seen better days. The joints have been particularly bad in the last week and there have been a couple of days when it looked like the trousers might win.

Fortunately time, rest and paracetamol seem to have done the trick. I didn’t report this earlier in the week as I was already moaning about my man flu. It’s important, I think, not to seem like a complete hypochondriac when blogging. The same goes for food reviews – I only report on virtuous recipes and leave out quite a lot of fried food and cake.

This is also the case with The Presentation, which has eight days to go. Though I tend to report it as a linear process it is more of a zig-zag, and I am struggling to finish. I have a few photos to do, a couple of slides to finish and quite a lot of information to trim.

I have already cut a lot out of the script, but there’s still more to do. It sent Julia to sleep when I talked her through it in the car and I’m afraid that if that is the case it might adversely affect the wakefulness of a group of elderly gents sitting in the semi-darkness.

I am fascinated by the events of 1919, but I don’t suppose this fascination will be shared by everyone. The Government put tanks on the streets to keep order in Glasgow and Liverpool, troops mutinied, revolution was in the air and, as the Irish started their final war against the English, they embarked on a series of Soviets and dairy-based resistance to their capitalist oppressors.

At that point, even I start to run out of interest…