What was the last book you read?

When I was small, other than my own parents, these family members (below) were my role-models.

They were good honest people who always helped others. They lived an ordinary life, and their son, Rupert, was always having adventures with his friends; usually helping to solve problems.

Rupert was a Bear, and his friends were a Lion, an Elephant, a Badger, etc. Nothing seemed unusual about this group of friends as they went about doing good. And I always looked forward to reading about them in my annual Christmas present book.

The great difference between my childhood, and that of today, is that instead of the Rupert Bear Annual to read, children will have a mobile phone on which they'll watch porn, crazy antics, AI composed videos of anything you could imagine, and even nude photos of Angela from the Lower IVth Form (probably faked).    

These days, children rarely read books, and if given a Rupert Annual it would simply be put away and never opened. Even the great adventures of The Famous Five no longer see the light of day.

I doubt if children now see or read anything that represents 'GOOD' in society. All is bad or dangerous. 

I have never looked at TikTok or Snapchat, but I believe they are pages where junior noses are glued for most of the day. As far as I know, they are certainly not a good-example for young people.

If you ask a group of school children "What was the last book you read?", you will probably be met with a grunt, and confused disbelief.

We currently have over a Million young people on benefits in the UK, half of whom have NEVER had a job. Maybe they should read a book (if, indeed, they can read).

 

The Fox Trot ?

 

I entertained TWO Foxes for breakfast yesterday morning, and they, in turn, entertained me to a Fox Trot. 

They seemed to be quite young, and treated me to a short, but perfectly choreographed, dance. What lovely animals they are, I feel very privileged that they come to me for breakfast every morning.

Preserves

In a different life, one of my greatest pleasures was the growing and preserving of fruit and vegetables. I've always hankered after a 'Smallholding' life-style.

As Winter approached, every single cupboard was filled with bottles of jams and preserves, and the freezer filled with certain vegs. Onions, Squashes, and Apples, filled boxes. At Haddock's itself, there was always plenty of greenery right through to the following Spring. It really was 'The Good Life'.

These days we are not in France for long enough to grow what's needed to 'preserve' in the same way, but we do still manage to make plenty of Jams; Plum, Apricot, and Greengage.

One of the fruits which we have in profusion in late August are Figs, and this year I intend to return to bottling some for Winter. They are very simple to process, and are preserved in an Armagnac flavoured syrup (500 gms water to 300 gms sugar). We have three HUGE Fig trees, and we hate to see them go to waste.

The trimmed, slightly unripe fruits are pricked all over, and blanched for about 4 minutes, then plunged into ice-cold water before being bottled, covered in the syrup, and sterilised for an hour. It couldn't be simpler.

A few of these Figs with a big dollop of thick cream in the Winter months is pure heaven.

I am very pleased to see that my Greengage tree doesn't seem to have suffered from its radical pruning (thank you Kimbo), and it is now looking extremely healthy. Whether or not it is producing lots of fruit remains to be seen. If it is, I shall be making LOTS of Greengage Jam. Delicious.

My mind is filled with Summer things at the moment, and I'm really looking forward to it all. All you veg' gardeners out there will know how I feel.

I can hardly wait.

They're at it again!

It's almost inevitable that as soon as there's a weekend Public Holiday (when all bureaucrats are away in Tuscany), the 'Travellers' turn-up overnight with their diggers, caravans, tarmac lorries, and thuggish behaviour, and make yet another field into a trailer park and rubbish tip, in a military-style takeover. This time it was in Felsted in Essex (below).

These folk take absolutely no notice of rules, regulations, or even laws. They do as they please, and stick two fingers up at authority; they even sell the individual plots in advance. And the most amazing thing is that 'authority' does nothing to stop it; not even to tell them to get-out, and repair all the damage.

Easy Solution: All their cars and caravans should be immediately towed-away, and if the field wasn't returned to how it was within 48 hours, everything would be crushed. The 'travellers' themselves would be imprisoned until everything was back to normal.

The effing cheek of these people really annoys me. You wouldn't believe the process ordinary folk have to go through, even to alter a garden shed; these people could build a whole bloody city illegally and no-one says anything. 

Why do we allow such things. We have a well-trained Army who could enforce laws, and we have over a Million young people on the dole who could help remove all the campers. Where's the difficulty?

 

Shinto

The word 'Shinto' was an answer in my crossword this morning, and it got me thinking.

We've all probably heard of the Japanese national religion of 'Shinto', but do we know anything about it? I went to Wiki to find out more.

Shinto focuses on ritual behaviour rather than doctrine. The philosophers James W. Boyd and Ron G. Williams stated that Shinto is "first and foremost a ritual tradition", while Picken observed that "Shinto is interested not in credenda but in agenda, not in things that should be believed but in things that should be done." The scholar of religion Clark B. Offner stated that Shinto's focus was on "maintaining communal, ceremonial traditions for the purpose of human (communal) well-being". It is often difficult to distinguish Shinto practices from Japanese customs more broadly, with Picken observing that the "worldview of Shinto" provided the "principal source of self-understanding within the Japanese way of life". Nelson stated that "Shinto-based orientations and values lie at the core of Japanese culture, society, and character".

It does sound a much more sensible 'religion' than most. Without a single deity, they see gods (Kami) in all of nature, more as a spirit that should be revered than something to be 'worshipped'.

I think we could all learn from Shinto; then maybe much of the world would stop fighting over 'My god is better than your god', etc.

There is no 'Holy Book' in Shinto, no doctrines, no silly miracle stories. The Japanese live their religion. They are 'practitioners' rather than 'believers'.

I must say; I do like that.

Interior Design Masters

 

Yes, it's back on our screens again, and I HAVE watched it simply because my ex-neighbour, Michelle, is the Interior Design professional. Here she is (below, sitting with Alan Carr) with all the hopeful contestants behind them.

I'm not really interested in Interior Design (I'm too keen on clutter), but it is interesting (to a degree) to see what a bunch of amateurs can do with the interior of an old Beach Hut, or a homeless people's refuge.

The answer, sadly, is 'not much'. As with so many amateurs, they seem to think that garish colours mixed with miss-matched loud wallpapers, and odd shapes, is 'modern'. Well, it's not. Interior design is much more complicated than that. I have yet to see one of their rooms that I would be happy to live in. Often they would have been wiser to have left their rooms entirely untouched, rather than end-up with the disasters they created. 

I do understand that it's not in the interest of the programme to be too critical, but just occasionally I think Michelle should be less flattering towards the ghastly 'makeovers' produced by the contestants. 

Just another day.

There are IDIOTS, bigger IDIOTS, and gargantuan IDIOTS.

We obviously have at least one of the latter here in Brighton; an idiot who turns over Dustbins.

I can think of a thousand ways of spending my day, but never would it cross my mind to turn-over Dustbins.

However, some bright spark thinks this was fun. I happen to think it would be even more fun to lock him inside it for a week.