1730 I buy a car but the rest the day does not go well

Yesterday summer came to Britain, but in my case there were two icy breezes and a very dark haunting cloud reminding of bloody times. I must begin with the events in Korea in the early 1950‘s when I and everyone else was beginning go recover form the fear and horror of World War 2. Then as now I was preoccupied with my own experience with one fundamental difference, then I was coping with becoming an adolescent whereas now it is with the prospect of death and old age infirmity and the impact of what is happening in affect children and grand children and subsequent generations. In the early 1950’s stalemate was reached as Russia and China lined up behind North Korea and the USA and Europe behind the South and eventually a peace was signed with respected the demarcation zone with was nevertheless heavily fortified with armies and their weapons by both sides.

Over the next fifty years North Korea became more and more entrenched as the vanguard of a communist dictatorship while South Korea became an economic miracle in Asia as the capitalist nations and enterprises did everything they could to encourage the population from having sympathy with the northern neighbours. As first, the Soviet union was dismantled, and then China appeared to embrace western capitalism, North Korea became more isolated and fearing implosion, no doubt aided by external interests, commenced to strut a stance with the development of nuclear weaponry and fermenting trouble elsewhere, looking for allies and hankering for the opportunity to invade and take control of what it perceives as its greatest threat, South Korea. However one wonders what China really thinks and if the west would do more than mutter tut tut if China annexed North Korea in the immediate future.

North Korea might think, and did Cuba that the USA with its popular new Democratic President could be challenged as they might has expressed the kind of tough right wing posturing which has been the characteristic of the Bushes and Regan’s of this world. Like most people outside the higher echelons of government and military and intelligence services, I have no idea if the present posturing is only that or something more sinister and dangerous. At the moment I hope it is no more than a temporary storm, but my gut reaction tells me it is worse.

For the greater part of the past five years if I have not written a minimum of a thousand words and on average over two there is a sense of failure, even if I been fully involved in matters of greater priority or personal interest. I have been less concerned with falling behind targets for the main project work because of the need to reduce costs and resolve problems about space and work organisation. I am confident that it is only a lull and that I will switch back to concentrated and prolonged working when autumn comes

Over recent weeks I have been torn between wanting to record experience through words and immerse myself in the experience. Although I took my film and still camera to Brighton, Hove and Worthing, I decided against using it, because I hoped I would be visiting again and because I was more involved in the present than remembering previous experience. The photograph is a quick way to record experience and then use it to remember and attempt to translate feelings and impressions, reactions and interactions into words. But the camera like to notebooks creates distance between me and the immediate experience. I am back to being the outsider, observing, witnessing but not participating as others seem to be able to do.

Yesterday as with the previous days I was much engaged in activity which took me out and about and there was one great moment which adds security and continuity. On Thursday of next week I will have a colour red replacement Suzuki Wagon. It was still available when I rang the car sales garage and the red Suzuki Wagon was still available. Having checked the location before departure it was only a 15 minutes drive and a couple of miles, perhaps three via the Tyne River Runnel at Jarrow Until the second Tunnel is built it can take half an hour to get through during the morning and evening rush hours. I had not been able to find my MOT certificate after all so had to go first for a duplicate which cost £10.

There was no problem getting through the tunnel late morning paying the £1.20 fee the other end with the money thrown in to a basket device. The road is the A19 and which connects with the A 1 from Newcastle a little way along. It was a mile, if that, along the dual carriage straight road to the junction of the road from Newcastle which continues to the coast at Whitley Bay. Here there is a fifth road where after the entrance to the Travel Lodge on the left and the Silverlink shopping centre in the right there are six to eight large car dealerships stretching on either side of the road for half a mile. At the far end of this road the Newcastle Building Society has built its new headquarters. An extraordinary building in terms of size and I do not understand why a building society requires so many staff. It is puzzling. Almost after joining the fifth road there is a travel lodge on one side and a shopping centre on the other with a large multiplex cinema at one end. I could see the red Wagon and a silver grey model. The silver grey was more discrete looking and £500 less and with a slighter larger engine at 1.3. However it has 26000 miles against 18000 and the red has an air conditioning system in addition to the fan blowing cold air. After looking at both vehicles I took the red for a test drive and then stopped at the quiet end of the shopping centre car park to properly explore and work everything out including the radio disk player, cooling system, removal of the head rests to get a flat surface in the rear, the condition of the spare tyre which looked unused, the petrol cap and the under the bonnet. As I intimated yesterday I have always tended to keep in a groove if I like the experience and the advantage of this car is that within a few minutes I felt at home despite a different layout for the controls and an information screen. I collect the vehicle a week’s time.

The day had not started well. The Epsom combined scanner and printer announcing that a service is required. This is an automatic notice which occurs after a period of use and can be over ridden. I managed this last time but have forgotten how I did so. The problem is that fixing an individual printer costs £25 and in the grand scheme of things was worth while but because it is combined with a scanner the charge is £40 and become questionable, especially if there is a problem obtaining reimbursement for the stock of ink cartridges. I had no inclination to sort out the problem and it was allocated a place in the queue

Then worse was to happen as the door of washing machine will not open. It happened once before recently and initiated a second cycle and the door opened after this. On Thursday evening it did not. Another sort out required and which if it needs to be replaced will require taking up the kitchen floor. I have in mind to take the opportunity to remove the fridge and replace with the tumble dryer although I will then need a table for the television. I will tackle this next week although of the brilliant weather as forecasted continues I will go to the cricket and if necessary go to a laundrette.. Fortunately I know where one continues to exist.

As a consolation I managed to find plant containers which matched by existing ones. I had not realises how warm it had to become till going on walk about. I parked the car at the supermarket and then walked to the post office. I could not remember if I had bought the original containers from the supermarket, Wilkinsons’ on B and Q After drawing a blank at the supermarket I walked through the garden‘s adjacent to St Mary’s Church, into the deserted Market Square and over to the store where I found similar units in stock. By the time I returned for the second time to the car I was perspiring in the close heat. I only wanted a few items at the supermarket, but decided to get the extra planting compost. I planned to cover for the weekend with cricket on Friday evening and Sunday afternoon. I forgot the milk. I also forgot to obtain reimbursement of the parking charge which necessitated a third return up stairs, thankful for the lifts although I did use the slow moving platform for one journey down.

It is evident that the Telegraph has saved some of the worst Tory expenses offenders until the run up to the Euro elections next week. Any Questions on Thursday evening was much consumed with the matter although the programme was about the European Elections the expenses of British and European Parliament members was the overriding subject of interest, much to the consternation of some. I was alarmed by what the Prime Minister had to say which was in effect there was need for a system which would ensure that Members of the House of Commons were not able to make the same mistakes. Some mistakes. Shame on you Gordon. You have lost my respect and In suspect that of any you have left with the majority of the British Government

1257 2008 Message

So 2007 has ended and my witness is nearly completed with another day of work to be undertaken on January 2nd. The fireworks on London's embankment were a cacophony of light and sound, costing one million pounds and appearing to out do the efforts of other nations. It was brash and bold but spoilt by the excruciating banal commentary, and for me summoned up one perspective on the present state of Britannica, a P.L.C out to make and the spend as much money as possible regardless of values. The 2007 symbol of this was the collapse of Northern Rock. I thought of the contrast between this and the moral values of Queen Elizabeth II after watching four successive programmes on the House of Windsor from its creation in 1917 to the present campaign for Camilla, the second wife of Prince Charles to function alongside him as Queen in succession to his mother.

Given the continuing good physical and mental health of Queen Elizabeth I am not likely to see if Charles and Camilla make it and what they then do, or if there will be a fashionable generation jump similar to that within our main political parties which commenced when Tony Blair first became Labour Leader, together with the most recent news that a 19 year old Oxford University student is being groomed to take office in Pakistan following the assassination of his mother, or if faced with requirements of the new world order, there will be a radical modernisation our institutions of government, the House of Lords, the jousting of Prime Minister's Queen Time, and having a heredity chairperson of the Board.

I thought the order of the Channel 4's E 4 programming inspired, commencing with the creation of the House of Windsor, the marriage of Elizabeth to her royal second cousin once removed and equally third cousin according to branches of the background, the campaign for Camilla to be Queen and the events which have forced Queen Elizabeth during her reign to change from her beliefs about her duty to her god, her position as head of states and to the people of the Commonwealth. The research establishing the factual basis on which these programmes were created has been undertaken by others but individually and collectively, and viewed with the additional information from BBC series on the Queen and her family at work, it appeared to me to create a comprehensive reality which all neutrals will accept, and which I also suspect only the most blinkered of monarchists and anti monarchists will reject.

My daily work is about the impossibility of making a judgement about one life, my own, without having all the information which has governed my thinking and my actions together the information regarding the thinking and actions of all those who interacted with me at the key moments when I could have thought and acted differently and that even if such information was to be available it is impossible to recapture from memory the personal feelings and factors which governed moments and the choices over a long period of time

What these programmes about the monarchy attempted is to try and separate the concept of an heredity head of state from the individuals who carry out the role and then examine how events outside of their control affected the official performance of the role and their personal life, and how events within the personal life affected the official roles.

To do justice to the programmes and to the Queen, it is also essential to separate her experience and position from the rest of the royal family, and in this respect I thought the programme which singled out ten events during her life presented the clearest picture, but which was also significantly enhanced by information from the three other programmes.

The main issue is the concept of an heredity head of state and which falls apart if there is a voluntary abdication, which is how Elizabeth became Queen, through the decision of her uncle to give up the throne for an experienced but miscalculating woman who was a divorcee. The British Aristocracy has always accepted outsiders, whether through legal marriages or from liaisons, and whether these were secret or open, as long as the individuals directly involved are prepared to fit into the accepted culture of the day and then adapt with everyone to changes required for the continuing survival of the order. There would have been no constitutional crisis if the King and Mrs Simpson had accepted that she could be no more that his mistress. and that it would be necessary for him to marry a virgin of British Aristocracy who would produce one, or better still two, children preferably, sons to preserve an essentially British Monarchy that had already officially dropped its German links in 1917 as a consequence of World War I. It has now become evident that Charles was forced to give up hope of marrying was has been the love of his life because it was known that although single, Camilla was not a virgin.

Elizabeth, and her father, had no preparation for becoming the head of state, and the root of the problem which caused the abdication, affected the future welfare of her sister, Margaret, and that of Charles has been and remains the fact that the British Monarch is defender of the faith, and official position of the church in relation to sex before marriage, adultery and divorce together with the requirement since 1917 that the partner of the monarch should be also of Royal Blood, preferably of a British House, which together with being a virgin would guarantee that succession would not be challenged on the grounds of right.

It was also not long into her reign that Queen Elizabeth was required to tell her younger sister that she could not marry the man of her choice because he was divorced. I wonder how much the Queen took this action out of conviction or from her sense of duty as a constitutional monarch who had taken vows which she is reputed to have strongly believed in at her Coronation. I raise this question because the programmes presented the case that it was the single minded wish of Elizabeth to marry her future husband which commenced with a teenage crush at the age of thirteen years, and which had swayed the reservations of parents, the court, and the government into accepting Prince Phillip of Greece and Denmark, and with the surname of Battenberg, despite the anti German feeling immediately after World War II, and because of the changes which had been made to divest the formal German ancestry to create the artificial House and surname of Windsor in 1917. The programmes also emphasised the role of Lord Mountbatten of Burma, the uncle of Prince Philip in pushing the marriage in order to further his own, and the position of the Mountbatten family, with the understandable expectation that in accordance with custom the bride would take the surname and the family House of her husband, as do ninety nine percent of those who marry in the British Islands today. At best there is a compromise with joint surnames and it is significant that Phillip and his uncle were reported to have been furious when such a compromise was also rejected and the Queen on advice insisted that she and their children would continue to have the surname Windsor as well as being known as part of the House of Windsor.

The constitutional basis was the 1917 Royal Proclamation that the family would abandon its paternal German ancestry and take the name of Windsor, the town in the county of Berkshire, dominated by the Royal Palace. By marriage Queen Victoria became part of the House of Wettin from Saxe-Cobourg and Gotha and the Queen's great grandfather and grandfather Edward VII and George V were both Kings of the House of Wettin, Saxe-Cobourg and Gotha. Following the death of her husband Queen Victoria had imprisoned herself in her Palace at Windsor, a Palace which Edward VII had radically transformed along with Buckingham Palace to his own liking, as well as reintroducing all the pomp and public spectacle of Royalty with the laying in State of his mother, his coronation and the State opening of Parliament

It is therefore not surprising that there was considerable resistance to Elizabeth marrying someone with a German family background, especially as his four sisters had all married German Princes, and who was also someone in line of succession to the Greek throne, a country torn between Communists and those who wanted to bring back the 1922 exiled monarchy, and who was also a man baptised in the Greek Orthodox Church, whose mother spent the greater part of her life in an asylum because of mental illness, and also someone regarded as a man's man who might not be expected to be faithful to her. The programme made the latter point and there has been media speculation in past times about this aspect of their relationship.

However I would suggest that the opposition was primarily concerned with the impact upon public opinion and the security of the heredity monarch given the election of republicans to Parliament and what seemed to be the revolutionary nature of the Atlee Labour government with the introduction of nationalization and the formal creation of the welfare state. However the insecurity which was wider and deeper was the fear of the landed British Aristocracy which had come to regarded itself as rulers of the Empire and superior to its mainland European branches.

Queen Elizabeth and her husband are in fact of Danish family origin with both descended from Christian 9th of Demark and are therefore second cousins once removed. The Queen is descended via her father from Alexandra of Denmark and the Duke via his paternal grandfather who became George 1st of Greece when Denmark was needed to provide the next monarch in that country. Thus it could be argued that they were more Scandinavian than German, and in fact apart from his first two years, Prince Phillip was brought up in Paris, Surrey and Scotland before becoming a distinguished officer in the British Royal Navy in which he served as did his uncle throughout World War II. The making of Prince Phillip as Duke of Edinburgh, a British Citizen also had its origins in 1917. Prince Phillipos of Greece and Denmark was a member of the Royal House Oldenburg, technically of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderberg-Glucksburg. The surname Mountbatten was a 1917 concoction to officially rid the German connection because the family surname was until then Battenberg.

The linking of the western European royal houses from Scandinavia to Greece is a complex matter but with the British link through Queen Victoria and her children, and where the Queen has stronger British links because of her mother's ancestry of Bowes Lyon. It is fact that Prince Phillip has become the oldest living great grandchild of Queen Victoria and her second oldest living descendent after Prince Carl Johan of Sweden. He and his family had to be rescued from the 1922 Greek revolution by a British gunboat, something which his uncle would have fully supported having attended the Court of the Russian Tsar as a young man and fallen in love with the younger sister of Anastasia, the Grand Duchess Maria who perished with the rest of her family and where it is said Mountbatten kept her photograph at his bedside through his marriage and until his untimely death, blown up by the IRA with members of his immediate family while boating.
The willingness of Phillip to give up his claim to the Greek throne, to become a naturalized citizen of his adopted country and to convert from Greek Orthodoxy to the Church of England might have been sufficient to become acceptable had it not been for suspicions about the motives and the integrity of his uncle who was regarded as a brilliant and courageous man, but also an adventurer, that is the kind of man who created the Empire from the time of Elizabeth 1st until appointed by her father as the last Viceroy of India and which led to the creation of the present nations of India and Pakistan, divided primarily according to religion.

Doubts about the extent of the ambition of Lord Mountbatten came to the fore during the Labour Government of Harold Wilson when it was said he was approached and attended a meeting with named individuals including the media Baron Cecil King to consider a coup to replace Wilson by himself. The allegations about Harold's Wilson's pro Russia position and the suddenness of his subsequent resignation when in office, and with a good majority, has fuelled speculation about this situation, but speculation it remains because inquiries have produced no evidence.

But suck talk appears less fanciful with the decision to reject Rab Butler as Prime Minister although there is no evidence that Mountbatten was directly involved as it appears the Queen relied entirely on the advice of her constitutional Prime Minister Harold Macmillan. Fearing that his life was ending Macmillan decided to resign as Prime Minister and from Parliament but did not went Butler to succeed him and advised the Queen to risk a constitutional crisis by using her Royal Prerogative to invite the unelected Member of the House of Lords, the landed aristocrat, Alexander Fredericke Douglas-Home, the 14th Earl Home 1951-1963, Baron Home of Hirsel 1903-1995 and Lord Hume of Berwick to form a new Government. Lord Home was the last individual to become Prime Minister when a member of the House of Lords and the first to resign his peerage, which required a special act of Parliament, then to successfully contest a carefully chosen seat in the Commons in order to meet the political requirements of the day, but who reverted to being a Lord upon his loss of office and where his son then became the 15th Lord Home after his death. The experience is said to have made the Queen hesitant to use the Royal Prerogative subsequently

There is no evidence that Queen Elizabeth was a knowing party, or were the majority of the Cabinet to the Sir Anthony Eden conspiracy, based on a French Government plan for Israel to go to war with Egypt, after Egypt announced the nationalization of the Suez Canal which controlled the passage of 80% of the World's oil, and for Britain and France to then intervene to restore peace. This decision placed the Queen in the most difficult position because she is not only the Commander and Chief, but every member of the armed services swears an oath of allegiance and obedience to her, and through her to her commissioned officers and other senor ranks in hierarchical precedence. The programmes report that Lord Mountbatten was strongly opposed to the Suez action and made his views known.

The decision of the United States of America not to support the intervention and the United Nations to condemn the venture, together with widespread opposition on the part of the British public, led to British French withdrawal and the realization of the Queen led aristocracy that Britain's role in the world was irreversibly changed. Changes which had commenced with the reluctant giving up of colonial power, the restricted role of the Queen as head of the Commonwealth and then what would have appeared as the most significant change in sovereignty, the decisions of Conservative Ted Health to join the European Economic Community and then Conservative Margaret Thatcher to agree to the Maastricht Treaty.

As previously mentioned one of the strengths of the British ruling class in terms of wealth, land, power and influence, within and outside of government, national and local, has been its adaptability and presentational skill in appearing to be one thing while doing the other, The problem has been the growing education and power of the middle classes who tend to believe in and attempt to practice the morality and religions they profess. No such problem exists with the lower working class and the underworld who are willing to accept bread and circuses as long as they are free to provide for themselves and their family by smuggling, cut price stolen goods and exploit the state welfare system while making merry to day and every day by whatever means they can.

The Monarchy faced with the loss of all power and with its continuation in question came to rely on three developments. The first which Queen Elizabeth would have wholehearted supported was the role of the Royal family as the bastion of Christian marriage. In this respect there was a problem in that Prince Phillip did not have the background of being a loved child in loving parental home with his parents separated and brought up by nannies, residential schools and an ambitious hard working uncle. The young Queen was also required to undertake duties at home and abroad, which in those days meant being away from her children for months at a time.

I can only speculate on the connection between having absent parents in their early childhood and being sent away to school in relation to the failed first marriages of Princess Anne, Charles and Andrew. All three sons were sent to Gordonstoun as were the two children of Princess Anne

Those of us who have experienced the loneliness of childhood in the midst of large extended families and with devoted and caring parents understand the life long consequence in relation to our self confidence and ability to function in the normal cut and thrust of society. Most parents have to learn the role of parenting whatever from their own experience as members of a family, or from trial and error and instinct, and the importance of grandparents and other adults cannot be underestimated although this can be unhelpful as well as helpful if there is conflict about the role and approach. It is unsurprising therefore that Prince Charles should turn to his supportive uncle and then to the more worldly experienced, self confident, loving Camilla who clearly understood what Charles needed in terms of support.

This is the context in which the Mountbatten family, father and uncle appear to have played a role in persuading Charles that he needed to marry a virgin of British aristocratic breeding to produce one or preferably more heirs to the throne, which led to the selection of Diana, and who is also said to have also had the support of the Queen Mother and of Camilla. Given this level of stated family support how did the gulf between expectation and reality appear to have so quickly developed? Or that Diana would fail to understand her constitutional public role to support the future King or that she would indulge in a series of inappropriate relationships, during and after the formal break up of the marriage without apparent regard to the impact on her children, or on the monarchy? I have no basis for suggesting an explanation other than from the work of others. She was from a broken home, in desperate need of constant love and attention and apparently no member of her own family, or friend, or from the House of Windsor, was able or willing to explain in advance what her precise role and relationship with the Prince was likely to be.

The evident failure of the relationship and the incompatibility of interest must have been devastating to both and it would be inhuman if they and been able to sustain the situation without turning to others for affection. It is at this point that differences in coping between the couple became apparent for the world to see. Diana cast off all restraint and became the outward loving, caring spontaneous personality for which she is now remembered. She successfully portrayed herself as the victim, turning the general public away from Charles and from Royalty, especially a brother and sister also divorced and the image required by the established Churches of England and Scotland crashed during the course of one year.

The Monarchy has developed two other functions. The first can be regarded as cement which binds the middle classes and a selection of others to supporting the retention of the heredity monarch. This is the system of honours given to the services, armed, public and voluntary and to those who distinguish themselves in some way on behalf of their country and the communities, however local. Together with the recognition given to those who live until 100 and those whose marriages survives six decades, together with invitations to garden parties and receptions. Play the game, be part of the system and society and you will be shown recognition in some way during your lifetime. Moreover you do not have to lead a life beyond reproach to be allowed to join the club and to have been a sex crazed drug taking alcoholic is no obstacle as long as the behaviour is in the past and you demonstrate the ability to function in an ongoing more responsible way. The problem is that apart from nominations in relation to the Royal staff, the initial control of allocations has been within the control of the ruling Prime Minister, although steps have been taken to modernise and make the system more neutral and responsive to public interests, rather than in the interests of the public, government and the monarchy.

The recent BBC series should leave no one in any doubt of the extent to which the Queen, her husband, her children and other relatives have and continue to make themselves available to authorities, organisations and to business interests as well as social and cultural, on a vast scale and on a daily basis year in and year out. Yet despite such efforts it is also fact, following the death of Diana, that the British Islands was on verge of republicanism. Once again I suggest that the contrast between how Diana performed this role and the rest of the Royal family had become all too evident. The problem, and it may be a problem which will disappear in time, is that too often the Queen and her family are viewed as engaged in role play, role play at which they are exceptionally good at, but where there are indications that the role is manufactured and does not reflect their true feelings or nature, whereas the criticism of Diana is that sometime after her marriage ended she decided to give way to her feelings and inclinations and be herself regardless of what anyone and everyone thought. Prince Charles has the additional problem that he went on public record that he believes in an elite without making it clear if this is a meritocracy or aristocracy, and then he was also caught out showing his true nature and feelings during the Camillagate tapes and through his contempt for individuals within the media. There is also circumstantial evidence that his public relations manager adopted the strategy of encouraging media stories which put other members of the Royal family in a poor light to bring his situation and that of Camilla into better perspective and public understanding. Again one of the programme stated this without producing evidence.

The dramatic death of Diana and the normal reaction of the Queen as a parent and grand parent to retreat from public life and concentrate on the welfare of her grand children, in a situation of a popular new Labour Government and a Prime Minister able to express their feelings brought the Monarchy to the precipice. The decision to fly the flag at half mast, to stop and view the flowers and talk to those present, to come out onto the pavement for the passing of the cortege and to talk to the Commonwealth beforehand, was sufficient to begin the process of healing the rift between the Queen and her people, although it was quickly evident that the rift was not with the Queen as a person but with the institution, its costs and the failure to pay taxes like the majority, except for most rich. This also became an issue when the government of the day immediately offered the use of public funds for the rebuilding of Windsor Castle when sections were destroyed through fire. The rift was therefore more serious because it went to the heart of what Queen Elizabeth believed in and had stood for, the role of the heredity monarch as the embodiment of the standards, needs and wishes of the people.

There was however one success out of the debacle of the marriage between Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer, the combination of the parenting of their two sons. Diana provided he kind of mothering that circumstance appeared to have denied the Prince and his brothers and sisters, and one suspects many of those with privileged parents in terms of birth, wealth or office. It is the norm rather than the exception that the children pay the price in such situations and although cut short Diana appears to have provided her sons with the ability to understand and be part of their wider generation. At the same time Charles, because of the lessons learnt from his own childhood and no doubt with the background support of Camilla, and with the support of his parents, has shown the ability not only to carry on from where his former wife was unable to continue, but to provide his sons with the experience of interests to enable then to fulfil their future roles as part of the changing monarchy and to be able to understand and represent all the interests which now make up the British Islands

The problem is while the Monarchy, the establishment, the elite, has always been able to adapt according to the carefully assessed needs of the Britannica PLC its established Church, its armed services and its people, the nature of Britain and the pace of change has become out of the control of the British Government and its trusted and well tried institutions, and worryingly, instead of concentrating on effective management based on proven experience, the response has been to follow the jump in generations started by Tony Blair and which has now spread to the Conservative and Liberal Democratic parties. Just at the point when Gordon Brown had several times shown that that he could effectively manage in a crisis, he threw away the initiative by considering calling for a General Election and then when the evidence of the polls suggested he could lose overall political control he led his forces back into the valley after having marched them to the top of the hill. He needs to follow the lead of the Queen and stand above the squabbling of the House of Commons and the thinking up of clever jibes which affect and influence no one except those in government, those wishing to be in government and those who make their living observing and commentating on government. The General Public expects role play but also expects the performer to believe in what they do and to treat their real audience with respect.

We have created a multi racial, multi religious and multi social society in terms of skin colours and ethnic origins with the burst of new Europeans having far greater impact than the West Indians of the 1950's, the Ugandan Asians, or those originally from the Indian sub continent. The influx has been too many and too quickly and the average Islander does not care if they are illegal, asylum seekers or with valid work or long stay visiting rights or permits. It has happened and we must all learn to live the situation and quickly adapt national and local governments and national and local institutions to meet the new situation in the wider context of Europe and the new nations who will dominate the world economy and political stage during the latter part of this century and into the next, China and India, and Russia if it can get its act together again. However this will not be the end of changing power structures because eventually other individuals nations in Africa, in South and central America and in central and other parts of Asia will see the wisdom of combining their resources and strengths into more effective collective trading and bargaining.

The greatest threat facing the UK is also potentially its potential saviour. This is the significant revival of religious faiths among younger people involving evangelical Protestantism, Catholicism and most visible among young Muslims . This may be the situation in British Judaism but I have not come across any evidence or attempted to find out the position today. Some forty years ago left wing politics and the CND movement was full of idealistic young Jews with an interest and commitment to both Israel and the future of the British Islands. Collaboration between such religions and all the others can only be of value to religious belief and practice in general and the establishment and common purpose of the community. Each of the religions has to demonstrate understanding and tolerance towards other religions and towards non believers. This is and should be outside the control of monarchy and government, other than to support and to intervene when invited or when the greater interests of all the people are clearly involved and are recognised and accepted by Parliament. I would like to see Prince Charles take an oath as defender of faiths and the rights of those without faith. This will mean the disestablishment of the Church of England.

We cannot begin to forecast the consequences of enlarging further education to its present and proposed scale but which together with the inexpensive travel within the UK and abroad has turned our cities and towns into playgrounds for the young where drugs, alcohol and casual sex has become the norm every weekend. The inviting of large number of overseas students to help pay for the expansions will also result in further changes in the composition our cities and towns, on the availability and cost of accommodation and on temporary and subsequent employment, and on inter marriages and the movement of young people across nations and continents.

As more young people continue into further education and do not immediately contribute to the economy and to taxation revenues, and as advances in medicine, in living conditions and individual means among elders continues to improve, the pressure on the economically active to contribute more and more in taxation, there is the risk that cry of no more could become revolutionary.
With already vast chunks of our land, buildings, institutions and businesses bought out by Muslims, Russians, the Chinese, Americans, and other nations together with global conglomerates, and the other changes mentioned, the concept of a meaningful Britishness is questioned, although there are historical geographical areas and distinct cultural identities, in Scotland, in Wales, in Northern and Southern Ireland, in the North East, In Yorkshire and so on.

The greatest challenge and threat to the British Islands is our increasing dependence on imported food, on the importation of manufactured goods or the raw materials from which to manufacture goods, and on the depletion of our own natural sources of energy and increasing reliance of those imported and supplied by others. This adds up to increasingly not being masters of our future. This is all happening now.

Moreover it also evident that the effects of the misuse of natural and manufactured resources is already having impact on climate and the natural environment and is beyond our separate ability to change without collective action on a global scale by government and by every individual. The implication is the confidence and trust of people in government and its head of state (s) has an increasing significant and which requires priority attention.

My conclusion is that faced with these changes and priorities the future of the monarchy as a head of state, in whatever form is considered appropriate is an issue to be looked at in practical terms. Britannia PLC has developed a number of important selling features, including economic and political stability, its openness to those who wish to contribute, its history, its ability to put on a good show ranging from Live Aid to the Concert for Diana, to changing the Guard at Buckingham Palace, to Royal Receptions and visits and even to fireworks displays to mark the end of a year. A feature of the British good show is that it has quality and style and quality and style costs. In this respect does anyone seriously challenge the value for money given by Queen Elizabeth and her husband decade upon decade?

Realistically what happens when Queen Elizabeth dies should be established now and any change should be agreed, prepared for and implemented subject to review depending on the elapse of time and circumstance. If as appeared to be possible ten years ago the UK nations suddenly decided to go for a universally elected head of state or one selected from an agreed short list by the Privy Council, who would have been considered for the job and put for up for the position? Who would be the candidates if something happened again tomorrow? John Major, Michael Howard, Ian Duncan Smith, Tony Blair, Neil Kinnock David Owen, David Steel come first to mind? What about Vince Cable, Charles Kennedy or Ming Campbell? My personal choice would be Michael Heseltine, for no other reason that I once sent him an essay about my views after spending a month at the Henley management college in the 1980's which he liked and arranged to be circulated throughout Whitehall. Then of course there is Ken Livingstone or Boris Johnston! Note these are all men so what about Mrs Blair? Or even the winner of a public voting competition between the winners of the X factor, Britain's Got Talent, Strictly Come Dancing or Your fired I am Alan Sugar? Is this what we really really want?

1254 Looking ahead to 2008

01.Twenty four hours is a series in which 24 one hour programmes describe the events of one adventuresome day. Each hour is connected to each other and continuing to the whole. I wish I could write like that. Usually I begin with an idea or a plan and it takes in the direction I fancy. Sometimes as now I begin with no plan but write according to a mixture of past and present experience and connections emerge which create a whole or the semblance of a whole. The following twenty four hours relates to the experiences of a day connected to the past and end with an interesting and strange experience.

02. I am not a good traveller if the object of my journey is to get a from a to b and for this reason I am no longer prepared to use a whole day travelling by car, sometime visiting somewhere en route or going for a film and then arriving at my destination for the evening or late when the evenings are light, but only two or three hours drive away, with another two or three hours thee following day thus a whole day is not given to getting ready, driving, resting from tiredness. There was a time I would rise early having got everything ready and undertake a fierce drive or as I have done rive early to Birmingham was it from London or Wiltshire via Oxfordshire so that there was time to queue and buy a ticket for the last day of a test match and watch Freddy Flintoff for the first time and Petersen and watch England win by tea time and then set off for the rest of the journey home. like my life to be like that, and with the cat there is security to being all the possessions I believe I will need such and adventure, the maps, the clothes, the electronics and the food. Yesterday I quickly assembled three such mini trips for the months of June to September 13 days accommodation in a Travelodge for £140, in Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire and Oxfordshire.

03. A different kind of travel and mindset involves the train or coach which these days as with accommodation can be amazingly inexpensive, nut always to greater London, to the flat of my mother and aunt until it was given up in 2004 and then to Travel Lodges at Croydon or central London when cheap deals were available, or at the Innkeepers Croydon on the basis of three nights for two and an unlimited breakfast of cereal, fruit juice, coffee or tea, croissants and toast. I usually go by train if the return cost is £20-£30 and the coach otherwise which has been for £10 to £20. I wonder what the impact of National express taking over GNER will be. I assume the new bus pass scheme this April will not apply to coach travel for the over sixties. By sitting towards the back of the coach or moving to an area the train which has not been prebooked it is usually possible to have two seats to sit in comfort with easy access to food, books and writing materials. While the train is significantly quicker than the coach in terms of city to city three hours compared six to seven I can save good hour on the overall journey because the coach station is across the road from Victoria and the fast train to East Croydon and I can take the coach from a few yards from the Metro station which for the train involves good a half hour journey to Newcastle. Because the coach begins at South Shields one can pick a seat as usually trhere are only two or three passengers waiting at the stop with me. I find I enjoy the travel through Durham, Teesside and Yorkshire and then coming across central London into Victoria more than the train, and often coach passengers will engage in collective and open chats, and I have books, or written well.

04. I had these thoughts in mind when yesterday I received an ail advising that Travel Lodge were making available a number of rooms for £9 a night for June, July and August. I abandoned plans for the day and checked when the Olympic games were to be held, although China is likely to mean much overnight TV watching, I also checked the Durham Cricket Club site for their 2008 fixtures. With the Olympics in early August and the football season recommencing in August, and considering taking iota season for Durham which as with football the prepayment means that one has to got to ensure one gets value for the money, although as with the theatre or the cinema, prepayment reduces flexibility. I must book to see Jose Carreras though if I am not already too late. The outcome was the decision to concentrate on June and July and when Durham were playing their matches away from the Riverside at Chester Le Street.

05. For ten years I watched Durham Cricket Club from the member's area of other clubs, football supporters please note, including the Long Room at Lords, meeting a distinguished former player at the Oval, and also at Guilford Sussex at Hove, Kent at Canterbury and Maidstone, Yorkshire at Leeds and Harrogate, Lancashire at Old Trafford, Warwickshire at Edgbaston, Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge, Leicestershire at Grace Road, My first target was Hove where if they game lasted the full four days, I would stop over on the penultimate day of May paying a higher price for accommodation of £19 and have three days or four days at Brighton or Littlehampton, or elsewhere in Sussex, with again one night at a higher rate somewhere en route back, making a five or six night break. The problem was that the system could not cope with the demand, despite booking having to be made six months in advance. By about four pm I was prepared to give until later, got myself ready and then discovered the torrential rain, so intent had I been on trying to log and stay on line, so I changed back once more and settled to watch films and play chess against the computer while continuing to try and log on to the site. It was mid evening before I became successful. Alas although £9 rooms were showing as available at Littlehampton for June 1st and 2nd the price was significantly higher when I attempted to book. Durham at Hove was not possible at the special prices.

06.I lived between Wakefield and Leeds for a year ad have been a frequent visitor to Leeds, Harrogate, Hull and other Yorkshire towns regularly since moving to the West Riding of Yorkshire in 1969, while at Cheshire and moving to Sunderland and South Tyneside. After West Riding where my area of responsibility took in Doncaster, Barnsley and Rotherham, although between Christmas and New Year 1960/1961 and 1961/1962 I walked from Coast to Coast leaving at Doncaster on the first occasion with a damaged foot, but making it all the way to Hill on the second. I continued to have contact with Yorkshire during the three years at Cheshire make my first visit to Hull until moving to Cheshire where I represented the County on the North Region Associations for Blind and for Deaf. This was monthly forum covering the counties and county boroughs from the Scottish borders to the Midlands where the official representatives were usually councillors accompanied by an officer specialising in the work of the disability and the independent organisations who often then provided specialist services. Cheshire decided to appoint only an officer to attend meetings and as one of my duties was to implement the new Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act, I was given the task and which usually involved an overnight stay if the journey was to Northumbria, Durham and Yorkshire. My official association continued then based on Tyneside and I immediately remember conferences or courses at Scarborough, York and Harrogate. I also did a Drug advisory visit to a Hospital Trust neat Skipton. Then there were social and recreational visits to Leeds and Sheffield, Hull, Grimsby and Barnsley for Football, Bruce Springsteen also played at Sheffield. I have experienced Opera at the Royal Opera House in Leeds and Botham Ashes at Headingly and I took my mother to celebrate the 90th birthday of my Aunt to Whitby, one of many days out to the Dales and the Moors. There have also been significant family links since 1966. I was able to book three £9 rooms and one at £19 for a four day mini trip to East and West Yorkshire in June.

07 My links with Oxford and its county did not commence until 1961 and apart from 12 months between 1963 and 1964 I lived there until 1967 and since then making a conference visit staying at the Randolph Hotel, also undertaking a drug advisory visit, and more recently making two visits to the city and the areas where I worked. I managed to get three nights staying near Bicester in the Cherwell valley on the M40 which involves a short trip to the outskirts of south Oxford, reaching the city through area which was badly flooded earlier this year. Because of the total distance I am breaking up the journey with a night each way at Wakefield

08 The third trip is to Nottingham, a city of significance for forty years, although most of the visits have involved cricket and football, but also includes Torvil and Dean.

1719 Home, summer festivals and Celebrity

Returning after a trip is always unsettling as there is so much to do before switching into the being at home groove. Not that I want to be in such a groove that I cannot look back on any day without having added something different and worthwhile to my experience

Durham’s collapse on Monday evening meant that all hope of gaining a place in the quarterfinals of the Friend’s Provident Trophy had vanished and the intention of getting up early to travel to Headingley for the noon start of the next match in the series against Yorkshire was abandoned. Just as well because only on Wednesday morning did I discover that the match was scheduled for that day.

On Monday evening I had filled up with petrol at the garage close to the Travel Lodge, bought four rolls, two pecan twists and a small jar of mustard. I eat one of the twists as part of the evening meal after two of the rolls filled with salami and mustard and a cup of soup. The original intention had been to stay on the South coast and find a sports bar showing the Boro at the Toon, but decided for the comfort of the room and a listen on the radio.

Boro scored through an own goal in the opening minutes and one felt the depression descended on what had been a vibrant and buoyant crowd when the talk was about the Boro’s team selection. The Newcastle equalised and went onto score two more with Boro said to have become demoralised along with their loyal supporters. The following night the supporters turned their wrath on the manager for his performance over the year and his selection on the night. Apparently there was almost riotous celebrations in Newcastle after the match but Alan Shearer was quick to bring everyone down to earth. Only two wins in the remaining two games could ensure survival although one more points might be sufficient.

On Tuesday morning I enjoyed a leisurely start the day with a coffee and a croissant. The weather was dull and I enjoying an hour reliving the Worthing experiencing and drafting a Blog. There was a knock at the door an expecting the cleaner I was greeted by the friendly assistant from the night before who asked if I had lost something. I had been out early for a copy of the Telegraph but had not gone to the car. I had left the keys in the driver’s vehicle all night and the owner of the next vehicle had seen them on going to his and handed them in at the office. To have done this once was bad enough but twice within a few days was inexcusable.

Suitably chastened I finished packing and made my way to check the vehicle and make my way home. It was after ten and the rush hour was over and for once the M25 was fast moving all the way to the start of the M1. The new four lane development has ended the bottle neck which sometimes developed here and in sunshine I sped towards my destination the Toddington service area. Here I bought coleslaw to add to the two roles for lunch followed by the pecan twist and brought with me coffee. The previous evening and in the morning I had listened to Dire Straits Alchemy and for the drive I had a tape of my Bruce Springsteen records which helped my momentum. I read a little but decided that the news about the expenses claimed by Member’s of Parliament was such that it would spoil my relaxed and content mood.

I drove comfortably averaging more sixty than seventy miles an hour to the Tibshelf service area between Nottingham and Sheffield. Taking my lap top I bought a medium size diet coke for £2.20 with small £2.05 and extra Large £2.40 although there were no extra large plastic beakers.

Logged on to the free BT internet link for an email check and then finished off the Worthing Blog which I then uploaded. It was a pleasant break and outside I was tempted to sit on one of the outside tables but decided on returning to car. One reason for logging on had been to find out the location of Wilkinson’s in the northeast and was surprised to find so many, at Stockton, Thornaby and Middlesborough within a few miles of each other and at Hartlepool, Peterlee and Seaham. There is also a store at Chester Le Street. However I was so relaxed that it was closing time before I reached the first area and decided not to bother and continue homeward.

I needed to stop at Azda for milk and fruit. There is always that moment just before arrival that I wonder if the house has been able to look after itself in my absence. All was well. The there were only a few tulips still in flower but I would leave those already ended with the daffs and other bulbs till close to the end of the month to remove from the their containers to dry out and replace with bedding plants for the summer. That would give me two weeks to get them started before the Isle of Wight trip.

I unpacked slowly and methodically and then printed out the Blogs posted over the past ten days, transferring the records but leaving the transfer to the master disks until later in the week. The post was uninteresting, mostly requests for money from charities. There was no return of the bus and metro passes which was disappointing. I watched some TV, had some food and went to bed and sleep.

I was enthusiastic about tackling return home activities the following day but where to begin? Against expectation the sun continued to shine but it was late morning after a midday meal of stir fry vegetables bought the previous evening and the chicken breast pieces brought at Marks and Spencer’s through their 3 for £5.
I went to Nexus to report the loss of the bus and metro passes, filled in the required form and paid the fee of £6.45 for the replacement which would take 5 to 10 working days. There was less success at the phone shop although the phone had been checked by an engineer and packed but had not yet arrived. I noted that there was no reference to being repaired which may or may not indicate a continuing problem.

On the way out I had acquired the summer What’s on programme. Next week there is an Alan Ayckbourn thriller at the Westhovian Theatre on the sea front with tickets at only £5 or £6 depending on the day

The first summer concert at the Amphitheatre is in Thursday 4th June, followed by Saturday 6th with the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and the Throes, both at 7 and a the Westoe Brass band on the Sunday at 2. This is surprising because a vast fortune has been spent on recreating the bandstand in South Bents Park. I checked the Council web site to discovered that performances are planned on Saturday afternoon during July and August.

The Cave showcase event is on the 11, and which I enjoyed last year followed by two of the original Boomtown rats on the Saturday. The South Tyneside College perform on the 18th and the Paul Kappa Band on the 20th, unnamed for the 25th and the Billy Mitchell and Donagan bands 27th. There are brass bands on the Sundays. The annual Cookson Parade and Summer Fayre is on Saturday 4th July. Toyah Wilcox, Carol Decker and Sinead Quinn entertain in Bents Park on Sunday July 5th on the 19th the Soundpower Orchestra and These Beatles; on the 26th Andy Abrahams, the Moobs and Elle and on August 2nd Bjorn Again S Club and Scott and Sive. All these events are and if there is raid there is cover under the walkway on the sea front.
The weekend of July 9 - 12th covers the Whitley Bay Jazz Festival and the Mouth of the Tyne Festival I must check that I am home for 9th where there is a recreation of the early years of Louis Armstrong’s Hot five and seven, and before then with Kid Ory and other at the Sage Hall two, hopefully the seats are still available. Yes they are and I was to get my favourite seat in Hall 2 which is at the second level front row overlooking the stage and at aisle for £16 which includes the on line booking fee I was tempted by the appearance of Heather Small but will take a further look at the programme and my present plans for the summer over the next week to ten days.

There are 29 traditional jazz and swings artists and groups appearing at the Whitley bay Festival this year, 140 musicians from nine countries. There are twelve hours of jazz on the three days with four venues at all times within the hotel complex at an amazing £70 or day tickets. Surprising the programme for the Mouth of the Tyne Festival has not been announced which suggests the event may be in question although. This free event includes a wide range of music on venues on both sides of the Tyne with two areas in North Tyneside at Tynemouth including 4 jazz performances on each of the two days at a special stage close to the Rock of Gibraltar pub, with other artists appearance in the main street Tynemouth and in the grounds of Priory. The South Marine and Bents Parks are the venue for most evening in South Shields with the highlight being an artistic parade in the evening followed by fireworks which local residents can view by walking the short distance from their homes to the top of banking at North Marine Park. There are brass band concerts during August on the sea front.

There is are also regular conducted walks, eight every week, five conducted cycle tours and Petanigue on two mornings a week. The Jarrow Festival tales places over the last two weeks of May. Thee are various activities arranged at Bede World and at the Souter Light House, where between 11 and 4pm, there are events designed for children during the school holiday. These take place Saturdays to Wednesdays. On Tuesdays and Thursday there are also Tommy’s Party’s for children at the amphitheatre. There are also activities at the Arbeia Fort and Museum and Art gallery. I leave to another day what’s on at the Customs House, the Sage, and other live venues.

During the day I sorted completed work cards into one pile and generally worked out what to do over the rest of the week. I was not planning to go out unless the weather prevented play in the Test match at Chester le Street. I then watched Celebrity in the evening. You either tune in to the way Woody Allen looks at life or you do not. Most critics did not like Celebrity his1998 black and white film about those who seek fame and the company of the famous

Kenneth Branagh plays a would be serious novelist who first attempts were critically savaged but still has ambitions while working as a journalist and bored with his highly strung and unconfident wife becomes sex obsessed with any and every young woman who crosses his path. The film is full of excruciating social situations, art show and film previews, parties and fashionable restaurants. One interest is Melanie Griffiths who he first meets as a film extra and with whom the later establishes a relationship after meeting her again when she is living with someone and he has just arranged for his girl friend to move in and have her possessions brought over. She, Winona Ryder, then destroys the only copy of his novel in revenge. That he has no copy is one of several absurd points which removes credibility from this piece of well trodden nonsense.

The film is amusing for the appearance of Leonardo Di Caprio who invites Branagh to participate in a four way swinging session. Another is the cameo appearance of Allison Janney (CJ of the West Wing) interviewed having a posh nosh, Charlize Theron plays a super model who is turned on which ever part of her body is touched but abandon Branagh when he gets so excited that he turns his Aston Martin into a store window.

Judy Davis plays Robin his neglected and abandoned wife who is picked up by a TV executive who for some reason enters the cubicle where she is waiting to see an eminent plastic surgeon and who compliments her on the work that has been carried when she has decided not to have any. Why the man finds her personality and appearance more desirable as a potential wife and mother given the opportunities previously and subsequently is a further flaw although that he is able to get her a job when she has no talent or experiences in the industry probably is not. I liked the ending in which Branagh meets his happily married and confident former wife who has become a celebrity interviewer in her own right whereas he still struggles to write his book, finding out that someone else has made a success of a similar theme and abandoned by all the girl friends including Melanie Griffiths. He is genuinely delighted with the outcome for his former wife. It was time for an early night.

1716 Brighton Belle Rocks and the State of Play

On Friday in the morning I explored central Brighton on foot, the shopping centre and shopping street parallel to the sea front towards Hove, and then in the evening the North Laine and the South Lanes and the cultural area around the Royal Pavilion. In the afternoon I went to the pictures at the Odeon Cinema adjacent the travel Lodge.

Yesterday or perhaps the day before I wrote about my understanding of Brighton having become several distinct communities, conference and holiday centre, two university and recreation town, commuter, retirement and gay town. I did not set out with any intention to establish how far I had correctly judged the situation but now a couple of days later I have to express pleasant surprise at its cosmopolitan sophistication. On my first evening I had a brief conversation with a young man in the lift on his way to watch the match and drink beer with friends and discovered that he came from Jesmond in Newcastle and therefore knew South Shields well but wished to move to the south coast. I now know why.

After two days watching cricket, one day in the sun but with a chill wind, and the second hiding from the bitter cold behind glass or clinging to the back of the lower member’s pavilion on a park bench against the wall, I needed recovery and exercise. As forecast there had been rain overnight and it was after eleven before the skies brightened. I had eaten croissants and drank coffee around between six and seven and then snoozed before undertaking some writing and making my way to the car to transfer the remains of the evening meal and to begin to sort out the rear before the transfer to the Hove Travel Lodge the following morning. As the skies still looked threatening I decided to make my way first to the Churchill centre and do so without climbing the Hill.

Brighton and Hove has a population of 150000 and is located at the western edge of the county of East Sussex. Worthing which I was visiting next has a population of 100000 and is the largest town of West Sussex and in between is the unexpected port of Shoreham by sea, unexpected because I had no idea before visiting that there was such a large port in the form of a waterway created by the mouth of the river Adur and a huge bar which extends to Southwick and Hove. Its population is around 20000.

Brighton the town is built around a hill with shopping and recreation district south of the railway station going down towards the sea front. The main shopping road extends for over a mile east west and part of this road is restricted to buses and taxis and in order to get to the major car parks it is wise to first reach the sea front coast road and then taking the turning past the Brighton centre, which also contains the Odeon cinema, the Travel Lodge and with the Grand Hotel also on the sea front adjacent. I made the mistake of trying to enter the parallel road on my way to the Hove ground on the second day and had to enter the bus only road area at one point. It was all very confusing until working out the system operated.

On Friday I missed the easiest entry into the Churchill shopping centre development which takes on into the Debenhams store with entry from the road between the Travel Lodge and the NCP Car Park. I did find a way from the outer centre car park which involved negotiating incoming and outgoing cars, noticing as I did that a stay here of more than 12 hours to 24 costs a massive £25 designed to restrict use to shoppers and day visitors. I joined a number of passengers from the car park basement who knew that the main entry level into the shopping mall was on the fourth floor and then take the escalators up the next level to reach the front centre street level and the buses.

I felt peckish and made my way to the highest level where there is small food court, MacDonald’s, Spud U Like, a ubiquitous Subway type filled baguette outlet and an healthy organic fruit drinks and hot good restaurant. I was in the mood for a MacChicken, French fries and diet coke and knowing this was unhealthy managed to tip most of the coke onto the floor, a just punishment I felt for the eat the food at a table overlooking the central area where down below a stage had been erected with a cabin like changing area for five tall models giving a professional fashion show with music, lighting, a compere and the designer taking a bow to the bemused shoppers who had intended to pass by.

I picked up a copy of a free magazine Latest 7 which combined property advertisements with articles about local entertainments and I was impressed by a piece by Will Harris on Britain’s I got talent and the sensation of the Scottish singing lass Susan Boyle. I must send him an email later.

It was time for a walk so the decision was taken to travel the shopping road east west towards Hove. I had forgotten that the only Wilkinson’s on this part of the South Coast was at Worthing and not Brighton so misguidedly went in search and to buy lottery tickets of the evening’s £80 million Euro draw. The street and the walk seemed longer than indicated by the return journey or went travelling by bus.

There were two noteworthy discovering and both involved food. La Fourchette is Brighton based with adjacent restaurant and separate bar restaurant and a separate restaurant in Kemptown, a patisserie and a Kemma bar. The place had contemporary European style and a mouth watering menu which needed a partner in gastronomic indulgence for the main course and pudding as well as the wine choice.

For starter I could not make up my mind between Mediterranean King Prawns sautéed in a parsley sauce, garlic and butter £11 or the Pan roasted red Mullet salad with oven dried tomato sauce and a petite salad £7 but the wine choice was a half bottle of Pouilly fume Chateaux Favray 2007 £13. Then we would share a shoulder of lamb slow braised and marinated in 25 spices with mixed vegetables and sautéed potatoes and a bottle Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon 2006 £20 and then a shared pudding of Assiette Gourmande, a chef’s platter of portions of all the sweets on the menu for £14 drank with Bollinger £55 and followed by Liquor Coffees for a total of £9 about £150 for two including gratuities.

The second discovery was Taj ( Mahal International) in the Mediterranean end of the street. This was the most interesting store encountered on my travels with a stupendous selection of olives in 2 kilo kegs, tins, cans bottles and served loose and fresh from large vats and with every size and stuffing.

I then went back to my room which had been cleaned and tidied for a second wash and a cup of tea and relax before going to the pictures in the afternoon. After a cup of tea I went out on an evening explore. There was still the cold wind but it had brightened up although I was not inclined to follow those heading for the pier along the sea front. My first destination was towards the cultural area and as I walked up the hill I was joined by a young man with a pedal bicycle hording on the pavement accompanied a young woman guide leader and a part of about ten young women dressed in green frocks and sashes advertising but can I remember what. Before getting to the cultural area I saw a number of younger people remembering everyone under sixty is young heading into the Lanes to my right, twisty and leading down to the sea front and was tempted by a piano at the Friends meeting House where for a modest few pounds there was a 90 minute concert and a light buffet. I needed to explore and to exercise so I passed and the various inns crowded out in preliminary for the rest of the evening entertainment. There are by the some 400 inns, pubs, restaurants and clubs in the town ranging from the sophisticated already mentioned to the tourist sea front, everywhere chain, earthy environmental and those used by the gay community the largest in the UK including London with its annual Gay Pride event.

The cultural area lies next to the Brighton Pavilion and a wide traffic free piazza before theatres and facilities used for the fringe performances leading to the North Laines. Here environmentalism, the organic and bohemianism was much in evidence and an interesting hotel whose name I forgot which had a lounge bar in a shop window. And then there is the Komedia a multi performance centre boasting 700 activities a year with two most nights featuring comedy, cabaret, club and music as well as performance for young people. Before going home I bought a two glass bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon with two cheese twists but what else I had I did not note or remember. The lights on the seventh floor were fused at one point, perhaps a lady used the wrong voltage hair dryer was one suggestion but it was soon fixed and I Found out that only five of the twenty rooms on the floor were occupied at the time. I conveyed one lot of luggage to the car and then bought a diet coke with ice at the bar around 11pm. There were lively sounds from the young until the early hours.

Fort anyone who has not seen State of Play and intended to do so Goodbye for now. It was my most enjoyable film of the year, requiring constant attention and a great plot with an ending twist which I worked out the bare bones but only just before it was revealed.

The film is an American update of the equally brilliant six part British BBC TB drama series in 2003 which won awards for Nighy and David Morrissey and also starred James McAvoy and concerned the death of a young woman researcher to a Member of Parliament.

The film opens with a black man running for his life and being executed for the metal case he is carrying. You it is more than a drug killing the police believe because the behaviour of the assassin indicated a professional hit and he also attempts to kills a pizza delivery man on a bicycle. Chasing this story for a national newspaper is Russell Crowe, long haired unkept but at the top of the job with Helen Mirren as his editor boss concerned about impressing the new owners of the paper .

Congressman Stephen Collins is participating in a committee investigating the activities of Points Corps a mercenary force which is involved in conducting work on contract for the army abroad as part of a government out sourcing operation. His research assistant appears to have committed suicide or had an accidental death on her way to work and fellow journalist who concentrates on the internet edition is investigating the sexual aspect in terms of the relationship between the assistant and the married Congressman. An added complication in the story at this point is that Crowe roomed with the Congressman, Ben Affleck at college and also had a relationship with the wife of the Congressman during their college days. As the story develops it emerges that the girl researcher was placed by Media Point to spy on the work of the Congressman but she stopped doing so when she fell in love and became pregnant by him. It began to look that she had been killed by Media Point when she failed to deliver further information and their involvement might become known as a consequence of the relationship.

It also emerges that in addition to the overseas involvement, Media Point is responsible for the creation of a raft of companies successfully bidding for multi billion homeland security contracts and the reason for knowing about the research of the Congressman and ensuring that he is silenced or removed from the committee. At one point a female friend and club hostess alleges to the press that she and the murdered girl were involved in group sexual activity with the Congressman as a further means of discrediting and eliminating the threat he poses. A later revelation is that the senior politician who suggested the girl as a research worker is also linked with Media Point who have an operation at the Watergate building!

And the twist in the tale comes from the efforts to find the killer of the black man in the opening sequence. He and his druggy girlfriend operated a racket of stealing brief cases of businessmen and then selling them back to feed their habits. In this instance the case contained surveillance photographs of the murdered and a weapon which suggested that a hit was being planned. The pizza delivery man is then killed while under police protection in hospital by a riffle at a distance from an adjacent taller building and Russell barely escapes with his life when discovering the base use by the assassin. The congressman with support from his wife agree to make a statement to the paper about his knowledge of the situation but Russell holds publication of the story when he puts together the actual scenario. The Congressman and served with the assassin in Vietnam and the twist is that the Congressman began to have suspicions about the role of his assistant and also the seriousness of the relationship and the implications for his marriage and political career. He argues that he intended for the girl to be frightened and that his former military colleague had gone to far. However this is shown to have been a further attempt to limit responsibility because of a telephone conversation between them on the need to kill the pizza man and the girlfriend of the black drug addict, four deaths in total. It is also true that Points Corps were prepared to go considerable length to protect their growing financial interests.

The film covers the problems of media ownership and political interests and the problems faced by newspaper media by 24 news TV and Blog writing stories. It has a relevance given the stories about Ministerial and parliamentary expenses and how to use the system. It was a good day.

1715 An excellent day despite wintry conditions

Yesterday was an excellent day despite wintry weather conditions. Although inclined for a lay in, or should it be lie in, I went looking for a car parking place as close to the Sussex Cricket ground as available around 8.30 am and found a free space facing the right way towards the sea front and a short walk from the main entrance. I then had an explore of the local shops and estates agents where the average rental of property is £1000 a month with several in £1400 to £1500 but where there was also a studio flat for around £500, Obviously it is about location and the ability to rent out during the Summer holiday season. I bought a cheese and onion sandwich and a copy of the Daily Mail and made my way into the ground and the Member’s lounge for a seat at a table immediately behind glass and with a large screen TV nearby. I read a little of the paper, did the wagon wheel word search, quickly getting the minimum average of 15 words and then floundering after 17, and then though I had the right starter for the code word but failed then onwards.

The skies were full of rain and the wind was exceptionally cold so before the match commenced I ordered a bacon roll which was a large bap well filled with bacon, and a cup of coffee for £ 3.40 remembering my £1.50 experience at the Ship and Royal back home. It was a salutary reminder of what the South regards as a normal costs of living.

My experience of Brighton is limited but there are some important memories. Going with my mother at the end of World War Two, it may even have been in war time with beaches closed off, mined with barbed wire and devices to handicapped a sea borne assault. I was dumped in the sea by the son of the my birth mother’s eldest sister after he had returned from a Prisoner of War camp in East Germany liberated by the Russians who raped and pillaged the enemy. I retained a fear of water into my adulthood. I attended a conference staying at the Grand Hotel. I visited as part of the Local Government Forum on Drugs. I made a couple of visits, days out one with my birth and care mothers. I visited as part of trips to Sussex Cricket Club. I have walked the remaining pier. I did come on a visit on my own when my mother was in residential care and I stayed at her former home, buying a copy of Peace News from a shop in the Northern Laines. Someone who was once important in my life when a young man and involved in the Peace movement became an academic administrator at a university in the area.

There are now two universities in the area whereas before 1960 there was none. The first, the University of Sussex was then created as a new red brick and with a reputation for being left of centre in its approach to the world and further education. It has a campus site outside of the town centre. Then with the subsequently development in which the Polytechnics transmigrated into Universities a new University of Brighton was created and which has developed campus sites not just in Brighton but neighbouring resort town of Eastbourne and Hastings, places which I visited as a child and once stayed on holiday at Hastings which was our least successful family holiday if I remember correctly. The number of students and staff will have increased significantly throughout the last decade because of government policy, academic reputation and popularity of the location.

Then there is the conference Brighton although my experience was that apart from a walk on the front there had been little opportunity to explore. I must search for the conference programme. There would have been a civic reception and dinner.

A lot people will be commuters living in Brighton and working in central London. When I worked for the Government’s Drug use advisory service on secondments I knew an administrator who did this.

During the same period I was also an advisor to Local Authority Drugs Forum (whose creation had been my idea and was the first local government organisation which represented all the separate representational bodies in the UK) we came on a visit to West Sussex and although based at Lewis (the place not the TV series) we had visited two advisory help services in Brighton, including a needle exchange service. The town had developed a community of gay people outside of London so there was a problem with HIV and it had always been a resort which attracted young people because of the season work opportunities.

Then there is Brighton the retirement area although rocketing property prices will have had it impact on those able to migrate here for retirement.

There will also have been a relocation here of asylum seekers and other displaced persons living on benefits because of the availability of accommodation during the period when the British seaside holiday was replaced by the short time flight to Spain and Greece and with Gatwick airport a quick train ride away and more people coming to the coast for day when the weather is fine. The road between London and Brighton used to be blocked with vehicles on the good summer weekends and bank holidays and with people making their way home slowly from early evening until the pubs closed on coach trips ( what were they called in those day charabanks?) or in packed special trains. Yes charabank is the correct spelling although it is also a character level 80 Troll Hunter to be precise in the World of Warcraft.

Then there are the mangers, the professionals and the service providing workers although my impression is that the latter are now are primarily new and old Europeans and students. I will try and find the time over the next few days to find out a little of the reality.

The sun did emerge, almost for a few minutes after lunch and left my comfortable and ideal position to climb the stairs to sit behind the bowler’s arm. The as I soon as a felt rain in the air I descended and retreated on bench backing on to the wall of Dexter’s the restaurant, so I did not block the view of those sitting at table for a late lunch or an early afternoon tea. When the rain stopped play I joined the dozens of other viewing the Test Match at Lords. It was a brilliant decision because Graham Onions of Durham in his first match took a second wicked in the same over, I missed the first, and then a third and later he took two more to finish with five wickets for 38 runs. The consequence is that anyone taking 5 wickets in an innings or scoring 100 or more runs have their names immediately added to a toll of honour board in the dressing room of the national side. It was the making of a legend. No one can alter what will be there for everyone to see in successive generations.

Returning to the field of play outside in the cold Durham were all out for 380 with Liam Plunkett not out for a career best of 94 and short of the fifth batting point. Sussex had an excellent start with 80 0n the board before the first wicket and then had an extraordinary collapse with five wickets going for 28 runs three were out each for 0 caught by the wicket keeper Mustard, one to Claydon and two to Liam. However then Hodd 101 and Luke Wright 67 came together and put on 150 before the next wicket fell and the Innings closed on Friday only 17 runs behind the Durham total, emphasising my feeling that a draw was the most likely outcome.

In the evening I watched an average episode of Taggart and had intended to watch Any Questions and the late political programme but went to sleep and missed the most significant political event so far this year which is likely to bring forward the end of the Labour Government.

1714

I am listening more and more to radio. On Monday as I returned home from an over night stop at the Pontefract services area at the former junction between the AIM and the M62, I slowed down to listen to Andrew Marr’s Start of the week discussion with authors who have written books about immigration.

I grew up in a refugee family from the threat of Nazi Germany to Gibraltar and pressure from the Catholic Church and although my care mother then lived in a small town in England for over sixty years as did my birth mother until entering residential care for the last five years of her life, they always felt Gibraltar was their homeland.

In Monday’s programme one argument presented is that immigration has not posed as great a problem in the United States as it is now doing in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and in parts of Western Europe because of two major policy decisions. The first has been the requirement to learn, understand and sign up to the terms and conditions of citizenship before it is granted with the consequence that successive waves of immigrants while retaining their cultural and separate religious identity nevertheless regard themselves foremost as USA citizens. One can think of the Irish, the Italians, the Russians, the Germans in this respect, but it is not something which can be taken too far in terms of the position of the native Americans, the black and Hispanic Americans until very recently although the election of President Obama may change their position as well.

The point was also made that the way substantial waves had become part of the society meant that no groups had overwhelmed and changed the core culture of being an American whereas in Britain especially there are vast numbers of long established citizens who feel overwhelmed and threatened by the waves of incomers from the West Indies, the Indian Sub continent and over the past decade from central Europe. One significant reason given for difference is that the USA has not only been clear about who has been welcomed and when, but also policed its borders with vigour and clarity, although again there is the reality behind the generalization as it has been less vigorous in sending back those needed and prepared to undertake be exploited for their seasonal labour or provision of servant status labour.

The second issue which interested me was the argument that policing borders with vigour only prevented a growing problem from immediately getting worse and helped to avoid immediate cultural clashes. There was a world wide priority to focus on raising the economic conditions, the political, educational, cultural and basic human rights of people in the countries which are their homelands so that the need to move would be removed for the majority, a need which was often one of desperation to survive, yet also knowing that many would not survive the journey or be accepted if they made it to their choice of place for salvation.

There is no evidence of any willingness to take the economic and political decisions to bring this about and therefore the emphasis will be on containment and limiting the adverse consequences of previous political policies and decision which dealt with the immediate difficulties and put off the those requiring more fundamental changes in priorities and attitudes.

I arrived home, unpacked and prepared for my longer trip and longer absence the following day. All the plants were watered and moved to an open sky environment. I then discovered that there was play in the one day game at Riverside in which Durham was meeting Sussex and decided to visit although is was too cold to watch in the open air, and skies threatened more of the rain which had greeted my morning.

I was lucky because I found space for a chair at a window in the Member’s Lounge. Durham had won the toss and elected to bat which someone who took the next seat with his partner considered to be a major mistake and with hindsight his view prevailed. The problem is that within the league Durham had the lowest run rate which becomes a factor if a divide has to be made if more than two teams top the points table. Unfortunately no one was able to sustain a partnership and were all out for 192 with 10 balls left to play Captain Smith struggled to reach 65 and six of the Sussex bowlers achieved wickets. It looked as if Sussex would have little difficulty in reaching the required runs and this they did with opener Joyce 102 not out at the end, Gatting 48 and Wright 28 the only two wickets to fall and Sussex gained the two points with seven overs in hand. It did not omen well for the week ahead. Not that I witnessed the end for as soon as the outcome was evident to me I made by way home and tackled the preparations for the long day of driving ahead.

Over the previous weekend I had decided not to wear my wearable suit on the journey but packed along with a shirt selection in a Priority Club suit or dress cover for a major dry cleaning firm and decided to continue this approach for the long trip, adding more shirts and a second pair of trousers.

I also changed from my usual black shirt and trousers for casual and work day wear to brown cricketing outfit for the country county or countryside visit, comprising brown socks and sandals as I no longer have a pair of wearable brown shoes, brown trousers, a soft brown jacket and a red shirt with a white and a cream shirt also packed and my green over-jacket together with the usual black jacket which combines an inner and outer jacket and where the sleeves can be removed from the outer and which is also reversible.

Because the car park is a fifty yard walk from the motel I decided to try and concentrate the luggage to two trips and which involved leaving the cool bag and the bag with tins, jars and containers, together with my hats, large umbrellas and spare shoes in the vehicle overnight. I had a computer in each bag and also divided my cricket books, one other book, DVD’s, radio and camera between two bags with a pull handle and wheels together with the balance of clothing and bag of toiletries. There was also my haversack where for the journey I placed by booking material and other information, notebooks, pens, decaffeinated tea bags and other last minute decisions to take with me.

I then wanted to write and stayed up until one but had a good night deciding against setting the alarm clock. I was naturally awake and feeling refreshed around 7 and ready for departure just after nine making two checks of the house.

On the final check I asked the house to look after itself while I was away and apologised for my recent lack of care, promising to do better on my return.

I was not hungry and decided against coffee before departing, but called at Lydl for a pint of milk on the way as the Azda car park was full only to find they had no single pints and there was a long queue at the checkout so I put back the pack of ham and crossed the road over to the Post office store where they had a pint of half skimmed and then at the butchers for two slices freshly cut ham. The journey was only a few miles underway when the decision was taken to pull in at the Washington service area for a croissant and coffee, having a bought a supply on my return from the match the previous day.

This kept me going for the next 150 miles which meant I could stop at my favourite service area on either the A19 A 1 route or the AIM M1 route South. There are only five rows of cars with a large hedge between the first two and the other three and by placing the car facing forward on the outer row there is a very pleasant vista of a gently grassy bank, shrubs and topped with trees. My only moan is that the free wireless link is only available inside at a table having paid out for a drink as a minimum. I did not have the time or inclination. One more stop was made at Toddington for fuel and to drink water. The roads were full of lorries and other vehicles but there were no hold ups and I cannot remember when I last travelled from the MI M25 link to the start of the M23 to Brighton without encountering a slow slow, even slower slow journey, I was able to average sixty to seventy miles throughout the 360 miles of the trip.

The previous evening I caught the last few minutes of 24 and wished I hadn’t but the cause was a good one, a new episode of Lost as there is an explanation of some recent events and connections and which appear to offer a solution to the overall series.

I continue not to rule out the possibility that human beings can travel in time back and forward. My main interest is whether memory is transferred along with physical characteristics. I must find out what research has been undertaken.