Month: August 2023

As they say ‘the day started like any other’. Françoise has gone off to see a friend in Bath so here am I looking at a rather indifferent sky. There is rain in the air.  Off to the town to do various tasks. On the way I pop into Sainsbury’s to look at the headlines of the newspapers. They seem irrelevant and alarmist so why bothered to buy a newspaper. I don’t think I bought one for, let me think now, since the covid nonsense started.  They are also expensive anyway.

To the post office to pay in some money from gardening. I always laugh and joke with the tellers combat teasing them whenever possible.

Price Rises

To Wetherspoons thinking that I might have breakfast but what do I see. I remember that during the covid era meals were available for less than three pounds.  The price of coffee used to be 99p now it is £1.50.  I now see the announcement that you can see on the left so this means that a  traditional breakfast  with coffee will now cost £7.25.   If there’s one thing I dislike and that is creeping price increases. Maybe I should not complain about Wetherspoons because they always try to give good value, The rise is probably  due partly to the enormous tax burden they have to find to pay the government.

I dislike even more intensely creeping petrol prices. If they bore some resemblance to the price of crude oil I would be more impressed. I know that in any event we pay 75p duty to the government for the privilege of driving around and the now upon us ULEZ  with their 15 minute cities background is a harbinger of doom.

I had a  telephone conversation out of the blue today with a lady from Trinidad and Tobago and it made me realize how poor we are in spirit. Here was a person bursting with love and with a complete absence of fear and I realize why I am sometimes bored with the versions of homo sapiens that we have round here. Where is the spark? Where is the spirit?  Where is the courage?

I was motivated to bring up my friend Steve who has worked in Africa to share my delight in meeting this person. I wonder if I shouldn’t end my days in a place that is more conducive to community and love.   Having said that though, we are where we need to be to fulfill our karma so maybe I should just get on with it.

What do do this weekend?

Saturday. My goodness, how much is there to see and do. The Mendip Times is one of the most reliable places to see what is going on.

What criteria should I use to decide which event to go to? I can only go to one or two. If I went to the same thing last year I would be less inclined to go this year not more inclined. The formula does not normally change. Some people take this to an extreme, I ask if people they have been to the Bath and West annual show in Shepton Mallet which is a vast event (some would say too vast) and they reply ‘I went 20 years ago but have not been since’.  I would have thought that was due for a revisit more frequently than once every 20 years.

I won’t go to a show where knitted objects of whatever type are on sale,  so-called craft shows, perhaps in readiness for Christmas. I’m in and out of there in five minutes possibly pausing for a coffee. I don’t need to see any more things. I do need to have new experiences. People selling stuff does not do it for me.

Having decided on the periodicity and the theme, I then look at the distance. Somerset is a big county and it can take a couple of hours to go from one corner to the other so the prize would be for those less than 30 minutes away.

I also look for something original for example with Oak Hill we have the Back Room Boogie Band.  These have to be a group of enthusiastic amateurs making a joyous noise but the very rough and ready uncommercial sound appeals to me before IV even heard a note of their music.

Flower shows I don’t mind. Flower shows with something else added is more appealing.  I see on Sunday we have the North Somerset agricultural society including a plowing match. Now, you’ve got me there, because I love agricultural machines of all types is specially old machines and that includes petrol driven pump engines with their unique chuff chuff sound.

So we haven’t immediately made up our mind but my guess is that we will be going to Oak Hill, and at least one flower show.

What criteria should I use to decide which event to go to. I can only go to one or two. If I went to the same thing last year I would be less inclined to go this year not to more inclined. Some people take this to an extreme, I ask if people they have been to the Bath and West annual show in Shepton Mallet which is a vast event (some would say too vast) and they reply ‘I went 20 years ago but have not been since’.  I would have thought that was due for a revisit more frequently than once every 20 years.

I won’t go to a show where knitted objects of whatever type are on sale,  so-called craft shows, perhaps for Christmas. I’m inner out of there in five minutes possibly pausing for a coffee. I don’t need to see any more things. I do need to have new experiences. People selling stuff does not do it for me.

Having decided on the periodicity and the theme, I then look at the distance. Somerset is a big county and it can take a couple of hours to go from one corner to the other so the prize would be for those less than 30 minutes away.

I also look for something original for example with Oak Hill we have the Back Room Boogie Band.  These have to be a group of enthusiastic amateurs making a joyous noise but the very rough and ready un commercial sound appeals to me before I have even heard a note of their music.

Flower shows I don’t mind. Flower shows with something else added is more appealing.  I see on Sunday we have the North Somerset agricultural society including a plowing match. Now, you’ve got me there, because I love agricultural machines of all types especially old machines and that includes petrol driven pump engines with their unique chuff chuff sound.

So we haven’t immediately made up our mind but my guess is that we will be going to Oak Hill, and at least one flower show.

PS on my transcription efforts

Thanks for your note – and for taking the time & effort to turn whatever you can into a work of art…. it all helps in the transmission…

Whatever happens, I hope you enjoy mulling over the text…and that you continue to be a beacon within these challenging times….so that we remain activated and not to fall into the slipstream of the ‘robosapien’…

Occasionally there will be a spillover from my other work to my diary as indeed was the case with Samuel Pepys and his activities with the navy, not to mention his extra curricular activities.

Controlled weather

I do research on various trends that are going on in the world and this is a very small excerpt by a researcher called Deborah Tavares.   If you are minded, you can hear the full article here but – warning – it does last nearly two hours.

” I’m going to refer back to an article that I discussed a number of times over the years. It was found on the Wayback machine and it was  an article April 17 of 1976 from the New York Times archives and it reads basically as follows ‘ in 1976 when there was a few real reports so they start out by saying “from space one can to control the Earth’s weather and cause drought,  floods,  change the tides,  raise the levels of the sea and make temperate climates frigid”. This was what Linden B Johnson was told by the joint session of Congress in 1957  so you ask how long has this been going on. It’s (been) perfected.

This may explain to the readers of this diary why there is so much strange weather, floods, extremes, so-called wildfires. It is not what it appears.

Anyway back to business at home.

The delights of writing a transcript

I was part of a four hour seminar yesterday. There was such wisdom and knowledge displayed that I felt moved to write a transcript.   Anyone who has written a transcript from a live performance will know what a labour of love it has to be.   Even when people speak clearly there’s a lot of repetition, umms and ahs,  and interjections so if you are to produce an item that is true to the original and clear of noise you have to do the following.

While the seminar was going on, I was recording it on Speechtexter  which is a bit of free software offered by Chrome. Thank you very much, people.   It conveys the output from the microphone to a computer somewhere, who knows perhaps California and you get the text appearing a fraction of a second later on your machine.   There is an editing element. If I wanted to say a word such as s h i t,  it would send back sh**.   So there is surveillance of a sort.

What I am waiting for now is the copy from zoom  of the whole conference, all four hours of it.   I will then turn it on and compare what was said with what the recording says.  You have to stop and start the recording every few seconds.  The recording is just continuous raw text in one great lump.  It has to be made more friendly, made into paragraphs plus you have to capitalize where necessary.

I told my colleagues  in the organization that I reckon it would take about 10 hours work but that may be optimistic.  Why am I doing it? Particularly as a voluntary task.  The reason is that the average attendee is very unlikely to have the time to plough through four hours of video for a particular point they have missed.   My idea is to produce a searchable WORD  type document where people can quickly jump to what they need to hear.

Occasionally, speakers are truly inspired and they make so many key points one after the other you would almost think they were looking at the situation from above. I knew when a speaker by the name of Kingsley Dennis started talking yesterday that this was one of those inspired occasions and so I am glad to give my time and energy to this.  I must now twiddle my thumbs until they send the copy.

The transcript of the conference arrived at about 1.30 pm. I set to work. I had underestimated how technical the topic was and how many unfamiliar names of quoted authors were. I have just spent three and a half hours and have only done about 35 minutes of worthwhile transcript. The problem is that if you miss a word you have to go back on the recording just a little bit and if it is a long recording as this one is it’s very difficult to find the exact point where you were so you had to listen to things again.

I found that my recording  of the event which I thought was complete had missing chunks so I had to go back and fill in the gaps which was a very time consuming and frustrating job.

I had hoped to finish the whole thing within 24 hours but that is not going to happen so I wrote off saying that I thought the original should be sent off and my transcript would follow when it was ready. I don’t think there’s any point in working myself into a stew.   The topic had a great impact on me and the work has embedded itself in my mind so maybe that’s a good thing.

Justice siding with the perpetrator.

I was just listening on GBNews to a woman complaining that she got on the London subway with her two-year-old child and she was threatened by a knife wielding guy walking up and down the car. Although the event only lasted three minutes or so she was very traumatized and she wrote about it on social media describing him as in need of medical attention.

To her surprise, she got some abuse because of the way she described the assailant and she commented that these days public Sympathy lies not with the victim but with the perfect traitor. I have noticed this before and I think it’s a very dangerous precedent. Thank goodness I don’t live in London but when I travel there I shall keep out of trouble.

Prosecution of a Christian MP in Finland

It is not only in Africa and Asia that there is persecution of Christians. Finland is the last place I would think of, but here we have Finnish lawmaker Päivi Räsänen a devout Christian and member of the Christian Democratic Party, became a figure in the fight for personal freedoms while facing an “ethnic agitation” charge for a social media post criticizing the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland for partaking in LGBTQ+ pride events in June 2019.

“I am prepared to go to prison if necessary to hold on to this message,” she said after leaving the courtroom.

The museum was founded in 1961 to showcase American declarative arts and to dispel stereotypes of American culture. It houses the finest examples of American decorative arts, quilts and folk art, and Dallas Pratt’s collection dash one of the greatest collections of Renaissance maps in the world’  Dallas Pratt, the owner at the time,  already had a home at Freshford Manor near Bath which he had made as a base for his antique exporting business. They wished to expand but could not find a suitable city centre base for their Museum in Bath itself so in 1958 Cleverton Manor was put up for sale and they responded. The rest as they say is history.

We arrived about 11 am, used the free parking facility and bought a combined ticket to the house, the Lego exhibition and the gardens for £10.50 which was a reduction as the holder of a local Discovery Card gets  a reduction of 25% on normal adult admission.

This will be a largely pictorial walk around the place. There were many lively school children because it was still school  holidays. I did my usual madcap talking to anything that moves.

 I talked to a man sitting down in the terrace which by the way commands a very fine view over the valley. I said something daft like ‘you can be lord of all you survey’. He brightened up considerably and said that he used to live here but now lives in Chippenham and has come back to remind himself in a nostalgic way of what it was like to live locally.

My second outrageous conversation was with two ladies who were really earnestly talking to each other and I said they had made my day because it was clear that although I could not hear their conversation it was very personal and heart to heart, I said how nice it was not to see a mobile phone. They joked that ‘we are too old for that sort of thing’.

I like to make a little bit of difference to a lot of people whenever I go out.

As for the staff  it is clear that each person has their own job and no one knows anything about what goes on. I am fairly certain that they have no staff meetings.  This reminds me of the American ‘need to know’ management style.  The person at the entrance gate did not know anything about the apparently permanent open window in the cafe. When I wanted to make a comment about the food, the same person said that I should write in by responding to a survey and then notice will be taken. In other words if she says anything no one will be interested. Bad.

This implies that they have no power to influence anybody and they should just do their jobs.  It is interesting how you can back-engineer  the design of the management from the behavior of the staff.

The so-called highly recommended cafe consisted of salad, quiche, cakes, coffee etc, ice cream, and one main dish.  The dish was pasta with cheese,  with green salad on the side.  I cannot describe it as exciting but it certainly filled us up.    The children entertained us with running around the restaurant.  A standard slice of cake, ‘cake of the day’, was £4.50 which I found a little bit excessive but the excellent  latte was £2.90 which was better.  I did have a word at the entrance saying that one hot choice for lunch was not enough. They replied that they had a hot dog alternative and I said that does not count as a main course meal. I guess they do not have a chef and that nearly all the food was imported.

Apart from that,  we enjoyed ourselves in the  LEGO exhibition,  and the quality of the historical side of the exhibition in the main building is extraordinarily good. Those interested in quilts should definitely visit.

The website is here .

The gardens have been very well developed and landscaped and it is a joy to walk around.  See the images below.  I believe this is the only American cultural museum outside the USA. It is well run and well-maintained and I am told that Americans are quite generous in their donations for the upkeep of this place.

Anyway I will now shut up and let you see some of the imagery which I hope will tempt you to pay a visit. The museum is open every day except Monday but open on bank holiday Mondays. The opening times are 10 am to 4 pm.  First, LEGO land.  My question is ‘what CANNOT be recreated in LEGO bricks?  Here are a few examples and, yes, they are all made of LEGO.

There was a side room where children could make LEGO models to their Hearts content. I think it is excellent for children’s creativity and in itself worth the entrance price. There is a special price for families.

I’m sure this establishment is not normally populated by so many children but it is after all holiday week and it is a great place to take the family. I noticed one or two grandmothers ‘doing their duty’ and loving it. The children were very well behaved so I guess they go to private schools. The comportment and dress of the parents did show some social and economic standing which should not be trifled with.

When you arrive you are given a very helpful package of a map, a description of the history of the house and an invitation to become a member should you so wish. There is a smiling lady that takes care of you at reception and assistant ready to show you round.

We then visited the main building wherein the historical artifacts are to be seen.

There are many more amazing scenes of 17th century and 18th century America but I hope I’ve encourage you to consider visiting. It is best done by car but can be done by the local bus, D2, from the center of Bath. For first time as I recommend a minimum time of three hours including time for a meal and perhaps a coffee but do pick a sunny day.

This is the day that the Lord has made – we will rejoice and be glad in it.  Psalm 118:24

So who was this chap David? A shepherd? What kind of shepherd would know about anything really?   There is more to David than meets the eye or at least the casual glance. He was a king and a talented poet rolled into one who lived a far from blameless life.   If you want to know more, read a summary here. For discussion on who actually wrote the psalms, here is a scholarly article by James Hamilton.

 So here we are on bank holiday Monday.  Nothing local going on. I arose at 9.30. We thought of going to visit the American museum in Bath where they have a huge LEGO exhibition but we will do that tomorrow.

I must avoid getting side-tracked by depressing news e.g. the financial failure of local authorities.
Britain’s local government network has been shaken by a string of financial collapses in the past two years, starting with Slough and followed by Croydon, Thurrock and most recently Woking, which announced a deficit of £1.2bn in June after a risky investment spree.

So, back to the psalm again, I’m quite happy to rejoice but ‘being glad’  I’m not so sure about

The word glad comes from the Old English word glæd, which means bright, shining, or cheerful. It is related to the words gleam and glitter, which also have the sense of brightness or sparkle. Some synonyms of glad are happy, delighted, pleased, joyful, and cheerful. Some antonyms of glad are sad, unhappy, displeased, sorrowful, and miserable.

I can be glad because it is not subject or environmentally sensitive.  I suppose that focusing on any subject is like shining a light on it. We talk about being enlightened, a light amidst the darkness  or a light to lighten the gentiles.   The word light is probably what are the key words in scripture as well as in everyday language so after realising that, what am I going to cast light on?

Do I study the light of others such as watching a video about people who describe their experience of something? I could investigate on my own from first principles but this would take far longer. A huge learning can be achieved by joining the dots, in the phrase of David Icke within his wisely named website is the ‘dot connector’ which is so relevant and yet so difficult.

There is scope for us to think originally 24/7 but maybe this is more easily done during the course of conversation, not alone. However I know there are people who think better on their own free of distraction. If I were with someone who was not on the same wavelength, I would probably find it a mild irritation at a certain stage in the proceedings.

When I look for something in the dark, I do not flash my light in a cursory fashion I look at the matter from many angles. I remember once many years ago when I met Karlheinz Stockhausen  who said round the dinner table that people do not examine a given theme from enough different angles.  I heard him say that 40 years ago but it still sticks in my mind so there is obviously a lesson to learn here.

The example I gave with the American lecturer a couple of days ago shows how I hate pond-skating, jumping around from here to there, and yet I do it myself more often than I would care to admit.  I think it is done out of enthusiasm.

As an example I cite the recent fires in Hawaii.  We must look at

1. what happened from the observers point of view
2. what is claimed to happen from the mainstream media’s point of view
3. what is claimed from the ‘alternative media’s’ point of view
4.  what reason people might have for claiming one cause or another.
5. Are the reporters subject to conflict of interest i.e. who pays their salary?

In other words you cannot say that you understand all about a subject if you have just looked at it from one point of view. It may be that you stick with your point of view because it is comfortable and fits with your world view but that may well be a limitation; we have to tread the uncomfortable path if we want to understand the origin or basis of offered of facts – of whatever action or fact we espouse.

It seems not to be about what we think but how we think. What is our viewpoint?  Why do people have different points of view?     I suggest that there are people who go through life without one single original thought.  I remember the phrase ‘we were born originals, don’t let yourself die a copy’.

Are we afraid to even think originally and say something that other people might not take a liking to?  In other words, are we afraid to use our imagination.  If so, where did this fear come from?  Maybe it is about being rejected by the herd or the majority.  There was a time when to be an outcast meant physical death so do we think of this at a subconscious level.

I do get easily bored in conversation with people when I hear them recycling matters with no new content. I understand that gossip is a way of conveying useful information but can we reach up from time to time and say what if…..    how about….. is xxx possible…. I have challenged people recently and found to my surprise that they respond positively. It’s worth a shot.

There is no question that thinking itself is a dangerous occupation. As we have seen in the last two or three years, people have been killed, ‘suicided’, been sacked from their posts,  been ridiculed,  been harassed, all for saying something that is in many cases demonstrably true.

The doctor who said that the washing of hands would lessen infection and mortality was ridiculed.  The philosopher who said that the earth revolved round the sun (heliocentrism) was ridiculed and worse. Look what happened to him.   Are we prepared to stand up for what we believe?

Back to our topic.

There are things that need to be done such as maintaining our property and  generally doing our duty.

I know someone who used to pick a topic, study it for three months, and then move on to another one but that’s not the way I am built.

Within my daily duty remit is the maintaining of the covid site,  my 5G site and my diary.   These are standards of behavior that I have decided for myself.  Outside that I can choose to educate myself on a new subject,  or consolidate what I already know about a particular subject. There are not enough hours in the day to take on a new subject but I can consider it, if it relates to what I already know and am interested in. In other words it can be a sub topic or adjunct.

For example, my interest in extra terrestrial life  is attached to how human kind behaves and whether we are or have been influenced by ET civilizations of whom by the way there have been 120 examples of visitations to Terra, our planet. See exopolitics.com for more.

I also need to spend some time reading although I do find that when I have completed my tasks it is evening time and there is a bigger temptation to turn on the television. Last night there was a lovely example of slow television on BBC4  where the life of a shepherd in the Lake District was featured. The sheep were being taken down from the high areas to the lower areas to be sheared.  The program lasted 90 minutes, there was very little commentary save short poems and the pictures were allowed to speak for themselves. This, together with very high quality drone work gave us the sense of being there. It reminded me of a similar slow film also on BBC 4 of a trip along the Bath and Kennett canal.

I should also do some physical exercises as well. I know they need only take 10 minutes a day but when I’ve had my breakfast I’m so keen to get on to the computer that I forget these things, no doubt to my  detriment.

So we have the following factors to balance

maintaining physical life

exercising our body

cleaning and maintaining our physical domicile/environment

maintaining our existing priorities / obligations

assisting those who depend upon us

looking out for newer ideas to form an adjunct and an enrichment

taking time out for friends and  recreation

communing with nature

I do not suppose many people manage to balance the whole thing but we can at least be aware that these are factors  to be taken into consideration.

For me, I wish there were more than 24 hours in a day but I expect if there were 36 hours a day I would still fill all the time.   In eternity there is no time which I can see as the ultimate luxury.

So it is already 13:03 and I’ve got to think about lunch. I have spent my time writing these thoughts and for me it has encouraged me to clarify my thinking processes and has therefore been a very valuable exercise. That is why I recommend that everyone should keep a diary and if possible share it electronically. It is a great way of keeping friends and family in touch.

Our lunch. I wish avocado pears would not be so deceptive. There are times you press them and they seem fairly firm but are half rotten inside. We tend to have a large emphasis on salad, cheese, lettuce, good bread, vegetables in season, fruit. As regards timing, I like it when I have 80% of my dietary needs before 3 p.m. at the latest. If I do have any more in the evening I certainly regret it so you could say I go on a mini fast until the next morning. Maybe us older ones have less gastric juice available in the evenings.

…continued..  Social media is too fleeting and therefore insubstantial which is why I recommend good old-fashioned websites. Some are using sub-stack but then I don’t want to monetize.

As with Samuel Pepys’ monumental works  I write because it is in me, as one is motivated to paint a work of art.

A Carrot produces triplets

My goodness, I know that carrots come in  all shapes and sizes but this triplet home grown carrot was somewhat unusual and very aesthetically pleasing. This has nothing to do with  today’s events but I thought I’d mention it. If I had been more conscientious in the past I would have taken a photograph of every misshapen carrot I have ever grown and given it a name.

But then I have more important things to do with my time so that plan must go on to the great ‘to do’ list

To Shepton Mallet but diverted along the way

Midsomer Quilting is just outside Midsomer Norton and we have been there on and off for the last seven years.  We were driving to Shepton Mallet but I decided – so-called on impulse – to drop in and see how the owner, Chris, and his wife were doing.  There is something special about the atmosphere. It is always welcoming and community minded and inevitably I get offered a cup of coffee.

There were one or two people in the work room but two ladies who had visited if not the first time the second time.  They were given the treatment and Chris the owner  chatted as only he can with complete strangers but with one thing in common the love of Quilts and quilting.  We actually went into make sure that they were aware of the current Bath quilt exhibition  of works by Kaffe Fassett  who believe it or not is a male.  Yes they were aware of it but had not been so we encouraged the two ladies to go.

Francoise talking to the two lady visitors over a nice cup of coffee and some always available chocolate biscuits

This would be a positively dangerous place for anyone who loves quilting and any of its relations such as sewing, embroidery and so on. There are only one or two quilteries in UK of such a standard so if you are keen then it’s worth making the trip. Here is the website.

The owner discussed with me that he had one space for the next addition of his bulletin. I said that creativity is unlimited and you don’t have to look for it, it will look for you. We seem to be on the same page though we have not often discussed it.  I think it is an implied philosophy between us which is rather nice because you don’t have to spell everything out or explain everything.

The monthly market that was not

So we arrived, parked our car by Aldi as we normally do and went to see the High Street. The place was absolutely empty instead of The hussle and bustle of a fayre which I had expected.  There is a reason for everything including that which does not appear to have a reason. We inquired of a passing woman walking her dog and she also expected to find the  market. I guess that the Mendip Times  added the standard entry, which is on the last Sunday or every month and just put it in without checking whether the bank holiday would interfere.

Never mind we will make the best of it. It is nice in any event to get out and about. We went to the Polish shop in the Square and Francoise  bought some fish.  We made our way up the high street and on the way saw this sign which shows me beyond any shadow of doubt that I am way out of touch with what the young people are listening to in terms of music, or what they define as music. To me, music is melody and harmony but these adventures that the kids listen to is anything but.

Community Food Bank

On the way we spotted a community food bank. In it were about 6 large  bags of mixed lettuce and quite a number of bread rolls and baguettes. While we were looking at it, a woman looked over our shoulder. It was obviously not the first time she had been to this facility. She said ‘if you don’t take it, it would just be thrown away’ and looking at the sell by dates I could see what she meant.

We discussed not wasting food and she said when she was young, if she did not finish her meal her mother would keep it and she would have to eat it the next day. My own mother was the same, if I left food I was told about the starving Africans. This lesson has stuck with me all my life and I feel bad if I don’t finish food but I also feel bad when I see other people leaving food in restaurants. Why did they order it if they did not wish to eat it.

The woman was very chatty and said there were also food bank  outlets  in Glastonbury, which I have featured  in these diaries before, and also Frome.  I can only hope that they reach the population that they are designed for.  People should not feel ashamed about not being able to buy food; it is seldom their own fault as for example a partner who has lost their job, the rent has gone up, the gas and electricity have gone up and come the end of the month they simply don’t have the money to feed themselves.

A walk in the Park, Collett Park, which was gifted to the town by John Kyte Collett in 1906.  It is an ideal and safe place for exhibitions and fayres, as well as every-day playing of games with children. There is a small chic cafe where you can get good quality coffee and snacks. We did our rounds. Well done local council for keeping its maintained

Sign in a shop window

I think in most cases doubt is about not trusting your own intuition. If you’ve got an idea then there was a reason for it so don’t push your idea aside because something tells you it is not achievable. This is a good example of a juncture where you could speak to friends, and I don’t mean acquaintances, I mean people who really care for you and have known you for some time.

If you try something and the results are not what you expect or you don’t get the leverage, then at the very least you will learn something – so what’s the problem? Are we frightened of being laughed at for a new venture that we try. If we are laughed at let’s look at the character and the courage of those who have done the laughing. What have they got to show for their lives? I think a fellow traveler would not laugh but encourage.

A trip round Aldi

There was an Aldi in Germany where you could only get admittance if you had a relevant identity chip. This was not popular with the locals.

This branch of Aldi is quite big, about twice the size of our Midsomer equivalent, Lidl.   One of these days I must cure myself of the habit of walking around the non-food aisles to see if there is anything of interest. Inevitably there is not as I suppose this exercise is rather sad really, have I got nothing better to do and try and spot a bargain and if I buy one will I really use it?

The truth is we’ve got too much stuff already most of which we do not use and as I have said before we really must get round to clearing everything out of our property to be left with what is needed and give the rest to others either through a garage sale or a charity shop

Most of the people in their shop were doing their weekly shop with or without crying children. I realised that Sunday morning is sometimes the only occasion people have to do something together so I must be tolerant and charitable. I must say that the prices for wine were very good indeed even cheaper than Lidl.

Back to the car and off to find paint

BSM is a home store on a big scale where pretty much everything for the home is sold. We wanted some paint for the garage door which means  a metal friendly paint. We could not find the color we like and  as for price we saw small pots, 500 milliliters for sale at £16. Not the sort of thing you buy casually.

It is 1230 so quite a lot of the day left. We decided to go home and make lunch. Not much on the menu event-wise for tomorrow, Monday Bank Holiday, except a boat race in round Wells castle. Can I take the crowds? At a pinch I suppose I could but do I want to?  There is lots to do at home.

BONUS BONUS  BONUS

If you enjoy ‘oddly satisfying videos try this one for size. It shows workers at a new level.   Sit back and enjoy.

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Making a profit from Illness | THE DIRTY WAR ON THE NHS | John Pilger Health System Documentary

Miscellaneous distraction

Last night I had difficulties sleeping, I did not seem to be tired even if I retire 11.30 pm or so. . Maybe the answer is to stop watching TV earlier and read a book or something. I have come to believe that drinking chocolate in the evening stops me sleeping. In this event I move to the living room to sleep which I find very comfortable and either snooze or sleep,  normally the latter and I may wander back to the bedroom about half past six or so.  However unusual my sleeping patterns are I always seem to get enough sleep and arise fit and ready to go.

 What to write about?

This has never been a problem. I do not think I will ever ‘run out’ of topics to write about. The brain is the ultimate relational database and it works on many levels so how can you run out?  Spot the missing elements in the diagram above. Clue – these are only the mechanical elements of the brain.

What about the spirit?
What about telepathy?
What about intuition?
What about the soul if you believe in that sort of thing?

It is what is NOT listed in the diagram that makes a difference between us and machines (but then you knew that anyway).

I never know what I’m going to actually write about until I’ve had my coffee in the morning and even then I’m not sure except if it involves going out to places as we are doing tomorrow Sunday. We will probably include the market in Shepton Mallet. If any place needs a market it is this town where the old indeed historic High Street with a significant proportion of empty shop units and where even during a weekday you can count on the fingers of one hand people walking up and down.

Today’s theme was created because I received an email from John Manley who is an American ‘light worker’ and campaigner who wrote in great lengths about the passing of his wife last year and the effect it had on him and others. I wrote back to him congratulating him on having the courage to speak about personal things. He wrote back to me thanking me and I noticed one of the adverts on his page which you see as a headline today.

As you may know I am a Christian and for some reason the above video flipped over to an address by David Jeremiah, who is an evangelical Christian and very active in America. He is talking about ‘The Fear of Sudden Trouble’. He struck me as a person with a wonderful – well – personna – an  authoritative voice containing love but not hectoring or bullying. Very few preachers have this natural God given ability. He says among many other things that fear is an intrinsic part of our life in this world. By great coincidence the instructional phrase ” fear not”  is in the bible 365 times.  This was drawn to our attention by the Charleston Gazette (USA)

So many things are competing for my attention this morning. I’m watching a video by the Dark Journalist on Edgar Casey’s prophecy for the 21st century plus the need to remove the evil regime of Joe Biden.  I think we tend to get lost in ‘information’  (in formation) and the inevitable panic and disturbance that it brings. These ‘sleeping prophets’ had (have) the ability for overview which I find comforting and somehow I have to find the time today to watch the best part of three hours of this wisdom and observation. It is very technical and will interest those interested in Atlantis, plus the niceties of the USA electoral system.

TV vs Library

Anyway, before the arrival of between three or four ‘must see’ videos I was going to talk about poor people who buy big TVs.  I will take a guess that the stimulus for doing this is when they receive a lump sum of money from the government the easiest thing to gratify the sense of possession is to buy a huge TV and paraded in your living room.  The idea of ‘saving’ for some people is not a concept they are familiar with;  it is hand to mouth living and if someone hands you a big sum you spend a big sum. I have been in this hand to mouth state in my earlier life so I do not look down on it. It compresses the mind to survival mode and it is not pleasant putting it mildly.

My own history of book owning goes back a long time and by the way I’m not saying I’m a rich person. I have been fascinated by books, not only the book itself but the process of acquiring it, the fact that it exists, the fact that it exists in my collection, the fact that I can add to the collection at any time. I like the feel of books. I like the smell of new books. I like the fact that other people can see them. I like the fact that when someone comes to stay they can take their pick of a good selection. I find the idea of book burning a la Hitler to be sacrilegious, never mind the burning of libraries.

On my nearest shelf  for immediate reading I have a small list of books that I have read but there is another bigger pile of books that are waiting to be finished.  I do not finish books because I do not like the style, or because I get the idea, or something else more tempting comes along. If and when we  get another lockdown or should I say if people are foolish enough to respond to the latest scam, a request for lockdowns, then I could probably spend some time catching up. Amazon has been a blessing and a curse. I can  be notified about the existence of the book in the afternoon and the next day it is in my hands.  The idea of ‘going to a bookshop and browsing’ belongs in the dim and distant past.

If by some terrible misfortune I lose my eyesight I will definitely have a garage sale, advertise it in Bristol and Bath and other literary places and make sure that my books get into the right hands.  I like to think that my collection is unique as indeed we all are in the composition of our soul.  I reckon if everybody realized this, we would have far less mental illness because there would be more dignity arising from the sense of us feeling to be a unique person.

If you wish to comment on any of this or add your own two penny worth please feel free to fill in the form.  I don’t mind if you agree or disagree.

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This sacred knowledge reveals how to control your reality. The seven rules of Hermeticism. I would can them guiding principles on the nature of ….

This morning we just felt like going out for breakfast. We try to let go of things a little bit on Friday in preparation for the weekend which funnily enough is busier than weekdays what with all the activities we try to attend.  I was thoroughly lazy and looked on Google to see ‘breakfast places near where I am’  and apart from the usual suspects one entry jumped up which was the Riverside Cafe in Radstock where we have never been for a breakfast before.

Off we went to find 2 of the 14 covers inside occupied by a man and his wife.  They come every day. He so we found out was 95 years of age and suffering from dementia but he was cheerful and positive and apologized for sitting with his back to us. This reminded me of good old fashioned courtesy.

I ordered a Riverside breakfast which was a fairly generous plate of food and Francoise  asked for the vegetarian equivalent. Both were slightly more than we could eat.  I had a latte and she had a tea and the total came to about 20 pounds which I thought was about right.   The food took its time to come, about 15 minutes, but that was partly because they had run out of mushrooms and one of the staff was sent out to get some more.

Of interest was the way that the owner who is a Somerset man responds to criticism.  Reading all the reviews I’m not sure whether they are genuine. ‘Support Our Local Cafe’  is not something the average reviewer writes.

There is one review, in fact more than one review which shows that the owner needs a little bit of public relations training.

We have decided to cut down the scope of our garden work to two elements, hedge cutting and trimming; and mowing. I noticed that I am slightly uneasy on my feet these days so we cannot be over ambitious. Francoise is always available to hold a ladder if I have to climb one. I am definitely the world’s worst person with regard to heights because I can’t even stand on the top of a ladder without getting some vertigo.

I had today what I would call the ideal job for my gardening situation at the moment. The customer lives nearby, in Chilcompton, and we had done work for them last year. As I have said before, I only do work for people if I feel comfortable with them and the last job I did for them was a pleasure. It consists of a large front hedge which is actually a hybrid as it has many elements to it. I am familiar with it as we had trimmed it last year. This year, nature has been very much being prolific with hazelnuts being added to the mix.

My customer was a well traveled Irishman and although he did not display it to the full I’m sure he has the gift of the gap as do so many Irish. I like their sense of humour, their literacy and their inquiring minds. In case you did not know, the phrase Gift of the Gab goes back to the Blarney Stone. Head to Blarney Castle and kiss the stone, if you do so you would be granted the Gift of the Gab, a ‘silver tongued eloquence beyond measure’.

The word gab is of mixed derivation, it can be just the action of talking or chatter, but also falsehood and deceit but originally in the 12th century a gibe or a taunt. The Blarney Stone presumably brings out the best of human nature within this remit.

I asked after his wife as she been the visible customer last time. He said that she had a big problem with her hip which was almost useless and she was hobbling around like an old woman. He told me that although they were covered by private health insurance, they still needed a doctor from the National Health Service to sign a form to verify her condition before they could take her on. The wife had the X-ray 6 weeks ago and they were assured that it would take only two weeks to get a signature but nothing has happened to date.

During the garden work I thought about this and  I suggested  that he should ask the hospital if there was anything they had not done, or failed in any way? This might activate what remains of their humanity and compassion to get a better result. I said they were unlikely to get a quicker result by complaining or threatening.

Anyway back to the job in hand.

There is often more to a hedge than meets the eye. It is quite rare to have a hedge that is composed of just one genre,  privet for example.  If thee is a mixture you have to treat different genres in different ways allowing for their individual growth habits.  If a hedge has not been treated for a long time it needs to be reshaped and this is a slightly different skill set from trimming it. Trimming is the easy part;  shaping requires time so if I tend to a hedge I should tend to it at least twice a year one in late spring and one in September or October and probably three times a year would be ideal.

If there is a lot of overgrowth, I find I need to cut once, leave it and then cut it again. Even 30 minutes later is enough for the branches to settle in a new position where you can see where you should cut. I always say that if you know how to give a hair cut, you can be a good hedge cutter. The same principles apply, well almost.

We did the job and it was duly  inspected. Before that I had another chat with him about the state of the country (UK). He had lived in Dublin but decided that as there was not much going on there, that the streets of England particularly London were paved with gold this would be a good time to move and that was in the 80s. Things have changed since then.

He told me that he had worked in Africa extensively and particularly in Kenya. He said that many Europeans were thinking of settling there permanently because of the better social conditions, and the culture. Francoise asked me afterwards if the health care in Kenya was up to standard. I had previously talked about people who were thinking of leaving the United Kingdom because it was going to be unlivable what with the refugees and so on. The Mayor of London was not serving the people, but outside interests.

This job was ideal for many reasons. It took between two and two and a half hours which is about right for our energy level at the moment. The customer was very pleasant, on my wavelength,  and we had a good rapport. We seem to have agreed the amount that was due almost telepathically because when he suggested a certain sum, it was the amount that I was going to ask for anyway. I feel we did a really good job, the weather was less warm and sticky  in the morning than it would have been in the afternoon so we got the timing right as well. All in all a very nice way of helping to pay the bills. As I have previously said, if you don’t like the person or their attitude is negative it really does make it a job of work and takes away energy and joy. Who needs that?

I know that some people have to suffer this sort of condition at work on a day to day basis and I sympathize with them. I suppose if you have an unsympathetic boss who has a ‘take it or leave it’ attitude there is not much you can do. This was how unions developed in the first place but that’s another story. The problems are more extreme in other parts of the world – on the surface anyway.

I am still somewhat on a high after writing yesterday’s record breaking diary entry. Most days I get my ideas for the day fairly early say before 10 o’clock but today nothing has happened of any note and certainly nothing to jog me into action.

I have been watching Dolores Cannon who is a very senior and well-respected lecturer and author in America. She talks about matters such as near death experiences and what happens between lives. In order to get peace of mind I believe we need to view the world from the right perspective in other words  true perspective.  Dolores says there is no such thing as hell, this was an invention of the church, and that we are welcomed by those who love us and want to guide us further when we pass over.

She says that people die when it is their time  and even at the way of dying was decided in advance when you incarnated this time around. I am not sure why evangelical Christians disbelieve reincarnation. It is not anti-christian, it is not anti-anything really it’s just the fact that the soul has consciousness and it has certain tasks to do and if it doesn’t achieve those tasks in one life then it needs to come back and do it again.

In an ideal situation we do enough to go back to God and we will never have to incarnate again. Dolores says that the idea of playing harps etc in so-called heaven sounds to her very boring. She is much more interested in the schools that she says exists there to teach us more. She must be the best part of 80 years now that she’s still loves learning and experiencing and this is the way I want to be. It is why I watched her video even though the sound level is very poor. I commend it to you as someone whose body language shows that she has nothing to prove, believes what she says through thousands of testimonies, and is at peace with herself.

This is the video.  NB low sound level

A holiday at home

Today I rose and had for breakfast porridge with a multitude of raspberries from the allotment and blueberries. There were  almost as many fruits as there was porridge and I enjoyed every moment of it. I like to get the major part of my eating done by about two o’clock. I take the same view but if I was taking a car on a long journey I would fill up with petrol I do it earlier rather than later stage.

We are blessed with a really sunny and warm day. The last thing I want to do is to go anywhere.  The idea of sitting in a hot car for one and a half hours to go to the coast does not appeal. I’d have just heard that two friends of mine who were coming to visit us this weekend cannot come due to academic and time commitments. From the human point of view I am a little bit disappointed as we had made plans, but from the quantum entanglement point of view it matters not  because I have essential communication with them and I  can even speak on the phone or by zoom if I wish to. As I say – wavelength and frequency is everything.

When all said and done you cannot have a beer together remotely.  I do feel that meetings by zoom can be damaging for the psychology in the long term because it becomes normalized as the default way of communication. People are not getting much out of it and wonder why. You cannot beat face to face or shall we say heart to heart contact

Would you like to identify as a gold fish?

I read today of someone who identified with being a motor car. Will this be as you want to be identified as craze never end? This is not the most attractive picture of a pond but this is our pond and it has five goldfish.It had more but the unfailing GPS of a heron not only knows where to come but when to come.

Somewhere we have chosen to be human beings. I wonder if fish choose to be fish. Perhaps free will does not operate in the kingdom of animals. The point is that there are certain advantages to being a fish. Your food supplies are easily available, as you are part of the natural world you don’t have to pay attention to any of the features that human beings have to. When it comes your time to die, you are either eaten by other creatures or gently go to sleep.

The point of being a human being is that we had this wonderful thing called choice. We can create. We can use our freedom to become a more glorious person or we can use the same freedom to become a robber, a thief, a rapist. This freedom brings responsibility and I suppose if we don’t accept responsibility we should not complain if things go wrong for us.

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Its one of the things that make me sick, almost physically, when young children are indoctrinated with this trans/sex change indoctrination. Here is an example when parents of a 4 year old pulled a boy out of school only to be called a ‘bigot’. Standards have just evaporated.

I got this great idea that the more you worry about things the more the solutions are going to come to you. I worry about the future of the world, I worry about the welfare of my friends.  I worry about the people suffering from fires. I worry about the refugees streaming into this country (UK)  without being stopped or turned away. If I want more things to worry about I can simply turn on the news.

What does it mean, to worry?   What does it mean?

I am tempted at this point to use Bing  which can now be accessed from within Skype.  I asked the question and this was its reply which in my opinion is as good a starting point as any

To worry means to feel uneasy or concerned about something that might happen or has happened. It can also mean to bother, annoy, or harass someone or something. Worry can be a noun or a verb, depending on how it is used in a sentence. Here are some examples of worry as a noun and a verb:

Worry can have different synonyms and antonyms, depending on the context and the part of speech. For example, some synonyms of worry as a verb are bother, trouble, distress, or pester. Some antonyms of worry as a noun are calmness, peace, tranquility, or relief.

Worry comes from the Old English word wyrgan, which means to strangle In Middle English, it also meant to seize by the throat and tear, or to harass. The sense of causing anxiety to someone developed in the early 19th century

I find the etymology of the word wrygan  meaning ‘strangle’ most interesting.   How can we get  the old meaning – by the throat –  to the current perhaps lazily used word worry.

We are very lazy in our use of words these days. We use the word ‘worry’ when in fact we could use the following synonyms more effectively –  have misgivings about, be apprehensive of, be concerned about, have a problem with, uneasy about, be distressed, be disturbed, be perplexed. Why don’t we think more carefully  about using a catch-all word when in fact it doesn’t really mean much, being in many cases too bland.  After writing this, I will certainly monitor my use of the word ‘worry’ in the same way that I monitor the use of the word ‘nice’

So if I need or find it necessary to worry or be preoccupied with something  probably over which I have no control, what is the point?  I will succeed mostly in frustrating myself. No change will happen and I will possibly divert myself from useful activity which could indeed make a difference.

Do I worry because of lack of faith?  There is a clue in the etymology that the throat energy centre or chakra is that related to creativity. Maybe worrying says a lot about our own creativity  or lack of it. In a strange way it could also relate to laziness.

What conditions pertain when I am not worrying?  In my case it happens to be when I’m doing something useful, making a difference to myself or others, in some way adding to the sum total of happiness or humanity in the universe. When I do this I’m in a state of mind where irrespective of the nature and extent of the evil that is going on I am somehow inured from it. Action has the power to take away fear.

Trip to Bath

The day started with a cool breeze but promised warmth and sunshine and indeed it delivered. I had a business meeting in the morning but we managed to catch the 11:20 a.m. from Wells to Bath. Francoise had had no breakfast and was looking forward to our accustomed meal deal from Morrison’s local market shop. You get a medium container from the cold salad bar, a healthy drink and a bag of crisps all for the very tidy sum of four pounds. That kept us going for the day.

On the bus we had a man with learning difficulties who was announcing on his phone at the top of his voice that he was looking forward to meeting a friend at the day after. I think everyone realized that all was not quite right within so we tolerated him in a good natured way.

A value for money lunch

There is a new branch of Morrisons by the bus station just around the corner and they are very much geared to grab and go people. They have an excellent self-service salad bar and if you have a medium size plastic container you can have a special meal deal which includes a very healthy and refreshing fruit juice and a packaged of crisps.  The price of the whole is £4.  That pretty much filled us up for the day.

When we came to eat our lunch on the table and chairs thoughtfully provided by Morrison’s there was a woman at an adjacent seat staring into the distance who from time to time shouted. They were noises rather than words and seemed rather random to me. She was later joined by a friend and she quietened down a bit. We wondered whether she had Tourette’s syndrome. I can tolerate a few such people even with good nature but if I was in an institution where everyone was like that, I think I would have a much more difficult time, to be honest.

Sugar Bomb Central

Some of us wonder why the population is so overweight and unhealthy. I see children as young as seven who are obviously overweight and who fit in very well with their overweight parents but what will happen to them in the future? The sort of shop illustrated here,  the Kingdom of Sweets,  will for unwise parents load their children up with a far greater dose of sugar than is desirable.   If we could see with other eyes all the sweets contain about 50% sugar, coloring,  preserving agents,  tasting agents, any mysterious E240 ingredients with no explanation.

From the NHS

Adults should have no more than 30g of free sugars a day, (roughly equivalent to 7 sugar cubes). Children aged 7 to 10 should have no more than 24g of free sugars a day (6 sugar cubes). Children aged 4 to 6 should have no more than 19g of free sugars a day (5 sugar cubes).

I will make a wild guess and assume that a big ‘suck it and see’ lollipop would contain enough sugar to be close to the daily allowance.

I was shocked to see the prices of the drinks. Is anyone seriously going to pay four pounds for a 500 ml can of sugar.  I suppose they do, otherwise this outlet would not function.

A Meeting with Mark Masters, artist

Bath is quite an arty place.  There are many venues for art large and small and no doubt they take advantage of the high tourist footfall certainly in the season.   This was a temporary exhibition called ‘Monsters from the id.’    Mark, the artist,  obviously didn’t want to write ID  in the title of his show = which is short for identity – and I can only assume that the id  is that used in Freudian psychological terminology.  According to his psychoanalytic theory of Personality, the ID is the personality components made up of unconscious psychic energy and works to satisfy basic urges needs and desires. It operates based on the pleasure principle which demands immediate gratification of needs it could be said to be the primitive and instinctive component of the psychic energy that includes urges, impulses, the libido and everything involved in survival Instincts.  The exhibition is at 44AD, Art Space, 4 Abbey Street, Bath BA1 1NN  and is open until 3rd September 2023

We found Mark to be a very pleasant and approachable person who unusually does not put prices on his artwork because he thinks it should be open to negotiation. He is aware of covid, the difficulties of maintaining individual financial stability etc. and I think that is a remarkable gesture which I have not come across before.

Well done Mark.

He finds the creation of work very organic and he is moved – as many artists are – to tune into various aspects of the universe and draw as inspired. I discussed with him and he agreed that it is up to people whether they like it or not and not really my business.   I discussed with him how was it possible to sleep normally during the creation of an art work because in a way the brain would not go to sleep. If I was painting the Sistine Chapel and that over a long period because of its complexity, would I be able to sleep normally. I doubt it

Mark at  15 years of age saw the film  ‘Forbidden Planet’  and that’s what triggered his artistic talents focusing on  the dark side of the mind. He uses dark color and it doesn’t like to paint in day time and prefers to paint in the evening with yellow light, a different wavelength and in general a different quality of light. He can mix his paints in the different way than if he was working to daylight.

He is very aware that his type of painting and subject matter is not liked by all. It’s a bit like Marmite either you love it or you hate it. Francoise said she would agree with this. She said that she finds this painting style really interesting but it’s not a style that she would like to hang in the  sitting room. He  understood that. He says that he will carry on doing the style of painting because this is what is in his mind and for him it’s a search for what is in the unconscious and what comes up in his dreams and that is what he is interested in. He uses oil paint. He said it is possible to  so publish a book and gave the name of a company, one of many,  ‘XYZ’ but on looking it up in Google it seems to be mostly focused on 3D printing.

I said that every painting should ask a question. His work certainly asks a lot of questions.  They ask the question ‘what is good and what is bad. Is there a dynamic between the two.  A coin has two sides and we need dark as well as light in my view.

I said that I have similar sentiments with my diary work (this diary).  I don’t mind whether they love it or hate it but the main point is that if we can cause people to think that is job done.

I said  that some of his images reminded meat of sea creatures that could be seen 2,000 meters down. Mark sometimes takes pictures in his garden of natural forms, loads it into his computer and looks for the form that he is seeking.  Once he was inspired by tiles on the kitchen floor.

A meeting with Annie in the Gardens

We entered the gardens at the centre of Bath by the river and the Weir. I noticed someone reading assiduously on a bench and something made us or certainly me make a beeline for it although there were other seats empty.

I ate the remains of my ice cream while the author engaged her in conversation and this started by Francoise asking  Annie what she was reading. The Author was Brandon Sanderson Elantris 2, part of a Books Collection Pack Set RRP: £17.98 (Elantris, The Emperor’s Soul).  This was a fantasy book.

We then discussed what type of books I found most attractive.  The last book I read and consumed was by an Indian doctor of 102 years of age who was still practicing,  we read about her observations,  her experience, the difficult early days that she had to endure.   This was a real page turner and I read  the entire book over a period of 24 hours.  This is The Well- Lived Life by Dr. Gladys McGarry.

I’m more interested in political stuff, biographies and autobiographies, provided they are not pretentious but I am less interested in fantasy. Maybe I should consider that as an escape route from the normal day to day study work that I preoccupy myself with.

Annie, now 21 (she was born the year before Francoise and I met). She was born in Latvia and came to Lincolnshire at the age of five and now lives in Bath. In my experience, very little happens in Lincolnshire except a lot of fields and she certainly felt the need to escape at an early stage.  She has been studying psychology for the past two years and next year will be going on a placement at a major University, I think it was Cambridge.

She failed to get into the university and told me a funny story about the person who interviewed her who gave her a complicated paper about monkey behavior and gave her 15 minutes to read it and then questioned her. When she was unable to come up with an answer the interviewer said “do you know what the word correlation means’?  She failed the interview.

Now due to a twist of fate the same examiner is going to be supervising her. You couldn’t make it up.

I also described her jeans with their many gaps and strands as a work of art.

In short we had a great meeting and although I will not meet her again I don’t think either of us will forget the conversation in a hurry. Such is synchronicity and long may it live.  That is something that a robotic mind cannot  achieve or indeed create.

In general I  was very impressed with the way she comported herself and her wisdom and her thoughtfulness, a million miles away from the average student who spends more time on their mobile phones the actually reading books.  We wished her a happy life and I’m sure she will have one. I recommended to her that she should not compromise with anything because that is not the way she is built, or her soul ancestry we can say.

A special coffee

After admiring the waters flowing over the Weir and me promising to go on a pleasure Boat at some future time, we went for a visit in to the old fashioned market. This is situated at the back of the Town Hall and is to be recommended to any visitor.

Francoise went to buy some cheese from a French seller as it happens and I had a coffee at one of the rather chic coffee bars in the market. Very few people know how to make a latte. It’s not coffee with milk. The person who made it knew exactly what he was doing, he had the right brand of coffee, and I was happy to pay £3.20 for the privilege. I lingered over it, savoring each sip. The barista  had actually warmed the cup which meant I could enjoy a hot coffee.

To the City Art Gallery

We want it to see a special exhibition by a single artist on quilts. Quilts are indeed a labour of love.  If you want to count the hours it takes to do something then you are in the wrong job.  I do not know how the artist found time to do all these wonderful examples.

We had fun meeting people as we normally do.  I said to a fellow male visitor who turned out to be a rather serious German that it was difficult to capture the texture of clouds and indeed it was also difficult to capture the texture of quilting with a camera. He said in a rather labored way that he would try to get  a good result. From the look of his camera I would think that’s a pretty much a given so I reminded him not to be too self critical.

The lady at the entrance said that if we would like to see the reverse of the quilt we could do so and I’m very glad she said it because the reverse to my amateur eye bore very little resemblance to what I saw on the front. I reckon it would take years and years to really understand this artistic skill.

Here are a few examples. I am not qualified enough to comment on the technical side and they must speak for themselves.

mirrors

It is always interesting to see where people have come from and just in case you cannot read easily the places are South Gloucestershire, Buckinghamshire, Essex, Sarasota Florida,  Dorset,  Portishead.

A final walk through the town. We went to Waitrose to get some unhomogenised milk. We then both decided that we had had enough. My principle is you should stop when you could do a bit more.  My records show 6,720 steps. Not a lot. I have done 12,000 and still not felt tired.

To the central bus stop. We are served by four bus routes 522,172,173,174 so there is no need to worry about time tables. Sure enough there was one bus just loading and we joined in the queue.