(0804) Sunny day out there, mornin’ all. Sorry I could not tailor my sleep pattern to exactly 8 a.m., then I realised I’d changed it to 8.30 a.m. Anyway, the main post is up at Orphans and Jstack. (0917) All right, folks, must fly. Back after this thing is done. Hopefully. Hour and a half, all right? (0918)
11. Another tale with Noah Woods in mind
Was about to run some sicko’s comment under the “no further news on Noah” Sun item, then realised it was a sick attempt to provoke us, just as was intended by the sickos in power. And a quick scroll down X and there does seem no further news.
Now … our Steve mentioned about water claiming them and I left it at that but of course the mind wanders to the state of our streets just now … either our “guests” or homegrown sickos you understand.
Last thought was just let it be, buy in no further.
I do have a memory of my own though. Three memories actually.
First is when I was a child, seeing a photo of myself at what must have been about 6 to 9 months. I’d been put on the driveway, sloping down to no gate but the road at the end of the down-driveway. I was in nappy and top and I had my eyes on that road. Plus I had a way of moving called “the crab”.
The fact that someone had taken the shot was safety enough but all the same … I could motor along quite quickly using “the crab”. It was not a high danger road though.
Second was after I’d learnt to ride a bike without training wheels. I was always allowed out for some reason … maybe they wanted peace and quiet … it must have been holiday time. Anyway, off I pedalled.
Thought struck me that if I was careful, I could go past my usual limits and as long as car drivers would give me a wide berth or I kept my wits about me and would walk the bike through narrow sections, it should be ok-ish. So off I headed towards the big smoke some ten miles away. Sounded reasonable … maybe a twenty mile round trip.
The drivers were quite accommodating (maybe I was 8 at the time) … at least I made it home in one piece, yet mother was perturbed. Er … why?
The third and last for now I’ve told before. Now that make of sailing dinghy I know had to mean about 12 years old, maybe 13. Summer holidays. This time I asked my olds could I do this trip past three rocky points to a yacht club down that way, maybe four miles? Yes? Oh, ok, fine. So I prepared the eight foot dinghy and off I went, nice breeze, tacking into it on the outward journey, a nice run back later.
That one went off well, it was boring at the other end so I launched and headed back again. Turned out my mother had been watching through the binocs most of the way and I suspect m’da had driven down there just in case. It all seemed quite reasonable, that voyage.
It’s only now I’m thinking … what the *&£#£&* were they doing allowing me to do that? Were they … er … hoping against hope …?
Nah, never … I was a lovely little chappy, a bit loud at times, salt of the earth. Yeah.
10. Moo corner
9. The bona fides of med qualifications
After I had the heart attack, a fair time after, I was called in by the med practice and told I needed to see a specialist at the big hospital. The crusty, crotchety GP was typical Brit, everything too much trouble but one of the old school. So I turned up at the hospital and waited. And waited.
Out came an Indian, sat by the far wall, asking maybe three questions, nothing to do with meds, then said I was coming off one of them.
Within three days, I made an appointment to see the GP … yes it was still possible in those pre-covid-scam days … and I could not breathe properly. She was angry, the GP, said all right, you can have it back but it’s not doing anything for you.
Next day, I was fine, breathing fine, all well. Not daring to look at qualifications as a topic, you understand.
8. We may have had this one already, sorry me
7. News from downunder
No. 11. That was life as children in the 1940s – 50s – 60s. From about the age of 5/6 I would leave the house after breakfast, return for lunch: the off again until supper. My parents knew that I was “Down the fields”. When older I used to cycle for miles and miles. Take a sandwich and be away all day. Ask at any house for water to drink. no problems.
That was life as I knew it, Jim.
That too was me, Dad. Out all day at weekends, exploring the byways of my beloved Dorset. I would build my own bikes and thrash the living daylights out of them. Before the age of 12 I’d been through several. The weather didn’t bother me either, or my mates. The journey was everything. Mum would give me sixpence, or if I was lucky a shilling. In those days we didn’t have a phone so a few coppers were kept for emergencies, which never came, so I didn’t have to phone our next door neighbour’s number. Happy days 🙂
Replying to James my reaction to the news about little Noah comes from a childhood memory of a boy who drowned in a pond nearby. It started out as a large excavation pit, dug during the Victorian era it even had a local name. The clay soil held a lot of water so most of the time it was full. It was also deep, about 30ft. The police dragged it and that’s how he was found. Can’t be sure if he was 6 or 7 but the tragedy happened the same year as the Apollo 11 moon landing. Public anger forced the Council’s hand so the pit/pond was fenced off then filled the following year.
#metoo. My childhood was much like yours in that respect Steve. Homemade or repaired bikes, distance increasing as I grew older and braver. Away all day, returning late afternoon with bags of roadside crabapples. Sometimes with such an appetite that I would use mum’s dough mixing bowl for my cornflakes, it was massive! At age thirteen I was travelling into London to go around the engine sheds. These days I don’t think long, lone bike rides are advisable and I dread the thought of going into London.
Not many today have childhoods like we had Andy. Kiddy fiddlers were dealt with locally as invariably the boys in blue would look the other way. So quiet on the roads in the evening we used to play football using opposite covered bus stops as goalposts. Carol singing was a big deal at Christmas and we knew all the words/music from school. Don’t see any of that now. We even used to make our own fireworks, well explosives anyway. Dropped into those old metal dustbins we used to bet on how far up we could get the lid to go. There was one kid who always seemed to win and we wondered where he got all that gunpowder. Pushing the envelope is what boys do 🙂
Gentlemen, we seem to have had similar in some ways. The level of freedom compared to today or rather the bad consequences today … well just how lucky were we?