I got up yesterday morning and switched on the computer to find that my lovely readers had already sent £100 for my chosen charity, the East Anglian Air Ambulance. By the time I went to bed last night this had risen to £165. In one day I have reached 30% of my £500 target for the year. I am 99.9999999% certain that I will meet that target and probably exceed it in the coming months.
I'm also on schedule with the walks as well. So must be time to break out the Bubbly in anticipation. Anything for a celebration. If you would like to donate to the charity just go to the Just Giving website and put my name in the search section. Or you can follow this link:
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/peter-steward
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Now to something a little less edifying. Yesterday was January 5th and so it was back to the tennis courts for my regular Thursday session - our first of 2022. So what do you think are the worst conditions to play tennis in during the winter? You might be surprised to find it's not the cold or wind but frost and sun.
It looked like a lovely crisp day as I set off for the journey of about five miles. The sun was out, the temperature was going up. In fact a lovely day for a walk, which I did later in the day. Problem was when we got to the courts they were covered with frost and were very slippery. So four of us just patted the ball back and forth until it had thawed sufficiently to play a simple game that didn't involve much running. Balls I would normally have reached easily were out of my zone and I just had to let them sail by. The sun made it virtually impossible to see the ball from one end of the court. So we piddled around for a while, managed to get a set in and then called it a day before somebody broke something.
All that of course pales into insignificance when compared with the trials and tribulations of a certain World Number One by the name of Novak Djokovic who is trying to play at the Australian open tennis championships which start shortly. And I say good for the Australian Government who have said that he cannot take part or come into the country.
You see there seems to be considerable doubt as to whether Djokovic has been vaccinated. As he hasn't said that he has and as there's talk of him having a medical exemption, we must assume that he doesn't see the point of having the needle (pun intended). This is the man who previously during Covid lockdown held a party in March 2021 after winning the Australian title. This is the guy that has a huge entourage or team that includes nutritionists and his own chef to prepare super healthy meals. This is the man who, apparently, doesn't see the benefits of vaccinations in keeping both himself and others safe. This is the man who has, in the past, bleated that he's not as popular with the public as his two biggest rivals - Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. Is there any wonder? In fact Nadal said that Djokovic was free to make his own mind on vaccinations but had to realise that there were consequences to not being vaccinated. It will be interesting to see on what grounds he claims he has medical exemption. At the time of writing this he was holed up in a less than luxurious hotel awaiting appeals and decisions at law. My advice is that he needs to stop being a plonker.
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Still on the theme of sport. It's good to see that in one area England and Australia share a problem. I'm talking Ashes cricket here and batting specifically. Australia have problems fitting all their batsmen in whilst England have a problem of trying to find batsmen good enough to play. Usman Kawaja was brought into the latest test by Australia and promptly smashed a big century. Australia must have 20 batsmen who could walk into the lamentable England team (Joe Root excepted of course).
Our performance in the four tests to date has been pathetic. The best bowling performance by an England player in this match was by Stuart Broad who took five wickets and is definitely in the top 10 greatest fast bowlers to play for England. Indeed only James Anderson has taken more test wickets for our country (Broad has 531 to be precise). Admittedly at the age of 35, Broad's time at test level is limited but he has been a touch peeved that he's only played in a couple of the tests in Australia. Broad is an intelligent assessor of cricket and said this week "It doesn't matter who you play as bowlers if the team in front of you only scores 140." This is a reference to England's pathetic batting. Broad can be as outspoken as he wants to be as more fans will listen to what he has to say than the coaches and selectors who have probably proved themselves unfit for the job. I'm sure Stuart Broad will have more to say on selection - after all he's got nothing to prove. Enough of sport.
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People in our modern society panic when they lose their mobile phones. Youngsters will burst into tears - not at the loss but the fact that they won't be able to phone or text friends, play games etc etc.
I am currently reading a biography of Tudor Prince Arthur - the man who should have been king instead of his younger brother who became Henry VIII. Arthur sadly died at Ludlow of an illness that has never definitely been diagnosed but which is likely to have been the sweating sickness - a possible illness similar to the plague. After his demise, a herald set off to break the news to the king (Henry VII) in London. It took him two days to get there! Now that news would be all over the world in seconds.
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I have been listening to a very interesting album by David Bowie entitled Toy. It seems incredible that it's six years since Bowie died (10th January 2016 to be precise). Toy is part of a new retrospective collection entitled "Brilliant Adventure 1992-2001". It was originally due for release in 2001 but got shelved. Toy is also being released as a single CD today.
It's an important addition to his work. Basically he re-visited a number of his earlier songs - many from the days when he sounded like Anthony Newley (deliberately I might add). But he has put lush orchestration to them making them have a much fuller sound. I believe he said he was going into the studio "to sing my tits off" when he decided to re-record them.
I have always liked these early Bowie songs (just listen to London Boys if you want to see what I mean). I'm not sure whether I prefer the new versions or the earlier more sparse ones. I do like the new version of "Can't Help Thinking About Me." It's very autobiographical and was actually recorded with one of his first bands The Lower Third shortly after he changed his name from his birth name of David Jones. The lyrics reflect on Bowie's life growing up. They include the following:
Question-time that says I brought dishonour
My head's bowed in shame
It seems that I've blackened the family name
Mother says that she can't stand the neighbours' talking
I've gotta pack my bags, leave this home, start walking, yeah
Remember when we used to go to church on Sundays
I lay awake at night, terrified of school on Mondays
Oh, but it's too late now
I wish I was a child again
I wish I felt secure again
I think a lot of us could identify with those words.
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Talking of school, I have a recurring dream about my grammar school. It's a series of images that fall somewhere between a dream and a nightmare. It's not all that frightening but rather confusing. Basically I'm in the sixth form, but aged about 25 and at the end of each year I'm continually told that I have to re-sit the year. I suppose it's a kind of educational Groundhog Day.
In the dream I have the feeling that I'm never going to break out of the school into the adult world. It's a strange dream because I certainly wasn't unhappy at school and remember it with considerable affection.
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Warning Alert - The following part of this blog may upset some people.
We have been having problems with our Sky television for a few weeks. It freezes and then won't start and then drops out and all kind of manner of other things. So I phoned Sky up to see if they could sort it out over the telephone.
A very helpful lady originally from South Africa (yes I did ask her if she came from New Zealand) whose name was Belinda (is everyone with the name Belinda helpful I ask - that's a in comment aimed at somebody who will be reading this and they know who they are) tried a few things that didn't work and said the only thing she could think of was re-booting the hard drive. The problem was that this would wipe out all our recorded programmes. That didn't concern me greatly but my other threequarters guards her recorded programmes very tightly.
"Does this mean we will lose our recordings of Call The Midwife and Casualty?" I asked.
"I'm afraid so," she replied.
"Oh good let's do it," I added. But then she burst my bubble "You can always watch them on catch up."
Belinda turned out to be a fan of "Call The Midwife," "Casualty" and "Holby City." I did think about terminating the call on the basis of bad taste but decided to carry on. After a lot of pressing buttons and holding things down (I won't say what) we got the TV channels back but not the recordings or various other things. Upshot is an engineer will be popping round this morning to replace the hard disk. Hopefully he won't be in time to record the new series of the Apprentice which is one of my least favourite programmes and where Alan Sugar has become a caricature of himself with his ridiculous finger pointing and ludicrous catchphrase "You're Fired." For me the programme is juvenile and puerile.
I told you I would upset some people with these comments.
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Not so long ago I wrote an article about the locally-based Wulugu Project which provides schools and education for children in Northern Ghana - tackling poverty through education. The article appeared in my e-magazine Hethersett Herald and the local newspapers and has prompted some exciting news which I will share with you shortly.
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I mentioned before Christmas a random act of kindness where we found a parcel left by Hethersett Brownies that contained a packet of Haribo sweets. Yesterday through our letterbox came another act of kindness in the form of a calendar drawn by a young lady who used to be a member of the youth section at Hethersett Methodist Church. It was a nice thought.
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Well I think this blog has certainly been long enough and some people may now need a lie down. So I will wish you a good Friday even though it's not Easter, and carry on with my day.