tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9263472867666776262024-03-18T01:35:58.293-07:00RaybeardRaybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.comBlogger1073125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-33893369313464903812024-03-10T01:32:00.000-08:002024-03-10T05:50:15.577-07:00The Bible as one's favourite book? Are you serious?<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqpWkXrYVEPAX-qBkllvcOws9xP5OXM4kIUIDrcJ_QMi8Mol_jGS51TgmNYRTCnp5wxr6wQXzaLjKgdOKTn2kLkFwFrFR7V8Kjvgi6dqC-ahsS8lz9AfXo1g0wC1mzJwoCBw86Hi69f2PiHUQ8TGtcvPsKiySH_5WkkT02X8U4PHfChpbxnuYbqFia6A7g/s122/download.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="122" data-original-width="122" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqpWkXrYVEPAX-qBkllvcOws9xP5OXM4kIUIDrcJ_QMi8Mol_jGS51TgmNYRTCnp5wxr6wQXzaLjKgdOKTn2kLkFwFrFR7V8Kjvgi6dqC-ahsS8lz9AfXo1g0wC1mzJwoCBw86Hi69f2PiHUQ8TGtcvPsKiySH_5WkkT02X8U4PHfChpbxnuYbqFia6A7g/w200-h200/download.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Last year I completed my 10th cover-to-cover reading of the Bible, most of them having been in the King James' version. I must have been in my late teens, and still devoutly religious (R.C.) on my first attempt at climbing this 'Everest', reading the then sole Papally-approved version, the Douay-Rheims (the scope of 'approved' has since been widened). At that time for me the task was completely for religious reasons.</span><p></p><div><span style="font-size: large;">So now, some six decades later, when I <i>still </i>read a passage of the 'Holy Book' on nearly every morning (at least 95% of days- as also the Koran, by the way <i>and </i>the Bhagavad-Gita - but all that will have to wait for a future blog post) what are my feelings about this collection of writings comprising what we know as 'The Bible', most of which (nearly <i>all!) </i>by a hodge-podge of writers unknown - even if a name has been attributed it doesn't mean that those are the actual names of the authors. (The four 'official' gospels have assumed named originators even though little or nothing at all is known about them). </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">There is no generally accepted selection of 'authentically' Biblical books, no 'standard' of those meriting inclusion in the canon, but what today most mean are the 37 parts of the Old Testament and 27 of the New. This is not the place to go into the history of who and why certain books were chosen while others, of which there were dozens of contenders, were disregarded. Loads of info can, of course, be researched through Google which will likely leave one bewildered with the vast array of 'evidences' (much of which being disputed) plus opinions based to a large extent on pre-conceived notions of what the writer <u>wants</u> to believe. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">But to get to the nitty-gritty - what do I think of the Bible as a 'read'? Well, quite frankly I find by far the largest part of it heavy, stodgy, ponderous, mostly boring, rarely 'inspirational' and only extremely intermittingly even interesting. Those relatively few (considering its vast volume) interesting episodes in both books are so sparingly written, with so few adjectives or adverbs to bring it to life, that they read as dullish reports of events, some highly improbable, rather than involved witness accounts, which they hardly ever were, being written years, decades, even centuries after the purported events. Moses, the assumed author of the first five books of the Old Testament (the 'Pentateuch') takes on the heaviest of all mantles in describing the Creation of the Universe itself, some 13.8 billion years before he was born - or, if one thinks that this 'God' would never allow His human instrument to make any mistake, some 6,000 years ago. So how did Moses <i><u>know? </u></i></span><span style="font-size: large;">Well, Divine inspiration, of course - or in other words, God told him! So despite all present scientific evidence in Astronomy, Physics, Geology, Archaeology, Biology......everything! this 'God' must have created all this evidence just in order to fool us into believing it whereas in 'fact' it's a fairy-tale because only the words that s/he dictated to Moses is the incontrovertible account of what happened. It only begs the question - Now <i>why </i>would s/he do that? What would have been the point? Of course we all know the catch-all response in 'defence' is......."God works in mysterious ways". S/he sure does!</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">But to say that the Bible is one's <i>favourite </i>book above all others? Just what other books have these people read? Have they read <u>any</u> others at all?</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">However, it's perfectly natural to wonder why on earth I myself keep reading it. I ask myself that very question. The best I can offer is that it's become a habit and still holds a fascination as to why such a collection of largely dull nonsense has become undoubtedly the most influential piece of 'literature', certainly in 'Western' culture, of all time - and I'm still searching for why that is so - though I'm sure that the answer lies in human psychology, the very natural need to find an answer to the most basic questions of existence - wherefrom are we and why? - and it's ever so 'handy' and, moreover, <u>lazy</u> to follow others who claim that they, above everyone else, and despite vast evidence to the contrary, possess the unchallengeable <span style="color: #ffa400;"><b><u>TRUTH</u></b></span>! </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">As to it being one of my own 'favourite' books, in that sense I have no doubt it wouldn't even feature in my top 1,000 - or deserve inclusion in such a list at all! My ultimate accolade for the Bible remains a resounding "Bah, humbug!" - though only (overwhelmingly) mostly. 😀</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-20912565839164700692024-02-14T03:05:00.000-08:002024-02-15T02:53:52.112-08:00The ultimate bleak read? - Steinbeck's 'East of Eden'. <p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm_3l3A-SQgDeDkRmwhPESLuz1jw0OazEGhsDOqLUFPqPxO98Pn-end9hwBXcCuEWgn3huJppdEUUYgXjzS7QciCWreAWk253jRCNq1FqCC2lTInbXkTWyCQCsJrhlQg9FFsXqEYFg4S5n50tEfqOm920__oxDXNrjj9fcqFur6INsVXI1I0SEqbEqKoPe/s538/24.2.13%20east_of_eden-book_344_538_90.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="538" data-original-width="344" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm_3l3A-SQgDeDkRmwhPESLuz1jw0OazEGhsDOqLUFPqPxO98Pn-end9hwBXcCuEWgn3huJppdEUUYgXjzS7QciCWreAWk253jRCNq1FqCC2lTInbXkTWyCQCsJrhlQg9FFsXqEYFg4S5n50tEfqOm920__oxDXNrjj9fcqFur6INsVXI1I0SEqbEqKoPe/s320/24.2.13%20east_of_eden-book_344_538_90.jpg" width="205" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><div><span style="font-size: large;">I finished it yesterday, a quite hefty 600 pages in my paperback edition.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">If you're looking for a disturbing novel, this is the one, no kidding! It's destined to resonate in my mind for days to come, and in no heart-warming way. It's essentially a 'horror' story, though not in any supernatural or extra-natural sense. Always down-to-earth, but <i>dark - </i>oh my, ever so! Hardly one moment of respite, no humour at all - and, despite that, considered as possibly Steinbeck's greatest novel. He himself thought it so. Based, to some extent on his own life and ancestry (though just how much remains veiled one never knows), he inserts himself a few times as narrator though ever at arm's length from the happenings told, without his giving away either how much actually occurred or to what extent the story is his own creation. But I do find his style of writing and his choice of vocabulary extraordinarily fine.</span></div><div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">It's a dynastic saga starting about three generations before the then present (it was completed in 1952) and contains hardly any sympathetic characters, though a prominent one is 'Lee', a Chinese manservant, a few times referred to as a 'chink' - so called only in conversations, I think. (Occasionally the 'N-word' is also casually used, as it certainly would have been in the writer's own day). This quietly tolerant and quite amiable 'Lee', the sole, vaguely likeable character, is ever-ready to voice pearls of wisdom which other characters sorely need to heed. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlFPskIXZwYEcqBbYjrHH4z5cgwLG7vBgkKST4hgRawfev8SPjIC-XzIXglaTnsQtX5vO8E-yn-3ij6kgp8Iu5BGvfUy9NCJlDyLC-Dglg4rpFz-s4taGV9vsPuQPxD3UlHk9EZOcjrZlzZBD2682xwrkpYP6Q12PhzMIsLwXtSw08Y2JIgcv8ZyV-8fj4/s1000/fposter,medium,wall_texture,product,750x1000.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="750" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlFPskIXZwYEcqBbYjrHH4z5cgwLG7vBgkKST4hgRawfev8SPjIC-XzIXglaTnsQtX5vO8E-yn-3ij6kgp8Iu5BGvfUy9NCJlDyLC-Dglg4rpFz-s4taGV9vsPuQPxD3UlHk9EZOcjrZlzZBD2682xwrkpYP6Q12PhzMIsLwXtSw08Y2JIgcv8ZyV-8fj4/s320/fposter,medium,wall_texture,product,750x1000.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><br />The story begins in Salinas California towards the end of the 19th century, where and when Steinbeck himself was born - he (thrice married, though so what?) becoming a dreadful, habitual misogynist, by several accounts. </span><span style="text-align: left;">Easily the most terrifying person in the novel is one Cathy, with no redemptive features and the mother of male twins, the latter who, at the age of 17, will end this saga towards the end of World War I. I could go on further about this Cathy but it would involve horrific plot spoilers at the heart of this 'jolly' (</span><i style="text-align: left;">not!)</i><span style="text-align: left;"> tale.</span></div></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>I first became acquainted with Steinbeck's works some 30 years ago when I read 'The Grapes of Wrath', and was so knocked out by it that I wished I'd encountered him a lot earlier. Then I read 'Of Mice and Men' which I found almost as impressive - and then, back in 2002, 'East of Eden', which I've noted that I'd 'read', though on second reading finished just now, I didn't recall one single thing about it as being familiar. I can only think that back 20 years ago I'd been so daunted with its length that although I must have read the words they passed by my eyes unregistered, though how I got through so many hundred densely-packed pages in such a manner I can't explain. Anyway, this present time I read the novel with not only full attention but with a number of synopses at hand which I regularly consulted so as not to lose the drift. And it worked marvellously well - even if the final effect on me felt so negative on an emotional level. Nevertheless, and despite its writer's indefensible reputation, I must now concur that 'East of Eden' is a truly <i>great </i>work. </span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglzT-J1u0mRokAaT5yZKa7MO-R4h3OCV99zLXtJB-RQ6B6QqvZE6d1WvFYGCL4G-9Vzlb67hl-sE5RbVPlKeiYBsyS8Yyhdrpjl3x8dPqn3pRb50-gxra-aes1RBMYXpoJard6-hIOgmi8OaXOBAECixR3Fdw-FTnnu7GphDWqK6V6OUTmCPU_R0gHBOCE/s1300/24.2.14%20146473.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1300" data-original-width="867" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglzT-J1u0mRokAaT5yZKa7MO-R4h3OCV99zLXtJB-RQ6B6QqvZE6d1WvFYGCL4G-9Vzlb67hl-sE5RbVPlKeiYBsyS8Yyhdrpjl3x8dPqn3pRb50-gxra-aes1RBMYXpoJard6-hIOgmi8OaXOBAECixR3Fdw-FTnnu7GphDWqK6V6OUTmCPU_R0gHBOCE/s320/24.2.14%20146473.jpg" width="213" /></a></div><br />When I was 10 my mother took me (and, perhaps, two of my as-young brothers) to the cinema to see the then new James Dean film of 'East of Eden', the actor himself having recently been killed in a car crash at the tragically young age of 24. But why she took us to see such an adult story I have no idea, though she almost certainly had no preconceived notion of what the film concerned. Of the film itself I have no recollection whatsoever. I badly want now to see it again. However, the character that Dean plays (as one of the two mutually hostile twins) when the book ends his character is just 17 years old, the actor himself having presumably been 23 when the film was shot. It's not such a big deal now, as such similar inappropriate-age castings have always happened. But with this film, one of Dean's three major iconic roles (along with 'Giant' and 'Rebel Without a Cause'), that remains a somewhat niggling curiosity.</span></div></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">But rather more pertinent is the fact that the character ('Cal') which Dean plays doesn't appear in the novel until two-thirds through, and even then only as a young boy. He only gets to his teenage years until a further near-hundred pages. Additionally, in the list of the film's characters there is no mention of the aforementioned, evil-incarnate 'Cathy', so strategic to the large bulk of the novel. Clearly the film deals with only a selected smallish extract of the book, possibly having been intended to be mainly a vehicle for Dean. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">In conclusion, then, <i>if</i> you are avid reader and one who hasn't yet encountered this novel, I couldn't urge you too strongly to give it a try. However, be aware that if your reaction is similar to mine, it could well affect you profoundly. A 'pleasant' read, one which you can let gently waft over you, it is <u>not</u> - though an intense, involving and unforgettable experience it could surely be.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Now, though I must tackle more Steinbeck ('Cannery Row' has some strong recommendations) I want to get back to something rather more uplifting. A re-read of 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking-Glass' perhaps? - and try to block out of my mind that particular author's penchant for photographing nude, pre-pubescent girls. Oh dear!......... </span></div>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com21tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-52051775034173149592024-01-27T03:37:00.000-08:002024-01-27T22:33:40.573-08:00Oh my days! BBC's 'Traitors' now ended. Huge gap left.<p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="372" data-original-width="648" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSfhOXbnhl-pX9CGG2_-1duPInUm6U5FSDqvHo7YAjXIUcs0ZYJKHhHbDRToV1MCYsB3Vkiu4JfOZ_NE-H9Lc8-DJDt_7ueQ_L8hD-N1TnJyaLtDzJUREu8F1E8L3uNlG3KtCp5WKgTTG0uorN4QzPzjK8NeM5TbvImUlTLu6uo5LM9tc9LMyVgdJ1DYXF/w400-h230/resize.webp" width="400" /> </span><span style="font-size: large;"><span><i>If you're </i></span><i>not familiar with this programme's format - though you've almost certainly heard about it - I'll not here lay out details of what the programme is, because if you'd been already interested enough you'll have been watching it.</i></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">In my view, justifiably the TV sensation of the last couple of years - with the now just completed series being as maddeningly compulsive viewing as was last year's, leaving me bereft once more now that it's over. We're not even entirely sure there will be another series!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I won't even hint at any spoilers for this year's resulting winner(s?) of the accumulated £95,000 (US $118,000) prize money, nor any indicators as to the others who lost out by being 'murdered' or banished, despite my hoping they'd have gotten further - however, I actually have already laid a tiny clue as to one particular unsuccessful contestant I'd especially favoured. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">After 2023's 'baptism', I couldn't wait the too many months for the BBC to do another, so I watched on iPlayer the American and the Australian first series. And we were told that Australian second series is also now available to watch, so I'll shortly be going there. The American programmes used the same Scottish castle location and its grounds as the two British series did. As emCee/invigilator they had actor and gloriously camp Alan Cumming in the role, though that's not to take anything away from the superbly domineering (and a bit scary) Claudia Winkleman in ours.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">This year's progs gripped me every bit as much as last year's though I did get rather more uneasy this time with the occasional increasing bitching between contestants which seemed to get downright nasty now and again - though they always insisted afterwards that in spite of the apparent hostilities they were all still friends. I've no reason to disbelieve them though when the arguments were happening I did sometimes get decidedly uncomfortable.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I wasn't going to do a blog posting on this subject but it's affected me so deeply, so rivetting it was, that I just have to relieve some of the weight from off my chest and get it out there. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Okay, so now where's Australia Series 2?...........</span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-91565463045806108532024-01-21T08:35:00.000-08:002024-01-23T00:38:14.038-08:00Disappointed (again) by my favourite radio programme.<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUpWgViqp1-twgr1upk-FTHteTe0ZsDtqbrCOc9wKyjVslHeC2IqyPo1rR5JaQX3R3onsLWbbgXXwlFHN1atyifarrTuCK1vOtaOaJqkW-KkoJFy3_cJHMERhvgNdpOMZ-MDwZTEfkzJGlWU6s6VuG_ncqMJUwEoj0l8I_ROw3cXvs0Od2anybzppja4EY/s180/24.1.21%20sheku.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="180" data-original-width="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUpWgViqp1-twgr1upk-FTHteTe0ZsDtqbrCOc9wKyjVslHeC2IqyPo1rR5JaQX3R3onsLWbbgXXwlFHN1atyifarrTuCK1vOtaOaJqkW-KkoJFy3_cJHMERhvgNdpOMZ-MDwZTEfkzJGlWU6s6VuG_ncqMJUwEoj0l8I_ROw3cXvs0Od2anybzppja4EY/s16000/24.1.21%20sheku.jpg" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">I've been listening to the weekly 'Desert Island Discs' (on BBC Radio 4) for over 60 years, and have ever found it a most absorbing programme. <i>For those not familiar with its concept (though I have blogged on the subject previously) it's that a well-known personality/celebrity from <u>any</u> field (such as scientist, actor, musician, politician....). and of any nationality, is invited to choose eight tracks of music (<u>not</u> complete albums containing multi-tracks) to take with him/her to a mythical deserted island which will last, potentially, for the remainder of that person's lone life. In addition they may have one book (aside from the Bible and Shakespeare, which are given gratis) and just one single luxury i.e. something inanimate and of no practical value nor anything which increases one's chances of survival. Though since the programme began in 1942 advances in recording techniques have rendered it almost impossible for all the rules to be strictly observed and absolutely consistent throughout - thus complete symphonies/concertos etc <u>are</u> permitted (though one is expected to identify which particular movement or section) but not complete operas (only specific arias, ensemble sections etc), nor complete oratorios, plays etc. Nevertheless the concept remains unchanged - and, after all, it's only just an entertainment, a bit of 'fun'.</i></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Now I was so looking forward to listening to that Wunderkind von unserer Zeit, cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason - still only 24, the third of <u>seven</u> siblings, all talented and variously playing violin, cello and piano, some of them more than one instrument, though at the moment Sheku is the most celebrated, having already appeared at the Last Night of the Proms as well as playing, by royal invitation, at the wedding of Prince William and Kate. (One of Sheku's sisters will shortly be appearing in this town where I live to play a Mozart piano concerto with our local amateur symphony orchestra).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">So I was most interested to hear Sheku being interviewed about his eventful life (so far!) interspersed with his eight choices of music. No problem with his music selections, but as to his talking, my God, I could hardly understand a word of it! I <i>have </i>heard him speaking on TV several times, but there at least one can follow lip movements, and besides there's additionally the option of turning on subtitles as well, which, to be honest, I do quite often use in order to get the fullest experience. But on for this radio programme I was lost so much of the time when I was desperately interested in what his answers to the questions about his life would be. What a let-down!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">It's by no means the first time I've been disappointed in the same way by this programme. In 2007 the renowned, theatrical (mainly), actor Simon Russell Beale was the guest and that really was the worst I have ever heard for non-comprehension - entirely under-the-breath, semi-whispered mumblings! I just gave up and switched off. So unexpected from an actor whose very being and livelihood depends on his words being heard and understood. I can only think that when some of them are in a broadcasting studio with a microphone under their very noses, they assume that every vocal sound they make will be picked up clearly. Well, it's not so!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Another disgraceful mutterer is the lavishly over-praised Sir Ian McKellan, though only when talking 'normally'. I've seen him live on stage several times and there he can project when called to, though hardly ever elsewhere. I used to have a video of that 'Othello' production of a few decades ago, with a superb interpretation of the title role given by opera singer Willard White, whose every word was as clear as a bell - even though he'd never acted in a 'straight' play before, having only appeared in sung operatic roles. However, for me, McKellan as the villainous Iago (actually given more lines than Othello himself!) let down the entire production with his shamefully mumbled deliveries, so unfair to the rest of the cast. I chucked the video away!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span>I cannot claim that my hearing is anything like perfect. At my age it would be absurd and a complete lie. There </span><u>must</u><span> be some deterioration, even if I'm not aware of any significant loss in my everyday life. But when I don't catch something on the radio (and I'm very much a lifelong radio addict) it does bring me up sharp - though it doesn't really happen that often.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">So as to Sheku's D.I.D, I'll give it another shot on BBC iPlayer, but I really shouldn't have to be doing this. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Slow hand-clap, Sheku - and, please <u style="font-style: italic;">no</u> encore! </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-6517762690393494882024-01-03T01:40:00.000-08:002024-01-07T00:23:25.563-08:00First Happy NY kiss on TV from NY - draws anger and hate. <p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuLbBngueJoa9Uhgb5AxXMgbjWniLGINDV6PrK5daImWHYcmL7EICJBOwQqT3aap-lAWO_gLX8PYpaxPACvdTNFGGLDK3uMsjAZ_qn33IPQtZYeTo9FZIHR4FCEpR5JYn4sRL0IC0R0JqWv7zppd1gly_skp8U4FBi1NyvIN8areyqQ7RQXFHqVYrK2bky/s792/24.1.3%20CNN-marked-2024-with-a-gay-kiss-that-has-sparked-discourse.-CNN.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="416" data-original-width="792" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuLbBngueJoa9Uhgb5AxXMgbjWniLGINDV6PrK5daImWHYcmL7EICJBOwQqT3aap-lAWO_gLX8PYpaxPACvdTNFGGLDK3uMsjAZ_qn33IPQtZYeTo9FZIHR4FCEpR5JYn4sRL0IC0R0JqWv7zppd1gly_skp8U4FBi1NyvIN8areyqQ7RQXFHqVYrK2bky/s320/24.1.3%20CNN-marked-2024-with-a-gay-kiss-that-has-sparked-discourse.-CNN.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">As I usually do early on New Year's Day, at 5 a.m (our time) I tuned in to watch Sky News TV broadcast from New York's Times Square to catch their celebrations - with the obligatory relaying of 'Ol' Blue Eyes' belting out "Start spreadin' the Noos....." Great stuff! But at the climax moment I was very pleasantly and very surprised to see the first visual kiss of 2024 being a gay one - <i>and</i> the camera lingered. When it was over my considered reaction was "Surely not! I must have been mistaken." and then thought little more of it - that is until this morning when I read that there's been oh-so-predictable <i>outrage </i>in certain American circles. (Oh, the horror of it!) The decision to show the two men physically bonded together in osculation <i>must</i> have been decided in advance. It's hard not to think otherwise. There was no quick change to a camera shot showing the kissing of what would be deemed a more 'acceptable' M-F couple. I think what we saw lasted at least 20 secs, possibly half-a-minute, before it turned to other similarly affectionately embracing couples. And what makes this particular first couple even <i>worse</i> (if that is possible!) is that this at least one of this pair seemed to be - God help us! - of <i>mixed</i> race! <i> </i>Will there be an inquest as to how on Earth this got through? I don't see why there should be though doubtless there'll already be clamours for one.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">The pictures were broadcast on CNN and ABC amongst others - and it seems Sky News used the same source. I'm only sorry that after it was over I was quick to dismiss my observation as having likely been mistaken. Now that I know for sure that I wasn't wrong I can only see it as very welcome progress. And I'm equally happy that many countries around the world will also have taken the same broadcast, no doubt causing a flurry of panic in those many countries where such images give rise to imprisonment - or even far worse. Russia maybe? - though certainly not on the 'official' Kremlin (= Putin) -controlled, anti-American channels. Would surely have given Pres. Putrid a heart attack, though I trust it wouldn't have been terminal as I'd dearly love his royal highness to live long enough to be a centenarian - though totally incapacitated, unable to move, speak, even indicate what he wants - poor chap! And fancy being the one who's delegated to changing his nappy every few hours! (Tee hee!) Must be at least as bad as having to change BLOTUS'.......erm, <i>diaper - </i>if it's not being done already - maybe by Rudy Giulie? But I digress. (Got a bit carried away with my hopes for the coming year). </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Anyway, to return to the subject in hand........</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I haven't seen in a real-live New Year since 1990. Always been alone since then, retiring around my usual time of between 8 and 9 p.m. but inevitably woken up by the sound of fireworks. When they began I checked on the cats and found each, as expected, cowering in wide-eyed terror - one under the bed, another in a cupboard, and a third at the bottom of the stairs, where it's darkest. And they don't move until they're sure, or hope, it's all over, though the odd errant distant bang or pop sends them scurrying back to their hidey places again. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">The last New Year 'seeing-in' that I experienced and mentioned above, was 1990 in Amsterdam. In those years I had an annual routine of being at the critical time in the 'Eagle' leather bar (near the Royal Palace and on the edge of the red light district) where, at midnight, ABBA's track of 'Happy New Year' was always played to announce the arrival of the magic moment - interrupting the various intercourses or mutual consensual fumblings going on in the (purposely) dark spaces and toilets, though it probably made no difference to those already engaged and busy in such! 😄</span></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Anyway, here's wishing my handful of blogpals (of whom I feel ever so privileged to have, every single one of you) all the very best for 2024, including all the money that you <u>need</u> - plus a bit more - and most important of all <i>good and ruddy </i><u style="font-style: italic;">health</u> to all of you! Cheers!!!!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"> --------------------------------------------</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">(<i>Added later</i> - 5 Jan).........</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">This couple's comments on the anti-gay reaction to their televised kiss here...........</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/01/04/cnn-new-years-gay-kiss-reaction/</span></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-31939127148406337032023-10-14T22:25:00.002-07:002023-10-15T00:41:06.408-07:00Happy b/day to me! (Sun. 15th)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuYY1dDx7tmz-yr99sdXnmn46KJOvqQxop7E8Tmks9lmQgqMcHDx1017Zq_4zrn81M1PSxcqjmFumnuNoCvK23n3y34b6KbfFmZDeAbkLblzXecbk8m6HlxLoK-YSiyvAF6awdVLjQSzSN_W75LyhL5L8T6KV5-dQ4B63W2_SGgfJcDE2Qh9VPLfHG2L2n/s294/23.10.1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="171" data-original-width="294" height="116" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuYY1dDx7tmz-yr99sdXnmn46KJOvqQxop7E8Tmks9lmQgqMcHDx1017Zq_4zrn81M1PSxcqjmFumnuNoCvK23n3y34b6KbfFmZDeAbkLblzXecbk8m6HlxLoK-YSiyvAF6awdVLjQSzSN_W75LyhL5L8T6KV5-dQ4B63W2_SGgfJcDE2Qh9VPLfHG2L2n/w200-h116/23.10.1.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Yes, we've reached all the sevens! Can hardly believe it myself even if sometimes feeling it with increasing regularity.</span><div><span style="font-size: large;">Regret still unable to post any new photos, so profile pic is now two years old. Imagine still sparser hair on top and a few more furrows on the physiognomy below it. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Incidentally, is anyone else also old enough to remember the TV series of L.A. private detectives, '77 Sunset Strip' (1958-64) - <i>[</i></span><span><span style="font-size: medium; font-style: italic;">fingers click twice!] - </span><span style="font-size: large;">launched to much hoop-la at the time, though hardly ever mentioned since? <i>("Kookie, Kookie, lend me your comb!")</i></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Really nothing more to say - so that's all for now. Heigh-ho! (sigh) 😉</span><p></p></div>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com23tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-60846259113378356572023-09-30T04:16:00.015-07:002023-10-06T06:50:50.396-07:00'Graham Norton Show' last night. What a treat!<p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0PZ13NsAn3dJI_omsvYAdhH7j-s3rrjQI6_zULwLFp8GkeJeLzPBa6BcHAePtXuWqrzC7Y6imyWJDJK07K1AtSo0U_m-Gjbz6OnwjwKMm0tDU8mxbPHpyuw4HmUGIespoJXM0emBL6oxhGV404acVyjaOrvK9qxwIPmIYtAhwxawxTH6DKSnVc4Vmaztn/s1536/23.9.30.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="864" data-original-width="1536" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0PZ13NsAn3dJI_omsvYAdhH7j-s3rrjQI6_zULwLFp8GkeJeLzPBa6BcHAePtXuWqrzC7Y6imyWJDJK07K1AtSo0U_m-Gjbz6OnwjwKMm0tDU8mxbPHpyuw4HmUGIespoJXM0emBL6oxhGV404acVyjaOrvK9qxwIPmIYtAhwxawxTH6DKSnVc4Vmaztn/s320/23.9.30.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">I do quite like Graham Norton, but as his show (new series starting yesterday) is always on telly at way past my bedtime, I only follow it up, if at all, by watching excerpts of any particular names who get my attention, and that's quite rare as most weeks I can't be bothered. But I tuned in to catch-up this morning because I'd read that one particular person was appearing. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">I've had the 'hots' for a certain actor ever since he first started appearing in films some 20 years ago - and it's (shhhhhhhhh!)..........one <i>Stephen Graham</i>! I don't know why he presses my buttons but he sure does - and it's so intense that he gives me head to toe tingles, and more than ever when he smiles. Mind you, at his 50 years, I'm more than old enough myself to be his dad, so it'll have to remain yet another unfulfillable fantasy. However, he was darned good on the sofa last night talking easily, amongst other things, about a new TV serial 'Boiling Point' set mostly in the kitchens of a rather chi-chi restaurant, in which he is part of an ensemble cast including, incidentally, his real-life wife. I've got to give it a wee peep, at least.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span>So, with Stephen G. as an 'appetiser', I've just watched the </span><u>entire</u><span> 50 minutes of this Graham Norton Show, the first time I've done so in </span><i>years!</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Other guests last night included comedian/actor David Mitchell - no, not his namesake, author of the stunning 'Cloud Atlas'. This David M. is one I've also liked for even more decades than Stephen G., though emphatically <i>not</i> in the same way! He wears his considerable intellect very lightly, never arrogantly. He appeared last night because he's just had his book come out which is a warts-and-all telling (particularly the former) of England's (and later, Britain's) monarchs right way back from the start, which sounds very engrossing and entertaining - even likely amusing, given the passage of time since.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">I always like to go through his ever-so-readable periodic contributions in the Sunday 'Observer'. There are so many topically significant articles from a number of contributors in that newspaper that I regretfully have to skim-read some of them, but David's features are invariably a real joy to read in full, articles which need to be given the time and effort they absolutely deserve. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Then there was also a new name to me, Mawaan Rizwan, who just has a new, apparently surreal-ish comedy starting called 'Juice' in which he plays one half of a gay couple. I'll be giving that a look-in too. It's the first I've heard of this guy but, my goodness, he looks one hell of a head-turner - beard 'n all! He sure is easy on both the eye and ear, and good fun with it! I've just looked up his details and find he's 31, so if I'm not quite a cradle-snatcher for him (beard notwithstanding!) I'm certainly advanced enough to be his gramps!</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Then there was the divine goddess herself (trumpets please!) .......'KYLIE'!, shortly to take up a season performing in Las Vegas. She didn't sing at all this time, just easily and relaxed-ly answering Graham's questions and joining in all the conversations. She actually never <i>has</i> to sing. For me, and many others I've no doubt, her just being there is more than sufficient. Lovely stuff!</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The show closed with this year's U.K. Eurovision singer, Mae Muller (who'd finished second from <i>last! - </i>which she didn't deserve) singing her new release, a number which to me appealed on this my only hearing - so far. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">A most fine show, this. Must try and keep up with more of the series. Even if any are just half as enjoyable as this one was, it'll be grand.</span></div><p></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-39914776519775291402023-09-14T01:37:00.001-07:002023-09-14T02:24:28.142-07:00World-renowned 'classic' writers whom I've never 'got'.<p> <span style="font-size: large;">Although there are more than three, there is </span><span style="font-size: large;">a certain highly prominent trio of widely famed authors of the past, each of whom disconcertingly enjoys a most significant reputation and a large and ultra-serious band of defenders, admirers and disciples. I've tried repeatedly to understand why it is that I've never been able to get into them, yet the reason still evades me. While attempting to read and become engrossed by their novels my mind wanders away so far that I'm very soon merely reading pages upon pages of words which fail to penetrate my consciousness at all, until I'm suddenly aware of the futility of the exercise. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">1. <u>Rudyard Kipling</u></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV5fYPzZf-3cHKAdO_qx71Wjk4kQfQU8rDYIYvNa8lPleont0TS1laDzsxhs1ygH9EX95NekF_NeBjuFEwuYam9Hnchxc9zw-1ESJMERuOulXsgW3lZiQlxOQwfDjO0j1ZpLBJQwN4GcAk3M37KHCQtS5fTM0JmDXtJX3-jMOgJumWj3eY68xtfC1IIm3W/s246/23.9.13.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="205" data-original-width="246" height="205" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV5fYPzZf-3cHKAdO_qx71Wjk4kQfQU8rDYIYvNa8lPleont0TS1laDzsxhs1ygH9EX95NekF_NeBjuFEwuYam9Hnchxc9zw-1ESJMERuOulXsgW3lZiQlxOQwfDjO0j1ZpLBJQwN4GcAk3M37KHCQtS5fTM0JmDXtJX3-jMOgJumWj3eY68xtfC1IIm3W/s1600/23.9.13.jpg" width="246" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">I cannot comprehend why this man is so revered - above all for his children's stories, which I find dense and obscure - and boy oh boy, how I've tried! Even his most famous of all, 'The Jungle Book' (<i>both </i>'Jungle Books' actually), I find indigestible, completely lacking the welcome lightness of touch which Disney brought to his cartoon (helped, of course by some awfully good songs). </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I've identical feelings towards <i>all </i>the 'Just So' stories. Right now I'm currently ploughing through 'Stalky & Co' and what a joyless slog it is! It's my very first attempt at this one, though I have read the aforementioned novels at least twice each. Apparently 'Stalky' is about a misbehaving group of (public)schoolboys getting up to various japes often involving their teachers or other members of the public as victims. It seems one is supposed to be entertained, even amused, by their antics but I'm finding it so hard to follow that it's leaving me cold and unmoved. But <i>got </i>to persevere, even though when I'm through I simply know now that I'll hardly recall any of it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I've also read the entirety of the man's poetry, all 800+ pages of it. I have to say that most of it is rather more accessible than his stories, but that's probably because they are largely in more digestible, mostly shortish lumps. (Btw: Some years ago a BBC national poll revealed that his poem 'If' was voted here as being the best regarded poem of all in the English language - and I wouldn't disagree that it at least is pretty good). </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">2. <u>Joseph Conrad</u></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNs4_d3MSF-_37TTaVgkA0k22vWimOu4rmFnxSlN1I1i7TfmlEutB8_Rpvhqbb5cRGNcqOQMVGK822DmL_yOMGgiFuVfuy9Wt_qk0x3dszswxrNfw3waO_u7jVWdhMIALrldzjAgqisxG6e7JiVLP-u5Ypr-msGU3ApQHoX598G27-pej-uIQ5uJBbgd4b/s225/23.9.13a.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="225" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNs4_d3MSF-_37TTaVgkA0k22vWimOu4rmFnxSlN1I1i7TfmlEutB8_Rpvhqbb5cRGNcqOQMVGK822DmL_yOMGgiFuVfuy9Wt_qk0x3dszswxrNfw3waO_u7jVWdhMIALrldzjAgqisxG6e7JiVLP-u5Ypr-msGU3ApQHoX598G27-pej-uIQ5uJBbgd4b/s1600/23.9.13a.jpg" width="225" /></a><span style="font-size: large;"></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">Have to confess that it's quite a few years since I last tried to assail this, for me, highly problematic writer - among whose works are 'Nostromo' ,'Lord Jim' and, his most celebrated of all, 'Heart of Darkness'. I'm not even sure that I managed to get right through any of them, his style of writing being maddeningly circuitous. A lot of admiration towards him is engendered by the fact that English was only his second language (after Polish) so it's undoubtedly some sort of achievement, though for me therein lies the problem. I could never get onto his 'wavelength'. If his thoughts were lucid, and I can't argue that they weren't, then to my mind they didn't translate successfully into the written word. He's definitely another author who gets my mind wandering off to unrelated, more captivating, subjects - though I would like to have another bash at 'Hearts of Darkness' before it's too late.</span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">3. <u>Sir Walter Scott</u></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy4Ls3u5OceQr6k3OOe8kkjmcuTRbQar4NxLw5v_DYk29hAHls4F-43-k-12Rd0YCcyYpKuOwk8QYtza2507MbmRttY4DQZCEtQW8GuduiKrxsPs9lHD3PGy9fZTV67B8Ctij2ibGRNHAq-92EMM6BcUavvg_8RbmjT-Zk4R41EJhxUd7-Im-k-3wgJiSc/s255/23.9.13b.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="255" data-original-width="198" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy4Ls3u5OceQr6k3OOe8kkjmcuTRbQar4NxLw5v_DYk29hAHls4F-43-k-12Rd0YCcyYpKuOwk8QYtza2507MbmRttY4DQZCEtQW8GuduiKrxsPs9lHD3PGy9fZTV67B8Ctij2ibGRNHAq-92EMM6BcUavvg_8RbmjT-Zk4R41EJhxUd7-Im-k-3wgJiSc/s1600/23.9.13b.jpg" width="198" /></a></div>I get the impression, perhaps mistakenly, that this writer is particularly well regarded by non-English readers, presumably translated into whatever language is appropriate - though how translations cope with his terribly tiresome phonetic attempts at mimicking the Scottish accents through odd, unfamiliar spellings I just don't know, a technique which, whoever the writer or the accent replicated, slows one's reading down disastrously till, I at least, want to say "Oh, stuff it! I can do without this tortuous effort to work out what they mean!" 'Ivanhoe', 'Rob Roy' and 'Kidnapped' are some of his works I've tried to rise to, but I think it's only the last of these I managed to get to the end of - and that with one huge sigh of relief - and then craving for something requiring less effort to read. Mind you, like for Kipling, some of Scott's poems aren't at all bad - so long as it's not those in which he's trying to ape the Scottish accent in writing.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">I could mention more writers - P.G.Wodehouse is just another who goes right over my head despite his being so adulated by many of far greater intelligence than I can boast, although he's considered by many to be the ultimate 'light-hearted' and 'gentlemanly' writer in English - but I've got to stop somewhere.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Oh, and I'm aware that I've not mentioned any female writers, though shamefully, it did take me some time to acclimatise myself to Jane Austen. Now she's no longer a 'problem' writer, thank goodness.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">But never say never! If I'd written this post, say, 50 years ago, my top three 'unreadables' would quite likely have been Henry James, Thomas Hardy and............yes, even Dickens himself. However, through persistence, I gradually came to love each if them in turn. In fact all three would now doubtlessly feature in my Top 10 favourite writers of all. So one <i>can</i> change if one really wills it. I merely want to experience those same admirations which other people feel, otherwise I sense missing out on something of significant worth.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Do you have any particularly 'difficult' writers? I'd love to hear some names.<br /> <br /><u><br /></u></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><u><br /><br /></u></span></p></div>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-72885739952599487392023-07-28T08:50:00.003-07:002023-07-29T00:24:32.170-07:00A horrible, pathetic 'discovery'.<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioP7PQ_G0iLMhCc0kNGsWzqRYO5tur1_mtEkZb7prin4Y0ECywSmq2Y7XVjOwPxcvqJKabSpKvyFKPcogv_DdpMWzIF--ynERm-FQU3Th25HJq5noZtdPHoaJfYV33vKJRcdLpl6tG-OXtZIm7qstLxQJgQZNfXGo7zplNsN7ZlZPvMVvCTQXpCOhgk0Kk/s268/23.7.28.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="268" data-original-width="188" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioP7PQ_G0iLMhCc0kNGsWzqRYO5tur1_mtEkZb7prin4Y0ECywSmq2Y7XVjOwPxcvqJKabSpKvyFKPcogv_DdpMWzIF--ynERm-FQU3Th25HJq5noZtdPHoaJfYV33vKJRcdLpl6tG-OXtZIm7qstLxQJgQZNfXGo7zplNsN7ZlZPvMVvCTQXpCOhgk0Kk/s1600/23.7.28.jpg" width="188" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Those of you who know about my feelings towards <u>all</u> animals may appreciate my horror and distress at yesterday finding a dead fox-cub in our small front garden beside a wheelie bin. How it died I don't know. It was only about eight inches long in body with its brush-tail a further four inches. It was under some foliage and I only found it because two of my cats were outside, both acting rather oddly and restlessly. I doubt if my own or any other cats would have been responsible for its sad demise. I couldn't bear to look at its face mainly because it may have had its eyes open. It was clearly not breathing, and as I swept it up with a hand-brush into a dust pan, grimacing all the while, there was no movement in its stiff little body. Although I couldn't look at it closely, from what I did see there were no obvious injuries. Perhaps it had starved. Nearly tipping over into tears, I double-wrapped its little body and gently placed it in the bin. What else could one do?</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">There's a <i>skulk</i> of urban foxes (I've only just found out the correct word via google) living in the park on the other side of this road. I sometimes see adult ones foraging for food from the roadside bins when I get up in the early hours to let my pussies out front. Any other cats also out at the time are, unsurprisingly, very wary of them, though the foxes themselves appear to take no interest in feline presences.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">As for the poor dead one, I didn't know they would wander far out at such a young age, but somehow this poor chap did - and was fatally unlucky. Poor parents - especially for its mummy. Oh, so blisteringly sad!</span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-50211744553983339482023-06-17T00:33:00.005-07:002023-06-23T23:08:14.157-07:00Never too old to learn squash is NOT a sweet dessert fruit!<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkWXIjsJJn2nDuk-7pmklfgEbcHzQnzsE8ASXzlzjf3i_6H_2KSdp9uxX0d3KT6_27TD0uBIOAx6NlWIUsG7Hed0xg0Xr6zcBy3F_Nfzc06m9ficF8tS9ieNAsqyUx8KulZbfS-P2pfKWdfOOn6XbIiVpSKGHB79xUoHRrI_ZmpwOytz9HAfsPTrOJjg/s225/images.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="225" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkWXIjsJJn2nDuk-7pmklfgEbcHzQnzsE8ASXzlzjf3i_6H_2KSdp9uxX0d3KT6_27TD0uBIOAx6NlWIUsG7Hed0xg0Xr6zcBy3F_Nfzc06m9ficF8tS9ieNAsqyUx8KulZbfS-P2pfKWdfOOn6XbIiVpSKGHB79xUoHRrI_ZmpwOytz9HAfsPTrOJjg/s1600/images.jpg" width="225" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Having never in my life tasted squash until yesterday, and in my constant quest edging towards 100% veganism, I took the plunge. In fact I'd bought this curious-looking foodstuff a week ago, having heard so much about its benefits, but then didn't know what to do with it. Now all my life I'd assumed it was a fruit which, in fact, it technically truly is, but I'd assumed it would be something sweet to be incorporated into an after-dinner dessert - no doubt because of associating it with what we used to call 'orange squash' or 'pop' ( which some still do). So yesterday, splitting it open and being surprised at how tough it was, I cut out some of the flesh which I diced and then put in a bowl, adding raspberries, blueberries and greek yoghurt. Need more be said? Yuk!!! Live and learn! Now so much wiser and, having googled said commodity, I shall cut up the rest, add olive oil, and roast it, to have as today's dinner with boiled cauli, kale and onion gravy. Now <u style="font-style: italic;">that</u> should be better! </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com24tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-78431175946584744112023-06-15T07:03:00.004-07:002023-06-30T22:04:30.859-07:00Glenda Jackson passed away, at 87.<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVniJGCRJsZAUaQJixIIzXGaEqrAAbRxuO5gGJuZ9qB4ZTplb8vFfK1oqfKF-KDhPf-6UFRAcXAq9l2MCsU0sk4JS63sfcjgFv9ROK0w21P0IM4BHPgShXRY2Op5iB5lBZPG3JT5poFayq6BTPruYSxIL_iM4ysbqbak1F2GtJHgcUGL_4TVr5qYvBfg/s275/images.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVniJGCRJsZAUaQJixIIzXGaEqrAAbRxuO5gGJuZ9qB4ZTplb8vFfK1oqfKF-KDhPf-6UFRAcXAq9l2MCsU0sk4JS63sfcjgFv9ROK0w21P0IM4BHPgShXRY2Op5iB5lBZPG3JT5poFayq6BTPruYSxIL_iM4ysbqbak1F2GtJHgcUGL_4TVr5qYvBfg/w400-h266/images.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">One of the most prominent, ever-present, living glittering jewels of my cultural life died today at her London home. Although it wasn't too much of a surprise considering her age, now that it's happened it feels like a punch in the gut to have now lost the conspicuous feature that she was. . </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I was fortunate enough to have seen her live three times on stage, first in Webster's 'The White Devil' in 1976, next in Andrew Davies' 'Rose' (1980) and then in Brecht's 'Mother Courage' (1990) - not 'The House of Bernarda Alba' as I'd posted earlier. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Her acting both on stage and on film was so consistently flawless it never failed to take my breath away. Two Oscars - for 'Women on Love' (1969) and 'A Touch of Class (1973) - and how can one possibly overlook her gloriously entertaining portrait of Mrs Tchaikovsky (that sex-crazed slut!) in 'The Music Lovers '(1971) with Richard Chamberlain also impressive as the mentally-tormented, genius composer - plus her numerous TV appearances, most famously appearing as Queen Elizabeth I in the 6 -part BBC serial of 1971. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">A lifelong socialist, she turned to politics for about 20 years, entering Parliament on the coat-tails of Tony Blair, very soon becoming a scathing critic of him, though she was made a junior minister in the early 00s. However, her political life then became, unfortunately rather low-key and she became largely invisible, though when she did appear in discussion programmes on both radio and TV she was energetically vociferous with her opinions. Always strongly pro-gay, she was a beacon to many of us throughout the final decades of the last century when we were fighting for our equal rights.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I'd love to have seen her final stage performances - as King Lear <i>him</i>self, which she took to New York four years ago, but by then it had become clear that, even though she'd have wished it, she couldn't keep it up forever. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Now she's gone, probably my own personal favourite actress of my lifetime. Thanks very much indeed, Glenda. R.I.P muchly!</span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-84793910007089318732023-05-25T01:55:00.007-07:002023-06-12T23:39:58.258-07:00My three toms all now neutered and microchipped + Tina R.I.P.<p> <span style="font-size: large;">The last 24 hours have been heavy anxiety, but it's over now - at least until the next drama. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Last week getting Bobby chipped wasn't too bad. He'd already been spayed when he arrived here 4.5 years ago, leading me to fear that he might already have been micro-injected, thus having an official owner, but he wasn't. He was good being checked over and didn't react to the injection. However, Sloopy, being still 'intact' when he arrived around the same time must be around 6 years old now, and still had to be done. Rather late-in-the-day for that procedure but no getting round it. Last week when I took him for his first vet check there was a heart-stopping incident when he managed to escape en route from the carrier by widening the zip fastenings and squeezing through (my fault!) and he scarpered off down the road which, luckily, wasn't too far from home so he did find his way back, even if I did dread him not daring to do so. But yesterday was the 'big day', much feared by me - <i>the </i>operation, after the obligatory (so cruel) 12 hours of not allowing him any food or even water. With much loud wailing as I carried him the 3/4 mile to the vet, I had to leave him there for 6 hours before collecting him, a period for which I was continually on edge. When the time came I was so relieved to hear that all had been done and without any problem. Told that if he keeps attending to his 'wound' by licking it I'd have to bring him back and have a collar fitted for, possibly, around a fortnight during which he'd have to be kept inside, which would be logistically v. difficult with a permanently open window for he and the other two to go and come as they please. However, since I brought him home, now 18 hours ago, although he has been licking himself 'there', which is hardly surprising, he hasn't been over-obsessed with doing so, so I'm now dearly hoping that the threatened further remedial action may not be necessary. He seems to be back to his old routine of being out all night - though now without having sired any more kitties to add to the population he's likely already to have done - and sleeping all day through. So, early days yet, but looking good.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Glad that's over with no major mishaps.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I'd like to have posted here new photos of Bobby and Sloopy but, darn it, I'm still unable to load photos onto this laptop. Meantime, here are two early pics of the 'boss', Patchie, who's now reached 18 years - one showing him being wary, the other he contentedly settled in.</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwfo0ZB7Q0jrPMsw4z5bbmxHRfYTvQmJdJ43NI5uqTxxZCF7fuvPsxcl31RyufPM4GH2Cob8WB4O3mbHjfQErYzXsLQWKOwwcuvRNWOyaWNz0gbCZh_ivCnyuriR8iWw2AH1Iu0JqR3jhtDVGprCsEVUakRmjmBObUATtgUbSE5Qv1xb6KSJgykIuZZA/s3296/100_2017.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3296" data-original-width="2472" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwfo0ZB7Q0jrPMsw4z5bbmxHRfYTvQmJdJ43NI5uqTxxZCF7fuvPsxcl31RyufPM4GH2Cob8WB4O3mbHjfQErYzXsLQWKOwwcuvRNWOyaWNz0gbCZh_ivCnyuriR8iWw2AH1Iu0JqR3jhtDVGprCsEVUakRmjmBObUATtgUbSE5Qv1xb6KSJgykIuZZA/w300-h400/100_2017.JPG" width="300" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihlTOD2oGvEuGYd1IzgVCp26ZiLkvAKx2a3X7N1-OLXCHagjVaxNa-wOoNS1FLFHeErgkBDgxtkx0_5oa0S3MagtLl6qXaZ01L60sTsbNag0a8UZ-t3KOiLDusorM7KiVlddHot7FnJhQyDcKD1Ix3H9If3m34j_URVY_34mGocCPM4VrPiEPxrLU5_A/s3296/100_2026.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2472" data-original-width="3296" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihlTOD2oGvEuGYd1IzgVCp26ZiLkvAKx2a3X7N1-OLXCHagjVaxNa-wOoNS1FLFHeErgkBDgxtkx0_5oa0S3MagtLl6qXaZ01L60sTsbNag0a8UZ-t3KOiLDusorM7KiVlddHot7FnJhQyDcKD1Ix3H9If3m34j_URVY_34mGocCPM4VrPiEPxrLU5_A/w400-h300/100_2026.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Btw: On this morning of hearing the deeply sad news of Tina's passing (she being a <i>highly </i>major feature of my own 1980s life's soundtrack, both literally and figuratively) I hadn't realised that for more than a few years she'd not only lived in Switzerland, but actually in Kussnacht, just outside of Zurich, a place I'd just happened to visit by boat briefly whilst staying for a few days in Zurich city in around 1985 (though Tina herself only started living there in the mid-1990s). Just by chance I'd happened to get off the boat at Kussnacht, which was doing a tour of Lake Zurich. It could have been anywhere else. I also learnt later that world-famed soprano Gwyneth Jones also lived there - and had probably been there at the time of my couple-of-hours visit, I believe. I only wish I'd taken some photos of Kussnacht, a relatively smallish place, while I was in it, not having fully appreciated just how attractive it was. In walking around for an hour or two, I remember lots of roses and other blooms in gardens and window boxes, perfuming the air, and it all being exceptionally clean and tidy.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">'bye Tina, uniquely wonderful - thank you <i><u>ever</u></i> so much. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrUyY2OPWzOUtcopZMDmClW2DKNL6IrWTde5fF2pAQU5eMBWlYq_8T56aPSGaCBCB93TlMgKV3I1jhaxxf-pbij2aMXzMj_JbYeFbEM6DX3Hz5ZeXmmgkxhOavfgC5IEoq34bIqs0YWM_VqvyR31KJPBp0MOdbuK2Axgb58W4-TRIjthDstzO-rn7Hgg/s222/images.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="169" data-original-width="222" height="305" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrUyY2OPWzOUtcopZMDmClW2DKNL6IrWTde5fF2pAQU5eMBWlYq_8T56aPSGaCBCB93TlMgKV3I1jhaxxf-pbij2aMXzMj_JbYeFbEM6DX3Hz5ZeXmmgkxhOavfgC5IEoq34bIqs0YWM_VqvyR31KJPBp0MOdbuK2Axgb58W4-TRIjthDstzO-rn7Hgg/w400-h305/images.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /> </span><p></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-19408328417540849002023-05-14T08:01:00.013-07:002023-05-15T03:21:07.262-07:00Eurovision - U.K. second again, but now second from LAST....again!<p> </p><p><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvCj7vHdRIFcAt-Lq3VJI_EUZedFIhG5Zxt2C7VBuTuOEZkqa6IZUtg6E3jIHvnNQLYFwxu_Fr0icRFju1iapI_9JTPLOGb0_x7bp5bR3sitxFib_Px4_p4CtPrApu9EJilGJv0aNpRElJAThXvwoVXx6I-V8_HJ68K7yy6dKD9_y55q-O5ngJNZGpZw/s318/images%20(20).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="159" data-original-width="318" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvCj7vHdRIFcAt-Lq3VJI_EUZedFIhG5Zxt2C7VBuTuOEZkqa6IZUtg6E3jIHvnNQLYFwxu_Fr0icRFju1iapI_9JTPLOGb0_x7bp5bR3sitxFib_Px4_p4CtPrApu9EJilGJv0aNpRElJAThXvwoVXx6I-V8_HJ68K7yy6dKD9_y55q-O5ngJNZGpZw/w400-h200/images%20(20).jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><br /><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Liverpool hosted this year's contest as the 2022 winner, Ukraine, was unable to do so because of the ongoing war - and last year the U.K. was runner-up</span><span style="font-size: x-large;">.</span><span style="font-size: large;"><span> </span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span>As happened last year, before the actual performances began, we viewers were told that we had up to </span><i><u>20</u></i><span> votes at our disposal? Eh? Why? When there are only 26 contenders? Absurd. Then, when it came to voting time, and also like last year, we were told to vote for our favourite act/song/performer - all in the <u>singular</u>, just as it should be. So goodness alone knows what was intended. I first voted for my favourite, Norway, then after a few mins decided to try to vote for my 2nd and 3rd, Poland and Finland, and see if they'd be blocked. They weren't. What everyone else thought and did, Lord knows! They've got to sort this out! Sheesh!</span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Yesterday's innovation was that this time not only would the 37 original participating countries be eligible to vote (no one voting for their own) but the <i>whole world </i>could! Presumably, just those broadcasting the programme live - countries in North and South America? Arab countries? Asia, Africa, New Zealand? How these votes would be monitored I dare not ask and don't want to know.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Winner was Sweden - a doleful, bellowed-out ballad sung by long-fingernailed damsel-in-distress, who appeared to be locked in some low-ceilinged prison, bewailing her sorry predicament.</span></p><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjzXwrSmf_llqRRdaoIecN2jBIlDCUVBFNEc_H6PrIMb14opDnUm8TQagbA-blN7lmFAl7ycNp0QROHE10nKM-V4ewbkMfmE1YEg6Q3ptS0BCfP8IgQh1Zm0aiUxZCZUUyQptc_nOvt7XLt31MxOK1V5Gp8t-mW8L-7wEJ7pjhvWv3qbpwH963B_0_yg/s259/images%20(3).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="259" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjzXwrSmf_llqRRdaoIecN2jBIlDCUVBFNEc_H6PrIMb14opDnUm8TQagbA-blN7lmFAl7ycNp0QROHE10nKM-V4ewbkMfmE1YEg6Q3ptS0BCfP8IgQh1Zm0aiUxZCZUUyQptc_nOvt7XLt31MxOK1V5Gp8t-mW8L-7wEJ7pjhvWv3qbpwH963B_0_yg/w400-h300/images%20(3).jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgriBbdYybqMU4OaXb-l1X3maaARjy_c3DwSZ0dpwjmJNEewgyq_ulcMw75kasYVQm47_A55eJ3muCGwsj7xUA0W-bEQHqmbXOvR8zlea2i02gle2Tbh6Iwvhxo_rNFTC08Y5Sxys_mqUbTUNf_3G7Wh35CjvmgBSN1V42i1sq6pM_uEzTdSva4VZQ8dw/s275/download%20(7).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgriBbdYybqMU4OaXb-l1X3maaARjy_c3DwSZ0dpwjmJNEewgyq_ulcMw75kasYVQm47_A55eJ3muCGwsj7xUA0W-bEQHqmbXOvR8zlea2i02gle2Tbh6Iwvhxo_rNFTC08Y5Sxys_mqUbTUNf_3G7Wh35CjvmgBSN1V42i1sq6pM_uEzTdSva4VZQ8dw/w400-h266/download%20(7).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><div>The appeal of her song, giving her more than sufficient votes to take the title, escaped me, and still does - even though, on hearing some days ago that it was the bookies favourite to win, I played it several times, and now even after its victory I still do not rate it <u>at all.</u> Must be my age. Her winning makes Sweden now an equal leader with Ireland for number of wins, seven times. Moreover, this chanteuse, Loreen, is only the second singer to win the contest twice, as well as being the first female to do so, Ireland's Johnny Logan being the first of all. </div></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Second, and winning just before the final vote announcement, was Finland's brave, sassy and daft - but engrossing - entertainment - 'Cha-cha-cha' by Kaarija (my own 3rd choice) - a true sing-along crowd pleaser, and for me too......</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuJ5UTfFM1aOBULVGlMlC3Njpq8Q0PEPXO-ac_H30ap2zz5bryq_r1RIPXRHyGyxiA86KtaEk4vYHxS0v30QuKgGwhVNb8ztgbwrs4T6-zyQKtd-Nyd_5PtRE_iBRKStit1yJdN51SXbk4I85B7bbmkI-IWv0vMemexLQdUmcDx7-QTYmN12i1bWWkTg/s300/images%20(2).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuJ5UTfFM1aOBULVGlMlC3Njpq8Q0PEPXO-ac_H30ap2zz5bryq_r1RIPXRHyGyxiA86KtaEk4vYHxS0v30QuKgGwhVNb8ztgbwrs4T6-zyQKtd-Nyd_5PtRE_iBRKStit1yJdN51SXbk4I85B7bbmkI-IWv0vMemexLQdUmcDx7-QTYmN12i1bWWkTg/w400-h224/images%20(2).jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYkWkDzwSnzWthkwjeCe6HTUjokGagyK9A8VKtZuqiBOWZNgN-hqA4ysXwuhMXoCfhaB2a2jpsc3gqae9evinNt710s0qKBoEkDEVhdfrOMW6a0Ow2aUWtIX5ba1RLBa20BVg2a05pXeK9MiecctsbuvGUGz1wNG1i4cLvmc5kSuwRb9odQr2_oEciNw/s275/download%20(1).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYkWkDzwSnzWthkwjeCe6HTUjokGagyK9A8VKtZuqiBOWZNgN-hqA4ysXwuhMXoCfhaB2a2jpsc3gqae9evinNt710s0qKBoEkDEVhdfrOMW6a0Ow2aUWtIX5ba1RLBa20BVg2a05pXeK9MiecctsbuvGUGz1wNG1i4cLvmc5kSuwRb9odQr2_oEciNw/w400-h266/download%20(1).jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span>In 3rd place came a nondescript Israeli entry, and then in 4th was the evening's eye-candy, Italy's Marco Mangoni......</span></span><p></p><div><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP8gMRFBHceUT7MaH94j9kMSQQkj6e-2vteg8gY9pYPzSCy68ipwcuWpRZgYA6CglpOrofMrUCsH4FIjh8Nhek-X_4yf8j0D_ZRNVY85Q_sLk5chRYK_Tfgvdu4VJ9SX9zmeMvW2xjPNabkIkfrZgE61KsqASE1JqFVs4tBANF2yAOIQYW7eg2G_gP1A/s275/images%20(6).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP8gMRFBHceUT7MaH94j9kMSQQkj6e-2vteg8gY9pYPzSCy68ipwcuWpRZgYA6CglpOrofMrUCsH4FIjh8Nhek-X_4yf8j0D_ZRNVY85Q_sLk5chRYK_Tfgvdu4VJ9SX9zmeMvW2xjPNabkIkfrZgE61KsqASE1JqFVs4tBANF2yAOIQYW7eg2G_gP1A/w400-h266/images%20(6).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span>Next was my own top choice, Norway's Alessandra with a bouncy, rhythmic number, even if the (English) lyrics were rather banal. But it captured me for appeal.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hFS5s4cgRdaRYpvfwNPDgOMnIjehKsIOR-BGgfj_UFJpfWe-WydAb6eJ0oB-k9A3YFtH5ygvUwo-gjii_wppfoEa8EIh70KWVNW1IQbBrRvyYROi5WUdFMIk1OIygtIlqB3eCfH1ow3XBX1x9V8ArLH-yW3taaT0nzwdRlrS1USGkh9KPGhesm34Tg/s275/download%20(2).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hFS5s4cgRdaRYpvfwNPDgOMnIjehKsIOR-BGgfj_UFJpfWe-WydAb6eJ0oB-k9A3YFtH5ygvUwo-gjii_wppfoEa8EIh70KWVNW1IQbBrRvyYROi5WUdFMIk1OIygtIlqB3eCfH1ow3XBX1x9V8ArLH-yW3taaT0nzwdRlrS1USGkh9KPGhesm34Tg/w400-h266/download%20(2).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>Sixth place came Ukraine, which I'd feared might win again through a substantial sympathy vote, though it did get a higher placing than I think was deserved.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">And it would be criminal to omit mentioning seventh-placed Belgium, with singer, Gustaph, a handsomely-attired top half including fetching white stetson but negated by lower-reaches pink bloomer-pants, rather like jodhpurs, suggestively split between his thighs to reveal.....pink shorts/underpants? Oh dear! He was interviewed at least twice and both times he mentioned his husband, which surely must have freaked out certain LGBTQ non-sympathetic countries. Good for him, too bad for them!</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3PHxfYSuIm6-AsRn_a6B18Twb3ogyGpOSs6ltixlJ8xcY0xZ9TEj5je4PBKlCWtPtYEuYTxzVlaOM0nWp4onPVmms1ZG6hvWsOziOGo_L7Vb3vT8eifzO-zgFvKa9PDOpG8mECaKc-UsrrkCSa7Q7bD5FpRLTIbYsQtI4zwa30Y7AfuKv1YSaKgemTQ/s244/images%20(7).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="244" data-original-width="207" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3PHxfYSuIm6-AsRn_a6B18Twb3ogyGpOSs6ltixlJ8xcY0xZ9TEj5je4PBKlCWtPtYEuYTxzVlaOM0nWp4onPVmms1ZG6hvWsOziOGo_L7Vb3vT8eifzO-zgFvKa9PDOpG8mECaKc-UsrrkCSa7Q7bD5FpRLTIbYsQtI4zwa30Y7AfuKv1YSaKgemTQ/w339-h400/images%20(7).jpg" width="339" /></a></div><br />And so right at the bottom of the results table, and coming just above last-placed Germany, who had already taken the wooden spoon last year, was the U.K.'s Mae Muller. This was a true surprise as I had liked the song from the very first time I heard it, and I still do, honestly believing that it was a potential winner. Catchy melody, superior lyrics. However, it did have the 'misfortune' to be performed as the very final entry behind all the other contestants, when much of the telly audience would already have made up their minds. Pity. She deserved much better.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimJ6E4Up4NDHoBCxpeOWavLDXyj6dseq8QkilOxxLtA2gyexsuyAjFbFsHYhAZ3X56h79tDfT0NCwovDQ2OyUNxh_SZxft5N2FKCPG2e5iuyBB9MEPv4vsstNH3Db9mEhl5MDngqsAQnDAbKA_G3ro4wTOONqZeDK8Na-CJ5ExZ7I8cNxzXTCkN69JSA/s275/images%20(18).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimJ6E4Up4NDHoBCxpeOWavLDXyj6dseq8QkilOxxLtA2gyexsuyAjFbFsHYhAZ3X56h79tDfT0NCwovDQ2OyUNxh_SZxft5N2FKCPG2e5iuyBB9MEPv4vsstNH3Db9mEhl5MDngqsAQnDAbKA_G3ro4wTOONqZeDK8Na-CJ5ExZ7I8cNxzXTCkN69JSA/w400-h266/images%20(18).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">The presenters this time were a headache (as usual)......<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIjz5CpIwHmMBy9FVPrQbfwmhzhF1oiNB1_Q-GHyyT2l9AXxl1KCZUcP0FcXuAYUo2kon2fFQ_Q2UG5zA9KRJ1lYXi9mBbL_tC9VI8PtOUEhAqka2n-YgcsWYuDv0Ki_U3oJohbacs8GQR8csW4qkRTtmbQnxYI6GEJsIzeBb0yO8LOglJ7oSwMQoFCA/s270/images%20(16).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="187" data-original-width="270" height="278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIjz5CpIwHmMBy9FVPrQbfwmhzhF1oiNB1_Q-GHyyT2l9AXxl1KCZUcP0FcXuAYUo2kon2fFQ_Q2UG5zA9KRJ1lYXi9mBbL_tC9VI8PtOUEhAqka2n-YgcsWYuDv0Ki_U3oJohbacs8GQR8csW4qkRTtmbQnxYI6GEJsIzeBb0yO8LOglJ7oSwMQoFCA/w400-h278/images%20(16).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Alesha Dixon who, I understand, is a pop-singer, and whose name only vaguely rang a bell with me - Ukrainian Julia Sanina - and big, butch-like, six-footer (almost), Hannah Waddingham, English actress, I believe. The latter was particularly annoying, shouting to the audience,,,,,,,,"<i>Are you ready? What's that? I said </i><b style="font-style: italic;">Are you ready???</b>" - Oh, of course they are. Shut up, woman! For the announcements of the voting results the three ladies were joined by an untypically subdued and reticent Graham Norton who'd deserted his place till then in the commentary box.</span></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The pre-voting 'interval act included last year's runner-up Sam Ryder singing his new release. I <i>still</i> can't comprehend why his last year's song 'Spaceman', came second, though I'm not complaining. After multiple hearings I still cannot discern any melody in it. His performance last night was accompanied on drums by the Queen drummer, Roger Taylor, heavily bearded but whom I recognised before the announcement had been made, though I dare say that much of the audience may not have been sure of who 'Q<span>ueen' were.</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXwmtBf3fQAHlZaRKdw7qp7FtLJKaq_6x_ig-xIkfHKKJVzUWPMRPD2rSaOKKxFoR0Rb5lEOj3f6lynH6lWrqCqjZrmQaDavgLUglo2TOxbE0mH52xCjuVdj2P3YmrgpcJmlXkD8YoiaRyhc4XEfN5Gfih2-PUU-XJCShNkj77dSmX4mXIoS-1Mn6kxQ/s275/download%20(9).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXwmtBf3fQAHlZaRKdw7qp7FtLJKaq_6x_ig-xIkfHKKJVzUWPMRPD2rSaOKKxFoR0Rb5lEOj3f6lynH6lWrqCqjZrmQaDavgLUglo2TOxbE0mH52xCjuVdj2P3YmrgpcJmlXkD8YoiaRyhc4XEfN5Gfih2-PUU-XJCShNkj77dSmX4mXIoS-1Mn6kxQ/w400-h266/download%20(9).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG09eKrD6nJmoBCDN8PYU2Gd1CiFgnd3PeiRQOm3xy7FarF39rbzpb4nCRiHU8UJweSwBsHyfiXDgUqfuqZZt6-D48fgyyc4Vz0hyjEbJgifkEk7JAWnkUT3vBMWeXlNdiTB-5tVHTCIyRVna12d3K_BsS-zknQJM5hnUMjnmJicCRaHz98FnURPkz7A/s275/images%20(9).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG09eKrD6nJmoBCDN8PYU2Gd1CiFgnd3PeiRQOm3xy7FarF39rbzpb4nCRiHU8UJweSwBsHyfiXDgUqfuqZZt6-D48fgyyc4Vz0hyjEbJgifkEk7JAWnkUT3vBMWeXlNdiTB-5tVHTCIyRVna12d3K_BsS-zknQJM5hnUMjnmJicCRaHz98FnURPkz7A/w400-h266/images%20(9).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">And finally, the most outrageously accoutred (prominent Y-fronts et al!) Croatia's 'Let 3' performing an anti-war song and finishing 12th.......Mad, mad, mad! 😄</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTl7CSADdWJX7OwqODOZ1REtF-NNV2AAGpSAuxie0qzXK9FYGPpqlwktEvkVkxp7lqPpb70xVSy4C8uIZnP64NaM_PJ9Ahqim-gvZP-1aTU00tVhgpLHo7B8WTeTyuAwriIIp7Z4H1lX_GegcPdr6TEAKqerPcgK_gV60YsxD4paXD5XjUeaTUiOy1jQ/s275/images%20(19).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTl7CSADdWJX7OwqODOZ1REtF-NNV2AAGpSAuxie0qzXK9FYGPpqlwktEvkVkxp7lqPpb70xVSy4C8uIZnP64NaM_PJ9Ahqim-gvZP-1aTU00tVhgpLHo7B8WTeTyuAwriIIp7Z4H1lX_GegcPdr6TEAKqerPcgK_gV60YsxD4paXD5XjUeaTUiOy1jQ/w400-h266/images%20(19).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>So there it was. As simultaneously entertaining and infuriating as the contest always is - and once more every bit as camp as Catterick. We'd been hoping that for the U.K. last year's nearly-first placing had marked the end of our more than two decades of being in the Eurovision doldrums. It now looks like that just <i>may </i>have been a flash in the pan and we're now once again back as a non-entity in Queer Street. But who's to know? What can't be denied is that this year Liverpool, with all the technical wizardry and fireworks we've come to expect, did us and our country proud. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Till 2024 in Stockholm, then (or maybe Malmo, Gothenburg, Kiruna........?)</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeg8mnRrpiKxW6ykIhSKt6GPAJQjJjyzOImjHprfFA55xS9CjkFxwewtkci4qfi23aZ6IiRMiiT8zAsnQ2Jys_YuBYgmpZKFer3y8dwnFJ5hEVJXLUodO6nrx9yYZwDQd12YDDlgMmeKe-rEnDhzWUOmaI41Kcb15YG_mAt6P7rjLM9wg6phndFtqv6g/s300/images%20(17).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeg8mnRrpiKxW6ykIhSKt6GPAJQjJjyzOImjHprfFA55xS9CjkFxwewtkci4qfi23aZ6IiRMiiT8zAsnQ2Jys_YuBYgmpZKFer3y8dwnFJ5hEVJXLUodO6nrx9yYZwDQd12YDDlgMmeKe-rEnDhzWUOmaI41Kcb15YG_mAt6P7rjLM9wg6phndFtqv6g/w400-h224/images%20(17).jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span><br /></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span><br /></span></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span><br /></span></span></div>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-4691229091071824792023-05-05T08:07:00.002-07:002023-05-05T08:10:53.095-07:00Cat micro-chipping becoming compulsory<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWeezE3ofl8WzxItMwFzin0QlaSs_iIVLChY9pPP6gIy82d-SdRMaprI9fI_cZ0kXu05FEIX0mpVbbVPBskcU6y7mtWKyYlRKEs3ZFzNupFedVk9owRajXNDaIFNFKjq0Q9NicmLZdj8dF00SumgFUBGHk947fLttnodqNVu5cy3axVszkoIGJBduy6Q/s265/23.5.5b.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><img border="0" data-original-height="190" data-original-width="265" height="143" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWeezE3ofl8WzxItMwFzin0QlaSs_iIVLChY9pPP6gIy82d-SdRMaprI9fI_cZ0kXu05FEIX0mpVbbVPBskcU6y7mtWKyYlRKEs3ZFzNupFedVk9owRajXNDaIFNFKjq0Q9NicmLZdj8dF00SumgFUBGHk947fLttnodqNVu5cy3axVszkoIGJBduy6Q/w200-h143/23.5.5b.jpg" width="200" /></span></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><span>I knew it was on the cards but had pushed it to the back of my mind. It now becomes mandatory in just over a month's time and so becomes priority to deal with. Failure to comply makes owner liable for up to £500 ($615 U.S.) </span><i>per cat. </i><span>O</span><span>h, </span><i>shooooooot!</i><span> Could have done right now without the costs of having it fulfilled, together with all necessary incidentals like health checks when, with everyday household expenses now being as they are, I'm getting close to checking under settee cushions for lost pennies. </span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">My present bevy of felines includes one, Patchie (now 17+), who already has all the essentials, including health insurance which alone is now getting on for £200 p.a. The other two, Bobby and Sloopy, moved in here (without my active encouragement) 4.5 years ago and have never been to a vet in their time here, both never having shown any signs of illness or physical pain or discomfort. I've no idea where their former homes are. Sloopy has very conspicuously <u>not</u> been 'doctored' so it's unlikely that he was well looked after and is therefore most likely not microchipped. As for Bobby, I'm not sure if he's also male, though I think he is, and if so must have been 'seen to'. So I'm concerned that if he does have a chip in him, his former owner will have to be contacted and told that he's got a new home - and if that's the case I'll tell the vet to explain that I'd dearly love to keep him, with all the costs that it entails. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">As for now, I've made appointments booked at the vet for both Bobby and Sloopy on successive days next week. I'll be glad when it's been done so I can then start weeping about how much it's costing me. But we all know that their friendship is priceless, don't we? (<i>Don't </i>we?........gulp!) </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I'm unable to post up-to-date pics of both my subjects as I can no longer load from my old-fashioned camera to this laptop, as it seems one now needs a smartphone, which I've never owned. However here's two earlier pics of them (Bobby is the mostly black one) from a couple of years ago, any changes due to ageing being minor:-</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEbKFJs8fsOzGHWtYObquV8k58wA4ALIAzA8uzVd26M2PIzrhW8X69Gs_wjnWDzzCJzPw4B_JEkoXlnxEM9nNKJDVTJA5qS9s0W2s4n2hZrIX_KzQLyAZUevBqxez7HcGJLI2tkpoToU4WtL7JxKgxxLlHpLPW4TD1Y3lS0N-8wY-o2TGI4D9vjrnR-w/s2889/100_1987.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2889" data-original-width="2144" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEbKFJs8fsOzGHWtYObquV8k58wA4ALIAzA8uzVd26M2PIzrhW8X69Gs_wjnWDzzCJzPw4B_JEkoXlnxEM9nNKJDVTJA5qS9s0W2s4n2hZrIX_KzQLyAZUevBqxez7HcGJLI2tkpoToU4WtL7JxKgxxLlHpLPW4TD1Y3lS0N-8wY-o2TGI4D9vjrnR-w/s320/100_1987.JPG" width="237" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUp3YVlQ_tRIhqj7X_n6m8FgT1ugeYPjQjU6eAbi3BTlRe-ga5Av_6AZtekutTWOG4ec9H3MxURSELHvt1u-2dKQnMTvH5tM9d37ACB_OMAuaHaxb1UOz6uRXVS6iU1Cz4SCKjYzX3369_f7oxJcQLwwBbjRGxJSgjGNeK2o9l-7_EcmvVUU6jnVXmKA/s3296/100_1988.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2472" data-original-width="3296" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUp3YVlQ_tRIhqj7X_n6m8FgT1ugeYPjQjU6eAbi3BTlRe-ga5Av_6AZtekutTWOG4ec9H3MxURSELHvt1u-2dKQnMTvH5tM9d37ACB_OMAuaHaxb1UOz6uRXVS6iU1Cz4SCKjYzX3369_f7oxJcQLwwBbjRGxJSgjGNeK2o9l-7_EcmvVUU6jnVXmKA/s320/100_1988.JPG" width="320" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span><br /></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-86546235810267747662023-04-19T08:59:00.009-07:002023-04-21T06:35:41.249-07:00Do we veggies deserve a 'holier-than-thou' reputation?.<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPS3iBbHlUJ0mIevEQUHgKcoNj3X1G7PWdAeluV9HsEuAI3p-y7XUDLggTMDIOqgQMv7hv7r8V2B0HGRgD7W7u9IzMJXagf6mlEJ21i2ATZrIXWANogKVC9x1NDaAZFL9Aw6QNJpkZVov_00WdGqCQIL2S9V6Umz1OlxYLknbP99C7SULjzDWv7cSzIQ/s259/23.4.19.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="259" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPS3iBbHlUJ0mIevEQUHgKcoNj3X1G7PWdAeluV9HsEuAI3p-y7XUDLggTMDIOqgQMv7hv7r8V2B0HGRgD7W7u9IzMJXagf6mlEJ21i2ATZrIXWANogKVC9x1NDaAZFL9Aw6QNJpkZVov_00WdGqCQIL2S9V6Umz1OlxYLknbP99C7SULjzDWv7cSzIQ/w400-h300/23.4.19.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /> </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><i>This post was inspired after reading my blog-pal JayGee's ('Going Gently') own recent posting of some calves mourning the (permanent) absence of their mothers, though he does </i><i style="text-decoration-line: underline;">not</i><span><span>, </span><i><span><span>as I do here,</span><span> </span><span>cover</span></span></i></span><i><span> </span></i><i>the topic of vegetarianism:-</i></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><i>https://disasterfilm.blogspot.com/2023/04/cries-for-mom.html</i></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">One of my most vivid childhood memories is when I was maybe ten or so, out with two of my brothers plus one or two of their friends (I'd never had any friends of my own up to that age, and actually till later still). We happened to be walking by an abattoir at the same time as a herd of cattle was being ushered out of a truck and into the building. I can still recall the animal's faces mooing pitifully, they obviously (one assumes) being completely unaware of the grizzly fate which was immediately ahead of them. I see them even now. Feeling profound horror for the animals myself, I'd heard about abattoirs but had never thought any deeper about it. I think this experience may have been the seed which was, a very few years later, to turn me away from meat-eating for the rest of my life (other than some minor, isolated lapses).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">The heading to this post is not something I've ever heard expressed so starkly as I do, but it's an attitude I regularly pick up when reading - or hearing - 'between the lines'. I may be mistaken but it could well be the way I would feel myself were I a meat-eater. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">When I've found myself with a group in a restaurant (in the past, usually a works gathering) and it came to ordering one's meal, sometimes I'd be asked "How long have you been vegetarian?" or, a trifle more insidiously, "<u style="font-style: italic;">Why</u> are you.......?" I can hear the curiosity, which is fair enough, but I also detect a burgeoning unspoken irritation on the speaker's part. When the question comes, which I dread, most especially in an <i>eating</i> establishment, I have to bluster about the subject, trying to avoid it directly yet closing it down, at least until in a less inappropriate location. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">The fact is that my awareness of an animal having had its entire life sacrificed, probably in some horrific and painful way, in order to give me (plus a few others) a few minutes of pleasure is always hovering so real in my consciousness that I could never truly enjoy the experience of eating it. Added to which is a secondary reason, viz the realisation that eating animals is not, by and large, <i>essential</i> to my survival. (I'll expand on qualifications to this shortly).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">So, how do I feel about those who, though being aware of my arguments, nevertheless <u>choose</u> to eat meat? (I include fish and seafood generally in the word). Well, I have to confess that I do wish there were more vegetarians in the world - or, better still, vegans. But as far as I know I have never attempted to 'convert' any carnivores out of their practice. That is for them to decide, though I'm pretty sure that many of the latter feel that we'd jump at any chance to preach our philosophy, and which, I've no doubt some do. However, I reckon such a ploy is largely counter-productive, only succeeding in getting the backs up of their target audience, a reaction which I can fully understand. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Our 'goody-goody' reputation, if it does exist, stems not just from a dislike at seeing animals suffer needlessly, but a general wish of wanting the survival of beings vulnerable to man's endless whim to end creatures' lives, sensate beings who often have such pathetically short natural existences anyway, protected and, indeed, respected. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Although I am emphatically not religious in any way, in early posts of mine I've mentioned my reading a Biblical passage most days (i.e. at least 95% of days) for now getting on for 60 years - as well as a daily passage from the Koran (in at least 5 different translations) - in addition to the Hindu Bhagavad-Gita and also various Buddhist texts. What is striking about the Koran, as far as I can make out, is that it's totally devoid of expressing any affection for non-human beings. I think I'm right in saying that Islamic countries have next to nothing regarding the legal protection of animals. As such I would never want to visit such countries where, even a chance visit to a market would be bound to reveal a tethered sheep, goat etc waiting to be sold and used to slaughter for Halal meat, doubtlessly often inexpertly done with an entire family spectating the horrific act. Observing such a creature destined for such a hideous end would ruin the rest of my stay in that country - and would remain in my mind for still longer. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">The Bible's New Testament, at least, mentions in Jesus' parables, the value of sheep, though that is really only as a commodity, a means of income for the shepherd/farmer. In the Old Book there are, it is true, a very few odd verses in Genesis and Proverbs which speak of the mistreatment of animals as being cruel, though such is not an oft-recurring theme in the volumes - and the Bible is particularly down on dogs. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">India, because of its wide acceptance of Hinduism has strict laws against the mistreatment of cattle though, as far as I know, little else for other animals. Buddhism is, as far as I know, the sole <i>major </i>religion which recognises the value of <u>all</u> life - including plants - though not necessarily all on a parity. What I find most difficult to cope with is its doctrine of standing back and dispassionately observing life ('awareness') in detached manner without recognising an absolute necessity of intervening to alleviate suffering in another being where it's possible - or maybe I haven't fully comprehended the guidance/doctrine.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I'd ideally like to become a fully-observant vegan, and for at least a decade I've strived in that direction. I'd describe myself as more than 90% there now. (Milk now has to be exclusively non-dairy - for me preferably oat- or cashew-milk). However there are two or three areas where I haven't made it, a major one being that I just haven't been able to acclimatise myself to vegetarian cheese though I have tried and tried. I find there a bland same-ness, even between varieties which try to mimic dairy cheese 'flavours', almost unpalatable, though I'm sure they'll get better in time. All my life I've been quite an avid cheese fan though have now certainly well reduced my intake of dairy cheese. In my fridge at the moment is a portion of French Brie as well as a some Philadelphia cream cheese spread. Also I'm quite partial to Cheddar, Red Leicester, Double Gloucester as well as a number of Dutch and French cheeses, though without going totally overboard for any of them. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Additionally, for common-sense health reasons, especially for someone of my age, I take daily cod liver oil tablets to postpone the onset of getting painful joints (even though, regarding fishing, I cannot bear to see it taking place - to witness a fish being hauled up out of its natural habitat and suffocate in the air I just cannot watch). Also, acknowledging that being vegetarian means going without certain essential vitamins, I take daily B12 tablets to compensate for what plant-based foods cannot provide - as well as, incidentally (odourless) garlic tablets, an ingredient well beloved of many but which I myself cannot tolerate in food, including just its smell, though appreciating that it's especially beneficial towards a healthy heart. .</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">When I mention my exceptions to true veggie-ism, so many times the person I'm explaining to will gleefully pounce on my admissions as if it punches a hole in my definition of being veggie, even going so far as if it invalidates all aspirations to achieve my ideal and, on at least one occasion, calling me out as a hypocrite! But being <u>not</u> totally consistent is merely one aspect of human nature. If I say I don't have a great affection for Mozart's music, yet absolutely adore around a dozen of his piano concertos, does that make me a liar? Enough said?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Looking this post over it reads more heavily serious than I'd intended - as well as being longer - but we'll let it stand. I've said more on this subject than I've ever said to anyone up to now, though hoping it hasn't bored the pants off you. And I <i>still </i>don't know the answer to my question at top. Perhaps someone can respond with a suggestion..........?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_eye-5E8H3CFy-bOH54xgjPNmI01WzzT1BxbFe1A64Mj6AlHzeaoCThlcabQBqSA4B5pFtfG412AZ855eUziijda-tKp36a6t2OAoGTWbVqfV4nL2dou0PsqyhX8kVs0KiGaFlsLI1LvZ3XkPzJP9eqKt5CS_kQvk00oVvPTGiFWfErSyI1AHyM2cMA/s284/23.4.19%20images.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="177" data-original-width="284" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_eye-5E8H3CFy-bOH54xgjPNmI01WzzT1BxbFe1A64Mj6AlHzeaoCThlcabQBqSA4B5pFtfG412AZ855eUziijda-tKp36a6t2OAoGTWbVqfV4nL2dou0PsqyhX8kVs0KiGaFlsLI1LvZ3XkPzJP9eqKt5CS_kQvk00oVvPTGiFWfErSyI1AHyM2cMA/s1600/23.4.19%20images.jpg" width="284" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /> </span><p></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-76480901393295274412023-03-31T02:14:00.011-07:002023-03-31T22:59:56.227-07:00My cold, wordless exchange with Lily Savage (Paul O'Grady R.I.P.) <p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgadLdQBaTzg5BaiLbqlnyZwJY1ld0xPCBBR5JFZvimG4-NiTT3_Fhf64YJBcWp45zTpv-bSGqFiCVTLjrcgWsqWNFrQaSpaPkh8DHKxIVAenfcXbxyRN3TC5jF4smUsbLaXCsWJ4xj3nf2bJY_bEZo98_XFxVdLK9BW9tJLpN2XJTKc8l9m8Ih5zV2eg/s275/23.3.31.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgadLdQBaTzg5BaiLbqlnyZwJY1ld0xPCBBR5JFZvimG4-NiTT3_Fhf64YJBcWp45zTpv-bSGqFiCVTLjrcgWsqWNFrQaSpaPkh8DHKxIVAenfcXbxyRN3TC5jF4smUsbLaXCsWJ4xj3nf2bJY_bEZo98_XFxVdLK9BW9tJLpN2XJTKc8l9m8Ih5zV2eg/w400-h266/23.3.31.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">It will have been early 1988 when the campaign was at its height to prevent an obnoxious Bill becoming law, which was to make it a criminal offence for a local authority (read 'teachers') to <i>promote </i>homosexuality. Our side's 'anti' campaign itself was unsuccessful as the then Mrs Thatcher's government managed to get her Bill through Parliament in the Summer of that year where it remained for a further 17 years until Tony Blair's Labour government got it rescinded without too much trouble. In fact throughout that law's active life not one single prosecution under it had been made, not helped by no one agreeing on exactly what '<i>promotion of</i>....' actually meant. (All this, of course, was while AIDS was ravaging the country, knocking gay men over like skittles - a gleeful gift to the gay-hating bigots). But much of the energy of our side's anti-law campaign was on the lines of 'if this gets through, what comes next?' - the answer to which, if not worded as the British law was, can depressingly be seen happening right now in the U.S.A. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">As part of the 'anti' campaign there were a number of events in support of that side, including theatrical charity dos. In London there were two such which I attended, possibly the biggest one being in one of that city's largest West End theatres, the 1,200 seater Piccadilly theatre, with a large number of stars, including internationals, making a brief 5-minute appearance to make their support known. I can't list all the names now, the long tally-call being quite breath-taking, though I'll still have the programme somewhere - but I do remember Dame Edna Everidge, Vanessa Redgrave, Alan Bates, Alan Bennett, Harold Pinter (and, I think, Tom Stoppard), Simon Rattle with his then wife, the cast of 'EastEnders' and 'Les Mis', Gary Oldman and Sheila Hancock did the seduction scene from Joe Orton's 'Entertaining Mr Sloane'.....and, making their very first live performance ever, the Pet Shop Boys who performed, highly appropriately, 'It's a Sin' (and, I think, 'Always on My Mind').......plus Lily Savage, who was yet to become a national figure though by then very well known on the gay scene. I'd seen her before and, frankly, hadn't cared for her, she striking me as relentlessly bitter and humourless, unless you thought that hurling 'f' and 'c' words with no wit at various celebrities and politicians, was side-splittingly funny which some, indeed, did. I thought his material was all too shallow. Anyway, he did his predictable routine leaving me duly unimpressed. Then after this show I had booked to go straight to another similar event at one of London smaller theatres, half the size of the Piccadilly, with another cast list of more big names but mainly those from the gay circuits. And once again Lily Savage was on that programme too. She came on, same dress as before, and did the very same act which I'd just seen. I was sitting in an end seat on about the third row from the stage, quite conspicuously placed as it was jutting out into a side aisle. In the middle of her piece she suddenly stopped and looked directly at me, probably noticing because I was sitting there, rigid, unsmiling and rather bored despite her best efforts - and it was a looooong, silent, icy, 'if-looks-could-kill' glare. The audience hushed, and I could sense them starting to look for what had caught her attention though I didn't dare to glance around myself. I could have put an end to the dreadful moment there and then by just giving a smile and a thumbs-up, allowing her a sense of relief, but I was frozen into immobility, face and all. Then, after what seemed an eternity, with blood rushing to my cheeks, she looked away. I was certain she must say something, but she didn't. She just carried on with her venomous spiel. She'd have forgotten the moment with me two minutes later, and compared with the vicious heckling she must have got in her early career up to then, it would have been nothing. Yet here am I, over 30 years later, still recalling and cringeing at the memory of that moment of 'nothingness'!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">By the time Paul O'Grady died unexpectedly in his sleep the day before yesterday at the age of just 67 (nine years younger than I am now. Eek!) he'd been accorded the now rather over-used accolade of 'national treasure' which is probably fair. He'd ditched the Lily Savage persona for good about 15 years ago and has been appearing on national television since the mid-90s, though in latter years only as his true self, a warm, genial host - a side of him with qualities which Lily Savage's character was devoid and I hadn't been aware of. He was a popular chat-show host, as well as for game shows, though he did also do the occasional theatre appearances, such as the child-catcher in 'Chitty' at the London Palladium - and he was when he died, appearing in Edinburgh as Miss Hannigan on a national tour production of 'Annie', which would actually next week have been in Southampton, just 50 miles along the south coast from where I am. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Paul became particularly well-known for his concern for animals - for which he gets a <i>huge </i>plus from me! - and, in particular, for rescued dogs, the subject of a popular regular TV programme. He leaves behind a husband (rather good-looking, I must say) as well as a daughter from a previous marriage. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Everyone's parting is sad, and it seems my briefest of briefs 'interaction' with him, if one can even call it that, did not do justice to the man. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">R.I.P., Sir!</span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-86122838007361860022023-03-27T03:50:00.024-07:002023-04-12T05:50:07.154-07:00The 'N - word' before it became the ultimate unmentionable.<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_3Fn0fHJHj7BcVxIrBPUNNdjfJP4c2TTXvG6q6atbxJohx0T8QRjWGF6MyMMfDxn2UP2zkiIjKAJeamIz--xWIJUZDCr800T3J4WUybnsDknwiNVw3TL21A-eNgpPwhkLRkucN8B7qoIX02Enw0dKpM-ba7wBFCuE2pUXNOUuvbPRViUnWhPEb78-HQ/s259/23.3.27a.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="195" data-original-width="259" height="195" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_3Fn0fHJHj7BcVxIrBPUNNdjfJP4c2TTXvG6q6atbxJohx0T8QRjWGF6MyMMfDxn2UP2zkiIjKAJeamIz--xWIJUZDCr800T3J4WUybnsDknwiNVw3TL21A-eNgpPwhkLRkucN8B7qoIX02Enw0dKpM-ba7wBFCuE2pUXNOUuvbPRViUnWhPEb78-HQ/s1600/23.3.27a.jpg" width="259" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><i>The idea of using this subject for a post comes about through very recent news that some of Agatha Christie's novels (as well as some of Roald Dahl's) are being altered so as to have terms which are now considered to be 'racially insensitive' either altered or completely removed for future published editions. I am not going to argue here whether such changes are or aren't justified.</i></span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Those of my generation and older will recall the time when this word was in almost everyday use by many, including friends and even relatives, with hardly an eyebrow raised in disapproving reaction. It must have been in the 1970s when, at least in England, it became 'dubious' until, following the example of the U.S.A., it became (probably in the 1980s) unacceptable virtually everywhere, especially in a social context - though it was , and I believe still is, used by (racist) comedians in the relative seclusion of private clubs. I recall it being used on TV 'comedy' shows still well into the 70s - this was a time when one of the most popular shows here was the weekly 'Black and White Minstrel Show', all the <i>male</i> singers and dancers having blacked-up faces, all the females without the black make-up but in alluring, revealing dresses as also their dancers, some in almost bikini-like costumes so as to give show to much exposed, exclusively white, female flesh which, it was assumed, that audiences liked to see. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">When my family first got a television, around 1958 - before colour of course - one of the very first films we watched together was the Agatha Christie thriller advertised above - which, with its unexpected, breath-taking resolution, made a deep and highly <i>favourable</i> impression on me. Christie herself had used the 'N-word' when transferring her novel, originally called 'Ten Little Indians', into a stage play. 'Ten Little <i>Soldiers' </i>had also briefly been employed. Incidentally, when I saw the play on stage about 30 years ago (though knowing the big 'reveal' of the plot rather blunts the experience) even 'Indians' had become 'Travellers' - which itself, with its uncloaked suggestion of gypsies, has now also become a clear no-no. And the play's title, like the 1974 re-make film - and with, indeed, Christie's own approval which she had also herself previously used - had by then become the entirely innocuous 'And Then There Were None'. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I hadn't heard of Lenny Bruce when I saw the 1974 Dustin Hoffman / Bob Fosse film, which I liked a lot - and moved me to find out more about the man. (Oh, how I'd liked to have seen him reacting, assuming his political and social stances had remained unchanged, to our present Trump-world!) In the film 'Lenny' he masterfully illustrates how the sting can be drawn from the word 'nigger' by using it regularly and non-judgmentally - a lesson which is, arguably, still valid today. However, I think there's not enough recognition that within the 'family' of non-white people, the word can be used as a term of friendliness or even affection - as much as the word 'queer' can, and is also used in a non-pejorative sense between gay, (usually) men. But that does not give authority to those outside those particular worlds to use the words as a put-down, something which is obviously not so when used by one member of such set towards another, as like an informal form of address. There is no sense here of one individual claiming a superiority over another in these cases. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I began primary school in 1952. In my family I have always been the darkest one - as well as the tallest, though that is 'only' 6 feet. Being born in India (of mainly European 'stock') was enough to additionally mark me out as someone 'different'. Some years back my younger brother had one of those ancestry tests done, which showed, unsurprisingly to us, a significant Iberian strain - my father claimed to be half-Portuguese, so hence is my surname, slightly altered from its original - as well as some Scandinavian - my paternal grandfather's 'other half' being Danish. But there was also some [I think 18%] Asian, which may have come from my mother's side, though she, as English, wasn't aware of - or didn't want to say? - where that originated from. At primary school, and it's hardly credible now, among 600 infant and junior pupils, I was the sole one who was most visibly not white, moreso than any of my three brothers. So I was an obvious target for the 'n' word, though, must say, not frequently, just now and again, and more often than not, abbreviated to 'nig' - and by boys (it was always only boys) from classes other than my own who didn't know me. Of course, being called 'nig' or the full word hurt, as it was meant to, though it didn't obsess me unduly. I just thought of it as being part of the world. As far as I know, my brothers had not suffered the same indignities that I did, though their complexions were a shade, or even two, lighter than mine was. When I started grammar school at 11, I found once again that I was the darkest out of another 600 boys (a boys-only school), that is until a young guy with coal-black skin joined some years later, and who, I noted, after riding out silently all the laughing and ribbing behind his back - sometimes even to his face - he quickly became hugely popular, gaining a retinue of devoted fans who followed him around and chatting with him at recreation time, something I'd never experienced myself. I felt so happy for him, though wasn't brave enough to tell him so.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Anyway, going back to 'Ten Little Niggers', at my first school, there was an annual event where pupils from all years were chosen by their teachers to take part in a series of performances before the whole school in the assembly hall. It was a Roman Catholic school whose headmistress was a nun, as also was her deputy/final-year teacher. All the other teachers were lay women and two men, all also R.C. of course. This particular year when I'd have been 7 or 8, the year above me had been given the task to act-out the then relatively well-known children's song 'Ten Little Niggers' (from which Christie got her book title, though which is never heard nowadays) on the assembly hall stage, with ten chosen boys given blacked-up faces (shoe polish?) - as well as big curtain-ring sized earrings(!) plus some garishly coloured scarf. Then they'd be made to pop up to being visible one by one from behind a low lateral screen to illustrate the song's story, with the respective, varied (humorous) demises - I remember one being caught by a shark, another being poisoned with a cake - all while the whole school, including teachers and nuns, along with a couple of priests as guests from the adjoining church, singing along merrily and heartily the chorus line of - "<i>One little, Two little, Three little, Four little, Five little NIGGER boys</i>" the chorus being repeated as each boy 'died' thus reducing the number 'survivors' - so at least TEN times altogether!.......all the while leaving me inwardly squirming as I watched the wretched, demeaning spectacle from a tightly-packed bench. I don't remember if I made some show of pretending to sing along.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Ah, such were the times! Better now? Well maybe - or.....?</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLKPxfaO78NikT4RO0uxtAGGmzv8_wKf9WgXGAEngIk9pkhbQyUxGluCNIi-tVRAilPeJHGpqNQB4WNaJINKFCaRMquGsbibmntU2lGtiHlRBW4siRYyE222Ri6520_Gue87mj7uf04dDRJEERYgl6n_DtfKUEfpoBEef5rgYre__25G95N-q-VW8f2g/s278/23.3.27.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="278" data-original-width="181" height="278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLKPxfaO78NikT4RO0uxtAGGmzv8_wKf9WgXGAEngIk9pkhbQyUxGluCNIi-tVRAilPeJHGpqNQB4WNaJINKFCaRMquGsbibmntU2lGtiHlRBW4siRYyE222Ri6520_Gue87mj7uf04dDRJEERYgl6n_DtfKUEfpoBEef5rgYre__25G95N-q-VW8f2g/s1600/23.3.27.jpg" width="181" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span></p></div>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-20309660947707918542023-03-13T03:33:00.004-07:002023-03-13T08:35:32.050-07:00Annual Doggie Extravaganza - Crufts Best in Show 2023<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;">The winner - and 'Best in Show' is.........ORCA!</span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiELzyFewlE9BQ6hubUUs2Y6JlIyM9nJFKQi7vF2_iPpFg6q3pIKbaM3Pa1oBTc0fxtBN4Y1S2t34shjEGrFmCkXslgwk7PsG78sSm0IzLfNk2SEh3bacN4acHp5LHAg5nxIJxA8kHAgLHZW8v8SW80myrCHAcPojMRMs0pjv60URcKZFFNBf9TCzHIeA/s800/23.3.13f.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="533" data-original-width="800" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiELzyFewlE9BQ6hubUUs2Y6JlIyM9nJFKQi7vF2_iPpFg6q3pIKbaM3Pa1oBTc0fxtBN4Y1S2t34shjEGrFmCkXslgwk7PsG78sSm0IzLfNk2SEh3bacN4acHp5LHAg5nxIJxA8kHAgLHZW8v8SW80myrCHAcPojMRMs0pjv60URcKZFFNBf9TCzHIeA/w400-h266/23.3.13f.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtfLPcF01r2gwrO5YGvSufoLjFFBRuV0Hy3Or5YBYyn18gIIc3a2fmOEW3Mfsv6Z26PDrGBFrgpxpNV8Ykme28ztzozWkqm3uTS3mZqTxcxbreCNKoF5WoWOj4G5UMTX6dx5y7gLs6LU3eHTp5ygDtpMPNFzDCSsXSB7Z3i67scfSLgPofAlj3CaNQFA/s2500/23.3.13%20Orca.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1565" data-original-width="2500" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtfLPcF01r2gwrO5YGvSufoLjFFBRuV0Hy3Or5YBYyn18gIIc3a2fmOEW3Mfsv6Z26PDrGBFrgpxpNV8Ykme28ztzozWkqm3uTS3mZqTxcxbreCNKoF5WoWOj4G5UMTX6dx5y7gLs6LU3eHTp5ygDtpMPNFzDCSsXSB7Z3i67scfSLgPofAlj3CaNQFA/w400-h250/23.3.13%20Orca.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /> <span style="font-size: large;">And runner-up or </span> <span style="font-size: large;">'Reserve Best in Show' is........Blondie</span><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOeXO0lZ4gTOQXNnYQpMnE60mverBFDupgrvrRpT-_wmK9A9OsyiGS8hjaBcrk5ARl1YMRiHWatqnLgzS56XyT2hwWYrIGf8kH4z_INQD8hZVMkIp3WJZjw9fj4X4tgVV_4Jve3Klhm51xq2vdbma-QO6v469LKc7YKsVKMxYdz_njLQWsD1R1U1jrpA/s637/23.3.13g.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="637" data-original-width="620" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOeXO0lZ4gTOQXNnYQpMnE60mverBFDupgrvrRpT-_wmK9A9OsyiGS8hjaBcrk5ARl1YMRiHWatqnLgzS56XyT2hwWYrIGf8kH4z_INQD8hZVMkIp3WJZjw9fj4X4tgVV_4Jve3Klhm51xq2vdbma-QO6v469LKc7YKsVKMxYdz_njLQWsD1R1U1jrpA/w389-h400/23.3.13g.webp" width="389" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Finishing last night, I watch this event every year as religiously as I do the 'Eurovision Song Contest' and can't think why I've not till now done a blog on it, especially considering there are so many avid dog-lovers in blogland, several of whom I'm delighted to be following. </span></span></div><p></p><div><span style="font-size: large;">Crufts, held every year in Birmingham, claims to be the world's <i>best</i> dog show. Whether it is or not it's certainly the biggest, with multiple thousands of entries from all over the globe, providing four days of quality 'entertainment' in competitions, obstacle courses, tricks, skills, obeying commands, grooming etc.......all of course, presided over by expert veterinary supervisors.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">I can't claim to be particularly knowledgeable about dogs (nor cats, for that matter) other than liking them hugely, their honest, uncomplicated emotional responses being the main source of their endearment for me. All on the surface, nothing hidden. But I know very little regarding dog breeds (so many of them, and such variety!) and the niceties of interpreting their doggie language. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">I've never been a dog-owner myself, except when as part of the family we owned one between my ages of around 10-18 - and though all my members of my family were animal-lovers to varying extents it was I who was foremost and closest to 'Candy'. Now, with three cats to care for and coddle (it was <i>they </i>who chose me to leave their homes for and move in here!) and at my advanced age, acquiring a dog, or even another cat, is really out of the question, sadly.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">So here are some misc pics from the last few days:-</span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTsMpm1_vWSELVJR5_wv1a4k_quN5KHIfG0WTT58CO6TvmF25B6AIXvQ42W3abizL37zvawOMKn_NcPTXiAdOYI3wqQOMMeUjuLoBvLH5-_HU_TD3rtUxfFJ-j71MeIOVcqW4r7W3uOrbdsI-hTYr_8rV559_CQ8EtVpxUEEDz8vkqAXNhfCJKzkrXFA/s225/23.3.13ag.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="225" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTsMpm1_vWSELVJR5_wv1a4k_quN5KHIfG0WTT58CO6TvmF25B6AIXvQ42W3abizL37zvawOMKn_NcPTXiAdOYI3wqQOMMeUjuLoBvLH5-_HU_TD3rtUxfFJ-j71MeIOVcqW4r7W3uOrbdsI-hTYr_8rV559_CQ8EtVpxUEEDz8vkqAXNhfCJKzkrXFA/w400-h400/23.3.13ag.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHAAOaN7K2XY93nnHIEca19s9jHY_bC1p-5xUW2StavHL2FAgTZaWluNdpEdP-vgtdouTiwdz7lplNc0hEIL2pTZrKk120_Eigx49FnSyIkp5nawzw4rbGVys8KrUCLHuCYleX6x6tuns9ziZi_Cx1VoX-Qc3yBY-6eqhwZW4vCsXh49cO_KKCZLbpKQ/s275/23.3.13ab.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHAAOaN7K2XY93nnHIEca19s9jHY_bC1p-5xUW2StavHL2FAgTZaWluNdpEdP-vgtdouTiwdz7lplNc0hEIL2pTZrKk120_Eigx49FnSyIkp5nawzw4rbGVys8KrUCLHuCYleX6x6tuns9ziZi_Cx1VoX-Qc3yBY-6eqhwZW4vCsXh49cO_KKCZLbpKQ/w400-h266/23.3.13ab.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvnVWWB1G5_tt_CrhmnFTz6eh-Dnak7zb5TaheR3BbnNFTX0e_PIpVkdVLfuOXUMsaFB3HCWiao46BNm7iYu63lVk1lWmDbKjPGEtobkqh1JgQN5LDff5_zNpK06AmCPeSyPfK0z9y1LdkmreAvZi4GRz5z-8pUB-H37OKLgBoeBWdrJbLMmz2aInUpQ/s284/23.3.13ad.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="177" data-original-width="284" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvnVWWB1G5_tt_CrhmnFTz6eh-Dnak7zb5TaheR3BbnNFTX0e_PIpVkdVLfuOXUMsaFB3HCWiao46BNm7iYu63lVk1lWmDbKjPGEtobkqh1JgQN5LDff5_zNpK06AmCPeSyPfK0z9y1LdkmreAvZi4GRz5z-8pUB-H37OKLgBoeBWdrJbLMmz2aInUpQ/w400-h249/23.3.13ad.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8gUC91_fVuCqbDmFatwEWEp0HR69TYYfJyDdQ-2hT3AcX6opOrhCty9u8RBPrGKRXpMmZwX2FjRBr0hcdMgjJVnEzYGOS6LqGYaUVX61GfSRJLdp4oeF_1A1HXezbmxrU7JfDHUPkszIi7VkBqldtuwflCfahqTUH62uo-eZN52YZCMg0juH1lBxXeA/s285/23.3.13aa.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="177" data-original-width="285" height="248" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8gUC91_fVuCqbDmFatwEWEp0HR69TYYfJyDdQ-2hT3AcX6opOrhCty9u8RBPrGKRXpMmZwX2FjRBr0hcdMgjJVnEzYGOS6LqGYaUVX61GfSRJLdp4oeF_1A1HXezbmxrU7JfDHUPkszIi7VkBqldtuwflCfahqTUH62uo-eZN52YZCMg0juH1lBxXeA/w400-h248/23.3.13aa.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3hOSE89jMKf18boGQd5PD1KflV5AowWQaiFn2gxTxE3H-x5hcbZTKtWtP85aqk8GLT0qXsaU1LdtuLD0JK0GNGrkslGfCmwH4nqy9ywRNEqo0jcZhHj3k_cVMyv7Fa7IsgvAOmmO4iIo-5RvtMYJJ8aSlszdVhuAkFLIGtqBAPTUgLwNN47XqYXWJQQ/s275/23.3.13af.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3hOSE89jMKf18boGQd5PD1KflV5AowWQaiFn2gxTxE3H-x5hcbZTKtWtP85aqk8GLT0qXsaU1LdtuLD0JK0GNGrkslGfCmwH4nqy9ywRNEqo0jcZhHj3k_cVMyv7Fa7IsgvAOmmO4iIo-5RvtMYJJ8aSlszdVhuAkFLIGtqBAPTUgLwNN47XqYXWJQQ/w400-h266/23.3.13af.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCl72pGEwxoRKyc_myI-lg3_zNPldcJzJ99iWlNxfDfRiw3WEc7e9A_-fLhvquRDt4UTRUEm3ztwkYaZEJu-mZFymYfrjVKgrRK19gL1klHC6GB1P7VyNi5DVvgOjULo9fOxQI5HKdobLzLvl3D3JORo3iVa2bonvhOpTw9qEylOeke9AYULwPJxxReA/s275/23.3.13ac.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCl72pGEwxoRKyc_myI-lg3_zNPldcJzJ99iWlNxfDfRiw3WEc7e9A_-fLhvquRDt4UTRUEm3ztwkYaZEJu-mZFymYfrjVKgrRK19gL1klHC6GB1P7VyNi5DVvgOjULo9fOxQI5HKdobLzLvl3D3JORo3iVa2bonvhOpTw9qEylOeke9AYULwPJxxReA/w400-h266/23.3.13ac.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0xc9xx8P0swd6jEKOgChUJM54pINKkswvJwwi3xnxQcPbnLzViWej2pC_DNB0Qg8ptW_xHXbdnP2i9jQyPOS4_Ua1t7RQc7afxMolEAh_qnZJehSlX2AQiNYWqZ-r8rRF-lYg5weUSl8k7GymBfnGsj-ZfmA9Wi-2u_cbvSfEOMOMBXqwC4tilarfeg/s275/23.3.13c.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0xc9xx8P0swd6jEKOgChUJM54pINKkswvJwwi3xnxQcPbnLzViWej2pC_DNB0Qg8ptW_xHXbdnP2i9jQyPOS4_Ua1t7RQc7afxMolEAh_qnZJehSlX2AQiNYWqZ-r8rRF-lYg5weUSl8k7GymBfnGsj-ZfmA9Wi-2u_cbvSfEOMOMBXqwC4tilarfeg/w400-h266/23.3.13c.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicYhWgMX6wl1Szq3cs7oEI38eXWJxqg6DgMWGx1oZ2mDPTAqUANET3SZNqQ0-SdYteQBA2tWXOXSLMTh4VmKniZyiec_x4L91pRPFyNtagfIg0RLcPOQaeP6Nb3tkzZi6dePpffjS1QtO1K3TQvBdwqSEjE0Hvk7318_zRRIq1M7qvAs2mNIuo5Fp48g/s275/23.3.13b.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicYhWgMX6wl1Szq3cs7oEI38eXWJxqg6DgMWGx1oZ2mDPTAqUANET3SZNqQ0-SdYteQBA2tWXOXSLMTh4VmKniZyiec_x4L91pRPFyNtagfIg0RLcPOQaeP6Nb3tkzZi6dePpffjS1QtO1K3TQvBdwqSEjE0Hvk7318_zRRIq1M7qvAs2mNIuo5Fp48g/w400-h266/23.3.13b.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEheRNsOxS-cC2LaEsczwgb2zYI8BAlsmflh9Mt9-9gfd8-5PTypdBsAegYNXEQR4T3zj6bMiI4aXtT-MVRvOervHq3A7vu9wmcTBQmYD-hYfS4xzYRKHvUyUI_gzowa0_QgqO9DC_A76ZDCiYMo1HfV5yU-NQsEsFvXW9FBuAwTb5Xp7lM8IkpzPDrA/s495/23.3.13e.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="341" data-original-width="495" height="275" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEheRNsOxS-cC2LaEsczwgb2zYI8BAlsmflh9Mt9-9gfd8-5PTypdBsAegYNXEQR4T3zj6bMiI4aXtT-MVRvOervHq3A7vu9wmcTBQmYD-hYfS4xzYRKHvUyUI_gzowa0_QgqO9DC_A76ZDCiYMo1HfV5yU-NQsEsFvXW9FBuAwTb5Xp7lM8IkpzPDrA/w400-h275/23.3.13e.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2nCLvJ_E1-HWh_T2HnKJpcbbLKw0-8gzFPHjhJx64Y_fFPVEdFF_eaWqaAb9MoaTcwLEU4YtwByL0Qx16q3MZYW9b9NnUfisL9-HSVhsEl9vHtCKGbMNTZ6i_ibawuWJuaKasyCOrnnkpKV3hQ4QWPkwOG5X7ZTJ6BanE7hkyqsM_G_KYb1Lewhk8IA/s279/23.3.13h.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="181" data-original-width="279" height="259" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2nCLvJ_E1-HWh_T2HnKJpcbbLKw0-8gzFPHjhJx64Y_fFPVEdFF_eaWqaAb9MoaTcwLEU4YtwByL0Qx16q3MZYW9b9NnUfisL9-HSVhsEl9vHtCKGbMNTZ6i_ibawuWJuaKasyCOrnnkpKV3hQ4QWPkwOG5X7ZTJ6BanE7hkyqsM_G_KYb1Lewhk8IA/w400-h259/23.3.13h.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEii4wX-ZFlMteuzO_4FhoEavpWmtuuhkojP_kNHrMFC32ht6JSBw69Bc3Ha_CeceBGrsersLOq3q7OmmTQqejKuU-KQX-wx7uTSbWZHJMVlsnnBTldSoko9hSWz9_C3jG3rQTTgndfk8stDYaiZKkO9WKg_7vuqpO9qY4XrQWz6Ppf9E5pQLrzthCXjtQ/s400/23.3.13i.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="262" data-original-width="400" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEii4wX-ZFlMteuzO_4FhoEavpWmtuuhkojP_kNHrMFC32ht6JSBw69Bc3Ha_CeceBGrsersLOq3q7OmmTQqejKuU-KQX-wx7uTSbWZHJMVlsnnBTldSoko9hSWz9_C3jG3rQTTgndfk8stDYaiZKkO9WKg_7vuqpO9qY4XrQWz6Ppf9E5pQLrzthCXjtQ/w400-h263/23.3.13i.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY8tTVekbOtqnCyMFiK8zqrujCQ6MY66mHorYwjExI-INgPtuQDAPEJ6w5wA1r1B8pUPiroLNZPwaio0d4Fs7b2PARvLk9cDL_ZMiz3HLZgNN6sOQvqzb-NDONsrt0Tr_yCO2gymzRLVaDmJyj9tbfAFx_rfiVYBJnzdw3i0KewVaupMDWGxQk1yi5EA/s290/23.3.13n.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="174" data-original-width="290" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY8tTVekbOtqnCyMFiK8zqrujCQ6MY66mHorYwjExI-INgPtuQDAPEJ6w5wA1r1B8pUPiroLNZPwaio0d4Fs7b2PARvLk9cDL_ZMiz3HLZgNN6sOQvqzb-NDONsrt0Tr_yCO2gymzRLVaDmJyj9tbfAFx_rfiVYBJnzdw3i0KewVaupMDWGxQk1yi5EA/w400-h240/23.3.13n.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqILe8qb1aI59DwHIpsdd1StTCltVEUTOby1LMoRJjiweSneIMM5M_mQPuy5e_qdaCB5CLEDeckjyI837XI0ELA6ZTEQg_LKHq2rmJ5oUFE36deKEjNZLlgowh3FrjG3IvRo6yXQGyf47pMJ5Er2ZDb2qGAHs23bRHOSFXTLZOertedfGbiTHO2lIi6w/s269/23.3.13k.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="187" data-original-width="269" height="278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqILe8qb1aI59DwHIpsdd1StTCltVEUTOby1LMoRJjiweSneIMM5M_mQPuy5e_qdaCB5CLEDeckjyI837XI0ELA6ZTEQg_LKHq2rmJ5oUFE36deKEjNZLlgowh3FrjG3IvRo6yXQGyf47pMJ5Er2ZDb2qGAHs23bRHOSFXTLZOertedfGbiTHO2lIi6w/w400-h278/23.3.13k.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidszgoJxV4wZJ5phQgdhXz5r9f79-3PixehQuLOUBsZ08INkJVdkbKaKQPFwqUHNwXyef1SfjYn0AnIRKFpAfAw8dSiONr3LZJaR9kB_vtbvHS2HSSHkY-tuYj8LWNj3JYNqrfsBMMuVUzVhdFom2PRg2dH1lzfuACTPchvUfw2xeDfWO7HNng0BKwUA/s277/23.3.13l.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="182" data-original-width="277" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidszgoJxV4wZJ5phQgdhXz5r9f79-3PixehQuLOUBsZ08INkJVdkbKaKQPFwqUHNwXyef1SfjYn0AnIRKFpAfAw8dSiONr3LZJaR9kB_vtbvHS2HSSHkY-tuYj8LWNj3JYNqrfsBMMuVUzVhdFom2PRg2dH1lzfuACTPchvUfw2xeDfWO7HNng0BKwUA/w400-h263/23.3.13l.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVKb1DzKLkr2HDAvj6ozaLLF7q_w_57qqkq5g0EmjP_4gPv8Lw7Ii_2UocNGz0RPuETsqzXxBiFLVEszaeWo9tn72H_NPz5eenSf56nHYJKjlIBd9C_Nb9pX9kbzD4x-gMWW1a2EMWB_IRDzaowgbZeEqXl6EYV7Acj8a1M8wIxrQ1PJqXiVtSymEzig/s259/23.3.13m.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="259" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVKb1DzKLkr2HDAvj6ozaLLF7q_w_57qqkq5g0EmjP_4gPv8Lw7Ii_2UocNGz0RPuETsqzXxBiFLVEszaeWo9tn72H_NPz5eenSf56nHYJKjlIBd9C_Nb9pX9kbzD4x-gMWW1a2EMWB_IRDzaowgbZeEqXl6EYV7Acj8a1M8wIxrQ1PJqXiVtSymEzig/w400-h300/23.3.13m.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitODH-APpElVGGTONNsvq84pDPG7M6Lbg8p-VowM-iNTuirv-mzrbaEI67OlnPBRMbEktSMrNVm3IK3jvlsMFVBeCJeUwxQ9JwrpQefKpsR83iWaBBVTiplqs8S275TMK922Drm5uOWh5UJiHXN2pjXFwnaAYGyMaYJVMyq2mXzo_0k2b35owyump2kA/s279/23.3.13p.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="181" data-original-width="279" height="259" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitODH-APpElVGGTONNsvq84pDPG7M6Lbg8p-VowM-iNTuirv-mzrbaEI67OlnPBRMbEktSMrNVm3IK3jvlsMFVBeCJeUwxQ9JwrpQefKpsR83iWaBBVTiplqs8S275TMK922Drm5uOWh5UJiHXN2pjXFwnaAYGyMaYJVMyq2mXzo_0k2b35owyump2kA/w400-h259/23.3.13p.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Incidentally, I would urge anyone who hasn't seen the Christopher Guest film 'Best in Show' (2000) to take a look. Totally hilarious, with nearly all the humour coming from or directed at the dog-<i>owners</i> rather than the animals. It's one off my all-time favourites and easily one of the funniest films I have <i>ever</i> seen.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Now, to end with, here's last year's champion, and what a fine specimen of the breed he is, you'll agree! And just look at the winning dog he owns too!</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxI4d-vDiC48L8BeM0bq7WJH8rne7Q4ZWiyrqgHMV3yDkmdvBto2_Wwa2T4VBgSwy-5x5FBrRISt3pOm_tPwZaDbSJ5SPViRL_bR9g2e4FZfbVBeM52DAeAuDZaQgzwIy2ZMcuhHcBa_b7ZR-6tgKe0rjnCI-MEv-bYyxWJ6DulPNmA4H-XF-kjxEuZw/s268/23.3.13a%20Orca.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="188" data-original-width="268" height="281" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxI4d-vDiC48L8BeM0bq7WJH8rne7Q4ZWiyrqgHMV3yDkmdvBto2_Wwa2T4VBgSwy-5x5FBrRISt3pOm_tPwZaDbSJ5SPViRL_bR9g2e4FZfbVBeM52DAeAuDZaQgzwIy2ZMcuhHcBa_b7ZR-6tgKe0rjnCI-MEv-bYyxWJ6DulPNmA4H-XF-kjxEuZw/w400-h281/23.3.13a%20Orca.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-44984389636278994202023-03-06T00:45:00.003-08:002023-03-06T22:01:05.894-08:00Mo Salah, Liverpool F.C. footballer - gets ALL my attention.<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHp5KfGdRvetlSNoOg44cB6jCgMgzn3HIH9fsyNFXVIhR3r0RtT1JUM7nhlGcNtHRE3SXCa6rMv6tGLBIGbt1Xnfpu4bKCq4zs5c2obVFuDGeU3kFIhKmsvTA2pqxk2CRi4imjpABq1kWM-geNJW0riSrWZfzXWE0heV8OMBTTQAhfsiTxg09VdnOkqg/s1200/23.3.6%20Mohamed-Salah-before-Real-Madrid.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1200" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHp5KfGdRvetlSNoOg44cB6jCgMgzn3HIH9fsyNFXVIhR3r0RtT1JUM7nhlGcNtHRE3SXCa6rMv6tGLBIGbt1Xnfpu4bKCq4zs5c2obVFuDGeU3kFIhKmsvTA2pqxk2CRi4imjpABq1kWM-geNJW0riSrWZfzXWE0heV8OMBTTQAhfsiTxg09VdnOkqg/w400-h300/23.3.6%20Mohamed-Salah-before-Real-Madrid.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">It's not a sexual thing - I mean he's 46 years younger than I am - but, goodness me, there's nobody at all in today's sports-world who, appearance-wise, comes anywhere near to ticking my boxes so completely, and he's done so ever since appearing on my radar when he started playing for Liverpool six years ago, and has always been one of their most prominent 'star' players and regular goal-scorer - while also remaining part of Egypt's national team. I know he's been married for 10 years and has two daughters, but even so, when I see his team playing I'm sitting utterly transfixed, awaiting a view of him, <i>any </i>view, to slaver at excitedly (okay, so maybe it <i>is </i>sexual to some extent). But such a beautiful man I haven't seen in many years - the epitome of 'stunning'!</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I'm not aware of any gay fan club with him specifically in mind, so maybe it's just me, but I can live with that - though I do hope he doesn't shave off his beard for some time yet.</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdnc7fB8IIkodyoijSKrDM8QObmVnUwhcg6ohja3V0SVDExQtxCk_unAGLYybjqvIw1j_ocF3hNN62hgw2WGPd81z6l2-n1fQs9ffWvBkYrP7htR9WCBNwd5Pv7gpawAapVnH5CUjRNIhiPMsfH5QtUjpI6BV8P0dsgZaKclUTNEeMaAQhfZ0vrAqESQ/s547/23.3.6.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="547" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdnc7fB8IIkodyoijSKrDM8QObmVnUwhcg6ohja3V0SVDExQtxCk_unAGLYybjqvIw1j_ocF3hNN62hgw2WGPd81z6l2-n1fQs9ffWvBkYrP7htR9WCBNwd5Pv7gpawAapVnH5CUjRNIhiPMsfH5QtUjpI6BV8P0dsgZaKclUTNEeMaAQhfZ0vrAqESQ/s320/23.3.6.jpg" width="281" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMT_CrQF-zQBW1POqSE_m5ss5gHcBAcUyvAFcVKpelHNFHU27TyjBMEFeJvpa6voObuKbzCicc1vpQFXLJx0fOfcY8QHUK4IMa5z_bz9osC1rO6M_eHsuLDRLnb6BRSqzuejTVELz0S4c0ubc3puF5xcc9_4eC7iEvPZPNIHKXkP3TrxNZpF03cbt-PA/s195/23.3.6%20images.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="188" data-original-width="195" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMT_CrQF-zQBW1POqSE_m5ss5gHcBAcUyvAFcVKpelHNFHU27TyjBMEFeJvpa6voObuKbzCicc1vpQFXLJx0fOfcY8QHUK4IMa5z_bz9osC1rO6M_eHsuLDRLnb6BRSqzuejTVELz0S4c0ubc3puF5xcc9_4eC7iEvPZPNIHKXkP3TrxNZpF03cbt-PA/s1600/23.3.6%20images.jpg" width="195" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbLse4nUpKndKW7pdOnV0js0M1hulLaOFr1Mx4BgmEVlEmYkLspU8K3CxeJ5ZALBiOpwx4nNb5uFrm6PFJy1sGNCJdYzGYFq1kYCWPPEA6QyzV9ymOS-qgK41iTrAsDhzREzUMAUSct9LtAlnOLHMQ27TJckfWMle70Nx6KidkqdkrupxiifLhblw61w/s259/23.3.6%20download.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="259" data-original-width="195" height="259" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbLse4nUpKndKW7pdOnV0js0M1hulLaOFr1Mx4BgmEVlEmYkLspU8K3CxeJ5ZALBiOpwx4nNb5uFrm6PFJy1sGNCJdYzGYFq1kYCWPPEA6QyzV9ymOS-qgK41iTrAsDhzREzUMAUSct9LtAlnOLHMQ27TJckfWMle70Nx6KidkqdkrupxiifLhblw61w/s1600/23.3.6%20download.jpg" width="195" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkRcv9pimBJQx7163BUuVTajWQTAb0pZj54nmcH_FOPaCSInn8lAv_aOHaxlnClSMvkV4ymyhXGROp_MqUoWfhtMwSawYTGubv1y80N9utn3m3NCJl9IL3c6dZurMCidbctjuT47HZdxC5i8y_Owj_i1JyUl-rbw5esP9mgjkfivWDPRlmccRXz20OXg/s223/23.3.6b.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="223" data-original-width="155" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkRcv9pimBJQx7163BUuVTajWQTAb0pZj54nmcH_FOPaCSInn8lAv_aOHaxlnClSMvkV4ymyhXGROp_MqUoWfhtMwSawYTGubv1y80N9utn3m3NCJl9IL3c6dZurMCidbctjuT47HZdxC5i8y_Owj_i1JyUl-rbw5esP9mgjkfivWDPRlmccRXz20OXg/w278-h400/23.3.6b.jpg" width="278" /></a></div><p><span style="font-size: x-large;">Drool, drool, </span><i style="font-size: x-large;">droooooooollll!!</i></p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-76731605102708496832022-12-12T01:02:00.007-08:002022-12-13T01:29:19.406-08:00Vulpine visitor.<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRmVOiyGapoqzBraR8jLOVbKoXDzf79gCl2rvO0CcrIExn9zmC9rNGo5c0PboJELZlP5R2MgfN0pNTsZkh95_KxAOdiIbpjFkRlsc0fFo4nASDP7SlMngkP8LVCMV1WJZzN8NZxYnNceEOaSsmX72wkAkszWiEdVxazAFH68InaWqbZGl8hEESSUv2PA/s275/22.12.12.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRmVOiyGapoqzBraR8jLOVbKoXDzf79gCl2rvO0CcrIExn9zmC9rNGo5c0PboJELZlP5R2MgfN0pNTsZkh95_KxAOdiIbpjFkRlsc0fFo4nASDP7SlMngkP8LVCMV1WJZzN8NZxYnNceEOaSsmX72wkAkszWiEdVxazAFH68InaWqbZGl8hEESSUv2PA/s1600/22.12.12.jpg" width="275" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">My flat is on the other side of the road from a large-ish park where, as I've known for years, a 'family' or more of urban foxes live. Over time, when I've got out of bed in the early hours, I've very occasionally seen one in the back gardens scavenging for food. Even with the odd cat around outside, including my own, they ignore or just accept one another, though cats seem the more wary and somewhat fascinated, without the overt hostility or fear they'd exhibit against dogs. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">A few nights ago I found the food which I always leave out overnight for my own furry threesome not only eaten up entirely and the milk-bowl licked dry, but also my indoor rubbish bag, prior to putting in bin outside, had been ransacked, with tea bags, avocado skins, cat left-overs etc littering the kitchen floor. (I leave the kitchen window open for the cats with a small gap for them to go in and out at will on their nocturnal prowlings). I didn't give the incident much thought then and there, thinking another cat had been the culprit. However, on the following evening, sitting watching telly with one cat on my lap and another nearby, they both became unsettled and got up to peer down the hallway above the stairs. I rose to look and there, disappearing through the kitchen window was the brush of a fox tail - and evidence of ransacking once again. It was clear that at least one of them had got bolder. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Searching the internet for a fox-repellent, they all appeared expensive and more geared to gardens or farms rather than domestic 'invaders'. But it seems that scents which foxes actively dislike include garlic (I'm with the fox there!) and chillies, so I bought some of both and, as instructed, crushed some of them in a bowl and added boiling water, which I've left on the kitchen window ledge for the last three nights. Seems to have worked. But only this morning, at 5 a.m. and temps well below freezing, looking out with a torch, there on the wall, watching me dolefully was a fox, with a pleading look which said '<i>Please</i> give me some food!' I felt so incredibly sorry for the poor creature, it was heart-breaking. But didn't dare to respond as I wanted to, knowing that if I did it would only return again and again - and then acquiring a dreadful reputation as a fox-feeder and attractor from all the neighbours and beyond - and, to top it all, the lovely young couple neighbours under me (he a doctor, she a former nurse - could be extremely useful!) have an 8-month old baby!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">So, as at right now I'm hoping that I don't see the vulpine visitor again, though I'm sure I will. And what if it gets brave or desperate enough to push in past the stinking concoction I leave on the window ledge? What can I do? Oh, the heartache! It hurts so! 😟</span></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com35tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-64252416190884525832022-10-14T22:31:00.000-07:002022-10-14T22:31:02.360-07:00And yet a further milestone reached - they just keep coming!<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNmmKjB2uNuf2D7KmFBc0y9nov14OOKyyQZU2mELBlay8U2Jtmoad8MB0nnsD_8FUzO1Nw_tV9rv1Sw8Uc7ElqNyBULgOtxJDp1zqCApXHs6hXqoRWm3MsqrhbznsIvsBoohJqtKS0OjEQ3wT7ljn8qEpb4VR2oK8XlJCQR37mNdoJMKt5HHO6vJZyHA/s259/22.10.6%20images.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="171" data-original-width="259" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNmmKjB2uNuf2D7KmFBc0y9nov14OOKyyQZU2mELBlay8U2Jtmoad8MB0nnsD_8FUzO1Nw_tV9rv1Sw8Uc7ElqNyBULgOtxJDp1zqCApXHs6hXqoRWm3MsqrhbznsIvsBoohJqtKS0OjEQ3wT7ljn8qEpb4VR2oK8XlJCQR37mNdoJMKt5HHO6vJZyHA/s1600/22.10.6%20images.jpg" width="259" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Yes, today (15th) is my 'Trombones Day' - <i>"With a capital 'T' and that rhymes with 'B' and that stands for........" - </i>Birthday! </span><p></p><div><span style="font-size: large;">For those who've been enquiring after my well-being during recent months - something for which I'm eternally grateful and very touched indeed - overall, my health continues fine, all thing considered. As I often say, it's far better than a lot of folk of my advanced age (and yet older) have, if they have even ever reached it, which now just about all of my one-time small handful of friends failed to do. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Previous eye difficulties are more or less gone now. Sight in both eyes is very good in one and quite acceptable in the other. Not needing spectacles at all, with contact lenses, after 50 years wear, also now being firmly relegated to the past. Lingering slight regret that there remains a discernible disparity between both eyes' visions but I appreciate how lucky I am having come through the sometimes dramatic difficulties with the result I have. So I've positively <u>no</u> complaints! </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Couple of months ago I managed to resume reading again, both newspapers and books - and to prove to myself that I can, a week ago started re-reading that readers' Everest, (or should we now be calling it 'Sagarmatha'?) of 'War and Peace', my ninth (and possibly last?) 'ascent' of it - and in a fifth translation. (Very curiously, this 'Penguin Popular Classics' edition, which I picked up for £1 some years back, doesn't give this particular translator's name, and which my Internet search has also failed to uncover. Most odd.) But it's a great relief to get back to what has been for me, viz. reading generally, one of the greatest pleasures in all my life since infancy.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">I must poignantly mention in passing that today would also have been the b/day of Arteejee (RTG), hubby of our late, dear Anne-Marie of Philly - both much missed, and will continue to be so.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Now it's disappointing that I can't show, as I always have done for every birthday, up-to-date photos of myself and my three furry flat-mates. Yesterday I took what I thought were good photos on my digital camera, but when I came to try to upload them onto this p.c. it seems that things have moved on and the old procedure doesn't work as before. The simplest way is now via a smartphone, which I still don't have, and to do it with a digital camera requires me to follow instructions which I just can't understand. Terms are used which are gobbledygook to me. So, until I can find some way to achieve it, unfortunately at present there are no new photos are to be seen. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">So, until the next time something happens in my life which deserves blogging about, I wish well to any remaining followers and readers of my sparse and rare posts. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;">Very best wishes to y'all!</span></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com32tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-51131020815196606052022-07-23T09:05:00.005-07:002022-07-24T01:43:50.201-07:00Boy oh boy! Wouldn't wish this on ANYbody! <p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk_G1Kt17bcadEsth3I92PTx9i-P02QPSf_QRDaCLn_bp4hvCEhLcYiXj8DufX35njhauREXtEAU3mLOhT8-_MkkgRb2U-Uck_ILYWw9RnOZ_Wzyi_-C4bXpl9UO_-WMKHRcAhgdfAiMKJ7VT8wTw552FC2_oLslehn8iAQdokfhP_-xrzxAhhJ8sVig/s155/22.7.23%20Hybrid%20Theatre.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="146" data-original-width="155" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk_G1Kt17bcadEsth3I92PTx9i-P02QPSf_QRDaCLn_bp4hvCEhLcYiXj8DufX35njhauREXtEAU3mLOhT8-_MkkgRb2U-Uck_ILYWw9RnOZ_Wzyi_-C4bXpl9UO_-WMKHRcAhgdfAiMKJ7VT8wTw552FC2_oLslehn8iAQdokfhP_-xrzxAhhJ8sVig/w200-h188/22.7.23%20Hybrid%20Theatre.jpeg" width="200" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">My first ever surgical operation - and. oh the pain<i> - during </i>it!!!!<i> </i></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">In short (?), then - I reported as requested to Brighton eye hospital for their team to examine the botched cataract removal surgery, my 'other' eye having been done with no problem at all - and within just 10 minutes when I'd felt very little discomfort. Now the team of specialists were alarmed at the build up of pressure inside the faulty eye, now with no lens, and I was strongly recommended an operation without further delay. Any postponement, they said, would carry a grave risk of losing all sight in that eye. So no choice, really. It had never occurred to me that things would have to move so fast. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">That was last Wed. They scheduled the operation for the following morning, asking me to stay overnight so it could be done right away at 7 a.m. I told them "No way!" ( I had to return home to see to the pussycats - which I didn't tell them. Besides, I've never been to hospital to stay in my entire life!) So early on Thurs morning I journeyed back with more than a little apprehension. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Pre-surgery was given several different tablets and eye-drops to, the theory was, deaden any pain - on top of which received an injected local anaesthetic for the eye and its surroundings. Right from the start, when one of the two main surgeons started poking into the eye the pain was simply <i>excruciating, </i>the like of which I don't recall having experienced before. I tried my best not to yell out, failing a number of times, and so it went on and on for very nearly an <i>hour! </i>I was gripping onto the edge of the operating table like my life depended on it - and each time I shouted out a soothing voice would say "Don't worry, Sir. Just a couple more things to do." The number of times I was told this was unbelievable - "Don't worry, Sir. Just a couple more things, then we've finished". It went on and on until I really thought my heart was going to give up the ghost.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Eventually it really did end and I was able to sit up, very sore-eyed, to be wheeled to where I could relax(!) for a couple of hours. At last I was able - just - to struggle up onto my unsteady pins. Then after a cursory examination, my 'new' eye (with new lens inserted) covered by cotton wool and shield, I made my wobbly way back home on the bus.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Woke up yesterday morning after sleeping a full 14 hours, though disturbed during night by soreness in and around the eye. Then at last I could venture to remove the shield. I <i>did </i>have some vision there, for the first time in several months, though was disappointed by it being nowhere near as sharp as the 'good' eye - and I even now as yet can't read with it, either distance and close-up.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Had to return to the hospital the next day yet again for a routine post-operation check-up. Both doctors I saw were very pleased at how things were, the pressure inside the eye having gone back down to near-normal. I was assured that once the lens has settled I will be able to read with it, which is the blessing I was hoping for. So I go back again for one further check-up in 3 weeks time.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">That's the saga as currently is. I was immensely relieved to be told that no further surgery will be necessary, which is just as well, as I'd do just about anything to avoid going through <i>that</i> again - above all, if it's to be subject again to the sheer agony of that hour 'under the knife'!</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Now the morning following what I posted above:-</i></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">After a night's reflection, and having now regained some composure after that horrific experience, I've come to the incredible, but not totally improbable, conclusion that, by some oversight (not intentionally, one assumes - and I hope) I was <u>not</u> administered with any anaesthetic, general <i>or </i>local. When I was told about the surgery the previous day I clearly recall the doctor saying that I'd be given a local anaesthetic. However, come the day I do not remember my being given any injection prior to the operation or, indeed, after. If I'd made any assumption at all it had been that there must have been something in the several tablets I was being given which would do that service. What prevented me from crying out during the operation even more than I did was the notion that I would be thought a wimp! But can one actually anaesthetise by taking only oral medication? Surely it would require an actual injection by syringe into the relevant area, as when a dentist gives you a jab in the gums, then waits a couple of minutes or longer for it to take effect. There was none of that in my case here. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">So that is my conclusion, unpleasant as it is, but now maintain what is likely to have happened. It would explain so much. When I went for the following day's check-up I did mention what a horror-show experience it had been - but no comment was made by the main doctor who just smiled benignly. (Perhaps he now realised it himself but didn't want to pursue it, maybe understandably so?) I think when I return for a further examination in three weeks' time I will mention it again and ask directly if it could happen that a patient is operated on without being anaesthetised first, to which the answer has got to be "Yes". I'd hardly have been the first! If there really has to be a 'next time', can't any more assume that the staff have got it all right.</span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-91502541383377425322022-07-17T10:26:00.006-07:002022-07-18T06:55:04.046-07:00Still here! - mono-visioned and newly disappointed.<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGPyicQtPvjw4pDkqnog0OsQ49SR6ORRc3hqQwSFK5O5UDvhB9_bO63h63mlKua_EW6vazg2EUN0as7f24Qji3Q0ZymeopfdBL-H3vyf2ebbrkNGRf1UFETjKG6eBuQcgJdwj1V7i00tKm-Mxq8leJG-JzZvXSobP4Y1noyYRJdKFYJd4hpf6R-VqVlA/s3840/22.7.17%20Quotefancy-176603-3840x2160.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2160" data-original-width="3840" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGPyicQtPvjw4pDkqnog0OsQ49SR6ORRc3hqQwSFK5O5UDvhB9_bO63h63mlKua_EW6vazg2EUN0as7f24Qji3Q0ZymeopfdBL-H3vyf2ebbrkNGRf1UFETjKG6eBuQcgJdwj1V7i00tKm-Mxq8leJG-JzZvXSobP4Y1noyYRJdKFYJd4hpf6R-VqVlA/w400-h225/22.7.17%20Quotefancy-176603-3840x2160.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Well, just in case anyone had wondered about, or even noticed, my absence, I can reassure such that I am still here and surviving, albeit in 'depleted' state. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">In April I posted about the 100% success of my first cataract removal. The other eye had the same operation last Tues, and (to be generous), I'll rate its 'success' at 0%. Different surgeon this time. The 'old' lens he was trying to remove apparently broke up into a myriad of pieces, all drifting into the jelly-like substance (vitreous humor) in the main body of the eyeball. Of course there could be then no attempt made to fix a new lens in. The result is that I have very blurred vision through that eye which now, unsurprisingly, has significantly more 'floaters' than it had before, some alarmingly large. The operation, such as it was, was twice as long as the first time, and unlike that occasion, was quite painful to undergo, with considerable jabbings. Afterwards, with me not being sure what had happened, while told to sit in a post-operation waiting area, the surgeon came out, very apologetically, explained what had happened, and gave me a consolatory handshake. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">So now I have to await a call from a (different) hospital which will be sent my records to assess what can be done - hopefully quickly and none too complicated, assuming they've met this problem enough times before so they know how to remedy it.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Meanwhile, the medication I've been prescribed to take down the eye swelling has finished today. It's been zonking me out severely, my sleeping something like 18 hours a day - or more! Also it took away my appetite, everything tasting 'different' - even water - and not in a pleasant way.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">And all this while we are suffering the most intense and prolonged heatwave in 50 years, peaking tomorrow (Mon) and Tues when temps over large parts of England and even into Scotland, are expected to hit or even exceed 40 C (104 Fahrenheit), which has never been seen before in this country's recorded history! Here on the coast we could have a slightly more 'merciful' high in the mid- or upper 30s. My poor pussycats have already been suffering badly. Only wish I could tell them it's just for another two days - at least we fervently hope.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I'll try to return to reading and commenting on blogs soonish even though reading still hasn't been that easy.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><i> </i></span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-58659061015307384252022-07-03T07:56:00.006-07:002022-07-03T08:08:46.505-07:00Trying to cure my addiction to....American politics<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvVMjDHDLGizaMwDYs8YBc66IO-E_nYdwTp2yK2uiT4mf-HVr2oocpxVllNmDXJa4jipb0EZ_5QcR-b3v99gwPmIjOPp6VlJLZDwfW6til_tXzMwsrdaWGFVVF7AFaOipQDZ-KpXggSqVyl-qyWlxC7znVQuzuFT1VQgNca2YNtP970LD-qshJRkLpcA/s1011/22.7.3a%20politics-hyperpartisan-poynter-ynews.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="314" data-original-width="1011" height="124" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvVMjDHDLGizaMwDYs8YBc66IO-E_nYdwTp2yK2uiT4mf-HVr2oocpxVllNmDXJa4jipb0EZ_5QcR-b3v99gwPmIjOPp6VlJLZDwfW6til_tXzMwsrdaWGFVVF7AFaOipQDZ-KpXggSqVyl-qyWlxC7znVQuzuFT1VQgNca2YNtP970LD-qshJRkLpcA/w400-h124/22.7.3a%20politics-hyperpartisan-poynter-ynews.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">It hit me like a stone yesterday (or like a light pat on Rudy's back), that I'm now spending anything up to <i>eight hours per day </i>watching YouTube videos on the subject - news reports, discussion excerpts, talks, opinions etc, from the more dependable/progressive sites like TYT, RoF, Meidas, Rebel...... + MSNBC, CNN etc. This is just plain c-r-a-z-y! And the cause of my being drawn in like this? The advancing horror of what the U.S.A. could well be like in just a few months time - as though the state U.S. politics is in even now isn't worrying enough! It has not only consumed my days, pushing aside any time I'd otherwise have spent reading, listening to music or watching TV, it's taken over my nights too, with me regularly waking up after maybe two hours sleep only to lay there until perhaps 4.a.m. or later with these thoughts and fears churning over and over without cease. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">I'll refrain from mentioning specific issues or personalities as this will only get me (and others, no doubt) worked up all over again. But I will mention just two differences between American politicians and British (the latter albeit with our own set of foibles) which in less serious times I would be bemused by rather than finding them grating as I do now:-</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">First, the observation of American politicians (almost exclusively of the 'right') repeatedly to declare themselves as 'Christian' as though it is a badge of honour - and furthermore, as though they expect to be respected for being so! In my 60+ years of being politically aware, that is something I don't ever recall a British politician of <i>any </i>party doing (though Mrs Thatcher did come mighty close to doing so at least a couple of times - but even she never wore it so conspicuously on her sleeve). In matters of 'faith' generally, we might see here the occasional Muslim female Member of Parliament with head covered, or the equally rare male Sikh member in a turban, but these overt signs of faith are never referred to either by the members themselves or, indeed, by anyone else, just as they need not be when not relevant. But to hold up being Christian (and it's always and only Christian, of course!) as a demonstration of one's 'superiority' would be, and should be, simply laughable in any other context, as well as in politics. (<i>Careful now, Ray. Watch your blood pressure!</i>) </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Another difference is how (again, the American 'right') uses words like 'Socialist' and 'Progressive' as terms of <i>abuse - </i>and expects those they accuse of being so to feel shamed at having such pejorative words aimed at them! Over here even the Conservative Party has long since dropped that ploy as being fruitless, which it is. In fact those of us who do consider ourselves as 'Socialist' take pride in being referred to as such, as Conservatives themselves have long since realised. Moreover, the most extreme word, 'Communist', itself carries very little or no stigma here nowadays, except when referring, say, to the current Chinese and North Korean governments or to Soviet Union days. It's a complete waste of breath for those words to be fired off as insults 'cos they're virtually inapplicable in a British context.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Anyway, having got those two matters off my chest for now, going back to my reason for this blog, I genuinely do fear that unless there's a <i>Deus ex machina </i>moment well before the end of this year, the U.S.A. is going to be firmly in the list of one of the world's most repressive democracies - if we can even continue to call it a 'democracy' at all. If I was a praying man I'd get down on my knees right now to beseech the old man in the sky to let it not turn out so. On second thoughts, as no harm can come of it, taking a knee might not be such a bad idea after all! </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">And btw: it's now getting on for 4 p.m. here and I've not (yet?) taken even a peep at any YouTube posts today. I'm determined to see the full day through without any such transgression.</span></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-926347286766677626.post-389731225977318902022-05-15T07:01:00.006-07:002022-05-15T22:49:04.447-07:00Ukraine wins Eurovision. Who'd have guessed it? Everybody!<p><span style="font-size: large;"> <span>..........and with a song I'd have ranked around 10th out of the 25 finalists. However, to be fair to the winners, even before the Russian <u style="font-style: italic;">invasion</u> it was being talked about as a leading contender to carry off the prize. At least it blows Russian President Putrid another raspberry if, as increasing evidence suggests, he is playing out the terminal stages of his ignominious life (Parkinson's? AND thyroid cancer? Cancer of the blood? All triggered by excessive use of steroids?) And all as if his country having been banned from even entering this year's contest wasn't hurtful enough to someone who sets such store on international prestige! </span></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWnUBwM84MEIAQCZ7SOrTKjo6CZHXLRZ4RXcLa_7QnT9x_UUdE-ablYTGcVnzwYdCzh_D0rI4KPzgKYis69Hw739UXS545nl97qY7eeHIiYCYBW1iR6VsIMZUmBdNQcxzxcd3nGITLXEtBGrnbcgx-JXaStcOiDZHhR4c9bUZrgrXaKUxTFiPfWPLLeA/s1024/gallery-1024%20(4).jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="682" data-original-width="1024" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWnUBwM84MEIAQCZ7SOrTKjo6CZHXLRZ4RXcLa_7QnT9x_UUdE-ablYTGcVnzwYdCzh_D0rI4KPzgKYis69Hw739UXS545nl97qY7eeHIiYCYBW1iR6VsIMZUmBdNQcxzxcd3nGITLXEtBGrnbcgx-JXaStcOiDZHhR4c9bUZrgrXaKUxTFiPfWPLLeA/s320/gallery-1024%20(4).jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Turin was the host for this year's consp-icuou-sly gay extrav-aganza, Italy having won the contest in 2021 - and with the usual indifferent (to me) entry. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Other than the winners, the main headline was that the U.K. entry, Sam Ryder, took our country out of its habitual laughing-stock zone of finishing last - even attaining the dreaded <i>nul points</i> two years ago - by now finishing <u>second,</u> even though I rated his song 'Space Man' (with its 1970s-ish Bowie-esque title) worthy of ending in around 20th place. </span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmsNq4bf30fBjXd7jlvNGSk2EYKxZylHIJQKNPCIh8b59FysvxTlVBrBoBmrIwN0vG4UNrGSQdiq0MK7Djfj5NJeNlWi_hZ03BwOnqVBpUscbEpKYd8yfvNLC_Pd6j8ia_lJP4dqEFmy6Ew4DN79f3yohnQQskUgGYORrSex3bC1jXOEAm1hloxa6Grg/s263/U'K'%20Sam%20Ryder.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="192" data-original-width="263" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmsNq4bf30fBjXd7jlvNGSk2EYKxZylHIJQKNPCIh8b59FysvxTlVBrBoBmrIwN0vG4UNrGSQdiq0MK7Djfj5NJeNlWi_hZ03BwOnqVBpUscbEpKYd8yfvNLC_Pd6j8ia_lJP4dqEFmy6Ew4DN79f3yohnQQskUgGYORrSex3bC1jXOEAm1hloxa6Grg/s1600/U'K'%20Sam%20Ryder.jpg" width="263" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">It's 20 years since we attained even 3rd place and it was 1997 when we last won outright, so this was a most welcome result. This entry, sung entirely in high-register voice, actually came out top when the first round of voting was announced, that being the verdict of each of the 40 countries' music jury, so there must have been something special about it, though that merit escapes me - possibly an 'age thing'?</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhD01SDZpDU8zOHHz89lKjqdYljyqgG_pCbUXyhdskbs7jnCy2oyPh0yghk1xY7tS65H-mGJIIlPzQ0Wz1pxjsHgq_3znldmqMBcUMulqzqwQTzDh36LtdlGAH8nITcZkJcvlKEoit--Ix5Ql2PjlNjIRpTr0jk4PMY8Y2HytAQhj9MdVer243MVeu1gw/s1023/Ukraine%20a.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="682" data-original-width="1023" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhD01SDZpDU8zOHHz89lKjqdYljyqgG_pCbUXyhdskbs7jnCy2oyPh0yghk1xY7tS65H-mGJIIlPzQ0Wz1pxjsHgq_3znldmqMBcUMulqzqwQTzDh36LtdlGAH8nITcZkJcvlKEoit--Ix5Ql2PjlNjIRpTr0jk4PMY8Y2HytAQhj9MdVer243MVeu1gw/w400-h266/Ukraine%20a.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Ukraine's winning entry ('Stefania' by the 'Kalusha Orchestra') was in no way <i>bad</i> - just unexceptional to my ears. It merely ticked the requisite boxes.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL-pdREsdbnTI2sbY_Q61y06s-KhebqMa0-liwGwHI3cT9OAJXw_T5uT7bXIti7zagmpoZRz8swYrKoMIc4HQlGLmbyW4FL9-Lj43ulKF0v18KjKakXJHNF96qDLYzQcyIvFkd_1O-mpbkBecF7a0oZx74YHTWACDHhrcaXYqD2-gxFHH1xyBZD63lYA/s1024/Spain%20%20a.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="682" data-original-width="1024" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL-pdREsdbnTI2sbY_Q61y06s-KhebqMa0-liwGwHI3cT9OAJXw_T5uT7bXIti7zagmpoZRz8swYrKoMIc4HQlGLmbyW4FL9-Lj43ulKF0v18KjKakXJHNF96qDLYzQcyIvFkd_1O-mpbkBecF7a0oZx74YHTWACDHhrcaXYqD2-gxFHH1xyBZD63lYA/s320/Spain%20%20a.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Third came Spain, one to run to the kitchen and make a mug of coffee. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwrHwYsv3h-cMEubG7xBFMab8i5QD4x6j6bE4Zm9q9K96zv1xsgD2h02gcwPjiVaflGeKgmsGyVgpqnyJitgVtokjeXV6erRiJvRTsi3iZisL18JgxlIWSvJ5-6CbBZO8QriPZ-lUvmY7MWwbg-8HmCk3ZC6oKdxugFcm7r0CjLCX8aNAfxsBw9dRsew/s275/Serbia.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwrHwYsv3h-cMEubG7xBFMab8i5QD4x6j6bE4Zm9q9K96zv1xsgD2h02gcwPjiVaflGeKgmsGyVgpqnyJitgVtokjeXV6erRiJvRTsi3iZisL18JgxlIWSvJ5-6CbBZO8QriPZ-lUvmY7MWwbg-8HmCk3ZC6oKdxugFcm7r0CjLCX8aNAfxsBw9dRsew/s1600/Serbia.jpg" width="275" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Fourth, Sweden and fifth, Serbia - the latter with its curious continuous hand-washing act, the singer being attended to by a group of male, bearded acolytes with towels at the ready to hand to her to dry before she dipped her hand in the washing bowl again. A strange offering among several oddities! </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdnRFc2qydhBQHydHJYeW7SMSPo8eWdJVB-zYFazo27PLnG3lxB_1UaXV9mkuDam804txu6ePURbMFTmWte6YhMjVlecYR_u2zL1HLmMpS8WHZwM6q4_PFI_eqiSfo2byrCLSiidUcO9iXtvhBZ_sMDZTbHzjNfCPwFrVykmNN5oO7tW2J5i57h5l4Lw/s1024/gallery-1024%20(1).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="682" data-original-width="1024" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdnRFc2qydhBQHydHJYeW7SMSPo8eWdJVB-zYFazo27PLnG3lxB_1UaXV9mkuDam804txu6ePURbMFTmWte6YhMjVlecYR_u2zL1HLmMpS8WHZwM6q4_PFI_eqiSfo2byrCLSiidUcO9iXtvhBZ_sMDZTbHzjNfCPwFrVykmNN5oO7tW2J5i57h5l4Lw/w400-h266/gallery-1024%20(1).jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br />The event's presenters Alessandro Cattelan, Laura Pauosoni and that brief 2007 sensation, the British-Lebanese, Mika (yes, <i>that </i>one, 'Grace Kelly' and all that - so impressive at the time that I actually bought his first two albums! I wondered what had become of him - but he's apparently still a celebrity in Italy, among other places).</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span>Complete with the ever-maddening "Now, are you <i><u>ready!</u>" - </i>when we'd been yelling at the telly "Jeez, just get <i>on with it!!!"</i> for the previous 20 minutes - she in the middle was by far the most gratingly irritating, and being well known in Italy, just <i>had</i> to start the show with not one, but a medley of <i>four </i>of her hit songs in Italy - and all when there were no less than twenty-five competition songs to get through! Sheeesh! It was nearly 20 minutes in before we heard the first entry proper. </span><span>Then in the pre-results hiatus Mika himself gave a selection of his own songs, which was better and, at least, more familiar and less jarring. </span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span>My own three favourite entries were not supported by results corresponding to my opinions. </span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNIAeJm98ZGoC-olDfRysr_kqrHlcgfOrJQnVS0j861HWztap6ZtdVKfVS39f6BkKELHDlGMQrqsJC2EWZhzWD-DOQhA3qnmjucb_sfR-vuR0otZr7i92Q7slVbAf3DQzHZZYZ0nIAxw1yFVzb6c2F5rBafD87ASncxM_B0O4Ybmp_D5eRqOA24b7UBA/s418/Lithuania%20-%20a.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="220" data-original-width="418" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNIAeJm98ZGoC-olDfRysr_kqrHlcgfOrJQnVS0j861HWztap6ZtdVKfVS39f6BkKELHDlGMQrqsJC2EWZhzWD-DOQhA3qnmjucb_sfR-vuR0otZr7i92Q7slVbAf3DQzHZZYZ0nIAxw1yFVzb6c2F5rBafD87ASncxM_B0O4Ybmp_D5eRqOA24b7UBA/w400-h210/Lithuania%20-%20a.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><span>I put Lithuania top - a song for which commentator Graham Norton expressed surprise that it had got into the final, so what do I know? A gentle, unshowy foot-tapping number sung by the sleek Monika Liu in slinky dress, entirely alone with no distracting dancers or visual fireworks. I thought it was the best by a mile. It finished 14th. </span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghtMCoAz-8H9blmcVYEGwFEC--BtdsoeihP2882qCHi60qi6yp6YutqVcv9TxMiNWwOzRAt7GoGt4bPL_0xdiPh5g2a6u-8ibM5C6tkRnmGLQ2bkzvxvrhye5O7f9Fece6j1D4_-TBv-2tH9B8ouyrmjV2Q1aB8tFr-IukVC1htAEpJqvSzss9Z292vQ/s275/Moldova.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghtMCoAz-8H9blmcVYEGwFEC--BtdsoeihP2882qCHi60qi6yp6YutqVcv9TxMiNWwOzRAt7GoGt4bPL_0xdiPh5g2a6u-8ibM5C6tkRnmGLQ2bkzvxvrhye5O7f9Fece6j1D4_-TBv-2tH9B8ouyrmjV2Q1aB8tFr-IukVC1htAEpJqvSzss9Z292vQ/w400-h266/Moldova.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><span><br />Then I placed the happiest entry - from Moldova, even if it was about a railway line! They seemed so darned <i>cheerful</i> and were having a whale of a time performing it, and lifting my spirits.</span></span><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span><span style="font-size: large;">Finished 7th</span><span style="font-size: x-large;">.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMm3M0Z-Y8dySqzNjvk1FE3Xwhuk18TIPTiSfO-Y8FmLrxfwZUl2mhjC6sx2hUOoasgXEukNsKkpZ5lARxoPHUYyDQuSRC_DjlG6FXHvVD6JcxXvWj46VE78SX2zV6S6SiHHra9SIgF0gKQBuL8hvvGOB0PmVwUvZ9FHuJDw8fyLh2fCPRbMMkc2DuHg/s259/Norway.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="259" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMm3M0Z-Y8dySqzNjvk1FE3Xwhuk18TIPTiSfO-Y8FmLrxfwZUl2mhjC6sx2hUOoasgXEukNsKkpZ5lARxoPHUYyDQuSRC_DjlG6FXHvVD6JcxXvWj46VE78SX2zV6S6SiHHra9SIgF0gKQBuL8hvvGOB0PmVwUvZ9FHuJDw8fyLh2fCPRbMMkc2DuHg/w400-h300/Norway.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">And then in third place I'd have put the dottiest entry, Norway's 'Give that Wolf a Banana' by Subwoolfer (in yellow wolf-masks). Daft, but original, funny and compelling. Finished 10th.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">A few curiosities - I was disappointed that Israel didn't get through to the final as I thought it the campest of all the turns........</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpTBQqOw5PE0j-gd38F4rclLa_xvD9pNeXVIK0rtboDgRkjVlpSxmW7GXgs3Uqd57bMmepEiExXCk7kc8s09pMgh6szJ1ME_YlF3qbAbWSSi3k3zK545HBm3fKl5cDNctdZ5vxDpkS1qBVGHnRmCNWPYWTdl_vivfSPcIBQ1jj8Ud6QtvPGm1c1ZFjNQ/s302/Israel.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="167" data-original-width="302" height="221" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpTBQqOw5PE0j-gd38F4rclLa_xvD9pNeXVIK0rtboDgRkjVlpSxmW7GXgs3Uqd57bMmepEiExXCk7kc8s09pMgh6szJ1ME_YlF3qbAbWSSi3k3zK545HBm3fKl5cDNctdZ5vxDpkS1qBVGHnRmCNWPYWTdl_vivfSPcIBQ1jj8Ud6QtvPGm1c1ZFjNQ/w400-h221/Israel.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSepQZCqlb5dd_kaGktrRbDE7rsmviSlqUmHRAcVvpiXk6dYVQRAuNhdDU5GTV81BukAAEG3sWxR7F2FJq2-PivSGz9cDqZrJN7gwR6lOifAyVmisR_mJrt6ZyXd4mXQ2h_RMjDpbaBljjOkbFrwF7Pyo7Fi0I7_WVP65TGiC33-3ckpKrFSTzcsm07g/s1023/Australia.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="682" data-original-width="1023" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSepQZCqlb5dd_kaGktrRbDE7rsmviSlqUmHRAcVvpiXk6dYVQRAuNhdDU5GTV81BukAAEG3sWxR7F2FJq2-PivSGz9cDqZrJN7gwR6lOifAyVmisR_mJrt6ZyXd4mXQ2h_RMjDpbaBljjOkbFrwF7Pyo7Fi0I7_WVP65TGiC33-3ckpKrFSTzcsm07g/w400-h266/Australia.jpg" width="400" /></a><div style="text-align: left;">Then Australia, which did make it to this final, coming 15th, featuring one Sheldon Riley singing tearfully how he, as a young boy, felt 'different' and his coming out as gay - all the while dragging a heavy train of white plume behind him which must have been ever so uncomfortable - and he looked like it was! </div></div></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">San Marino, ditched in the semi-finals, had ended with a man-man kiss. But the song wasn't 'special' enough - as weren't over half of those that actually did make it to the final.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">This year's wooden spoon prize went to Germany, just below France - two of the biggest financial contributors to the contest taking the bottom two places.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">And what about the voting? We'd always been used to beng allowed to cast just the <i>one </i>vote by telephone (now plus computer and other modern means of communicating) - but obviously <i>not </i>for one's own country. This time the presenters <i>twice </i>said "You have <i>twenty </i>votes at your disposal!" "WHAT?" I thought. Yet Graham Norton went on about voting for your favourite song/entry - emphatically in the singular! Did he not hear them? Didn't he know? Did it mean that we could, if we wished, vote for up to 20 countries which we liked? I can't have been alone in noticing this. If it meant that we, perhaps along with other countries, were deprived of registering <i>all </i>our likes, then surely the final results will have been skewed, to some unfavourably, to others in their favour. I await someone else pointing this out - and the verdict thereon. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">So, all in all, a reasonable contest, even if my last point leaves me with an uncertain taste in the mouth. But hey, at least the U.K. is once again one of Eurovision's big league players, and that's no mean thing.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNGGFTHOkZmAHEg3UMA4K2NdpmXpJL_oQkHv9wPcZlBAS2bX152bz02-t-Xf7Fpf5FU_wc1VcYP6oDPtmT27lUrBDraOgOGD-zVk880DtLv-268WbNDM31bTDV9XGG73OfCo4vtaVjOug6m7WATtOkM1MJwqDPcTl853Nx63kYn_FKcP2gEnPwS2Ikpw/s261/sam%20ryder.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="193" data-original-width="261" height="296" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNGGFTHOkZmAHEg3UMA4K2NdpmXpJL_oQkHv9wPcZlBAS2bX152bz02-t-Xf7Fpf5FU_wc1VcYP6oDPtmT27lUrBDraOgOGD-zVk880DtLv-268WbNDM31bTDV9XGG73OfCo4vtaVjOug6m7WATtOkM1MJwqDPcTl853Nx63kYn_FKcP2gEnPwS2Ikpw/w400-h296/sam%20ryder.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-size: large;">Kyiv next year then? Russian-less and defiantly independent we trust - and by then as much 'repaired' as we can help with. </span><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p></p>Raybeardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12424095016313843883noreply@blogger.com14