My morning routine was much the same as ever… up until I
turned on the lap-top. Amazingly no one was squabbling with anyone else at all
this morning.
I then spent a few minutes getting the dogs onto their
leads. Morgan is getting quite troublesome before a walk; he simply doesn’t
want to go out. Once we are on the walk he obviously has a great time. And if
he doesn’t get a walk he is like a fractious toddler. But before we go out he
runs from the lead and hides and clearly doesn’t walt to go.
As we drove to the woods the pundits on the radio were
talking about the government’s
announcement that they are spending a million quid to “support
children attending schools in disadvantaged areas across England to learn and
play chess, improve visibility and availability of the game and fund elite
playing”. There were those who felt this was a lot of money… mostly these
were those who were too thick to understand how to play chess. After all, this
million quid is just pissing in the wind compared to how much the government
spends on sports.
There was also talk about how the International Chess
Federation has banned trans women (biologically men) from competing in
women-only chess competitions. The head honcho of the English Chess Federation
was wheeled on who made the point that the top one hundred chess players in the
world are all men and made a rather good defence of the decision… Even though
the English Chess Federation don’t agree with it and
aren’t implementing it.
We went to Kings Wood today and went on a longer walk than usual.
At Orlestone unless we walk in circles and back-track a lot it is difficult to
get more than a three-mile walk in. I have a series of geocaches in Kings Wood
on a (sort-of) circular walk of eight and a half miles. Today we did a
walk of four miles. As we went we met three other dog-walkers; all within half
a mile of the car park. We walked for an hour and a half, had had a really good
(if uneventful) walk.
With walk walked the dogs were soon fast asleep in their
baskets. I got pastries for me and “er indoors TM”, and once
we’d had them (with a coffee) I went on a little shopping mission.
When I left home (in September 1984) one of the very
first things I got for myself was a fish tank. I’ve always had a fish tank. My
current one is rather old and tired and just a tad too small. I would like one
which has a footprint about six inches bigger in both directions, but is the
same height as the current one.
I couldn’t find one.
I also need some sort of a huge hose-reel thingy for the
pipe I use for cleaning the pond filter. I couldn’t find one of those either.
I came home. I had all sorts of ideas for things to do in
the garden but it was a very hot day, and the physical effort of the last two
days had taken their toll. So I sat on the sofa (with Bailey) and
watched episodes of “Four in a Bed” in which a pub, a holiday complex
and a hotel totally thrashed some posh woman who lets out bedrooms as a hobby.
And then the doorbell rang. The nice bathroom man came to
measure up. Our current bathroom is a bit tired; my Dad installed it as a
moving-in pressie some time in the early 90s. It is time for a new one. I’m
dreading seeing the estimate, but what is money for if not to squander
foolishly?
“er indoors TM” boiled up a very good
bit of curry which we washed down with a bottle of hock whilst watching a
rather good episode of “Lego Masters: New Zealand”. And then we watched
Sky Arts’ “Landscape Artist of the Year”. This programme really is “The
Emperor’s New Clothes” of our era.
Some of the paintings were *very* good.
Some really were pathetically awful; my eight year old
grandson really could do better, and has done so.
Sadly no one was brave enough to say “that painting is
truly crap”, and to ask who the (so-called) artist has porked to get
on to the show.
I’m told that doing so is bad form…
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