I woke in a cold sweat at half past five this morning
following a rather vivid nightmare. Something of a shame really; with Pogo off
on a little holiday there was plenty of bed space for once.
I made toast and had a little look at the internet. There
was an incredibly petty squabble kicking off about a factual inaccuracy on one
of the on-screen graphics used in the TV series of “The Hitch Hiker’s Guide
to the Galaxy”. You have to wonder who would freeze-frame and check what had
been written on a TV show from the last century, don’t you?
There wasn’t much else happening quite so early in the
morning. I sent out a couple of birthday
messages to friends and got ready for work.
As I drove to work I listened to the radio as I do. There was
loads of talk about how the schools inspector OFSTED
is dropping its one-word summary of schools. Apparently they aren’t
changing anything else about how they inspect; just the one-word summary. I’m
no expert but it strikes me that any inspector would be far better offering
advice on helping improvement rather than finding fault.
Does OFSTED do that? I don’t know.
And there was talk about the problem of antibiotic
resistance. Basically doctors have been giving out antibiotics like sweeties
for years, and farmers have been feeding them to animals for years. For the
most part the bacterial that antibiotics kill have long since been killed, and
so with them gone their space is being taken by bacteria that laugh at
antibiotics. And before long we’ll be back to the middle ages when an infected
cut will go septic and kill you.
I was told all about this when I started in hospital
laboratories in 1981, and it was common knowledge back then. Every few years
this story does the rounds and everyone acts surprised.
I drove to work up the motorway today which had none of
that “Operation Brock” stupidity going on. I got to junction six in
seemingly record time, and then the delays started. The slip road from junction
six to junction five has road works, as does the Coldharbour roundabout off of
junction five. Mind you when I say “road works” I mean miles of road
cones and dug-up roads, but no one actually doing anything.
Work was work. As I did my bit I had flashbacks from my
time in the Harbour Restaurant. Over the summer of 1981 the Italian boss had
friends staying with him. He asked the youngsters who worked for him if we
would take his friend’s teenage children out with us in the evenings. We were a
tad reluctant as they didn’t speak English and we didn’t speak Italian. Boss
gave us the price of an evening out… and we all got on famously. Despite not
speaking a word of Italian I soon found myself able to understand it. I couldn’t
speak it, but I could understand it. Similarly the Italians couldn’t speak English
but hey understood us.
I wonder what happened to them?
Today some of my colleagues were chattering in Italian. I recognized
the sound, but sadly I’ve forgotten all that I picked up over that summer
holiday.
And then at one o’clock a colleague had a text from her
daughter’s school. They had unilaterally decided that with effect from today
children could only be collected by parents unless a form was filled in
allowing someone else to collect the child.
My colleague told the school that she needs more than two
hours notice of such a change of policy, and that if her sister couldn’t be
trusted, then she herself would collect her daughter after work… at six o’clock.
The school never replied.
But isn’t this a sign of our times? Ten year olds needing
to be collected from school. I used to walk home by myself when I was seven.
Being on an early shift I got out early. The journey home
took me twice as long as it used to. It took half an hour to drive the mile and
a half from work to the motorway. I did have a plan to take the dogs to the woods
after work, but I spent all of that time in a traffic jam.
I came home to find the postman had been. I subscribe to
three magazines. The postman brought the September edition of two of them
today.
I will read one from cover to cover several times. The
other will go for recycling unopened...
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