6 May 2021 (Thursday) - Election Day

My morning routine is so set in stone that today it was good to mix it up a little. Immediately on getting out of pit we took the dogs to the woods for a walk. The same chap who was sitting in his car there yesterday (with the engine running) in the car park was sitting there again today.

As we walked we saw what looked like animal tracks. Something rather large had scuffed up the leaf litter. Wild boar? Deer? As Pogo and Treacle ran through it we decided it was probably another dog.

 

With walk walked we came home, and I had a minor disaster. I went to trim the lawn edges and the strimmer fell in two. It still works if I hold it together, so I got the lawn edges done, then mowed the rest. It is amazing the difference mowing the lawn makes to the look of the garden.

 

I then walked up the road to the church hall to cast my vote in today’s elections. I had the choice of five candidates. There wasn’t much to choose from really, but then all the time I’m not prepared to get off my arse and do the job I can’t really complain. I looked at the ballot paper and didn’t really have much choice.

The Conservative candidate has put quite a bit of election paperwork through the letterbox an on-line recently. He talks a good fight, but much of his stated policies are *exactly* the opposite of those of the Conservative led county council and the Conservative  national government.

The Green Party candidate is very active locally, but I am very wary of the Green party. I’ve heard it said before that people who vote Green are either tree-huggers or friends and family of the Green Party candidate. And locally there is a rather large “vote Green” clique (on the fringes of which I sometimes hover) who seem to treat political allegiance in much the same way as supporting a football club.

I’ve heard absolutely nothing at all from the local Labour or Liberal Democrat candidates.

I voted for the independent candidate purely because he asked me to. The chap lives a few doors down the road. He seems keen, and I suspect that living where he does, anything he votes in which boils my piss would also boil his piss.

There was also an election for the position of police commissioner. Bearing in mind that policing should be above party politics and also bearing in mind that not one of the candidates had made any effort to convey anything to me about their views I wrote “what a waste of time and effort” across the ballot paper. Spoiling a ballot paper was probably a far more considered political statement than casting a vote for one of three randomly selected nobodies.

I came home to find the Green party had popped their election promises through the door.

 

Over a much later brekkie that usual I peered into the Internet. It was much as it ever was, but I did have one email which was a minor result. The final payment from the vet insurance has been paid into my account. This one went in far faster than the first.

I then solved a few more geo-puzzles before getting ready for work, and realistically that was it for today. A rather busy late shift, a very late finish and a pizza dinner watching old episodes of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire”, and off to bed…

5 May 2021 (Wednesday) - Guts Ache

Sid didn’t start yapping until half past six this morning which was something of a minor result. I came downstairs and chivvied him into the garden where he had a piddle, then as I tried to watch “Hardy Bucks” so he went outside another three times.

er indoors ^TM” emerged from her pit, and (with Sid securely away from any carpet) we took Treacle and Pogo down to Orlestone Woods where we had a good walk. We met the little old lady with the poodle half-way round, and passed the posh lady with the Labrador as we came back to the car park, but again we had a good walk undisturbed by the normal people. Mind you when I say we walk for ages and see no one, there is usually someone or other sitting in their car in the car park. Today when we arrived there was a middle-aged bloke sitting in his car (with the engine running), and after a half-hour walk we came back to the car park to find the same chap sitting in his car (with the engine running). Yesterday it was a young (twenty-something) woman. I wonder who it will be next time.

 

With walk walked I quickly sparked up the lap-top to send out birthday wishes, got dressed and set off to find where I’d left my car, pointed the car in the general direction of Hastings and set off. As I drove there was some program on the radio about the life and times of Kublai Khan. Eight hundred years ago he was Emperor of the largest (in area) empire the world has ever known, and I know pretty much nothing at all about the chap. This was followed by a mini documentary about the painter Hans Holbein the Younger (who lived at the time of King Henry the Eighth). I didn't know that was an older one.

I learned quite a bit from these two radio shows.

Looking back at my time at the Hastings Academy for Budding Geniuses it has to be said that the history lessons were an utter waste of time. Having us copy out the textbook (word for word) over the course of the year demonstrably taught us nothing at all.

Mind you I am reliably assured that our old history teacher was carried out of the school and taken away in an ambulance (apparently he went completely round the twist big-time), so I think things might have changed in the meantime.

 

I got to Dad's and had a cuppa with him. He seems to be doing OK. And from there I pointed the car towards Maidstone and work. As I drove there was some utter tripe being broadcast about tomorrow's forthcoming elections. The BBC had spent no expense to wheel on some students who called themselves  "political commentators" (aren't we all!) who were offering  their expert advice. Personally I felt their "expert advice" was a waste of the licence fee I begrudge paying, but what do I know?

Anyway... in tomorrow's elections...

Firstly look at the opinion polls. Obviously if it is pretty clear who is going to win the election where you live, then no advice was necessary. You vote for the winner - as the presenter said, who *doesn't* want to vote for the winner?

But if it isn't clear who was going to win, then the sage advice was to read the election materials published by all the candidates and vote for the one whose promises appeal to you the most.  (A novel concept!)

And if you don't like the sound of any of them, then you should (apparently) vote for the Green or the independent candidate as they will come last anyway (!) and giving them a vote or two means they don't end up utterly disillusioned at the end of the day.

And people wonder why I don't believe in democracy.

 

As I drove I stopped off twice. Firstly at Sedlescombe Organic Vineyard where I spent twenty quid on one bottle of wine. It was perhaps a bit much, but I felt sorry for the place. The woman behind the counter looked as though she was about to cry. They had a sign-in sheet for customers to sign as they arrived (supposedly a COVID thing) and I was only their second customer of the week.

I also stopped off at a farm shop in Cranbrook in the hope of a half-way decent bottled ale selection and I wasn't disappointed. I would have got some bottled ciders too, but their cider wasn't cheap, and it was the stuff that was so strong that just looking at the bottle makes you fall over, so I passed on that.

 

I got to work, scoffed the sandwich and bag of crisps I'd got from the farm shop, and a bag of chocolate covered peanuts too, and spent the late shift with a rather grim guts ache. Peanuts do that to me; I had hoped that the chocolate covering might have offset the guts ache, but it didn't. I really should give the peanuts a miss – a shame I like them so much.

4 May 2021 (Tuesday) - Early Shift

My phone’s alarm woke me by telling me “Get your arse out of its pit” (as is does). So I got my arse out of its pit, came down and (taking care not to wake Sid) made brekkie. This morning the Sky-Q box found “Hardy Bucks” so I watched the first episode, It was OK. As I watched so Sid was barking in his sleep. I wish he wouldn’t do that, but rather that than turds.

Having done a COVID test (negative) I peered into the Internet. It was fairly quiet this morning. No one was arguing on Facebook for once. Mind you there was no space for arguments – my page was packed out with adverts for Conservative politicians. The Tories have certainly spent a fortune on their campaign. Oh well… there are some wards locally where only the Conservatives stand for election. Partly because they know they will get in round here anyway, and partly because no one else can be bothered. I know I certainly can’t.

 

I had one hundred and eighty emails telling me that geocaches I’d hidden had been found yesterday (and no “did not find” messages!). And I had an email telling me the vet insurance were going to pay for pretty much all of Fudge’s final vet bill. They weren’t going to pay for the top-of-the-range casket though. I suppose that was fair enough, but I’ve recouped a thousand pounds that I thought I would never see again.

Mind you I’d rather have my little dog back, but there it is.

 

I had a minor victory when I got to my car this morning. On Saturday evening a bird (slightly larger than a jumbo jet) had done a crap the size of a dustbin lid on the windscreen. Having planned to wash it off yesterday I forgot all about it. Fortunately the torrential rain overnight had washed it all away.

As I drove to work the pundits on the radio were talking all sorts of drivel, as they do. Bill Gates is getting a divorce. He was described as the fourth richest person in the world with a personal fortune of a hundred and thirty billion dollars. I wonder how much of that he will give up in the divorce settlement. Even one thousandth of one per cent of his bank balance is far more money that I will ever earn in a lifetime. Who would ever miss one thousandth of one per cent of what they've got? I'll sent him an email and ask if he might give me a bung.

There was also talk about how the cost of legally changing your gender has been radically slashed. You can now change whatever you are for less than a tenner.  In years gone by I would be rather sarcastic about whether someone was male, female or hatstand; these days I just look on in frank amazement. There are (apparently) over fifty different sorts of gender and quite honestly I have no idea what any of that is all about.

 

I got to work and did my thing on a rather iron deficient sort of day (you can tell because of the hypochromia and the pencil cells), but being on the early shift meant I got to go home early. I collected Pogo and Treacle and drove them down to Orlestone Woods where we had a rather good walk. Rather good in that we went round the wood and the only other people we saw were about a hundred yards away and walking in the other direction.

 

Once home I fed the fish, then saw my phone was telling me that my Amazon delivery was only one stop away. There was even a map showing the van was outside my house. I popped outside and met the chap just before he rang the doorbell.

There are those who look down on having stuff delivered by Amazon… today I got the food I needed for the pond fish. Having it delivered meant I didn’t have to make a special journey to go get the stuff, I didn’t have to put up with the rude and patronising attitude of the woman in the pond shop, and I paid half the price of what the stuff costs in the pond shop.

 

I solved a few more geo-puzzles, then er indoors ^TM” sorted a rather good bit of dinner which we scoffed whilst watching the second episode of “Intergalactic”. I was all for giving up on the show, but er indoors ^TM” says to give it another chance… It might perk up…