And Finally, Cyril

It is safe to say that this missive may just be the last post; possibly; perhaps the final entry for 2011, perhaps not.  As always these last days of the year tend to have us looking back over our shoulders.  It is inevitable really, but I much prefer to be looking forward, to gaze into the unknown.  I do so not so much with plans, but with wishes, and with hope.  I have never been one for Resolutions and, after 52 years, see no reason to start now.  But I do harbour hopes, more so than ever before.

For 2011 had one defining event, and I refer here not to the start of my labours over this keyboard, or indeed to the eventual decision to allow others to peer over my shoulder, but to the night of 5 May.  If ever there was an occasion of history in the making that long night, when sleep was never more than a distant rumour, was a pivotal moment in the history of our nation.  Looking forward we will now see the start of improvements to our society, with legislative powers on alcohol pricing and on the curse of sectarianism.  Gradually our children and their children will improve their education and their outlook.  Finally we can start to do something.

I see that Alex Salmond has just received another award, on top of the various political gongs that have come his way since that monumental night.  Now he has been named as The Times’ ‘Briton of the Year’.  Yes it was an achievement to rattle the very foundations of society, and the country is on the cusp of major change.  To have that very pinnacle of London Establishment finally recognise what Salmond has achieved, so far, is in itself quite remarkable.  One day the man be inelligible for that award.

Despite my desire to look forward I cannot ignore the temptation to glance back, aware that The Times is part of the Murdoch empire, you know, the one that is embroiled in phone hacking and corruption between journalists, police and politicians.  The News of the World is no more and more of the central characters will find themaselves breakfasting at Her Majesty’s pleasure before it is all over.  Some will be hung out to dry; Coulson already has his legal funding stopped and from there it is but a small step to Cameron.  What lies ahead?

And so my thoughts turn to the year ahead, selfish thoughts, of matters close to home.  The Urchins will continue to develop, too briskly for an old man at times, but what joy there is in being a part of that, a guiding hand one hopes, learning all the time from past mistakes.  The years go by, and FirstBorn will reach his quarter century, whilst the PD, who managed to put in an appearance at the Big Boxing Day Bash, gets the key to the door so to speak, assured always of a welcome through this open door.

The bookshelves have been replenished with fresh material and already I have the first of my favoured reads for the 2012 list under way.  I know, after only the first couple of chapters, that it will start that list, ; and I know its author will be the source of more joys, for he has been in my sights for some time.  I’ll keep you in suspense for now, but when I get round to it, I hope also to bring colour to his words, with a picture of said volume.  For the much desired new camera has arrived and all I need now is the ability; the ability that is to get the pictures from camera to computer and then to these pages – another learning curve.

And so, if you stick with me, I can promise another strand.  There will be scenes and views from the cycleways hereabouts, but I’ll spare you the family snaps.  The odd picture relevant to any topic may be possible, but not the politicians for I’ll spare you too Rosa Kleb over breakfast.  And that takes us full circle, looking forward politically, Salmond with his majority, and three new opposition leaders finally in place, looking as inept as their predecessors.  On the immediate political front we have the local council elections, and the very real risk that after almost 70 years in power, seventy years when the people of the East End still have the lowest mortality rates in Europe, the Labour Party could lose Glasgow City Council, and their days of cronyism and more could finally be brought to an end.  Now that would really be something.  Westminster escapes my view for it is early and breakfast not yet digested.  Looking further ahead Westminster may not be a direct concern, but that is some years away yet.

There is little in place on the travel front for the year ahead.  I had hoped for a wee break in Wales in March, but I see there is a date now for October.  It is an event to hone these limited talents, so you’ll have to put up with these efforts, untutored and without outside influence, for a little bit longer.  There is a date in the diary for the Cumbrian coast early in May.  The family gathers for Granny’s 80th, and we gather at an old childhood haunt, in Allonby, with friends seen all too rarely.  It might even be fun.  The tent will have another outing in the summer, in The Netherlands, destination as yet unselected, with bikes in tow.  At least that’s the thinking at the moment, the logistics remaining to be thought through.  I’m guessing I’ll need an escape later in the year, but whether I risk the reliability of The Gamellawallah once again remains to be seen.  And if I get that trip to Wales on the agenda there are unlikely to be sufficient brownie points to allow a second selfish sojourn.  We can but dream.

And it is dreams that lie ahead.  Whatever your own plans to celebrate the turn of the year, I hope that you too have hopes and wishes for the year ahead, and that you will look back on them with a smile on your face.

Humbug

That’ll be it all over then, that festive feeding frenzy?  Maybe not, says he picking at goodies and nibbling leftovers at every visit to the kitchen.  But it is time to try and get some routine back; to pay a bit more than lip service to work commitments; to eat proper meals at proper times, and to get to bed at the appointed hour.

The last has been difficult these last few days, for I have been glued to the box.  Not, I hasten to add, as a result of the endless joys put forward by the various broadcasters, but solely to a DVD boxed set, in Danish, with sub-titles.  I heard a review of The Killing a week or so back.  A ‘must buy’ I thought, and in a moment of selfishness when money was disappearing, I splashed out.  It is utterly gripping, each episode in the first series – and so far I have managed 13 of the 32 – ending with you reaching for the next.  The plot centres on a police investigation into a murder, and then diversifies into so much more.  We have hints at corruption in politics, the highest levels of the police perhaps involved, civil servants too.  We have flaws in characters, in fact we have everything, and it is spellbinding.  Books have taken second place this week, I kid you not.

We had a rare opportunity yesterday for a day away, together, as a family.  The weather was not kind but the wind blew us east, where we found a watery sky with patches of blue.  It was a chill wind that blew across the decks of the RRS Discovery, as we stood and gazed up the mast to the crow’s nest high above.  Little faces peered into compasses, and little hands turned the wheel by the spokes.  It was in 1901 that the Discovery was launched in Dundee, in preparation for Scott’s first trip to the Antarctic, not his final one on the Terra Nova, but his first, with Shackleton, later to return on his own Endurance trip, and Wilson, amongst others.  It was a trip that came about from a school reading book, Urchin the Elder having been enthralled by the tale of Scott.  So she saw his cabin, restored twenty years or so ago.

The visitor centre in Dundee mesmerised both Urchins, with many interactive exhibits for the youngsters, amidst memorabilia and displays from those pioneering days.  We had films to watch, photographs, life on board and on the ice, as well as the ship itself, from construction to restoration.  In short it held us all, even before the shop.  I had thought that we may end the day with a wander round the wildlife centre at Camperdown Park, but we spent so long at Discovery that we missed the last entrance by ten minutes or so, with darkness less than an hour away.  Still The Urchins did get a run through the fabulous adventure playground, and a blow of fresh air around the ears.  They were not the only ones to sleep on the road home, though thankfully I managed to vacate the driver seat before my eyes gave up any pretence at resistance.

But today there needs to be a certain amount of nagging, for there are people to be thanked for generosity above and beyond the call.  It will take some doing though, for Skylanders is threatening to burn out that wii thingy, and dollies are having their hair brushed and being dressed.  Perhaps suggesting we could do it by email may spark a bit more enthusiasm.  And then I need to think of feeding them, for the school is still off, and I need a routine, until I can get my own back a week on Monday.  There is a very girlie basket now fixed to a bike, a pink one, but that is the only bike that has been along the road of late.  Need to change that sometime.

There have been a few more books added to the lists, with spaces made on the shelves; some long desired, others unknown.  And there is research to be done, for my favourite magazine arrived yesterday with word of a little scribbling competition and a theme to consider, with a only a few weeks for submissions.  Those weeks are largely spoken for, what with school holidays and then the frightening thought of frenzy on the work front.  I don’t want to think about that just yet, the work frenzy that is, but turn my mind to the theme, to lunch, to the reading list, to episode 14…..

I hope it’s been good for you too.

Dolly Mixtures

I refer to a broad range of topics, rather than to any suggestion that dusky maidens may be in the mind.  Quite the reverse actually, for I start with the imminent, and final, FMQs of the year.

More than seven months since Elmer Fudd announced his resignation Scottish Labour finally have a new leader.  And it is with Rosa Kleb in mind that I rebuffed any thoughts of maidens, dusky or otherwise,  We are assured that Johan Lamont leads all of Labour in Scotland, but I still think that her colleagues at Westminster representing Scottish constituencies will take their whipping from the wrong Miliband, rather than the wrong Scot.  I say wrong because Rosa took second place to Ken Macintosh in votes from parliamentarians and party members, so she hardly has the full support of her group at Holyrood far less Westminster.  But she got the nod on the bizarre electoral college that sees union members, even those opting out of the party funding element of their subscription, deciding the leadership, rather than the party members or the parliamentary members.  Rosa’s apointment seems to me to be a step backwards for a party in deep turmoil in Scotland, devoid of both direction and ideas.  If the SNP had a wish list for Labour leader then Johan Lamont may have topped it!  I await FMQs.

The Urchins are at home now, for almost three long weeks, and already there is a call for fish fingers, of which the freezer contains not a single one.  We will get to see the RMS Discovery, in dry dock at Dundee at some stage in the next week or so.  But there are other priorities, and others to consider.  I am minded this week of the frailty of the elderly; that we assume that faculties that once functioned without doubt, can no longer be relied upon.  Extra care is needed, and we have to find the time for those we always thought to be robust and eternal.  We may yet have to set a couple of extra places round the festive table, but any offer will probably be refused.  It’s a pride thing, but when we eventually wake up to ageing then you know it’s much worse than it seems, and can be denied no longer.

Despite the presence of said Urchins I hope to, nay must, find the time to get that bike and those old limbs out on the roads.  The Grasshopper has been garaged for far too long, following a delay for parts, periods of poor weather, and even, whisper it, too much work on the desk.  I fear that the lycra may find it all a stretch too far, and that is before the massive calorie intake of the excesses that lie ahead.  But exercise I must, and soon.  The ice has gone, the temperature reaches an unseasonable double digit level at this winter solstice, and the law of sod dictates that I lose my freedom with the school closed.  But I will get in the habit again soon, and update you on life in the hedgerows in these parts.  That promised camera, to bring pictures to the words, may yet happen, but not this week.

For this week there is spending and largesse, though certainly much less than in the past.  I am hoping that all outgoing presents have the approrpriate level of thought, have use and a purpose.  Surely the days of buying thoughtlessly, of dustcollectors, and whimsies, must be put behind us.  I’d much rather receive a goat in Africa than a festive tie or whatever.  That said there is a book list circulating and if, come the end of the week, I can cross off a few much wanted tomes then a smile may even cross this coupon.  I am reminded often that, as a child, I once had a Christmas where every parcel contained a book.  I must have been about nine or ten.  Now if that were to be repeated more than 40 years later, that smile would be guaranteed, provided of course they were books of my choosing.

I have struggled to move on reading-wise since that astonishing memoir last week.  Right now I am circuiting the world, via deserts, in the guiding hands of Martin Buckley.  His Grains of Sand has been on my radar since we met  four or five years ago, at Sandfords in Manchester.  I finally picked up a first edition at Hay on Wye this year and right now it is helping me move on from Horwood’s childhood.  We have traversed the Sahara and the Kalihari.  This morning he took me through the Atacama, and above the Nazca lines. Ahead lies the Gobi, and more.

I mentioned those lines to The Networker earlier this week, for he is off cruising on Monday, en famille, eventually disembarking at Valparaiso.  We had a session at the gym, but he did all the work.  It is a massive trip for a man in a wheelchair, one that he may not be able to make in five years time.  So he’s right, he has to live for today and to hang with the expense and the consequences.  Every minute is precious and we know not what lies ahead.

I was pleased to see a return this week of Real Travel magazine, after an absence of a few months when the publisher went into administration.  Fingers crossed for a successful return, link on the blogroll restored.  Also popping up again this morning is Abdul Baset al Megrahi, giving his final interview, protesting his innocence one last time.  There is still more to come out, and not just the book and the film.  Keep up to date with the link to Robert Black’s postings on The Lockerbie Case, aside.

On the viewing front I have treated myself to try and fill the void left by the ending of Frozen Planet and The Last Explorers.  Any excuse to avoid the festive schedules is a good one for me, and I suspect that a DVD player for the little telly may be needed.  I heard a discussion of a series I had missed.  The Killing has run through two series now, aired on BBC4.  It is Danish with subtitles, and billed as the finest crime series ever.  The second series was released on disc this week, so I had a wee treat.  I had to force myself to switch off after the opening two episodes, of series one, last night.  There’s also a new edition out marking the 65th anniversary of It’s a Wonderful Life, and that is on the shelf for a viewing on Saturday evening.  Until then The Urchins have to put up with a nightly reading of The Night Before Christmas.  They’re getting a bit excited you know.

And If I don’t get a chance to report in later in the week, have a good one, and a large dram.  Go on treat yourself, and those special to you, just this once.  I know I will.

 

The Need to Heal

I had plans for this day, but they have been shelved.  Suddenly the tree is not important, it can wait.  The phone can ring, the inbox rest unopened.  Even Elmer may take a back seat, though Iain Gray’s final performance as the Worst First Minister Scotland, thankfully, Never Had may be quite as gripping as all those that preceded it – viewing through spread fingers, listening with astonishment.  The Labour Leadership farce of the last seven months should come to an end this week, and Elmer Fudd will leave the scene.  But I came here not to talk about politics, not to whinge, but to share some joy.

The family slept in today, en masse, apart from me, me who had been awake for hours, but lost in a different world, one between the covers of a book you may not be surprised to find.  The clock mattered not, even if I could have seen it without glasses, without tears.  The book may need to be dipped into again, for some passages tugged at the heartstrings so hard that I know not if I really took in what I couldn’t clearly see.

For decades now I have read the works of William Horwood, enchanted first with his world of moles, and followed him into the skies with his eagles, the forests with his wolves, and more recently into the world of the Hydden.  Horwood it was who was selected to write four volumes of tales to enhance those works of Kenneth Grahame a century ago, works that we all know as the Wind in the Willows.  From Horwood’s pen the magic lives on once again.

Back in 2004 William Horwood published a memoir.  It got much press comment at the time but, despite acknowledging him as a favourite writer I was not tempted.  In fact I purchased the book just a few months ago, after I had replaced some early paperback volumes with hardback firsts, and I did so primarily to complete the collection.  I hinted the other day that I was in the midst of something deep, but even then I knew not what lay ahead.  My final session began around five this very morning, and could not end until the covers closed, no matter who may miss the school bus.  But I finished, and they got the bus, breakfasted and dressed, and I slowly gather my thoughts.  I have had a quick look at Horwood’s website, and I see there is an update in the offing.

The Boy With No Shoes was written third party, with changes of names to people and places.  Initially it brought reason and insight to some of the magic of the world of Duncton Wood,  and The Stonor Eagles.  We learn how he slowly uncovered the world of medicinal plants, his knowledge of the seas and the tides.  But more importantly we learn.  And the sources of our learning may not be the expected ones.

Horwood was born in 1944.  His memoir was published at the age of 60, telling how a five year old boy grew, taking us through the formative years into adulthood, times when writing was not on the agenda.  We start with illiteracy and end with first class honours, but third class ambitions.  We enter the world of a family that would now be labelled dysfunctional but then remained behind closed doors.  He was 34 when he started to delve into his past, but it was decades later before he shared it with us.  For Horwood it was a journey of healing, an essential trip, and for us, for me anyway, it is in education in itself.  An education into understanding childhood, the responsibilities of being a parent, and the hope that wise words can make me, finally, a better one.

I am not going to tell you of the highs and lows that lie in those 400 or so pages.  Not even of the importance of Granny and the worthies of the beach and the harbour; nor of the Menace of the  Master at school – I thought here of Anthony Valentine’s performance as Major Mohn in Colditz – or of the effect such menace has on the innocence of youth.  There was first love, shattered so cruelly, the same cruelty that marked so many stages of his young life.

Depression and despair; Darktime, and fear; mistrust, as people that knew better mishandled and destroyed; Love and hope.  And finally an astonshing outcome, not for Horwood, but for others who again suffered so cruelly when they should not have done.

So as I set out to get an understanding into the delving of moles, the reasoning behind the settings in the Welsh mountains, the Kent coast, the book took me way beyond that.  It took me further into the mole tunnels, and to rain and flooding.  But more importantly it teaches me about family relationships, and needs, and responsibilities.  Life really is too short.

A little lad had only one memory of his father, The Man Who Was, and his home had occasional visits from another, the Man Who Wasn’t.  He had one pair of shoes, the only ones he owned and they had been given by his father, before the train came and the rain came.  The shoes were removed and the boy was lost.  Today the boy is a hugely successful author bringing joy to many.  Perhaps it was his review of his early years that allowed the boy who could not read or write, to become so.

I see there is an update on his life in the offing, with The Man Who Feared Rain, and I hope that it does make it’s way to the bookshops, for I shall be first in the queue.  And as for  you, well even if you are but a stranger to Horwood’s various worlds, track down a copy of The Boy With No Shoes.  Read it, and weep; I know I did.  This book has a place in my book list.  It is a place beyond my favoured reads of this year, a richly deserved slot all of it’s own, for I am trully touched.

Greasepaint

Once again the rain lashes the glass, driven by a wind that was a gale.  Yesterday it tore the glasses from my face, in pitch darkness, and I stood unable to move, unable to see.  One wrong step and they could be smashed into the mud, though for all I knew they could be twenty yards away in the field.  It was one of those days, but it turned out all right, for I can see the screen, specs safely recovered thanks to an urgent call above the noise and a dash into the tempest with a torch.  But it rains still, though I wake filled with joys, and hopes.

It is that time of year, you might have noticed, the one where bugs and hums come together.  But enough of me for it is a time for children, and don’t they know it.  It is that time when the school show is aired to the public, those long weeks of lines and songs and tears and tantrums come to an end.  And what an end it was we had last night; and the moistening in the eyes was nothing to do with the rain or the wind.

There are 34 children at our local school, soon to be down to 33 as one moves on leaving behind memories and sadness, and a last performance on the stage caught on camera, never to be forgotten.  It is a tiny school with but a handful of staff and scant resources.  Every year they put on a show, written by the teacher of the big class, scripted and scored, costumed.  There is always no room at the inn, for you cannot squeeze enough bums onto school benches to satisfy the families, and you cannot leave enough room in the tiny hall for the children to perform.  So this year we bussed them into town, to the local theatre with its tiered seating and dressing rooms, with a lighting box and a proper stage with backdrops and props.

And did they let us down or did they do us proud?  I think we’ve left the schoolroom behind and the theatre will be in demand; we are past the point of no return.  And by doing so we do our little bit to try and keep the theatre viable, for it is in the old mill, an ancient building with history and neglect and a few friends.  And the mill has found a few new friends with an interest in preservation, for our children now need that theatre.

The dress rehearsal was dire, but I think these things are meant to be so.  It was their first sight of a real stage, their first fright of a real stage, and it showed.  But on the day there was no fright and a lot right.  There were two performances and two packed houses, and every one of those thirty four youngsters had a starring role, and played it, to perfection, well almost. Oh yes they did.

The audience joined in, caught up in the enthusiasm that swallowed them whole.  The event had reached beyond the school and even the councillor came out, and only a cycnic would remember there’s votes needed in the spring.  Our local professional thespian joined us, and perhaps this morning she is beginning to look over her shoulder, or remembering how she got into the business, as I remember the best soap of all.  There’s only one Mrs Mack.  Oh yes there is.

But where are those shy little urchins, tongue-tied, eyes cast down and nervous?  Where did they all get that confidence?  That’s all down to the school, and to the staff, and what a wonderful job they do.  I can but hope that the councillor takes back to his education committee the vital relationship between tiny school and rural community, for without it we have none, and these times there is always threat, and uncertainty.  1874 it was that the school opened, and though the roll is smaller now, the need is even greater.

I remember school shows of old.  In fact I remember the Prodigal Daughter, who will one day return; the lost sheep back to the fold.  Which takes me back to school shows of old, those nativity scenes, the ones where said Prodigal, now graduating, sat as an infant holding the babe beside the crib whilst the shepherds and the kings watched by night.  We have moved on from then, in these days when the minorities are making a stooshie about marriage, rejecting any move that let’s them opt out of being forced into doing what society wants.  These are secular days, times of equality, of forgiveness and understanding.  Days when the schools address faith in different ways, and of different ways.  The nativity is not the theme for the show.

And so we had our own show, with laughter and dancing and songs.  And we had stars on stage, 34 of them, not one singled out, but all together as a community should be, and audiences bursting with pride as the tiny school came to town.  Better get next year’s theatre booking in quick methinks.  For the school room can be no more.  It’s behind you.  Now, where do we get an usherette, with a tray of ice cream and a torch?  Well done everyone.  I’m sure I’m not the only old man waking with a silly grin this miserable morn.  Oh no I’m not.

Crows

I woke today to a sound I had not heard for some time.  There was no rain battering the windows; no wind ripping slates from the roof.  Outside it was dark, bereft of that light that tells you that the silence is deep snow buffering the sounds of the land.  It was the calm after the storm, and very welcome it was too.

Twenty four hours ago, rising above the gale, we heard on the wireless that all of the schools would be closed, just as the uniforms were being laid out, the porridge bubbling.  And so I had an unexpected day with The Urchins, and it was a day confined to barracks for outdoors was not welcoming, ill-advised even.  From our perch we could see water, gathered in places it rarely does.  We heard of roads closed, and worse to come.  The wind was to reach dangerous levels.  The forecast was accurate both in gravity and timing.  By mid-morning snack the power had gone.  There was no wii, no World’s Deadliest, and The Urchins were lost.

How was it we lived again, back in the dark ages, the ones without internet and email, with telephones that didn’t need power sockets?  Fortunately we had one of this in the cupboard and I could hear the power company telling me that if the power remained off by 4pm on the morrow to call back.  Thoughts of the dark days flooded back, ill-chosen words as I look at the fields.  But that year when there was no power from Boxing Day to Hogmanay, when the temperature remained sub-zero, will never be forgotten.  Now though we had Urchins to consider.

But I struck gold for Tractor Jim was securing loose sheets of metal and shed roofs and things, lifting railway sleepers with his digger and weighting down anything that would move.  We had in the past taken a trailer to all parts gathering in sheets of tin spread far and wide, sheets that could take your head off if you were out in the wind.  Since those days I had a generator in the shed, just in case, and Jim had it set up in no time.  At least come the night we would have light, and the television would work, perhaps the boiler would fire.

But with little petrol the genny sat silent during the day, I would get more fuel when mama returned, for there was nothing to tempt me out with children in those conditions, not the urgency of the bank, nor the need to catch the mail.  We camped indoors, with gaz stoves at the ready and candles.  Table tennis in the kitchen, ping went the ball and pong went the Younger, beans for lunch.  School books and nouns and verbs; dominoes, and I managed to win, just the once.

Chickens turned the corner at the side of the house, lifted and deposited from whence they came.  A draught came in from the french doors, the doors that had caved in twice before when the wind blew and we sat up through the night trying to hold a settee against the doors.  But there was hedging now, grown to ten feet or more, and the doors held.

But what really caught my attention were the crows.  Normally we have a few, tormenting the buzzard, laughing.  But down in the field, in the lee of the wind, the field that had more water than grass, they gathered yesterday, in their hundreds.  It was murder out there, and in between the waters from the snowmelt and the torrential rain, on the rises of ground that remained green, there were hundreds of crows, jostling for space, bumping in the wind, a few gulls too.  It was a field where a few greylag geese have been known to stop for a week or three; the same field where ten years ago the black grouse would graze every day, up to a dozen males and two or three of females disguised as molehills.  But the grouse have gone now.  And the crows gathered, gathered as I have not seen before.  It was extreme weather.

When the power company suggest that connection may be the following day I plan for several, for they have form in that area.  We had noise above the wind, for a radio worked on batteries and I learned that engineers had been drafted in from the south.  I feared a long delay for no one could be expected to be up a pole when the wind blew at speeds that were not allowed on our motorways.  And today the aftermath, the tales to tell.  And you will gather that the power is back, returned in time to heat the house and cook the dinner before Herself struggled home from the Big City with few trains and flooded roads and wind and debris.

And so I woke to the sound of silence, and put the light on, and read.  On the bedside table now is a memoir, a healing.  The words are of one of my favourite writers and as I am less than 100 pages in I will tell his tale later.  But already the eyes are moistened as I hear of a childhood with more troubles than it deserved.  I am taken back to the days of the coronation, with screens placed so that those watching on the grainy black & white tellies could not see the Royal Chest; I hear of pride in Tibet and New Zealand as Everest bows down, pride claimed then by England; and I hear it from a lad who couldn’t then read and write, but who held the world record as Private BWNS at the Marines barracks.  And I left him this morning at the summit of Moel Siabod, sights set on Tryfan, and I begin to see the majesty of his later works taking shape.  Urchin the Younger had snuggled in, as I thought of childhood and parenting, and our own failings.

So many writers, with tales to tell and the skill to do so.  Flawed characters, conforming not to the expectations of society; works of genius.  And building a head of steam these days is the debate on same-sex marriage, and intolerance and preaching, minority interests.  I may return to this at a later date, but for now I rejoice in the warmth of a hug under the duvet from the innocence of youth, a happy childhood, and I welcome the sound of silence.  Not even a crow to be heard.

True Grit

On the wireless we hear tales of the snows and the chaos of 12 months ago, the rumpus that brought the resignation of the Transport Minister for what, it seems to me, was primarily the failure of media to tell the world with any degree of accuracy of the weather that was then to afflict us.  It is repeated now as the snow has returned and the new Transport Minister is quizzed incessantly.  In refreshing those reports of last year the BBC are conveniently excluding their weather bulletins.  But this time round those bulletins have been true and reliable; the snow fell exactly when and in the precise amounts predicted.  Yet still we have phone-ins from drivers telling how it took them 40  minutes to travel a mile, or whatever; schools are closed and events cancelled.  Locally we have the trials of the school bus, the routes being outwith the gritting runs meaning that urchins far and wide are supposed to walk on untreated, unlit roads without footpaths to the nearest the bus can reach, or parents take to to the roads and add more traffic to the chaos.  The next stage is the road safety officer, for children are not supposed to have to walk where pavements do not exist, the roads department care not and pass the buck to the education department whose next responsibility is apparently to arrange for home schooling.  Just send the gritters round, please.  Local farmers are doing their bit with ploughs, whilst grit bins, wheelbarrows and shovels are deployed on foot.  In five months the councillors are up for election……….

Moving seamlessly into politics the broadcasters seem to be catching on slowly to the changing mood of the nation.  The spur for this has been the publication of the annual Scottish Social Attitudes Survey, and the results are quite enlightening.  The state-funded broadcaster of course puts the usual spin on it, head in the sand.  These days I am warming to the latest from STV, Scotland Tonight, which follows News at Ten.  Last night the survey was the topic for debate and a platform was given to members of both SNP and Labour.  But the star performer was Pat Kane, once half of Hue & Cry and now a columnist and blogger of growing repute.  The mother of Pat’s children is one of our newest MSPs and sadly has had little time in the last six months to add to her own impressive blog.  Pat delved into the morass of statistics coming out of the survey, his finger very firmly on the pulse, the changing mood of the nation captured.  The BBC continue to be in denial, but considering the numerous links between staff members, reporters and the Labour Party it is little wonder that they continue in their role as Labour’s media arm, intent on preserving their source of license fees from Old Scotia.  A review of the media reaction to the survey can be found here.

Meanwhile, after Scotland Tonight I hopped over to hear what the Beeb were saying on Newsnight Scotland.  No survey comment, just an in depth debate with the three candidates seeking to succeed the hapless and depressingly negative Iain Grey as the next leader of the Labour group in the Scottish parliament.  Apparently now it is to be a head of Team Scotland, responsible for members in Holyrood and Westminster alike.  We even have a Westminster candidate in the form of Tom Harris, also a prolific blogger, no link provided for it leaves a nasty taste and not one I am prepared to suffer in the interest of balance.  If the BBC can overlook balance and impartiality……….Interestingly we had the two MSP candidates trying desperately to distance themselves from the negativity and oppositionism that saw them obliterated in May.  Ken Macintosh even mentioned the ‘tribal hatred’ as being a cause for their demise.  Quick to catch on these politicians, perhaps they had been reading the survey, or listening to Pat Kane, before they came on air.

The Labour leadership election though is a flawed process.  Yes the members get their say, but so too do the parliamentarians, and then the unions pitch in with their block votes.  The electoral college has three distinct strands to try and find a leader, one that will unite the party and dictate policy for both London and Edinburgh.  Given that last week we saw MSPs on strike while MPs debated and voted, it seems that unilateral policy is simply a rumour put out to the press and survey respondents.  Young Miliband will tell his colleagues in Westminster exactly how to vote, probably on English only issues not affecting the constiuents of said members, while in Scotland, the vote will continue to be in opposition to the SNP Government, regardless of the interests of the consituents.

The local council elections are only five months away.  Glasgow has been under Labour rule for almost 70 years, rule that keeps poverty on the doorstep, has mortality rates among the worst in Europe.  Methinks that finally there is a move away from voting in the manner of fathers and grandfathers, to voting in the interests of children and grandchildren, and continuing the progress of last May into a local level.

Now I know that Labour took control in Glasgow in 1933, for it was one of the questions that saw us gather insufficient points in the quiz at the weekend.  It was though a proverbial in a brewery, and the local ales went down well, failing though to add moisture to the shortbread which had its revenge.  But what made the night was the generosity and good nature of a certain Queen of Hearts, on voluntary taxi duty and desperate to have a few hours freedom from her Knave and assorted jesters.  It’s the community spirit that does it, and more of that this weekend as the reindeer come to town, with Santa.  The town will come out in throngs, and the Farmers’ Market adds weight too, as local business battle against supermarkets and out of town retail parks.  Now if the snow remains and the roads are closed and we can’t get to the motorways; and if the Queen of Hearts is extending favours……….

Time now though to get out the snow shovel.  The air is still and quiet, the owl back to his roost, and The Urchins need to be walked along those dangerous roads.

Explorers Again

It may come as no surprise to hear that I reached for my copy of The Voyage of the Scotia before retiring last night.  It sits now on the bedside table, waiting.  For last night the second episode of Neil Oliver’s The Last Explorers took us in the wake of the Scotia, across the Southern Ocean, as we plotted the life of William Speirs Bruce.  The programme ended with shots of the current favourite black & white residents at Edinburgh Zoo, and the daily delights of the penguin parade.  That is most apposite as the adelies and the emperors are about to be usurped with the arrival of another black & white package, the Chinese pandas.  The pandas though are not so much here to boost vistor numbers at the zoo, and hopefully boost their own with the some breeding, but to open the trade routes between Scotland and China, to sell whisky, and very welcome they are too.  Speirs was one of the zoo’s founders, and he would approve.

I am reminded too of a couple of promises made, yet to be fulfilled.  In recent months the school provided a reading book to Urchin the Elder the topic of which was Scott of the Antartic.  I promised a trip to Dundee, to go an board the RSS Discovery, and to see how Scott and Shackleton, Tom Crean and the rest, had lived.  More recently, the current reader being The Moon, I promised to take the telescope outside on a clear night and to let said Urchin explore the Sea of Tranquility and whatever else we could find.  I wonder which promise will be fulfilled first, but they both will be, I promise you that.

Bruce though, headed south on the Scotia in 1902.  He did so having been overlooked by the RGS who wanted the Discovery to be Naval led, by Scott.  Bruce was then one of the handful of people on these shores who had actually visited the southern continent, in 1893 on a Dundee whaler, the Baloena, and also had experienced the Arctic.  His interest was in science and nature, not exploration.  The RGS was somewhat miffed to hear that Bruce had obtained sponsorship from the RSGS.  He went to Norway and purchased the Hekla which was refitted at Troon and renamed.  The Scotia was on her way, and Scott’s Discovery was not.

There is an iconic postcard from that trip, The Piper and the Penguin, one that a certain collector might like for her album.  For The Genealogist has been in those southern waters, with a couple of trips to the Flakland Islands, and that was where Oliver joined what looked to him and to me to be a tiny craft on which to spend days on the planet’s most dangerous seas.  I could empathise with his trepidation for I too detest all manner of fairground rides.  Anything that goes up and down, or round and round, or worse all together, is to be avoided.  Seas should be crossed on CalMac ferries, island destinations preferably in sight.

But the weather was kind and the only trouble to afflict our guide was one of boredom, even though some of the views of lumpy waters had the settee seeming to roll.  I like my horizons to be level.  But then the icebergs drifted into the path, all blue and massive, and without the seemingly permanent sunned backdrop that Frozen Planet brings to our screens.  Oliver followed Bruce into Scotia Bay, on the South Orkney Islands, he took us to to the remains of Omond House, the home that Bruce had built whilst his ship was locked in the ice until the following spring.  He caught and weighed and counted penguins, helping with a survey on massively depleting numbers as the krill disappear as we warm our planet.

There is an episode of Frozen Planet which we will not see.  It was made on the topic of global warming.  But it could not be sold and around the world buyers of the series wanted only the six episodes that remind us not how we are ravaging this earth, and doing too little to preserve and to reduce the rate of change.  Perhaps one day we will be permitted to see the evidence that Attenborough’s team put together, before it is too late.

When Bruce returned to these shores he had some celebrity, but little interest in the rounds of the halls, for by then the audiences wanted to hear tales of exploration and discovery, not of nature, which is the story Bruce had to tell.  Not for him the white-ribboned Polar Medal, the one awarded to his rivals on the Discovery, and not just to Scott and Shackleton, but all the way down to the lowest stoker.  For Bruce and the Scotia were shunned by London, still miffed that they had taken the edge off their desires to be furthest and and to be first.  You can imagine how they felt later when Amundsen headed south, and went furthest and was first.

But it does not end there, for London’s refusal ro recognise the work Bruce had done on the South Orkneys and on the mainland allowed Argentina to stake a claim.  The Scotia went to Buenos Aries for supplies and repairs after that first winter in the ice.  As a result Argentina was not slow, once it realised that London was more interested in Scott and Shackleton, in putting a post office on the islands, with a recognised district.  This was the first step in an Argentinian claim to the lands, from Los Malvinas south, and what remains today as their part in the multi-national interests in the continent.

But the legacy of Bruce remains, and in Edinburgh this weekend there will be much publicity as the zoo once again has its very own minstrel show.  Bruce may well have been the only founder who knew not only how penguins behaved in the wild but also how they tasted with curry sauce.  Hopefully there is no similar claim when the pandas arrive.  But on screen Neil Oliver is proving to be a fine guide and if this little series is not available where you are then you would be well advised to seek it out on whatever BBC facilities are open.  I await the next two instalments eagerly.  And it does not end there for, in addition to Frozen Planet and The Last Explorers, we also have some little nuggets within the exploration theme, like The Hudson’s Bay Boys, aired the other night, and still to be watched.  By the time the snow comes here we will be well and trully acclimatised.