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Official Status
This morning Jackie drove me for a short trip into the forest. Bovines basked among the browning bracken of Bull Hill. One couple sat talking on the gravel of Tanners Lane beach; another walked their dogs across it. With the Isle of Wight and The Needles on the horizon, gentle waters gathered in the regular […]
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Unforgettable
Today we tuned into BBC’s broadcast of the memorably, monumentally, reverential funeral service, bearing some of her own touches; and subsequent procession of the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II through the central London streets I know so well yet have never before experienced, albeit through the television screen, conveying such awesome silence but for the […]
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The High Flying Ball
Late this morning Jackie drove me to Hockey’s Farm Shop at Gorley Lynch for brunch. The crocheted decoration on the pillar box on Wootton Road is now a tribute to the late Queen Elizabeth II; next door, an owl keeps watch over the community notice board; the gate of The Poplars on the corner of […]
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A Knight’s Tale (78.1: The Troubles)
The 1970s was a decade in which the IRA carried out numerous bombing attacks in and around central London. A full list appears in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_terrorist_incidents_in_London. While living in Soho’s Horse and Dolphin Yard we heard numerous explosions from the safety of our flat. On 30 March 1979, Airey Neave, British Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, […]
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Coming Clean
This morning our friend Giles visited to collect me for a walk. Unfortunately his idea of flat terrain varied a little from mine. The footpath from the Taddiford Gap was so narrow that when we met oncoming traffic, unable, like crows, to perch on a post, we needed to squeeze ourselves into rather awkward spaces. […]
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A Knight’s Tale (38.1 Wives And Servants
‘The Obscene Publications Act 1959 (c. 66) is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom Parliament that significantly reformed the law related to obscenity in England and Wales. Prior to the passage of the Act, the law on publishing obscene materials was governed by the common law case of R v Hicklin, which had no exceptions for artistic merit or the public […]
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21st Century Encroachment
This morning I shared https://www.thefeatheredsleep.com/grief-in-faces/ which is a sensitive and insightful tribute to Queen Elizabeth II and to all who have their own reasons to mourn. Such sharing is not my normal practice, but this most definitely warranted it. Afterwards Jackie drove me to The Bridges, an historic area of Ringwood, where we met Helen, […]
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Grief in faces — The Feathered Sleep
As a child I was acutely aware of grief in faces my grandmother staring into forest as they carried my grandfather’s suicide aloft, tarpaulin sagging where he gave up his struggle grief when my mother bowed her head at the foot of my bed telling me she was leaving, never to return you can’t claim… Grief […]
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Pigs Can Fly
This morning was again sunless, but this time rainless, as Jackie and I once more filled our Modus with soggy garden refuse which we unloaded at Efford Recycling Centre (otherwise known as the dump) and continued on a forest drive. We turned left off Camden Lane into another, which soon ran alongside private woodland. Clearly […]
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A Knight’s Tale (116.1 Cumbrian Interludes)
During the early 1990s Jessica and I enjoyed a number of holidays in Cumbria. Our August 1992 holiday was spent at Towcett with Ali, Steve, and James. On 18th August we climbed the fells from Haweswater where we made the acquaintance of mountain sheep who looked rather more comfortable than I felt. The youngsters, Louisa, naturally […]