31st December 2011

Due to the excesses of Christmas and New Year, the blog page for ‘Last day of the Month’ will be a day or two late. I have published what it is completed so far and will develop the page before the 12 days of Christmas are finished with.

Have a wonderful New Year. We are off to a family bash within the hour and I still haven’t had a shower, a shave or a bite to eat.

Marvellous….

December 1st.

World Aids Day…. BBC reports 30 years ago this week were trying to understand this strange disease that had led to more than 70 deaths in San Francisco among gay men….

Not a word about that, or the Day of Action, or anything else really, other than Jeremy Clarkson clogging up the airwaves, after his foot in mouth comments about the strikers and marchers in support of the ‘Day of Action’.

I am in my sick bed, aching and sweating and not sure if it is coming up or going down. I telephone work to give my apologies and my boss, Tracy G calls me back to see if I am ok. She has been worried about me and has noticed that I am not myself. I re-assure her that it is flu like symptoms and not related to my previous health problems. She tells me to stay off work until Monday and to catch some sleep. I take her at her word and it is Friday morning before I feel well enough to get up.

I have an appointment at the Anti-Coagulation clinic for my blood test and think about re-arranging. My INR was really high last week …. 4.7 …. way over my limit…. They want to re-test me again.

I have a quick swill in cold water and pulling on jeans and a fleece, zipped up above my chin I decide to go regardless. There is only one waiting ahead of me and Dawn, the receptionist is her usual chatty self. I am tempted to tell her my friend Robert has a soft spot for her but decide to bide my time. I need something more damning to get the conversation going with that one….

St Andrews Day…. Svetlana Stalin…. (NOV)

Mervyn King, from the Bank of England is all doom and gloom but I can barely concentrate enough to drive up to the hospital….

There is a murmuration of starlings filling the sky and Honour Attacks in the UK are at nearly 3,000 for the past year….

A recent survey of bank notes, tested by Kent Police are found to contain traces of 11% of Cocaine…. almost treble what it was 6 years ago….

American Bankers win the lottery…. Socrates dies…. Philosophy football….

A lovely dedication to Gary Speed at Goodison but a similar result to when he played…. We lost…. Euro Draw…. FA Cup Draw….

Trial treatments are to get a boost in the NHS ??? Is this new marriage between Clinical Researchers, The Independent Sector and the NHS going to lead to faster, better, more available services for all…. ?

There are reports of concrete blocks being thrown from road bridges, in Chelmsford and Shrewsbury, onto the moving cars below…. at the same time, reports suggest that there are 4m young people in the UK who don’t own a book….More research is investigating and exploring the ‘sleep genes’….

I think mine must be in the washing basket as it’s 2am and the radio refuses to lull me to sleep…. There are the first stories of ‘weather’…. Snow in Glossop, the ‘Snake Pass’ is closed and I am thankful for my bed after all….

Europe is still in a deep hole and when Gareth calls down for a cup of tea, the talk is of ‘anti-economics’ and the beast that is consumerism…. The Eurozone Credit ratings take a bit of a hiding in the end of year reports….

News comes of the death of the Brazilian footballer Socrates. What a fantastic name. What a player…. dead in his bed after his struggle with alcoholism….

Gary McKinnon, the arch hacker, is described as having Aspergers and being unfit for a fair trial….

Military Intelligence gets a casual mention in the background from the radio…. an uneasy coupling I always felt…. Two suicide bombers create havoc in Afghanistan…. It is 70 years since the bombing of Pearl Harbour…. The army is wary, as the protests rise in the wake of the Russian elections…. Even Gorbachev throws in a dissenting voice….

Defence cuts may rise to 22,000….

I get another e-mail from Wally . Yes it is Ottawa where he lives, working hard t his job as well as managing to run an Independent record label…. from his own house I would imagine…. he is delighted with the CDs I have sent him and I am eager to get my hands on the material he has sent to me as a thank you…. The Internet has got a lot to answer for but it’s ability to put people in touch with each other is undoubted…. as long as you want to be found you will be…. I decide to use the e-mails I have sent to him in the form of another blog page….

Freeze Frame – A Compilation

I have an hour or so out of the office. I have got to drop off some prescription medication, to a Pharmacy in Plas Madoc. It is windy and cold and getting back in the car, I turn on the heater, listen to Radio 4 and roll a cigarette. The afternoon play is in full force, a piece by Peter Tinniswood, a writer I have long admired. It lasts the journey back through Ruabon, Rhostyllen, past the cemetary and ‘The Oak’ and down towards town, through Pen-Y-Bryn, up Brook Street, Hill Street, Regent Street and Grosvenor Road. I love driving in town in the day time. Come 5pm it is a nightmare…. What we could do with is a park and ride…. That may help….

There are still people dying by the hundred in Syria and Assad gives no indication that the bloodshed is about to end…. The Arab League want an end to the regime…. Another Afghan bomb….

My desire for a park and ride bears no comparison to that kind of madness…. 

The weather turns colder and across Scotland the schools are closing and the electricity lines are down…. there is talk of winds of 165mph…. I am glad we have got the new roof on although it isn’t nearly as bad here in North Wales….

A soldier from Stoke is found guilty of arson and causing an explosion…. He is also found guilty of inciting racism…. I should think so, his appeal for all Mosques to be ‘nuked’ is right out of the military intelligence files….

An unarmed US drone drops quietly into Iran, causing consternation to its owners and a propoganda coup for its recipients to show off….

There are deaths in Melton Mowbray…. I can’t help thinking of Pork Pies, where they are produced in all of their glory….

I have a busy morning at the drop in and find myself doing the ‘duty’ shift on the Friday afternoon. It is a bit of a grind but generally, I like the constant flow of people, all needing in one way or another to be patched up and sent on their way. It makes the time go quickly too and before I realise it, I am at home with a glass of red and all set for Friday Night Club.

I check the mailbox, yes the package from Wally has arrived. Fantastic…. 5 no 6 CDs, some details about reviews and a note from the man himself…. Marvellous…. E-mails are great but there is nothing like getting some mail in your box….

I don’t know whether I worded that correctly….

The Father calls down and Gareth of course and I play the Roy Moller and later an album from fellow Welshmen ‘Armstrong’…. the tunes tick through nicely as we indulge ourselves, as usual, in what’s left of our memories and turn them back into conversation….

Gareth remembers a guy he knew who would head to town for a nights drinking, wearing a pair of ‘cripplers’…. usually someone elses shoes…. usually because they didn’t want to go home and needed proper shoes so they would be allowed in to the nightclubs….

I recalled in my own local pub, ‘The Wheatsheaf’, when I was in my late teens, the lads would all swap each others clothes, those who were heading for a late session, having to wear ties and shoes….

I laughed out loud, it really tickled me as I had seen it with my own eyes too….

The Father cracked a nice joke in keeping with his habits…. How do you make God laugh…. ? Tell him your plans….

We recalled old brands of strong beers, ‘Black Challenge’ and ‘Tungsten’ that, for me to remember, were just like drinking liquid metal…. my own favourites had been ‘Party Sevens’, a large tin with seven pints of beer in it…. ‘Whisky Mac’, a kind of whisky and wine mix…. ‘Gold Label Barley Wine’ and ‘Exhibition Cider’…. when I thought about the recent years, all filled with banner headlines of the blight of ‘anti social behaviour’…. we were just the same…. just kids really with the usual problems…. I finally make it to my bed for about 2am and watch a little TV.

The winds have caused a turbine to explode off its huge stantion…. amazing…. Sarkozy gives a Gallic shrug when asked about the UK role in the forthcoming summit in Europe…. Clegg is distraught…. I am ready for dreaming….

Saturday…. A lie in…. Mums Birthday…. Adrian coming to visit later today with Lliwen and the boys…. It is his birthday tomorrow…. Saturday Pass for Bogster….

Joel and Tina call with Lana and Jamie after having been out for a bite to eat together…. I play Janet the new tracks we have recorded…. she likes them…. we head for a bath and bed….

Sunday…. another lie in…. unheard of…. The climate change conference runs over by two days in the hope that the big polluters can agree to make substantial cuts in emissions….

The Xmas tree on the Korean border is causing unease and Noriega is to be extradited from France and will face charges it seems in Panama….

 Visit to EP….