RIP Tony Scott
I did see a couple of Tony Scott‘s films, but I wasn’t a great fan.
RIP Tony Scott
However, I’ve never seen a cinema put something like this on the front.
C Gets Stuck To Me!
When we went to Cardiff, it appeared that I lost one of the return train tickets. In the end it turned up in the back pocket of my wallet, stuck in there by an old Post-It note. I was a small one and written on it was an 0208 phone number. The writing appeared familiar at the time and only now, am I sure that it was C’s. In any case it wasn’t like any other of the usual suspects, who might have given me a Post-It note with a phone number on.
So has that note been looking after me, these nearly five years since she died? Who cares? I’m still here! Even if there is a touch of the just-abouts to it.
Death Of A Cyclist
It is always very sad when someone dies, but the death of a cyclist outside the Olympic Stadium is creating a few waves as well.
He was knocked off his bike and killed by a media bus, at a place that cyclists have said was dangerous for years. It was the typical cyclist under a turning vehicle accident, if any accident is typical.
I know it doesn’t help his family, but Bradley Wiggins has made strong statements about safety and said that all cyclists should wear helmets at all times.
One subsidiary point, was that quite a few of the soldiers guarding the Olympics were about but sadly couldn’t save the victim. Surely, this in itself is an argument for using soldiers at big events, as I suspect their emergency medical skills are a lot better than your average security guard.
Olympic Security in Perspective
It has been reported, that two British climbers and five are missing after an avalanche in France.
We are rightly worried about security for the Olympic Games, but I think we are very much overly so.
Most of the people-related problems in the Olympics, will be drunks falling under Tube trains and serious health problems like heart attacks. As a regular user of London’s transport network, I know my places, where problems are likely to occur, but I won’t follow the government and most of those listening to radio phone-ins and scare-monger.
As I write this there is a Colonel on the radio, saying that we wouldn’t be able to provide the extra security, once we’ve reduced the size of the Armed Forces. I’ve heard his arguments many times before from left-wing union leaders, when a factory is being closed.
The real security failure has been the non-fulfilment of the contract by G4S to provide the security, they said they would provide.
The largest mole, I’ve ever seen, has just scurried down my road in the direction of the Olympic site. I assume, he’s part of the moles’ Mountain Brigade.
I Tend To Live Life in the Wonderful World of my Head, Where Every Day the Sun Shines
The title of this post is from a leader in today’s copy of The Times and it was said by Eric Sykes, who died yesterday. His obituary was also felt by the paper to be worth two pages.
Has there ever been a comedian and scriptwriter, who succeeded so well, against all of the odds?
C and I once saw him in the theatre in the play, Run for your Wife, where he appeared in his eighties, despite being totally deaf and virtually blind. An absolute tour de farce!
I Am A Man Who Is Approaching His Terminus
Not me, I hasten to add!
But the very brave Clive James has said this about himself, as he battles against cancer.
He is obviously determined to go with dignity and humour.
Is there any other way? Not in my book there isn’t!
Everyone and Everything Is Leaving Me!
Not really, but it sometimes seems so. I now have no mobile phone and won’t probably until I get my Nokia 6310i in a few days. My wife and son have both left me and all I get is a visit from an occasional friend. The radio is just going on and on about the Diamond Jubilee and today’s episode, is not what I’m interested in. The torch relay has stopped for lunch and there is nothing to do this afternoon. My health seems to be going downhill rapidly and it seems that I get tired walking just a hundred yards or so.
At least Suicide is Painless!
But that is not an option, as it’s not painless for those left behind. My other son, who’s working today, by the way, has suffered enough grief in the last five years, and I would never inflict anymore on him, by my own hands.
They’re having a party in the Square, but do they really want me there, as I’m just rather a miserable killjoy at the moment.
A Tragedy Waiting to Happen
The tragic fire in Derby, where five children died, was one of those incidents, where I thought there was a lot more to the story than initial reports, led us to believe.
It now appears that the father had had seventeen children by six different women and that a woman in her late twenties has been arrested for starting the fire. The father has also appeared on the Jeremy Kyle Show, which probably adds even more to the story.
A lot of C’s work as a barrister, concerned sorting out families like this one. Usually, at the centre of her cases was a woman, who couldn’t say no! She would often act for the Council to get the children taken in to care.
So what is the difference here?
The state this family lived in wasn’t good, so why weren’t some of these children taken into care and fostered? I have known of families with ten or more children that were well run and the children were well looked after, but usually in these cases, both parents were model ones.
So what were Derby Social Services doing?
It would appear very little in a constructive manner! Otherwise this tragedy wouldn’t have happened.
It’s Swimwear Buying Time Again
Judging by this picture of a London bus, it’s time to buy swimwear again.
H&M Swimwear Advert on a London Bus
Not me, as I don’t swim. And the advert wouldn’t apply to me personally, as I’m a man.
My late wife, C, was a manic and enthusiastic swimmer to say the least and every day before work, she’d swim umpteen lengths in the pool at Bedford Lodge Hotel in Newmarket. She used to wear out Speedo Endurance swimsuits regularly, and I used to watch eBay for when last year’s models were sold off for here. Do professional swimmers have suits and trunks made out of something more long-lasting, or does the sponsor just pay?
I remember in 2007, which was the year she died, that C decided she needed some summer clothes and that of course meant swimwear. Since her breast cancer a few years before, she always felt that she must look the best fifty-year-old on the beach, not out of vanity, but more to stick two fingers up to the cancer. Although, she was probably two polite to do that other than metaphorically.
So she bought tickets on easyJet and one Friday in April we took the plane to Nice and checked in at the Hotel Windsor, which is much recommended. We had a marvellous weekend in the sun.
It was the first of seven holidays that we took in that fateful year before she died in December of a cancer totally unrelated to that in her breast.
My biggest memory of that holiday, is that C decided to buy a couple of bikinis for the summer. So we headed to Gallerie Lafayette and for a couple of hours, she tried on most that were suitable in the shop, whilst I passed what I thought might be suitable or a different size over the door of the changing room. It was a difficult job, but someone had to do it. They got hard work that last summer she was alive.
The picture shows C on the beach on the island of Panarea. I think you can just see that she was wearing nail polish, something she rarely did except on holiday.
Climbing The Shard
It would appear that a group of intrepid climbers have climbed the Shard by London Bridge station. Read the story here in the Belfast Telegraph.
People and especially students have always been doing this.
At Liverpool in the 1960s, I was in a year with Alvin John Slasser, who was usually known as Sean.
One night he climbed the crane of the Catholic Cathedral in Liverpool, which was being built at the time. I suspect that the Shard was taller, although the crane was several metres taller than the cathedral and Sean did claim to have gone right out to the driver’s cabin.
Sadly, Sean is no longer with us. In the first year of the course he died in a freak climbing accident in I think North Wales.
If there is something tall there, someone will climb it!
It must have affected me greatly, as when C named our second son, he had a middle-name of Shaun. She got the spelling wrong.
The Anonymous Widower 