Annalog

On Christmas Day I read a book

– right book, right time, thank you Rebecca.  All the way through, like I used to do when I was 15.

I tried to cook an elderly

goose breast and it was horrid.  Wound up throwing it away and giggling at myself in the passage leading back from the front door.   HWKE (He Who Knows Everything) said “ Oh I could have told you – the fat goes off…”  Indeed.  The vegetables were delicious.  I ate raspberries and yogurt and dried fruit and nut at about 3.00 and in the early evening I ate cold poached salmon and salad.  I think I was previously a rabbit or a squirrel. 

The  novel mentioned above was written with ease and I could separate the narrative  which is too long for me but has a point to its length, from the documentary evocation  which was terrific.  I have read a great deal about the war in Vietnam –  but never had such a good picture of the sheer shock of young Americans being sent to fight in a country they  knew nothing about. Not even about the weather. 

And the idea was to evoke the absolute  estrangement on returning home of the very few women who served as nurses – historical fact – now of course a pressure group, a statue etc.

Beyond a few minutes of this and  that, the tv stayed off.  And on the 26^th, I read something else, went for a short walk and watched Goodnight Mr. Tom  – yes again, yes with real appreciation for all concerned.  Terrific cast, good script, production, camera  etc.  I understand estrangement.

A headline read something about human wisdom remaining important as the reliance on technology grows.  Thames Water Board

fielded two operatives for hours, then a third who went down the  manhole at the front but the drain at the back remained unmoved and was eventually remedied by  3^rd man saying to man in charge when he began to suggest  “a second job” – “We are not leaving this lady like this.”  Five hours work (three of them, think of the cost), it worked for less than 3 weeks whereupon I recontacted TWB and called a private contractor who has unblocked it so far.

Very grateful for small mercies.

People who  work often enjoy this odd period between Christmas and New Year.  I generally do not like it,  I feel stuck. But this year it has a purpose – rest. 

The impact of that word on my long life began Christmas 2024, the week of which I lost.  Christmas  2025 I  moved  slowly and discovered the value of wedged in warmth, resting.   I know I sound  140, quite a lot of the time I feel it.  A woman whose French bulldog I stopped to acknowledge widened her eyes when I told her my age (it was  apropos , really – though increasingly it becomes the only thing of  interest about me).  I said  laughing “Yes, yes  – the face has held up.  You should see the arms – crumpled tissue paper !”  And we both laughed.   “Oh bless you” she said.

I regard New Year with respect. 

We do not know what it will bring and we are in every kind of trouble.   I could write a list – from war to waste.   The subpostmasters still without  settlement,  victims of soiled blood products likewise.  Trump suing the BBC and why it behoves us to support the entity of the BBC even as we criticize it (like me).  The most  positive ending to  fashion , trends and lifestyle copy ever ie “be less influenced” ie trust your own judgement.  And try to remember other people use the pavement as you set off for that run that has become the 11^th Commandment.

By the time you read this we shall be in the anteroom of year’s end, waiting for year’s beginning and why start drunk?  If it doesn’t sound much of a Christmas, I learned things which is always good and it was very much better than culinary overkill and attitudinizing.  I loved my Christmases past, I remember them with all kinds of affection.  And New Years too.  

Here’s to you, see you later, and all the very best to you.

a tree of memory, and hope

Man of the week for me was

Mark Rutte, NATO’s secretary general, who named the fear to say Putin will make war on Europe and we should get our heads around it now -shortages, cold, bombs, disruption.  File this under “prepare for the worst and hope for the best” which is a good way to live

 I wish I could send cards

to everyone I wanted to but it is expensive, impractical and unrealistic.  So here, for the record, are things in my stockings filed under what I want: what I don’t want: and what I wish for, denoted w, dw and wh.  

I wish I could thank you all for staying with me this troubled year (w). I wish I could thank every journalist, writer and presenter who has given me pleasure – quite a lot, hooray (w).   But you can’t get to them, even if you could fork out for the postage.  I would ban, blow up or otherwise disable social media (w) which I regard as the Other’s War on the west,..However it came about – oh the hubris of humankind.

I’d like us all to do a bit more towards every kind of peace up

to and including world peace (w)and I would like to be out of pain (w).    I would like to send a group card (w) to my local Waitrose –  a shop staffed  by kind professionals, a credit to the race.

Christmas brings out the competitive – the best food and drink, clothes, gifts, party, guest list, decorations – like the eleven plus with holly.  I would ban the word “perfect” in this context.

(w)    My Christmas  is mine, about the past  (both glowing and grim memories) but it couldn’t have started better.  I hope in the smiling anterooms of another world that my parents know how much I appreciate their love, the food they gave me, the wonderful simple memories they created for years (w). I remember my son’s second Christmas and the smallest blue jeans on the planet.  

Of course there is wish fulfilment at Christmas –  there is leave, to go and meet (w), there is warmth and nourishment and colour and light and extra ordinary patience – with this one’s indigestion and that one’s paddy.   But I w ill do it my way, not your way, and I’d encourage  people to read everything they could about the origins of Christmas and the stories that have built up around it (w) – sure, they are stories.  A Russian proverb says “A story is more powerful than the Tsar.” 

  Let’s hope ours, acted on, believed in and committed to, will be more powerful than Putin (w).

Forget endless food of no value overloaded with fat and sugar and heaven knows what else (dw)  Only those catering to extended groups need food on this scale (dw)  You make a selection from the trimmings the children adore – they are unnecessarily expensive unless they mean something to  you (dw).  I have unscented candles 365 days of the year (w) though I was tempted to one in a dark red glass container, scented with things I liked .  But I don’t need it. 

For the first time for ages, I saw a coat I liked (w), a bracelet I liked (w) and a tempting lip gloss  (w) .  A person can dream.  All three of these could be countersigned as wishes (wh).  I don’t need them and can’t afford them but it was lovely to see something I really liked, to have an innocent yearning for something that pleased my eye. 

 I wish(wh) to keep my temper better – I have lost it twice recently with twits. Yes   that is a value judgement.  Trimmed with your best baubles, a twit is a twit.  Wouldn’t it be wonderful if people reinvested in basic courtesies and good manners , realizing that this is the hallmark of power and maturity, not necessarily weakness and evasion (wh).   It’s all in the tone. Whoever is next in power, I hope they can communicate better than over the last many years (wh).   It’s a learned skill, it should be mandatory in public life to learn it.     Make war on dumped rubbish, large or small, get some of the bright directionless young to do something about it (wh) Believe in commonsense (wh), smile more often than frown (wh) and understand that this world is the only one we have and cherish it (heartfelt).