Attitudes and (hidden) apologies

People sometimes ask me what my philosophy of life is. I’m not religious but I am thoughtful, and I try to spend my life being calm and friendly, and it gets noticed. People read this blog (for some reason) and assume me to be a nice, reasoned, level-headed individual (for some reason) and occasionally they will send me a message, assuming I have the key to life and hoping I will share it with them.
So - what do I think is ‘The Key to Life’?
Having thought about it a lot in the past week or so, I actually think I can sum up my attitude. I think I can give you a phrase which tells you how I think you can approach the world in a way which will give you peace and a level of contentment.
Ready for it?
Here it comes:
Stop thinking “I will be happy when….” and start saying “I’m happy now, because…”
And that’s it.

RC 30-9-21



P.S. I suppose I should apologise to The Sun. Not for calling them a bunch of ****s – I stand by that – but for blaming them for comments that were actually printed on the front cover of the Daily Mirror.
I’ve done this apology in small font and hidden it away because that’s exactly what they do when they get something wrong about someone….

Enough with the negative posting, R.

Let’s cheer up a bit, shall we?
Moaning about everything is easy to do, but it doesn’t put me in a good frame of mind, and it’s not what this blog was ever supposed to be about. The more you spot the shit stuff, the more shit stuff you will spot. I mean to say – walk around looking at everything negatively, and negative things will happen to you. Karma. Payback. Call it what you will, it has been proven to me that it exists and it happens and it is a powerful force in our universe. Go out expecting the worst, and the worst is what you will notice. Walk out with a smile and a determination to see the good things, and you’ll start noticing the decent side of life, and the everyday shit will bounce off you without affecting you.
So I apologise for buying into the downturn and highlighting all the stupid behaviour, and I intend to move on with a fun, lively outlook.
Starting now!
First – I am feeling much healthier than I have for weeks. Whatever my weird ‘Long Covid’ thing was, I think it was bubbling away for a while, but I think it is finally behind me now. I have energy, most of my body is pain free and I am waking up each morning without having to drag myself out of bed and reaching straight for the coffee pot.
Second – Philippa hasn’t mentioned ‘another child’ for a while now. It may be that she’s trying reverse psychology, or lulling me into a false sense of security, but it’s nice not to have that seemingly constant pressure to plan for more parenthood.
Third – Sister Sophie is popping down for another visit this weekend. Only staying one night (Saturday into Sunday) but at least she’ll be here and it’ll be great to see her!

RC 29-9-21

FFS

Man, we’re nearly three-quarters of the way through the year. Next thing you know, we’ll be unwrapping presents and, (according to this week’s news) eating something for Xmas dinner that ISN’T turkey.
Honestly, if this doesn’t sum up everything that’s wrong with the current state of our country, then nothing does: The TOP story on the radio news bulletins on Sunday was that we might have a shortage of Christmas turkeys this year.
The most important story of the day, and the worst thing we had to worry about, was that we might be missing one item of food during one meal in three months from now.
There are honestly days when I envy people who live in a remote part of Greenland.

RC 29-9-21

No Fuel, All Fools

I don’t really want to revisit this topic again, but it’s hard to avoid it really. The amount of petrol bought in Britain on Saturday was FIVE TIMES the amount that normally gets sold at the weekend. Was everyone doing five times more travelling than they normally do? No, of course not. The bottom line is – we don’t have a fuel shortage in this country, we have an intelligence shortage.
The older I get, the more I am convinced that Britain has the stupidest population in Europe.
I don’t know what the answer to dry pumps is – my suspicion is this will take a couple of weeks to settle down, because the idiots who panicked at the weekend and filled up unnecessarily will be back at the garages as soon as they’re open again, to fill up unnecessarily again – but I do have an idea for how we can bring up the average IQ among our populace, and therefore avoid this happening again in the future. Anyone who works for The Sun, or has ever read it, or ever bought it, should be sent to live on an island together somewhere, leaving the rest of us in peace. Common sense will begin to prevail, and a less toxic atmosphere will exist. That shitty rag was the main culprit in firing up the masses with bullshit on Friday and creating this problem in the first place, and today on their front page they included the phrases “Schools may have to close” and “care homes might run out of food”
What a bunch of ****s.

RC 27-9-21

Power, Petrol & Pillocks

This post may end up sounding like a middle-aged rant from a middle-aged prat, but so what? There’s no point having a blog if I’m not going to clear my head occasionally by sounding off in it, and events this week have given me lots I need to sound off about…

First, let me mention ‘The Energy Crisis’. Rising gas prices are leading to lots of energy providers being on the point of collapse, and 1.5million people having to go through the inconvenience of absolutely nothing happening to their power supply, other than seeing a different company name on their bill. Most of these people, by the way, have already changed their supplier several times by choice, as they have used a profligacy of comparison websites to chase cheaper deals on a regular basis. And that’s why this ‘crisis’ is affecting so many. If you’re going to enjoy benefits of the sort of system that means any Tom, Dick or Harriet can start up an energy company and undercut others, then you have to accept the risks that using that system comes with. That is to say – you’re getting your electricity cheaper because you’re not getting the protection of a company that can survive fluctuations in the market. If you play with fire, you may get burned, and I don’t see how you can complain if it comes back to bite you.  I know we live in Capitalism Run Amok, but you can’t have it both ways.
I hope that made sense. I’m still not feeling very well.

Next, let me mention ‘The Petrol Crisis’. (A quick side note before I continue – Jesus, I’m glad I’m not working in a supermarket garage this weekend!) A handful of places around Britain ran low on fuel yesterday, so this morning’s newspapers said, “WE’RE RUNNING ON EMPTY” and lo and behold, every man, woman and imbecile have gone crazy and started using old fridges to store fuel in.
Can I just say a little thing, from a point of experience, about how incredibly unlikely it is that we would ever, ever find ourselves fuel-less?
Remember the days when I worked as a Filling Station Manager-of-sorts? It was my responsibility (aided by an algorithm or two) to judge how much fuel we might need to have delivered from one week to the next. It’s much harder than you might imagine, and you almost never get it right. Either you end up running low because there’s an unexpected rush or you over-order and have more than you need. It’s an effect that I have just decided to name “The Surplus/Shortage Conundrum”. It’s impossible to judge perfectly, but the point is that there is always enough to go round. I’ll make that point again, in bold type, for any of you reading this while queueing up at a garage to buy petrol – there is more than enough fuel for everyone.
The only problems we get are when the Great British Public, fuelled by some stupid scaremongering headlines in the Malignant British Press, and reacting as ever to some facebook fuckwittery, get it into their tiny brains that something is going wrong and take it upon themselves to fill up their cars unnecessarily.
There are three ‘S’ words that I used to hear about in the fuel delivery business (of which I am gratefully no longer a part) – squeeze, shortage and struggle. SQUEEZE is when there is a slight issue with the process of getting the fuel to the garages (say, bad snowfall, or a lack of drivers), SHORTAGE is when you start to notice certain pumps running dry because there just isn’t enough to meet needs, and STRUGGLE is when those problems extend beyond a couple of days and become a real problem.  All we had yesterday was a squeeze. There was literally nothing to panic about. But people panicked, because they never learn, and so now we are getting into a mess.
Last year it was toilet rolls, then tea, then carrots, then computers, then God knows what else. All these things were supposed to be in short supply; none of them ended up being so. You would think Mr & Mrs Britain might realise this media-stoked worrying was always a waste of time and start ignoring it. But they don’t. They do the same old thing again. And when you react to the same provocation in the same way you create the same situations all over again. If you don’t learn from your experiences, you’re an idiot, and you’re part of the problem.

All this waffling is leading to me reiterating someone I have always known, and which this week has proven to be as true as ever:
People.
Are.
Stupid.

RC 24-9-21

Bleergghh

My bout of Long-Covid-That-Isn’t-Long-Covid-Because-I-Never-Had-Covid-In-The-First-Place seems to have come roaring back for another go at my immune system. Honestly, I am getting really fed up with waking up with a sore throat. That, and the constant tiredness. I feel as if my brain is lagging two seconds behind my body, and my body is struggling to drag itself through mud.
I may be misremembering my own past, but I’m pretty sure I went through this before some years ago, and it turned out to be a minor allergy to the washing powder we were using, and a switch to non-bio alleviated it. But I may be mistaking my personal history for an article I once read in Reader’s Digest.
There’s an old adage that says ‘An early night can cure all ills’ so I’m going to take myself off to beddy-byes soon and see what the morning brings. Probably a sore throat, but you never know….

RC 23-9-21

The Possible Profitability of Pushy Parenting

Emma Raducanu (who seems to be taking up 80% of the available space in British newspapers at the moment) was handed a cheque for £1.8million after winning the US Open last week. That seems an extraordinary pay packet for roughly three weeks work, and I wondered whether tennis is a bit top-heavy, with only the most successful two or three players earning big money, and much less available to those who falter in the early rounds of tournaments. So I did a bit of research:
The current world no.100 in the men’s game is Gilles Simon, who has won $303,000 in prize money in 2021.  There are 99 players better than him, and he has earnt around a quarter of a million pounds in 9 months.
Tomorrow, I’m buying Mathew a tennis racquet.

RC 22-9-21

FILM RULE No.48

Anytime a movie (or a scene within it) is set at an American university, you will see a shot of people rowing.

Now I’ve mentioned it, you’ll notice it more and more.

RC 20-9-21

Wet man and Ice woman

Slight change in the weather today. After the constant sunshine of yesterday, we had a day of grey skies and almost constant rain. I misread the inevitable downpour and mistimed my morning walk and misinterpreted my clothing needs and ended up soaked. It’s a good sign of my current good mood, though, that I was able to accept it with a shrug of my sodden shoulders and not get frustrated or angry. It was a nice soaking, anyway; a gentle, cooling one-of-those-things rather than a blinding, freezing torrent that leaves you feeling like your skin is sloughing off. A quick shower on my return home, followed by a quick complaint from the wife about leaving my wet trousers on the hallway carpet, and I was fine.

I watched the darts on ITV last night, in which Fallon Sherrock became the first woman ever to reach a PDC ranking final live on television. Not only did she reach it, she had a damn good go at winning it, coolly taking a 7-3 lead against Michael van Gerwen (yes – THAT Michael van Gerwen, the three-time World Champion) and forcing him to bring out the best of himself to guarantee the victory.
She won’t get anywhere near the amount of coverage that Emma Raducanu has been getting since winning the US Open, but I don’t think her achievement is much less worthy. She didn’t get a big shiny trophy at the end of it, but bearing in mind the quality of the opposition she faced, I think the two achievements are comparable.

RC 19-9-21

Tired, but satisfied

Another glorious day of super September Summer sunshine. We laid on a free afternoon barbecue onsite (my idea, thank you…) and we had a total of about 40 turn up. Not a huge percentage of those currently staying with us, but a nice turn out for an unplanned event and the ones who were there seemed to appreciate it and have a good time. We even provided music by having a local bod with an acoustic guitar throwing out a few tunes. I was going to go up to him at one point and say, “You look lonely. I know how to play the drums, y’know?” but I decided to leave him to it and carry on with my wine-pouring duties.
Gavin wasn’t there but sent me a text to say he had heard good things from other staff and was delighted with the outcome. I have to say, it was very easy to persuade him to spend a few quid for nothing more than a bit of goodwill and some repeat bookings. In my previous job, you couldn’t get them to go over-budget for a stamp, unless you could show them irrefutable evidence that it would lead to increased profits.
Anyway, all in all a good day. I am pleased with myself for bringing an idea to fruition, and for the fact that our freezer is now stuffed full of leftover burgers.

RC 18-9-21

Say what?

I thought that leaving the garage job would mean I have less encounters with weird individuals and therefore have less funny quotes to report in this blog, but in fact, there have been a steady stream of quotable conversations at the holiday centres. Maybe people being away from home and more relaxed makes them more likely to let their guard down and say something accidentally controversial. Anyway, here are a few ‘corkers’ I have noted down after hearing them from assorted bods over the Summer:
Most of them, it might be worth mentioning, came from men….

“Boris Johnson should have died last year when he had Covid. I’m not saying I wish him harm, but it would have made people take the virus more seriously and we wouldn’t be where we are now.”

“There has never been a better time to be a woman, and yet women are moaning more than ever.”

“Suffolk reminds me a lot of Brisbane, but with, y’know, less things that can kill you."

“Whoever marketed our caravan as having ‘ample head room’ should have their testicles put in a vice.”

“If I knew then what I know now, I would have taken more drugs and done myself more damage so that I wouldn’t even know it now because I’d have forgotten it, then it wouldn’t bother me.”

RC 17-9-21

Curmudgeon?

I love children, but it’s nice to have less of them around on the holiday centres now they’re all back at school. I know one of our sites exists to attract families, especially those with young children, but my work life just seems to be easier when there aren’t hundreds of over-excited, holidaying sproglets racing around everywhere, making me feel like everything is a potential trip hazard and a potential company-ending lawsuit.

There has been a decidedly Autumnal feel to the mornings so far this week. Cool, damp, crisp air, with a definite changing of colour on the leaves and a noticeable lessening of birdsong. Probably exactly what we should expect in mid-September, but after the joy of the heat of last week it feels like a sudden step into a different season.

I’m proud of myself for being able to type this: I still haven’t bought a wetsuit.

RC 16-9-21

Do I buy a wetsuit?

You know how I sometimes have these wild, flash-in-the-pan ideas that I obsess about for a while and press on ahead with even when it’s obvious that it’s not something I’ll end up continuing long-term? (I refer you to – juggling, magic, Bible studies, etc, etc, etc.)
Well, here’s what’s clogging up 98% of my brain this week: I am thinking of buying an all-weather, all-year-round wetsuit so I can keep going in the sea right through the Winter months.
It just seems like the obvious thing to do, to help alleviate the pain of the awful Summer we have just had; a way to say ‘feck you’ to The Gods Of The Weather by allowing myself to swim at a time when I’m normally stuck indoors by the cold. You think you can stop me having fun by making me wear a coat in August? Well, I shall respond by investing in a climate-proof swimming garment that means I can swim in the sea in February while sticking two fingers up at you and your shitty grey excuse of a Summer.
There are cons to consider, alongside the positive pros. The wetsuit wouldn’t be cheap, and if I end up bailing out of using it, it will be an expensive addition to my pile of impulse purchases. I’m a bit wary of swimming on my own, what with riptides and unseen underwater dangers and so on, and I’m not sure I can persuade anyone I know to accompany me down to the beach in November just so I don’t have to panic about being swept away. And I also have to acknowledge that I have free membership of the spa facilities on each site owned by Gavin, and therefore free access to indoor, heated swimming facilities any time I choose to use them.
But still… you know… I’ve had the thought of it now, and I can’t get that thought from my mind. And it’s oh, so easy to go online and make a purchase that will clear my head and stop me thinking about it every second…. Coz nothing stops the pain of trying to make a decision like hitting ‘Buy Now’ and therefore taking the decision away.
And dealing with the regret and guilt of a purchase is far easier than dealing with the mental torment of choosing whether or not to buy it in the first place.

RC 15-9-21

Memories and Madness

I didn’t lose myself too much in the 20^th anniversary 9/11 stuff, but I have to say that “Inside the President’s War Room” was a captivating, interesting watch. If you haven’t seen it, I believe it will be available on BBC iPlayer. It was an inside look at the 12 hours or so after the attack on New York in 2001, but rose above the many other similar shows of the past two decades by featuring interviews with many of the main players from the US inner circle of power on that fateful day, including the President, Vice President, Secretary of State, Press Secretary and Senior Advisors.
We all have our own memories of the day, but this is the first programme I can remember seeing that gives you an insight into the minds and make-up of the key figures on American soil and how they reacted and acted.
George W. Bush, it amazes me to say, came across as quite a level-headed, thoughtful, determined man who had respect for the office he was holding, rather than the bumbling, tactless, cheating, son-of-a-former-President accidental President that I viewed him as at the time. I may not agree with what he did in the wake of that particular September incident, but this programme did give me a bit of an explanation as to why he made the choices he did, and - whether he was right to make them or not - he did at least give me the impression that he had made them after careful consideration, and with a definite goal in mind. Of course, one has to watch all this with the understanding that they’ve all had 20 years to edit their own memories and to adjust their statements about their actions accordingly, but it gives you a new way of looking at everyone’s behaviour, and maybe even a growing level of respect for what they did that day under unbelievable circumstances.
And you do have to accept the revelation that, far from being calm, unfeeling super-beings with some kind of unseen internal power of control, they were all just regular humans who must have been absolutely terrified.
RORY’S THREE-WORD REVIEW: Worth a look.

RC 14-9-21

Man, was I wrong about Emma...

Back in July, during Wimbledon, I wrote a long essay (it was far too long to just be called ‘a posting’) about Emma Raducanu’s mini meltdown during the Championships, and how I felt it might affect her mentally moving forward. I never read these blogs again after I’ve posted them online, but I seem to remember saying she would never fully recover and that her experience on Centre Court would come back to haunt her every time she got near the end of a tournament.
Two months later, she has won the US Open. As an 18-year-old qualifier.
Making mistakes is how we learn as humans, and getting things wrong is how we grow, so I like being wrong sometimes.
And I don’t think I’ve ever been wronger.

RC 13-9-21

Bright Makes Right (a crapoem)

Summer in September
Puts a spring back in my step
I feel awake, alive again
Full of bounce and pep

I walk into the world of work
and nothing seems too hard
I get back home so lively
I could power-wash the yard

Relationships are rosy
Son’s as grand as he can get
Job is just a jolly jaunt
and Covid’s not a threat

Everything feels better
Coz the temperature’s been high
Imagine how my mood would be
If I lived in Dubai?

RC 12-9-21

Accurate Seasoning

Jeez, I used a lot of commas in my blog posting yesterday. It’s like I was doing a Sponsored Overuse of Punctuation for charity or something.

Anyway, moving on:

We had a chat at work today about the different seasons, and when we think they start. The Met Office are very firm in their dates – Spring is from March 1^st, Summer from June 1^st, Autumn from September 1^st, Winter from December 1^st – but we all agreed that those dates don’t really tally with the modern world and the modern climate. We all threw in our own ideas, and talked from personal experience of when we each considered the seasons to start.
For some of the others, it was an external trigger like seeing the first daffodil (for Spring) or seeing the first frost (for Winter), but it's difficult for me – I think of them as a frame of mind and an atmosphere, rather than corresponding to a particular event or day on the calendar. It’s just a feeling I get as the air changes and the temperature fluctuates. (Hence why I felt like Winter throughout August).
After a bit of thought, though, and looking back over my entire life (not just the last few climate-change-altered years), I think I can pin it down to these:

SPRING – starts when you first hear a cuckoo (those of us lucky enough to still hear them)
SUMMER – starts once the trees are fully leaved (and the hedges are thick and green)
AUTUMN – starts when the children go back to school
WINTER – is everything after Bonfire Night, up to the time of the cuckoo (as mentioned above)

I got through all that without using too many commas, but Christ I used a lot of parentheses….

RC 11-9-21

Sunny skies, snowy thoughts

Weird thing to mention in September, but I had a weird little flurry of excitement about our family Christmas get-away get-together today! I guess this year, for most of us, has been about reconnecting with the things that we had to miss out on during the fun lockdown times, be they sports, events, sports events or otherwise. For me, not seeing my sisters often enough was a real pisser, and it saddens me still that they missed out on all that Mathew time when he was of an age when they could really connect with him and watch him changing. Best not to dwell on all that, though, and just be thankful that it’s in the past.
And, weirdly, for the first time, I am starting to believe that they are in the past. I know the virus is still around, and still causing problems, and still one small mutation away from kicking our arses irretrievably, but I am allowing myself to start to believe that we are, sort-of, getting on top of it. I have no doubt cases will rise in the coming months, and I have no doubt there will be a return of restrictions, but I don’t think they will be anywhere close to how they were back in January 2021. I may be wrong, of course. This time last year we were all thinking the worst might be behind us, and were all daring to look forward with hope, because we couldn’t comprehend, nor did we wish to acknowledge, what might be on the way, because it seemed too terrible a prospect to cope with. This year we have vaccines, and lots of natural immunity among people who have recovered already, and the lessons learned from last year.
So, anyway, back to Christmas. I thought about it today because someone asked if we’ll be open for bookings for family holidays (we’re not, by the way, it’s residents only in December) and it made me think about our own plans, which of course were postponed from 2020. I’m not wishing the time away, and I hate myself for mentioning it when it’s 20+ Celsius and feeling decidedly Summery, but it’s nice to have it to look forward to, and to feel confident that it might actually happen.

RC 10-9-21

Please, please, please let this continue...

Another sunny day; another spell of smiling faces and positivity from within. The last 5 days have lifted my spirits up to where I would like them to be all the time. I am sleeping better, breathing properly, relaxing, feeling optimistic and enjoying everything I am doing. Nothing aches, I like the drive to and from work and time seems to have slowed down to a pace that I can deal with.

The job has been what I envisaged it to be when I first thought about accepting it – getting to spend time in glorious weather looking after people who are in a great mood because their holiday is being blessed with sunshine. Up to this week, it had mostly been dealing with people’s disappointments and trying to keep myself warm.

We have had a barbecue, we have been to the beach two out of the last three evenings, and we have spent the latter part of each day sitting in the garden with a glass of wine, watching the September sunsets. Basically, we have been making up for lost time. We have been cramming in as much Summer as we can into the few days where Summer has made an appearance. But it hasn’t felt like cramming, it’s felt like a slow, satisfying, soul-enhancing period of loveliness.
This week has felt like a foreign Winter holiday, to be honest.

RC 9-9-21

Sunny Disposition

Well – having moaned constantly in August about how horrible the British weather was being, I suppose I should redress the balance and post something positive and grateful after a day when the temperature at work hit 28 degrees Celsius!
Sorry if that was a bit of a confusing opening statement. I have been away from this blog for a week now and seem to have forgotten how to write right.
But hasn’t today been a glorious, gorgeous, SAD-busting, Vitamin D enhancing, super bright, beach-worthy Sunfest? Much-needed, long-awaited, and almost nice enough to make you forget the low-temp horrors of the past 6 weeks or so. It has been noted by many, and commented on by most of them, that the first Summer day we’ve had all Summer has coincided with the bulk of the schoolchildren going back into class. If the weather is indeed controlled by some kind of sentient being, then you have to admit they have a sense of humour, and a cruel streak.
For me, it just felt wonderful to be able to walk around the centre chatting to people without wearing a jumper, and without having my hair blowing all over the place. I’m not a demanding human – all I ask is that we only have to put up with Winter when it is a month that responds to Winter, and NOT AUGUST. Is that too much to ask???

RC 7-9-21