This is not the Brexit we voted for

So said the Brexity panel on BBC's Question Time last night.

Its not the first time we have heard this, nor will it be the last.

Also, it is wrong. This is the Brexit they voted for, at least when peple elected Johnson back into power in order to implement the deal he negotiated deal with the EU. Putting up barriers with your nearest and largest trading partner was always going to stifle trade, it is basic economics and common sense, but in denying reality only makes it hurt them all the more.

As Britain struggled to get enough fuel to get them to a partially stocked supermarket, the PM, apparently unaware how stupid this seemed, triumphed a British "space program" with rockets to be launched in Cornwall and Scotland.

From Global Britain to Galactic Britain.

KFC has run out of chicken, the UK built one rocket and abandoned the project, but Johnson, as always, is about grand announcements, with no actual plan behind it.

The Brexit-hating global elite is watching Britain's chaos with glee

So says an opion piece in the Daily Torygraph, whose two owners live in a castle on a small island off the coast of the small Channel Island Sark. Like the owners of most of our daily newspapers, they don't pay any UK tax.

These self proclaimed non-elites pushed Brexit endlessly, pushing the lie that immigrants were coming to steal our homes, jobs, lives and country.

It is the same non-elites, who at the same time, said Brexit would be a revolution, and would change nothing.

Both can't be true.

And indeed were not.

Allister Heath goes on: "intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded us with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us..."

No plans against Brexit were needed, as the Brexiteers themselves had ensured the Brexit they puched would fail as they made no plans.

Like life after the invasion of Iraq, beyond shock and awe, there was nothing. Just bucket loads of cash to grease the wheels. And corruption on a grand scale.

No one is enying Britain, the world is laughing at us, but like a banana republic, our own media doesn't report that. No other country in Europe has food shortages, queues at petrol stations, even though in some cases their labour shortages are worse, because labour can work either side of a border, and deliveries are flexible due to cabotage, trucks can go from delivery to collection to delivery to collection meaning stuff gets delivered.

Only in the UK is this now impossible for EU drivers, those that do come, return home with empty trucks to escape Brexit Plague Island as quick as possible.

The only gless is from EU companies and countries taking business from UK companies, and our companies and institutions are relocating to be able to keep trading in the Eurozone.

Reality and Brexit now share the same universe, there is only truth and blame.

Wednesday 29th September 2021

The day without internet.

Da da daaaaaa.

Sort of.

I came down the stairs and saw something out of the corner of my eye, the power button of the internet hub flashing.

I tried to reset it.

And again.

And again.

My laptop told me there was no internet.

No Flickr.

No Faceache.

No Twitter.

No TOTA.

Eeeek.

I searched Google on my phone and found the flashing orange light meant the hub was in "safe" mode and had suffered a possible software failure.

Download a reboot program it suggested, whilst I shouted back I have no frikkin internet.

Jools left for work and said something about setting a mobile as a hub or wifi hotspot or something.

That'll be difficult, I thought.

So I rang Sky, used their automated systems to check the line and box and they agreed it was not working. Good that it's not ust me, then.

I arranged an engineers appointment for Tuesday, and pondered whether I could really not work for four days.

I couldn't really.

So I looked at my mobile, looked at the settings, turned on the personal wifi hotspot, it generated a password, I switched on my home laptop, connected to the phone, entered the password and the internet came, if not pouring, trickling back.

Perfect.

Some four hours had passed. I had lunch.

And tried the same thing with my work laptop.

It worked.

And then not.

THen worked.

And then not.

No matter what I did, I lost connection within seconds, and after another hour or so had passed, in order to stop me from throwing the bloody laptop out of the window, I switched it off.

I find something to distract myself, three WIYE birthday podcasts, drink tea, eat toast and the day passes.

I should go for a walk, but talk myself out of it. Instead do some writing, listen to the new PSB album and the afternoon passes.

Dinner is crispbakes, curried rice, fresh corn and sweet chilli vegetables, all ready for when Jools got home at six.

No wine.

Already it was getting dark, so we washed up, made coffee and listened to radio until I watched the Fulham v Swansea game via my phone hub, and it even handled the audio of the Man Utd game on Radio 5 too.

Amazing.

Apparently it makes phone calls, takes photographs, plays music, counts my steps and millions of other things too.

Reserve Tanker Fleet

Kwasi Kwarteng, one of MH Government's Ministers for Chaos, tweeted today:

!I can confirm the government's Reserve Tanker Fleet will be on the road this afternoon to boost deliveries of fuel to forecourts across Britain.

The trucks are driven by civilians and will provide additional logistical capacity to the fuel industry

We are now seeing signs that the situation at the pumps has begun to improve with more stations getting more fuel.

The sooner we can all return to our normal buying habits, the sooner the situation will return to normal"

This is the first time anyone has heard of the "Reserve Tanker Fleet", no details of who the drvers are, what training they have received or how many trcks are in the fleet.

An internet search, however, reveals a Government contract which expired at the end of 2020, so its all rather a mystery, or make believe.

Tuesday 27th September 2021

Pay day.

And second day back at work, and I seem to have all caught up. Which is nice.

And the sun was going to shine, though be breezy. I might go out for a walk later, I thought.

For Jools, of course, it was the same as usual, doing the work of two people, and the news is Andy, her boss, is off for at least this week, and maybe next too, and the concern is she'll burn out too. My concern too. So, we shall see what they can do. But in the meantime others are helping out as best they can, even if she does have to spend an hour in the evening, filing in our utility room.

Dawn came, followed by sunrise, and I could see the spectacular colours of the sky reflected in Di's house opposite, so I went out back to take some snaps. Colours soon faded and the sun rose.

Another days in paradise.

With the cats fed, they go to sleep in their various lairs for a few hours, and so I have peace and quite until after lunch.

Oh yes, lunch. I had better make some bread or it'll be pancakes again.

So I get out the flour and yeast and get mixing and kneading. Then to allow it to rise.

90 minutes pass.

I fold it into a loaf, put it back int he warm oven to rise.

90 more minutes pass.

And I have created another monster, I realise just as the loaf is making a break for it, to put the oven on and the loaf is baked.

I am in a meeting with a guy in India. I couldn't really understand what he was sayng, but I think he makes a joke, so I laugh. He laughs. So all good. I heard nothing from HR.

Fresh crust, thickly buttered and smothered with apricot jam is the lunch of kings. Or a quality manager anyway. So nice I have a second, non-crust slice.

And tea. Lots of tea.

Once work is done, I go out for a work. Its chilly, but bright, and I feel this is the last chance to find the Queen of Spain.

I change the route, go across the field first, then past the glade which is so overgrown now there are no butterflies to be seen there anymore, down to the (empty) pig's copse, and then down past the farm, through the mud and up the long track to Windy Ridge.

No butterflies seen there, and only few flowers: Yarrow, Common Mallow, Field Scabious, various dandelions and daisies. And lots of blackberries.

Up at Windy Ridge, it lived up to its name as the westerly whipped along the farm track, meaning there were no butterflies basking.

On the walk back, two fresh looking Painted Ladies were disturbed, and although I stalk them, they fly away before I could get close. So, I walk back home.

I make a ragu with the remaining tomatoes from the garden, use lots of garlic and the mushrooms from the fridge. It smells glorious.

Tastes better once Jools comes home and I have cooked the pasta.

I even have a red wine spritzer to go with it.

Lovely.

Jools is shattered, but as I said, spends an hour doing filing, sorting POs into piles so she could file them in the morning.

I make coffee, then I watch a Championship game whilst listening to Citeh in Europe.

Multi-tasking.

Pouring petrol on a crisis

The Government has been missing in action for the last six days of the fuel crisis. Really. On Monday and Tuesday, not one Minister was made available to media to explain the action, or lack thereof, being taken to fix the issue.

Thing is, there is a documented record in newpapers and on the net of repeated warnings going back years about Brexit causing a shortage of drivers. Warnings that Johnson and his Ministers have downplayed or ignored.

Train more UK workers to become HGV drivers they say. But there is a finite pool of labour, and you move thousands, if not tens of thousands from one area of the economy to become drivers, it creates a shortage elsewhere.

For fruit and vegetable picking, the Government has issued two and a half thousand six month work visas for people from as far afield as Nepal to come and work here, rather than EU citizens, this has meant that they have come as part of organized labour, the cost of travel and visas leaving them open to exploitation. And rather than have EU labour, we have labour from other places in the globe, but labour with less rights, protection. So much for global Britain.

Which in itself shows how poor the thinking of Johnson is. Before Brexit, I didn’t know the difference between Britain and United Kingdom, it soon became clear that UK is England, Scotlan, Wales and Northern Ireland, while Britain is just England, Scotland and Wales. So the use by Ministers of Britain this or that, means without NI. Now that could just be a slip of the tongue, the use of a poorly thought phrase, but if I lived in NI, I would be noting this.

The Express headline screamed on Monday that the shortages were not down to Brexit. Ministers claim the same. But although its true there are driver shortages across the EU, shops are well stocked and there is fuel. Even in Northern Ireland, there is food and fuel. Just in Britain. NI is, of course, part of the EU SM and CU for goods, so paperwork on goods from the Republic or rest of the EU isn’t an issue.

Although that should be true of Britain too, as the Government has delayed implementation, truckers have a thing called cabotage, where after delivering one load, they pick another up locally, deliver than, and so on and on, so fill up their week/trip with profitable jobs. But, they would have to leave Britain empty otherwise be subjected to checks on goods crossing into the EU, same into NI.

And then there is what happened in December, when thousands of drivers were locked in a secure compound at Manston for days on end, with little sanitary facilities, one cooked meal a day, and unable to receive consular support. Many drivers won’t forget that, and so with the thought that the offer of a three month visa here, ending on Christmas Eve, the anniversary of that event, most drivers won’t come back.

And who can blame them?

The military is being called in this week to deliver fuel. But they have to be trained first. That is to start today. That it has taken six days for this to start shows how reactive the Government is. And anyway, it is unclear how many servicepeople are HGV trained, have ADR licences, before you even think about training in driving tankers. I saw an article about MOD examiners, well, when in the RAF, I did an HGV course and the test was conducted by the usual civilian examiner.

I’m sure the Government could make a workround, but that doesn’t seem too safe to me.

The fuel shortage might be easing, as most people have filled their car, but video of fights breaking out have been shared online, and so tempers fray, and essential services are starting to crumble further.

PANIC!

There is no internet.

This morning.

We came down as a software update was installing, Jools did some stuff and it was working, and then it wasn’t. Resetting the box/hub hasn’t worked, so there is little hope other than it fixes itself at some point, or I call out an engineer.

You can download a reset code, but you need an internet connection for that, so I think I have discovered the fatal flaw in that plan. So, it could be a quiet day for work and its only now I realise I do so much of work and hobbies online.

None of that today, clearly.

Heck, I might even go back to bed!

Jools has gone to work, and I have had second coffee and a slice of Nutella on bread. All is well with the world, other than the internet thing.

Monday 27th September 2021

Back in the jugg agane.

Yes, back to work, and with the week or so having passed since I went on holiday, the equinox has happened, and it is now nearly dark when I get up at half five or so.

Jools is already up, and getting ready for another week without her boss, so having to do the work of two people, and so keeping the factory and company going.

We have coffee, Jools has a shower and gets dressed and is gone.

I have ten minutes before work, so I make another coffee and get the computer out and see if I can remember my password.

Outside, summer seems to have ended. It was cloudy, cool and a breeze was building, ready to take the warmth out of the day.

I fire up the computer, log on, and straight away there's a Windows update, of course, and that takes twenty minutes. I put on a podcast before the computer reboots and I am all ready to log in again, and this time check mails and call friends to find out if there was any exciting news.

Not much in our department, but three factories in Europe to close, meaning colleagues wil either have to move or lose their jobs.

I work my way through the new e mails, and send out reminder to those I had sent chasers out for before I went on holiday. After I copy in my boss and thei boss, they finally reply.

I have no words.

So, the day progresses. There is no bread in the house, so I make pancakes for lunch, filled with sugar and lemon. I only make two, and make them as thin as crepes.

I could have gone for a walk, but it was cold, and my back ached, so I didn't. I try to speak to my boss, but he's in meetings. I make another coffee and put on some music.

At lunchtime, the new Public Service Broadcasting LP arrives. On coloured vinyl. It looks fabulous.

But the player is broken, so I can't play it, but I will be able to download tracks with a supplied code.

Three o'clock comes and goes, so I switch the work computer off, and chop up potatoes for hash, so that's ready to cook for when Jools comes home, giving me lots of time to chop up the vegetables and sausage.

Sausage!

Hash is great, as it always is. I top it up with some firery paprika, and that pepes it up somewhat.

THe evening comes at half six now, we have coffee and the last of the biscuits, and for me, there is football on TV: Palace v Brighton, a good game which I really should have watched all of, but bail at half time with the score 1-0 to Palace.

Poppy is waiting upstairs, so we go to sleep, with her on my pillow beside my head.

Sweet Pops.

COVID

Hardly anyone is talking about COVID any more.

The daily data from the Gvernment on infections, hospitalisations and deaths are barely worth a mention, and if it is, its the last item on the bulletin.

To put it in perspective, this is the data from the last 7 days:

244,164 new infections

5,242 hospitalised

920 deaths.

Its like this is normal.

In London over the weekend, most on the train wore masks, we did, one young guy in the seats opposite on the phone the whole journey with no mask. On the ship we were mostly outside so didn't wear masks, but inside, eating, there was no spacing, so that is a worry.

Most again worse masks on the tube back to St Pancras, and on the train back to Kent too, but this seems to be the exception, with compliance certainly less than 50%. Watching football matches, those wearing masks are outnumbered at least 100:1 by those unmasked and singing and hugging.

As a country, we have just about given up.

My Crazy Life

Now mine, however, but Bud Flannigan's.

Bud is best known as half of Flannigan and Allen, performers of Underneath the Arches and the theme tune to Dad's Army.

Back in July, I was at the "Word in the Park" event in London, and Danny Baker recounted he was then reading Bud's autobiography, and made it sound so amazing, I tracked down a copy to read, and now I have (almost) finished it, I thought I would share with you the highlights.

The only critism I have of it, is that's its not long enough and skimps on details almost all the way through, but what he did was amazing.

He was born in Whitechapel in 1896, in the middle of a large Jewish community where his parents ran two shops. The aspirations of those who lived there was to earn enough to buy a house in the suburbs, at which point they realised they missed their friends.

At 14, so in 1910, instead of going to school, Bud decided to walk to Southampton to work on a ship. Poverty was so bad, he wanted out of it. So, he walked to Southampton, and joined the line to work on a ship, and once at the front said he was older than he was, of course, and was an electrician.

This was a lie.

He took the next ship out heading to New York, first job was to change a lightbulb, that he could do, next was to strip down some piece of machinery, which he couldn't. He admitted his lie, and was sent to the kitchens to wash up for the rest of the voyage.

He worked with a guy who was going to jump ship in New York, and had a plan, so Bud thought he would do the same.

He changed into his street clothes, went onto deck and took the first of the suitcases lined up to be taken offshore, was give a five dollar tip for that, went down the gangway, across the dock and kept walking, out through the dock gates and into New York.

Where he found the povery worse and more crushing than back home.

Someone who had emigrated before him, spotted Bud and got Bud a place to stay, he got a job for Western Union, delivering telegrams.

He got a place of his own, and in time fell into vauderville, and got a place on a show, which went well, and went on tour, so he travelled across the State, across the Mid-West and ended up in Los Angeles, where the show then went to New Zealand and Australia. The ship called in in Tahiti, where he was even worse squalor.

He toured New Zealand and Australia, by which point the War had started, so when the tour returned to the West Coast, he decided to return home to enlist.

He needed all his saved money for a passage from New York home, so rode box cars all the way east once his money ran out, ending up in prison at one point for 28 days.

In Chicago, he told the ticket seller in the station of his situation, and sold him a tcket to New York for much less than the face value, so reached New York, got his money and returned to England, meeting up with soldiers on the way back to London on the train, he enlisted in Birmingham, so returned home 6 years after leaving, in uniform.

He was gassed in France and suffered shrapnel wounds, but survived the war.

He teamed up with a pal from the Army and they created an act which was a hit in Scotland, and he lived quite well for a time, he thought he should try his hand in London, but no one knew of him or his act there.

He was offered a job in Scotland, and not having the money for the train, he again walked, from London to Glasgow.

And that was before he was famous! Quite a life, and crazy indeed.

Sunday 26th September 2021

After the excitement of Saturday, the plan was for Sunday to be much more quiet and relaxed.

Heck, we even lay in bed until seven.

Phew, rock and roll.

We got up and made coffee, fed the cats and pondered the day ahead. The plan was "to go for a walk".

We put the radio on, have ruit for breakfast, then a second coffee, second breakfast.

THe morning drifted by.

At half nine, we went out. All back to Windy Ridge on another butterfly hunt, but by then the bright start had given way to clouds and a freshening breeze. I wouldn't let that put me off.

We walked up Station Road, me now barely puffing up the hill to the top of the down. I waited for Jools as she had brough a bag and her pick, so to tidy up the neighbourhood. We like to think its not deliberate and instead caused by the wind on bin collection day, but there is just too much, and much of it fast food wrappers beside the road away from any house.

People, it seems, hate their country and the planet. Which is a shame, as its the only planet we have.

We turn down the track, and nothing much had changed. Lots of bees in the ivy, a few Red Admirals and more Speckled Woods, but nothing else let alone more exotic or regal.

It was even chilly now, so I was glad to turn down the hill for the long walk past the farm and up to Fleet House. By then, Jools nearly had a bin liner full of rubbish. So sad, really.

One final stomp over the fields to home, and just in time as there was rain in the air, enough to take the washing in.

That was the excitement for the day.

I make caprese and garlic bread for lunch, and as a treat we had a bottle of pink fizz, but shared between us, it made me sleepy all afternoon and I struggled to watch both football games.

Second game was Arse v Spurs, and one sided it was, with the Arse running out 3-1 winners, though should have been double that.

Once the game ended, it was getting dark, so we had supper and a coffee.

9 days had passed by, I had travelled and did pretty much what I wanted, now to get back to work and earn a crust again.

Confidence

Back in high school, I studied O Level economics.

I failed and got a "u" grade.

However, one thing I did learn is that the entire banking system is based on confidence. Confidence by the customers/investors, that their money is safe in the baks, and the way the bank uses it will supply them with interest.

Once customers lose confidence and try to withdraw their money, the system can collapse.

Its what is known as a run on a bank.

We saw it in 2008 at the Bradford and Bingley, where custmers raced to withdraw their savings from the bank, and thanks to the reserve asset ration, the bank was only required to hold a certain percentage of that money, using the rest for loans and mortgages, it didn't have the money to give to depositors, so as news got round, more people tried to get the money and

Crash.

There is enough fuel in the country.

There isn't enough drivers to deliver fuel, but under normal use there is no shortages.

Until the public, drivers, lose confidence that this is going to continue. Leaking minutes of meetings were plans for shortages were discussed, and Ministers making public statements that there is no need for panic buying will create just that.

So, there isn't a shortage of drivers, as such, and not of drivers with the required ADR licence, but when people all want fuel, they create a run n the filling stations and they run out. This causes more panic and the crisis deepens.

This crisis might ease soon, or it might get worse. If customers fail to regain confidence in the fuel supply or what, heaven forbid, what a UK Government Minister says, then anything could happen.

No Minister was available to do media rounds this morning, making the Government seem weaker that it already appears.

5,000 EU drivers won't make much of a difference to 70,000 or 100,000 vacancies, and certainy not for three months. To be acceptable, visa of at least 12 months would be needed, and even then there is last December to think of and years of anti-foreigner rhetoric.

Who'd want to come and work here?

The clock is ticking

90% of petrol stations in the south east are, as of this morning, dry.

No fuel for people, businesses or emergency services.

No fuel for delivery trucks that supply our shops, meaning that unless confidence in supplies isn't restored soon, then shops will quickly run out of supplies too.

Already people who work in social care, doing home visits are calling their employers saying due to having no fuel they can't work. So the old, sick or disabled will go uncared for at home too.

The Government has very few days in which to sort out the problem before it escalates and we see shortages of food, supplies and other esentials for life and businesses to carry on as normal.

That it is the most incompetent Government in history that has to fix this is a major concern, a Government elected and appointed for their belief in the single policy that has caused the crisis to a large part, and for sure has made the issues much worse.

In order to fix the issue, the Government would have to fix the root cause, and that would mean admitting its Brexit and them ignoring the warnings from indusries and experts about the very issues that are crippeling the country now.

All we have is hope that, for once, the Government will act in a quick and timelymanner and address the issues at the root of the problem. Otherwise this will get worse, much worse, very quickly indeed.

Two years on

Mum has been gone for two years now.

That the time has slipped by so quickly, our life has settled down, mortgage paid and the rest of the estate wound up with little or no fuss, is quite amazing.

So much else has happened in the last two years, I look on 2019 as some kind of nirvana, which in some ways it was.

I no longer have to travel to Suffolk on a regular basis, moan about how bad she looked and was in ignorance of her situation. Her body sorted it out in the end.

Life goes on, as it did when Tony passed, when John's wife passed, when Meg passed, when Nan passed. THey exist only in our memories, faces in faded photographs, their vices fading in our memory.

Dad has been gone a quarter of a century, I no longer remember what his voice was like, no recordings were made, just a few photogrpahs, and half my genes.

Life goes on, we endure.

And then we don't.

Saturday 25th September 2021

And what, as it would turn out, was an exciting and event packed day.

Due to the protests and queues, we decided to go to Tesco before going to London. This meant getting up really early, and even in normal times would have been plenty of time, but these are not normal times, I mean I knew there had been queues for fuel the day before, but really I wasn't prepared for what I saw.

Jools was even more worked up about it that I was, and in order for our day in London to go smoothly, she was awake at four, and went to Tesco at half past as it should have been open, but wasn't. The petrol station there and at the Duke of Yorks were closed and both had "no fuel" signs.

Jools came back, and it was her reversing down the drive that woke me up. I got up; it was ten past five. I checked online and Tesco would be open at six, so we had coffee and went out at five to.

No cars at Shell, but then no fuel either, and when we got to Whitfield I could see the queue of cars leading into Tesco, all for fuel, but there was no getting into the car park, even if I wanted to.

I dropped Jools off, and I said I would check at Shell.

I should point out that the red fuel light had come on at this point, so wasn't merely panic buying, we really needed fuel.

At Shell there were two lines of cars forming, so I joned one of three to a row of pumps, but I saw a tanker was filling the tanks, so there should be fuel.

And as I waited, we all waited, more cars joined at the back and soon they were queued up onto the A2 and across the roundabout. It felt like madness. I got a text for Jools saying there were few in Tesco and all what we needed was in, so I hoped that I could refuel and go to pick her up.

We waited and waited, turned out the pumps could not be reset, and in the end one driver was told to try to refuel and see what happened. What happened was that fuel came out, so we returned to our cars and waited our turn.

Mine came and I filled up, it was all very orderly and British, I even said thanks to the lady on the till as I paid. I drove to Tesco and met Jools on the layby on the through road, so we loaded the car and went home.

We were booked to go on a boat tour of the Thames, and had to be at the Tower of London by half ten, meaning we really had to catch the quarter to eight train, the one an hour later might make it, but it would be tight.

We unloaded the shopping, but the milk and cheese in the fridge, left the rest and I grabbed a camera and we were back in the car hand heading into town. We had twenty minutes.

Thankfully, I found a place to park in Priory Gate, Jools had gone to buy tickets, so by the time we met on the platform, our train was coming in, so we were able to board and sit down, and have ten minutes to wait before departure.

Phew.

The journey to London you know, but even for me, only the second time in three months we have gone by train to London, and that previous trip was the first time in 16 months. But here we were again, zooming through Kent and under the Thames into Essex and then through the long tunnel to Stratford.

We had 90 minutes, enough time for breakfast, so we went to the place I used to use when I travelled to LCY, had a grilled cheese sandwich and coffee, before walking through Westfield to the regional station to catch the DR into central London.

We used to stand here and look on at the Olympic Park being built, not its home to West Ham and lots of housing.

So it goes.

The DR came and we climbed in. Again, not crowded so we felt safe enough. We wore our masks again.

Getting off at Poplar to change for a service to Tower Gateway, we took in the scene of Canary Wharf ahead of us. And for a Saturday morning, there were few other passengers waiting, or on the next train when it pulled in.

Just ten minutes into The City, walking dwon the steps from the station we were confronted by the traffic intersection that separated us from the Tower. In a gap in the traffic, we ran over to the other side, then along the main road to Tower Bridge. I don't want to labour the point, but usually this pavement is rammed with people, I was able to stop and get shots with no trouble.

We had twenty minutes, so we stop for a coffee beside Tower Bridge, before walking inder the road and along the river between the Thames and the Tower. There were tourists, but in fractions of the numbers usually seen here.

We heard the siren going off, and this we knew was the arrival of our boat, The Will, coming to the pier to pick us up. Its an old Thames barge, and the bridge had to be raised to allow the mast to go through.

We all climbed aboard, and found places to sit around the deck, listened to the safety bref before they cast off, and we had to wait for half an hour before Tower Bridge would reopen for us to go through.

There are amny dofferent ways of travelling up, or down, the river. The jet clippers can be used for the price of a few stops on The Tube, there are cruise boats, and jet powered speed boats, that have a loud James Bond soundtrack, apparently. Or there is a gentle chug on a barge. YOu get to see much more detail from each shore, and everyone else seemed to want to wave at us.

We waived back.

The first mate got children on board to trim the sails, pulling on ropes nearly as thick as their arms.

We drifted along, though Wapping and round the Isle of Dogs. Canary Wharf, which sits at the top of the Isle of Dogs, apparently got close, moved round, got further away and came back close again, as the river wound itself round the Isle.

On the other back, Greenwich came and went, the Navl Hospital looking magnificent and the Royal Observatory on the hill with time ball clearly visible from the river.

We cruised on.

We came to the Thames Barrier, flood defence for the city. I can remember seeing this on TV when it opened back in the 80s, and now we were going to sail through it.

Once through the barrier, the captain turned the wheel and so began the slow drift back to Tower Bridge, the only problem being that it wasn't due to open until half three, meaning we would be waiting somewhere.

Saying that, it was announced that lunch was served; bangers, mash, peas, carrots and onion gravy, all of which went down very well. We ate in the state room down below, and very nice it was, and amazing that food for about fifty of us was produced in such a small galley.

We ate well, and I treated myself to a glass of red wine, Jools had a cider, and we went back up to the deck to watch London glide by.

We went back past the Dome, the cable car, Greenwich, Rotherhythe, Isel of Dogs until we reached The Pool of London, where we had to go round in circles for an hour, as we waited for the bridge would open for us, and a sister barge too, letting us approach the dock inbetween jet clippers and other ferries, giving us ten minutes to get off and then get to land.

THe area around the Tower was busy, not anything like it usually is, so we picked our way through camera toting families, up to Tower Hill tube station, and down to the Circle Line platform to wait 5 minutes for a train to whisk us to Kings Cross.

Again, the train wasn't crowded for a weekend, and we got seats and so people watched as the train went through and under the City.

Up in St Pancras, we had twenty minutes before the train to Dover left, Jools went to get supplies from M&S, and I walked up to the platform to wait, my back grumbling about sitting for four hours on a hard hold cover on the barge.

We got seats on the train, opened cans of ginger beer and Italian fruit juice, grazed on honey roast peanuts as the train sped through the tunnel to Essex.

I checked my phone, and Norwich had slumped to another defeat, the sixth straight loss of the season, and things look grim. I paid little attention to other results.

We arrived in Dover at twenty to six, walked to the car and drive back home, getting inside just before six, in time for Craig on the radio.

I put the kettle on, check on the interwebs and then began sorting through shots taken during the day, 800 of them!

Keep on trucking, baby

I am an HGV driver.

Or was.

My medical expired, but if I got a medical, if it were possible, and I wanted to get back into driving, I could.

But I won't.

I drove for six months, delivering dangerous chemicals, and I was shattering.

Out of the house 13 or 14 hours a day, enough energy to reheat the meals I made at the weekend and then going to bed in order to be able to do the job the next day. And weekends spent catching up on washing, cooking and resting up for another week trucking.

And when out trucking there were few facilities for toilets, food, showers, rest spots, all the things that would make a crap job better. If I had a very long day, even the greasy spoons closed up and there was no where to get something hot from.

I now work in management systems, and so am well versed in incident resilutions.

The immediate corrective actions the Government has decided upon is 5,000 3-month visas for truckers, and another similar amount for poultry workers, until December 24th. Using people rather like water, turning the tap on and off.

That in itself is bad enough, but the Government has to use that three months to come up with a permenent solution, which I just don't think they're cabable of.

And I don't think people will come over for three months to drive trucks; they have to find somewhere to live, and all the other stuff, by the time they're settled, it'd be time to leave as the Government is really only concerned with "saving Christmas", which is why poulty workers are included as there isn't enough people to supply the country with fresh turkey for Christmas.

Without mitigation the country will be back in this situation for the new year..

Grant Shapps is blaming the Road Haulage Association (RHA) for leaking details of a meeting, and people for panic buying fuel, not the shortage of drivers.

As I have said before, about the issues with Brexit in General, if Ministers and Johnson can't be honest about the root causes, the real working solutions can't be found.

Meanwhile people are still lining up to panic buy fuel.

Friday 24th September 2021

Friday.

Still on holiday.

And the country went totally fucking mad.

First of all, Jools went to work, as her boss is knacked with a bad back and is waiting for an MRI, paramedics had to come to collect him to take his to the hospital for the scan as he can't get downstairs.

I had chores planned.

Vacuuming, tidying, maybe some washing, and waitin for a parcel to be delivered.

And writing. Listening to podcasts.

I had finished hoovering, so was having a brew, looking at Twitter and I saw "Dover" trending.

Climate activists had blocked both Townwall Street and Jubilee Way after Priti's plan to pass laws for long sentences for doing this on the M25. So they came to Dover and blocked the port. And all main roads into and out of the town.

I let Jools know so she could plan an alternatve route home.

And then there was the fuel shortage. Although not really a shortage, a distribution problem, but all of Dover was out panic buying after the Government advised us to to panic buy.

By two the protests had died down, so Jools got back OK, but with queues leading to all filling stations, and Tesco blocked, I said we would go Saturday morning.

We had coffee instead.

We sat outside, watched the birds in the garden, and for a while, forgot the world's problems.

At six I did the music quiz, did badly, so we drove to Jen's, and saw long lines at the filling station at the Duke of Yorks, and by the time we came back two hours later, they had sold out.

John was otherwise engaged, so just the three of us, we feasted on breaded chicken and garlic potatoes, then played a game of Meld, in which Jools won.

We left Jen's just as the gibbous waining moon was rising, dark orange against the indigo blue sky.