Wednesday 22nd November 2017

Each day I work from home, I think about how I am going to describe the tedium of a day at work. I mean, not much changes, just the tiny detail, but the general details: mails, documents, phone calls, breakfast, lunch, cats, weather. Are about the same day in, day out.

As I often say, I'm not working in the chicken factory, standing at the end of the pennine tunnel waiting for the next row of chilled chickens to be dropped then racked up. I did that for a year. The packed the trussed and wrapped chickens. Another year, eighteen months went by. There was a tannoy which played Radio 1, and so the day flew by during the Golden Hour, then crawled by during Our Tune and Woo Gary Davis, but it was the soundtrack of our day, and on the days the tannoy broke, the dullness without pop music, on Medium Wave being piped through a crappy tannoy was better than nothing. Well, except Steve Wright maybe.

The music has changed, now comes in down the copper wire of the interwebs or through the TV aerial, but still music, and the BBC too. Lunch is taken at a leisurely pace at the table, listening to a podcast or something, reading the Brexit chaos on Twitter or something. Coffee breaks are taken when I want, and not when the line stops. Yes, all in all life is better now. I'll put the kettle on!

There is the usual stuff to day as ever, you know; cats, coffee, breakfast, more coffee, start work. At leas with my new laptop, work has returned to humdrum normality, with no need to keep rebooting until Outlook worked. Saying that, this laptop does not like to create PDFs out of Word docs. Might be a 1st world Quality Manager's problem, but it is real. I have to send docs out and let people create their own PDFs. I call it the DIY Office 365. I have no idea why, and to be honest is only a minor issue so I ignore it.

After lunch I have a man come round to see about a path. Steve and Martin have let us down once too many times. I know Steve has been ill, but if you promise to turn up, and fail to do so, twice, then we look for alternatives.

We are not fussy, but want it done cheap as chips, so the guy offers some alternatives to the granite blocks: one pound fifty a pop those. So, he will get back to me at some point. And that really is the exciting part of the day.

My boss calls and we are talking, and a dialogue box appears on the computer screen; something about an update. I ignore it as I am always asked when installing an update is convenient. I log off the call, and the computer switches itself off, and starts again, telling me that it is installing a Windows update, and might switch itself on and off a few times.

I wait, do some editing, do some writing on my blog, make a brew. The laptop is still updating away.

An hour passes.

Another hour passes.

THird hour goes by, surely it is done now? No.

It is done at half five in the afternoon, four hours after starting, anything that was urgent could wait for the next day.

Its bangers and mash and beans for dinner. One of JOols' favourite meals. Especially as I now put some horseradish in the mash.

And for the rest of the evening, I devoured the rest of The Book of Dust until just before ten it was read. And enjoyed. There was football on the radio, but it went unlistened. Who will think of the footballers and commentators? Not I.

Remember the bus

You might recall, or at least the Brits among you will, the Brexit bus, festooned with a slogan saying, we send £350 a week to the EU, why not fund the NHS instead?

Well, today was the budget, and the chancellor stood and told lies for a couple of hours, then May and Corbyn argued like school kids over what was said and not said. One of the things to take away from the budget this year is that Hammond has promised £3 billion extra funding for Brexit preparations, but only £2.8 billion for the NHS. The head of the NHS has already said that is not enough and will lead to longer waiting times and even treatment rationed.

On top of that, it turned out the Office of Budget Responsibility, on whose projections the Treasury uses to plan ahead, revealed that the Government had refused to provide it with any costs estimates relating to Brexit. That is, the entire budget was prepared and delivered without anyone knowing or guessing or revealing how much Brexit was going to cost and whether this would mean more and more borrowing.

This is now beyond madness, of course.

The Government also pledged £3.5 billion to help first time buyers by abolishing stamp duty (tax on buying property), helping 3,500 people, meaning that each first time buyer will have cost the taxpayer £924,285.71 each. Would could have built all of them a luxury home for that!

Last night, the Irish Government stated that the £40 billion that Britain hopes to unblock the Brexit negotiations will not be enough in itself, as there will have to be something concrete on the Irish Border issue. It is telling, that the one land border Britain, or the UK has with the EU is between the Republic and NI, you would have thought the Brexiteers, and the DUP in particular would have given some thought to how this would be dealt with, and getting angry at the Irish Government at protecting their interests helps no one.

I say again, Britain triggered Article 50 before it was ready, and before it had identified risks and how to overcome or minimise them. Official figures show the economy tanking, as Western World recovers from the 2008 recession, and the EU zone growth is increasing month on month. Britain has gone from the fast growing European economy to the slowest. In a year. Now, what could be the reason?

One last thought; is it just possible that May is trying to create a situation, any situation, that gives her reason to walk out of talks, which will result in the economy tanking, the government falling, and Brexit killed? Stanger things have happened, but I fear May is not that clever.

Tuesday 21st November 2017

Another working day, with the same start as ever. YOu know the drill by now.

There is the chance to stand and watch the sunrise again as Jools makes ready to leave for work, and I finish my coffee.

Days very quickly fall into a pattern; have breakfast, get dressed and log on to work just before eight. Deal with mails, taking breaks regularly for coffee and/or tea. Work through until about half eleven, take a break for lunch. This time half a left over fish cake roll, sprinkled with grated cheese and then drilled until golden and crispy. Another winner!

The cats watch me like a hawk, and on occasion bring me something to eat. And as usual it was just as I sat down for a three hour training session/meeting, that Molly brought in a mouse, still, alive, and she not to keen to drop it. In fact as I try to get the poor creature out, I see it still twitching, and Molly squeezing it more and more. I can hear the meeting going on, but I have a half dead mouse to deal with. I take it out into the garden and drop it into a flower bed, hoping it might pull through.

Molly is still looking to where the mouse might be, so I give her some kibbles and she is distracted and forgets about the mouse.

I go back to the meeting and immediately wish I was chasing a mouse again. Dear God.

The afternoon leaks away, and I find that having a mid-afternoon snack of cheese and crackers along with a glass of red wine make the meeting go by much better. Probably not the the best thing to do, especially if I was sitting face to face with the person giving the training.

Dinner is pizza, so I can watch some of an episode of Time Team, once work had finished. Thin crust pizza is so easy to cook, I don't have to do anything until Jools is home, and then pop them in the oven for ten minutes, and bingo! crispy pizza.

There is football on the wireless, and Norwich are playing too. Don't know why I bother as City slip to another 1-0 defeat and then Liverpool throw a 3-0 lead away at Seville. Not enough oranges at half time one suspects.

Anyway, another quiet day, and a day nearer the weekend/Christmas/retirement.

Why Brexit?

I thought I might take a few lines to explain why I blog about Brexit.

Well, Brexit is the largest single act of economic self-harm I can imagine. It defies logic, reason, and those who believe suffer no opposition, but will do anything to avoid an actual debate, resorting to nationalism in an attempt to silence the remoaners.

In truth, I will probably be OK. I work for a Danish company, travel will be difficult for a while, but my skill set now is in high demand, and through my employer, or self-employed I can work anywhere in the world doing this job. So, mortage will be paid, and as long as there is demand, I will be able to work. Our savings will suffer, affecting our pensions, but we have moved the risk to Europe rather than keeping our options in just Britain.

But in limiting opportunities for future generations, every aspect of what the Government is trying to do needs to be challenged. That is the biggest crime, and something our children and children's children will damn us for; how on earth did such a course of action be allowed to happen relatively unchallenged? The Conservative Party, the Labour Party, broadcasters, the media all have allowed the lies and untruths to go unchallenged, or allowed facts to be countered by lies, in the interest of balance.

Britain will be poorer, subdued, ugly and with much reduced influence. And as has happened already, we will turn on each other once there is no one else to blame.

I hate what my country has become, and fear what it will turn into once those sunlit uplands are full of unicorns and fairy tales like they always were. Reality will close in on Brexit, we will be trapped by it, as we already are, but reality will win out, there is no escaping it.

Even now as EU agencies are relocated, some Brexiteers are still claiming it will be a success. Maybe they even believe it. In the end, we will know what the truth is, because there is no escaping it.

Everything I have said about Britain not being able to stop or pause the A50 process is true, so that would be a gift of the EU27, but still the UK Parliament is arguing about getting a "meaningful" vote on the final deal, if there is one.

More rearranging deckchairs on the sinking Titanic.

And the Labour Party is next to useless, as given the opportunity of getting an amendment to the Brexit bill forcing the Government to ensure Britain stayed in the Single Market, the Labour front bench whipped the party into abstaining. Worse than useless.

Today, another spanner in the works, as Ireland said that there has to be a viable solution to the border with NI or there will be no talks on trade.

Brexit means Brexit.

Monday 29th November 2017

And again, just like that, the weekend was over. And along came Monday.

Monday, Monday, so much to answer for. Or something.

Which means that we do the usual stuff in the morning, all the while it is still dark outside. Even with coffee, its still Monday. I have to say I have not had this antipathy towards Monday for years, not since the chicken factory days.

Jools is up and ready to go to work, and I sit on the sofa catching up on the football from the day before. Outside, daylight creeps over the land.

But this Monday, I have a new laptop to use for work, only I have to transfer all the files from the old one first, putting them on a pendrive took two hours, then downloading them onto the new one takes another two hours. Ready for work just before lunchtime and the computer tells me I have to download some new updates before I go any further.

And that is where my day went. Or morning anyway.

And then I can begin on the issues that I have not been able to deal with since Thursday. And everyone wants stuff done.

And then there are the cats. Molly knows that by laying on the keyboard, she gets attention at least, and Mulder and Scully both have their loud attention grabbing meows.

No news on Mum today, so will call tomorrow.

Dinner is fishcakes in rolls. I'm not saying you'll get that at the Ritz, but it was pretty darn good, laced with sweet chili sauce. And washed down with Old Spicy Hen, or cider for Jools. We have beaten the worse day of the week, so are on a roll, as it were.

The evening is cold outside, so we turn the heating up.Such is the excitement of a working Monday spent at home. There is TV in the evening, and coffee and chili flavoured chocolate. But we are both pooped again and go to bed at nine. At this rate we will be going to be at six in the evenings and getting up at three in the morning.

Anyway, Tuesday tomorrow, and will be one month to the shortest day. Spring will be coming.

Brexit means Brexit. No really

Today Micheal Barnier made a speech detailing what Brexit means to Britain, and as a result of that decision to leave, what will happen. On Ireland: And those that pushed Brexit must offer solutions. Which seems reasonable.

"Those who say Britain can enjoy parts of the single market must stop this contradiction... The integrity of the SM is non-negotiable" An ambitious FTA with Britain covering many areas is "possible" but says "in none of these areas will the EU wait for the UK" as it has other priorities and other free trade projects to focus on. "But in none of these fields will the EU wait for the UK. We must continue to advance. We will continue creating new free trade agreements in addition to the ones we already have with 60 countries."

He also confirmed, what some of us already knew, that UK firms could not continue with passporting rights after Brexit. Again, this is not really news.

John Bruton, former Irish taoiseach. We have no problem with UK referendum, we have prob with UK's ill-considered decision to quit single market and customs union. "Quite remarkable" that French, German pols taking GFA more seriously than UK

And the Daily Mail reported today that British companies would not be able to trade freely in the EU after Brexit. I mean, they act like this is news.

It is reported that the UK Government is going to offer an increased amount of money to the EU. They still have no answer on the Irish border of course.

The Brexit Minister Lord Callanan has just given a personal statement in the House of Lords to correct himself on the revocability of Art 50 having wrongly claimed in the Lords last week that the UK could not legally revoke Art 50.

And finally, the European Medicines Agency is being relocated to Amsterdam and the European Banking Authority will move to Paris. These might mean less than 2000 job losses, but these are well paid jobs, and in the case of the former, most Drug Companies also have offices here, which they will also move. So, Brexit is having an effect, ones that cannot ever be reversed.

And Brexit has already cost every household one week's wages. But, sunlit uplands and having cake and eating it. Eh?

Another typical day in Brexitlalaland.

Sunday 19th November 2017

Some months ago, I signed Jools and myself up on a tour in another abandoned Underground Station, one I had not heard of before; Down Street.

Down Street was closed in the 1930s, due to lack of use and being close to both Green Park and Hyde Park Corner stations.

Although going in anywhere that has been abandoned for many years, and 80 year old decay of a tube station would be reason enough on its own to go down, there is its links to the war.

The station was taken over by the Rail Executive, to coordinate railways in the time of war, as it was central, bomb proof and had enough space.

Life must have been grim down there, living and working on an active tube line, with trains passing my every couple of minutes for 20 hours, lack of fresh air and a general lack of space.

They did eat well, even the lower ranks, and there was flushing toilets and running water.

So, and despite needing more than eight hours sleep, we were up and about at half six in the morning, making coffee, feeding the cats and grilling bacon to ensure we could leave the house by quarter past eight to get to Martin Mill, be bale to buy tickets, blah, blah, blah. And so on.

I even regretted that we were going to London, and maybe we might give it a miss, but then the tickets were so expensive, we may as well go and make a go of it. One last check to make sure we had everything, then into the car and to the station.

Already the sun had been up and hour, but being the season when there are long shadows when it does shine, the rays of the sun fell onto the trees the other side of the opposite platform, another fine sight for us. Jools had got the tickets, so all we had to do was wait, and turned out we were the only passengers boarding here. Maybe it would be a quiet trip on the train. I had noticed a note on Google maps that morning when I was looking to get to the tour, and saw that Regent Street had an event called "carnival of toys", but gave it no other thought.

At Dover, Folkestone, Ashford and Ebbsfleet, more and more families got aboard, all with chattering excited children, and talk was of toys, Kitkats and drawing books. Or at the least the two families numbering nine or ten members. I thought of the cost of the train, the Tube and all the other stuff a family day out in London would cost.

It was another golden day, the countryside was a riot of reds, yellows and golds. I was a feast of the eyes, and I was entranced, even passing through such familiar scenes.

We leap off the train at St Pancras, hoping to beat the families with buggies and assorted children through the barriers, which we mostly did. However, we then wandered over to Kings Cross so I could check to see if there were any Azumas waiting at the buffers. But, again, there were none.

So we went under the station into the Underground, walking to the escalator taking us to the Piccadilly Line platforms, where our train would take us the half dozen stops through the West End to Green Park.

Piccadilly (the street) runs down one side of Green Park looking towards Buckingham Palace, although the golden laden trees meant that it could not actually be seen. And now is lined with high-end hotels, including the one we had to be at in an hour's time. We dodge the traffic and cross over so to walk through the park, weaving through a group of Spanish tourists on a guided tour.

However, we were both hungry, and thought maybe we could get a coffee in the hotel, so after a walk of just a few hundred yards, we crossed back over Piccadilly and into the hotel, where we agreed to stump up for the most expensive continental breakfast it is possible to have. Mind you I haven't been to the Dorchester or the Ritz of course. But fruit, cereal and bread and preserves was fine, but not worth the price, obvs, but it did mean that we just had to walk up the steps to meet up with the tour.

We check in and wait until all twelve of us had arrived, and are then given a H&S brief, and the tour starts. Starts with some history, and why the station is down a narrow street, down Down Street. And why it failed to attract passengers and closed down after 30 years.

We were then lead out of the hotel, into Down Street to look at the front of the station, before being taken to a narrow door covered with all sorts of warnings, through that and down a narrow set of steps to the top of the spiral staircase.

We stopped again for another bit of education before we were allowed to walk down to the station level, 80 feet below.

In fact, the station was quite small, so when it was converted into offices and a control centre for the railway executive, rooms were small, and passageways just wide enough to allow a tea trolley through.

Photos were shown and then compared to where we were standing, shadows on the wall showed clocks or notice boards, and through these what it left can be matched to those photos. As after the way, the internal walls of the offices were demolished, so little remains, just where floors were levelled.

The big draw for Down Street is that for two months at the end of 1940, Winston Churchill slept here, and even asked that an office be built a little later, though probably not for him.

The platforms were bricked off during the war, and that is still the case, but the Piccadilly Line still runs past, and so every minute or so there is that familiar rush of air and the sound of an approaching train. Although just a sturdy door each side through which the lights of the passing train can be seen.

The tour doubled back over and over again, but was interesting.

The station is filthy, decades of grime and dust from the passing trains has been left, so that even brushing against a wall will leave you dirty. But it washes off, and makes it all the more photogenic I suppose.

All things come to an end, of course, and at the end we were left with the climb back up, 100 or so steps up to the surface, just about managed it without needing to stop and have a breather.

We collected our bags, and should we do something else, or go home?

Go home.

So we walk back down Piccadilly to the station, down the escalators and wait for a train back to St Pancras, where we had just enough time for a beer near to the Southeastern platforms, sitting on stools watching the world go by, before going up to the platforms and finding the train already in and door open.

And it seemed that the carnival wasn't over, as the train was less than half full as we pulled out. The journey you know, but for me passed with the sun low in the west as the day drew to an end.

We were back in Martin Mill just after sunset, and the day was getting dark. And cold. So in the car and up Station Road to Chez Jelltex, where the kettle and coffee pot put on and brews made, chocolate eaten.

Phew, what a day. What a weekend.

I listen to football as I cook chorizo hash, not a good game, but it passes the time, until half six when dinner is ready and we can uncork the wine and sit down to eat.

The weekend had slipped past again, and there is time to watch the football and have a shower, but before MOTD is over, my eyes are too heavy, and we call it a night.