Here are three of my favourite painters:-
It was so easy there. No stress. No managerial responsibilities. No need to ever raise my voice and above all there were those delightful Thai schoolchildren. So pleasant and smiley, so grateful for the assistance I gave them and for the lessons I delivered.
In the process of decorating our dining room and shifting the furniture around, I rediscovered a kind of farewell poster that one of my classes in Bangkok gave me in the week that my contract ended. It was so sweetly put together with "thank you" letters and a photo of me in the middle clasping a mug of coffee. The use of the word "Joke" was I hope positive - referring to my jokey amiableness in the classroom.
The very next day I was on the island of Koh Lanta in southern Thailand where I spent a few days before flying home to England. To travel seven years back in time: Go here.
Prisoners get to trudge in circles around the exercise yard but I was permitted to steer Clint to the village of Pleasley near Mansfield. There I took another walk. Eight miles or so. Sadly, Mr Sunshine did not keep his promise. Those pesky weather people said he would illuminate the landscape all afternoon but he remained bashful which meant that many of my pictures were drained of colour.
Still. I got some much needed exercise before returning to serve the remainder of my painting sentence.
Near the war memorial in Pleasley Vale, I conversed with a vicar in full church costume. She was holding a bible close to her chest. I guess she believes in that kind of thing. She was there with a small group of bandsmen to film a service for Remembrance Sunday. Our new, harsher COVID-19 restrictions mean that many Remembrance Day services will not happen this year. This vicar planned to put her church's service on Facebook for her parishioners to watch on Sunday. Lest We Forget.
South of Shirebrook, an ignorant and anti-social sub-human had dumped an old fridge freezer on a pleasant bridleway that winds across farmland. We call this behaviour "fly-tipping". A lot of it seems to happen in that particular neck of the woods. It makes my blood boil.
Ah well, back to the room makeover in the morning. As I complete this blogpost, the people who live in our television are telling me it is more and more likely that Joe Biden is going to win the U.S. Presidency! Maybe there is a God after all...
Derbyshire countryside west of Forge Lane
It's nine thirty in the morning and I have got my cool paint splattered shirt and trousers on ready for a day of decorating. Already I can hear Mrs Pudding prowling - telling me non-verbally to get off my backside and get cracking. Okay! Okay! I'm coming!
No time to write a proper blogpost so on this politically significant day across the Atlantic Ocean, I just want to plead with American visitors to this blog to:-
My football club is Hull City - nicknamed The Tigers. I have actively supported them for fifty seven years experiencing many ups and downs. It has been quite a journey I can tell you.
One of the first players to really catch my eye was a local lad called Chris Chilton. He was a big, strapping centre forward who played the game with a smile on his face. He loved it. As a centre forward he had to head many balls as they were crossed in to the goal mouth by the team's wingmen.
In the mid-sixties The Tigers enjoyed some much needed financial investment that sparked an era of reasonable success. In spite of the introduction of new players bought from other clubs, Chris Chilton was able to hold his own in the rejuvenated team. He went on to become the club's all time top scorer with 222 goals overall. Quite an achievement.
Many's the time the crowd would sing his name - mostly after goals had gone in - a lot of them headed - "Chillo! Chillo!" He would wheel round in the penalty area with his fist raised to the heavens and a big grin on his face. In his heyday, Tottenham Hotspur and Leeds United wanted to lure him away but Chris was happy in East Yorkshire and wished to remain with his boyhood club. A local hero.
At secondary school I became a very capable rugby player. Though I loved watching football (American: soccer) I admit that I was a very average footballer. Even so, at fifteen I was asked to play in goal for my village men's football team. It was just the one game on a wet and windy Saturday in November. I believe the regular goalkeeper was indisposed..
In those days, football was not played with light plastic-coated balls, you played with leather cannonballs that must have been designed to absorb as much moisture as possible. They weighed a ton and on that fateful Saturday I proved to be a hopeless goalkeeper. I let in four goals, mostly because the cannonball went right through my flailing hands. Though at school I could kick a rugby ball for fifty yards, kicking that soggy football that miserable afternoon was a different story. Hopeless.
This personal diversion was simply to illustrate the kind of balls that Chris Chilton headed very frequently. In his career he must have headed thousands of balls, rising to meet them with brave athleticism.
And now I reach the very purpose of this sporting blogpost. Chris Chilton is now 77 years old and he resides in a nursing home diagnosed with dementia. He is one of many footballers whose lives have drawn to a close in this distressing way. Only yesterday it was announced that the England and Manchester United World Cup winner - Bobby Charlton has also succumbed to dementia.
All those headed footballs! They could get away with it when they were young but former professional players are paying the price now that they are old. In East Yorkshire, fund raising is happening to support Chris Chilton's care. Go here. As Remembrance Sunday draws near, I shall remember Chillo and the joy he gave us. Up The Tigers!
Chris Chilton in action in the early sixties
"Still Life With Onions" by Alfred Sisley (1839-1899)
Where would we be without onions?
The onion is a nutritious, easily stored and adaptable vegetable that plays vital roles in a wide range of cuisines. Furthermore, onions are pretty easy to grow and succeed in lots of different growing conditions.
Where did they come from? The general consensus is they originated in central Asia from where, around 7000 years ago, they began to fan out with mankind's assistance around the known world. Onions were present in the cuisine and indeed the mythology of Ancient Egypt.
When pilgrims emigrated to North America aboard "The Mayflower" in 1620, they took seed onions and planted them by their Massachusetts cabins. Later it was discovered that some Native American cultures were already growing and using onions. How had they arrived there from central Asia? Most probably over the land bridge that once linked north eastern Russia with Alaska. After all, that is the route via which the earliest human migrations into North America happened.
When I roast a joint of meat or a chicken, I always layer the bottom of the roasting pan with chopped onions. Later they will make a perfect base for creating tasty gravy. Sometimes I boil onions or roast them whole but I think that frying is my favourite way of using onions. I fry them slowly in olive oil and butter, turning them occasionally to avoid any burning until they are brown and scrumptious. They benefit from a little seasoning during this cooking process.
The fried onions are great with steak, homemade rissoles or burgers and its nice to be generous with them. After all, onions are inexpensive.
My favourite member of the onion family is the leek but that is another story.
God bless onions! The Lord may have screwed up with unmentionable diseases and "the problem of evil" but onions remain a huge success even though they are mostly taken for granted. As I said at the start: Where would we be without onions?
