Updates

I don't like going up to bed when the computer is still on. I like to make sure that it has shut down properly and made its final sigh. But occasionally I find myself waiting for Windows Updates. You know the kind of thing - Don't power off or unplug your machine - Installing Update 1 of 324. 

On Wednesday night I stayed up far too late trying to craft my poem "No Going Back". In fact it was round about two o'clock in the morning when I reeled away from the computer only to see that damned Updates message popping up again. Update 1 was over quickly, but Updates 6, 8 and 15 seemed to take absolutely ages, that little loading wheel spinning round and round maddeningly like a miniature catherine wheel. Finally, finally at about two thirty five, the computer powered off and I could go and get some sleep.

I have absolutely no idea what these hideous Updates are all about or why we need them. It doesn't seem possible to press an opt-out button - "Nah! Not today thank you!". Why can't they update in the middle of a computer session? Why must they wait till the very end? And there seems to be no pattern to these Updates. Days and days can go by with no Updates at all and then suddenly there's a whole bunch of them.

Does anyone share my irritation about Adobe Updates or Skype Updates too? I am starting to think that this updating malarkey is  a subtle kind of marketing - making you feel that you are in league with a conscientious organisation that is constantly improving its product. What would happen if we were all somehow able to bar Updates? Would our computers crash? Or would computer sessions just trundle along as before?

Poem

Wadshelf

Wadshelf is referred to in the Norman Domesday Book (1086)

Wadshelf is an unexceptional village six miles west of Chesterfield. It sits in rising agricultural land before the heather moorland takes over. I parked there late yesterday afternoon and began a seven or eight mile circular hike in the July heat which has blessed the north of England these past few days. More pictures...

The old Wesleyan Chapel in Wadshelf - now a private home.

Foxgloves by Top Lane, Wadshelf. In the
far distance there's Chesterfield.

Imposing Westwick Farm on Westwick Lane. Not sure if it
operates as a farm any more.

This is Broomhall Farm near Holymoorside

A broody young cow waits for me on
the ancient path to Fairfield

Rolling farmland by Birkinshaw Wood

Road junction on Longside Road

Loadshead Lane

"The Highwayman" pub-restaurant at Eastmoor. Now part of the  Beefeater chain.
 After seven miles it was  nice to quaff a pint of bitter shandy here before getting 
back to the car in  Wadshelf

A reminder of how Wadshelf used to be .  A stone trough fed by a 
spring - where horses would have refreshed themselves in days before cars.

And so back to Sheffield via  Holmesfield. Shirley was out at a nurses' meeting. Made something to eat, went to the supermarket for some milk and then down to "The Banner" for the Tuesday quiz with Mick and Mike. By midnight I was bushed.

Lightheartedness

Heavy man!

As I have grown older, I have come to better appreciate the value of lightheartedness. Why must everything be so serious? Let's laugh about it all and take life with a healthy pinch of salt.

In real life - not this bloglife - I suppose I have had a reputation for being a serious sort of guy. I read books. I ponder upon world or local events and habitually display a passionate interest in what is right and what is wrong. But these days - sometimes I can't be bothered with the old  intensity, fervent debate, the issues of the day. It's nice to not be bothered and just to drift along.

A key feature of lightheartedness is the ability to laugh at yourself. To recognise your mistakes and to accept that we can all do stupid things. Our mutual friend, Earl John Gray, seems to have grasped this implicitly as, in his very popular blog, he regularly pokes fun at himself.

Our lovely daughter, Frances, once saw me pour "Coke" on my chips. It was when my brother Robin lived in Bishops Cleeve near Cheltenham. We had been camping in South Wales and Frances was about six years old. We were staying over for one night and we had bought fish and chips for supper but the malt vinegar bottle was as squat as the supermarket brand bottle of cola - almost identical. I reached for the cola and shook it rather disastrously over my meal.

For years afterwards, she would remind me "You poured Coke on your chips!" And mostly this announcement would piss me off. But yes - I admit it now - I was a silly arse - I did pour "Coke" on my chips after a long drive - distracted by conversation. Ha-bloody-ha! Even the great father of the nascent princess could make dumb mistakes!

To live lightly and simply  must be good for one's constitution. Doing ordinary things. Not feeling the weight of the world on your shoulders. One of the catchphrases of  my namesake Neil - the hippy character from the BBC comedy show "The Young Ones" - was "Heavy man!" -  usually expressed when there was a serious issue to address. But the converse of this is the notion of lightness. Not everything has to be serious - making your brain hurt - giving you a massive dose of angst. To live lightly, even gaily (!), like a butterfly fluttering from flower to flower - isn't that a good way to be?

Light man!

Champion

On Sunday afternoon, instead of enjoying the early July sunshine and pottering in our large suburban garden, I was indoors glued to the Men's Singles Final from Wimbledon on the BBC. Though there were tense moments when the psychological  pendulum threatened to switch between the two twenty six year old combatants, in the end Andy Murray from Dunblane in Scotland won the battle in three straight sets, becoming Great Britain's first Men's Singles winner since the legendary Fred Perry in 1936. It was a magnificent moment for British sport just a day after the British Lions rugby union team had thrashed Australia in Sydney to win the test series.

Andy Murray is an awkward character to warm to. Sometimes described as a "dour Scot", he can seem uncomfortable and rather monosyllabic during interviews. Underneath it all, I suspect he is a rather shy and private person who blossoms on the tennis court but finds the associated media palaver a little distasteful. Fred Perry would have been amazed to witness the media frenzy that has followed Andy Murray for years. It surely wasn't like that in 1936.

Murray was a nine year old pupil at Dunblane Primary School when mad gunman Thomas Hamilton walked into the school and killed sixteen children and a teacher before turning the gun on himself. This event has clearly left an indelible mark on Murray's psyche and it is also likely that his parents' eventual divorce in 2005 had a huge effect upon his developing character. He once said, "I would get really upset. One of the things I would have loved to have had was a family that worked better together."

Yesterday, almost in spite of himself, Andy Murray proved that he is a winner. With guts, daring, experience and supreme fitness he threatened to make World Number One - Novak Djokovic look rather ordinary in the scorching Centre Court. Whatever happens from now on, Andy Murray has earned a place in sporting history and if he isn't voted this year's BBC Sports Personality of the Year in December I will post a photo of myself in this blog - wearing just my pink Y fronts!...Feeling flushed ladies? It'll never happen. Well done Andy! Braveheart indeed!

Roving

What a scorcher!...In spite of the doom and gloom merchants who told us that Great Britain is in for years of wet summers, early July is lovely and warm - how our summers are meant to be. As I write this post, our garden is ablaze with sunshine and yesterday I undertook an arduous five hour walk in the southern Peak District, parking in the "estate village" of Ilam. Here are just a few of the pictures I took:-

Town End Cottage in Ilam. Most of the houses here were built for estate workers who serviced Ilam Hall and its associated lands.  Ilam Hall probably dates back to the fifteenth century but it was in the early nineteenth century that the new Ilam Hall was developed by a wealthy industrialist named Jesse Watts-Russell whose son went on to build another Ilam Hall in Christchurch, New Zealand.

This may look like a pile of limestone rubble but it is actually the site of an ancient  water source called St Bertram's Well. Water sources were venerated in pre-Christian times and early Christians cunningly absorbed this culture so that in the middle ages pilgrims descended on Ilam to take the waters from this holy well. In more recent times, a local farmer has clearly damaged the well in order to pipe water to his nearby sheep pasture. It deserves to be preserved for posterity.

I'm always wary of cows when out walking. This group of oestrogen-fuelled  ladies seemed to chase me. Perhaps they thought I was behaving in a bullish manner... or the farmer coming to milk them or the vet with his artificial insemination kit. Whatever it was, I was happy to get across their field and through the gate that leads to Gag Lane.

At a remote uplands farm, the farmer clearly fancies himself as a bit of an amateur meteorologist - hence the swinging stone. Well I guess that when you live miles from anywhere without neighbours or shops, you have to find something to do - apart from animal husbandry.

Please close the gate! View over the Dove Valley and the limestone uplands above it.

After this exhausting walk, I changed into some long trousers and a fresh shirt before motoring into the nearby town of Ashbourne for a curry and then headed home to Sheffield past Carsington Water, through Matlock, Darley Dale and Chatsworth Park. It was nine thirty when I got in and still light. Summertime and the living is easy. 

Popeye

From the sublime ("Unawatuna - December 2004") to the ridiculous (Popeye the Sailorman). Or maybe the other way round? When I was a young lad with permanently scabby knees, I used to love watching Popeye on the box. At first, I could only watch him on other people's televisions as our first TV was BBC only - just one channel and of course we could only watch him in black and white. The cartoon made me think - if that is what America is like - I want to go there!

In spite of his gravelly voice and vulgar laugh, Popeye was a force for good - continuously protecting his gorgeous Olive Oyl from the evil hunk known as Bluto. When the going got tough, all Popeye needed was a fresh can of spinach to boost his energy levels - then Bluto was doomed. There were several other peripheral characters too but  Popeye, Olive and Bluto were always the triad in the middle. The show was guaranteed to make me laugh - but not like Popeye himself for mine was boyish, giggly laughter before cycling home for tea.

In my little sheep-infested, permanently sunny East Yorkshire mono-racial village, we had a playground rhyme:-

I'm Popeye the sailorman

I live in a caravan

I went to the pictures

And pulled down my britches

I'm Popeye the sailorman

In our rural innocence, we didn't realise that there were much muckier rhymes we could have adopted such as:-

I'm Popeye the sailor man

I'm Popeye the sailor man

I sleep with my granny

And tickle her fanny

I'm Popeye the sailor man - toot! toot!

Or:-

I'm Popeye the sailor man, 

I live in a caravan, 

And when it gets chilly,

I tickle my willy,

I'm Popeye the sailor man

They were probably reserved for urban playgrounds in mysterious faraway places like Leeds, New York or Cairns.

Wikipedia research brings this information up about Popeye:-

Popeye the Sailor Man is a cartoon fictional character created by Elzie Crisler Segar, He first appeared in the daily "King Features" comic strip-  "Thimble Theatre" on January 17, 1929.

After that the Popeye industry grew year on year and in 1980 a feature film was made starring Robin Williams as Popeye. I didn't see it but incidentally - much of this was filmed in Malta. In recent years I haven't heard much about Popeye. Perhaps he doesn't appeal to modern children or maybe the media moguls are siding with Bluto and the forces of evil and greed these days. Here's a Popeye flashback from 1933. You may need to skip an ad:-