Forlorn

Today we met up with Shirley's sister and her boyfriend. They have been seeing each other for a good few months now. The only trouble is that he lives in The Channel Islands while she lives in a village near Selby, Yorkshire. We met in Thorne and enjoyed a pleasant lunch together in "The Punchbowl Inn". He seemed like a pleasant fellow and it is great that Shirley's sister has found him. Her husband died in 2011 so it has been quite a long time since she had a man in her life.

Afterwards, Shirley and I drove to the nearby settlement of Moorends. I had an idea that we might stroll to The Humberhead Peatlands Nature Reserve but it was a bit far. We passed the site of Thorne Colliery where there is now a solar farm. I find that rather ironic.

I am sure that there are many decent and happy people in Moorends but the place itself seems desolate and unloved. The houses were nearly all built by the local council or The National Coal Board. There's a dearth of trees but  plenty of litter, broken concrete and dog faeces. Two laughing yobs careered past us in the street on exhaust belching go-karts that were probably acquired illegally. On the main street there are basic shops and takeaways - the stuff of survival, not aspiration. This is the "other" England - forgotten, neglected. Just east of Doncaster, on the wrong side of the railway track.

Where Grange Road meets Northgate, a forlorn pony was tethered to a stake on rough wasteground. I wanted to release him and lead him off into the sunset and freedom but I guess he has an important role to play as the living symbol of Moorends. Poor thing. He looked at me through his unkempt fringe as if to say "What kind of life is this?"

Fakery

Trump keeps banging on about "fake news" but there's plenty of fakery about him. His complexion is unnaturally bronzed - as if he applies foundation cream each morning. Then there's his weird hair. Once it was dark brown but now it's kind of blonde and it balances on his head like a Scottish sporran. Just occasionally you get tantalising glimpses of the baldness beneath the sporran. But what about his teeth? A row of ultra-white porcelain veneers that must have cost him a fortune. These are certainly not the natural teeth of a seventy year old man.

And what about his marriage? Even that seems fake to me. The Slovenian immigrant Melania languishes happily in New York City whilst "The Donald" plays up to the cameras in Washington D.C.. And whenever they meet her body language speaks volumes about the repulsion she feels deep inside. They're just playing at being President and First Lady.

One of the things I really don't get about the "fake news" accusations is that America's press and news services are pretty conservative and tend towards The Republicans. Surely it would have been in Trump's own interest to placate them and bring them on board. But at every opportunity he denigrates them just like his laughable pipsqueak of a White House press secretary - Sean Spicer.

Great to see Spicer lampooned brilliantly on "Saturday Night Live" by Melissa McCarthy. Go here.

Fox

A break from decorating. So where did I go? To my painting class of course! But the painting class doesn't cover matt emulsion or the best way to use paint rollers. No. It's about Art with a big "A".

This was the last of six sessions. I am pleased to say that the class has given me a boost and I suspect and hope  I will continue with the pastime in a solitary fashion. It has been a case of rediscovering my mojo.

Meike in Ludwigsburg, Germany asked if I might make a picture of a fox for her so this evening I took along a photo of the old fox that used to come in our garden. We called him Fred Fox and this is the photograph I decided to base my painting upon:-

Working on coloured paper, this is the version of Fred Fox that I created after two hours at the final Art class. Perhaps Meike will like it but if she doesn't I will try to make her a different fox painting.

Decorating

Caramel Latte

Out there in the blogosphere, it may have appeared that the author of this blog has been keeping a low profile over the past few days. Such a suspicion is accurate because I have been engaged in a grim, time-consuming human activity called decorating which is only slightly less onerous than grave digging.

The target for my endeavours has been our front room or lounge or sitting room -  whatever you want to call it. Before the decorating begins there's the moving of furniture. I took most of the furniture out of the room but I was still left with two leather sofas which I placed on top of each other in the centre of the room. Of course there's also the carpet which needed to be protected from possible paint spills as we do not plan to replace it - just give it a damned good clean when the decorating is done.

Above the picture rail, I have painted the frieze areas and the ceiling almond white using brushes and rollers. Plenty of this almond white emulsion paint finished up on my hands. One substantial blob of it plopped into my right eye and a smaller blob landed on the end of my nose. When decorating I wear paint-splattered old clothes and trainers (American: sneakers) and I leave my nice wristwatch by our bed for obvious reasons. Yesterday, when I took an empty paint can out to our wheelie bin, our next door neighbour Tony grinned at my stylish apparel and asked,"What are you painting today Picasso?" Cheeky monkey!

The almond white went on top of barley white but the difference between these two colours is so slight that you can only really tell where you have painted in daylight. In electric light, the two colours appear to merge into one.

The walls have been easier in that I didn't have to balance on aluminium step ladders and also the new colour - caramel latte - is somewhat different from the previous wall colour. To get behind the central heating radiator, I used a long-armed roller which worked a treat and meant I didn't have to remove the radiator sending mucky water squirting everywhere.

The job isn't over yet. I still have to do the skirting boards, radiator, window ledge and the picture rail in white satin paint. Then time must be left for the paint to dry properly before I get the furniture back in place. As it happens, the two leather sofas which we have had for about twenty years will soon be replaced. We ordered two new "La-Z- Boy" sofas from a local department store before Christmas and they have now arrived in the warehouse earlier than expected. That is what sent me spiralling into a decorating frenzy.

When undertaking decorating projects, it used to be that I could bounce up and down like a tree frog but these days I have dicky knees and have to be careful when kneeling down or getting up again. I must always remember to use my foam rubber kneeling pads or face the consequences. Even so,  I was hobbling uncomfortably when I strolled out at lunchtime today en route to the Oxfam shop where I put a shift in with no paint pots, rollers, rags , brushes or dust sheets in sight. But they were all waiting for me when I got home.

Nevertheless, as Scarlett O'Hara correctly stated - Tomorrow is another day.

Almond White

"Human"

"Human" by Rag and Bone Man ( Rory Graham). Enjoy!

I'm only human

I'm only, I'm only

I'm only human, human

Maybe I'm foolish

Maybe I'm blind

Thinking I can see through this

And see what's behind

Got no way to prove it

So maybe I'm blind

But I'm only human after all

I'm only human after all

Don't put your blame on me

Don't put your blame on me

Take a look in the mirror

And what do you see

Do you see it clearer

Or are you deceived

In what you believe

'Cause I'm only human after all

You're only human after all

Don't put the blame on me

Don't put your blame on me

Some people got the real problems

Some people out of luck

Some people think I can solve them

Lord heavens above

I'm only human after all

I'm only human after all

Don't put the blame on me

Don't put the blame on me

Handshakes

The 45th President of The United States of America uses handshakes to assert himself and signal his dominance. Did you see the embarrassing way in which he squeezed and held on to Shinzo Abe's hand last week? It was quite disrespectful. Mr Abe was doing his best to pull away but the 45th President held on, beaming triumphantly at the cameras.

Some men are of the opinion that  a handshake should be so firm it's almost vice-like. Perhaps they see it as a way of signalling their manliness or their sincerity or like the 45th President - their dominance. Other men have weak and rather gentle handshakes so that the proffered hand feels like a limp lettuce. My own handshake is in between the two -  firm but not knuckle-cracking. I don't want to dominate, I just want to say hello - we are equal.

You need to be careful with overly firm handshakes as sometimes they can hurt the recipient. He or she may be slightly arthritic or they may have a ring or two on their fingers. They may have had a recent hand injury. Squeezing too hard could be painful.

Another tactic the 45th President employs is to use his spare hand to grip the receiver's arm as if to say, "We are shaking hands but I'm in charge here buddy! Make no mistake!" What at first appears to be a friendly greeting becomes a non-verbal interactive device, a tool of assertion.

I wonder what your philosophy is when it comes to shaking hands with others?

CAPTION COMPETITION - Canadian PM Justin Trudeau

 meeting The 45th President earlier today:-

Surnames

Here in England, it used to be the case that double barrelled surnames were the preserve of the rich landowning gentry. Pray rise for Sir Henry and Lady Margaret Ponsonby-Smythe! May I introduce Major Fortescue-McDonald and Sir William Cavendish-Pratt. Often the collision of surnames was connected with estates and noble family histories.

However, during my decades as a secondary school teacher I noticed a growing trend towards double-barrelled surnames in ordinary households.There were various reasons for this phenomenon. Sometimes it was to do with divorce. In other instances it was frequently to do with children being born out of wedlock. Hence Tyson Johnson-Smith was the son of a roofer called Graham Johnson and his mistress Shelley Smith who had two other children by different fathers - Chardonnay O'Reilly-Smith and Cameron Obafemi-Smith.

You can perhaps appreciate the basic reasoning behind these modern surname choices.

But let's suppose that in maturity Chardonnay O'Reilly-Smith hooks up with a fellow called Sam Ramsbottom-Vincent. After a few months, Chardonnay announces that she is pregnant and in due course a beautiful baby is born. Now Sam and Chardonnay are unmarried so how will Baby Elvis be named? Will he have a four-barrelled surname? Elvis O'Reilly-Smith-Ramsbottom-Vincent?

And move onwards twenty or thirty years - Elvis O'Reilly-Smith-Ramsbottom-Vincent falls in love with Madonna Gibson-Williams-Brague-Gray. When they have a little baby girl, does she become Adele O'Reilly-Smith-Ramsbottom-Vincent-Gibson-Williams-Brague-Gray? An eight-barrelled surname! 

It's hard to get your head round this but multiple surnames no longer suggest privilege and land ownership. On the contrary, they often suggest dimness, shaky relationships and a lack of historical perspective or foresight. I often felt a little sorry for children from the local council estates who had to suffer double-barrelled last names so heaven  knows how teachers of the future will feel about eight-barrelled surnames. Perhaps some of the teachers will also bear them - Yes Miss Douglas-Raptor-Dalgleish-Hunter-Fitzpatrick-Martinez-Kruschev-Trump, I do know the answer to your question!