November, You Didn't Let Us Down. Grumpy's Alternative News.

    Let's talk money for starters. Anyone got any spare cash? So what's going, cheap or otherwise. A Supermarine Swift jet aircraft on eBay, cheap at £250,000. Or some bed items, maybe? Hitler's single sheet and pillow, embroidered with his initials, estimated auction price, £3,000 (Bristol). The sign, reading 'BED PEACE' that hung above John Lennon and Yoko Ono's 'bed in' in 1969. (on sale at Christies, London, estimated price £100,000). No, how about the blackboard from the room where Michael Jackson died. Reads 'I (heart) Daddy SMILE, it's for free.' Written in chalk by his children, estimated price, £250. We may be broke, but there's still plenty of money about. The world's most expensive train ticket fetched £3,872  at auction in Cirencester. (Journey from Banagher and Maryborough, original price 9s 4d.) A doll, originally bought in 1747 fetched £58,850 at Bonhams in London. Not over surprised, London after all is, well, London. (There's an unmodernised flat, two bedrooms, for sale in Belgravia. Only £600,000 and its got a long lease. Not really, how would ten years suit you!

    Mind you, for the 'real' money its back to the good old US of A. Liz Taylor's 'La Peregrina' necklace is to be auctioned in New York in December, estimate, $3 million. This after all is the country that has built a robotic rover (called Curiosity) to investigate whether Mars is capable of supporting life. The cost of this 'robot', £1.6 billion! We can't compete with that. Why bother! We are in recession. We are careful with the money, we have to be. So the 99p stores contribution to it all is to be applauded. A bra for less than £1. (Choice of three colours plus a bow at the front.) Well done (ladies?), now how about something for the chaps!

    Petty criminals, now they're always good for a smile. Like the thief on the the church roof in Lincoln who took the lead and left behind a can of Polish lager covered in his finger prints. And the A-level student from Wolverhampton who stole two left-footed trainers from a shop during the August riots. (Doesn't say much for modern A levels.) Or the burglar tip toeing round a bedroom in Swansea when his mobile phone went off. Not so petty the hopelessly inadequate postman in Torquay who finished up with over 30,000 undelivered, unopened  items dating back to 2008. (A third of it junk mail) Stored in his shed, his car and a local garage. Interestingly enough, he's been replaced by two postmen and a van!

Now ten unrelated titbits that I found interesting.

1 Danica May Camacho born to a 'jeepney' driver in the Philippines one Sunday night in November was the seventh billion human being.

2 Two Russian families, whose children aged 12 were accidentally switched at birth have bought houses next to each other with compensation from a court.

3 A researcher at Oxford University has been honoured for devising a fence that scares away elephants in Africa by buzzing like a bee.

4 A couple in Ratley, Warwickshire have had to halt their house extension work after four skeletons, part of an Anglo-Saxon burial ground were found under their patio.

5 5000 portions of curry were served in Trafalgar Square from malformed vegetables to highlight the fact that 30% of all fruit and vegetables is rejected by supermarkets for not meeting cosmetic standards.

6 270 tons of miniature Eiffel Towers were sized in police raids on illicit street vendors in Paris.

7 A teenager preparing for a skiing trip to the South Pole prepared by spending the night in a supermarket freezer. In Iceland of course.

8 Tonga won a competitive football match for the first time in their history. Their Man of the Match was Johny 'Jayieh' Saelua, the first transgender footballer to play in the World Cup.

9 Surgeons removed a piece of bone from Matthew Willey, took it from one Birmingham hospital to another  for radiotherapy, returned it and reattached it, all in a ten hour operation.  

10 Johny Rotton, of Sex Pistols fame drew some rather crude drawings on the wall of his flat in London, in 1977. It has been suggested they be preserved, being, like the cave paintings in France, 'of archaeological interest'.

    Finally a few 'rude' bits I couldn't help noticing. The Office For National Statistics has published figures for a 'baby boom', suggesting it was down to last years long and harsh winter. Really! San Francisco is changing the law and making it an offence to enter a restaurant naked. Evidently it has been putting people off eating! (Surely a Freudian slip that reported it was making the city the butt of many a joke?)

    A man accused of secretly filming himself making love to his girlfriend in South Wales claimed it was 'research not voyeurism', he being a 'Time and Motion Consultant'. You couldn't make it up! (He was found not guilty. One person who saw the 35 minute video said, and I quote, 'There was very little action in it.')

    The mind boggles but not in the same league as the Russian historian and expert on local cemeteries. He had 29 mummified female corpses, some posed, in his home, all dressed up as life-size dolls. Some with music boxes, toy hearts and soap inserted into the rib cages. He was described by a local newspaper editor as a loner with 'certain quirks'. Rather an understatement I fear. I think Louis hit it in one 'What a Wonderful World'.   

Nutty November.Grumpy's Alternative News..

Where shall we start. Now there's supposed to be a recession, so let's talk money.

I notice pencils made from the Mary Rose timbers are for sale at £250 each; The Mary Rose Trust hopes to raise £50,000.

It was recently announced Buckingham Palace spent almost £100,000 cleaning chandeliers in one year and the first personal computer, Apple 1 was sold at Christies for £133,250. A casino owner in Macau bid £211,000 for two white truffles (weight 907 grams) and a rare 1872 stamp fetched £220,000 in an auction in Berlin. (Actually it was only half a stamp as they were in short supply at the time!) A collection of 450 London Transport posters from the 1920/30's fetched £233,000, again at Christies. Almost as much as a fireman fleeced from his workmates in a betting scam in Chelsea. (The actual amount was £250,000). The lyrics written by John Lennon on the back of a bill for £12 were expected to fetch £350,000 (the song was I'm Only Sleeping) and the Walther pistol used by James Bond in From Russia With Love fetched £277,250 at, where else, Christies.

Now for the real money.

A Canadian couple won £6.7 million in a national lottery and promptly gave 98% of it away, to churches and a hospital; nice, kind people, Canadians. And a 14.2 diamond called 'the perfect pink' fetched £15.000,000 in an auction in Christies, this time at their Hong Kong branch. But the sale of the month has to be the 18th century Qianlong-era ceramic vase found in an attic clearance in Ruislip, West London and sold in auction for £51,000,000. (Mind you, even that will be pocket money when the Blackburn Rovers Football Club's sale to Indian owner of 'Venky's Chickens' goes through.. £46,000,000 for starters, but much, much more to follow.) Recession, what recession!

Mind you, money is all right when you've got it. Not so funny for the man from Southend who left £80,000, his life savings in plastic bags on the roof of his car; he says he's 'gutted'. So is the German musician who left a £850,000 violin on a train. In this case he got it back, but he had to be treated by a doctor!

So what else was in the news. Four little animal stories.

Knut the polar bear in Berlin Zoo is suffering. He is being bullied by three females (polar bears, silly!) He now spends most of his time on a rock while the others snap at him and steal his food. Life must be 'unbearable'. Sorry! And again in Berlin Zoo, two male griffon vultures, Detlef and Guido have been forcibly separated and put with females (yes vultures) in the hope that they will mate. Which has upset some of the German community; the gay community to be precise. This has led to protests at the zoo gates. Nothing new in Germany. Five years ago a public petition prevented a pair of gay penguins at Bremerhaven Zoo from being split up.

Apple and Cider, turkeys, have been spared the Thanksgiving dinner table in the annual White House ceremony. Only this year they won't be going to Disneyland like their predecessors. Disneyland don't want any more Christmas turkeys. Shame on you, Disney, what's the world coming to! Not as lucky as three elephants rescued in Assam. Evidently Assam state has a serious elephant smuggling problem, they have lost over ninety in the last five years. I know they fetch over one million rupees, but how do you get a five and a half ton elephant through checkpoints set up to stop the smuggling of contraband?

Four idiots .

The official who decided a lady from Shaftsbury (Canadian passport) must take a citizen test. She has lived here for sixty four years. The surgeon who neglected the post-operative care of patients because he was too busy as chairman of the British Medical Association. Lewis Hamilton, fined for performing 'wheel spins' on a public road in Melbourne. What a role model, what an example to others! Nick Ginetta, car and truck salesman who thinks its clever to give away a free AK 47, the world's most notorious assault rifle with every sale. No wonder the USA has a gun problem.

And three who need closer supervision!

The council of the London Borough of Sutton has spent £3.2 million on its new street log benches. Unfortunately a faulty mechanism causes the benches to roll if anyone sits on them!

And talking of seats, an Indian co-pilot on an international jet flight accidentally knocked the control panel whilst adjusting his seat. He was so flustered he couldn't unlock the cabin door to let the captain, who had gone to the toilet, back in. The plane nosedived for 7000 feet before the captain regained entrance and control. (He had to wrestle the controls from the co-pilot.) At least the man in Berlin accidentally walling himself in his cellar was only in charge of a trowel. He was intending to seal up the cellar entrance but finished the job on the inside. It took him two days to get out.

And a couple of stories with a 'good feel' factor. A fourteen month old toddler fell out of a seventh floor window of a block of flats in Paris. he bounced off a cafe awning into the arms of a waiting doctor. He was unscathed and fell asleep within minutes. Normally the awning would have been retracted, the cafe being closed, but the mechanism wasn't working; a miracle indeed.

Britain's first dating agency for ugly people (theuglybugball.com) is celebrating its first engagement. Tom Clifford and Janice Walker met less than a month ago. Mr Clifford, described as 'Having a face that makes children cry' said, 'She's beautiful and I love her in every possible way.' Everyone say aah.!

Finally my 'Its all in the worst possible taste' section.
I see an Indian company, Gou Brands Private have developed an aftershave made with bovine urine. Plus Gauloka Peya is evidently a sugary soft drink laced with cow urine. They reckon its a threat to pepsi and coca-cola sales. Honest! Interesting place, India. I see they are increasing the pension of elderly eunuchs. Evidently they get a rough time of it when they are old. I see the Soil Association wants to overturn the ban on spreading human sewage on the land. (I remember it well in my youth.) Evidently we are short of phosphates and human sewerage is rich in the stuff. Why dispose of it, what a 'waste'. Sorry again!
Stephen Fry doesn't seem to like the ladies. he 'tweeted' that the only reason women slept with men was that 'sex is the price they are willing to pay for a relationship. Unlike Silvo Berlusconi who seemingly loves the ladies. The press reckons he has some lively parties at his private residences. He denies it of course but his case is not helped when he restores ancient statues in his office. Including one of Mars, now complete with a new penis. For some reason it has been announced the new parts are 'removable'.

The Erotica fair did well at Olympia in London. It seems some of the exhibitors could teach other businesses a thing or two in these austere times. A pair of lady blacksmiths from Wales switched careers making bondage equipment. Apparently a growing market, a 'spanking' good business to be in, one firm making bondage gear previously made bouncy castles!

Finally, finally.

A leading consultant plastic surgeon is being threatened with a libel action after suggesting 'Boob Job' cream, (for sale in John Lewis etc cost £125 for a 100ml pot) is likely to be ineffective. (The claim is for a 8.4% increase). The reason this caught my eye was the incident in a Jersey Co-operative supermarket where a customer was overcharged by £5. Evidently the assistant's seat was too low, causing her breasts to rest on the scales! The shop assistant was apparently mortified. The £5 excess intrigues me; I make no further comment. Feel free to suggest an 'inappropriate' headline!

Memories are Made of This. (Dean Martin)

Some of my readers will remember that I have been involved in an autobiographical work for some considerable time. Sixty thousand words later a torrent of words have become a dribble.

Now I honestly believe everything we have ever experienced is stored in our minds, for the human brain is cleverer than any computer. The problem is how to recall a lifetime's 'happenings'.

I have lived for well over twenty five thousand days, perish the thought. But how many of those days can I honestly recall. For someone who can rarely remember what he had for breakfast, quite a thought! In life's journey what do we actually remember.

We usually remember births (our children, not our own), weddings, funerals, serious illnesses, some holidays, and very occasional special days in a lifetime in employment. Schooldays, some at least stay in the mind though actual dates are often gone forever. We often remember 'firsts'. Our first television, new furniture (when poor and first married), and as we prospered, first and subsequent cars, houses and so on.

We remember days from decades; in my case the forties, fifties, sixties, seventies and eighties. (Strangely I remember less of the nineties.) We can often recall a day or days at the age of ten, twenty, thirty, forty and so on. (I often suggest to elderly groups who 'hire' me as a speaker that they all write a day in their life and publish it as a fundraiser, the end products often dwarfs my efforts.)

We sometimes remember great moments in history and exactly what we were doing at the time. The assassinations for instance of J F Kennedy and John Lennon. (I remember a school teacher coming into the class room and announcing that a man called Gandhi, of whom I had never heard had been assassinated in a country that I knew not of, called India. I suspect many of our most entrenched memories are the result of trauma.

Both my wife and I are ardent fans of Derby County and seldom miss a home game. (Please, no rude comments though messages of sympathy are acceptable.) Over the years I have probably watched nearly a thousand football matches. That would account for over 90,000 minutes of my life if my maths are right. (I was an English teacher, not maths!) Yet I remember one match in detail, at Wembley Stadium and bits and pieces of a few others. The details of whole seasons I cannot recall.

I have just had a wonderful relaxed, pleasant overnight stay in our motorhome in Castleton, Derbyshire. Weather, perfect, company, perfect, experience, perfect. As I said earlier I am absolutely sure such memories are stored in the mind forever more, but more important, will I be able to recall such a tiny part of my life in five years time. (For the religious amongst you, where do our memories go after we are dead?) Mine hopefully will in part be written down, but, realistically, from a cynical point of view, who else cares.

I kept a diary of sorts for one year as a child. (See blog dated Diary of an Adolescent, 1953 dated 11th April 2009.) I also kept a diary in far more detail for the year 1985. I'm no Samuel Pepys but it is of value to me in that it records unimportant details of my life that year. (It seems to be around 70,000 words long.) It also details for only the second time in my life what I did on given days. (It does not record every single day, even I recognise the sheer mundanity of my life at times.) But it is useful in showing the minuscule nature of daily life.

June 16th 1985

Woken at 5.00 am by children in an adjoining tent! On Saturday evening a family arrived complete with shining Mercedes.The camping field contained only four tents. Our new neighbours promptly pitched tent within feet of our tent! How strange is it that we are conditioned to live in close proximity to our neighbours. Are we therefore almost frightened of the wide open spaces offered! ( In actual fact, when the minor irritation of the close proximity wore off the family proved to be pleasant, outgoing neighbours.)

Skegness is again visited, fish and chips, that most staple of diets again sampled. We return home mid afternoon happy and relaxed. Who needs the Costa-Bravo!

Now, dear readers, what do you remember from your journey through life.

One, a memory from childhood.

Two, a memory that highlights for you a certain decade.

Three, something of world shattering importance.

Four, something of importance to you only.

Finally, a happy event you will remember forever.

There and Back to See how Far it is.

Do you remember the saying' There and back to see how far it is.' I wonder where it came from.

I was on holiday in Southwold recently. There I met a delightful man and his family. We chatted, as holiday makers do and he turned out to be, like myself, a football fan. Now I reckon I'm keen, but he far surpassed my dedication to Derby County. I noticed he had tattooed on his fingers letters that together spelt out the words TRUE BLUE, his love of Chelsea Football Club self evident. Even more remarkable was the large tattoo on his back. He was proud of his tattoo and showed it willingly, there presumably for all eternity. The name Chelsea and their post code for all to see. He was indeed a character, a very affable one and he lived on the Isle of Sheppey.

Many years ago, when lessons came to an end early (lesson plans, what's a lesson plan?) I had a pupil who rescued me many a time. He gave a touching rendering of 'Old Shep' that was far more moving than anything I had offered in the previous fifty minutes. The ending was guaranteed to bring tears to the eyes of even the most street-wise.

'Old Shep he has gone

Where the good doggies go

and no more with old Shep will I roam

But if dogs have a heaven

There's one thing I know

Old Shep has a wonderful home.'

(Evidently you can get the lyrics of Old Shep as a ringtone. As Michael Caine would say 'Not a lot of people know that'!)

All this was in the seventies when Elvis Presley, who recorded Old Shep was particularly popular. (Walter Brennan's version is far more moving and probably influenced Elvis.) The day Elvis died is one of those dates in history that almost everyone can remember where they were when the news broke. (August 16th, 1977. I was at Chapel St Leonards at the time camping with my family.) Who could fail to remember such important moments in history.

Yet they also reckon most people remember where they were when both J F Kennedy and John Lennon were shot. I remember the Kennedy assassination yet have no recollection as to my whereabouts when John Lennon's demise unfolded.

A strange thing, memory. Many amongst us can remember what we were doing at the age of five, in some cases being over sixty years ago. Yet we have difficulty in remembering more than three items 'the wife' sent us to buy at the supermarket less than an hour ago. I once attended a funeral on the wrong day, went to the wrong church to attend a wedding, visited town on my bike and came home on the bus. (Not all on the same day!) Not that a sat nav or a computerised memory aid would have made much difference.

Sat navs, who needs them! I reckon we are on auto pilot in life, particularly when driving, for much of the time. (A year or so travelling north from Bath on a filthy black night, my wife and I had sat nav trouble; the darn thing refused to let us find the motorway. After what seemed for ever, the wind blowing a gale we arrived in a dark gloomy town. I wound my window down and shouted to one of the few people daft enough to be on the street. 'Gloucester?' I enquired quizzically. 'Cheltenham' he replied dismissively.)

I know little regarding Cheltenham. It has if I remember rightly an establishment for the education of young ladies, Cheltenham College that is highly regarded. I served as a teacher in a large comprehensive for many years. But it was certainly no Cheltenham. A public school yes, in that anyone could come, but an establishment of refinement, not really.

I have taught both in the secondary age sector and in adult education. In the latter I taught a young man, previously one of my school pupils. He had led a somewhat undisciplined life since leaving school, and had served a spell in prison. He was sentenced, amongst other things for hiding a policeman's helmet in a lively street altercation. I wonder what the charge was.

He once told me that 'he had run over a car.' 'What were you driving, a bulldozer' I asked with typical teaching ignorance. 'No,' he replied, exasperated at his former teachers stupidity. 'You know, ran over a car. Ran over, up onto the bonnet, over the roof and down the boot.' He was in my 'night school' class because he now realised the value of education and wished to 'better himself.'.

He too had a tattoo; plus it was on his back ; a tattoo and picture in large letters. Only he wasn't a Chelsea supporter. He had had this tattoo done when he was barely out of school. Now, some fifteen or twenty years later, with a wife and children, he was less than enamored with his tattoo.

He no longer went in the local swimming baths and certainly not with his children. At seventeen or so it had seemed a fun thing to do. His tattoo too will be there for ever and a day. And why is he less keen nowadays. I don't suppose too many people would like a large coloured butterfly and the words 'Butterflies Eat Shit' across their nether regions. Ah, the foolishness of youth. I wonder if my Chelsea friend will ever rue the day he had inscribed his support of Chelsea.

Where Were You When it Happened?

The Armistices of Two World Wars are in the news this time of year and rightly so. There are people who will remember exactly where they were as they were announced, in 1918 and again in 1945. Even the second is not within my memory although I do remember VE Day celebrations quite vividly. Which set me thinking, how many events in life do we remember for whatever reason. Not the everyday events thrown at us on life's long journey, but those unique, special one offs never to be repeated. It would be easy to browse through an almanac of world events but that would be cheating. For if we have to look it up, so to speak, has it really been implanted forever on our hearts.
I remember as a child a teacher coming into a classroom (I can remember which particular classroom and the teacher's name, Mr Jones.) and announcing that a man called Gandhi had been killed. We did not know of a man called Gandhi, or for that matter where India was but the word assassinated intrigued.
How many remember where they were when John F Kennedy's assassination was announced. I was outside my grandmothers in Ockbrook, Derbyshire, tinkering with a vehicle when someone came outside to announce the news. Yet I am unsure as to which vehicle was involved. Surely I haven't imagined so important a moment in history? I certainly didn't imagine being told of Elvis's death whilst on holiday with the children in Chapel St Leonards, Lincolnshire. The whole campsite was full of the news for hours if not days; nothing much ever happens in Chapel. In fact this is one of the few memories of the place retained more than twenty four hours. (Though childhood memories of Chapel are positive if unexciting, at least in adult eyes.)
Being a retired person with nothing better to do I was idly watching the news at home when the events of 9/11 unfolded on the TV screen. Transfixed I watched for hours as the sheer horror and importance of the event became apparent. History in the making, who wouldn't remember for ever such an awesome event.

My wife and I sat in a garage on Harvey Road in Derby when the sensational, sad news was announced on the radio that Princess Diana had been killed in a road accident. I even remember where we were going, to Wirksworth to buy a dog grate for the fireplace and then on to Chesterfield. I am not a Royalist so why should this event be so firmly imprinted in my mind?

It is a fact now that almost any event in the world can now be reported at very short notice indeed. Tsunamis, plane crashes, wars, disasters in general blur into each other; we are so bombarded with the worlds terrors and tribulations. Is it that we are fascinated by the dramatic or the morbid, for many of our memories involve death and destruction.

When I was a schoolboy capital punishment was still the norm in this country. Some murderers were hanged. At eight in the morning in London, nine o'clock elsewhere I seem to remember. I, and some other schoolmates were undoubtedly morbidly fascinated, to the extent that we would knowingly glance at the clock if it were a nine o'clock 'happening'.

It is virtually impossible to escape world events almost as they happen. But why do some events burn into our psyche more than others. I don't remember where I was for instance, when it was announced that John Lennon had been shot. What do you remember? Put it another way, to paraphrase Hal David and Burt Bacharach's 1960's song, 'What's it all about, Alfie.'