| Mon 1 | A singularly unexciting day doing loads of household, and other regular, admin. But still the To Do list gets longer. |
| Tue 2 | Why is it that one’s bed is always so much more warm and comfortable when one has to get up? A real struggle to face the world this morning. |
| Wed 3 | Awoke this morning to some significant frost. The first of the winter, and possibly the first of the year. |
| Thu 4 | Why is it that when there are pieces of work needing doing for the groups I volunteer with, those with the reins always try to sloping shoulders the work onto me – when they could just as easily do it themselves? Twice today: one took 5 minutes; the other an hour and was then vetoed by the Chairman. Grrrrrr! |
| Fri 5 | It’s been one of those weeks of first world problems, topped today by (a) the supermarket delivery being 2 hours late, and (b) the Champagne delivery being 1½ hours late. Apparently you just can’t get the staff these days! |
| Sat 6 | One tray roast sausages and veg for dinner – a Mary Berry recipe, adapted as always. Comfort food on a particularly grey, dismal day. |
| Sun 7 | A few weeks ago the dog rose which grows to the top of our silver birch tree was laden with bright red hips. No more. There are hardly any remaining due to the depredations of the wood pigeons and squirrel.
 at the larger version to see just how many there were Meanwhile our small ornamental crab apple is laden with glorious bright red, marble sized fruit.  |
| Mon 8 | Bah! Depression! Humbug! A typical, unexciting and dreary Monday which hopefully doesn’t presage the week going to Hell in a handcart. But grateful (as always) to be solvent again this month. |
| Tue 9 | Other than strimming my hair, the only result today is that I’ve now finished writing & scheduling all next year’s regular monthly blog posts that can be written in advance (that’s 4 a month) plus this year’s blog Advent Calendar. There’s a feast to come! |
| Wed 10 | Mid-morning and there’s a shooting gallery line of 14 pigeons on the apex of the roof opposite. |
| Thu 11 | A young man from Octopus (our gas & electric supplier) arrived (pre-announced) this afternoon to fit a new smart meter. If they were all as polite, cheerful and efficient as him the world would work much more smoothly. He was done and dusted in an hour. Job’s a good ‘un! |
| Fri 12 | Highlight of the Year: today’s trip to the dental hygienist to be abused. |
| Sat 13 | Spent the afternoon trying to do household admin with a purring tabby & white cat stretched out on my desk. This is becoming a regular feature, which is rather lovely (if sometimes inconvenient). |
| Sun 14 | Managed to avoid most of the nauseating Remembrance Day. To quote Evelyn Waugh in 1930s: “A disgusting idea of artificial reverence and sentimentality”, or in my terms “a public display of maudlin sentiment and sycophantic obsequiousness”. If you want to know more of how I feel, see my blog at here and here. |
| Mon 15 | Last night I saw 01:01, 02:02, 03:03 and 04:04 with no more than dozes in between. This was followed by 06:45 then 11:15. No real wonder not a lot has been achieved today! |
| Tue 16 | Turned my CPAP machine on last night; it ran for 10 seconds and died. No ventilation, thus a poor night’s sleep and a crashing headache. Brompton Hospital are sending me a new machine; wonder how long that will take? |
| Wed 17 | A second night without CPAP as the new machine has not yet arrived. One always wonders how much good these things do, especially after almost 20 years, but this has made me realise I would be totally dysfunctional without the CPAP. |
| Thu 18 | The new CPAP machine has arrived. Hoping for a good night’s sleep tonight. Which indeed I had. |
| Fri 19 | Really disgraceful service (again) with the supermarket delivery – booked for 11:00-12:00, but arrived at 15:00. Topped by effectively zero communication. Their executive office got a roasting. |
| Sat 20 | Who knew today was Cat Herding Day? Awoke this morning to find two females in our front garden trying (unsuccessfully) to catch their very young cat. Good game! Later in the day we rounded up ours to flea treat them. Tilly needed it badly as I later removed over 30 moribund beasts from her at a rate of about 2 a minute. |
| Sun 21 | “By the way, the mic’s off. To turn it back on slide the switch …” Fucking shut up! That’s why it’s turned off. |
| Mon 22 | Ducked out after 30 minutes of a meeting I was dialled into this evening. I’m not wasting time while the borough’s old pussy (of all genders) argues publicly with the council over who did/didn’t do what, to whom and when. |
| Tue 23 | Discussion over dinner: Why does time whizz by so fast as you get older? The theory is that when young you have many new things happening which act as markers, so you notice time more; whereas when old there are fewer markers and everything blurs. |
| Wed 24 | Woken up just before 10 this morning by the arrival of the Boy Cat, who proceeded to lie on my pillow purring and dribbling. N and I had both overslept solidly – best thing to do on a miserable November morning. |
| Thu 25 | A limping cat: Tilly appears to have sprained her right front paw. |
| Fri 26 | Over dinner a chemist (me) trying to explain aromaticity (think benzene) and metal complexes (think chlorophyll or haemoglobin) to an art historian (N). |
| Sat 27 | A merry time was had by all turning out and auditing the freezer. As always we found a few bits of treasure, and an equal quantity of rubbish. Sadly there isn’t the empty space which we were hoping for in the run-up to Christmas. |
| Sun 28 | It’s that time already, when you have to sit down and write the Christmas cards which are going abroad. Sadly they’re getting fewer every year. Yes we do still send Christmas cards; we like to and think it is a good way to keep in touch. |
| Mon 29 | Finished making a huge pan of tomato soup, which I’d started yesterday and left to mature overnight. We then devoured half of it for tea: tasty, filling and warming. |
| Tue 30 | I wasn’t looking forward to that meeting, although it was much more interesting and less contentious than expected. Even so I’m glad it’s done. And breathe! And gin & tonic! |
Category Archives: personal
Unblogged October
| Fri 1 | Every week, by Friday teatime, I’m convinced it’s Saturday. Every week! |
| Sat 2 | Writing a monthly update for my GP’s patient group usually takes under 2 hours. But today … it took me over 4 hours because there was just so much healthcare news to be included. |
| Sun 3 | We had a 3 or 4 large radish plants still growing scruffily. I pulled them out today and one was a decent sized mooli. The others had some pretty little pink flowers but no radishes. |
| Mon 4 | Especially for N on her (big) birthday, we went to the dentist for a check-up. She has to go back in 6 weeks time for some work; I got away with being nagged. |
| Tue 5 | Somehow this was just a non-day. Been on zombie auto-pilot all day. Nothing happened. And I don’t feel I achieved anything. This is not good for the depression. |
| Wed 6 | Somehow we seem to have spent very little money in the last month – at least as far as discretionary spend goes. So we’re solvent again this month! |
| Thu 7 | Spent too much of the day playing around with photo carousels and sliders for websites. And writing blog posts. Oh, and it’s Thursday not Friday! |
| Fri 8 | Draconid Meteor Shower tonight. Not a chance. Yet again complete cloud cover. It’s all a piece with the day. |
| Sat 9 | While photographing the tree outside our house a lady came along and stopped to talk, saying how lovely the tree was.
What a breath of fresh light – we saw, we appreciated, and we shared some joy. So whoever you were, lady, thank you! |
| Sun 10 | Our resident wood pigeon is making short work of all the rose hips at the top of the silver birch. Soon there won’t be any left to feed the goldfinches over the winter. |
| Mon 11 | Nothing achieved, except too much chocolate eaten. Cadbury’s new DarkMilk is good, as is their Bournville Chocotoff. |
| Tue 12 | My mother would have been 106 today. Sad that she got to only 99. Still very much missed. |
| Wed 13 | Invited today for my Covid Booster jab – 6 months to the day after my second jab. |
| Thu 14 | Why is it that people can’t understand why GPs’ surgeries work the way they do? Doctors are employers who have a legal health & safety responsibility for their staff, as well as their patients and themselves. And the receptionists are not there to be obstructive, nosey dragons, but to help. |
| Fri 15 | Gave up on the day in early evening. I’d had enough of being bombarded on all sides by demands for things outside my control. Remember: Don’t shoot the messenger! |
| Sat 16 | We both to the local pharmacy for Covid booster jabs this morning. Although a minority, sad at the number in the pharmacy not (properly) wearing masks. |
| Sun 17 | N spotted another clump of huge fungi growing down near the pond and sent me to look. They’re each 20cm across and look like bracket fungi but aren’t: they’re growing in the ground and have gills. White to milk-chocolate brown wth darker brown gills. No idea what they are. |
| Mon 18 | I’ve had a batch of 16th to 18th century wills transcribed and spent a couple of hours looking at the family history info therein. Nothing exciting but they have confirmed much of what I already knew – which is always useful. |
| Tue 19 | I wake at 08:00. The next thing I know it’s 11:00. What happened there? |
| Wed 20 | A joyful morning herding cats. Find all three; one by one round them up and catch them; stuff them in their carriers … and take them to the V.E.T for their overdue annual check-ups and jabs. Return with a large hole in the credit card balance. |
| Thu 21 | Interesting London Historians talk (on Zoom) on the way the nations art treasures were protected during WWII. |
| Fri 22 | Awoke early to a lovely (just past full) silvery moonlit morning, followed by pastel peach-coloured sunrise. |
| Sat 23 | Auditing the wine stock, discovered we gad a bottle of gin which had somehow (I honestly know not how) got out of the store without having its security tag removed. No it wasn’t shoplifted! But how to get the tag off? |
| Sun 24 | At lunchtime a red kite gliding effortlessly around, not taking too much notice of the crow mobbing it. |
| Mon 25 | Oh dear, what has the world come to? Slumming it with fishfingers, chips and beans for tea! |
| Tue 26 | Doing the supermarket order today it feels as if overall prices have risen at least 20% since March 2020. However a quick check back suggests this probably isn’t so and the rises are no more than 5%. |
| Wed 27 | Lots done today, partly as I was up betimes and my morning meeting got moved to next week. Also took delivery of a pre-Christmas top-up for the wine cellar; just need more Champagne now! |
| Thu 28 | Got up this morning to find a pair of geezers digging a hole right outside our front gate. Then remembered the water company are going round installing meters. By midday the hole was covered with a temporary coloured (plastic?) plate; I wonder how long before the hole is filled properly? |
| Fri 29 | 01:15hrs. Why does next door’s security light come on? Oh, good evening Mr Reynard, trotting gaily down the street. |
| Sat 30 | Chaired the Anthony Powell Society AGM over Zoom to allow the officers to concentrate on the business rather than the technology. Glad to say it went well. Moral: Perfect Planning Prevents Pathetic Performance. |
| Sun 31 | Finally managed to break into the security tag on that gin bottle (see above) – at least enough to be able to decant the contents. But it required the attentions of my Dremel “mini-angle-grinder”! |
Christmas Cards
Now you might think this is a bit too early, but today I’m going to talk about our approach to Christmas cards.
First of all (and let’s get this out of the way) unlike many people we still send real Christmas cards. Not e-cards, and not a donation to charity instead. We do this because we like to, and feel it is a good way of keeping contact with friends and family. We also do it because, as you’ll see, we believe our approach adds value to people’s lives – and the evidence tends to support this.
Since 2005 we have created our own Christmas cards – that’s 17 years, including this year. But they are not traditional cards. Instead they are postcards. Many years they’re A5 size; some years DL or square. Each year, a new card.
I’ve included a few examples below, and I’ve also created a full gallery.
Many years the image on the front has been one of my photographs – and it’s quite fun choosing which one to use. A few years we’ve used an image of a piece of art we own (as long as it’s out of copyright). And a few years one of my late mother’s paintings.
But, you say, this is expensive. Well actually it isn’t; it’s a lot cheaper than buying traditional cards, and a lot simpler. OK, in the early years it did feel expensive as we were using a specialist postcard printer; that tended to cost £150 to £200 for 500 A5 cards (so 30p to 40p per card) which was at least competitive compared with traditional cards.
The last few years we’ve used VistaPrint and designed and ordered online – having done it once it is really easy and quick to do again. This year the cost has been £67 for 500 A5 cards (or just over 13p each). Even allowing for the fact that we’ll use only about half of them that’s still only 27p each. Now tell me where one can get good cards at under twice that price. (OK, they still cost a horrid amount in postage, but so would anything.)
But the advantage doesn’t stop there. For a start there’s the fact that we create a postcard; with an image on one side and a greeting on the other. There’s still space for personalising the card, and for an address label. They’re also relatively light weight, thus saving on overseas postage. With printed address labels and no envelopes, they are easy and fiddle-free to write.
On top of which everyone gets something special – and many people tell us they love receiving our cards and often keep them to enjoy. And of course we have the spare cards in stock for later years when we may not be able to produce a new card.
We ordered this year’s cards over last weekend and standard (free) delivery was expected to be in about 2 weeks. The cards arrived on Wednesday (so in 3 working days), and that is typical of VistaPrint‘s service over the years. But you’ll have to wait to see it as the design is staying under wraps for a while yet.
What’s not to like?
Unblogged September
| Wed 1 | Another first today. During lunch, for just a few seconds, a Garden Warbler skulking through the shrubbery outside the Dining Room window. |
| Thu 2 | A very busy 2 days. Actually got done everything I needed to, but that’s not everything on my desk. |
| Fri 3 | Sitting waiting for the supermarket delivery this morning, saw the clock on the cooker say 11:11. I’m always fascinated by times like this which show a pattern, like 01:23, 23:45. |
| Sat 4 | Retrieved the two wasp traps that were put out last Saturday. Not a wasp to be counted – again! Very disappointing, but not a great surprise. |
| Sun 5 | Another day struggling with the depression: sleeping too much; not eating properly; having to resist an excess of gin. |
| Mon 6 | Payday; and time to do the monthly accounts. We’re solvent for another month – even after paying our outstanding income tax. Result! |
| Tue 7 | We bought some Granny Smith apples a few weeks ago, but never used them. Still in their supermarket wrapper they’ve kept well on the sideboard and ripened to a greenish yellow. To my surprise they were rather good: crisp, juicy and slightly sweet: unlike the green cannonballs we are normally sold. |
| Wed 8 | A lovely warm sunny day as it was 42 years ago when N and I were bound together at St Peter’s, Acton Green. |
| Thu 9 | If anything happened today, I didn’t notice. Too busy analysing survey data. |
| Fri 10 | It’s Saturday, so why is EastEnders on TV. Oh! Wait! It’s actually Friday! |
| Sat 11 | There’s a big group on Facebook about the new recipe Felix catfood making cats ill. I’ve been running a survey to try to gather evidence rather than anecdote. Today I finished analysing the 499 records. |
| Sun 12 | Just what are DPD doing delivering on a Sunday? They said the package would arrive Monday, but lo, here it is today. One does not expect this of any courier company. |
| Mon 13 | What did I do today? Apart from starting the production of some pate, I have no clue. |
| Tue 14 | So the hospital have finally decided to cancel my 2019/20 sleep study because of Covid. So glad they’ve finally caught up with reality. |
| Wed 15 | Hurry, hurry, hurry … we’ve just realised we need the website updated … today! |
| Thu 16 | Spent most of the day horizontal. Too dizzy in the head for vertical hold to engage properly. |
| Fri 17 | Vertical hold working intermittently today, which is an improvement. But still not good. |
| Sat 18 | What happened there? Awake-ish at 0600 with a purring, upside-down, cat for company. Next I know it’s 12 noon! But at least vertical hold is restored if not full functionality. |
| Sun 19 | Got some British apples in the supermarket delivery this week – and so I should think at this time of year! Suffolk Pink (a fairly new and unusual variety) and Worcester. The Worcester were good, quite sweet but not over juicy. The Suffolk Pink, although more tart were juicier and crunchier which I prefer. |
| Mon 20 | A day of fiddling about and catching up. Really fed up with the depression and inability to do anything. |
| Tue 21 | Picked almost 3kg runner beans. Sadly they’ve been rather neglected so many are over grown and very stringy. But 4x 200+gm packs frozen. The rest stripped for the beans inside which gave another 600-ish gm. |
| Wed 22 | Put some of the beans salvaged yesterday from our overgrown runners, in tonight’s casserole. And they were good. We Brits are apparently the only ones who eat the pods; everyone else grows them for the beans – and I quite see why! |
| Thu 23 | A voyage of discovery trying to understand how to create flipbooks for websites without having to pay for someone else’s cloud storage. |
| Fri 24 | Flu jabs are go! Invitation by text from GP. Booked in for next week. |
| Sat 25 | That’s another acquaintance gone: Lord Gowrie who was President of the Anthony Powell Society. Former Minister for the Arts. Erudite, knowledgeable, and always friendly. |
| Sun 26 | It could almost be Christmas: roast duck followed by biscuits and cheese (with red wine and port, of course). |
| Mon 27 | Awoke early to belting rain, half a gale and Stygian gloom. A lovely sunny day by lunchtime, if still breezy. |
| Tue 28 | Time to remove a bird’s nest amount of hair from my head. N doesn’t like it this short, but it’s a lot more comfortable and I can do it myself (with N’s assist). |
| Wed 29 | It’s flu jab day, today! Let’s see if it knocks me out this year – like it does most years for a day or so. |
| Thu 30 | Picked another 28 big red ripe chillies from the plants on the study windowsill. That’s 92 so far this summer, and there’s more to come; we should make well over 100. Almost all have gone in the freezer; they should keep us going for years!  Chillies on the bush a couple of days ago (left) and today’s harvest. |
Unblogged August
| Sun 1 | I don’t understand the guy next door to me. He doesn’t like the pigeons because they go “flappy flappy” flying away when he goes down his garden. And yet he persists in chucking old bread out on his garage roof for the birds – mostly pigeons, of course! |
| Mon 2 | A sad day. Returned from lunch to an email that my osteopath had died; he was only 72 although he did have failing kidneys. Over the years he’d become a friend as well as my osteopath. Because of lockdown I’d not seen him for 18 months. A true gentleman, remembered with great affection. |
| Tue 3 | Phew! Work of various sorts today from about 0930 to 2045, including two Zoom meetings. But I did achieve pretty much everything I set out to, and a lot else too. I’ll call that a result! |
| Wed 4 | Slept late, then had a day regrouping after yesterday, and clearing away some of the junk on my desk and in my in-box. |
| Thu 5 | Time to take in the wasp traps (see Thursday 29 July). Oh dear, I’ve caught nothing but a few very small flies. Fuller’s London Pride is obviously not to wasps’ taste. I’m not really surprised as I’ve seen hardly any wasps yet this summer, and the last week hasn’t been good flying weather. |
| Fri 6 | Managed to cock up defining a new website an installing WordPress. I hate having to get the hosting admins to fix it for me. |
| Sat 7 | Slept very late again; achieved little. |
| Sun 8 | Afternoon spent baking: rustic raspberry & blackberry tart; rustic tomato & onion tart; casseroled lamb shanks; stewed gooseberries; stewed blackcurrants. That should keep us fed for a bit. |
| Mon 9 | Spent a large part of the day tinkering around building a website. Why can you never get WordPress to do exactly what you want? |
| Tue 10 | When going out our cats are always told “Take care. See you later. No live prey please.” So what does Boy cat bring us in the middle of lunch? Live mouse. Which he then proceeds to lose in the study! |
| Wed 11 | Anyone who shares their home with a cat, knows they are perverse creatures. Ours, when offered chicken from your plate will tell you it’s their favourite food and ask for more. Today, when taking the meat off the chicken carcass I kept some scraps aside for the cats’ tea. Result: universal disdain from all three! |
| Thu 12 | Last night was supposed to be a peak for the Perseid meteor shower. Yet again, not a hope due to complete cloud cover. We never get to see these phenomena nowadays – just like we don’t get thunderstorms any more. |
| Fri 13 | Friday 13th is always an odd day. Luckily there’s only one this year, compared with 2 last year (March & November). And just one again next year (May). |
| Sat 14 | Last year’s 4 scotch bonnet chilli plants on the study windowsill were cut back in February. They’re being prolific. I’d already picked 15 fruit. Today I harvested 34 chillies, in sizes from “processed pea” to “large ping-pong ball”. They’ve been frozen whole, so small amounts of crushed chilli is easily available when needed. And there’s more to come! |
| Sun 15 | Whatever it was that was going to be done today, wasn’t. |
| Mon 16 | A lot of people are reporting their cats being ill after eating the new recipe Felix cat food; there’s a big group on Facebook, but it’s all anecdote and the manufacturers aren’t listening. So I spent some time drafting a survey to try to gather more reliable information which we can analyse. |
| Tue 17 | Awake and up really early, so I had almost the whole day working on my family history. Many years ago, my mother did a lot of her father’s line, but I think I’ve proven her mistaken about 250 years back. |
| Wed 18 | More work today on firming up yesterday’s family history work. And work on a website for the PPG, which is taking an age! |
| Thu 19 | Wide awake at 0530; shall I get up? Next I know it’s 0930; I’d better get up. Then the next I know it’s 1100; somehow I manage to get up. |
| Fri 20 | Sleep? What is this thing called sleep? Consequently feeling wrecked and the day went to Hell in a handcart. |
| Sat 21 | Was that a day? Up early again on too little sleep so felt out of it all day. Definitely out of it after wine with dinner. Hic! |
| Sun 22 | N picked 2 ice-cream tubs of blackberries from the front garden; it’s a really good, self-set and vigorous blackberry which almost always crops well. There’s also a big patch of large fungi by the wheelie bins; they’re not ordinary mushrooms and not deathcaps; trying to ID them. |
| Mon 23 | Another Monday – at least I’m told it was Monday. And another itching collection of gnat bites. |
| Tue 24 | Got a magnificent book on fungi [Roger Phillips, Mushrooms (2006)] to try to ID the fungi in the front garden. I think they’re probably The Prince, Agaricus augustus. If so they’re supposedly good eating (they’re the same family as commercially grown mushrooms) but I wouldn’t dare risk it. |
| Wed 25 | Why is depression such a vicious spiral of inability to get out of one’s chair? Even on a nice summer’s day. |
| Thu 26 | A hard day’s work organising two very different sets of announcement material for 1 September. |
| Fri 27 | Another of those days where you’re busy all day but seem to have nothing to show for it; except perhaps fish pie for dinner. |
| Sat 28 | Put up the 2 wasp traps for round 2 of Big Wasp Survey. At the same time noticed that the woodland floor between the old apple tree and the pond is prolific with small brown puffballs, probably Scaly Earthball (Scleroderma verrucosum).  Wasp Trap (left) and 3cm diameter Puff Ball |
| Sun 29 | Awake just after 0630 this morning and looking out of the bedroom window. Suddenly in the ash tree outside a small sparrow-sized bird; looks odd; it’s not a sparrow; yes, a first for me: a juvenile Lesser Spotted Woodpecker. Nice, as they’re now relatively rare due to loss of elm trees. Have now seen 3 of 4 native woodpeckers (all in the garden here); only missing Wryneck (and that’s very unlikely). It just shows what is around even in suburbia. |
| Mon 30 | A grey, breezy, not very warm August Bank Holiday. Well at least it isn’t raining this year. |
| Tue 31 | Had a couple of new season English apples today. It’s that time of year already. Discovery, an early variety. My memory was they’re not up to much, and it was right: they’re dry and only moderately sweet. A bit like the apple equivalent of a ship’s biscuit. But they do have pretty blush pink streaked flesh. |
On Depression – VIII
It’s three years since I last wrote about depression.
That’s not only because my depression has gone away; there just doesn’t seem to have been anything much worth saying about depression.
The depression hasn’t gone away. If anything it’s got worse. I seem to have descended from “I just don’t want to do anything” … through “I just can’t make myself do anything” … to “why am I even bothering to do anything”.
The rationale (such as it is) for not bothering isn’t just a lack of visible results for my efforts – although that doesn’t help – but has been significantly impacted by the plague of the last 18 months and the ongoing need to stay isolated.
No, it goes deeper. I’ve reached my “three score years and ten” and I’m not going to be around here for very much longer – especially given my medical history etc. Obviously I want to make it to at least 80 in a reasonable state; if I do I shall consider it a result. However I’m not optimistic that I will make 80. Which seems to make anything I do even more pointless.
But then, as Noreen pointed out to me last night, I have loads of longevity genes on both sides of my family. If I look at my parents and their siblings (8 of them) their ages at death were:
Men: 86, 3 (severely handicapped), 93 (and still going)
Women: 90, 99, 99, 78, 89
[I’ve ignored my father’s three half-sisters as they’re only half related to me.]
And if I go back to my grandparents and their siblings (23 of them) their ages were:
Men: 54, 1, 61, 3, 80, <1, 84, 9, 82, 80, 62, 24 (WWI), 78, 73, <1
Women: 26, 84, <1, 72, 83, 40, 88, <1
Stretching a point and going back to my great-grandparents generation (another 60 people) of the 29 I know about we find ages of:
Men: 57, 96, 71, 57, 40, 54, 43, <1, <1, 91, 87, 37, 46, 6, 67, 3
Women: 57, 73, 71, 57, <1, 66, 79, <1, 81, 76, 46, 88, 75
This last isn’t so brilliant, but remember with my great-grandparents we are talking about people born in roughly the middle third of the 19th century.
In all this we also need to remember:
- We are not talking about wealthy people – even if my parents generation eventually became comfortable with advancing years.
- Until post-WWII medical care was fairly basic, and had to be paid for (no money; no doctor); and it was more basic the further back you go.
- Also pre-WWII child mortality was significant, and perinatal death not uncommon; again worse the further back you go.
- There was relatively little regard to health & safety in the workplace, so industrial accidents were more common.
There are a number of interesting things which pop out at me in this data (though I admit it is incomplete).
- Almost a quarter (14/60) don’t make their 10th birthday.
- If you make 10 then you have an evens chance (23/45) of making at least 75; a 40% chance of making 80; and a 1 in 8 chance of making 90.
- While I don’t know he cause of death for many of these people, only 3 of the 22 adult women could even plausibly have been perinatal deaths. That seems surprisingly few.
- Only one of the cohort was lost in WWI.
So all other things being equal – which of course they’re not; if it weren’t for modern medicine I’d likely not be here now – I must have a decent chance of having another 10 years.
What would be interesting is to know how much of my depression has a genetic basis, and how much is environmental (in the widest sense). My father had depression (largely unrecognised, except by him, and latterly me) and his father was also depressive (although that was ascribed to trench fever from WWI). How many others of my (recent) forebears suffered from depression we shall never know.
Does that make me feel any better? Well sadly, as a fully paid-up pessimist, it doesn’t. Most people would doubtless say it should; but depression doesn’t work that way. And despite all my efforts I’ve yet to find anything which will kick this “black dog” hard enough in the nuts; although the antidepressants do keep me mostly functioning.
To cap it all, I just can’t get my head round the thought of not being here, doing what I do. How can I not be here, leaving everything in limbo?! It just feels so wrong; so unlikely; so frustrating; and yes, even depressing. Which luckily means I’ve never had any serious thoughts of self-harm or suicide.
Wish me luck!
Eating 30-a-Week
A couple of years ago I wrote about how we should be eating at least 30 different plant foods a week. Research into this is continuing, especially by Prof. Tim Spector of King’s College, London. I’ll link to just two relevant items: Spector’s recent Top 5 Tips for a Healthier Gut Microbiome and this Mail+ article.
This prompted me to log how well I did against the 30-a-week target over four weeks starting on 5 July. Herere’s what I achieved.
W/C 5 July
|
W/C 12 July
|
W/C 19 July
|
W/C 26 July
|
[This excludes most condiments & pickles; tea; squash etc.]
That’s over 30 every week for four weeks, and is fairly typical of my normal diet – perhaps slightly better than average because of the availability of summer fruit. I really didn’t try especially to pick foods which would add to my total!
What’s more I make it 64 different foods over a four week period. Which is just plain crazy!
Could I do even better? Yes, probably; but apart from adding in winter vegetables I’d have to try fairly hard.
Unblogged July
Taking a leaf out of Diamond Geezer‘s book, I’ve decided to write a post each month of strange, interesting, unusual, or just tedious things that happened each day, but which I didn’t write about at the time.
So here are 31 things I didn’t blog about in July.
| Thu 1 | I bid for 2 paintings live, online at our local auction house. Didn’t get them; wasn’t prepared to pay more than £50 and they sold for £75. |
| Fri 2 | Waitrose new Fulfilment Centre near home made rather a mess of this week’s grocery order. Lots of items unavailable and an unusual number of errors. Unavailability of items possibly down to the shortfall of lorry drivers? |
| Sat 3 | Picked a good handful of chard & radish leaves for salad. Having removed everything slug eaten, I was left with enough for half a sandwich. But supplemented with some coriander, and a big bunch of mint and basil, it made a nice quantity of baby leaves. |
| Sun 4 | Having lost the last of our koi a couple of years ago, we still have at least 4 goldfish in the pond: one large pale one, and at least 3 orange/red ones of various sizes (one of which must be home grown). |
| Mon 5 | We’ve a couple of bags of date expired cashew nuts and have been feeding them to the birds in a wire peanut feeder. And are they appreciated! This evening for an hour, while eating dinner, there was a procession of great tits and blue tits (at least 5 birds altogether) feasting on the nuts; one, often two, on the feeder at all times in a perpetual relay. |
| Tue 6 | Trip to the optician to collect new glasses; will have to finish adjusting them myself. Then I filled in & filed both our tax returns. And all before lunch. |
| Wed 7 | Why is it that without an alarm set I seem unable to surface before 10am? |
| Thu 8 | Glad to be side-tracked this afternoon into doing maintenence on N’s PC, thus avoiding tedious work for the PPG. |
| Fri 9 | Had to do the work I avoided yesterday. One piece I can’t complete yet as I need input from others. The second, some data analysis, proved too much for today’s addled brain. |
| Sat 10 | Awoke to find a wondrously clean white plate in the garden. N had put out some lamb chop bones, fat topping from some paté, and a cracked egg. Mr Reynard clearly had a tasty buffet. Must see if they like banana. |
| Sun 11 | 40 years ago today we moved into this house. Saturday 11 July 1981 was hot & sunny. With the help of a colleague and a van we moved from our dingy rented flat into this house. I lost half a stone in the process. This latter needs to be repeated, many times over. |
| Mon 12 | Today’s thunderstorm was the nearest we’ve had to a decent one for some years. We used to have lots, but they seem to have dwindled in the last 10 years or so. |
| Tue 13 | Selection workshop for a local council community review panel. Don’t expect to get through as they’ve probably got too many white middle-class men of a certain age. |
| Wed 14 | One of those tedious days where nothing much happens and you don’t have much to show for it either. Although I did finish a couple of short articles for AP Soc Newsletter. |
| Thu 15 | Had to email friends and decline a dinner date. After much discussion we both still feel much too vulnerable in current Covid situation – much though we want to go back to socialising and these friends are the very top of the list. Hope they’re not too pissed off with us. |
| Fri 16 | Up early (for me) to a lovely sunny morning, and the squawks of next door’s African Grey parrot out on their veranda. |
| Sat 17 | Hottest day of the year so far. And far too hot and uncomfortable to do anything; so I didn’t. |
| Sun 18 | Waitrose new Fulfilment Centre near us is still not at the top of its game, and I’m fed up with talking to Customer Services about it; now in conversation with the John Lewis’s executive office. |
| Mon 19 | Freedom Day for some. But not for us. We’re still feeling just as vulnerable as ever thanks to our short-sighted government. |
| Tue 20 | I’m retired. So why did I spend almost the whole day working? |
| Wed 21 | Chaired the early morning meeting of GP’s patient group on Zoom. Poorly attended. At times you wonder why you bother! |
| Thu 22 | Contrary to expectations the local council have appointed me to their community review panel. They’ve clearly not twigged that I belong to The Awkward Squad. |
| Fri 23 | Extra meat rations today! As we were about to receive the supermarket delivery, Tilly the Cat presented us with a small freshly dead rat. |
| Sat 24 | Thunderstorms? What thunderstorms? It was touted to be heavy thundery rain all day today, but not a rumble of thunder, nor a single drop of rain – although it was dark like November. |
| Sun 25 | Well, after complaining yesterday, the fairies were moving the furniture around upstairs this afternoon, and finally after days of waiting, at teatime we got some good thundery rain. |
| Mon 26 | Mid-afternoon there’s a sudden, hard smack on the study window. Obviously a bird strike. Very dead wood pigeon later found on the patio below the window. |
| Tue 27 | N had moved yesterday’s dead pigeon onto the lawn. This morning it had disappeared, one suspects with an assist from Mr Reynard – later confirmed by the trail camera. |
| Wed 28 | Awake just before 0500hrs, I was alerted by a nearby security light. After a minute or so, a fox trotting briskly and purposefully up the road carrying something which in the half-light looked like it could be dead rat. |
| Thu 29 | I’m taking part in the Big Wasp Survey again this year (the 5th year), and today I set the first two wasp traps. BWS are doing two survey sessions this year, now and in late August. I’m not hopeful of this session as the weather looks rather iffy for flying. |
| Fri 30 | Not having got everything we wanted on today’s supermarket order, we tried a small delivery from Amazon Fresh. Although maybe not up to Waitrose quality, and one doesn’t like giving Amazon even more money, it certainly worked well as a stop-gap. |
| Sat 31 | It’s one thing being depressed, but it’s a bit much when you spend the night dreaming about being depressed. Especially as it leaves you even less inclined to do anything than before. |
So what will next month bring, I wonder?
Ancestral Byways
What did you do in the lockdown? I spent time with my ancestors!
There are always some unexpected places one gets taken by the ancestors and family history. This is one of those, and a connexion which I had never expected.
I have just acquired at auction a copy of A Display of Heraldrie by John Guillim; 4th edition from 1660; probably in its original binding (if not, it has been very carefully rebound).
John Guillim (c.1565–1621) was an antiquarian and officer of arms at the College of Arms. He was made Portsmouth Pursuivant Extraordinary in 1608, and Rouge Croix Pursuivant in 1618. Guillim’s A Display of Heraldry was first published in London in 1610, although there is some dispute about the original authorship. It was revised and reprinted a number of times up to 1724, with the fourth edition of 1660 generally considered to be the best of them. Samuel Pepys appears to have had a copy of the fifth edition in his library.
I’ve known this work for many years, having first seen a copy in Harrow School in the early 1980s (on a work visit!) – it was lying on a huge Cromwellian refectory table for anyone to browse. I’ve always coveted owning a copy. Somewhere around 20 years ago I acquired a fairly poor, rebound and damaged copy of the fourth edition, and have since been keeping my eyes open for a copy in good condition. At last I found one, and was very surprised to get it rather more cheaply than I expected.
And now we get to the family history bit, which I only discovered in the last couple of years!
As you’ll see on the title page the fourth edition is “Faithfully collected by FRANCIS NOWER Arms Painter (and Student in Heraldry) in Bartholomew Lane, London“.
There are two branches of the Nower (or Nowers) family. The senior branch is in Oxfordshire; the tomb of Sir George Nowers (died 1425), a companion of the Black Prince, is in Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford.
The junior branch was centred around Pluckley, Kent, and it from them I am descended by way of a string of younger sons of younger sons. Francis Nower (1624-1670) was indeed a herald painter who died tragically with his two infant daughters in a house fire in Bartholomew Lane, London in 1670. He’s not a direct ancestor, but he is my first cousin 10 times removed – ie. the grandson of my 10x great-grandfather, Joshua Nower, Yeoman of Pluckley (c.1555-1618).
That was totally unexpected! I didn’t know I had Nower(s) ancestors until a handful of years ago, and only found out about Francis Nower during the first lockdown last year. Catherine Nowers (born 1820) married into my paternal grandmother’s line. Luckily the Pluckley Nower(s) are well documented at least back to the early 16th century. And to think that my Marshall line appears to be nothing more exciting than AgLabs all the way down.
And the moral is? It’s worth doing your family history, and following all the lines, not just your father’s father’s father’s line. And follow the lines as far back as you can. You never know what delights – or skeletons; we’ve all got some of them too! – you’ll find.
Horrible Times 22: Lockdown 450
In this instalment … Today, Saturday 19 June 2021, is day 450 of lockdown for us.
And still not a lot has really changed since I last reported on Day 400
So why don’t we get the “bad” news over first?
- In the last 50 days I’ve managed to get off the premises just twice. Once for part 2 of my annual diabetes check-up & shingles vaccination, and secondly for an optician’s appointment. That makes a grand total of just 9 “outings” in 450 days. Which is quite pathetic really, although rather understandable.
- I managed to miss the partial eclipse of the sun on 10 June. I don’t remember when we last had clear skies, at a sensible time, for any astronomical phenomenon.
- We’ve had two friends in hospital. One with heart problems, which have needed a pacemaker fitted; the other with a broken leg (luckily not a hip).
- In other medical news I got a talking to by my diabetic nurse for letting my blood glucose control slip somewhat over the last year, and not losing any weight. Moral 1: must try harder. Moral 2: the medical profession need to understand quality of life.
- And of course our pathetic government has delayed removing all Covid restrictions. I have to say I think this is the right decision, given the apparent extra transmissibility of the Covid delta variant. However it is entirely of the government’s own making: they could have nipped this in the bud by introducing travel restrictions to/from India in early April rather than waiting 3-4 weeks. But then this is entirely consistent with their whole approach.
In more positive news …
- We’ve had a mini heatwave, which is rather a nice change from the cold wet weather which preceded it.
- And the good weather has enabled us to get our runner beans planted, as well as a selection of salad leaf veggies. Nothing to harvest yet a while although I have harvested the first dozen chillies from last year’s plants (on the study windowsill) which I overwintered.
- The good weather has also brought the roses into bloom. The garden is a riot of roses at the moment, including a dog rose flowering right at the top of our mature silver birch tree. Walking down the garden there is a heavy scent of roses.
- Having found a very dead Rose Chafer on the patio table, I was finally impelled to buy a macro lens for my camera so I can take more/better close-ups. So far this has mostly meant flowers.
- As well as splashing out money on a new lens I also bought two paintings by Adrian Daintrey at auction. For security reasons I’m obviously not going to post them here, but members of the Anthony Powell Society will find out more in due course (as Daintrey was a friend of Powell’s).
- And finally, I’ve been doing quite a bit of work on my family history. I’ve especially been trying to unravel the Marshalls back in the late 17th and early 18th centuries around the Weald of Kent. I have a brick wall there in my father’s line; I’m sure there are connexions between all those I’ve found, but currently I’m unable to prove it – or satisfactorily work out exactly who is related to who. It doesn’t help that the men are all called Stephen, Thomas or William. The one guy with an easily identifiable name, Reynolds Marshall, seems to parachute in from nowhere in the late 17th century. It’s a tangled web which should be solvable, but for the fact that back then parish records were patchy and often haven’t survived. And along the way you get diverted down some (usually irrelevant) rabbit holes – so just who was the rather improbably named Samuel Drawbridge? Such are the joys of family history!
So what happens next? Well who knows. By the time of my next report at day 500 we’ll either have had all restrictions lifted and told we can go back to (some approximation to) normality, or we’ll be deep in another wave of Covid cases. Or, the pessimistic side of me suggests it might be both of those.
We’re not even in the lap of the gods, but the whim of our government. Gawdelpus!