Metal Ox

 Here we are in 2021 locked down once more. The vaccination programme is due to reach a significant level by the 13th February. It is interesting that as far as the Western world was concerned the virus started in China during its year of the rat, and in February we enter the Chinese year of the Ox.  Not sure what the significance is but just thought I would throw it out there!!

The time between Christmas and now has been somewhat low key as I suspect it has been for everybody. Lockdown has made it a tad more challenging as I can't use the golf course now so will have to embrace Joe Wicks  and the online spinning classes. Why was he not even nominated for SPOTY?

There are interesting anomalies within the regional lockdown guidelines. I can play golf in Scotland but cannot go to church. The opposite is true  in England of both. There is talk of Wales relaxing the golfing rules shortly leaving England and Northern Ireland still excluded.

I have just been to Tesco as we re-introduce our ten day shopping windows. The store had more staff picking home delivery than it did have normal punters which was a big change from last year when the queue stretched half way across the car park. There was plenty of stock although  few  gaps existed for toilet roles, porridge strangely and bird seed!!

Still it's done now so hopefully I can just stay close to home now. It is a pity that the new car can't have a run out but it is bedding in well and I am working out all the bells and whistles. I now have some admin to sort out then the lockdown list will e as follows:

• scan all old photo's in and make a few photo books
• move Atmosphere from VHS to DVD
  
• put the decorations in the loft when the new loft lights arrive
• floodlight the garden
• find useful tradesmen for routine home maintenance
• repair the holes in the garden golf net
  

So that should get me to February when my new golf trolley arrives and I can get back to hitting balls in the net. The vaccine in late February would be the icing on the cake. Fore!

 

Prosha

I am feeling very self righteous today, following a trip to my local Tesco. On this occasion I purchased all my fruit and veg loose and declined the use of the small plastic bags which the supermarkets place close to these items for separation.

The lady at the checkout seemed totally at ease with the approach and weighed and priced each selection as if I was in a street market. It saved me using eight or ten bags which I would have immediately thrown in the plastic recycling box, and herein lies the problem.

Hounslow Council have a plastic recycling facility in the car park of the local Sainsburys in Chiswick. As of 1st November, Sainsburys are going to manage this facility themselves. As a result, only plastic bottles will be able to be disposed of at this site. Packaging and plastic bags, film and food trays will have to go elsewhere or be thrown in with the landfill rubbish. The reason?

Plastic bottles have a resale value in the recycling value chain, plastic film and bags have a much smaller market and are consequently harder to dispose of. Sainsbury, therefore, are maximising their revenue from this new venture at the expense of the local residents and the Council.

I have talked about recycling before here and to their credit Hounslow are looking for an alternative site to place their wider plastics disposal facility, but it does make you wonder, as supermarkets create 90% of the plastic packaging, why they should be allowed to restrict the amount they collect for recycling.

Getting back to Tesco, I quite enjoy shopping in the store in Isleworth (pronounced 'i-sell-worth', rather than Tiger Woods home course with is pronounced 'i-el-worth') .As it serves the nearby Asian community it stocks loads of food from the Indian sub-continent and even food from further East, and it stocks it in bulk. Some great smells come from the curry section to which I am regularly drawn. The Sainsburys in Chiswick, by comparison, is much more Anglo-Saxon and is only just starting to stock selected Polish brands to satisfy the increase in demand from our Eastern European neighbours.

There has always been a close tie with the Poles in West London, particularly in Hammersmith where there is a large Polish cultural centre. Their strong catholic ethos also blends well with the high percentage of Irish residents in the area. I long had a Polish cleaner, well before they became de rigor. She was sourced from a work colleague who seemed to act as a gang boss for them. The girls would come to England for a year or so, doss with friends, and earn enough to go back and pay for their University or other higher education courses. These days my Crescent is more likely to play to the tune of au pairs, and builders, all working at a rate cheaper than their more traditional European competitors. Plus ca change.

Ah but we were evicted from our hole in the road.....

Well 'Camp Dick' has been and gone, and what a fine affair it was. The weekend got off to a better than expected start I have to say, when 'er indoors and I found out we had bagged the spare bedroom in the farmhouse. SWMBO was actually in the queue at ASDA buying a tent when I passed on the news.

We arrived on Scammonden moor just in time for the evening barbecue and a few pints of Black Sheep gravity fed from an antique barrel cradle. There then followed a tour of the camp site, and a community sing song around the camp fire. I learnt alot about camping life over the weekend, and one such was that there are two types of fires, an English one and an Indian one.

An English one roars away burning logs at a great rate, its too hot to get near and all the warmth dissipates into the atmosphere dirt quick. An Indian one, however, is much smaller, and burns away steadily producing enough heat to warm people and allow them to sit round it. It was an Indian style fire which hosted our sing song.

The singing went well, but I must remember to take a torch next time, it certainly helps to be able to see the words.

Day two started with bacon sarni's and copious cups of tea, before the battle hardened walkers set off for a yomp down to Marsden and the Tunnel End public house. We arrived at the same place some while later via the Piece Hall in Halifax, and Dean Clough mill. Everybody then assembled for the high point of the weekend, pie and peas.

Now they looked great in the pot as you can see, however, the gremlins had been at work while the hike was under way, and the peas had taken on a life of their own, and over cooked. Given there was pork in with them there was no alternative but to throw them away and obtain substitutes. Tesco came up trumps, and so the mint sauce did not go to waste, and by 'eck, they were right grand......

Then followed more singing before rain stopped play. Next morning,after another fortifying breakfast, it was the packing up of tent, and several other lessons as to how that works, the emptying of the latrines, which luckily did not get allocated to me, and the ill fated walk back up the hill. Finally were the goodbyes, and all in all a great weekend. No cats got eaten, although it was a close thing, no humans got bitten, that I know of, the children all ended up with the right parents, but probably a bit too much fresh air for my liking. I am back in the smoke now though so the status quo should soon be restored.