Dog Lodge

I was having a pub lunch with my friend Tony - and his giant dog Jasper - and our meal was constantly interrupted by dog-lovers, coo-ing and ah-ing at the aforesaid Great Dane. Not at Tony, obviously. Or me; I was a non-person in the interaction. Apart from the comfort which Jassie brings him, Tony loves the camaraderie of the doggie fraternity. A couple of days ago, on a walk, I heard someone saying to someone else "I love having a dog because people come up and talk to you".

Wait! You can talk to other people, you know. Is this some kind of quasi Masonic secret society? And I don't have the password? Come to think it, when I first met Jasper I was impressed that he would respond to "Sit!" even from me, a stranger. "He'll shake your hand, you know" said Tony. Aha! The Masonic handshake. I was right.

I declined.

I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member [Groucho Marx]

Why Are We So Angry?

We seem to have been living for years in a state of anger. Looking at the USA political scene from the outside, the country appears not only divided but in a particularly bitter and angry way since the lead up to the 2016 presidential election. At home in the UK, the 2016 Brexit referendum stirred a great deal of acrimony and that state persisted perhaps longer than it should have. This is not the usual partisan politics, it's a cacophonous battleground.

We seem to be permanently angry. With Downing Street parties, Prince Andrew, a footballer kicking a cat, John Bercow, Black Lives Matter, Extinction Rebellion protests, footballers who take the knee, others who don't take the knee, statues, immigrants....... now Vladimir Putin is centre stage in our anger universe. And his oligarchical cronies who have the nerve to buy a mansion in Kensington or a football club in Chelsea. 

It's exhausting. And, I would argue, debilitating. Any psychologist would warn us, on a personal level, of the harmful effects of anger - whether momentary or permanent - and the need to deal with it. It feels obvious to me that it's the same on a national level. By which I mean that an angry country - and its citizenry -  is likely to be unhealthily divided, unproductive, displaying low self-esteem and confidence, and lacking clarity and focus. It's a recipe for stagnation at best, decline at worst.

I can't watch the TV news bulletins......yesterday's Times had its first 13 pages devoted to the war in Ukraine. I'm not for one moment denying the seriousness for that country; my issue is that the populace of Britain is being wound up to be angry. By the media, almost as an arm of the state. "People of the United Kingdom, you must be angry!". We've had it before: most recently those parties, endlessly, day after day. 

I don't want to be angry, and I don't welcome the suggestion that I should feel anger. Maybe I should build a calming playlist on Spotify. That might do it.

“Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.” [Mark Twain]

“Angry people are not always wise.” [Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice]

I like the Sea

I feel fortunate to live near the sea. I love the sea. Obviously not being on it; I get seasick in the bath. Or in it; certainly not in English coastal waters in winter. Or Australian shark-infested seas at any time. 

I just love the look and sound of the sea. It can sometimes be angry - aren't we all? - but mostly it's a calming solace in troubled times. As with these from Charlestown yesterday.

Cinderella

I've been missing from my blog, largely due to lack of inspiration. Feeling guilty, and alarmed at how angry the world (at least as reflected in the media) is, some puns to entertain you. Some of these may have been borrowed or, in a reflection of world events, stolen.

Why is Cinderella so bad at soccer? Because her coach is a pumpkin.

Why did the chicken get sent off in the football match? For fowl play.

What did the cat call her blog? A pawedcast.

Why is my cat so ornery? He has a bad cattitude.

When I was a kid, my teacher said, “Name two pronouns.” I said, ‘Who, me?”

I decided I wanted to write a memoir but I couldn't be bothered, so I hired a ghostwriter. I haven't seen him for ages.

Why was the cartographer grumpy? He had a bad latitude.

In the kitchen, the Italian said "I'm Hungary". The German replied "Czech the fridge".

Please get your kids/grandkids to add more ...

How many of the Seven?

I fell to musing about the Seven Deadly Sins and how many I am guilty of - or, at least, just guilty enough to admit to.

Lust. “Flee also youthful lusts; but pursue righteousness, faith, love [and] peace...”

There are things - not people, you'll be pleased to know - that I would rather like to have. A private plane, to visit my Australian family and friends. A television with decent sound. A magic weight loss formula. But probably not to the degree that Lust implies. So No. Anyway, "youthful" counts me out.

Gluttony. “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

Oh dear, if this means eating and drinking too much of things that may not be good for me - burgers, cream horns, Armagnac - and for my sake, rather than God's, then this is a definite Yes.

Greed. “Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have."

In the sense that I want more than my fair share of the pie, or a richer lifestyle, definitely No. 

Sloth. “Go to the ant, you sluggard! Consider her ways and be wise.”

That's me. I'm the sluggard. Yes

Wrath. “Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.’”

I consider myself a courteous driver, maybe even very much so, but on occasion I might get angry - and shout extremely loud - when someone does something very stupid and dangerous on my piece of road. Does this count? I definitely leave it to the wrath of a Higher Being, so I suppose this is a Yes.

Envy. “A sound heart is life to the body, But envy is rottenness to the bones.”

This is a No. Can't say more than that.

Pride. “...Let not the mighty man boast of his might"

This is the most solid Yes. I generally believe I am the cleverest, most intelligent person I know. Brain the size of a planet. A view which takes a constant hammering when playing my son at Connect 4 sadly.

Total: 4/7. That's bad. Maybe I should repent and become a monk.

The Spell of the capital

Capital cities cast a spell over their countries. They are magnets, drawing to them money, culture, tourism, commerce and, in the case of London, Russian oligarchs and their 'unexplained' wealth (see Catherine Belton's Putin's People for her explanations), houses, yachts and the GRU. And now sanctions. Because of a country whose capital city's name has undergone a makeover. All my long life I have known that Ukraine's capital is Kiev. No longer. It's now Kyiv. Why?

I learned in school that the capital of China was Peking. We had to start using Beijing as its name in about 1979. I know, that's a post-colonial transliteration thing but worth mentioning. Maybe Kyiv is too.

Ho Chi Minh City used to be known as Saigon until the locals heard the musical Miss Saigon and hated it. Claude-Michel Schönberg flatly refused to rename it Miss Ho Chi Minh City. OK, it's not the capital; just thought you'd like to know.

I'm tempted to sneer at the fact that New Delhi is no longer new but it appears that ND is a district within what Wikipedia calls the 'megacity' of Delhi.

Capital cities seem to be a root cause of inequality within a country. What if we (the UK) declared that from now on Middlesbrough is our capital? Would that city shoot from #1 in the 'most deprived places in the UK' list of the highly esteemed Daily Mirror right up to #1 in their 'least deprived' list? Surely worth a go. If it works, we could move the capital around the country every ten years [this happens in Dido's Phoenicia in Civilization VI] and reap the benefits of capitalisation. Memo to Michael Gove, Secretary of State responsible for the government's 'levelling up' strategy.

Anyway, I'm off to the opera in Middlesbrough, followed tomorrow by a visit to the Middlesbrough Tate and dinner at the Middlesbrough Ritz. See, it's working already.

Oh and no, I'm not meaning to make light of the lot of the people of Ukraine - or those of other currently war-torn countries: Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Myanmar (let me know if I have omitted your country).