Back On The Wire
I’m back. Apologies to those who have missed my posts. Thanks to the hundreds who have asked where I am.
Truth is that I was under the cloud of a vile, vicious, unforgiving flu virus. If anything ever deserved the unremitting attentions of the Israeli Army and everything that Mossad has to offer then it was this. Misery, depression, lack of motivation – nothing could have been more unforgiving and merciless in its attack.
I survived. Perhaps Palestine will not.
As I emerged from under this dark cloud there was one thing that helped me through. I have read about it for months. The HBO series, The Wire. I have seen it described as the best thing ever on television. These superlatives seemed different from most and as I immersed myself in the stories of Baltimore I understood why.
This is magnificent television. Wonderful characterisations not based on “star quality” or reputation but on acting ability. Utterly credible dialogue, surely much of it improvised.
What seems at first glance as just another American cop show is revealed as the very best in drama, capturing every nuance of the human condition.
I pray for the people of Palestine. I curse the evil Israeli state. I look for hope in mutual understanding through drama like “The Wire”.
Police Misconduct
The outrageous arrest and detention of Tory MP, Damian Green is a dangerous and worrying mistake of the most serious proportions.
Those responsible for this must be held to account for an error of judgement that is, literally, unforgiveable.
In this the Metroplitan Police should look to the BBC for an example rather than the banks or the government. The people responsible must lose their jobs without compensation.
The full story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7756047.stm
Strictly Politically Correct At The BBC
I will not add any more sustenance to the well deserved success that everybody’s favourite dancer has achieved but what nonsense is this at the BBC? They’re going to refund the cost of calling to vote for him! How utterly stupid and paranoid. This betrays a real lack of proportion and judgement by someone. Next those poor victims at Sky who pay to watch the footie will be getting refunds if their favourite primadonna is off sick!
Anyway best of luck to you John. You’d never have beaten Christine…or Rachel…or Lisa and that’s not even mentioning the other men – but you’ve triumphed over them all!
John Sergeant for PM!
The full story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7737447.stm
Walking The Dog 12
We returned to lashings of ginger beer and a plateful of scrumptious ham sandwiches. That’s not the actual menu but as we had been struggling in Kimmeridge clay all morning, the Famous Five comparison felt right, particularly as we’d just had a huge adventure, even bigger than we’d expected!
It wasn’t the Famous Five that set off from Ringstead that morning but the Intrepid Three: Carla, Capone and me. We were set on continuing our Jurassic Coast walk and so drove to the end of the last episode – and the beginning of the next!
The White Nothe
We were heading for the White Nothe headland. It’s the tallest and furthest headland you can see from the top of our mountain above Sutton Poyntz.
We left Ringstead Bay but then cut back towards the beach and descended using the sort of steps that are just pegged shuttering into which the hill slides. Onto the beach and the dogs wanted to swim but there was no time for that. I planned to keep along the beach as far as possible and then climb up the fallen clay cliff before we reached the towering chalk cliffs of the the White Nothe itself.
So, at what seemed a sensible point, I turned away from the sea and started to pick my way up through the clumps of clay, each surmounted with a brush of coarse grass. Climb up further and there are vicious gorse bushes and and little trees with thorns like hardened steel. In some areas a raw wound of open clay has appeared where a minor landslip has taken place. This was almost real climbing, all the weight on the feet but still reaching up at head height and above for support.
The Burning Cliff
This, in fact, is the Burning Cliff. In 1826 a landslide uncovered deposits of gas and oil which caught fire and famously smouldered for about three years.
At last, at the very top, the thickest brush of all so, heroically, I rolled into it with my back and the dogs slipped through underneath me. Then a semi-tropical glade, completely enclosed by thorn and flower. A strange, even light and ferns of all sorts rooting in the carpet of leaves. We were trapped. The way back out was prickly and difficult. In every direction was more thorn and bramble. I swung at some branches to clear a path and I was cruelly shot in the eye by a sloe berry hurtling back towards me, an eclipse of the sun seared in my eyeball and I actually felt dizzy and slightly feint. Had she been there, George would have immediately volunteered to go for help.
No such rescue was open to us though. Forcing our way back out through the thorns I picked, slipped and slid a perilous path back to the beach. No option for it but to go back up the way we had come down. That was hard work too. We wearily resumed the footpath but when I saw that we had made exactly half a mile’s progress from our start, discretion proved the better part of valour and and we returned to the car.
Undaunted, undefeated and determined to reach our goal we returned this morning. Avoiding the pull of the sea and the beach itself we stuck to the path winding upwards through an area that reminds me of Fern Gully, near Ocho Rios in Jamaica where are there is supposed to be a greater variety of ferns than anywhere else on the planet. Here, now safely above the Burning Cliff, this area has a similar ambience.
Finally up onto moorland then close to the edge of some truly scary cliffs. This was “Vertigo City” for me and I was filled with that priomordial fear that at any moment I might flip, run and throw myself headlong into space. Concerned only as to who would look after the dogs, I restrained myself and we made the summit. There we sat and communed with nature until that intense moment of peace arrived. It comes very easily. You just sit, look around you and wait. The very moment you forget yourself it arrives.
So Carla and Capone scampered down the hillside with me in close pursuit. Another thrilling and exciting adventure completed! I wonder what will happen on our next visit!
Charles At 60: The Passionate Prince
This was a gem of a TV programme. I have always been a fan of our Prince Of Wales. I remember his investiture vividly as a major event in my childhood.
It is also worth saying that I am one of the silent majority who, I believe, as well as loving and admiring Charles also felt the same way about Diana. The two points of view are far from incompatible and Charles himself is the best example of this.
I was tempted to title this post “Supreme Intelligence” because that is how I would sum up what I saw. He is a man of great wisdom, insight, patience and vision. It was good to see his mother’s endorsement of him yesterday too.
One of the issues addressed in the programme was how, when he assumes the throne, he will be have to abandon his “hands on” involvement with issues. This, I believe, is wrong. In fact, this will be his contribution to the modern monarchy. He already treads a difficult tightrope between involvement and detachment. I believe he has the ability to continue to do so in a way that will be to the great benefit of our nation.
Watch it: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00fky55/Charles_at_60_the_Passionate_Prince/
No More Excuses In Haringey Or Downing Street
The story of Baby P is a national scandal of monstrous proportions. Appallingly handled by Gordon Brown in the House yesterday, even the silky, smooth Ed Balls cannot cover up the Prime Minister’s inability to deal with David Cameron’s questions. Closer though to the shameful failures that allowed this child to be tortured to death is Sharon Shoesmith, the Director of Children’s Services at Haringey. Putting aside for a couple of sentences the question of her culpability in Baby P’s death, we simply have no room for anyone who demonstrates such utter incompetence in communications. She must be dismissed immediately. No question of being allowed to resign. She must be sacked.
The full story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7708398.stm
Walking The Dog 11
The lights on Portland are warming up orange in the distance. Everywhere there’s a gunmetal grey murk with a few billowing black threats. It is cold, chilling cold and the wind is biting and penetrating. This is the very nub of dusk and here we are back on the beach after a break of over a week.
It’s been a tough week, travelling everywhere, bad news about my Dad, a disastrous episode with my car. Saturday morning in the valley was a welcome relief. The ground was very very wet but the sun shone strong and as we hit the toughest part of the trek up the mountain a ginger blur up the near-vertical slope, the dogs in pursuit, the healthiest, most muscly fox I’ve ever seen. And on top, two bobbing, weaving white backsides of deer escaping towards Dorchester.
I’m in the little red Citroen loan car from The Cartshed, generously offered as “you’re welcome to put your dogs in there” and I knew I had an appropriate stick stored in the garden. Now I’m slipping and sliding down the grass bank to the beach while Capone and Carla tumble, fight and slither through the shingle to the water.
At high tide a three foot windblown chop is breaking 20 yards out but the undertow is ready to pull Capone 
right back under the next one. Once, twice, three times he is wiped out, thumped in the face and chest with icy white water. He ploughs on like a Chieftan tank, shaken but not stirred and reaches the stick at the very crest.
Around he comes, half drowned, half propelled by another wave, he disappears underneath a crashing cauldron of surf and then he’s back, Carla already grabbing the stick from him. His fierce but playful growl penetrates all of nature’s noise. They scamper away up the beach carrying the stick together and turn to the most satisfying tussle and chew while I give them a few moments to rest.
Carla is no fool and although I throw her a little twig while Capone is busy she frolicks into the shallowest surf but thinks better of it and turns back. It’s much more fun to wait for Capone to go in, do the work and intercept him on the way back.
Man Of The Match - Andy Powell
What more perfect end to a day when Wales have almost beaten the South Africans in Cardiff and shown enormous promise, invention and the usual courage.
In these conditions I have to be careful how much I push him because he would try and try, keep going back, ignoring the cold and the shortness of breath and the sucking, churning, remorseless waves. He tackles the surf like a second row forward and nothing stands in his way.
He wants nothing more than another chance. He would die for me in that seething, heaving water.
This connection with my animals, my countryside, my sea, my sky, my wind is my salvation. When we understand what matters, who matters, whatever happens, then contentment comes a little easier.
Life makes a little more sense.
WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE – Bankers On The Run
It is infuriating to see them now scurrying and rushing to reduce their interest rates after the outcry at their dilatory and greedy response to the Bank Of England’s massive rate cut.
We are going to to have to drag the w**ker bankers every greasy step of the way to a place where they start behaving responsibly and fulfilling their obligations to us as major shareholders. We are going to have to watch their dishonest and deceitful efforts to snaffle huge bonuses, in shares if not cash, and we are going to have to treat them as the completely untrustworthy spivs that they are.
What is clear that some of them are already getting away with it because the government has been so weak in stipulating the conditions and “mechanisms”, as Gordon Brown put it, that will control their greed and thievery.
It is time to start naming names and for the work to be done that will uncover and expose those who have manipulated the system for their own ends.
The first candidate for the WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE poster is Bob Diamond of Barclays.
Bob Diamond, Barclays
It is generally agreed that he has spurned the government’s rescue package in favour of the Arabs so that he can hang on to his outrageous, undeserved multimillion pound bonus. I will be researching his record in more detail.
Please submit your nominations for WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE bankers with as much evidence as you can.
Peter Reynolds 