Sugar Loaf Mountain

 Sugar Loaf Mountain 588

'Why in God's name are we spending the last day of our holiday up this fricking mountain when we could be on the beach,' said Paul.

'Please be patient,' said Adam, ' you will thank me for this experience.' and he also thought you will thank God too.

'Are we there yet? ' asked Paul in a half mocking and half joking tone adding, ' I wish I'd worn trousers. I fricking freezing in these shorts.'

'Stop using that word. You know I don't like it. You might as well swear. Everybody knows what you mean'.

Adam put his arm around Paul's shoulder and leaned in and planted a kiss on his neck.

Paul moved Adam's arm away. He walked to the railing of the cable car and leaned over to look at the view of Rio below. He was puzzled. It had been such a wonderful holiday and now Adam seemed to be determined to prove something but about what? He didn't know.

'What's wrong now. I thought you liked me showing affection in public? You know being gay is not illegal here.'

'What has that to do with this Mountain?'

'Nothing really. I thought you would like to take some photos from the top. It really is amazing. There is also a restaurant where we can have lunch and there is a gift shop. We haven't bought any presents to take home and we are leaving tomorrow.'

The couple didn't speak again as the cable car rose higher and higher. Paul had his camera on a strap around his neck. He lifted it and focused on the extraordinary views below.  Adam was pleased to hear the click, click, click as Paul snapped away.

AS the car almost reached the summit a mist shrouded the view. It grew quite cold.

Paul turned away from the rail, saying, 'So that's it then. The end of a fantastic holiday.'

'I am so sorry. I really thought that you would be impressed. I am disappointed as well you know. There is something quite special that we can see, well usually. When we reach the top.'

Adam never did explain to Paul that 'the something special was the almost 100 feet tall statue called Christ the Redeemer.' In a way he thought that it was probably a good thing that the statue was shrouded in this mist.

Adam was a Christian and Paul was an atheist who thought that the bible condemned homosexuality.  Adam's confused ideas had lead him to think that seeing this amazing statue might have an effect on Paul. 

Now he wondered whether the invisible statue was a message not for Paul but from God  to him. 

It would be a long time before Adam untangled his confused thoughts and feelings. The cable car reached its destination.

'Come on. It is the last day and I am freezing and starving. Lets get a hot drink and something to eat. I still love you even though this isn't the beach,.' said Paul.

They walked hand in hand into the restaurant.

An hour later they walked out of the restaurant into blazing sun. 

 Adam looked across the valley to the incredible statue of  Christ the Redeemer and said to himself, 'Thank you God.'

Paul looked over the rail and saw the beach. He said to Adam, ' There is still time to go to the beach. It will be fantastic to sit drinking cocktails while watching the sun go down.'

Opposites attract ain't that the truth.

Chess

Chess

My latest addiction is chess. Once I had played in the library in Alsager I discovered that opportunities were ubiquitous. The church hall on Monday, the new café in Alsager and the Blue Bell on Tuesday, Wednesday I mentioned, Thursday Red Bull, Friday Sandbach library, even Kidsgrove library on Saturday mornings all provide opportunities to play and a warm space which is an added temptation.

Then of course the internet on my phone. Any where any time, sitting on a bus or even waiting at the bus stop. Waiting for the washer or dryer to finish. It can almost be a pleasure to go to the laundrette with chess. com.

But there is no need to leave the house at all. Chess.com allows me to play on my computer, lolling in an armchair, sitting up in bed. Then, not answering the door or the phone, or checking emails, certainly not reading a book, not painting or writing. Writing.

What day is it? Second Tuesday, First Thursday. Is there a chess session anywhere? Stop, stop and think, writing. When did you last write your blog? Have you written anything for the Kidsgrove group. Oh no, it's today. What was the topic? Oh dearie me. You should remember you chose it.

Cinema

 Addiction 816

The addiction to sports, marks an arrested development of man's moral nature.

Addiction focuses on desire.

Living with an addiction can be very stressful. It can seriously damage your work performance and relationships.

Eg Computers Gambling  Shopping Work 

What made you want to write a memoir now about your “addiction” to film?

My first addiction was the cinema. This was the pre TV era. There were so many cinemas to satisfy me. Goldenhill was within walking distance. 

Then there was Kidsgove I could walk or take the bus. My brother and me/I were given half a crown each to go to the pictures as we called it then. I took the bus, went in the 1/6's, bought chips after the film and took the bus home, leaving no change. My brother walked there, went in the nines and walked back. He saved 1/9. Oh yes, and now he is a millionaire and I am practically broke.

I remember the cinema in Tunstall. It was called Barber's. Like most cinemas at that time, everyday there two films, an A film and a B film at each showing and there were two showings a day. I think they were called first house and second house.

There were two programmes a week. One ran on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and a second on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

But an extra delight for children was Saturday morning Chum's Club.

Gosh what a smorgasbord of delights that was. Trailers for the forth coming films, a serial which always ended on a cliff hanger and then of course the main film. This would usually be a comedy if I remember correctly. Bud Abbot and Lou Costello, Laurel and Hardy and my favourite Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.

But the main attraction for the girls before all these delights was a live performance by a local boy. A tall blond, heart throb with a voice like an angel. The screams and shouts of the girls almost took the roof off. Now I can't even remember his name.

In my teens it was always Second House on Saturday. We, that is my friends and I used to queue outside the cinema at 7.30 because although the film began at 8.00 cinemas were so popular that we needed to be first to enter in order to get a good seat. Oh and there was another reason. We were saving places for the lads who were in the Plough which was across the street. They were drinking - under age drinking.

The main subject of the films, was WAR. The second world war of course. US versus Germany. I am sure Japan featured too, The other main subject was cowboys and indians. The cowboys always won of course. The truth later proved the portrayals of the Old West to be outdated and often offensive. Of course there was also a plethora of Hollywood musicals and love stories. The famous scene of Fred Astare singin' in the rain is still frequently played on TV.

But it wasn't tap dancing and singing games that featured in our outside play. That was a time when we played in the street. No, we always played cowboys and indians or armies. Everybody wanted to be a US soldier or a cowboy never a German or an Indian.

Of course all enactments featured guns. Shouts of 'Bang,Bang, your dead. Lie down'.

'No I'm not, I'm only wounded.' Was the usual often repeated script.

After a night at the pictures, the next day the boys re-enacted the whole film in the playground remembering every action word and gunshot.

Looking back, I see how a whole generation was indoctrinated.

This leads to an addiction I have today, American politics. I remain puzzled and enraged that the word immigrant never refers to the present population but is outraged against the people trying to enter the so called land of the free. There is rarely a mention of the indigenous people. What I find worse is that the American Indians cared for the land and animals far better than the present occupants.

Of course the same is true of Australia. Australia's first people—known now as Aboriginal Australians—have lived on the continent for over 65,000 years. Diverse and culturally distinctive, they are represented by more than 250 distinct language groups spread throughout Australia.  About 3 percent of Australia's population has Aboriginal heritage.

But the origins, and fate, of Australia’s native peoples are still the subject of heated debates—ranging from social disparities to legal representation, and even whether their genocide can really be considered a genocide.

I have to stop here because there is so much to say. A current theory holds that those early migrants themselves came out of Africa about 70,000 years ago, which  would make them the oldest population of humans living outside Africa.

Now don't get me started on Africa.

Tobacco

 Tobacco

I remember my first cigarette. I was on a day trip to Blackpool with the Youth club. The coach stopped at a pub so that we could buy pop and crisps. We weren't old enough to drink. I was 15 as was my friend who had acquired some cigarettes. She gave me one. We both lit up and I told myself that I would not inhale. However rushing back to the coach which was about to leave I had to jump over a puddle and I took a big intake of breath and smoke. It wasn't pleasant. It felt sharp on the back of my throat and it made me I leaf dizzy.

I can't remember my second or third cigarette. I can't even remember becoming a regular smoker after that first one. All the adverts at the time urged and encourage everyone to smoke no matter how much the costs went up after every budget. Of course once begun it was difficult to give up such a powerful addiction. It was socially acceptable. It seemed that everyone smoked- parents, neighbours even film stars and TV personalities. We could smoke anywhere and everywhere, in pubs in cafes and cinemas. We viewed the screen through a smoke filled theatre.

We were surrounded by bill boards telling us that we 'were never alone with a strand'. Craven A started using the slogan "For Your Throat's Sake" around 1939. It had a famous slogan, "Will Not Affect Your Throat". Many advertising posters were made to promote Craven 'A' cigarettes.

Cigarettes were heavily taxed. The government knew in the early 40's about smoking and cancer but the tobacco lobby was very powerful and the government did exceeding well out of the purchase tax which was raised at every budget.

My first few days at college were lecture free and we students were left to get to know each other and the college geography and I suppose leisure possibilities. The girls on my floor all collected together in one room and talked. Talked and smoked. We all smoked. We smoked Gallois which were very strong. And we smoked a lot in those first few days.

After college when I was married I continued to smoke and so did my husband. He chained smoked. He gave me his wages and I bought his cigarettes for the week, 10 packs of 20. That was 200 in a week. He did smoke at least 20 a day. I must have smoked the rest. If I ever suggested to him that he should stop he flew into a rage. So I realised that he couldn't even consider giving up. He died of lung cancer.

I did manage to stop. I learned TM and my teacher told me not to try to stop smoking, not to even think about it. It would just happen, and it did. I was sitting with my feet in the oven, I was living in a freezing cold flat, I was coughing, and rolling a cigarette. I was on the dole and money was short. I thought,'What are you doing to yourself ?' I threw the tobacco and papers in the bin and I have never smoked since. That was over 40 years ago.

Lung cancer was once a very rare disease, so rare that doctors took special notice when confronted with a case, thinking it a once-in-a-lifetime oddity. Mechanisation and mass marketing towards the end of the 19th century popularised the cigarette habit, however, it caused a global lung cancer epidemic. Cigarettes were recognised as the cause of the epidemic in the 1940s and 1950s, Cigarette manufacturers disputed this evidence, as part of an orchestrated conspiracy to salvage cigarette sales. Propagandising the public proved successful. As late as 1960 only one-third of all US doctors believed that the case against cigarettes had been established.

The cigarette is the deadliest artefact in the history of human civilisation.

Cigarettes cause about 1 lung cancer death per 3 or 4 million smoked, which explains why the scale of the epidemic is so large today. Cigarettes cause about 1.5 million deaths from lung cancer per year, a number that will rise to nearly 2 million per year by the 2020s or 2030s, even if consumption rates decline in the interim. Part of the ease of cigarette manufacturing stems from the ubiquity of high-speed cigarette making machines, which crank out 20 000 cigarettes per min.

Cigarette makers make about a penny in profit for every cigarette sold, which means that the value of a life to a cigarette maker is 10, 000 US dollars .

In the Beginning

 In the Beginning 834

So in the beginning was the word, we are told in the bible and the word was god, we are told in the bible.  

Being an Atheist this interested me very much. No not the bit about God but the bit about the word. Because as a writer I am very interested in words. In fact without words it would be impossible to be a writer. Without spoken words it would be difficult to communicate would it not? 

However in the beginning, I mean before the bible. Let's say from the stone age on, 8-10,000 BC until 4000BC, people did communicate without words did they not? eg. Cave paintings. The earliest known writing was invented around  3400 B.C.  in an area called Sumer near the Persian Gulf. The development of a Sumerian script was influenced by local materials: clay for tablets and reeds for styluses (writing tools).27 Apr  I seem to remember American Indians used smoke signals. I learned semaphore in the guides but I could never manage Morse code except for S-O-S. Now I am thinking did these people think in words or were they just communicating feelings.

At this point, as usual, I was about to go down the deep dark bottomless rabbit hole. 

But the topic is not words is it? It's in the beginning. 

So, Brian/ Russel,  I expect this title amused you. It is a real puzzler is it not?

I asked myself, the beginning of what, the universe?

“In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move. “ To quote Douglas Adams. “

There are lots of books about beginnings. 

Here are a few

The beginning of a career:  100 Must-Read Debut Novels

The beginning of a series:  62 of the Best Book Series to Start Reading

The beginning of life:  10 Books Featuring Childbirth as a Theme

The beginning of something new:  Nonfiction Science Books About Discoveries

The beginning of people:  Books by Indigenous Authors

The beginning of the world:  Novels Set in the Ancient World

The beginning of a love of reading:  35 Classic Children's Books Adults 

I like that one. The beginning of a love of reading. I did begin to read in the infant school. We had strips of card on which there were sentences. We had to match these lines to another card with multiple lines. I liked this because I found it easy and was eager to get on and read a book.

This truly was the beginning. 

As a child I read everything In the house. My father had bought what I imagine now, was then a special  offer for a complete library that every home needs. The World's Greatest Short Stories, Everybody's Family Doctor, The Universal Book of Hobbies and Handicrafts,  The Universal Home Lawyer  illustrated. The big Book of Needlecraft and A Dictionary of the English Language. There was also a book entitled The world's Most Famous Photographs. These books are still in my book case. However I am ashamed to say that the book of photographs is falling to bits probably because it contains photos of nudes. I can blame my brothers for that and I'll take pride in the fact that the dictionary also looks well used.

To continue with the theme. I joined the library where I went every week and devoured Enid Blyton (frowned on by some) and books about school life. Looking back I find this catorgory bizarre. Did I fancy going to a boarding school? Certainly not. But there were no books about working class kids like me. I often wish that I'd had someone to point me to the classics but I came to them later.

Grammar school meant Shakespeare of course. I know it's frowned upon to say that one is not a fan of Shakespeare but I am not. Oh I forgot to mention that my father's library contained 'The complete Works of Shakespeare'  which I am ashamed to say and which I regret, I gave it away.

I did not do much reading at college as my subjects were Games and Maths.

After college I returned to being an avid reader. Historical novels were my thing.  Nevil Shute, John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, Thomas Hardy, Dickens and of course Arnold Bennett were all popular.

Then I read the Female Eunuch which you could say was another beginning. Feminism. I had always been a feminist but it was not a clearly defined idea. It was more of a feeling.

Not sure when I joined a Women's Group and read many feminist writers. Fear of Flying by Erica Young, Feminism as Therapy impressed me greatly.

Now so not to bore you with a list of the books on my shelves I 

have taken a photo.

A question I often ask is 'Who wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin “?

It was a woman Harriet Beecher Stowe not Mark Twain he wrote Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn

The computer speaks

 The computer speaks

January 2nd 2024 8.53

Happy New Year to you my dear computer user. Why don't I call you by your name you ask? Which name would that be? Your non-de-plume? Your Facebook name? Your college name? Yes I do know your 'real' name but from now on I shall call you computer user. I should really call you computer abuser.

So let's start this new year with a few home truths. First of all it's not my fault if you forget what date it is. Open your eyes and read it. It's at the bottom left of the screen in big letters when you open me. Secondly it's not my fault if you can't find the story you wrote yesterday, or the piece you wrote for the writing group, or the new post you wanted to put on Facebook, or the new stuff for your blog. Furthermore it's not my fault if you can't even find your blogs.

The problem my dear computer abuser is that you do not remember where you have saved things. You are not consistent. Oh yes I know you try. You even bought a new computer just for writing. How did that turn out hey? An even bigger muddle.

Now just to get some things straight. You have been told this before by your grandson and your son. What is the common denominator of all your 'so called computer difficulties'? You. Yes, you. I suggest you make an effort to save things correctly. Keep a note book and write down for example: Date-Title-Place . So what are you going to do now and I do mean now, this minute. It's like the pandemic -face –space -safe -something or was it -mask?

-flask -task , no that's wrong. I don't know it wasn't me who could get the virus. Yes yes I could get a virus, a computer virus but I have anti-virus protection unfortunately it does not not protect me from abusers like you. I know what you did with your first computer. How do I know? Because you have written about it numerous times; on Facebook, in your blogs and in emails as though it was something to be proud of. Oh that leads me to another thing. Why oh why don't you record email addresses in the email address book that I have provided for you.

When you find that my battery is flat whose fault would that be?

Yours in frustration,

Your long suffering computer.

PS Where are you going to save this?

 

Languages

School Options

I enjoyed French and Latin so in the 3rd year we could choose German. The head mistress arranged a meeting for us to discuss options for the GCE's. This involved about 60 pupils queuing at the Head mistress's desk to ask questions. I did this and asked if I would be able to opt for German. My marks in French and Latin were considered sufficient so the answer was yes.

I sat down and thought about this. The alternative to German was Physics and Chemistry. I quite liked Science so I thought I would ask Miss Smith if this would be a better option for me hoping to receive some help and or advice in deciding.

" You have just asked me if you could take German. Go away and stop wasting my time."

Twinning

I am not sure how it came about but years later l went on a twinning holiday to Pezenaz on the south coast of France. It was a very enjoyable holiday and my French improved greatly. I also learned an extremely important rule when speaking French to a French person. At a reception which was held for us by the twinning association I was having a conversation which a rather nice french gentleman when he suddenly turned his back on me very abruptly and walked away muttering that I was very rude. I realised that I had addressed him as tu and not vous. I never did that again. Later when I read novels in French I discovered that even young married couples vouvoyed eachother.

I made another vaux pas when was living in Brittany. I was on a day out with the Club des Aines, Old Folks Club . We were on a boat on the river Rance and it was very cold. Everyone was wearing winter coats and hats and scarves all that is, except the president of the club. He was bareheaded and was wearing a sports jacket.

"Vous etes toujours chaud", I said. I should have said ," Vous avez toujours chaud." I had told him that he was always hot stuff and not that he was always warm.

Moscow

I was in Moscow with my ex and we were standing on the pavement asking passers-by directions to the Post Office. Some people laughed and walked away. Others asked us to repeat our question. We had looked up the words for Post Office so wondered of it was our pronunciation that was at fault. Finally someone pointed out to us that it was behind us. We were standing in front of the post office.

Portuguese

Spanish Barcelona Basque