I love Germany. Let me make that abundantly clear. However, there is one “tradition” here that has annoyed me more and more in the years that I have come to be living in this country. It is: eavesdropping on private phone calls. This happens almost every time I am sitting in a café, whether that […]
So sang Flanders and Swann in The Song of Patriotic Prejudice. I think Schatz agrees – at least when it comes to going on holidays abroad. Back in September this year, Schatz and I spent a few days’ holiday in a wonderful hotel on Cyprus, nearly 40 years after I had last visited, to see […]
The backseat driver (BSD), the Co-Trainer. They get on my nerves. Immensely. Let me give you some examples of what I’m driving at, oh, backseat driver. Long live staying in your own lane!
A Tory vote of self-preservation

Originally posted on Wee Ginger Dug:
It has now been announced that the Prime Law-breaker will have to face a confidence vote Sir Graham Brady, chair of the back bench 1922 committee made the announcement on Monday morning after reports in the Sunday Times that the threshold of 54 letters to the chair of the…
One of the key duties of church warden is dealing with the back-seat driver, who thinks he knows more than the experts, just because the back-seat driver has watched a few YouTube videos. Here’s an email I had to send out this month to explain to the back-seat driver, umm, actually, I do know what […]
War crime. Waging aggressive war is a war crime. Murdering innocent men, women and children in war is war crime. Torturing innocent men, women and children in war is war crime. Starving cities full of innocent men, women and children in war is war crime. Crime is crime is crime. Long live Ukraine!
Back in the autumn of 1976 my Dad came back from Thornton Watlass pub in the Yorkshire Dales. “Well, I never knew there were so many experts on Northern Ireland, drinking in The Buck Inn!” That’s what he exclaimed. He had just come back from a six-month tour of duty at the Maze Prison in […]
Last Monday evening I went to, and interpreted at, a prayer service at church, where we prayed together with five Ukrainian refugees, living a stone’s throw away from church. Since then, I have had occasionally damp eyes and lump in my throat while thinking of our new church brothers and sisters in Christ. I’ve also […]
Two and a bit months ago, our chaplain proposed an evening prayer service for one Monday a month. I told him I probably would not attend as Monday was my heaviest day and usually early bedtime day. Then Schatz’ mum fell ill, needing hospitalisation and almost daily clinic treatment. Then Ukraine “happened.” We now have […]