Redemption Song

 It’s been a tumultuous 9 days since I last posted. With the help of some British politicians, some American politicians and owners of social media along with some fairly ordinary people from, mostly, England, various collections of racists, right wing idiots and collections of people out for a fight have rioted in parts of the UK all claiming to be supporting the parents of the children murdered in Southport just over 2 weeks ago.

As if to prove how easily false rumours spread, our next door neighbour, a nice lady of about 80(?) calmly told my wife, after the actual name of the murderer had been released, that the murderer had come over on a boat a couple of weeks earlier and was an illegal immigrant. When my wife pointed out that the person whose name had been released was born in Cardiff, our neighbour calmly informed my wife that her friend had told her the murderer was an illegal immigrant so it must be true.

Thankfully the police and courts seem to be cracking down really hard on the riotters. Not as hard however as they cracked down on the Just Stop Oil protesters who were locked up for 4-5 years as opposed to 2ish years. There have been people convicted of attacking buildings, police and immigrants as well as shoplifting from Greggs (a tray of sausage rolls!) and Lush (soap). Also, interestingly, a Conservative councillor’s wife and a fairly wealthy farmer’s wife from Chester have been charged with maliciously spreading false rumours about the murderer. Unfortunately, none of Nigel Farage, Elon Musk or Tommy Robinson are in jail yet. Hopefully that is just a matter of time. Currently riotting seems to have abated, and Elon Musk’s prediction of civil war in England has not been fulfilled yet.

Sunshine on Ullswater

August was much improved by our family gathering at my elder son’s house near Penrith. We had a lovely weekend. Just for once the weather behaved itself. We did a lot of eating and drinking, a bit of walking and the younger end of the family did a bit of canoeing, kayaking and paddle boarding. As usual it was great to see the whole family together and it’s particularly great to see how well my two grandsons (5 yrs old and 22 yrs old) get on. I love them both enormously and equally!

Deer at Dalemain Hall

Young grandson and Molly the dog

On the way home on Monday we stopped at Rheged to see the Jackie Morris exhibition. She is an illustrator who, amongst other things, produced the book The Lost Words with Robert Macfarlane. The exhibition was brilliant, the book is brilliant and Robert Macfarlane is a brilliant writer.