24September1997

24 September 1997
My dear folks,

A dull London afternoon is gradually giving way to a grey London evening. Typical London scenes are freely available from the front windows. A council truck has just hauled an illegally parked car effortlessly on to its back & vanished down the road in the direction of the pound. Generously proportioned residents of the local estate are waddling back towards it, labelled by their beer & burger profiles. Mavis is snoring gently from the study bed where he is recovering from a hard night. So am I, recovering from a hard night that is. He failed to synchronise his return with mine this a.m. & I arose from my bed at lunchtime to find him quivering with hungry indignation at the front door. He couldn’t get his chops into the biscuit plate fast enough to assuage his complaining tummy - & he has a lot of tummy to complain.

I have an irritable throat, an irritation that arrived promptly at 0400 & hasn’t gone away. On the scale of irritations, it barely registers so I’m not complaining. More irritating is the neighbour’s barking dog. I keep my bicycle in a tiny space under the neighbour’s stairs, with the neighbour’s approval. But the neighbour has married an unpleasant man with an unpleasant dog that goes wild with indignation whenever it hears me coming or going. This causes a problem as my visits are often late at night or early in the morning. Although I try to camouflage them with the noise of passing traffic, the dog has sharp ears & keeps a special listen-out during the likely times of my arrival. So it’s a bit of a game of cat & mouse. My only consolation is that I probably irritate the dog more than it irritates me. I am also aware, as always, that other people have more serious problems to contend with.

The Saudi ambassador here has been stoutly defending his country’s judicial system & the sentence of 500 lashes & 8 years in prison imposed on one of the two unfortunate British nurses convicted of murdering an Australian colleague. The case has been enjoying a high profile, particularly as the second nurse may yet face execution by the sword. The Brits are predictably outraged. All that’s clear is that the Saudi judicial system is a lot gungier than Saudi oil. There is also the reflection that while having one’s head chopped off is messy, it’s also quick, which is more than one can saying for frying people in electric chairs – especially as other people have to clear up the mess.

With my retirement in prospect some time before the millennium, I have spent two hours examining our investments – likely maturity values & maturity dates. I made a special spreadsheet & set everything out crisply & clearly. After analysing the results, I concluded that a lottery win would be very handy. I confess that in recent weeks, my selection of lottery numbers & those of the lottery machines have had very little in common. Making rather more progress (this apropos of nothing) is the Diana memorial fund, which has hit £8m, & is heading for an estimated £200m with the sale of memorial CDs & videos. Earlier this week, I saw her face looking out from the front covers of at least half a dozen magazines being displayed in Sainsburys - as saleable in death as in life.

A detailed & lengthy account of Cousin Trish (& husband, Mark’s) travels in Morocco arrived in the post this week, together with pictures. (Thank you cousin!) I have nearly finished reading it (a good hour’s work). I felt quite exhausted by the amount of effort they’d put into deterring pests & avoiding scams, & felt covered in the dust that flowed throughout the trip. While I must admire their ventures into such lands as Ethiopia & Morocco, I am content to travel there vicariously. Makes Portugal sound like a picnic (which most of the time, it is).

Speaking of which, I have booked to go down again from 17 to 25 October. When I get back, I may discover whether I have a job in BBC Online. The Beeb has been anxious to enlarge this fledgling department by saving money in other areas (excluding the DG’s salary & bonuses) but its plans to do so have run into a torrent of criticism. I am happy that I don’t really care any longer. More immediately, I have foolishly proffered my services in developing the new news templates we’ll be needing next month & am going to need the trip to Portugal when it comes. (There have been a flood of complaints from the Irish community at being portrayed in the BBC’s most popular soap opera as inebriated, unwashed & uneducated - & a very senior BBC person has had to say sorry!)

Enough unto the hour

Blessings
T