Diary of a self-isolator – week 56

A light-hearted look at a few memories and the situation over the last seven days in our house.

Sunday 04/04/2021 – Day 388

Had some news this morning, although, the family crisis continues – we seem to be taking one step forward and three steps back. Things are no better than they were 16 days ago– so frustrating!. I will however continue with my blog as it keeps me sane.

Well, dear reader, what a terrible Saturday night on TV last night, absolutely nothing worth watching on BBC unless you are a fan of hospital drama and believe me – that is the last thing we need to watch right now. Ant and Dec used to be top of their game but thankfully it was their last Saturday Night Takeaway last night, it was all a bit samey if you know what I mean, the constant laughing at their own unfunny jokes and sketches, and the programme being propped up by all the ex ‘Get me out of here’ contestants. Perhaps they should stop trying to emulate one of the best comedy duos of all time, the immortal Morecambe and Wise, so many little things ‘borrowed’ from the two greats. Time for a rethink lads!

This was followed by the ever-popular Alan Carr with a re-hash of the old classic ‘Play Your Cards Right’ at least the little chap doesn’t try to emulate Bruce Forsyth who -like him or loathe him – was the King of the game show. Just the same old tired celebrities starring though.

This was followed by the roguish Jeremy Clarkson in a new TV critic show, it was quite good, but Clarkson is a Marmite sort of guy, you either hate him or love him, as I said the show was quite good, but I got the feeling he was being held on a tight rein. Welcome to Ericbox by the way.

Sometimes life is so unfair, two people had sex in the early fifties, and I end up paying a mortgage and utility bills!

I am over the moon with myself, I don’t mean to brag, but I actually went into a room and remembered why I went in there in the first place – it was only the bathroom but hey, it’s a start.

On this day 1873 The Kennel Club was founded. It is the oldest, recognized kennel club in the world and was the first official registry of purebred dogs in the world. Its role is to act as governing body for various canine activities including dog shows, dog agility and working trials. I am writing to them to ask them to overlook the various canine activities on the green opposite my house, they will need to bring numerous blue bags, wellingtons and a shovel though.

1934 Yorkshireman Percy Shaw laid the first “cats’ eyes” along the centre of the road at an accident black spot near Bradford. There wasn’t a cat to be seen within a hundred-mile radius for the next ten years.

1964 British pop group The Beatles occupied the first five places in the US singles pop charts with: – ‘Can’t Buy Me Love’, ‘Twist and Shout’, ‘She Loves You’, ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ and ‘Please Please Me’. It was the first and only time anyone ever monopolized the entire top five. The Beatles are the best-selling pop band in history, have had the most number-one albums in the UK charts and have held the top spot longer than any other musical act.

Well, Mrs H’s back is finally back to normal after she twisted it last week whilst helping me to carry the French doors to the Garden room. My weight however – is another story, it is up and down like a proverbial Yo-Yo, one day I am below twelve stone and a few days later I am over twelve stone, I am worrying so much that it’s causing me to lose weight!

There were 2293 new cases today with 10 deaths recorded.

Monday 05/04/2021 – Day 389

Things are much the same re-our family crisis on this Easter Monday.

Mrs H is concerned that I keep falling asleep whenever I relax, but it is 1.00am in the morning, what’s the problem!

Well, here it is, Easter Monday, and you are surrounded by children/grandchildren with chocolate covered faces, so far, in the last two days the little darlings have had chocolate eggs for breakfast, elevenses. Lunch, high tea and supper. Still, cuts down on the laxatives I suppose.

We had two visitors yesterday, firstly my daughter Gemma who was a football widow for most of the day, her hubby and two sons are all football mad, they will watch anything that involves a ball if it’s on TV. So, Gemma walked (another Easter miracle) around to our house, she also brought gifts bless her, I had a Terry’s chocolate orange, and a bag of sweets and Mrs H had a slab of dark chocolate (her favourite), she also brought a chocolate marble cake, home-made I hasten to add, I wanted to ask who she was and what had she done with the real Gemma, but it was Easter, so I refrained.

Our other visitor was Mollie, our Granddaughter, she is an incredibly talented 18-year-old artiste and had come around for Sunday lunch. She immediately fell in love with the Garden room. Apparently, the light and airy room is perfect for doing her artwork, and she spent the whole afternoon in there working, she is now considering moving in permanently. (Just joking Mum).

On this day in 1922 The birth, in Preston, Lancashire of former footballer Sir Tom Finney. He was famous for his loyalty to his league club, Preston North End and for his performances in the English national side. He played his entire career for his local club, appearing 433 times and scoring 187 goals.

1999 Richard Dunwoody became the most successful jump jockey of all time when he clocked up his 1,679th win at Wincanton. (The record is now held by Tony McCoy with over 2,000 winners.) I have a wonderful story to tell about the Grand National, back in 1985/86.

I was working as a jobbing builder and had a lot of work to do at a stable block in Elmley Lovett in Worcestershire. The place was a National hunt stables owned by trainer Michael Oliver aided by his brother Martin. One of my first jobs was to mend a stable door, the horse inside was called West Tip. This wonderful horse had often gone walk-about in the yard and Michael thought it was the dodgy door. So, I fixed it, went back the next morning and West Tip was in the yard saying hello to the other residents. Everyone was perplexed, I checked the door again, nothing wrong there. I was working in the yard later that day when I saw West Tip poke his nose out of his stable and push the bolt across, within a few seconds he had come across to me to say hello. I put a spring-loaded bolt on the door and that was the horses last foray into the yard.

This was 1986, the year before Michael had entered West Tip into the 1985 Grand National, with Richard Dunwoody riding. The horse started as favourite but fell at Becher’s Brook.

What a lot of people didn’t know was that in 1982, West Tip was injured in an accident involving a lorry just down the lane from the stables It was a foggy morning and Oliver’s string was waiting for the arrival of jockey Philip Hobbs to join them riding out. As the horses were walking along Walton Lane the lorry approached and went past them. West Tip was the last in the string and whipped round as the lorry went by. Unfortunately, a hook on the bed of the lorry caught West Tip on his near side hindquarters and tore a huge hole. The lorry did not stop. West Tip required over 70 internal stitches and many external stitches. It was feared that the horse would have to be put down, but thanks to the expertise of veterinary surgeon Peter Thorne, the horse made a complete recovery and went on to win on his racecourse debut at Warwick on 29 December 1982, at 50-1, ridden by Philip Hobbs. West Tip was left with a distinctive large scar on his hindquarters.

Richard Dunwoody was convinced that West Tip had a lot more to offer, so it was decided to enter him into the 86 Grand National. He started the race 15/2 second favourite under a weight of 151 pounds, he was always amongst the leaders and jumped the last fence in second place behind the Scottish-trained outsider Young Driver. West Tip took the lead on the run-in and got the better of a sustained struggle with Young Driver to win by two lengths.

I was working for Michael the week of the race; the poor chap was a nervous wreck! But he was confident! When I went to collect my wage on the Friday which was about £300 he offered to put it on West Tip for me, but I had a young family and a mortgage and politely declined.  Had I taken him up on his offer I would have won close to £3000, I became one of those in the category of ‘also ran’.

I remember them coming home on the Monday, there were hundreds of people there to welcome them, I shared a glass of champagne with Michael and that week there was an extra £200 in my wages.

A further 2757 cases today and 26 new deaths recorded.

Tuesday 06/04/2021 – Day 390

Woke up this morning to a covering of snow.! The sun is out but it looks pretty cold out there, we need milk, so I’ll send Mrs H down to the shed in her dressing gown, she’ll soon tell me what the weather’s doing.

Alas, we have nothing to report on our family crisis, after much improvement we are now back to where things started over two weeks ago, the stress for both of us is tremendous.

Today I need to go into the Repair shop and put away all the stuff I’ve used in the past week finishing off the Garden room, the place looks like a bomb’s hit it, this is my fault, because each time I do a big project I get too enthusiastic, then I do far too many hours and by the end of the day all the stuff I’ve used just gets thrown onto the bench.

I was in there tidying up and got to thinking (as you do) about those poor people who first discovered mushrooms and had to go through all the trials and errors, like – this one tastes like beef, this one killed Brian immediately, this one was magic and gave you hallucinations which included being re-united with your mother-in-law, I can’t begin to imagine what they thought of the Shiitake mushrooms! And who named them?

I bet you won’t believe this but a little while back I applied to join our local Gym, I even had my own personal trainer, after half an hour – although I was out of breath and quite tired I thanked him sincerely, and said that I already felt a lot better, he replied, “That was only the guided tour!”.

Today is also the start of the new tax year, here are a few facts, on this day in 1944 Pay as You Earn (PAYE) income tax was introduced into Britain. It was devised by Cornelius Gregg. In 1990 Married women in Britain became independent entities for income tax purposes for the first time, making them responsible for their own tax declarations. Their income was no longer assessed with that of their husbands. And finally, in 1993 Following public disquiet, Queen Elizabeth II began paying income tax.

After tidying up the old Repair shop I decided to relax in the warmth of the Garden room. I sat in the hazy sunshine drifting in and out of consciousness, when a terrible thought entered my head, when the Pubs are officially re-opened on the 17^th May what shall I do to celebrate, do I pop down there with all my mates, or do I book a candlelit meal for myself and Mrs H, well of course there’s no contest! I was straight on the computer to inbox my mates and set it up!

New cases recorded today were 2374 and new deaths registered totalled 20.

Wednesday 07/04/2021 – Day 391

Nothing has changed in the family crisis situation so we carry on as best we can. It is absolutely freezing outside again, a brass monkey and spherical things come to mind, someone on radio mentioned the return of the ‘Beast from the East’. I look out of my office window and all the clouds are coming from the West – such is life!

I did manage to get out to the Repair shop however, it is once again back to its habitable state, but my fingers are dropping off and I am frozen stiff.

Mrs H and myself are really struggling to find something decent to watch on Netflix, we finished nine series of ‘Suits’ last night ( You know, the one with the uppity princess in it), we are already having withdrawal symptoms, missing Harvey, Louis and Donna, when I asked Alexa to find something similar she brought up five series we have already watched, so dear reader – any suggestions would be very welcome.

I’ve just received a brochure about a new wine for elderly people (cheeky sods) apparently, it is distilled from an ante-diuretic hybrid grape and reduces the number of times you visit the toilet, it’s called Pino More.

I’ve been spending my time the last two weeks entering lots of writing competitions, poetry competitions and almost anything that involves writing, anything basically that’ll keep my mind off recent events, even this pile of garbage that I inflict on you every week dear reader, and I must apologise for it. Some competitions are excellent, but I really do have to watch out for the garbage among the offers. There’s one that claims (very loosely) to have 100,000 members, they offer prompts every Friday to get you to write a story, now, remember how many members they have, the prize every week is $50, not even five prizes just one prize, so they are getting a minimum of 500 stories sent them every week for a total of $50, what a scam!

There were 2758 new cases recorded today while deaths more than doubled from yesterday at 45.

Thursday 08/04/2021 – Day 392

Nice and sunny out there today, but the wind chill factor is keeping things quite cool, we are still no further forward with our family crisis though.

You would think that after all this time that I’d be bored, and restless? I suppose that depends on your outlook on life, I am one of those rare creatures that actually enjoys the company of my other half, we both like doing the same things, we both like the same TV programmes, but I do have to admit that dear Mrs H doesn’t share my love of music, I have some source of music in almost every room, and if I’m on the move then I have my I pod, whereas Mrs H likes to sit in peace and quiet I’m afraid I don’t. I have to have background noise, unless of course, I’m writing, then peace and quiet are the order of the day. However, that is the only way we differ, except clothes of course – we don’t share our clothes, anyway -hurrying on – more importantly we have been in each other’s company for over 50 years and married for nearly 48 of them, so we both enjoy life to the full. (Mrs H said I am an exceptionally good boy for posting this and I have earned lots and lots of brownie points).

I was listening to Gold radio this afternoon and they played the theme tune to Z Cars, the memories came flooding back, The BBC were looking for a new cop show with a bit more bite to it, rather than the policeman on the beat solving crimes, the answer was to introduce “modern” Ford Zephyr patrol cars and Z Victor One was soon cruising around with Northerner PC William “Fancy” Smith (Brian Blessed) and Scotsman PC Jock Weir onboard. Z Victor Two contained Irishman PC Herbert Lynch and redhead PC Bob Steele.

Before he became famous as a movie star, Michael Caine turned down the part of Police Constable Bob Steele, as he did not want to be typecast in a television series. It went to Jeremy Kemp.

That was all the conversation was about in 1962 as I was about to leave Junior school, everyone seemed to be talking about what happened on Z cars after every episode.

The names of the key actors became almost as well-known as those of their characters: Stratford Johns (Inspector Barlow), Frank Windsor (Det.Sgt Watt) the duo went on to a spin off called Softly Softly in 1966. The theme music was arranged by Fritz Spiegl as a military march, from the traditional Liverpool folk song “Johnny Todd”. It spread across the nation like a cultural virus. Everyone could whistle it – we even sang our own stupid songs to the tune with cod-Scouse lyrics. In fact, the theme tune was so popular that Liverpool-based soccer side, Everton F.C., immortalized it as their theme tune as the teams enter onto the field, a tradition that remains. Elton John enjoyed the theme so much that he also adopted it at the club at which he presided as chairman, Watford.

Windsor made a final appearance as Watt in the last episode of Z-Cars, “Pressure”, in September 1978, with Robins (John Phillips), the detective chief superintendent from the original series who had risen to chief constable. Jeremy Kemp, Brian Blessed, Joseph Brady and Colin Welland also appeared, though not as their original characters.

By March 1962 there were two versions of the theme tune in the top 40 from Johnny Keating and Norrie Paramor. I only know that when I hear those old theme tunes I am transported back to an era that is sadly – long gone.

After nearly 48 years of being married to Mrs H I have learned to read her like a book, I can also tell a lot by the way she uses her hands, for instance, If she slaps her hand on her knee then she is exasperated, if she sits there wringing them then she is fretting, if she waves them about she is annoyed, but if they are around my throat I know she’s really angry and I’ve done something terribly wrong!

Deaths once again continue to rise and today 53 were registered, there was also a slight rise in new cases at 3023.

Friday 09/04/2021 – Day 393

Bit of a damp start here in downtown Kidderminster, but we have had some encouraging news at last regarding the family crisis.

The new flooring arrived late yesterday afternoon via White Van Man, (actually it was silver, but who’s quibbling), the thing was that I’d been waiting most of the day, so at 4.30 I decided to go back into the house after doing a lot of little jobs I’d been meaning to catch up on for weeks. The back gate had been open all day in expectation of the delivery. So, Mrs H and I are sat having a cup of the old rosy lea when we heard the letter box go, you know those moments when the phone rings and you sit looking at it and wondering who that could be? Well, we did the same! Then it dawned on me, I went to the front door and noticed the card from B&Q, then I ran outside just in time to see the delivery man getting back into his van,

“I didn’t think there was anyone in,” he explained.

“You didn’t ring the bell or knock the door.” I retaliated, “I kept the gate open all day in case you called.”

“We’re not allowed onto your property for health and safety reasons.” He replied. What is it with these delivery people? I had one earlier last week saying the same or using the same excuse for a shoddy delivery service, this Covid has got a lot to answer for.

Meanwhile, on this day in 1983 English trainer Jenny Pitman became the first woman to train the winner of the Grand National (Corbiere) at Aintree, Liverpool. How do I know this amazing fact I hear you ask, well I had a tenner to win at thirteen to one and had £140 back for my trouble, a good return in those days?

The death was announced of Prince Philip (aged 99), husband of Queen Elizabeth II for more than 70 years. He officially retired from royal duties in May 2020 after 22,219 solo engagements. The Duke was the longest-reigning consort in British history and had recently been treated at King Edward VII Hospital and St Bartholomew’s Hospital for an infection. But what you probably didn’t know was that he has died on the anniversary of the funeral of the Queen Mother which was held on this day at Westminster Abbey in 2002. It was also the wedding anniversary of his son the Prince of Wales and Camilla Parker Bowles. They were married, in a civil ceremony at the Guildhall in Windsor in 2005. So, it seems that April 9^th is not a particularly good day for the Royals one way or another.

While Mrs H was very sympathetic toward the Royal family, she was not amused when they took off Gardeners World to show exactly the same programmes about the life of Prince Phillip on both BBC 1 and BBC 2, It seems that they had to set up a separate phone line to cope with the thousands of complaints from views. The whole of ITV was also taken up with it all evening. She was not a happy bunny.

The number of deaths were at their highest in over two weeks, there were 60 deaths recorded in the past 24 hours, the number of new cases also rose to 3150.

Saturday 10/04/2021 – Day 394.

Slight frost last night but once again our family crisis continues to improve, fingers crossed!

I have to finish the flooring in the Garden room today, we looked at all options but eventually went for a ‘floating floor’ option, these are boards that click together and look like painted floorboards. I used the calculator on the B& Q site which  -when you put in the room measurements – tells you how many packs you need, It will also ask if you ‘want to allow for wastage’, well of course you do, nothing worse than getting to the last bit and discovering you are one plank short, it turns out that the calculator errs on the side of caution as I have one and a half packs left over.

There’s no peace for the wicked, as soon as I’ve finished the flooring I start putting up the window and door blinds, one of the few jobs I hate doing.

Last Christmas (sounds like a Wham record) I bought Mrs h a lovely present of perfume, she said she loved it, well, she must like it very much as I could smell it all over the downstairs area. On investigation I discovered that the lovely Mrs H is using it as an air freshener in the downstairs toilet!

Can you remember the first record you ever bought? My dear old mum had just bought a Formica matching tables, chairs and sideboard, in the sideboard was a built-in record player and radio. So as far as I can remember the first record we ever bought was ‘Big Bad John’, it was originally recorded by Jimmy Dean, but for some unknown reason in the dark depths of my mind I thought it was recorded by Lorne Green of Bonanza fame. He was a singer as well as an actor and in 1964 he had a No1 hit with a song called ‘Ringo’, (no, not the Beatle, the sheriff and the baddie, try and stay with me here) The thing is that I can find absolutely no proof of him ever singing ‘Big Bad John.’ Funny how the memory plays tricks isn’t it.

I remember the second record I ever bought, it was titled ‘The sound of wasps’, when I got home and played it I couldn’t hear any wasps at all, then I realised – I was playing the Bee side.

There were 2,589 new cases today that brings my total for the week to 18,944 which is 8.967 less than last weeks numbers. There were a further 40 deaths registered which brought the total for the week to 254 just one above the previous week’s figures. Meanwhile a further 73,283 people had recovered, this brought the total of recoveries to3,961,738.

Well dear reader, I must once again take my leave of you all, we are all hoping and praying that things will improve over the next week.

Have a good week and take care.

It’s been emotional.