Remembrance Sunday

Today I have been thinking of my nephew, Graham, who is laying a wreath at the Belfast Memorial as the Representative of the Salvation Army in Northern Ireland. No doubt, like me, he will be thinking of Ernie, his uncle, one of the 55,000 men of Bomber Command who were killed in WW2. Soon, I hope, there will be built a memorial in London to honour the sacrifice made by these brave young men whose average age was 22 years. It is so right that for our tomorrows they gave their today.

The Second Fire of London

This month's copy of Saga magazine has a picture like my picture of St. Paul's Cathedral when the City of London was on fire. The raiders came in first with incendiary bombs and the resulting fires were a beacon for the bombers following with high explosive. I might have sounded light-hearted but it was overwhelmingly frightening. The noise went on and on.

The next morning I picked my way to work over piles of broken glass and firemen's hoses which snaked their way across the streets. When I arrived home that evening my mother told me that Jack's father, a fireman, had been killed by a falling wall. This is what war is really like.

Guy Fawkes

The evenings close in and before you know it Bonfire Night has arrived. Why do we still celebrate it? Perhaps because the foiled attempt by Guy Fawkes and his plotters was meant to kill the King as well as destroy the Houses of Parliament. Hitler had a good try and the IRA almost suceeded in killing Mrs. Thatcher and her Cabinet but we are a resilient race. Despite our enemies efforts to undermine us I remain an optimist.

Fire watching

I have just been watching a programme about the London Blitz. In particular the night of 29th December 1940. This I well remember because it was my first time of fire watching.


We lived in a tall house close to the south side of Westminster Bridge. There was a basement which served as an air raid shelter and three floors above. We lived on the middle floor. The stairs led upward, past the top flat and up to a door which gave on to a flat roof. This was where we used to do our fire watching looking out for incendiary bombs.


There was a rota kept of all able-bodied residents and neighbours who took it in turns to watch for bombs. We were armed with a stirrup pump, abucket of water and a bucket of sand. i don't remember anyone telling me what to do but I was up there ready to do it! Fortunatelyfor the safety of the building and the occupants no incendiaries ever landed on the roof while I was on watch though they rained down all around.

The other watchers with me were Jock, a steward on the train "The Flying Scotsman" and usually well fortified with his native brew and Jack aged about the same age as I was to whit 17.



On this night the shrapnel from the anti-aircraft guns was rattling down all around us Thankfully I had my Civil Defence tin hat on. Not so the others, so Jock decided he would go down and look for something for them (and, incidentally stoke up with some more Dutch courage,I expect) He let the door bang to, and when Jack and I decided it was getting too dangerous and we had better take cover, to our horror, we found we could not open the door. No one could hear our agitated banging because of the noise of the raid. Not a moment too soon the "All Clear" sounded and somebody came up to see where we were We made sure , in future, that the door was propped open. Being brave was all very well but there are limits!

More Tea

Yesterday I had a surprise present. It was a tin of tea. Since the packer had omitted to in clude a message I had to surmise who the donor was. No need to call in Poirot. It was, of course, my tea drinking friend from Tokyo. Now for the second surprise. The tea was grown in England!
If Cousin Carole is reading this she no doubt knows all about it as the Tregothnan tea is grown on the Boscawen estate near Truro in Cornwall. Tregothnan is believed to be the only commercial tea plantation in the U.K. It has secured a large order to export its quintessentially English tea to Japan. It already exports to China and India.
The estate has been the home of the Boscawen family since 1335. Enough information?
To get down to drinking the tea! I have to report that is bright, refreshing with the slightest hint of a perfume. I recommend it.

Idle thoughts of an idle lady.

I have just read a letter from a man whose lock on his bathroom door does not work so he has taken up whistling pro tem. When we were viewing a house prior to purchase the vendor said the lock on the loo door was broken so you had to sing "God Save the King".

I notice that a number of Air Lines are advertising very cheap one way tickets to various exotic destinations.
Paddy to Mike "Where is your brother?"
Mike "He won a one way ticket to Singapore".
Paddy "Did he have a good holiday?
Mike "I don't know yet. He is waiting to win a ticket home".

Despite the gloomy forecasts of the weather men of an impending Ice Age I have for the past four days enjoyed sitting in the conservatory in brilliant sunshine with beautiful blue skies. I have to admit it is autumnal outside. Regular readers will have gathered that the conservatory is one of my blessings even though , like me, it is getting on a bit If, as seems likely, it was built with the house it has stood there since 1873!

Redecoration

Our house painting is finished and it all looks beautiful. The scaffolding has been taken away. Fortunately our neighbours did not need, like Charles Saatchi (Nigella's husband)to send in their own workman to take it down. We shall miss our friendly builder who has been here for some weeks and is almost like one of the family.

On the subject of scaffolding I have been told that the scaffolding is customarily left in place until it is needed for another job. It saves on transport and storage I suppose. There are tricks in every trade.