So with every day there is the chance for new beginnings, challenges and opportunities.
I know there are a few of you out there that think I'm as mad as a hatter but you tolerate and humour me, you let me rant on about plastic, waste, recycling, the joy of seedlings, the smell of a freshly dug carrot and the wonder of a new born goat, the healing powers of calendula and lavender, my crochet creations.........the list is endless. I am happy for this to be so because in my own little way I hope that maybe some of my ramblings might be heard and maybe considered, but if not thats fine too because you simple let me ramble. You don't try to change me you simple accept my opinions and choices. I would like to think I do the same for you, because we are all human and we all have the right to our own opinions, to make our own decisions and to live as we choose to live.
I saw this poem online recently and it just seemed appropriate.
IF
If you can keep your heart open when all about you in darkness
Are closing theirs and blaming everyone else,
If you can trust your common sense when all have lost theirs,
But make allowance for their confusion too;
If you can work for the change and for the good, for the people and for nature - and not be tired by the waiting,
Or being surrounded by the lies, media lies, propaganda lies, personal lies, never believe the lies,
Or being bombarded by the hate, of race, culture, class or creed, and not give way to hating,
And yet neither preen with pride, nor talk too humbly wise:
If you can still dream—but not let your dreams die in life's endless diversions;
If you can think freely—but not let your thoughts drown in the days urgent deeds;
If you can recognise from afar the coming of Triumph and Disaster
And set your course calmly between their bright lure and their dark threat;
If you can acknowledge that the truths you have spoken
Will always be twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, to betray you - yet still you speak truth,
Or watch the causes you have given your life to, of human rights, civil rights, environmental rights - all broken by greed,
And patiently build them up again with love and with a light in your heart:
If you can talk with the people, listen to their hopes and their fears,
yet keep your kindness ever near, your compassion share with good
cheer;
Or walk beside the Mighty — but not loose sight of all that is right,
If you call none foe but see that all are friends - tho some lost in their pain
seek to hurt you,
If all creatures and every people matter for you, but none to the cost of the other;
If you can dance in the Infinite joy of this moment
With your heart ever caring, sharing and shining, singing your song for the life of the world,
You are a true citizen of Earth and a brother to everything that’s in it,
And—which is more, my friend —you’ll be forever free.
c.Titus. L 2016
Inspired by Rudyard Kipling's poem of the same name.
Monday, 27 June 2016
Sunday, 26 June 2016
Bugger!
As you all know I've not posted for a while, Beccy has been admirably steering the blog along while I've been wrapped up in dealing with migrants, miscreants and general rubbish stuff at work. I will get onto what we've been up to in a bit but first I'm going to take this opportunity to have a bit of a rant about events this week - and if you don't like it don't read it - it's my blog!
I always used to be for the right of the general public to be given the opportunity to be able to say whatever they want, to have a say in their future etc etc. But that was before Football radio phone ins when the Great British public ring up and say things like -
"Wey they should just sack the board and appoint Jose Morinho", and when asked by the radio person how exactly that could be done, reply "Ahh divven kna but they should dee it like." I decided that perhaps it maybe wasn't ideal to ask some people how the future of the country should be decided.
That view was confirmed when I watched the news last night. Britain has voted to leave the EU - OK that's fine if it's based on a reasoned argument with a clear plan on what happens next. I'm sure many people have a clear idea and vision of what the country will be like in say 5 years time - but please hurry up and tell us what it is. But back to the news - an interviewer asks two old biddies on the street what they thought - we think it's great they replied, we want to go back to "the good old days."
Now had I been the interviewer I'd have asked "What good old days are they then? Before or in between the wars, maybe when rationing was still around, perhaps it was a bit later on, when maternity/paternity leave was pretty much unheard of or when workers rights weren't enshrined in a European wide rule. Maybe it was in the days of the 3 day week, when electricity was cut off or maybe in the deeply divisive decade of the 80's when we stopped making stuff and it was all me me me." I'm not saying that the EU did or didn't make any difference to all of that, it probably didn't (except to workers rights), because in truth I really don't know - I just want to know when those good old days were?
Then the BBC cuts to a market in Sheffield and asks two stallholders what they thought. They both voted leave, but didn't expect it to happen. One is now scared and the other worries if he did the right thing - if you weren't sure with a decision of this magnitude and which affects so much - why did you vote that way? Oh let me guess it'll have been because of those immigrants who come and take our jobs. I reckon the job centres will be full on Monday with people desperate to take those jobs picking potatoes, processing chickens and cleaning old folks home that those selfish buggers from Eastern Europe have been claiming for themselves. By the following weekend I fully expect all the car wash places that have sprung up because people can't be arsed to wash their own -"I'll just get the Poles to do it for a fiver" will be inundated with new white British workers whistling Land of Hope and Glory as they polish your alloy wheels!
You may have sensed I'm a tad pissed off - you'd be right.
On a purely personal level this decision will have monumental effects on how the rest of my life is to be lived. Moving to France in a couple of years is no longer a certainty, me and Beccy can no longer plan on being able to go to live in Brittany as simply as we could before. The right of movement goes two ways. Yes we probably will be able to go and live there, but we won't simply be able to turn up one day and just not go home. If we won't automatically accept French people into our green and pleasant land - why would they automatically accept us. I have no skills that are of any use to anybody not involved in Customs & Immigration work - so would fail miserably on any points based system. Our only hope is that we become like Switzerland and accept freedom of movement in order to accept free trade - but then if you voted on the basis of " keeping those bloody job stealing immigrants out" that would have been a bit of a wasted vote then wouldn't it!
Like I said normal service will resume when I'll tell you all about the Whittle's trip, the summer ball, dog & kitten rescue and all the frivolities of Cyprus. In the meantime I'm off for a beer and a lie on the sunbed
I always used to be for the right of the general public to be given the opportunity to be able to say whatever they want, to have a say in their future etc etc. But that was before Football radio phone ins when the Great British public ring up and say things like -
"Wey they should just sack the board and appoint Jose Morinho", and when asked by the radio person how exactly that could be done, reply "Ahh divven kna but they should dee it like." I decided that perhaps it maybe wasn't ideal to ask some people how the future of the country should be decided.
That view was confirmed when I watched the news last night. Britain has voted to leave the EU - OK that's fine if it's based on a reasoned argument with a clear plan on what happens next. I'm sure many people have a clear idea and vision of what the country will be like in say 5 years time - but please hurry up and tell us what it is. But back to the news - an interviewer asks two old biddies on the street what they thought - we think it's great they replied, we want to go back to "the good old days."
Now had I been the interviewer I'd have asked "What good old days are they then? Before or in between the wars, maybe when rationing was still around, perhaps it was a bit later on, when maternity/paternity leave was pretty much unheard of or when workers rights weren't enshrined in a European wide rule. Maybe it was in the days of the 3 day week, when electricity was cut off or maybe in the deeply divisive decade of the 80's when we stopped making stuff and it was all me me me." I'm not saying that the EU did or didn't make any difference to all of that, it probably didn't (except to workers rights), because in truth I really don't know - I just want to know when those good old days were?
Then the BBC cuts to a market in Sheffield and asks two stallholders what they thought. They both voted leave, but didn't expect it to happen. One is now scared and the other worries if he did the right thing - if you weren't sure with a decision of this magnitude and which affects so much - why did you vote that way? Oh let me guess it'll have been because of those immigrants who come and take our jobs. I reckon the job centres will be full on Monday with people desperate to take those jobs picking potatoes, processing chickens and cleaning old folks home that those selfish buggers from Eastern Europe have been claiming for themselves. By the following weekend I fully expect all the car wash places that have sprung up because people can't be arsed to wash their own -"I'll just get the Poles to do it for a fiver" will be inundated with new white British workers whistling Land of Hope and Glory as they polish your alloy wheels!
You may have sensed I'm a tad pissed off - you'd be right.
On a purely personal level this decision will have monumental effects on how the rest of my life is to be lived. Moving to France in a couple of years is no longer a certainty, me and Beccy can no longer plan on being able to go to live in Brittany as simply as we could before. The right of movement goes two ways. Yes we probably will be able to go and live there, but we won't simply be able to turn up one day and just not go home. If we won't automatically accept French people into our green and pleasant land - why would they automatically accept us. I have no skills that are of any use to anybody not involved in Customs & Immigration work - so would fail miserably on any points based system. Our only hope is that we become like Switzerland and accept freedom of movement in order to accept free trade - but then if you voted on the basis of " keeping those bloody job stealing immigrants out" that would have been a bit of a wasted vote then wouldn't it!
Like I said normal service will resume when I'll tell you all about the Whittle's trip, the summer ball, dog & kitten rescue and all the frivolities of Cyprus. In the meantime I'm off for a beer and a lie on the sunbed
Thursday, 2 June 2016
Its been a while......
So May arrived and departed in what felt like a nanosecond, Jess called in for a month or so before departing for Sydney - she is having a ball and loving every antipodean moment and is currently traveling from Sydney to Byron Bay and hoping to find work. Then we had a couple of free days before mum arrived for a visit. The latter part of April and most of May have involved trips to Famgusta, Lefkara, Protaras, and Kyrenia, meals out in a variety of touristy or traditional restaurants both in the north and the south, a spot of diving (thats Jess not mum!), sightseeing, donkey spotting, a little football (although we aren't mentioning that!), a few beers, wine, a couple of dance shows and encounter with the Blues Brothers and in between all of that we actually show our faces at work.
Oh and ofcourse there was Duncan and Candace's wedding in Las Vegas - we didn't attend (think we may have needed a time machine to fit that in too) but we did watch the nuptuals via the internet.
Now for the photographs another glass of wine a some relaxation.
Oh and ofcourse there was Duncan and Candace's wedding in Las Vegas - we didn't attend (think we may have needed a time machine to fit that in too) but we did watch the nuptuals via the internet.
Now for the photographs another glass of wine a some relaxation.
Jumpin' Jessie
Donkey Sanctuary
Famagusta Old Town
Kato Paphos
Aphrodite's Rock
Yet more drinking in Kapparis
Dipkarpaz
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