The engine

Marlene from Poppypatchwork asked about the engine in my header.

It was drawn by my son, Gareth, when he was about four, I think.

I love it. I like the pencil lines of his original drawing. I like the details he included - the chimney, the couplings, and the four wonky wheels. I love the way he used a black wax crayon to colour it in so vigorously. There are two roughly rectangular white spaces to the bottom right of the engine. I don’t know what they are – maybe they represent the steps up onto the footplate.

I can see when the energy began to lag. The wheels are not so thoroughly coloured, the last one, on the right hardly coloured at all. He was a dear little boy and developed into a caring and loving husband and father.

One day, I will ask him if he remembers drawing this.

Children’s drawings can tell us so much, if only we care to look closely enough.

The law is an ass

 

The law is an ass

                                        Enforcement officer

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

Welcome to today’s rant!

A woman in Richmond, West London was recently fined £150 for pouring the dregs of her coffee down a roadside drain. She was about to catch a bus to work and didn’t want to spill the remains of her drink on it. She was accosted by three ‘enforcement officers’ who issued the fine.

 Richmond Council employs enforcement officers to deal with violations of parking regulations and issue fines where necessary. They may also investigate fly-tipping, dropping litter or refuse in the street, or the incorrect way of presenting refuse for collection (!)

 She was unaware of the law, which, as we all know, is no excuse!!

It can be found under Section 33 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. There are 164 sections, and 16 Schedules, 20 if you count the sub-schedules.

The miscreant asked the enforcement officers, all three of them, if there were any signs or information warning of the requirements of the law, but received no answer. She found the incident quite intimidating, but Richmond Council maintained that the body cams worn by the three officers showed that they had not behaved in an aggressive manner.

I think the sight of three officers approaching me and telling me I was breaking the law and needed to pay a fine would make my heart beat a little faster, too.

The lady asked what she should have done with her left-over beverage, and was told she should have poured it in a nearby bin. Richmond Council stated, “We are committed to protecting Richmond’s waterways and keeping our borough’s streets clean and safe. Enforcement action is only taken when necessary,”

This begs the question. ‘What should I do with left-over tea, coffee, or other drinks at home?’ Should they all be poured into the bin, rather than emptied down the kitchen sink?I wonder if this was a box-ticking exercise, 

with the results to be charted to prove that ‘efforts are being made in our ongoing campaign to improve conditions in our borough,’ or words to that effect.

If the lady who has committed the criminal act pays the fine within fourteen days, it will be reduced by £50 to £100. She is intending to make a complaint when her case will be reviewed.

Postscript: The fine has ben lifted. Commonsense prevailed.

Expanding appointments

 

Expanding appointments

It is a week of time-gobbling appointments. Monday’s dental appointment was three times as long as expected. I had to have three (or four, I lost count) anaesthetic injections. And to think, Vishal was contemplating not using any injections at all! Enough of that.

On Tuesday we had to go to a hospital a few miles away for a cholesterol blood test. I don’t know why. Perhaps the powers that be, who have little notion how to organise things, thought it would be a sensible idea to centralise things.

We duly turned up well before the appointed time, and booked in. No problems there. My blood was taken and then it was Barry’s turn. He’s supposed to have blood tests every few months. He reappeared very quickly, looking thunderous. The doctor’s notes were missing, so the phlebotomist couldn’t take a sample. However, all he needed to do was ‘phone our medical practice and get a doctor to authorise the blood-letting. Then the phlebotomist told him he could bang on the door, and he would be relieved of the requisite syringeful of blood. Annoying, but simple.

He rang the GP practice. He was number nine in the queue. Fifty minutes later he was able to speak to a long-suffering receptionist. She then had to consult a doctor. In another ten minutes, a doctor was available to speak to the phlebotomist, and the sample was taken.

Today will be spent making ‘phone calls and composing emails and letters to Wes Streeting (Secretary of State for Health and Social Care) local MPs, the CEO of the hospital, the CEO of the Foundation Trust, our medical practice, and anyone else we discover who should be made further aware of the inadequacy of the system.

Patients – we, the public – are being expected to take on more and more of the organisation of our medical treatment. We must make the appointments, chase the results, organise ongoing treatment if required. Many of us are perfectly capable of doing that, but there are many more who experience great difficulty.

People who are already feeling unwell can quickly be defeated by a system that appears designed to confuse. They don’t or can’t persevere, miss appointments, and become seriously ill. By the time they finally come to the attention of the medical profession, they may be much sicker than they would have been had they been seen in a timely fashion.

In short, the appalling IT system is completely inadequate and deteriorating all the time. Everyone agrees, from consultants to clinicians to nurses to receptionists, that the system is broken and needs urgent repair. There is huge frustration across the medical profession because a wildly inadequate system is putting people’s lives at risk.

Tomorrow, Barry has an appointment at another hospital for an MRI scan.

Fingers crossed!

Unexciting

 

Unexciting

Nothing of note to tell you, so I thought I’d share a recent photograph. Gilbert and Herschel often go to bed before the rest of us. They’re effective bed warmers.

It’s rained quite a lot today, which is good. It’s colder, which is not so good, but a bright fire is dispelling the gloom. We’ve drawn the curtains, too, so it feels quite cosy. 

I spent Monday afternoon at the dentist. It wasn’t the whole afternoon, of course, it just felt like it. A thirty-minute appointment stretched to ninety. C’est la vie!

No names, no pack drill

 

No names, no pack drill

Boots, ankle, gs (general service, usually called ammo boots)
Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

This expression, often to be heard in our house, originated in the British army. 

Pack drill was a punishment for offenders which entailed marching in full uniform carrying a heavy pack of equipment. It was a common form of discipline in the nineteenth century army and was first recorded in 1903.

‘Boots – boots- boots- boots - movin’ up and down again’

Rudyard Kipling  1869-1936

The phrase carries the meaning that when a misdemeanour has been committed no-one can be punished if the miscreant has not been named.

In general humorous use, it is used as advice to abandon a subject or discussion so that further difficulties can be avoided. I suppose it could be superseded in some circumstances by, ‘Mind your own business.’

The phrase sprang to mind when I read the following on Facebook:

It’s frightful that people who are so ignorant should have so much influence.

George Orwell  1903-1950

Christmas shopping

 

Christmas shopping

🎅🎄🎁😇

I have been Christmas shopping all afternoon. I am exhausted and I haven’t even left the house! 🙁😟😕

Have I finished? No!😉

How’s your shopping going? 

Coconut crab

 

Coconut crab (Birgus latro)

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

The coconut crab is not the largest crab in the world – that accolade goes to the Japanese spider crab (Macrocheira kaempferi) – but it is the largest terrestrial crustacean. It is also the largest land-dwelling arthropod, the invertebrate family that includes insects, spiders, and centipedes. (Arthropod means ‘those with jointed feet.’)

An adult coconut crab may weigh four and a half kilogrammes and have a leg span of up to one metre.

The coconut crab, also known as the robber crab and the palm thief, is found on Indian and Pacific Ocean islands. It has become extinct on islands with large human populations, like Madagascar and Australia. Christmas Island has the largest population of coconut crabs.

This large hermit crab spends its entire life on land, once the young have developed sufficiently to go ashore. Coconut crabs mate between May and September. The female then lays the eggs and sticks them to her abdomen, where she carries them for several months. When they‘re ready to hatch, the female travels to the seashore to release them into the water. This is a dangerous time for her, because if she falls into the water, she will drown. She cannot breathe underwater and is too heavy to swim back to land.

The small shrimp-like larvae float in the ocean for three or four weeks. They are very vulnerable, and large numbers are consumed by predators. Eventually, the survivors sink to the seabed and find a shell to live in. They then move towards the seashore, where they remain for about a month until they finally venture onto dry land as young crabs, at the same time losing their ability to breathe in water.

Coconut crab on coconut! 
Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

As they outgrow their shells, they find larger ones. If they are unable to find suitable shells, they may use broken coconut shells. Large adults do not live in shells but develop a hard exoskeleton. They moult annually. For this they dig burrows to take shelter while their soft shell hardens, which can take up to three weeks.

Their popular name suggests that they eat coconuts and while these may form part of their diet, they also consume an omnivorous diet, including fruit, nuts, carrion, birds, baby turtles, and younger relatives. They have an acute sense of smell, allowing them to locate food. They actively hunt rats and larger sea birds, like the red-footed booby, and climb trees to reach hanging fruit, like that of the pandanus tree.

Coconut crabs climbing trees in Bora Bora, French Polynesia
Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

They mature very slowly, and can live for 120 years, reaching their maximum size between forty to sixty years. They are sexually mature at five. Colours vary by location. and may be shades of red or purplish-blue.

The only predators of coconut crabs are other coconut crabs and humans. They are hunted extensively, and in some areas, like Guam and the Mariana Islands, it is illegal to trap egg-bearing females or adults under a certain size. A limit is placed on the number allowed to be captured. It is currently a bag limit of five crabs at one time, or fifteen in a whole season.

In the Philippines it is illegal to catch them in any category. Violation of the law can lead to a heavy fine or a prison sentence up to six years. Despite this, and in order to satisfy the tourist trade, hunting continues. Coconut crab meat is toothsome.

Numbers are declining and the coconut crab is considered vulnerable by the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature)