Christian sacrifice

It is too cold in my unheated workshop to do the last thing to some objects to be delivered (if I can find a truck and HIAB crane) next week, so I am leaving the car parked up and footling about here at home.

Try as I have done, I find it impossible not to get caught up in the mounting frenzy of the build-up to Christmas. It reminds me of the death of Princess Diana all those years ago. I did not think that the British were capable of such unashamed, hysterical displays of mass grief, then I remembered what happened when the death of Sherlock Holmes was announced. Black armbands, the lot.

I have to 'shelter-coat' the pair of composite stone dogs prior to putting them up on a wall. This involves making a sort of paint with very fine stone dusts, putty-lime, very fine aggregate (pumice in this case) and a binding of casein. It must not freeze.

The shelter-coat technique was developed at Wells Cathedral by a Professor Baker, who resurrected the traditional use of real slaked lime which had fallen out of fashion when they marketed Portland cement in the 19th century. He originally called it a 'sacrificial coat', but it was decided by the diocese that the term smacked too much of Paganism to sensitive Christian ears, so was dropped.

Lights in a dark world

I am feeling quite chirpy today. It is Saturday, the weather is fine and crisply frosty and there is a lull in the ghastly events to allow the exchange of hostages and delivery of essentials. 

Next week I will titivate a pair of 17th century stone dogs (copies of old friends) and arrange for them to be hoiked up onto a wall of my favourite house in Bath where they will stand guard over the lawns and some other objects I have put there. This will be my last job before Christmas, which is always a good thing.

My wealthy neighbours have excelled themselves with their Christmas lights this year.

Today I will take the tweed overcoat out of its wrappings and wander around town, stopping for a coffee to watch the hundreds of people milling around in the sunshine for the Christmas Market. 

Tonight I am roasting a chicken and making a cream sauce heavily infused with fresh tarragon. You can't go wrong with that, so long as you like cream and tarragon.

Green-Eyes is pregnant with a girl so I am about to become a step great-grandfather. It seems so recently that I was holding her hand to cross the road, and I hope I can stay around long enough to do the same with her daughter.

Small things, big world, or big things, small world?

Not transformation but enhancement

These are what have been taking up my time for a bit longer than they should have been recently. You see a 'before' photo, as on Monday I will be colouring them to match in with the wall and blend in with the surroundings, not stand out and glare as they do now.

I quite like turning stone on my lathe, but I do not like the dust I get covered with from head to foot. The design of these urn finials mean that 50% of the material is reduced to a very fine dust. That is a lot of dust. At weekends it is wonderful to wear clean clothes.

I have many more things to make and acquire which will improve what is an already beautiful garden, and I am very lucky to have been given the opportunity to work on my absolute favourite house in the area. I fell in love with this place when I worked here before many years ago, but almost everything I did for it then has gone (it's a long story) so I now have what amounts to a clean slate for the future. That is quite a responsibility, but after all these years I am more than capable of suggesting things which will suit perfectly and I am not about to inflict any incongruity on somewhere I love so much.

Are you for us or against us?

For quite a few years now, divisiveness has been used as a tool to gain political support from the more extreme factions in societies right around the world. Trump was probably the first to throw himself wholeheartedly into the modern version of the tactic, and he was so surprised at how well this simple technique worked that he cranked it up higher than anyone else before him in recent history. His support is so strong and his opposition is so weak now that he stands a very good chance of a second term as the most powerful leader in the Western World. Being convicted in court will only boost his campaign.

With him as an example, our current government began to believe that you do not need any clear policies or even any degree of ability or competence to tackle unpredicted problems for the good of the country, and now they can only focus on the survival of The Party by appealing to what they perceive to be the lowest common denominator in any situation - so long as it might consist of 1% over the others by this time next year.

Taking sides has now become mandatory. Nobody sees the bigger picture anymore. You are only allowed to support either Israel of Palestine, even though the governments of both have committed horrific war crimes in the name of 'justice'.

Trust what you see with your own eyes. Don't take anyone else's word or interpretation for what is happening.

A simple outlook

Nookie's grave at the dog's cemetery in Parade Gardens. I think they all must have overgrown since the 1920s because I only found them a few years ago after a clear up. I didn't know I missed Nookie so much.

I have not felt like blogging since the siege of Gaza began because I did not want to add more hot air to an atmosphere which I barely understand anyway, and the rhetoric from both sides of the fence is further polluted by statistics and lies about statistics. I don't like Netanyahu and I don't like Hamas. As with everywhere else in the world, the majority of people in Israel and Palestine are ones who I would like to have as friends, but not necessarily their rulers.

An Israeli ex soldier (professional, not conscript) was giving his account of incursions into Gaza during the previous conflicts and he was convinced that no military offensives would ever solve the problem. His brother was killed by Hamas and he lost comrades in the incursions he took part in. Hamas will not disappear no matter how many are killed, and neither will Israel. This conflict just strengthens the resolve of both sides, and thousands upon thousands more children will be killed by bombs, bullets and dehydration. 

The civilian hostages must be returned to Israel and the vengeance for the killing of Israeli families must stop. The only way that could happen is through talks and deals.

How many years did it take for the Brits to sit down with their mortal IRA enemies and come to some sort of tenuous understanding? Where did the bulk of the IRA's funding come from? The USA gave a lot of support through NORAID. Ideologies are not always good things to aspire to, but it is too raw in the Middle East to start talks right now. It will be a long term resolution if there is ever a possibility of peace and a two-state solution. 

I don't feel any better for writing this.

Smile

It's hard to believe that this used to be my passport photo. I look more like Zapata as portrayed in The Simpsons.

I remember the time of my first passport photo, in the days when you had to go to a professional photographer to have one taken.

The photographer was a pain in the arse, but aren't they all? I sat down in front of the camera and stayed still, waiting for him to press the shutter. In the days of celluloid they did not want to waste any more film than they had to, so he spent a long time fiddling about with the settings before telling me to smile. I did not want to smile and told him so.

"Come on," he whined, "You can manage a little smile, can't you?"

I held my ground and he eventually - and reluctantly - took the shot. These days you are not permitted to smile, which is why all men look like terrorists in their passports.

Sometimes people would ask me why I never smiled unless I was laughing. To me it felt as though I was smiling like a baby with bad wind, but my face just fell into vacancy without any instructions from me.

Apparently, the Ayatollah Khomeini was an avuncular barrel of laughs when he was not on camera, but considered smiling an undignified act for someone in his position. I wonder how the situation in Iran would have differed if he had just laughed a few times on camera when in office. I had quite a few good Iranian friends in the days of the Shah and I know that they all like having a good time. Poor sods.

Evidence

A Conservative politician said today that Hamas have caused the water shortage in Gaza by digging up the pipes and using them as 'offensive weapons'.