Wednesday October 22nd 2025 "Do YOU ever feel sorry for those beans you scrape out of the tin haha?!!!"

Yes, friends, do YOU ever feel sorry for the beans you get out of your tin? Who knows, after all, what those little guys went through, before Heinz or whoever stuffed them into that round-to-roundish bit of metalwork! 

At least those beans are getting some apologies now, if a little grudging (!), for what they've been subjected to during Britain's imperial past, according to the local Onion News for East Hampshire, with even some of those apologies now coming from the mighty BBC no less !!!!!

Poor beans !!!!! 

Did you see the story? My light-to-moderate wife Lois and I thought it was a bit shameful of Onion News to "bury" the story a bit, way back on p.94. Has the Onion been mistreating beans itself - maybe in some kind of horrible caramelised stew, maybe? I think we should be told!

Forgive the 'foodie' joke there, won't you, but what a crazy world we live in !!!! 

The story nevertheless gives Lois and me a bit of a chuckle this morning, however, because it's our turn to be "mean to a bean" (!), now it's well and truly autumn again, 

The reason is because after our daily walk over Old Man Lowsley's Farm, near our home in Liphook, Hampshire, listening to the birdsong etc, Lois invites me to take down her "wigwams".

And no, that isn't a euphemism - I'm talking bean-poles here! 

Well Lois's beans have certainly had a good "run" this year  [no pun intended!!!!], to put it mildly! 

They've produced so much we've even had to literally give some of those little blighters away, either to neighbours or to our 50-year-old daughter Alison and family, who live just 5 miles away in semi-rural Churt, just over the county line in nearby Surrey - what madness!!!

flashback to earlier today: Lois and I take our daily walk, today over Old Man Lowsley's Farm,

listening to the dunnocks etc, before I use my muscles to take down Lois's bean-poles and plants

Poor beans (again) !!!!!!

Pulling those poles down is a lot of fun, as it is every autumn, but the rest of today turns out to be more hectic even that that, would you believe!. 

Nine months after moving to Liphook, Hampshire, our old dear home in Malvern Worcestershire remains unsold, but maybe not for much longer, because a young couple, Sophie and George, are on the point of committing to buy it. At last the prospect of paying off our humongous bridging loan has appeared on the horizon, which will be nice. Today,  however, I have to work out our family finances and send a report to our lenders - busy busy busy!!!

(left and centre) our dear former home in Malvern, Worcestershire, still unsold

after 9 months, and (right) our current home in Liphook, Hampshire

What madness isn't it !!!!

At least we can look forward tonight to the third and final programme in Welsh comedian Rob Brydon's enjoyable series Honky Tonk Road Trip in the American South, which is nice.

In Alabama, we see the African-American neighbourhood where Elvis was the only white kid, growing up. For his 11th birthday he wanted a rifle from the local hardware store to go hunting and help his family out by putting food on the table, only to be told that that was too dangerous - the end result being that they bought him a guitar there instead. 

We also see the Sun Studios, founded by Sam Phillips, where Elvis and lots of other singers cut their first records, including Johnny Cash. In tonight's programme, Rob meets Sam's son Jerry and talks about those days, and his dad's first meeting with the young Johnny Cash.

Yes, apparently, being more sinful was the key to Cash's later success as a singer-songwriter. 

But what kind of sinning did Johnny Cash go and do, exactly? I think we should be told, don't you?!!! 

All we know is that, after sinning, Cash came back to Sun Studios with the song, "Hey Porter" - and here's the last verse, which suggests that Cash's new sinfulness might have had something to do with jumping the queue to get off the train, do you think?

Certainly, here in the UK, you can't imagine a worse sin than jumping a queue, can you (!).

I wonder....!

In Nashville Rob drops by the Bluebird Cafe, where Taylor Swift was first discovered as a 14-year-old, and he meets one of today's country music stars, Lainey Wilson. Brought up on a farm outside the small town of Baskin, Louisiana, she's now a Grammy winner.

And Lainey, with her memories of childhood down on the farm, soon has Our Rob (and Lois and me!) "tearing up". Awwww !!!!

Awwww (again) !!!!

And Lainey talks about the inspiration that little job gave her, which makes Rob get even more emotional. Well he's raised two daughters himself, just like Lois and me.

Lois and I are waiting to hear Lainey's song "Those Boots", but I guess there's no time for that - here's one of the verses, however, to give you a rough idea!

At this point in the interview, Rob starts to feel totally overcome by his emotions and he tells the camera crew to look away.

Poor Rob!!!  

And poor Lois and me - sob, sob!!! We also brought up two daughters, now middle-aged. And you certainly know you're old when your children start to hit their 50's, that's for sure !!!!

When the programme finishes, Lois and I spend some time recalling those days long ago, when we four were the centre of the universe. Happy days !!!!!

flashback to 1990: Lois and me with our daughters Alison (15) 

and Sarah (13), in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire,

when we four were the centre of the universe

One of my fondest memory of Alison, our elder daughter, is one which she doesn't remember because she was too young, She and I, both inveterate early risers (still are!), I remember how she liked to sit on my lap at the breakfast table, when I was eating my boiled egg or whatever, before I disappeared to work, while Lois and Sarah would still have been snoring happily away upstairs.

flashback to 1980: our elder daughter Alison, riding 

her bike down the pavement near our home in Cheltenham

- happy days !!!!!

Pass the tissues haha!

Will this do?

[Oh, just go to bed! - Ed]

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzz!!!!!

Tuesday October 21st 2025 "Does YOUR heart sink when your pals show off their 'superior' phones?"

Yes, Friends, does your heart sink when you realise your buddies have nicer, maybe more up-to-date phones than you do? It's a common dilemma, isn't it, and there's a story about one local sufferer in this morning's local Onion News for East Hampshire. And if you missed the details, catch up here, on Yours Truly's blog, slightly edited for content - but there's no charge, which is nice!

Poor Simons !!!!

But his heart-rending story brings a much needed chuckle to part of my face this morning, and also to the face of my light-to-moderate wife Lois, as we sit in the "Phone Clinic" in nearby downtown Petersfield, Hampshire, while helpful assistant Ali tries to unlock Lois's little Huawei - something I don't normally allow, unless it's for professional purposes haha! 

We spend at least an hour in the shop before deciding to let Ali out of his misery and just buy a cheap bargain new phone from Amazon, one that consumer magazine "Which?" says is "okay" and, overall, a good bargain at the price. 

We feel quite stressed, however, after sitting for an hour or more in the shop while Ali silently "tries things", while we sit patiently not knowing if he's on the verge of a breakthrough - he's a bit laconic, and a man of few words, to put it mildly. There's no charge however, and after the morning's ordeal, Lois and I decide to treat ourselves to a quick lunch and a coffee at the local Costa's before driving the 10 miles home to semi-leafy Liphook, Hampshire and going to bed for a few hours to recover. 

It's a hard life being retired haha!!!

(left) my light-to-moderate wife Lois and me sitting in Petersfield's iconic 

"phone clinic", while Ali "tries" things with Lois's Huawei (!), and (right)

us having lunch and a coffee in the Costa's before driving home to Liphook

But what a crazy world we live in !!!!

21:00 We relax this evening with the first programme in a new series of QI XL, the comedy quiz programme. They've now reached the letter 'W', so there are lots of Welsh-themed panellists and questions, which is nice. Also some questions on 'whales' and 'wails' to give a bit of balance haha!

They're a mixed bunch of panellists in the programme tonight, with presenter Sandi Toksvig being a Dane, and comedian Griff Rhys-Jones being part-Welsh, having a Welsh grandfather. Comedian Alan Davies has a Welsh name, but genetically, apparently, he's 100% "Essex". 

Welsh comedian Kiri Pritchard-McLean lives in a predominantly Welsh-speaking part of Wales and has been learning the language and can understand "bits of it". For comedian Ellis James, Welsh was his first language and he had to learn English as a foreign language, as did film star Richard Burton back in the 1930's. 

(left) Richard Burton as a Welsh-speaking schoolboy growing up in Swansea,

and (right) Burton as a Hollywood star seen here with wife Elizabeth Taylor

As for Yours Truly, my siblings and I are 52% Welsh: my younger sister Gill took a DNA test and found this out: our mother ("Parent 1") was 100% Welsh, but our father was a little bit Welsh and also a little bit more Norwegian - work that one out!

Our mother, born 1919 in Bridgend, Glamorgan, grew up speaking English in the home but she learned a bit of Welsh as a foreign language at school. Since then, there's been something of a revival in the fortunes of the Welsh language.

flashback to the late 1920's, on the beach at Southerndown, 

Glamorgan: my mother Hannah ("Nan") in the front, with her 

parents and 3 of her 9 siblings: Ruth (left) and twins Joan and Babs

And as we find out from presenter Sandi Toksvig in tonight programme, at the last census, there were 538,300 Welsh speakers in the UK, representing only 1% of the total UK population, but representing one in six of the population of Wales. 

In the 19th century the authorities tried to suppress the language, and panellist Kiri Pritchard-McLean says that her grandparents were beaten in school if they spoke Welsh there. The belief was that the Welsh language was 'uncivilised' and was holding the country back.

This policy of suppression, together with other unpopular government measures (!), led to a lot of unrest and rioting, however. During the so-called "Rebecca riots" of 1839, sparked also by the high charges for travelling on toll roads, Welsh farmers dressed up as women, as a form of disguise, it's thought, although Ellis James has an alternative theory:

What madness !!!

And during the Napoleonic Wars, the French tried to exploit Welsh unrest. In 1797, they landed an army at Fishguard, Pembrokeshire - known as the last foreign invasion of the UK.  The French Army camped out on one hill outside the town, and the women of Fishguard went out and camped out on another one, looking over at the French, and the French looking over at them.

But because Welsh women all wore those black hats, the French thought that the British Grenadiers had arrived in their bearskins, and they high-tailed it back to France.

What a crazy world we live in !!!! [You've done that one once already - just saying! - Ed]

But all the most tremendous fun, isn't it!

Will this do?

[Oh just go to bed! - Ed

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!