07:00 Sunday morning means a cruel schedule for us, starting really early - it's my turn to make the tea so I get up and bring the tea back up to bed, but I can't linger. We have a zoom meeting at 8.30 am with Sarah, our younger daughter, who lives in Lower Chittering, near Perth, Australia, together with Francis and their 7-year-old twins Lily and Jess. There's an 8 hour time difference, so the zoom takes place at 4.30 pm over there - a good time from their point of view: any later and it interferes with their evening meal and getting the twins to bed, so it makes sense.
08:30 The zoom call begins. The twins are tired - the family had a long 300-mile drive home the day before yesterday, after having spent a couple of weeks down on the Southern Ocean near Albany. Also it's been really hot - in the nineties Fahrenheit, or 30's Celsius, so they're more or less confined to the house. When they got back they found that nasty biting ants and redback spiders had been having a jolly good time in the house at their expense - yikes!!!
Christmas dinner - Aussie style, near the Southern Ocean
the long journey home last Friday
We don't see much of the twins on zoom today - they are obviously exhausted, although Lily shows us a bit of what she can do on their shiny new electronic keyboard and karaoke machine.
Lily demonstrates the family's shiny new electronic keyboard
Sarah has to go back in to work tomorrow (Monday), but the twins have another month's holiday till they start the new school year at the start of February. They don't know it yet but they won't be going back to the Catholic school they've been attending for the last year or so - they'll be going back to their previous school at Ocean Reef on the coast. Sarah and Francis plan to move eventually to a house in Ocean Reef, but in the meantime Francis will have to drive them the 30 mile journey to school and back every schoolday from Lower Chittering.
this will be the twins' 30-mile route to school each day
when schools reopen after the long Christmas holidays
flashback to March 2018: Lois pictured outside the twins' former school at Ocean Reef
Sarah watches the twins play on the school playground - happy times!!!
09:45 The call ends, and Lois and I relax with a cup of coffee on the sofa. Then Lois disappears into the dining-room again to take part in the first of her sect's two worship services on zoom today.
I make myself useful by filling and organizing our recycling boxes - the recycling truck is calling tomorrow, any time after 7 am: there is more stuff than usual to get out there on the forecourt, because of all the Christmas detritus: yikes! Also it's nearly 3 weeks since they last collected, due to the Christmas break - what madness!!!!
12:30 After lunch Lois goes back into the dining-room for her sect's second worship service, while I go to bed for a nap.
I take a look at Lois's Christmas present to me, a book about GCHQ and its predecessors, called "Behind the Enigma" by John Ferris.
flashback to Christmas Day - I open my main present from Lois
I study the early years. Apparently in the 18th century "comint" (communications intelligence) concentrated on intercepting messages to and from foreign embassies in London. The Government's small interception, decryption and translation unit had an office (called "The Secret Office" nudge nudge wink wink) in the GPO Royal Mail building in Lombard Street, London, which was convenient: my god! All letters to and from embassies were routinely opened, read and re-sealed to make it look as if they were untouched, although I suspect that few were fooled haha!
There was virtually no military or naval "comint". Naval ships didn't sent messages to each other except when they were close together, usually by hoisting flags, unless you could get a small boat to go from one ship to another. And they could only see about 15 miles in daytime, and even less at night haha (again)!!!
In those days navies had real trouble finding each other. In 1798 Admiral Nelson spent weeks sailing about the Mediterranean looking for the French fleet, until he eventually stumbled across them at Alexandria, Egypt.
So although the British Royal Navy was theoretically the most powerful navy in the world, it didn't do us much good always. Because of the difficulty of finding enemy ships, the Royal Navy tended to play it safe and most of its ships stayed in home waters to protect the homeland in case of a sneak attack - this is why they didn't intervene much in the American War of Independence, thereby allowing the French Navy to give the colonists valuable aid. My god, what madness!!!!!
20:00 We watch a bit of TV, the first in a new series of socially-distanced Antiques Roadshow, from Enfield, Middlesex, where for decades they made the famous Lee-Enfield rifle. This is the series where members of the public bring along prized possessions from their homes and have them examined and valued by experts in the field.
It's fascinating tonight to be shown a policeman's helmet by the owner's daughter. In November 1963 when the Beatles due to appear at the Hippodrome Theatre in Birmingham, the local police had the idea of disguising the group as policemen by giving them helmets, to get them into the theatre without the screaming crowds of teenage fans detecting their presence - simples! And John Lennon was the group-member who wore PC Russell's helmet.
in this photo PC Russell can be seen standing behind George and Paul
Apparently the Beatles were really easy-going at this stage of their career, according to the policeman's daughter, and they were still lots of fun to be around. The police inspector in charge of the security arrangements invited the group back to his house for a cup of tea afterwards, and the group all had tea in his house. They also signed an autograph book whilst having their cup of tea.
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzzzz!!!!
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