Wednesday April 12th 2023

That puzzling Venn diagram that has been haunting Lois and me for a few days has now been explained to me by Tünde, my Hungarian penfriend, and it's all starting to make horrible sense - my goodness!!! Lois and I found the picture oddly familiar but we couldn't remember where we had seen it.

Tünde, who, almost literally, knows everything worth knowing, has reminded me that a few years ago a woman in Spain took it upon herself to clean up an old fresco of Jesus Christ in her local church, but didn't make a very good job of it - people said the finished face looked a bit more like a monkey.

She recalled this article on rtl.hu celebrating the 10th anniversary of the botched "restoration" which has become a bit of a tourist attraction locally.

And you may have seen an article in the Daily Mail, dating from the original "restoration" in 2012.

The Venn diagram was funny even when we didn't recognise the picture - usually the word "Brexit" on its own is enough to start Lois and me laughing. But the Venn diagram is twice as funny now that we know what happened in Zaragoza, Spain all those years ago - my goodness (again) !!!!!

Flashback to the original and later versions:

the original painting from the late 19th century

the damp-damaged version

the newly "restored" version of 2012

Enough said haha !!!!!

09:00 We drive over to the wonderful local Applegarth's farm shop near Grayshott to buy, amongst other things, two packs of Winslade Cheese, a local Hampshire cheese, recently recommended to us by Steve, our American brother-in-law. One pack we make a gift of to Ali, and the other we'll take back home to Malvern.

We enter the shop and immediately start feeling the "hygge" (the Danish concept of cosiness). We buy some products in the farm shop, including the cheese, and then have a coffee and cake in the café. 

Nice one!

we enter the farm shop and immediately start feeling the "hygge" -

the Danish concept of "cosiness" - nice!

Ali and the children look over the deli counter

we enter the café, and put in our order for coffee and cake.

Here Lois showcases the local Winslade Cheese.

time to leave and drive back to Ali's house

13:00 We come back and greet Sika, the family's Danish dog. He's been "in the wars" a bit lately, he's all "wagged out" following a huge family get-together by Ed's relatives on Good Friday, the day before Lois and I arrived here, and he's been a bit below par ever since, not wagging his tail at all, which is not like him. Today he's showing signs of a partial recovery, which is nice to see.

Sika, the family's Danish dog, is showing signs of perking up

after a few days when he's been a bit "under the weather"

Poor Sika !!!!!!!

13:00 We have lunch in the kitchen-diner, which has been prepared by Ali from a pizza, plus many of the left-overs from the family get-together last Friday.

Ed, Ali's husband is away today. Usually he works from home but today he had to go in to work at the head office of the firm he works as legal advisor for, in central London, and tonight he's going to be flying north to Glasgow for a day or two on business.

We're joined for lunch today, however, by 12-year-old Isaac's friend Ned, which is nice. Isaac slept over at Ned's house a couple of days ago, and Ned is here again today for a "play date". They're great friends, even though Isaac is a Spurs supporter, but Ned supports Chelsea, which is a pity!

the lunch table: (left to right, clockwise) Ned (Isaac's friend), Isaac,

Ali, Rosalind, Josie and Lois

20:00 Ali, Lois and I settle down on the sofa to watch for the second time the third and final episode of the Agatha Christie serial "Why Didn't They Ask Evans?". This time we are able to find the answers to many of our unanswered questions about the murder of Mr Savage - who did it, first and foremost, and why, which are two of the most basic things you want to know if you're watching a whodunnit, aren't they. Be fair, now!!!! 

Some typically sarcastic dialogue at the dinner table, featuring [Spoiler alert, if we're right haha1] the people Lois and I think are the two killers - Roger and Moira, also the crime-busting Lady "Frankie" Francis.

Roger puts Moira "on the spot"

Roger and Frankie seen here waiting for Moira's answer

And tonight, watching the re-run, we also find out why the 2 killers felt they then had to murder lots of other people, and we also find out who Gladys Evans was, and why she could have told people more facts about the original murder, if only she'd been asked.

Good! 

But there are still a few things that Lois and I think are "loose ends" which the series creator, actor Hugh Laurie, probably didn't have time to explain in this 3-hour condensing of Agatha Christie's 304-page book. So Lois says she's going to get the whole novel on to her Kindle, so then we'll see !!!!

21:00 We go to bed on today's edition of Pointless, the quiz in which contestants try to get the most obscure answers to questions, rather than just get them right. You know the one, don't you!

There's a question tonight that could have been made just for me. And it's a "pointless" answer, which means that not one of the 100 members of the public polled knew the answer.

It's about trying to think of the names of certain people who have both a 4-letter first name and a 4-letter last name.

It turns out that of the 100 people polled on the question of who was "the politician who was Hungary's Prime Minister from 1953 to 1955, and again during the 1956 Revolution", not one single person knew that that was Imre Nagy, or "Nagy Imre" as the Hungarians say.

It turns out that the most easily identifiable name was singer Kate Bush (Question 1), who wrote and sang the song "Wuthering Heights" in the 1978. Fifty-seven people out of the 100  named her correctly. 

Out of the 100 people, 26 correctly named actor Brad Pitt (Question 2), 25 could name Karl Marx (Question 6), 21 could name Python star Eric Idle (Question 4), and 3 could name British athlete Mary Rand (Question 5).

Nobody, however, could name Hungarian Prime Minister Imre Nagy, even though I was yelling his name at the screen the whole time - what madness !!!!!

It's a bit sad for Karl Marx, the fact that he's now less famous than Kate Bush, but then, he never released any records, did he, nor did he ever dance a mystic dance on the Yorkshire moors, at least not as far as I know.

Poor Karl !!!!!!!

22:00 It's a big day tomorrow because I have to drive the 125 miles home to Malvern from Headley, Hampshire, where Ali and family live. You see, I don't normally drive more than about 25 miles at one go. 

Yikes!!!!!

We go to bed - zzzzzzzzzz!!!!!!