Area dads - are YOU one? A lot of us are. And we tend to get a lot of "stick", don't we. "Crazy area dad!" - that's what they say about us sometimes, isn't it, in the local press. Not to mention "What's that crazy area dad sounding off about now?"
Well, maybe it's time for them to show a bit of respect. Maybe those "crazy" area dads aren't so far off the mark as people always seem to assume. Especially after news of local dad and Nob End native Charles Hillman, and the new, hard-earned but richly-deserved reputation he's earned amongst the world's scientific community.
Took us all a bit by surprise, didn't it!
Stylish, or what? !!!!
And it's especially nice being an "area dad" this weekend, because it's the imminence of Father's Day that's brought our 47-year-old daughter Sarah to stay over last night, so she can have a few dad-and-daughter chats with me, and also go out with my ever-sceptical wife Lois this morning to buy me a Father's Day present and card, to leave here with me, when she goes home to Alcester later today.
Yes, watching Trooping the Colour - how my dear late mother would have been proud of me if she were still around!
Awwwwww!!!!!
"Area Dad" watches Trooping the Colour
with wife and daughter - awwwwwww!!!!!
the three "little royals" - awwwww, how cute they look !!!!!
our King and Queen....
....our climate......
... our beautiful capital city, the Mall, the river....
... and our climate (again) - awwwwww!!!!!
all too soon - our daughter Sarah drives off in
the family's white electric BMW: awwwwwww !!!!!!
14:00 Now it's just Lois and me again in the house, rolling around like 2 peas in a giant drum - but that can be fun too, and Lois decides to postpone the two tarts she's decided to make for her fellow-church-members to have on Sunday, so we can first have a bit of nap-time in bed this afternoon.
Yesterday evening she unveiled her trademark flapjacks. I got a sight of them late last night and had a bit of a nibble. And I can exclusively reveal that those church-members, including the large contingent of Iranian Christian refugees, are in for a treat tomorrow - my goodness yes!
flashback to yesterday: Lois working on the trays
of apple fig and walnut flapjacks she's making for
her fellow-church-members to have on Sunday
flash forward to this evening: just one of
Lois's two freshly-baked apricot tarts - yum yum!
20:00 We unwind on the couch, and watch a fascinating TV programme by famed documentary-maker Ken Burns, showing tonight on the PBS America channel, all about America's entry into World War II in 1941.
It's well-known here in the UK, for instance, that on the day that the US entered the war after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, the UK's Prime Minister, Winston Churchill "felt the greatest joy that the attack had arrayed his mother's country (i.e. the US) on the side of Britain", and that he that night "went to bed and slept the sleep of the saved and thankful".
How different was the mood, however, on the other side of the Atlantic, as the country entered the war, with everything looking gloomy or very soon to be looking gloomy, according to this documentary. The Germans were at the gates of Leningrad, and the Japanese were swallowing up, one by one, Singapore, Malaya, Borneo, Burma, Hong Kong, and then virtually all the islands of the Pacific, apart from Hawaii and the Philippines, and threatening all the sea-lanes to Australia and New Zealand.
It's interesting that, nevertheless, the US, early on, agreed with Britain that Germany was the enemy to concentrate on, because of its massive industrial base, and that one of the US's main priorities was to ensure the survival of Britain and Russia through supplies of food and weaponry.
For us, the best thing about tonight's programme is the fascinating interviews with ordinary Americans from various parts of the country and to hear their reactions. And so interesting to see, from the viewpoint of the ordinary American-in-the-street, what an utterly strange thing war itself was. We hear from a man recalling his childhood in Sacramento, and the arrival at his high school of a teenage "English refugee", whom he befriended - yes, refugees aren't always foreigners, you know, we Brits can be refugees at times.
This boy from England announced tearfully one morning to his schoolmates that "the Germans killed my dad yesterday", when a U-boat torpedoed his dad's ship, and his new American friend recalled his own astonishment that people he knew could have fathers who could die in a war.
And what a shock it must have been for ordinary Americans, when it was realised that German U-boats were steaming up and down the East Coast - the first attack of the war was by a U-boat captain "astonished to see New York still ablaze with lights a couple of months after war had been declared", enabling the U-boat to target and sink a big US oil-tanker before slipping away into the waters of the Atlantic.
No matter what Roosevelt felt about Germany being the big target, for ordinary Americans it was obviously the Pacific that was the focus, the great ocean and its islands, where their sons or their friends' sons or their neighbours' sons were in danger. And we hear a lot of dissatisfaction from interviewees about how little they were being told by the authorities about what was going on, but then that's war isn't it, I guess.
And also, if I picked up the unspoken signals from the interviewees correctly, there was a lot of dissatisfaction when General MacArthur, nicknamed "Dugout Doug", relocated to Australia, to direct the war from a location of relative safety. Is that right? I think I should be told.
Lois and I feel a little bit ashamed but we were also struck, as never before, by the cruelty and inhumanity shown by the Japanese to their prisoners-of-war. Yes, we thought we knew all about it from documentaries about the fall of Singapore and all those other British colonies, but I have to say, that this documentary tonight really brings it home to us in a way that previous programmes we've seen didn't.
The sequence on the Pacific War ends on a positive note when US marines recaptured Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands, and put up signs saying "Under New Management". It's nice to keep a sense of humour, but what a horrific story it took to get to that point.
As regards the war in Europe, the point is made that Eisenhower's generals wanted to invade France in 1943, but Roosevelt was persuaded by Churchill that such a move would be premature and too dangerous. Churchill favoured attacking the Germans first in North Africa, and Roosevelt went along with that - the US generals being a bit taken aback by the realisation that "the leader of a democracy always has to remember to keep the people happy". But was Churchill right or not? Again, Lois and I would like to be told!
Fascinating stuff !!!!
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzz!!!!!
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