Danskcolin: Monday July 1st 2024 "I can't wait for my double glasses-holder, coming this week haha!!!!"

This is definitely shaping up to be the kind of week I like, which is nice, and it reminds me that being retired is really a very wonderful thing! Yes, you've guessed it! There are no appointments in my calendar other than online shopping deliveries - what could be better thing to wake up to on a Monday morning? Answer: nothing !!!!

Oh joy !!! And I think nobody - in the whole long history of the English language, starting from its parent-language Indo-European on the steppes of Russia 6000 or more years ago - yes, nobody, nobody has expressed this joy better than New Yorker John Wilson in his game-changing series "How To..." - a guide to modern living, first seen by us back in March. Remember that guy Wilson?

flashback to March 2024: New Yorker John Wilson checking

over one of the purchases he can't remember ordering,

and wondering what exactly it is, and why he would have ordered it

My long-suffering wife Lois is expecting some things for the garden/gardening side of her life - the side of her that I can't share and can only watch with a certain wistful envy: pet-friendly weedkiller, a bunch of 8 ft canes for her runner-beans, a ball of string to tie the canes together with, edging for the lawn, a wooden clothes-line prop to replace our "sticky" metal one.

just some of Lois's recent orders for her "other life"

of garden, gardening etc

Compared to that, my own list of eagerly-awaited deliveries seems incredibly modest, but no less exciting to me: a double glasses-holder. At last !!!!

A lot of couples we know are both glasses-wearers, and I know that, for some of these couples, purchase of a double glasses-holder to keep on a shared nightstand is looked on as "taking their relationship to the next level", and "a symbol of their undying commitment" to each other.

some couples look at the purchase of a double glasses-holder,

to keep on a shared nightstand, as a symbol of commitment

and a sign that they're "taking things to the next level"

I'm going to shock you now, but I've got to confess it sooner or later. This double glasses-holder is going to be for my own private use only - "shock horror"! Yes, Lois is officially "barred" from using it, except in an emergency - and may I just add, she fully understands the reasons for this, and is fully "on board" with these rules, which is nice.

Yes, I've decided to use both parts of this double glasses-holder myself.... one side for my principal pair of glasses and the other side for some of my other night-time needs, because, you see, this purchase is for a part of my life that Lois can't share, and which she can only watch with a certain version of her own wistful envy: my constant organisation and reorganisation of my for-the-moment "super-tidy" bedside cabinet and window-sill so-called "overflow storage area".

flashback to yesterday: I showcase the top surface of

my newly tidied bedside cabinet and adjoining window-sill,

which is my traditional "overflow area" for excess items

So yes, one half of my shiny-new double glasses-holder will contain my glasses, and the other half will be dedicated to my other night-time needs. You're probably wondering what those mysterious "needs" are [Not me! - Ed], but for now I can only say, "Watch this space!", but keep an eye out for future pictures of what I'm calling my "nightstand collection" in future posts of my blog. Exciting times !!!!

So, in sum, a lot of exciting deliveries will be coming this week, for both of us! You may have forgotten, so, as a reminder, here's New Yorker John Wilson's step-by-step guide to the online ordering process.

Wilson's guide, however, comes with a pretty graphic health warning, so I remind Lois that we mustn't get overexcited too quickly this week. Remember what he told us? It's worth noting these things down, if you're not sure: the fact is that not all deliveries are equally satisfying....

Still, that's modern life, isn't it, John, and we've just got to live with it, both good and bad - that's what I say! [You're turning into quite the philosopher, aren't you, Colin! - Ed]

12:00 An email comes in from Steve, our American brother-in-law, containing another of those amusing Venn diagrams that he monitors for us on the web, on a weekly basis.

Haha! Yes, me when hungover - which doesn't happen very much to me these days, partly because of the sheer cost of my favourite "tipple": a G&T, and I discuss this with Lois as we're laughing over this lates Venn. And, as I tell her, it's nice to get a bottle of gin as a present - something which our dear younger daughter Sarah did for me, this last Fathers Day.

Lois, who, from my point of view, is the font of all knowledge tells me, that gin used to be dead cheap. "Drunk for a penny, Dead Drunk for two pence", that's what they used to say during one of Britain's historical gin-crazes:

"Drunk for a penny, Dead Drunk for two pence"

- the iconic advertising slogan for gin popularised in the 18th century

However, I didn't know, till Lois tells me today, that the price of gin originally became so cheap thanks to William of Orange, who came to the throne in the famous parliamentary "coup" of 1688. This was England's famous "bloodless revolution", when William arrived from Holland with his Protestant English wife Mary, after Parliament had effectively deposed Mary's father, James II, for allegedly trying to reinstate Catholicism.

flashback to 1688: William of Orange with a small Dutch army

lands at Brixham, Devon, at the invitation of Parliament

Do you remember all that from from your school history lessons? I'm sure you do!

Well, when William-and-Mary first arrived from Holland, the "go-to" alcoholic tipple in England was just common-or-garden beer. So, to aid Dutch exports of gin to England, William persuaded a grateful Parliament to put a hefty tax on beer, making gin the new "go-to" drink for the poor.

Isn't history fascinating !!!! [If you say so, Colin! - Ed]

And it gives Lois and me lots to talk about on our walk through "Polly's Orchard" on the slopes of the 700-million-year-old Malvern Hills this morning.

we take a morning walk through "Polly's Orchard" [not shown]...

.. passing the entrance to Malvern College (founded 1865), a private

coeducational boarding and day school...

...and examining some of the area's iconic plants, these ones

close to the Hereford-Worcester branch railway line (top left)

The area is called "Polly's Orchard" in memory of romantic novelist Barbara Cartland's mother, who used to own the land and who planted a lot of fruit trees here [not shown].

We chat not just about the price of gin, but also about our dear 13-year-old grandson Isaac, who flew to China yesterday with some of his classmates, all of whom are studying Mandarin Chinese.

Imagine that - our little Isaac !!!! Yikes !!!!!

our dear 13-year-old grandson Isaac, photographed

yesterday in deepest Surrey, with his case all packed

for the his 10-day visit to China - yikes !!!!!

Isaac's mother, Alison, our elder daughter, texts us this afternoon to say that the group had landed safely in Beijing. They had dinner and then had just 40 minutes to unpack before "lights out" at their accommodation. She says "hopefully they will manage to sleep after probably not much sleep on the plane, and then a bus journey from Beijing to Tianjin. All in good spirits - yay!".

Lois texts back to ask if Isaac has his mobile phone with him, and whether that was safe to take a phone to a place like China. Ali texts back to say yes, he's got it with him, so hopefully we may get pictures at some point.

Awwww!!!! Our little Isaac in China !!!!! And the time difference is similar to that with Perth, Australia, a time-difference which Lois and I got used to when our other daughter Sarah lived with her family in Perth, for 7 years (2015-2023), now living back in the UK at nearby Alcester.

And you know what Isaac's trip yesterday makes me think of, don't you. Yes, autumn 1970 and my flight to Tokyo for my study year in Japan. I still remember, so well, that gorgeous sensation of feeling excited and terrified all at the same time.

Yes, I was 10 years older than Isaac is, but on the on the "terrifying" side... (a) I was on my own, (b) I was going for 12 months, and (c) I was very conscious that a lot of my spoken Japanese had been derived from reading medieval poetry and works like "The Pillow-book of Sei Shonagon" (1002).

So it would have been a bit like a foreign student arriving in England after studying mainly Chaucer's 14th century Canterbury Tales. What a madness it all was!!!!

Worst of all was (d) I knew I would have to "manage" without Lois for a whole year - oh dear!!!!

And so it was that, excited and terrified and lovelorn, all at the same time, I took this picture of the airliner I was flying in through one of the big windows of the transit lounge at Anchorage Airport, Alaska, on my way from Heathrow, London to Tokyo.

flashback to 1970: I take this picture through a glass

window "darkly", in the transit lounge at Anchorage, Alaska

- you can just see some of the Alaskan mountains in the background

1970, and the first picture of me on my Japan study year,

taken by my Tokyo landlady Mrs Saito, who was showing me

where to catch buses and trains to go to my university.

In those days, the "smart" way to fly to Japan from England was to go over Greenland and the North Polar Region, stopping at Anchorage before flying on across the Pacific to Narita Airport, Tokyo: "only" 17 hours. And I still vividly remember the sight of those incredible snowy wastes of "Greenland's icy mountains" (phrase copyright: Reginald "Reg" Heber, 1819) stretched out below us, after we were a few hours out from Heathrow.

my 1970 route (the left option) from Heathrow Airport, London

to Narita Airport, Tokyo via Anchorage, Alaska

This was the kind of "polar" route that went out of fashion, but was later reinstated after airlines avoiding flying over Russia after the invasion of the Ukraine in 2022.