HIGH JINKS IN LONDON AND HOME TO THE SAME OLD POLITICS - and Christmas just round the corner

Well, I got back safely from London after having a wonderful time with Laura and Margaret.   On the Friday night we showed up at Ronnie Scott’s club, Jessica, grandaughter, and now working as an intern in the crazy capital joined us as we took our places at our booked table.   Three hours of great jazz, great singing, terrific atmosphere, all small, lighted tables.  We ate our meal and drank our drinks in a haze of unusualness.     At least for me, the older generation, it was a really exciting occasion.   So we three generations of Scots, out on the tiles – didn’t we live it up and have a ball!   Even paying the enormous prices for taxis (London is a big city!) seemed daring and amazing £l6 here and £20 there.   We didn’t venture on the Tube – in Glasgow when I lived there, they called it “The Subway”.   Alternatively you can call it “The Underground”.    I had decided we should celebrate in style and for three days we would be toffs and use London Cabs.

You just get in and give them the postcode of your destination and off they jolly-well-go!   Great fun!    We had dinner in an Italian restaurant with some Scots friends and relatives working in London, and from there we dashed off to see “The Bodyguard”.    This was an A1, ace, dramatic musical story of the singer Whitney Houston.   What a fantastic performer she was.   Her life story was so moving.   We cheered with the rest, and at the end the cast got a 20 minute standing ovation.   Then ….. to my astonishment, the audience burst into wild dancing and singing etc., etc.  This included my party.   I became a sort of embarrassed bystander at this point.   Don’t people have fun nowadays?   When I was young shows and films usually ended with The National Anthem and we all filed out gravely, showing what good people we were.

Otherwise, I picked up a hideous cold – an acquaintance, a lady vet, explained I didn’t pick up the virus in the Big Smoke, but on the aeroplane to Gatwick from Inverness.   However I got it, it was hellish – wheezing and coughing, probably my punishment for enjoying myself so much at my age.   I was dressed up in my new long black boots, and felt great when I was there, but I never got invited to any party!!  Well, you can’t win them all.   We went to the Tate Britain Gallery, and we got a free round of drinks at the Hotel St. Pancras because their service was slow that Saturday night.

Christmas presents all purchased for better or worse.   Terrible scenes of refugees in Syria and Lebabon.   Winter storm and dreadful privation.   I admit I have to turn to another television channel as I can’t watch these poor children in their suffering, and their poor parents.   What a ghastly world it can be for people.   We Brits are so lucky in 2013 about most things.   And old Nelson Mandela is gone.   What a shining light he was.  Glasgow should be proud of how they stuck up for him while he was imprisoned.   He was made a Freeman of the City of Glasgow when he was still in jail, and they changed the name of a street to name it after him.  Warm-hearted people as always.   They’ve had it hard themselves in the past in Glasgow, and know how to stand up for the underdog.

The Prime Minister, David Cameron and the Leader of the Opposition, Ed Milliband continue to shout at each other in parliament.   David makes one statement and Ed completely contradicts him.   Then Milliband  makes a statement about the failures of the government, and Cameron accuses the Labour Party of failures in their term in government, and so on, and so on.   Even Gerald and I, dedicated politics followers get cheesed off, and despair of things coming right for the tired, penny-pinching  population, that is 90% of our country today.   Compared to some areas of the planet we are privileged.   Caring people raise money for the charities that try to aid these poor people.   It is all we can do, it seems.   The instant communication of television is a double-edged example of progress.    We can be entertained and horrified within a few hours.

May the Christmas Season bring you and yours Joy and Peace.