School is out

It has been an interesting series of days since my last post about the family. Both children did really well in the end of year reports that they brought home, in fact, one won an award for reading!  But school is over for now.  My daughter had her last day yesterday and in addition to that, a cousin of my wife came over with his better half.  They have looked after us in the past and it was our turn and pleasure to entertain them. I collected them from the airport last night and drove them home. It has been too long since we last saw them and my son, who had school today was not able to stay up to see them, though my daughter did so (and we arrived very late).  It was a disappointment for both children as they were looking forwards to seeing them.

Today, after my son went to school, it was a big breakfast for all, and then a quick trip.  I had wanted to show them Dedham, my wife took us to Lavenham instead, and it was lovely there.  The pictures are from there.

Should our politicians vote how they feel, or based on what they are told to do?

Last week, there was a big vote about the expansion of Heathrow.  The Conservatives were told to vote to back the view of the party and Labour MP's were given the freedom to vote how they felt.

And to me, this is how democracy should work.  I think that MP's (or councillors) should be able to listen to and debate facts and opinions on proposals that they have to deal with.  And a famous example of this is how Jeremy Corbyn did so.

I disagree with his views on military intervention in Kosovo, and my views on Iraq have been discussed before.  (I also disagree with his views on NHS reform, though we agree it needs a lot more funding, and while I disagree with him on Nuclear Weapons, that is a hard decision where I am not 100% certain.)  But the reason that he is admired by so many of the new (as well as the old) members of the Labour Party, is his honesty and integrity.  And that includes the way he has voted for what he thinks is right.

I think other politicians should be allowed the same freedom, unless that is, if they have agreed to serve in the cabinet, or shadow cabinet.

Being a patriot means accepting that our nation is multicultural

I am honoured to live in a great nation.  It can, and should be better than it is, and while, like all nations, it has unsavoury aspects of its past, it has many things to be proud of.

And anyone who is proud of our nation has to accept that it is a multicultural nation and has been for a very long time.

Some may not like to hear that, but the first example I am going to cite here is the Royal Family. Ignoring the German ancestry of the Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (now the House of Windsor), our queen is married to a man often called Phil The Greek, Prince Philip having been born in Corfu into the Greek and Danish Royal families. And of course, there is the recent marriage of Meghan to Harry.  

One reason that I bring this up, is because some of the Far Right have doubted the right of some of our sportsmen (and women) to be part of out nation, notably a past comment by Nick Griffin about Ashley Cole.  Being an Arsenal fan, I am still bitter about the way the adulterer left our club, but he is British, and if you look at many teams that represent our country our multicultural heritage is reflected here as well. 

For those who claim that our nation has not been multicultural for ages, please remember the different languages spoken in our great nation.

Traveling around our nation and learning its history, you will find that the culture of East Anglia has many differences to that around Birmingham or in Manchester but just as we have differences within our nation, we have many things that bind us together.

And last of all, remember that the Patron Saint of England was born in the Middle East.

Labour, the credit crunch and the Redwood Report

I have got fed up with Labour being blamed for the credit crunch, or leaving the nation in debt after the general election of 2010.

First of all, the credit crunch happened across the globe.  Labour was not responsible for it.  While the Conservatives officially state that it was the fault of Labour and that Labour had overspent, they had made a commitment to match the spending of Labour, and after the Credit Crunch started to cause issues, they came up with the Redwood report.  And if this was in place, our nation would have been more exposed and fared worse.  In fact, there was one politician who was aware of the risks that we faced, and I remember his warnings in the lead up to the crunch, and he was not a Tory (though he was considered an honorary one between 2010 and 2015).

And while the Conservatives would not admit this officially, they know that the economic crisis was not the fault of Labour.  But it does not stop them repeating the lie.



   

The weekend that was

I missed my son playing cricket this weekend.  On Friday, after work I had been asked to collect my son from a cricket meetup in Halstead and I was hoping to get to watch him play, however, while I got there in time to collect him, the games had just finished. 

The weekend involved my daughter going to a birthday party where she got to do some climbing and after she got back, she had to catch up on homework.  My son was amazing around the house and I did throw a few balls for him to bat away.  The deal is that if he is able to get it over the back garden fence, I will give him a pound (for his Pokémon GO account), but one ball was lost near the shed and the other one went over a fence, but to the side.  I have to say that I am impressed with how hard that he is able to hit it, especially as when this happened last, he got annoyed as I hit him twice (he did not block properly).

And of course, there was the England game, which I watched with Tony.  I knew that we had to win this to take off any pressure when it comes to playing Belgium, but I did not expect such a scoreline!

A happy son

Since the last post, the family have fallen in love with the new car.  Last weekend we drove down to London to see my mother and the parents of my wife. I had to attend a course, and my son was away on a camping weekend.  My daughter therefore got alone time with her grandparents, who while glad to see her, were a bit sad to only see one grandchild.

My son has a weekend of activity planned.  He gets to play cricket tomorrow and on Saturday gets to go out onto the River Blackwater.  This meant that I did not get to collect him from school this weekend as my wife had to get him some cricket whites and apparently he was sad as this meant that I have not collected him from school for a while.  But later in the day, he proudly showed us his work when it came to his Celebration Evening at his school. My daughter found that school was smaller than it was when she left it and got to meet some of her old teachers as well.

Back to my son, the downside for him and his day at the Blackwater is regarding his love of PokémonGO as it means that he has less time to catch Pokémon. But he went to bed very happy today as he managed to get a rare Pokémon. One which I do not have, and I am not jealous at all! And on that topic, I still have a Pokémon in Sri Lanka!  

Most importantly though, I have my fingers crossed for the first competitive match of cricket that my son has to play.  Considering that he hated it when he was first taken to play it by my wife, this is a big step for him and I do hope that he does not lose the love for the game that he has developed.

A new car

Well, this weekend was a hot one, and one that was not expected, though not always hot otherwise my son would have been able to play cricket on Saturday morning.  But in addition to that pleasant surprise the kids got to enjoy our new car.

It was sad to leave our old one, or rather the old one of my wife.  It has been in the family for years, and while it has been a faithful helper to the family, it has not been as reliable as it was before.  And over that time, the technology in cars has changed.  So while my car has changed a few times, we have been exposed to how things have changed with it.  The kids now that they are older want to listen to music that they like.  And they find it easier to do so on their phones.  So now we have two cars where they can do so.