Day three in Sri Lanka

Remember those sandals that I bought yesterday? They are already broken!  I woke up early and went for a walk.  It was raining lightly which was no big deal with it being warm.  On my way back to Hotel Janaki, I noted an issue with my right one.  The sole was no longer attached properly.  It lasted until I got back to the hotel room, but my receipt states that there are no returns!

Anyway, my wife had to leave again to sort out her documents and I ended up sleeping loads.  The kids, who had been in bed until about ten themselves entertained each other.  Until I was woken up by my son claiming that his sister had punched him.  She denied it, and I was left with the dilemma of who told the truth and who lied.  When I was younger, I was a horrible sibling and frequently beat up the older of my two younger brothers.  He would bruise easily, and there was no point denying things as in general, I had hurt him.  But my kids are more subtle.  They know that I will not tolerate one being physically violent to the other.  Or telling lies.

Does anyone have any hints to solve this?

Day two in Sri Lanka, shopping and other things

My wife took my son with her when she went with her mother to get some official things sorted out.  I was expecting them to have a terrible day, and sadly I was proven right.  Due to a series of mishaps and errors, none on her part, she is probably to do the same tomorrow.

I went for a walk with my daughter instead as we were to head off to a shopping mall to get my son and I some sandals.  The kids now have the same sized feet, so essentially they are interchangeable.  We did not get far before the heat and humidity started to sap our energy.  So we returned to the hotel to change into something more appropriate before heading out again, this time by Tuk-Tuk courtesy of Uber.  The app makes life easy for people like me who cannot speak any Tamil or Sinhala as the destination pops up on the mobile of the driver.

When in the shopping mall, we found sandals for me, not my ideal ones to replace those that died in Rhodes.  But my daughter wanted to return home and I felt too unwell to argue.

We met her uncle and later her grandfather too us our for lunch.  She got to decide what kind of food we ate, which was Japanese.  I loved it, and would return, but it have to be without the other two who did not like the food there.

After falling asleep again, I went with her wife to her pedicure and then later we all went out for an amazing Chinese meal.  Anyway, time for bed before midnight (here).

Planes, trains and automobiles. Our first day in Sri Lanka

We are relaxing in Colombo.  Well, I am.  My daughter is freaked after encountering tropical wildlife, in her bed.  Or the bed that was going to be hers anyway.

We left yesterday flying from Stansted to Dubai, arriving there this morning.  On the way, I watched Toy Story 4.  We, by which I mean my wife and I, have watched Toy Story since before the kids were born.  As enjoyable as this was, it was not as good as the original and while a good film, not the masterpiece the others were.  After this, I watched the end of Yesterday.  My wife and I had watched it before, but she asked me to sort some things out while it was on, so I never actually got to watch the end of the film.  A lovely feel good film, one I would watch again if on the telly, possibly.

Arriving in Dubai, we relaxed ate food but left it a bit late to get to our flight,  in fact, when we got there, the flight had finished boarding!  Fortunately, it turned out that it was not our flight, but the down side was that we had a short time to get across to the other side of the airport to make our flight.  My daughter and I raced ahead and got there after it started to board having jumped onto trains and into lifts just before depths sliding doors closed. We let them know that my wife and son were on the way and was expecting them to be a while.  But my wife had managed to get some of the airport police to drive her and my son in a buggy and they took the airport shuttle bus to get to the flight.

Once we had all calmed down, it was them the next part of the flight and during this, I watched X Men, Dark Phoenix.  I had heard bad reviews of the film, but both I, and my daughter who was watching it at the same time as me, both liked it.  Much better than films like Wonder Woman!

Anyway, we are now in the Hotel and are to rest.  Good night!

Yo, I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want (December)

I am after high CP Pokémon.

And just to make it clear, just these ones in any lucky trades.  I am aware that I may not be able to get some of them, such as the Alola forms of the Meowth or Vulpix, or Klink, but I guess my view is if you do not ask, you do not get.  I do have some high CP forms of some of the Pokémon that are on the list but the actual statistics that they have are wanting. 

Sadly, I do not have as many shiny Pokémon as I would like, and those that I have tend to be those that others have anyway.  Which means in general that I am after like for like trades.

Abra
Absol
Aipom
Burmy
Clefable
Drilbur
Duskull
Electabuzz
Foongus
Geodude (normal form)
Goldeen
Growlithe
Heracross
Horsea
Klink
Magmar
Mankey
Meowth Alola form
Murkrow
Nidoran♀
Nidoran♂
Oddish
Onix
Pidove
Ponyta
Porygon
Scyther
Shieldon
Squirtle 
Tanglea
Tentacool
Vulpix Alola form
Yamask
Yanma 

However, after the December Community Weekend, while I do not have many, I have a few evolved Pokémon with community day moves available to trade, some of them being shiny ones!

Arsenal need Chris Wilder

A quick post about Arsenal. We were terrible.  While Manchester City played well, their manager felt they could and should have played better.  Our defence was terrible with all three goals being scored by players who should have been under more pressure, one essentially being tapped into an open goal!

We need a manager who can organise the Arsenal defence.  And one manager who can do that is managing Sheffield United.  Though like many other managers, he may decide to stay away.

Was Brexit to blame for the worst defeat of Labour, or was it the Blairites?

It has been devastating to see the destruction of Labour at the ballot box.  Many though feel that this is not the fault of Jeremy Corbyn, and instead there are other reasons.  And this, despite direct evidence that more voters who switched from Labour citing Corbyn as the reason for the change rather than Brexit. 

One big reason stated my many on the left is that this is the fault of Blairites who caused a change in the position of Labour to back a second referendum.  This claim ignores the influence of unions in the change of this position.

While there is no doubt that the support for a second referendum, and therefore more delay contributed to the defeat of Labour in the North, there was an increase in votes for Labour which many will argue is due to this change.  The change in stance of Labour to back a second referendum occurred after Labour was beaten into third place behind the Liberal Democrats in the European Elections.  Both the Green Party and the Liberal Democrats were felt to be remain parties and both lost a share of the vote in the General Election.  Yes, part of this may be due to the system of voting where proportional representation was used, as opposed to the first past the post system, but after the change in stance, Labour gained from its 14.1% vote share in the EU elections to 32.1% in the general election.    

There is the failure of Labour to tackle antisemitism within its ranks promptly and also the failure of Corbyn to apologise quicker when challenged on this.  The worst thing about this, was that Corbyn has always been against anti-semitism, has always been in favour of fighting against discrimination and has advocated kinder gentler politics.  But too many of those who support him have engaged in abuse, this not just being on-line, but also driving MP's away from the party.   

To make things worse for Labour, this has happened while poverty for those in work has increased, while the Conservatives have pledged to increase police numbers but not to the levels they cut them to, while schools are facing huge funding shortfalls and of course NHS performance failing to meet targets, including ones that the government have changed.  As noted on a previous post, Labour came closer to re-election under Gordon Brown in 2010 despite the global credit crunch than it has under Corbyn with the Conservatives handing him an open goal with the mismanagement of the public services of the nation.

The Corbyn effect drove too many voters away.   Despite the Tories giving Labour so many open goals.

In summary, before the change in policy, Labour lost votes in Leave areas and the Brexit Party gained them.  After the change in the policy regarding Brexit while Labour gained a share in the vote from Remain parties, what happened was that the Conservatives made electoral gains in the leave areas instead.

Silver linings

Well, I knew things were going to be bad for Labour, but I did not expect things to be as bad.

First of all, due to the margin of the victory of Will Quince, tactical voting would have made no difference, so Labour and Lib Dem supporters can and should not blame the other, and instead work to getting him out, when it comes to the next election in five years time.  I had hoped that he would be voted out of office, this despite the way he had answered the letters that I have sent him.  But now, with over 50% of the electorate of Colchester voting for him, he can truly claim to represent the town.  Let me again emphasise, the silver lining here is that those who voted Green, Lib Dem, or Labour need not regret what would have happened if they had voted another way and some of the rancour that was present before the election should be forgiven and forgotten.

Second, Arsenal did not lose.  I had expected that to happen, and while going two goals down is never good, the team showed resilience to come back from that to earn a draw.  Hopefully, this will be reflected in league performances and the team will be able to pull together and produce the results that the ability that is in the squad deserves.

Labour will look at the reasons why this loss occurred, the question is if the right reasons for this loss will be identified and acted on.  Many are going to blame Brexit, and many are going to blame the leader of the party.  It was felt that Labour were going to be destroyed in the polls in 2017 but Jeremy Corbyn proved that there was an appetite for a fair Britain for all.  But, ultimately, he still lost and austerity continued (other than in Northern Ireland due to the deal with the DUP).  And to put things in perspective, despite Swine Flu and the global credit crunch, Gordon Brown came closer to being PM in 2010 that Corbyn did in 2017 or 2019, and that is when Corbyn had a failing NHS, police and education cuts giving people a reason not to vote for the Tories!

I am of the view that elections are won by getting voters who do not vote for you normally, to vote for you.  Boris Johnson has done that, getting Labour voters to either vote Conservative, or switch to the Brexit Party.  Labour can continue on a path away from appealing to voters of other parties, one which has resulted in one term stints in government, or Labour can learn from its most successful leader and bring about a government for the many which lasts longer than one parliamentary term.  But considering the calls to have a purge of Blairites (I am a Brownite), I suspect I know what is to happen.  And I fear that means more Conservative rule after the next General Election in 2024.