Observations from a Hill

  The is the first in an occasional series based on the "Boring Postcards" book I mentioned the other week. Pictured - well I think it's probably self-explanatory - the New Jersey Turnpike around sixty years ago. Now, disclaimer: I've never been to the States in my life, and whilst like most of my generation I grew up on a diet of Americana - movies, comics, music and garish commercial graphics - I've never really wanted to go over the pond to see it first hand. Given my age now, and the current febrile state of the USA's politics under Trump, I'm as unlikely now to go there as I was when I was an impecunious youth back in the era this postcard was first published. However, as the title of this post alludes, this particular bit of US freeway holds a semi-mythical place in my heart, in that as a young teenager I listened to Simon and Garfunkel's album "Bookends" almost daily; usually just side one, with a very occasional foray into the flipsid...

There is much to be exercised about in the news this week, even aside from the continuing military conflicts in Europe and the Middle East. The botched execution of Christa Pike in the state of Tennessee for one. If there was ever an argument for ditching the death penalty - and there always should be, in my opinion - this is it. The Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, Part 1., Article 1 paragraph 1 . states: '..."torture" means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such [a purpose as] punishing him (sic) for an act he (sic) or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed...' The end of the paragraph carries an unfortunate apparent caveat in '... It does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or accidental to lawful sanctions...'. This sufficiently vague statement could be taken to mean, e...

Just a very quick throwaway food post tonight - and not even about anything I've bothered to cook for myself, either. I decided on a whim late this afternoon to just get a takeaway Indian from the Sitar in Bethesda. After much faffing around to find a working cashpoint [the place is still delightfully cash-only after thirty years and several owners], I went for a swift half of estimable Welsh cider at Y Fic [the old Victoria pub], before picking up my simple repast of Chicken Madras and two chapatis. Whereas when Abdul - the original owner of Sitar - was in charge of the place, the Madras had all manner of things in the curry, including loads of green pepper chunks [not complaining], this Madras was a totally Old Skool plain and hot Madras Chicken with a vengeance: a 1970s-style B.I.R [British Indian Curry] in all its glory. Having said that, it wasn't perfection, but pretty damned close enough for rock'n'roll, and it certainly packed a hefty punch of chilli. To be perf...

Funny thing, memory. I had two possible topics in mind for tonight's post, but both now escape me totally: I made the mistake of not making an immediate note of either when they occurred to me in the first place. Note-taking is an essential tool in securing stuff in memory. Failure to not remember things is not simply a feature of growing older, as most would take it [for granted, even], but rather a baked-in feature of who we are as a species; psychologically we are a need to know organism: we retain in minute detail all of the stuff that is necessary for our survival. Have you ever doubted that you would find your way back home or any other important place, for that matter, at least when sober? Until any of us enters a period of physiological and mental decline, we retain all of our internalised geographies and topologies in some form: we learn to map our environment instinctively from birth, as do all creatures on this Earth. Disease aside, we never forget this stuff. But when i...

Despite my best intentions from the outset of every day, I invariably leave the posting of my trivia in these pages until the very last possible minute, which I guess sums up the modus operandi of my life generally: deadlines I feel instinctively are there to be pushed firmly against, in order to gird the loins, put fire in the belly and sweeten the eventual closing of the chase. O! but were life itself were so urgent and so pressing. Oft-times true in usually distressing manner, but for the most part as commonplace and I would hazard, mundanity in itself. Tonight's scribble is no exception. Up against the wire yet again with nary an idea to my name. However, I was reading a piece in my partly-read Summer Edition of The New Statesman about time . Time, of course is something I return to time - ahem - and again here, and I could be accused of being so exercised because of my advancing age and the rapidly contracting reservoir of my personal supply of the stuff; but it's simply n...

Rachub, what a place. Of all the places we've lived, this little burg is wholeheartedly the sentiment encapsulated in its name: Yr Achub; literally 'The Rescue' or perhaps better translated as a refuge or sanctuary. For that is what this place is: a place to find peace and respite from the world beyond, either as refugees from without or as returnees to a lost heritage re-found. To casual visitors, this hodge-podge of narrow streets and tiny terraces can seem mean in the harsher seasons of autumn and winter; grey, slated roofs over blue-grey stone or pebble-dashed walls streaked with rain and moss, uninviting at best at first sight. But the place itself invites and welcomes people: the interiors of the small cottages and terraced dwellings hereabouts; the people that live within their confines, welcome people to come and stay. To make homes and form friendships; to find a welcome bulwark against an increasingly hostile and baffling world. The world here is smaller and gentl...