Mrs Relentlessly Cheerful wore her broadest grin. ‘Sleep well?’ Her head tipped from top to bottom in that nodding motion employed by amateur psychologists which is supposed to get you to nod in
Continue reading →The Ship of Fools motors on…
No we didn’t put the sails up.
You can’t put up the sails when the wind is coming from the opposite direction to the one you have a pre-arranged appointment with – the wind would
Continue reading →The Ship of Fools.
Christopher Rudd was a Kent school teacher, grandson of the famous Cape merchant and adventurer Charles Rudd, who also took his pupils out to sea in a dinghy to teach them the art of seamanship. Sadly, he
Continue reading →The Ship of Fools motors on…
No we didn’t put the sails up. You can’t put up the sails when the wind is coming from the opposite direction to the one you have a pre-arranged appointment with – the wind
Continue reading →The Ship of Fools.
Christopher Rudd was a Kent school teacher, grandson of the famous Cape merchant and adventurer Charles Rudd, who also took his pupils out to sea in a dinghy to teach them the art
Continue reading →Stop Your Sobbing
Rape and culture/rape and culture/go together like a…well, those two words don’t really go together at all, do they? An oxymoron is, I believe, the correct term. Culture is described by the dictionary I prepared earlier as
Continue reading →Parish Notice.
Ms Raccoon duly attended her quarterly interview with the oncologist on Friday; delighted to tell you that you will have to put up with me for longer than predicted – it seems the Letrozole is having some beneficial
Continue reading →What about the Boyos?
Amnesty International is as right-on, bleeding heart, liberal as it comes. Since 1961, when it was launched hand-in-glove with the caring souls at the Guardian, it has redefined colonialism by imposing the views of the Islington crowd on
Continue reading →Something for the Weekend, Sir?
I don’t believe that I have ever had work that recognised such a thing as the weekend. If I did, it was a long time ago. The idea that a Saturday or a Sunday is something profound, or
Continue reading →You’ve Got Male
To the Choose Life shopping-list that opens ‘Trainspotting’, one could add subsequent creature comforts – choose an iPad, choose an iPhone, choose an Apple Watch, choose Twitter, choose Facebook, choose every bloody online appliance and gadget to
Continue reading →How to pay your taxes without parting with a penny piece.
E’en the grateful thanks of the nation ringing in your ears! That is surely good news for the millionaires currently marching in support of austerity or summit?
‘Tis true, you don’t have to part with a
Continue reading →I shall dine on Mince and slices of Quince…
For Ms Raccoon is putting to sea in a pea-green boat. Or maybe it’s not the boat that will be pea-green but Ms Raccoon. We shall see.
I have thrown caution to the wind, and signed up
Continue reading →Stress Testing The NHS (Episode One).
Ms Raccoon has been your reporter-at-large for the past week, selflessly stress testing the NHS emergency procedures. It has not been a happy experience. I throughly dislike using a blog for a ‘poor me’ misery-memoir,
Continue reading →Stress Testing The NHS (Episode Two).
Dear Ms Anna Dugdale,
I was admitted to your hospital last Sunday afternoon via ambulance – severely dehydrated, with acute abdominal pain, vomiting and sedated with morphine. Partly as a result of the
Continue reading →Too Fast to Live; Too Young to Vote
I think I can say pretty confidently that if William Hague had been a pupil at the high school I attended, his return from the Conservative Party Conference in which he’d given a star turn would have
Continue reading →If you go down to the woods tonight…
Liverpool is an amazing place. Militant. Unbending. Not frightened to speak its mind. Especially the women. They are a terrifying breed.
What was that you said? Where was I born? Oh, Liverpool, since you ask. I
Continue reading →Dying to be Dead?
You’ve probably, hopefully, never had cause to visualise yourself asking a Doctor the proverbial ‘How long have I got’? question.
Chances are, if you had imagined the scenario, you got it
Continue reading →May the Fourth be with You!
90 years ago, the grocer’s wife gave birth to Margaret Hilda. Alfred and Beatrice, her parents, fed her on the food that was nearing the end of what would become known as its ‘sell by date’. She thrived.
Continue reading →Up Close and Personal with the NHS.
Ms Raccoon has been back studying the NHS at close quarters. What a fascinating animal it is.
It reminds me of Windows 8 for some obscure reason – a bulk package which drains the lifeblood out
Continue reading →The 25 Hour News/Do You Remember The First Time?
The 25 Hour News and You Decide…
OK, it’s the question on everyone’s lips, the most important news item of the week bar none, the issue galvanising the nation into making a crucial choice that will affect
Continue reading →Say you Want a Revolution… you Know we all wanna Change the World
How do you get a revolution in the UK? The Sex Pistols thought Anarchy might work but that got them no further than Joseph Conrad had long ago predicted.
Continue reading →
Someone’s Looking at You
Zirndorf is a seemingly nondescript German village on the outskirts of Nuremberg; in the foreboding shadow of a city that owes its location on the map of European history to grandiose public pronouncements of Aryan supremacy, Zirndorf is probably
Continue reading →Innocent until Proven Dead; and the secrets you will never know.
In this age of Internet trial, the dead are truly Damned. The slurping sound you can hear on the cyber waves is the sound of a thousand career conspiracy theorists licking their lips at the thought of
Continue reading →Hotel California!
Last night, after much debate, we decided that since it is patently obvious Ms Raccoon will not be off on her travels
Continue reading →Essence of Anglia.
I had not thought that I should ever suffer from homesickness. Not once seven years had passed since I left home – and certainly not after I returned. But I have.
The Last Taboo.
I don’t ‘do’ taboos; neither does my imaginary friend. Have you met my imaginary friend? She’s called ‘Contraria’; she starts every sentence with ‘On the other hand’, or ‘Looked at a different way’ – and I have lots of
Continue reading →The Finale – part two.
As it happens, Duncroft was the last of the plates to come to rest – over the last five weeks, I also had to move house, move country – and move
Continue reading →Sandwich Bored?
How long does it take you to open the fridge, scrape up some ‘I can’t believe it’s not butter’ and apply it to two pieces of bread? A minute? Less than a minute? You’ve still got time to
Continue reading →Thoroughly Modern Millie.
I was in Amiens recently. Just a few days before the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day.
I thought I knew a fair bit
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