We went to watch some fireworks tonight. As many have. My daughter, all of 7 years old, is quite happy with the loud fireworks. Possibly, like me, she feels the louder the better. And there were some good, loud ones. Then one went off that was pretty, very pretty, but also quiet. And this voice floats up from my daughter, in an inredibly serious tone, "well that was never going to be good in my opinion".
Midweek on Radio 4 this morning had Lawrence Dallaglio as a guest. During the trailer earlier in the morning Libby Purves wanted to wrap up the sound bite with a funny comment, as the presenters often do. I wonder if she really thought it through though, when she made a reference to it being a scrum and that she wanted "to be the hooker".
Should you find that the world, and whatever God you believe in, isn't listening to you then remember this parable from The West Wing:
You remind me of the man that lived by the river. He heard a radio report that the river was going to rush up and flood the town, and that the all the residents should evacuate their homes. But the man said, "I'm religious. I pray. God loves me. God will save me." The waters rose up. A guy in a rowboat came along and he shouted, "Hey, hey you, you in there. The town is flooding. Let me take you to safety." But the man shouted back, "I'm religious. I pray. God loves me. God will save me." A helicopter was hovering overhead and a guy with a megaphone shouted, "Hey you, you down there. The town is flooding. Let me drop this ladder and I'll take you to safety." But the man shouted back that he was religious, that he prayed, that God loved him and that God will take him to safety. Well... the man drowned. And standing at the gates of St. Peter he demanded an audience with God. "Lord," he said, "I'm a religious man, I pray, I thought you loved me. Why did this happen?" God said, "I sent you a radio report, a helicopter and a guy in a rowboat. What the hell are you doing here?"
I am no lover of the BNP or of Nick Griffin. I fact I find them fairly abhorrent. However I don't think that the BBC can be criticised for having him on Question Time. They have been condemned for giving him credence, for acknowledging him. Unfortunately the system has already done that. It wasn't the BBC. If it is legal for the BNP to run in elections, if the BNP can have members voted successfully as MEPs, then we have to recognise them. We can ask oourselves why, we can wonder why lessons haven't been learned previously, we can despair. But we have to open our eyes and see that people are voting for them. We have to see that somewhere our society is messing up so badly that ordinary people think that it is right and necessary to give their vote to the hatred.
The BBC has helped us face up to our fears. This is correct, we should not bury our heads in the sand. We cannot ignore what is happening. But we can expose it for what it is and remove the gloss that lies over it.
What an interesting day. Long, and I now wear the unmistakeable odour of "vet" which I have not had for many years. But interesting.
I went to spend a day out with a "real" vet, ie one still in practice rather than being in industry. Normally this means I am able to lean on gates, chat to the farmer, ask the vet a few sensible questions, then go home. It was clear from the start that this particular vet thought I should get my hands dirty. The second visit was to a calving. Except it turned out that it was going to have to be a caesarian. Just as I was about to say "great, I'll grab my camera and get some photos" I suddenly saw a gown being thrown toward me and heard the vet telling me to scrub in. For a moment I thought he was joking, but the look on his face was enough to know he wasn't. So soon I found myself elbow deep in the abdomen of a cow, something I haven't done for about 9 years. Later, on another farm, I was to be found kneeling in cow s**t, collecting ejaculate from a bull. This is something I studiously avoided doing while I was in practice, so was a real shock. And I promise you, just looking at the electro-ejaculator would bring tears to your eyes.
It was all great fun. I don't want to go back in to practice, but I really enjoyed the day.
And one of the farmers was an ex-Spitfire pilot. How amazing is that!
