READY & WAITING

Memorial to the Royal Air Force at the National Memorial Arboretum.

Holiday duties for today (Friday 10th August 2012), as my Walsall working holiday continues, the first duty was a pleasant trip to the fine Staffordshire city of Lichfield which this morning was basking in glorious sunshine. That was a pleasant duty but on returning home it was back to digging up roses that my better half decided needed planting elsewhere, and laying a few bricks around a drain to try to stop it overflowing every time the bath is emptied.

Yesterday also saw a pleasant duty, we took my father in law, Fred English, for a return visit to the National Memorial Arboretum in Alrewas, which was also bathed in glorious sunshine. It is a moving place to visit and wander around. There are so many names inscribed on the walls of the main memorial, all of those killed in service since the end of World War Two.

The last time we visited the Arboretum it coincided with the day hundreds of great hairy motor bikers turn up to raise funds for the National Arboretum, so this time it was much quieter. We revisited the plaque to all those who served on the aircraft carrier HMS Formidable for Fred to shed a tear or two for his late brother Harry, who served on her in the Pacific during the war. Fred was in the Pacific too at the same time, he served on HMS Euryalus and the brothers managed to meet up every time their two ships returned to Sydney, which coincided from time to time.

At the end of the War Fred came home but Harry had met an Aussie girl and remained in Sydney for the rest of his days. There is a whole branch of the English family living down under, which is not the best surname to have in Australia if you don’t want to be called a ‘Pommie B!’

Fred nearly wore his medals, but decided against it, but while there we saw others in uniform, both men and women, proudly wearing their medals next to their hearts. Seeing that took me back to the odd interview I had on Radio WM on Tuesday morning with Adrian Goldberg regarding my objection to the Olympics currently dominating everything. The medals won by my father in law and these service men and women, in my eyes, are worth far more and should mean more to our countrymen than the medals won by a few athletes for nothing other than being able to run a bit faster than someone else.

Even though some of the callers after my interview had some tough things to say making me the pariah for the day, in reality I took it in light heart as it stirred things up and helped to create a debate. Adrian, who I have always liked, must keep an eye on this blog and my opinion of him rose even more when he noticed my remarks about being a ‘pariah’, he called me and was concerned that I had been upset, which I had not and I had to tell him not to worry as I was not upset at all. This shows what a decent chap he is.

It currently looks like I am in favour with Radio WM at the moment as today I was also called by a chap named Brett and asked to speak on the Paul Franks programme at around 5.30 pm, I was asked to go on air to speak about Tony Blair’s fears that the people will vote in a referendum to leave the EU as they feel the EU has too much power. Now coming from a past Prime Minister that began giving powers away almost the moment he walked through the portals of Number 10 Downing Street, wbegan by surrendering more powers by signing the Amsterdam Treaty and then the Treaty of Nice placing eevery British subject at the mercy of the EU Arrest Warrant, So, for Blair now to wail about the possibility of peoplevoting to leave the EU because it now has too much power seems somewhat hypercritical.

If the people of the UK are worried about how much power the EU has then that is a situation that Tony Blair helped to create, with just about every other PM since Heath signed us up the the Common Market and lied that it was just a trade deal. I for one have my voting fingers ready and waiting to grab that stubby little pencil in the polling booth and willing to place my cross against the get out of EU ASAP box. All we want now is the referendum.