Category: very old blogging

there is now a live webcam of East Street, Chichester. The pointy thing in the middle is the cathedral spire – if you walk up to the cathedral from the point where the webcam is, and turn right, go another 300 yards, you will come to my front door. W2 is just out of the frame of this picture, about 100 yards to the right. Kev’s house is about 200 yards behind the webcam. Nick’s office (home of Nick’s Pad) is about 200 yards up East Street on the left, as is SJP’s.
we’re all waving at you!

Robyn is unwell. be wonderful and send her a get well note.

well, the flooding in Chichester turned out only to be minor. the Lavant has dropped back from its peak, although it still makes a formidable sight for what is only a seasonal stream after all. but the traffic chaos continues – Andrea has decamped to my place for the rest of the week so that she doesn’t have to sit in the queues – average journey times between Chichester and Bognor are now 90 minutes or more – it normally takes less than 15 minutes.
the “City Fathers” (the dusty, crumbly, stick-in-the-muds that make decisions in Chichester) have decided to honour the fire service with the freedom of the city in recognition of their efforts in averting the flooding. this honour will allow the service to march freely through the city with bayonets fixed. hmm. I’m sure they would rather the city gave each one a £20 bonus in their Christmas pay packet.

just checked travel news – every road between here and anywhere north or west is closed by flooding, with the exception of the A259 – Andrea just called me. She is on the A259 and has moved about 400 yards in half an hour. Not a good night. The Lavant has finally managed to escape its confines and is flooding the area around the Sainsburys supermarket on the western side of Chichester – many roads are flooded. Inevitably some homes will be too. Fingers crossed for W2. Trains are still running according to Connex, so I should be able to get home (in theory).
More tomorrow.

Gore quits and Bush is set to be 43rd president. So, it’s all over. At last. I have to say that I think history will show that Al Gore probably should have been the president. But I wonder if he’ll be in a position to be a candidate in the next campaign.
Either way, we have four years of firmly right-wing policies ahead in America, with Republicans in control in both the lower and upper chambers and in the White House. Whether this is good for the UK and Europe remains to be seen. I personally do not think it will be good – Mr Bush represents a more isolationist idealogy.
Of course, some will say that this is the beginning of a new move to the right in global politics (the mirror of a move to the left that started around the time of Clinton’s election). I think that is already happening, but will not be very extreme – more a move to just-right-of-centre. But I think it will be overshadowed by a more worrying trend – a general disillusionment with politics and politicians in general, with UK and US politics dominated by spin more than substance, and the debacle and disarray of the Nice EU summit as prime motivators of that opinion.
As “they” say, time will tell.

you can now link to individual posts in this blog – the URL is under the nice little > in the byline at the foot of each post.

Laser offer for bearded shepherdess – “has no need of men”…hmm, draw your own conclusions.

Man jumps off crane to prove he’s an angel, fails – wins today’s award for driest news headline.

Solicitor sells mud on internet – actually, I know from work that there probably is a serious market for good quality screened sterile topsoil online. Anyone want to set up a business on those lines?

Chatham women are the ‘new Essex girls’ – hmmm.