Work, eat, sleep, repeat

My First Love

I've not been posting much so far this year, even though it was a promise to myself that I would start writing more again, largely because there hasn't been that much to write about. I do have to constantly remind myself that I am one of the lucky ones, ~ I can still go out and do one of my jobs (when it's not raining) so I can do something I love as well as see people. But even I am beginning to find it all a bit of drag.

Like so many others I have been eating and drinking a little too much, my regular evening these days is just sitting in front of some mindless TV with a glass (or two) of wine. ~ Well it's not good enough! Last night I rediscovered my first love, so I am determined that I will now start doing some regular practise so that when we are allowed collective music making again I won't embarrass myself too much! 

Having said that, this weekend I do have three Rugby matches to watch!

Advent Calendar XX

This is a special one for UK readers of a "Certain Age". For many of us when we think of Advent one of our first thoughts will be the Blue Peter Advent Crown. For the rest of you Blue Peter is a children's magazine show on the BBC, with an emphasis of learning, making and doing stuff. One of the many things they always did was their Advent Crown, made of tinsel and old wire coat hangers it exemplified the concept of making.

I think pretty much every show one of the presenters would make something, then while the glue or paint was drying they would pull a perfect example out from under the table and say "Here's one I made earlier". Well I am now on holiday, so this post is a bit of a "Blue Peter" ~ in as much as it's one I made earlier.

We Are Not All The Same

I have just realised that it is now ten days since my last post.   It was quite a dramatic post, with over 1,500 hits on the first day alone, for some that may not be much but for me that is pretty momentous.   Having said that I would much rather not have felt as though I needed to say it all, yet even with the much higher profile that trans people now have sometimes it feels as though these things do still need to be said.

Part of that higher profile has come from a variety of media stories, one of the latest is the ITV program Transformation Street. This series started a couple of weeks ago, but with my stupid life I have only now got round to watching the first couple of episodes on Catch Up.   In many ways it is not as bad as I was expecting, but I do have to remind myself that the show is following people through surgery, and the surgery is what much of this show seems to be about.   Although it is nice, if on occasion a little voyeuristic, to see some of the processes that some will go through, as well as to get some of the insights into different people's journeys, I do feel uncomfortable with the basic premise of the show ~ that we become the person we are through surgery!

The central characters are the staff and patients of this private clinic, many are interesting attractive personalities, including the surgeon Christopher Inglefield, but once again I feel I need to stress that this is a surgical clinic and so surgery is central.   I am really labouring this point because for many, indeed most of my trans friends surgery is not the be all and end all of our transition.  Certainly for some it is, but for many of us it isn't.   Maybe it is the stage of life I have now reached, or maybe I just have a different approach to life to many, but just as my transition has not all been about high heels and short skirts, then neither is it all about surgery.

I will admit that for some (particularly trans women) they can be so focused on surgery, the aim that has been pursued, potentially the end of their transition, that I do worry about what may happen after surgery? what happens to your life after you have achieved the one thing that you have been pursuing?

Certainly I do know that this series has taken quite a bit of flak on social media from within the Trans community, I do think much of this has been unfair, but I also think that just as India Willoughby did not speak for the trans community on Celebrity Big Brother then these stories are not necessarily common for all trans people.   They are insightful, they may be heart wrenching, they are certainly indicative, but they are not my story, they are personal stories, and we are all very far from being the same!

Advent Calendar II

Tomorrow will be the first Sunday in Advent and all around the World Churches will be marking the day by lighting the first candle of their Advent Crown, a display of five candle, four around the outside for each Sunday and then one in the middle, usually larger and a different colour which will be lit on Christmas morning.

As a child I always knew that Advent was due and Christmas on it's way when BBC's Blue Peter made their advent calendar, out of tinsel and wire coat hangers, I've never been too sure about the fire safety, and we never made one but they looked like fun ~ did anyone from John Noakes every make one of these?

Desert Island Discs V

Last year I took part in the BBC Great British Amateur Orchestra series, and indeed in the first episode was one of the featured artists.   This was a great experience  even though "We was robed!"   While I was slightly uncomfortable with the competitive aspect of the show I was more upset that we didn't get through to the final even though we were Cleary the most technically competent orchestra, and even more upset that the music we were given to play after this, the first episode did not include the brass. So although I was featured in the first episode along with the rest of my section I took no further part.

First challenge was "The Symphony", we were given an extract from Tchaikovsky's sixth ~ the Pathetique.   I was really pleased to get this symphony as it is one of my favorites, and has a great Tuba part, I was less pleased when it became apparent that we were only going to play a short extract from the last movement.  True a searingly emotional extract but none the less a short extract taking out of a massive context.   I wanted to play the whole thing!

Of course when we look back on Tchaikovsky's life this was an eminently sensible, if a little obvious choice for our orchestra.   It is now pretty much generally accepted that the symphony deals with Tchaikovsky's struggles with his sexuality and whether he is prepared to live a dishonest life denying his inner being.   Indeed it is often taken as being a prelude to his suicide, if indeed it was suicide ~ sometimes I wonder if we read too much into pure music, but we have both angst and triumph, joy and sorrow, what makes this symphony so dramatic is that it finishes with the sorrow and angst, in the minor key, with the joy and triumph expressed in the third movement.

I would be lying if I were to deny an affinity with these feelings, but once again I could not have explained why when I first came across the piece back in the 70s ~ I would then have said that what appealed to me were the big romantic melodic lines, a great tuba part (especially in the third movement) and suburb, masterful orchestration.




We start about 49 minutes in, my interview is around 17 minutes in.

Tall Girls

Last night I watched a couple of episodes of I am Cait and several things struck me

• It was said that any one with all of Caitlin's privilege could not understand how ordinary Trans people feel and what we have to go through.   This is of course very true, but not just of the trans world, any one with that much privilege simple cannot understand how ordinary people function, our relationships with money, work, benefits, education and family are all a mystery to them, I suspect that that explains a lot of what our current Government in the UK is trying to do. Those rich, privileged public school educated men in suits, simply don't understand how it feels to have to choose between being warm and fed or paying the Council Tax.
• A couple of times I found myself noticing that a lot of the trans girls on screen (Particularly Cait) were quite tall and have broad muscular shoulders and slim bottoms, to only be reminded by myself that so have I, is that how other people see me?
• There was a lot of talk about the "Trans Community" and who has a right to be a spokesperson for us.   One of the things that this show does highlight is how different we all are.   Very often the only thing we may have in common is a divergent gender identity, for anyone to identify with all of us is too much to ask, for anyone to share all our opinions would be impossible. However if one of us does come under the spot light of publicity and has a platform I think it is reasonable that they should be able to highlight some of the issues that we all face, but please don't expect anyone to speak for the whole trans community on every point. (And that does include me!)
• At one point the Pink Fog began to descend on our heroine, and she began to side line a friend, I think we all need to remember those who have been important to us through our lives, and not let the pink fog take over, 
• I have read a lot of things about this show, much of it disparaging, but I found it to be a mostly harmless bit of fluff, that did manage to highlight some of the problems that many of us have to face, while still having the superficial gloss of wealth and glamour of the lifestyle of our eponymous heroine

I gather that I am right at the start of series one, and that "stuff" develops, I look forward to seeing more, after all I am still very much of the opinion that the more visible we are, the more we are perceived as members of the general community at large and not some freaks who put everybody at risk, then the more our new normal will become generally accepted.

Dangerous!

I like to think that I don't watch a lot of television, and when I do I like to think that I am quite selective.   I like to think that I watch Rugby, especially the internationals, good quality British Drama and and the odd film.  However a quick look at the programs I record shows that I am turning into a bit of a fan of TV Detectives.

Kembleford

There are a lot of dangerous places in comfortable areas of England. Oxford, Kembleford, and now Grantchester all seem to be rivaling Midsomer as the most dangerous place in the UK.   Although unlike the others Oxford is a city, but it seems as though most of the murders there are amongst the august spires of the university, either way the shear propensity for murder amongst these lovely rural or suburban settings is more than a little worrying.

Easy on the eye

These settings are of course chosen to be easy on the eye, and to offer a contrast with the gruesomeness of the 'orrible murder!

All joking aside I find myself attracted to the rather rarefied tone of these dramas, the classic cars, the classy tones of the central characters, and of course the twists and turns of the plotting.   What I don't understand is the body count.   Why do they feel that in order for a good mystery in need of a solution there needs to be a body, or often several bodies.   It is now many years since I read any of G K Chesterton's Father Brown stories but I do not remember many deaths, yet in the TV series they have at least one a week. In a small Cotswold Village, with an ancient Roman Catholic Church, no Anglican Vicar, and Lady of the Manor who's husband never seems to be at home.   I am quite happy to suspend disbelieve, but please, they could at least make an effort!

I'm a Star Darling! (or at least my back makes a brief appearance!)

Since the show was aired on Wednesday I can now tell the story, around six or seven months back I got a phone call inviting me to try on some "posh frocks".  
The invitation came from a Channel 4 researcher working with Mary Portas on her new "Secret Shopper" series.   Basically they were going to send a taxi to pick me up and take me home, pour wine down my throat all evening and all I had to do was try on some dresses and give my educated opinion.    After thinking about it for fully a quarter of a second I reluctantly agreed ~ for the sake of the community of course!

The story was that a failing Bridal shop run by a husband and wife team had bought a load of dresses because the husband liked them, he liked them because he is a cross dresser and they were what he wanted to wear.  The team wanted to get rid of them and find out if there was a potential untapped market.   I was one of a selection of Trans Women, Crossdressers and Drag Queens there especially to try the wares.   A quick look told me that the dresses were much more appropriate for the Drag Queens and the Trans Beauty Queens than for full time trans women.   Now I do have occasion to wear posh frocks, I actually have three evening gowns and another couple of long dresses, and they do get worn, but there is no way that there was anything there that I would even consider actually wearing.

Still we did have some fun trying them on, making a couple of new friends and giving our opinions.   In the final broadcast you just get see me in a couple of shots, including one of my bare back ~ the dress was so miss sized that it wouldn't even meet, never mind do up! However there is a nice little bit where Mary is talking to my friend Patricia who explains some of the facts of life.

If you haven't seen it yet I do recommend that you do, if only to see Mary Portas' embarrassment when she realises that she has inadvertently called her client a Tranny!

Stuff & Nonsence

 Well I finally returned home last night after a few days away, and a protracted struggle with the M4, after settling down I decided that what I really, really needed, was a nice Dry Martini. only to find myself confronted with the results of my own gluttony, I had already eaten all the olives!   Never mind I managed with a little lime instead.

Then this morning I had the pleasure of discovering that BBC Radio 4's Womans Hour was devoting a whole program to trans issues if you didn't hear it it is worth it and you can listen again here.  If there is one thing I will remember from the discussion it was the statistic that nearly twice as many Americans think they have seen a ghost as think they have seen a Trans person.   I am reminded of the stat that says 90% say they don't know a trans person, 100% of them were wrong.

I now find that BBC2 are showing now showing "Albert Nobbs" tonight as well. Thank you BBC

Advent Calendar III

Now that I think about it, having an advent calendar looking back is a truly bizarre idea. The whole point of Advent is looking forward; looking forward to Christ's birth, looking forward to his ultimate redemptive act, looking forward to being reconciled to God.   Having said all that I find I am in the Magnus Magnuson position of "I've started so I'll finish"

Back in February I see I was very much concerned with my transition, and was beginning to morn the loss of the bloke I had been, I now understand that this was something like a bereavement, for others as well as myself, and a process that had be gone through. I also see that I was mourning the late great Leonard Nimoy, and remembering the evenings when my brothers and I would have our tea watching Star Trek.  

Those were strange days for our family I was changing school, my eldest brother was about to start A-levels and my other brother O-levels, my Father was working away all week, and my Grand Father, who had been living with us all of my life, had recently had some severe strokes and was permanently in a geriatric hospital.   All of this was a tremendous strain on my Mother who would visit her father daily, as well as looking after us and the house, and teaching two or three days every week.

My Father would be away from Monday morning till Friday evening, and then would often have to visit his Mother during that precious weekend time, so in many ways family life was difficult, at the same time we had no mortgage or rent to pay, my father's career was progressing nicely and by then he had a company car so we were a two car family at a time when many families still did not have a car at all, I Suspect that it may have been around this time that we first got a colour television; a vast box in the corner that dominated the whole room and even made horse racing interesting for a while.

I always knew which uniform I wanted to wear

This co-incided with the time I found myself becoming more and more interested in feminine attire, I often wondered if this was all linked, the absence of both my Father and my Grand Father, my Mother' busy schedule, causing my eldest brother to take on a deal of the caring role for me. I consider all this a lot less now, I tend to adopt the position that my parents did what was best at the time (and did work out to be the best!) the situation was what it was, and I am what I am.

Going back to Star Trek, and Google picture search of "Star Trek Christmas" throws up some interesting images, these a few of my favorites.

Live long and prosper.

Thank you Kelly

We are all aware of the media furore there has been recently around Caitlin Jenner ~ or have we? every now and then a little bit appears on main stream TV or radio, but other than the dedicated Kardashian fans I suspect that not a great deal of unaffected people have noticed much on the civilised side of the Atlantic.   Of course we have our own "poster girl" with Kelly Maloney her transition has made more of an impact over here, not least because she was a well known personality in the aggressively masculine world of professional boxing.

These high profile transitions, and the fictional TV series that are hitting our screens all serve to raise our profile and normalise the idea of transgender.   In my own little way I like to think that I do my own little bit of familiarising civilians with the idea, and presence of trans people.   As a performer I like to think that I do my bit in normalising contact with trans people.

However it appears that quite a few of my fellow ladies arn't so keen on some of these celebrity transitions, certainly Caitlin and Kelly haven't had the employment issues or financial insecurities that many of us have to contend with.   When asked how I am I will often reply with "no problems that can't be solved with money", well these two don't have that problem. I suspect that some of us may even be a little bit jealous of some of teh publicity (and extra income) they have been getting through their media exposure.

Until now I have been a little bit ambivalent about all of this until I received a text message from an old friend

"Just been watching Kelly Maloney on TV and wanted to send you a hug. Seriously I think I haven't been as on side as I should have."

People may be afraid to ask us the question they really want answers to, they may not know the questions to ask which will give them true insights into our situations, they may simply assume that they understand when they don't, so now I have to say thank you to every trans woman or man who goes on TV and tells their story, not least becasue it may mean that I don't have to quite as often.

Fascinating!

When I put together the previous post obviously I had no idea about Leonard Nimoy's imminent death.   Although I never met or knew him I was deeply saddened to hear the news.   Leonard Nimoy played quite a big part in my life, first through his role in Mission Impossible and then of course as Spook.   I have already blown my cover as a bit of a Trecker, but I think that pretty much everyone around my age will remember the wonder with which we first greeted Star Trek (TOS) and then the films.

It seems like only yesterday but of course in reality it must be the best part of 50 years ago that my brothers and I were allowed to eat our tea in front of the TV so that we could watch Star Trek. As far as I can remember this was a first in our family, and was probably only allowed due to various other issues my Mother was dealing with around that time.

I suspect that Spock will go down as one of the great TV characters, but in a way it is a shame that he will always overshadow all of Nimoy's other work.

There's no point in saying it him now, so to you all I say "Live Long and Prosper"

Star Treking

I have been enjoying the re-runs of Star Trek TNG on CBS Action.  I'm sure that as far as they are concerned it is a bit of cheap programing, but for me it is a great little trip down memory lane.   I watched these when they first came out and loved them then, and now I find that I still do.

I am amazed that there seem to be episodes that I either have forgotten or never saw.   I was even more surprised by the uniforms.  

I remembered the jump suits and the trousers, but had totally forgotten that in series one we still had the mini dresses hanging over from TOS, the big difference of course being that in TNG the men had the dresses as well.I have only found these two examples on line and I expect that the idea was dropped very nearly as quickly as they dropped the idea of a female senior officer in the Original Star Trek.   Shame if they had continued with this idea a lot of us might have been a lot happier for a lot longer.

TV and the Trans Girl

During the period between Christmas and new year I had very little work that I could get on with not much in the way of rehearsals or performances and very little inclination to do much anyway.   So like a lot of other people I ended up watching quite a lot of television, there was a lot of good stuff being shown I enjoyed some excellent films and some first rate shows.

Those that immediately come to mind are "The World's Fastest Indian", I originally recorded this as I am a bit of a bike nut, but enjoyed it for the simple goodness of the central character, and the sympathetic portrayal by Chris Williams of a Trans Woman.   I am a little peeved that so often the character seems to be referred too as a transvestite, when the script makes it quite clear that she is, and identifies as a woman, even gently correcting Anthony Hopkins' central character on the point.

I loved watching the Gruffalo again, this brought back such happy memories of reading this book to my daughter when she was little, it was one of our favorites, I had to do accents for all the different animals (surprisingly similar to the ones chosen for the film) and each time the phrase came up she would join in with the "doesn't he know, there's no such thing as a Gruffalo!"   For similar reasons I also enjoyed Room on the Broom ~ sometimes I think Childrens books and films are too good for children!

Doctor Who is for me now more a part of Christmas Day than the Queen's Speech, and Miranda was so funny I think I wet myself laughing.   Of course there was a lot of other stuff I watched and enjoyed, and some that I watched and wondered why I had bothered, but I suspect that for many of us the stand out piece of television over the holiday period was David Walliams the "Boy in the Dress"

Of course I enjoyed this on a personal level, I enjoyed the contrast between the camp overacting of the adults against the simple realism of the children, I enjoyed the characters, and the storyline, most of all I enjoyed that children enjoyed it.

While at Church this morning a curious and confident boy asked me why I was wearing lipstick (somehow this was what he noticed rather than the earstuds sparkly ring or nail polish), not wanting to go into all the complications of gender and what that meant to me, I could simply ask him if he had watched a lot of television over Christmas and of course he had.   Had he watched "The boy in the Dress" and of course he had, so I could just say well some people are more comfortable like that and I am one of them.   He was quite happy with that as an explanation and was quite happy with me.   Somehow kids totally get it most of the women I talk to totally get it, it's just some of the men who are uncomfortable or don't understand.

I wonder if this is because they feel that somehow their own masculinity is undermined, or as one of my cis sisters opined they may be frightened that by be attracted to a trans woman their own sexuality might be in question.   Either way I have decided that my behaviour is not going to be influenced by what others may expect of me, but by my doing my best to be the best me I can be and to grow into the person God made me to be. 

just a quickie

So, just got home after a thoroughly butch weekend with Mum and Daughter, the drive home as an absolute bitch, rained nearly all the way and way too much traffic, just kept grinding everything down to a halt.   The M4 is not the best place to spend five or six hours at the best of times but on a rainy bank holiday evening, well lets just say I can think of better things to do,

Still we all had fun over the weekend, it was god to spend time with both my Daughter and my Mother, and have lunch with my Eldest Brother and Sister in Law, for once I didn't have to do all the cooking but it did feel like an awful lot of washing up at times.  Being 93 Mum has never quite accepted innovations like dishwashers and microwaves so everything has to be done the old fashioned way.

Now I am going to settle down with a beer, and omelet, and my recording of Doctor Who

Taxing times

For all those of us who are self employed and living in the UK today is one of those horrible days when we have to pay the taxman! once every six months we have to put our hands in our pockets and pay our dues.   Most of our compatriots have to pay tax every month or every week, each time they are paid, but because of our self employed status we only do it twice a year, of course this also means that each time we have to pay six times as much.

Now the well organised business like people put aside the amount they will need to pay each month into a savings account; accrue a little interest and then pay what they have to when they have to.   The rest of us get surprised every time and then find that we have to scrimp and scrape together the pound of flesh we have to pay on time, or be charged interest and a fine.   So I spent too much of the morning trying to get what little money I have in the right place to be able to settle my account.   Of course apart from the loss of productive work time this can also be more than a little stressful, so I did manage to reduce the stress a little by making my visit to the Building Society wearing a nice light blue long cotton dress.   Very cool, very comfortable and in my opinion very stylish.

Friday will be all about work during the day and then out with my daughter in the evening and then on Saturday I will have to make sure I am very girly ready for Brighton Pride on Saturday.   Our float has a purple theme I have a variety of options but at the moment none of them seem to be quite right.   For once this is an event when I don't need to worry about passing, or indeed even blending, and in some ways that makes the choice even more difficult.

Wurst Wins

So against all my expectations Conchita Wurst has won the Eurovision Song Contest for Austria.   As I have been so busy making my own music I have not been following the competition I am in no position to comment on the quality of any of the songs, but I am not at all about her look, or what this will do for general attitudes to the trans community.

Even without the beard I find her look to be a little too high camp, a little too close to "drag" for my taste, with the beard it is just plain confusing.   Personally when I am out I want to be treated like a lady, this involves behaving like a lady.   Part of this is looking as much as possible like a lady.   I don't fool myself that I pass, but I am close enough that people generally treat me appropriately for my presentation.   I know how I want to be treated so that tells me how I have to look, so I try not to look like a hooker (either type!) some one who has raided her smaller teenage daughter's wardrobe, or most of all a transvestite.

Now this maybe because I self identify as a trans woman, not as a transvestite or as a female impersonator, both of which are men in women's clothes, rather I am a woman wearing the right clothes, it's just the body that's wrong.   I will wait and see what effect another high profile fellow traveller will have on general attitudes, I suspect that Conchita's influence will not be as positive as Grayson Perry's.

Buddleja, Bible Study and Batman

Well we are now into day two of our A - Z challenge and I continue to search fruitlessly for any coherent theme other than what I have been doing, or stuff that just happens to cross my mind.   Fortunately for me yesterday was a day full of Bs, there were indeed even a few bees.

We are currently enjoying a funny old spring which seems only natural after a funny old winter.   Although very, very wet the winter was also very mild, in consequence a lot of plants are a little further advanced than might otherwise be expected.   March and April are usually good months to get a lot of my spring pruning done, but I find I keep looking at plants and thinking "I should have done this a month ago"  

Yesterday was one of those occasions, I was in the garden of a new customer, mostly concerned about pruning, she has a very large climbing rose in desperate need of extensive restorative pruning but is too nervous of letting me do as much as really needs doing.   With this plant I had to pretty much content myself with trimming back to laterals and cutting out dead wood, but further down her garden there is a monster Buddleja Davidii (this is the standard "Butterfly Bush") in order to keep a reasonable size, shape, and to produce lots of heavy dense flower clusters a good hard prune in spring is just what these need.   It was a real joy to be able to give this plant exactly what it needed, I cut it back to no more than three foot high at any point, removed all dead wood and crossing branches and opened up the centre of the bush a little.   I don't know when this Budleja was last pruned but some of the pieces I cut out must have been at least twelve foot long!

I look forward to seeing him covered in flowers and butterflies later in the summer.

Regular readers will know that my faith is an important part of who, and what I am.   One of the ways that this manifests itself is every other Tuesday I host and lead a Church Home Group.   We meet for mutual support, fellowship and Bible study.   This being Lent we are actually meeting every Tuesday and following a course looking at the fruit of the Spirit, last night we were thinking about Kindness and Goodness.   Sounds simple, but inevitably it still took us a good couple of hours to come to the conclusion that in order to display the fruit of the spirit we need to be in step with the Spirit and welcome Him into our lives.   I always enjoy these evenings as I find that talking about things helps me to know what I do believe, and sometimes to challenge myself and my believes.   Hosting the meetings also means that I am forced to clear up and vacuum the place every now and then.

Although it happened a couple of days ago on the 28th March it was only yesterday that I heard on the Radio that Lorenzo Semple Jr. the writer and creator  Batman had died.   I should clarify, Semple did not write the original comic book Batman, nor was he responsible for any of the recent crop of films, no what he created was the wonderful, camp TV series of the sixties, complete with the KPOW banners coming up in fight scenes.  

For those of us who are a "Certain Age" Adam West will always be Batman, and he spoke Semple's lines. (For my money West also had the best ever Batmobile)

Amongst many other worthy productions, such as Papillon, Semple was also responsible for the Flash Gordon screen play, another triumph of camp, this also means that his words are on the best selling album in the UK ~ Queens Greatest Hits!

An Endagered Species?

Inspired by the "Femulator" photo on Stana's Femulate page today, I wondered, where have all the female impersonators gone.   I grew up during a period when Danny La Rue was a main stream major star.   Around the world there many others like Laverne Cummings, and Harry S Franklyn, they were not drag artists, they were not ostensibly, or at least publicly, trans gendered, but were main stream performers.

Danny would often lend a real bit of glamour to Saturday evening family TV, a regular on "The Good Old Days" old time musical and other variety and entertainment shows, he would impersonate females, he never pretended that he was anything other than he was,, and avoided "camp" if not innuendo.   I watch TV now and wonder who are his successors, I see no one doing anything like this, sure there are the drag queens and actors occasionally taking roles that require cross dressing, but the Female Impersonator sees to be rarer than jugglers and performing dogs.

Maybe I should brush up an act and go "Britain's got Talent"

TV?

I mentioned yesterday that I was looking for a cheap replacement TV (Television not transvestite, I am quite happy with the one I am). The other evening I was out when I got a text message from my wife, who is still sleeping at our house, asking what was wrong with the telly? Well it had been fine when I turned it off, but now it just had a white screen, the sound was OK but no picture.   A quick search on the old interweb indicated what the problem might be and a possible fix, but that didn't work so I will be resorting to replacement.

However bearing in mind our current uncertain domestic arrangements I am loath to spend any money, hence the looking in charity shops.   On Thursday I visited Wallington where there is a BHF Furniture and Electrical store, they had a TV I quite liked but it didn't have a remote so I decided to leave it, wandering further down the High Street, I tried on a spectacular black evening dress, I wanted to buy it but wasn't sure that I could carry off the backless look.   I have now decided that today (Monday) I will go back and will buy both the TV and the Dress if they are still in stock.   If they have been sold then I will try to convince myself that it is a sign that I was right and shouldn't have bought them.

In the mean time we do have a little 14 inch portable TV that I have set up, it's not quite the same but at least I can watch the cricket.