I have read before this chapter and know what is all about. It is where you invite 5 friends for a weekend on the long and narrow boat to try and find out about yourself. But never finish yet.

Why are you always trying to find out about yourself? Ask me and I will tell you all you might be wanting to know. This is partial joke.
But whyfore do you not just get on with it. Your life, what you are doing now?

If I was being you - which I am not - I would not frequent this public house again for some while. Public means public. It does not mean ticket-holders only. Why in England are you so accepting of such goings on?

But here is idea. Why not do you make up your own charity and go to this landlord fellow and say - Look here, I am wanting to hold charity evening at your public house for which I shall be charging £10 a ticket because is worthy cause. And he may say - what is in it for me, matey?

And you will say - for every ticket sold you get £2 plus all profits from extra alcohol which you are selling. So this is what we are calling a win-win situation.

Then all you are needing to do is to have some leaflets printed advertising your pretend charity. But best to make it to do with some foreign land so peoples cannot check the dodgy validation of this charity.

Perhaps even invent foreign land which is something ending in
...istan. People are not going admitting they never heard of this place and being also too damned lazy to go look up on Google.

One last tip is to make charity to SAVE something. It can be a pretend endangered species or ancient language or forest, or anything what comes into head.

This Dagny Taggart is sure one smart cookie. And powerful woman to be rescuing railroad from disastrous mistakes made by men. Also finds time to have lovers. I am enjoying immensely this book.

I know things are bad with you for the times being but all you can do is to keep calm and carry on - like your Winston Churchill say in war. Course you might get blown to the smithereens in meantime but we will burn that bridge when we arrive at it (another British idiom)

Why not play some jazz which always cheer you up.

Anna

It's for Charity

***************************

Bad day yesterday. Complicated. All sorts of stuff. 

Then - got locked out! - actually that was the best part of the day.

On my way back, after you had gone, Anna, I called in a pub I frequent on a regular basis (I refuse to call any pub my local)

Well, I say 'I called in' - I actually got as far as the door and was prevented from entry by the landlord. A big man, who can block most doorways, he said 'Ticket only tonight'.
'What?' I expostulated.
'Six pounds a ticket - it's for charity'.
He didn't say which charity, or what was on offer for my six pounds, and I was too taken aback to even think of asking.

I left, and found another pub.

But just imagine that: Ticket only entrance to a public house. Not a club or some sort of music or dance venue -  but a public house.

And then I thought of that magic phrase - It's for charity.

Now I support many charities, as you know, Anna, but it does seem you can get away with anything if you are doing it for charity.

I bet if Hitler had invaded Poland and said it was in aid of OXFAM we would have sponsored him.

But enough of this. I have a lot of things to worry about.

George

Effect without cause

********************************

Oh look, Anna... browsing with a melancholic eye over some past writings I came across this first chapter of a novel I expected great things for - oops... ended sentence with a preposition (is that a preposition or is is something else? Who knows... who cares). It got quite a bit further than this but eventually I ran out of steam. 
Anyway, here is the first chapter.

(By the way, I should like to preface this by noting that I have always been fascinated by the western philosophic approach that says that for ever effect there must be a cause. But an effect can be a cause - as we shall see)

Chapter one

The throb of a low-revving diesel engine, and the big heavy gates swing open; a steel narrow-boat emerges from the darkness of the lock into the sunlight. A shadow flits across the brown water, and I squint upwards just in time to see a big black crow take off on lazy flapping wings. I turn away and pick up my coffee cup. Suddenly I am aware of the buzz of conversation from the tables around me. I look up. The closing gates have stopped before the end of their travel; they appear to have jammed. Up on the lock, black figures silhouetted against the bright light, are running about, shouting and pointing down into the shadow of the lock. Pushing back my chair, I run up the slope. When I reach the top my heart is beating more than it needs to, after the short climb. No need to ask what's going on. There is a drop on thirteen feet to the muddy brown water, but I can easily see what's stopping the gates from closing: What looks like a bundle of old clothes is gripped in the mighty jaws of the gates. Suddenly there is a sound like plastic cracking, and the gates come together in one swift movement. The small knot of people standing on top of the lock  fall suddenly quiet. The crow has returned and is circling, curious, above a widening reddish stain on the brown water. The thick silence is pierced by the sudden shriek of a police-car's siren.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Chief Inspector has a cold, and I didn't catch his name. There is a box of man-sized tissues on the table and I find my mind worrying over the question of whether these are police issue or if he has to buy his own. Silly, I know. It's nerves.

'Tell me again, why you invited these five people down here this particular weekend? To stay on your boat?'
The inspector manages to get the question out between sneezes.
I'm getting a bit worried now; worried about catching this man's cold. He's not too fussy when he sneezes. He doesn't always manage to get a tissue out of the box in time, and I am only three feet away, across the desk from him.

'It seemed like a good idea at the time'. I hear a voice say, lamely. Is that really me speaking?

'It seemed like a good idea at the time?' The inspector parrots me, in a slightly sarcastic tone, his voice rising at the end of the sentence, to indicate a question. I can feel the wind in my gut building up. It seems hours since I've had something to eat, and the tension is making it worse. Suddenly it escapes in a loud sigh.

'Am I boring you?' The sarcasm has now got a dangerous edge to it.
'No,' I reply, hastily, anxious not to upset him. 'I suffer from IBS.'
'Stress makes it worse, does it?'
'Yes,' I reply, - too quickly. I realise he has tricked me. 'Well, no... I mean -'
'Look sir,' Or did he say son? 'Just start again from the beginning.'
So I do.

------------------------------------------------------

I've noticed that I'm pretty good at starting novels. Well pretty good at starting anything, really - including relationships. What I'm not so good at is carrying them on.


Perhaps I am a starter. Other people are continuers . And yet others are finishers.

But so what? Is there really time to worry about such things?

Is there really time to worry about anything?

Answers on a postcard, sealed in a plain brown envelope, to the usual address.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Saturday morning

************************

A chilly and damp morning.

I look across to the same roofs I looked at yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that, and the day...
Still, I can look out at roofs, so I guess that's something.

 Dreams about canal boats and ladies.

Yesterday I went to a reunion lunch. A good meal and a respite from all that is going on.

Called in a library and started to read a Stephen King short story -
'Autopsy Room Four'. I don't usually read horror stories but I got involved and brought the book home to finish the story. I'll probably take it back today - on the way to to finish off emptying 'my place'. And then... travelling.

I remember reading about a war photographer who travelled  all over the world. The interviewer asked him, 'Where is your home now?' He replied, 'My home is in my head'.
Good place to have your home. 

My finger-nails need cutting - probably toes nails as well, although they don't affect my typing. There's an idea for a project: Learn to type with my feet. But that would be the height of laziness: To learn to type with your feet so you don't need to cut your finger nails.
Of course, eventually - presuming I did learn to type with my feet - I would have the same problem as I had with my finger nails. So best deal with the current situation.

Well, Anna, it is 8.05 am, and I must gird my loins. They need a good girding.

Ah, as if on cue, the sun breaks through the cloud.

Until we meet

George

EVEN DIRTY OLD MEN NEED LOVE

**********************************

No, I am not talking about myself - I am not old!

But the title of this post is taken from a slogan on a T shirt worn by Burt Munro, holder of several motorcycle world speed records. (see earlier post)

And I am inclined to agree with Burt. In fact I would go so far as to say we all need love. For without it, what do we have?

Anyway, I went for a spin on my Honda Benley this week. A lovely afternoon and the bike going like a song. 

But I am on a downer again, Anna. I do not wish to trouble you with the details.

I shall go to bed.

George

This video of silent motor cycle. Perhaps you should take another and this time be sure of the sound being present. After all, should not be impossible to do this.

People here are saying how cold it is. Cold? I say to them. You should be living in my country where we know what cold is. Although our cold is not damp cold like it is here, and maybe  that is what makes people feel it is really cold. When it isn't.

I go to my 11 am lecture. Slightly late.

Anna

Motorbike

*****************************************

No, you silly Swedish person. I did not give another woman a ride.
I attempted to record bike engine. I have now managed to upload but the sound seems to have disappeared???

NOW REMOVED

What is this video of which you speak?

I do not recall making of video.

Have you taken other woman for a ride since I have left? 

Sorry you have slipped into the decline. Perhaps you just have to take things easy for the times being. Or no - perhaps instead the long brisk walk will help, releasing as it does the endorphins. which is the little things in the brain that make one feel good. But this of course you know, being as you say, once in the trade.

This book - Atlas Shrugged - is very good story, operating (as my tutor says) on many levels. I like this girl who runs a railroad while her brother just sit on arse in big office.

I look out the window and see it raining. 

I eat my yoghurt.

Until we meet again (and you show me video!)

Anna

Problems with the technology

****************************

Been trying to load the motorbike video... several times but it isn't uploading. Now why do you think this might be?

Anyway it's not been a good Monday, Anna. Not after the weekend. You back in university and me...well... here I suppose. 
But as a friend of mine once said, 'I am not always where my feet are planted'.

Anyway. let's not blame the day, it's my reaction to it I suppose. 

I think the best thing I can do is to go to bed... to sleep, perchance to dream - oh shut up Shakespeare. I dream every night. A skull-full of dreams each night. But I'm not complaining.

Sleep well in those hallowed halls of residence.

George

I think we should all try for One Good Run. Whether there is or  whether there is not anything coming after this life.

I read when your write about Job Centre in sky and reincarnation, and some sounds like possible idea.

But then I am thinking to oneself, if we come back here then there must be somewhere to come back from.  And where is this somewhere? What if there is no 'somewhere', only a 'here'. But maybe this 'here' is much bigger than we know. Perhaps we are only knowing a tiny part of 'here'.

Then my brain is starting to hurt.

Yes, I would like to spin on motorbike. And maybe it will blow away cobwebs of the mind. Also motorcycle riding is sexual experience. 

I also do not know if two negatives make one positive but if we pretend hard enough then it may happen.

I think we have to do a lot of pretending in our life. Pretending that it all is meaning something and also pretending that everything is all going to work out in the end. But knowing there is really no end to work out in. Perhaps pretending is necessary to keep world going on. Pretending hard.

Perhaps that which some people are calling 'Faith' is really a kind of pretending.

Now one's brain is hurting more.

While I have been typing this I have been having a drink of the Scottish Whisky. What you English are calling a night-hat.

With eager anticipation to having big motorcycle engine thumping away under one.

Anna

'One Good Run'

*********************************

I was going to say: I know how you feel. But nobody can know how anyone else feels.

I have been on a downer myself. Still, don't two negatives make a positive? I don't know, I was never any good at maths. We could pretend it does! And if we pretend hard enough, perhaps it may come true!

'One Good Run' is the title of a biography of Burt Munro who, at the age of nearly seventy, broke the world speed record on a motorbike. They made a film with Anthony Hopkins: The Fastest Indian, which I saw some time ago. Anyway, somebody has lent me the book, and it inspired me to get out my motorbike, and start it -  for the first time this year.

No - I do not intend to try for the world land speed record! But we could have a spin around the lanes of this pleasant land. What do you think?

You've still got your leathers and you know how you like a good blast.

That title 'One Good Run'... . Burt was aiming for one good run that would get him the title, but I think you could apply it to life. Suppose you've only got 'one run'. Why not make it a good one!

But enough of this philosophying.

I shall go and check my equipment (crash-hat, gloves and stuff).

My throttle fingers are already twitching.

George

Tired I am tonight, Georgie, and despondent.

It is usually you who despond a lot but tonight I begin to wonder what its all about? All this studying. Words, words, words. And what for is it all? So I get my degree and maybe also Masters - and then what? To be perhaps working in call-centre in Cardiff?

This book, 'Atlas Shrugged' is fattest book I ever read, and only have I got a few pages into story. So many pages. How does this woman have time to write all this?

Sometimes I am thinking back to when I was star in adult films produced and directed by brother Sven. But obvious cannot pursue such a career for ever, nor never am I wanting to. It is that just sometimes all these words are clogging up my brain.

Maybe I take rest from studying and come to visit, even though I said would not because of closeness to exams and the deadlines for the coursework.

What do you think, Georgie?

Anna

The Poem

To Richard - in prison
From Althea - not in prison

Dear Dicky it's a shame
You're stuck in prison - all the same
A woman has her needs
And with you up there in Leeds
Behind bars with your jailors
And me down here in Portsmouth -
The streets awash with sailors...

Well, I'm sure you'll understand
None of this was planned
I've not fallen out of love
But when push comes to shove
A woman's gotta do
What a woman's gotta do -
So I did it

Well, thanks for all the fun
But now I've got to run
I'm just off up the Palais -
Best of luck
Yours ever
Ali

Rites of passage

*********************************

I like your idea of conjugal rites... sounds more interesting than conjugal rights!

Yes, I know Ayn Rand. She caused quite a stir in her time (and still does).  'Atlas Shrugged', ( her longest novel) is considered a classic - for good reason. You may not agree with all her ideas but this is a brilliant piece of writing. Yes, there's a lot to get the old Swedish molars into there.

And by the way, I was not having a go at your nose. It is a beautiful nose, as I think I have told you often enough. You are getting a bit paranoid (you're not smoking that marijuana again are you? I know what you students are like).

Yours is the most pragmatic approach to the Richard Lovelace poem that I have come across. I wonder if Althea would tell him it's all over in a poem of her own? A sort of rhyming 'Dear John'.

I shall give it some thought.

And I am surprised at you Anna:  It's not politically correct to say 'homosexual' any more - the word now is 'gay'. And even so, riding a folding bicycle on campus surely does not provide any indication of a person's sexual proclivities, does it?

George

Are you making criticism of one's nose? I have very straight nordic nose, which is not to be compared to elephant trunk, and though many times have I done unseemly thing, never with nose. 

And also from where do you obtain photo of immense elephant and small boy? It appear to be from very old newspaper. I cannot read caption but do not believe this boy is helping elephant to learn how to sit with front legs in air, and think this to be one of your bad taste jokes.

And about this man who is in prison, it matters much for what crime he has committed because length of sentence will determine how soon he get out to be with his woman. I know that even in Britain is woman allowed to visit her man, but not like in Sweden for the conjugal rites. So needs may not be satisfied for some long time, and if so woman may say - Sod this, but I will seek solace of a sexual nature with other man.

I am to do, for my thesis,  feminist critique of 'Atlas Shrugged' by woman author Ayn Rand. Do you know this book? (or this woman?) Hilary (who is a man but has woman's name and is my new tutor)) says this should be right up my ally. This is British idiom - I hope. Hilary rides fold-up bicycle around campus but is not homosexual.

I leave you now because need to read 'Atlas Shrugged'

Your over-worked Anna

An elephant never forgets - but it doesn't bear a grudge

*******************************************

This elephant is in the early stages of training, hence the boy with a steadying hand on its back. Later, due to the high death rate, it became illegal to employ small boys in the circus.

I don't know why Richard Lovelace was in prison, or which prison he was in. Typical of you pedantic Swedes to ask such questions. I mean, what does it matter? It's the poem that's important.

Anyway, to get back to elephants: How do you know they are jolly?
Just because they wear funny hats and troop round the ring holding one another's tails and doing un-elephant like things with their trunk doesn't necessarily mean they are jolly. (How would you like to have to do something unseemly with your nose just to amuse kids?).
They know that if they want their dinner they have to do these silly tricks. 

Another thing: I don't like clowns. I don't think they are funny. Scary, yes - but not funny.
I like the lady on the trapeze though, and the high wire. Now that is dangerously entertaining.

My back is much better, thank you for enquiring. I'm not saying I could perform on the flying trapeze but it is perfectly functional for my lifestyle.

Well, I can't stay here typing - I have much to do.

Au revoir

George

Why are you hinting to all people that I stay in bed late,  when such a thing is untrue? I am always up by the tide of noon - even though often exhausted by thinking good ideas night before (which is true).


How do you know African elephant has this negative attitude? Elephants, which I see at circus, are always jolly animals with funny hats on head, doing tricks like sitting down on big barrel and raising in air the front legs. Also, like lifting lady with trunk and marching round ring with her held aloft.

I know of this poem you post (not silly one about staying in bed but other one) but I do not know why the man was sent to prison or which prison. British prisons 100 years out of date with overcrowding and slopping out to be done - UGH!

Sweden, being much more civilised country has fine prisons which is really like hotel with all modern conveniences. But Sweden also  land of freedom, not like England who is supposed to have Magna Carter which supposed puts block on king and tells him he is to respect common persons. Only it does not do this because barons only interested to stop King John from chucking weight around with them (barons), not giving the toss for commoner. But you are calling Magna Carter: cornerstone of democracy. What typical English hypocrisy.

Is the back of you feeling better? For you was complaining of muscle strain or something similar. I think you are too caring of condition of health, and there being no need to consult doctor who has better thing to do, with waiting room full of coughing and spluttering sick English people.

As I look out window I see that blossom appear on almond tree. This sure sign of spring. Later I take a photo.

Well, must needs get on with important work of studying.

Goodbye for now

Anna

Sunday

*************************

Strange, Anna, is it not: I get my best ideas early in the morning, and you get your best ideas late at night.

So here I am, out of a warm bed and sitting with a cup of tea, typing away.

I found some stuff I had written 17 years ago... I will print some of it, heavily edited of course. But that is for another time.

There's something about the atmosphere of a Sunday, don't you think. It feels Sundayish. I bet elephants in the African bush wake up and say... Another Sunday... and bugger-all to do. 

But we shall not adopt the negative attitude of the African elephant. We shall find something to do. Even though I have been as low as... something that's very low, I shall make an effort. Sometimes it's best not to make an effort, and sometimes it is. The trick is to know the difference.

It's no good saying: well, those poor sods in Syria are worse off than me. It doesn't work like that. But how does it work? That is the question.

When I was a lad I would go out on my bike on Sunday, with some pals (we didn't have mates in those days). Sometimes we would do a hundred miles in the day; we'd either go north or south. North was to the Trough of Bowland; south was Wales. I think I preferred south. Although if you went north it was pretty much downhill coming back.

A bike meant freedom then. It still does. 

Freedom is important, don't you think?

If I have freedom in my love
And in my soul am free,
Angels alone, that soar above,
Enjoy such liberty.

Richard Lovelace wrote that, Anna, in a poem called: To Althea, from Prison.

Sometimes you can say something in a poem that you can't say any other way.

So...

I'm going to get my breakfast,
While you lie asleep in bed;
When you get up you can get your own -
'Cos I'll be in the shed.

(actually I'll be out, sniffing the salty air)

I've not had any really good ideas this morning - but you wait until tomorrow!



George

It's all very puzzling

******************************

Yes, I hear what you are saying, Anna, but - before we leave the subject and concentrate on other things - I guess it comes down to the old question: Does the brain create consciousness or, does consciousness create the brain. (the old chicken and egg thing)
You know that bible says: In the beginning was the word... (something like that). Could that be another way of saying: In the beginning was consciousness?

Now that may sound a bit spooky but, being a true scientist, I believe it to be my duty to consider this possibility. 

Of course, the usual 'scientific' explanation is that consciousness is simply a function of the brain (perhaps not so simple, because only us humans are said to have attained this consciousness) That is to say, consciousness (and here we mean 'self' consciousness) is simply the brain sort of looking at itself.

And when we 'evolved' to achieve consciousness, that is when we started looking for other-worldly explanations of 'why we are here' and 'what life might be all about'.

Can life really be much ado about nothing?

It's okay, Anna, I don't want an explanation this evening. Instead let us explore the delights of this physical plane.

This is interesting theory you propound, Georgie. But also load of crap.

For example, you do not define what 'soul' is? And where do soul reside before it is entering first body?

Also, what is soul for? I mean apart from entering bodies? What is it soul is supposed to learn? And when it has learned what it is supposed to learn, where does it go? What does it do?

These are indeed puzzling questions. So I look up on internet about Hindus. And I see they have this wheel of life, which you go around and around on until you become enlightened. Then you can go to place called Nirvana (which I thought was name of pop group). But upon reading further, this Nirvana is terrifying place, like the abyss.
And it put into my mind the lines you used to quote to me:

'Night, mothering night, take us on your knee
And hide our eyes from the blank face of eternity'.

But I have one's own theory which is too complicated to expound heretofore.

Now I see that British politician called Tony Benn has died. And all these other politicians now coming out of woodwork and saying what a fine fellow he was. If he was such fine fellow why did they not make him leader of his party, which was labour? 
I will tell you why: Because he will make radical change, and although these other people tell you they want to change things, they mean only up to certain point. Or maybe he go too fast for them. But I am not interested in the politics.

Anyways, we meeting usual place? Under clock?

Your Anna

Don't think you're going to sit there with your feet up!

Where do you go when you die?

To that Job Centre up in the sky.

Obvious, when you think about it. Yes, the Hindus got it right - for all the wrong reasons - Reincarnation.

Just because you've finished one job here on earth, it don't mean you can just swan around up there for eternity, living on heavenly benefits.

No, I'll bet you have to sign-on at that great Job Centre in the sky, where they find you another job down here.

Maybe you get a couple of weeks holiday first. Or perhaps, if you had a bad time down here, you get put on the celestial- sick for a bit. Even then, you might be expected to do a bit of ghost work: a spell of light-haunting... that sort of thing. But I can't see you being allowed to just sit on your bum on a cloud for all eternity.

It just don't work like that.

Maybe if you've done a good job down here you get promotion (like the Hindu caste system) or if you haven't...

What sort of work you lookin' for mate?

Well, I was an Untouchable last time - how about a Brahmin?

A Brahmin - You kiddin' mate. With your past record. Not a chance. I could get you an Outcaste or, at a push, a Vadra - but I'd be putting my job on the line.
Tell you what: How about a complete change? There's a shortage of souls in Africa: millions of babies being born out there, we can hardly keep up with it. Now, I could do you a nice Rwanda - or how about Etheopia? If we could find you the right gene-pool you could end up an Olympic runner?

No? Just a thought. Well what about a spell in China. You'd have to be male of course. You know what they're like on this population thing. Look, I'll keep you away from Beijing - all that smog  it's a disgrace that's what it is; What with that and global warming -  I tell you: If you humans can't look after the planet better than that, we'll take it off you.

Or imagine a banker turning up:

Right mate, now what can we sort out for you?

Well, I was a merchant banker in London for forty years, so with my experience something on the New York Stock Exchange - or Tokyo, at a push.

You just don't get it mate, do you? The idea is for you to get work-experience. In other words: something different from what you done before. In that way your soul can develop - and in your case, a lot of development is called for.

Now, if you fancy a change of sex...I've got just the thing for you: Palestine. They aren't half poppin' em out in them refugee camps. You wouldn't think so, would you, not with all that deprivation and food shortages. But they are. It's all we can do to keep up with a supply of suitable souls. Also, being born a female will give you an idea what it's like to be a woman in the third world. Now that will really be a steep learning curve. Do the old soul a power of good.

--------------------------------------------

By the way, Anna, that owl was stone. You never saw it fly away, did you?

George

What is this thing about futility? This is something I do not understand.

All this philosophying of which you are doing could send one mad.
Like in 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance' which happened to the man called Phaedrus, which was not real name but name narrator gives to himself because he is ancient Greek philosopher who argues with Plato, or maybe Socrates... who cares,
since so long ago this occurs (not the book which is written in the 60s by the man Robert Pirsig.)

I am always telling you, Georgie, you think too much. And you tell me you have the philosopher's temperament. Whatever. We all must do that which we can do, or as they say in England 'horses for courses'. Another stupid idiom.

Are you sure this owl on roof is not real owl? He look real to me.

Anna

Futility sets you free

*******************************

When you accept that there's no boat to miss; no grand plan; no judgement; no salvation; no retribution; when you realise the utter futility of it all, hope disappears, and with it fear. 

And finally you are free.

Here's a picture I took on our weekend break.

This is the cottage we didn't stay at.
Notice the owl on the house next door.
It's not a real owl. It's made of stone, and I guess it is to frighten away seagulls who might otherwise shit on the roof.
Canny folk, the Welsh.

The place we did stay at was halfway up a mountain. (would a pessimist say it was halfway down a mountain? Who knows, and who cares? Well, I do, for one, because these philosophical conundrums fascinate me.)

I'm off to bed.

George

Georgie. Why do you say - I am going to have a shower, instead of just saying - I am going to shower?

Is this perhaps because your working class roots upbringing when you live in house with no bathroom and  lavatory at bottom of yard?

But this is of little importune at this time. 

What a weekend did we have, eh? Such relaxation, and other things. And food, which is more than one eats in a week. This country Wales is, I think, a fine place. With hill and mountain and waterfall, and sheep everywhere. Which is why they always having roast lamb on menu. I will not eat this because I think of poor little lamb, gamboling happily in meadow and not knowing he is to go for the chop. 

Anyways, I am publishing here photo I took. -

This is picture of Conway estuary, and is taken on the Saturday morning of 1st March - which is St. David's Day. Who is this man I do not know, but they celebrate in Wales his birthday. And on the table in place where we stay they put daffodils. Which is to remember this man.

Conway is only small place but has monstrous big castle which people are telling me is built by King Edward I - who is called 'Longshanks' because he is very tall (tall for his time of history, when people are shorter than they are now - average person that is. So if Longshanks were to come back today he may be called 'Ordinaryshanks'. But this is just supposition on my part.)

I touch ancient wall of castle, thinking maybe Longshanks has touched this same spot.  But he could not know that in a thousand years time, beautiful Swedish girl, called Anna will touch this spot and think of me. Is not history fascinating.

Anna