Year end busyness

Cloudy, windy, with cloudbursts again today. It's daunting, but I slept until after eight. I was just about to have breakfast when a phone diary notification reminded me that I'm due to take the nine o'clock Eucharist at St John's. I put that there a couple of months ago when the rota was being worked out as Fr Dyfrig had not yet been able to find someone to cover this, just in case. 

I wasn't sure whether he'd found someone or not, as I hadn't received confirmation that he needed to take me at my word. I checked with Andrew who was already in church trying to fix a glitch in the central heating and he said I was expected, so I dressed quickly and drove to St John's, as it was pouring with rain. There were seventeen of us for the Eucharist. We had a drink together afterwards, and there was toast for anyone who fancied a bit to eat afterwards.

Then I drove to St German's in good time for the eleven o'clock Sung Mass, where there were three dozen of us, and where the central heating also was not working! There were no refreshments afterwards, so I was home for lunch before one, which is unusual for me these days. There wasn't time for a snooze as I was to be picked up at half past three for a Carol service at St Peter's. There were a dozen of us for this and everyone sang heartily. It was less intense, more relaxed than the usual pre-Christmas carol services. We shared mince pies and wine and laughter together in the church hall afterwards. 

I wasn't nearly as drained as I expected to be after a three service Sunday. It's a long time since I've done that. After supper I spent the evening working on the document I've been writing for the Ministry Area Council to support them in calling into question financial demands by the diocese. A day of nasty weather stopped me from going out straight after lunch, so I went out just after ten instead and walked up and down Llandaff Fields, buffeted by gusts of wind, but thankfully no rail. The clouds were clearing and I saw Orion clearly, and clouds no longer obscuring the waning moon. I saw two people out there in three quarters of an hour, although car horns announced revelry in progress some distance away.

It's been a difficult year in many ways with a government unfit for purpose, striving perpetuate the illusion that its dogma has done the country significant long term good. A recent poll showed that the vast majority of Brits have come to the conclusion that brexit has not done the good it promised the country. No poll yet with people admitting they were lied to and accepted that a con-trick was pulled on them. Brits are a creative people with great strengths and great ability to live and work together with their differences, but perhaps still over-tolerant of the huge disparity between rich and powerful, and the deprived poor. It's time for the radical change that will do justice to all citizens, and give true value to the many qualities King Charles affirms in his addresses to the nation.

Support for Ukraine nationally at many levels this past couple of years has shown due regard for the very seriousness of the threat Putin's regime poses to the whole of Europe and the world. It's no nearly so clear when in comes to the situation in Palestine. Getting rid of Hamas governance is a reasonable aim, but the means are so destructive, the death of twenty thousand civilians can not be justified as collateral damage, or failure to follow instructions from invading aggressors. Netanyahu's people and Putin's rely on the same deceptive rhetoric to murder the innocent. 

Festive fireworks have started. The countdown to more uncertainty injustice and misery is upon us. Will 2024 turn out to be any different? God help us all.

View from a far off tower block

Waking up to more of the same weather, overcast, windy and showers. Pancakes for breakfast with grated apply for breakfast, as unusually we'd forgotten to buy bananas yesterday. Photos from Kath and Anto in a Singapore tower block hotel where they're spending New Year, I think, before flying on to Australia. I dare say they'll have a great view of any firework displays, but a forest of high-rise buildings isn't a place I'd be keen to celebrate anything.

After breakfast I finished and printed off tomorrow's sermon, then went to the Co-op to buy a heavy load of groceries while Clare cooked lunch. Afterwards I started looking at some of the published findings of the 2021 census figures for West Cardiff. A lot to take in and reflect upon in one go, so after a while I went for a walk in the drizzle. I returned before sunset, but low cloud made it seem like the sun had already set.

After supper, I completed and uploaded next week's Morning Prayer video, and then put together a paper with some observations and questions to inform the discussion the Ministry Area Council needs to have with the diocesan head of finance. There was nothing I wanted to watch on telly. Then it was time for bed.

City lights upgrade

It was past nine when I woke up this morning, having dozed off again after listening to 'Thought for the Day'. It looked as if it would be a brighter day, but wind from the west blew in more rain clouds, giving us light showers and a beautiful rainbow at midday. After breakfast I edited the sound files from last night. I found it hard to relax into sleep after making a recording late in the day. I must resist the temptation to do this again, and wind down earlier for improved sleep.

We took in a parcel for Sarah who lives next door. Shortly after the postman arrived, she sent a message to ask if we would take it in, as she's got covid. Last month, her next door neighbour got covid. Neither of them move in the same circles socially as far as we know, and as older people it's likely both have had the necessary jabs. The virus is not so life threatening now, but it's still in circulation, and people my well be more prone to pick it up as individual levels of taking precaution have waned as time passes. The evening news reported 3,600 people currently in hospital with covid in contrast to over 9,000 this time last year.

We had a snack lunch, planning to go out to eat this evening, but having booked a table at Stefano's Clare unaccountably lost her appetite. We went for a walk, to see the new generation of snowdrops bursting into flower, then Clare headed for home and cancelled the table. I continued walking until sunset, then caught a bus into town, to see how busy it would be now the sales have started. 

By this time of day, it wasn't so crowded however, as people were already heading for home, and the influx of night time consumers wasn't yet under way. The Christmas illuminations in St Mary Street have been given a colourful upgrade, with animated banners bearing bilingual Christmas greetings, and the St David's Centre decoration have also been given a makeover. Nothing worth buying in the sales yet.

I caught the bus home as it was drizzling, and cooked lentils with quinoa for supper, as that was what Clare fancied. I started work on Sunday's sermon and for a change I adapted and edited one preached in Montreux six years ago. How time flies! That was a wonderful locum.

Then we watched the 2017 version of 'Murder on the Orient Express' with a star studded cast, all of whom had minimal roles showcasing Kenneth Branagh as Poirot. The interior settings portrayed the train with period piece accuracy, but all the winter landscape settings were constructed with CGI animation making it look more like a computer game than a movie drama. The whole thing was slow moving and wooden. A waste of two hours viewing time.

Next year's snowdrops already

The huge storm front which has brought so much extra rain from the west this past few days has blown over during the night. I woke up at half past seven to an overcast sky with the prospect of occasional showers. It's surprisingly mild for late December at 12C, symptomatic of climate change.  After posting a link on Whats app to today's Morning Prayer video on YouTube, Listened to Thought for the Day, then fell asleep again for another three quarters of an hour.

After breakfast I went to St John's for the Mass of Holy Innocents' Day. There were four of us with Fr Dyfrig. He told us that he'd been asked to take a Welsh language Eucharist at the Cathedral, but had been double booked which relieved him of an extra duty. 

It seems a little chaos creeps into arrangements rather easily the more means of communication are available. SMS, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, email, plus voice messages and live calls, which are less popular. Some senders may want to be sure of a message getting through and send it out on every channel they can think of. The problem is that with several possibilities of receiving a response, and the reality that recipients reply to messages at different paces, a response may be missed, as sender and recipients may have different expectations. We've created a new problem, now that we rely less on simply speaking to each other.

I cooked lunch, and fell asleep in the chair afterwards. As the pressure has eased after a demanding Advent and Christmas, I seem to need even more sleep, as I might do when I'm on holiday. Hopefully it's doing me good. I walked to Blackweir to check the water level. It was about fifteen inches lower than last night, though still higher than normal. On my way to the river past the stables, I spotted the first snowdrops and a crocus with a full sized flower about to open in the grass verge at a place where the first come out each year. Something about the ground in that spot seems to encourage early growth. 

I checked my photos from January this year, taken on first sighting, and realised this winter's flowering comes a week earlier. My phone's weather app says today's air temperature is four degrees higher than the average over previous years. It's been violently stormy all over the country lately with snow in Scotland,, but there have only been strong gusts of wind here this past few days.

Before supper I started a batch of dough, and left it to raise. When we'd eaten, I prepared the text for next week's Morning Prayer and Reflection ready to record, then knocked the dough back and put it into baking tins for leavening before baking. I joined Clare watching a delightful documentary about the Coronation while the oven heated up. By the time the bread was baked, Clare was on her way to bed. Once the house became quiet, I took the opportunity to record next week's Morning Prayer and Reflection, ready to edit tomorrow, and then turned in for the night.

  

Catch-up and digital housekeeping

More torrential rain and flood warnings greeting us when we woke up this morning. After breakfast Kath Anto and Rhiannon got ready to drive to Kenilworth in horrible condition. I took my leave for them and headed for St Catherine's during a pause in the rain, pick up my prescription from the surgery and take it to the pharmacy across the road, before opening up the church to celebrate the St John's Day Mass with five others. 

Owain stayed on to have lunch before returning to Bristol. I drove him to the station to save him getting soaked, and fortunately it stopped raining just as we arrived at the Wood Street back entrance. He was even luckier to walk straight on to a train for Bristol, with his rucksack and two bags-for-life full of pressies and a share of leftover feast food. By half past three the travellers were home safe. For Rhiannon, there's work this evening as an ice rink steward in Coventry. In Kath and Anto's case, preparation for their departure to Melbourne tomorrow. Owain has to arrange transport for a take-away fifty quid sofa in the next few days before he has to start work again. It was a lovely few days together, involving much effort on all sides, we're all rather tired, but it was worth the effort.

I waited for a pause in the rain, then walked to Blackweir as the sun was going down to find out what impact the last few days of rain had made on the Taff. For the first time since last January. For the first time the river was just overflowing on to the footpath. The weir outflow spewed three metres into the air, a good half metre more than I've seen it all year. Those severe weather flood warning weren't exaggerating.

While we ate turkey soup for supper when I returned, we listened to four episodes of 'The Archers', as we have missed them during our family festivities. Then I spent an hour or so tidying up my phone file system, and archiving albums to a hard drive from by Google Photos accounts, to clear on-line space for whatever new pictures I may take next year and store on my free Google account space. I'd rather not pay for extra storage when I can find a safe haven for years worth of pictures on my own devices. 

Clare gave me a two terabyte hard drive for Christmas. I could probably get all the photos I've ever taken on to this, but I already have several other storage devices, not yet full, containing in a random fashion the twenty two years worth of digital photos I've taken, plus another thirty years worth of digitised photos scanned from film negatives. That's a job not yet finished. I have acquired from Anto an old Windows 7 laptop which should work with my film scanner. It will take up less space than what I use at the moment, a fourteen years of Windows Vista PC to drive my equally ancient film scanner. Here's hoping anyway.

When I'd finished my digital tidy-up, I joined Clare watching a fascinating nature documentary about the remarkable properties of mosses, which are able to grow and adapt to existing in all kinds of hostile environments. They're amazingly resilient and may have been among the first kinds of living organism along with plankton, to colonise new environments and help lay the foundation for the rest of life on earth. Then I watched a re-run of an episode of nineties comedy show satirising the Asian expat way of life in the UK, 'Goodness Gracious Me'. I don't really recall watching this when it was on originally. It had some funny moments, but on the whole I found it crude, lacking subtlety, over-reliant on stereotypes portraying Asian culture. Mind you, this seems to characterise a great deal of what passes for comedy broadcasts today. 

Boxing day tiredness

We slept in late this morning and breakfasted slowly. Owain and I went for a walk in the park, ending up at Coffee #1, where Clare Anto and Rhiannon were meeting school friends Emma and Mandy with both their mothers. I stopped and chatted for a while over coffee and then returned home for a snack lunch of turkey leftovers. The girls walked into town to see the Christmas illuminations, then returned for tea and delicious Christmas cake made by Kath. 

Then Owain, Anto and I walked down to Blackweir before the sun set, and returned in time for a supper, of salmon and cold turkey rounded off by singing 'The Twelve Days of Christmas' together, struggling to remember all the verses and needing to resort to the internet for prompts. Kath and Anto talked about their Australian trip which starts in a couple of days time. After a couple of family festive days, that's where their attention is focused now, with a couple of reunions with friends lined up in Oz and south east Asian stopovers in Singapore and Dubai lined up coming and going. 

We watched a ridiculous cartoon fantasy sequel to the Aardman comedy 'Chicken Run', called 'Dawn of the Nugget' after supper. An over long satirical take on the fast food industry, then a Blackadder Christmas special, featuring Rowan Atkinson and a host of celebrity entertainers, in a rather unpleasant satire on the dickensian 'Christmas Carol' story. Neither of these movies were would be my entertainment choice, but I wasn't that interested in watching telly. I think we were all relaxing and starting to feel that tiredness that seeps out when you're no longer running to a work or travel schedule. Interesting to hear on the news that John Lewis and M&S haven't opened for Boxing Day sales, preferring to give their staff time off. 

There's no sign of the Israeli military relaxing the pressure on Gaza however, A hundred air strikes today and heaven knows how many more deaths. Bethlehem and other holy places in Jerusalem and the West Bank shut to visitors, but it didn't stop the inhabitants turning up for Midnight Mass. The Roman Catholic church of St Catherine is reported to have welcomed five thousand worshippers of all religious traditions, some are said to have travelled from other parts of the West Bank, braving the check points and security cordons for a common act of witness to what really matters to them all, unity in peace and dignity as God's people in the very place God's Son arrived to dwell among us.

Family fiesta

Just over fifty came to Midnight Mass. As I was getting ready to celebrate, I discovered that the readings selected for the service were actually the ones I'd published on Sway for Christmas Morning, altogether different in theme and ethos. Just as well, I had tomorrow's sermon in my bag as well as the one I expected to preach tonight. It was half past twelve when I left church and five past one when I climbed into bed.

Up at eight, and going straight to my workstation to work on adapting last night's unused sermon to preach this morning, the breakfasting with Owain and Clare before setting off for St Catherine's to celebrate with two dozen worshippers, and a couple of noisy young children to remind us of what Christmas is all about.

It's not the traditionally packed church with as many participants as spectators for both Christmas services. Covid broke the popular spell. The unmerciful assault on Gaza has left a sour taste in festive sentiment for many people of good will. Decline in habitual regular churchgoing is making the cultural and social life of local community based parish churches and ministry unsustainable. Shortage of clergy is only a part of the equation. Without lay leaders and workers to inspire and engage the wider constituency the building soon ceases to be relevant, an asset becomes a liability. It happened to the majority of non-conformist churches in the second half of the 20th century, and now it's happening to Anglican parishes. I don't think I have any insight into how reverse the decline I feel I've been fighting throughout my ministry.

Owain and Clare came to the ten thirty service this morning, having started the turkey cooking and getting the veggies and pudding ready beforehand. At two we sat down to dinner with chestnut casserole as well as turkey and a selection of excellent Rhone valley red wines. We paused for present opening before going on to the Christmas pudding and cheeses. Then I slept sweetly for over an hour, waking up just as a movie on Netflix was starting called 'Nativity' an extended fantasy musical comedy about primary schools vying with each other to produce the best possible nativity play with their children. It appeared in 2009, but I'd never heard of it until a showing of it was arranged in St John's Church a week ago. It was hilarious and it made impressive use of a large cast of children in the seven to nine age range. After this we watched the King's speech, which was impressive in its inclusiveness and unashamed affirmation of communities of faith and public service.

Then it was time for a walk through silentt empty streets in the dark to get some fresh air before bed, Kath and Owain, Clare and I, to round off a traditional family fiesta in a way we like to celebrate.

A housefull

I was awake at seven, and making breakfast by a quarter to eight, to be sure I was ready to leave for St Peter's by nine. Owain, Clare and I had breakfast together. The others hadn't surfaced yet, and not so surprising, considering how hard they've been working. Kath and Anto collected Rhiannon from work. She's been working as a Christmas Elf in Santa's grotto at Hatton County Park for the last month.

The rain was unremitting. I was impressed that we were a congregation of thirty adults and around ten children on such a wet morning. Each week of Advent, the Sunday School presented colourful nativity images in windows made of tissue paper with cut out figures of the Holy Family in relief. These were mounted in the windows on each side of the nave. Despite the dull weather the images added colour and cheer to a dull day. I hope the display will stay up for all forty days of Christmastide. I suggested they be videod for YouTube, so house bound parishioners and far off family members can see them.

I was back home by eleven. Owain and Clare were in the throes of preparing the turkey for tomorrow. I contributed with a stuffing of sausage meat, walnut and apple stuffing. Owain then went into town for last minute shopping, while Clare and I had a snack lunch. Later I cooked a pasta sauce ready for supper once the Kenilworth crew arrive. It was good to slow down and start to relax and doze awhile, conscious of the need to conserve energy for tonight's late service at St Catherine's.

Kath, Anto and Rhiannon arrived at half past six, and we sat down to a pasta supper and began the joyous process of catch-up. It's been an eventful year for all out us, so there's lots to tell.  It was great to listen to Rhiannon talk about her 'ministry' to kinds as an Elf. Everyone's here who's coming, but we're al missing Rachel and Jasmine in Arizona, though we did get to have a long video call with her after supper.

At half past ten, I slipped away to church to get ready early for Midnight Mass

Ready for the feast

I was awake at seven and found a message pointing out an error in the advertised timing of one of the services on Sway. I got up straight away to correct this, and rather than return to bed, I carried on working on next Thursday's Morning Prayer for uploading to YouTube while Clare cooked waffles for breakfast. I finished the job afterwards, and then went into town to collect the filleted salmon she ordered by phone yesterday. Walk down Romilly Crescent I car passed me by with 'Feliz Navidad' playing loudly on the car stereo - a reminder of the presence of so many Spanish ex-pats in our neighbourhood.

Ashton's the venerable fishmonger's stall in Cardiff Market was surrounded by customers of many nations buying their Christmas specials. On one side of the stall were several dozen bags of fish and game orders awaiting collection. It was a pleasure to wait, as people were chatty and in a good mood. You never have to wait very long as there are so many staff behind the counter, well organised, working efficiently. It's a little seasonal treat I really enjoy, that ten minutes at the fish counter, remembering standing there with my Dad seventy years ago, while he ate a dish of Penclawdd cockles.

I caught a bus which dropped me in Cowbridge Road East, also known as Canton High Street, as it still has a good assortment of small shops. The Codfather, a fish and chip shop which suffered a fire nineteen months ago, has now reopened, and there's a new supermarket which isn't part of one of the major chains. It may be middle eastern or eastern European, I didn't have time to stop and check it out. I went straight to Mr Berry's the butcher, to collect our small turkey, some streaky bacon and sausage meat for stuffing. The fish and the turkey between them cost nearly a hundred pounds. Very much a sign of the times.

When I got back I checked my sermons and printed off all three, so that I don't have to think about this at the last minute. This should help me to relax as I face an intense twenty for hours of leading worship and preaching, and hopefully not be too exhausted to enjoy the fast approaching fiesta.

After a snack lunch, I slept in the chair for over an hour, catching up on what I missed earlier. I then had the energy to hoover the carpets and wash the floors, while Clare went out shopping, so the house looks welcoming when the family arrives.

I've been thinking a lot about Gaza this past few days, with the death toll past twenty thousand now, and two third of them women and children. Hospitals are no longer able to operate and women in danger of dying because there is no longer the means for them to be delivered by caesarian section. Despite rising desperation anger at the situation in countries sympathetic to Israel, and persistent efforts to get urgent aid into the Gaza Strip, through northern and southern border crossings, there is no movement. 

Talks about a pause in hostilities and release of hostages are still unfruitful, and pockets of fierce fighting continue producing even more casualties. Houthi rebels in Yemen, armed by Iran are shutting down the Red Sea to shipping traffic, which is now re-routing via South Africa, adding huge delays and expense that will soon be reflected in the cost of commodities internationally. None of the heavily armed nations want to intervene in a way that will draw Iran into the conflict, or the Iranian backed militia in Lebanon but the more the Israelis persist the greater the risk of escalation becomes. It's going to be an unquiet Christmas throughout the MIddle East, as well as in Ukraine.

I went for a walk in the drizzle as the sun was setting. Occasional strong gusts of wind made it hard to control the brolly, so I gave up, and only got slightly damp in the end. 

Owain arrived at eight and we sat and drank a bottle of Swiss Gamay which he bought last year and kept until now. It was still healthy and good to taste. I headed for bed early, with an early start to Christmas Eve at St Peter's in the morning.

Struggling for words

Another variable day of clouds sunshine drizzle and gusty winds, but not that cold. After breakfast a welcome email from Pete with some entry points for gathering data about the constituent parts of our ministry area. I'll have time to study thus in the post Christmas calm period.

After breakfast a trip to the surgery to get my medication prescription renewed. I was told it would be ready this afternoon, as the surgery is closed until next Wednesday, but then I was so busy trying to finish my remaining tasks that I forgot to go and collect it. At least I know that I have enough medication left to see me through until the end of next week. I went to the butchers to confirm my turkey order that I'll collect tomorrow, then did some last minute food shopping, before returning to do some audio editing and then cook lunch. 

I had trouble finishing my three sermons for this weekend. I realised the impact of the war on Gaza was affecting me, as did the siege of Sarajevo in the nineties, a time when I found it painfully hard to preach meaningfully, and felt like I was clinging for dear life to the remnants of broken ideals and aspirations for Europe's future after the fall of the Berlin Wall. I've never been able to separate my understanding of current events from my inner life of faith. Brexit was bad enough, but here I am again, thirty years later, struggling again, outraged at the violent defilement of the Holy Land by godless forces, figuring out what I can honestly say that has meaning, close to tears.

Having finished one sermon, I went out for a walk, and then continued writing and finished a second until it was time to go to a party held by Hilary and Clive. It was lovely to meet their friends and neighbours, and chat with some of them while sipping an assortment of interesting wines. Then back home to try and finish the third sermon before bed. All clear for errand running tomorrow and getting ready to welcome the family on Sunday.

Flat out

On this the shortest day, I woke up at seven and posted the Morning Prayer YouTube link to WhatsApp then dozed for an hour before getting up. There was time before going out to prepare next week's Morning Prayer and reflection ready to record. Then I went to the Eucharist at St John's. There were seven of us. Father Colin celebrated. Pearlin joined us as she wasn't working today. 

Earlier in the week she was asking for prayers for her elderly mother in South India. She home is in a region which had been experiencing terrible rain storms and the family home has been flooded, and for two days there were no telecoms. This was particularly difficult, not just because of concern for mother's welfare, but because Pearlin is able to organise support for her through a network of friends and relations her mother may not be able to reach, given that breaches in communication networks can be piecemeal and localised. Well, we have the same problems here from time to time, don't we?

Before going home to get the car and take Communion to Sandra at home in Danescourt, I called at Diana and Peter's to ask his help in obtaining localised socio-economic data to assist the Ministry Area Council in questioning the financial demands being made by the diocese. It's nice to know someone who knows how to navigate their way through specialised academic research studies. He was saying how important it is to ask the right questions in order to get the information you need about the economic strengths and weaknesses of particular communities. Then, interestingly he said that to get a general impression of a community's ability to be generous, it would be look at Christian Aid Week donation income on a street by street basis, as collectors often observe how poorer communities tended to be more generous, but richer communities cannot be relied on to pay their way.

After lunch I took Communion to Ray at home. I made a mistake noting down his address, the difference between Saint David and Sir David rendering Google useless. Thankfully I had his phone number, and was only a few minutes late reaching his flat. I was delighted to learn that he was born in Adamsdown and was a choirboy in St John's City Parish Church for eight years. Amazing to think that he was drafted into the RAF in the year I was born, and served in India for nearly two years, just like our much missed friend Russell.

When I got home, I did this week's Sway distribution with Mailchimp, then devised a carol service for St Peter's on New Year's Eve. The little Christmas tree in a pot which Clare had delivered, I installed in the front rom, and Clare decorated it, just with white candles, nice and simple, looks good.

Then I went to Tesco's to get some wine for the Chestnut Casserole, which has equal status with turkey on our Christmas dinner table. After supper, the only thing left on my to-do list in need of urgent attention is the three different sermons I need to prepare for this long weekend, so I made a start and completed the one for Midnight Mass. Then I went out for a short walk in the drizzle to get some fresh damp air, and recorded next week's Morning Prayer before turning in for the night, I've got quite a lot done today.

Interrogating financial demand

I was late to bed last night but awake for 'Thought for the Day' and up for breakfast in time to leave to go to St Peter's on the 61 bus in good time for the 10.15 Eucharist. I didn't stay for coffee after the service but took the bus back to Canton with Kate one of the two Ministry Area Wardens for a meeting to which I had been invited about an unexpected increase in financial demand from the Diocese, considered unsustainable by Ministry Area churches. 

The impression all have received is that there's no fact based understanding of the economic capacity for generosity on the part of church members and the wider community in which the six churches of the Ministry Area are set. The question is how best to respond to this? We mulled this over for an hours and a half before having lunch together, and agreeing a tentative next step. What really needed is a way to raise questions about the assumptions made by those who manage diocesan finances. Are their decisions correctly informed? 

As ever, the real issue is a gulf between institutional church bureaucracy and grass roots communities of worshippers which seem unbridgeable unless such difficult questions are faced. Reforms in the way churches in the same geographical area work with each other, introduced by Bishop June, the previous diocesan bishop haven't yet succeeded in their intention, as they were dictated to parishes with no meaningful dialogue about the prospects of getting them to work. 

Admittedly covid damaged regular support for the churches. Recovery is still a work in progress and decline continues unremittingly. Judgement about how to cope with the situation, viewed from the top down or the bottom up, isn't going to be objective. We're far from having objectively informed dialogue between diocesan authorities and church congregations about how it's  possible to navigate through the present economic crisis. 

These thoughts plagued me after the meeting. I went straight into town to bank a cheque in the newly refurbished central HSBC branch, which has finally replaced all its automatic banking tills. It's now possible to pay in cash or cheques and withdraw money from the same machine. Clever little thing.

I had an idea of a Christmas present to buy for Clare, but I had to hunt for stores that would provide for me what I wanted.  I was delighted to have succeeded after trekking all over the city centre.

St Catherine's Nine Lessons and Carols took place this evening, and I joined a congregation of about a hundred and twenty for the hour and a quarter service, rather over-long to my mind, as there was a mini nativity scene and crib blessing in the middle, plus a liturgical 'dance of the angels', which was lovely and an uplifting contrast to all those words and music. I have to plan a carol service for St Peter's on New Year's Eve. Tonight's service has informed my thinking about how much time is 'enough' for an evening service with hospitality to follow. 

If I remember aright, this year's carol service congregation was bigger by two or three dozen compared to last year, suggesting to me that covide fears may be lifting and influencing casual, as opposed to regular church attendances. To my mind, this is significant, in an era where people aren't driven by obligation, as they were in times past, but by interest or curiosity. But, we'll see, long term.

During the service, still chewing over the problems presented by today's meeting, it occurred to me that what was needed was an independent fact checking process to examine the reality of the demand being made by the diocese that people in the Ministry Area contribute 25% more than they expected to, and at short notice. I have an idea about how fact checking may be possible, but that's for tomorrow.

More tech' achievements

Whenever I stay at my sisters place I have a good night's sleep. Her spare bed is more confortable than mine at home. There was more work to do after breakfast on getting the mobile hone settings as easy to use and distraction free as possible, and more practice at using it.

Getting used to the phone camera was also necessary as it looked different. I had to transfer 211 pictures from her old phone to Google Photos, so she can access them on the new phone. The old phone back up wasn't activated. I had to make sure the new phone back up is switched on to avoid grief in future.

June wanted a Pavarotti aria ring tone, so I had to find a recording I could edit and cut to produce a short piece and deploy it for this purpose. I think I made it a bit too long, as it was rather tempting to listen and enjoy it and forget to answer the call!

I met Charlie, her young neighbour who hails from Pontcanna as he brought up some mail for her. A delightful young man. 

Thanks to June's Jamaican friend Elaine, I enjoyed a dish of Curried Goat with cous cous for lunch, and a slice of black Christmas cake to follow. I gourmet trip down memory lane. A warm winter . reminder of days in St Paul's Area Bristol.

There was one last piece of trouble shoting to do regarding passwords. Having decided to make some changes, the problem had arisen with them not being lodged in the Chrome password manager. I started to make changes manually checking them one at a time,  but this was tricky and taxing on concentration. Digging down into the settings I found a crucial automatic prompt for saving a password was switched off. I didn't even know this existed until I discovered it. All will be well from now on with this.

Mid afternoon an Amazon envelope was  dropped off carelessly in the front lobby, rather than delivered to the proper address, but I retrieved it on my way out for a walk. It was a bright red cover for the new phone, easy to spot wherever deposited.

We parted company at a quarter to five and I was forty minutes early for my coach home. The coach arrived seven minutes early, a sign that traffic out of London was flowing freely. 20mph speed limits, whether observed or broken don't seem to add to congestion. Same here too. I walked how along the Taff footpath the Blackweir for the exercise. It was so beautifully calm and quiet in the dark. And it didn't rain. 

Altogether a worthwhile couple of days. I shall sleep well tonight.

London Bound

I woke up in good time for breakfast and get ready for a coach at ten forty five. But first, it was necessary to mail out the four sets of liturgical readings for the coming week, my essential Monday morning task. I walked part of the way to the coach station and caught a bus for the rest, to ensure I got there in good time.

The bus was almost full, and a man took the seat next to me who was perhaps ten years younger than I, a retired engineer who had worked all around the world. We chatted throughout the jouney. Although I didn't disclose I'm a priest, he was keen to talk about spirituality, and in particular the monastic life, as he had often spent time staying in monasteries in the USA where he made his home when his children was young. In adult life they have all moved to the UK, and now he's considering resettling here, and in the process of deciding where. An unusually enjoyable trip.

I reached my sister's place at three and set about troubleshooting her telly, and then setting up her new mobile phone and teaching her how to use it. Then a shopping trip to Sainsbury's, and a walk around the Common to get some fresh air before turning in for the night, quite tired.

Abba yn y Gymraeg

Another cold grey day with no rain. When I was getting up Sunday Worship was being broadcast from the Church of God of Prophecy in Ackocks Greet Birmingham, with Homelessness as its theme. Inner city Birmingham was where I first came across Black Pentecostal churches, when I was a University Chaplain fifty years ago and then again in St Paul's Bristol a few years later. Hearing singing and distinctive down to earth approach to taking about Christian ministry brought back happy memories.

I drove to St German's to celebrate the Eucharist with three dozen others. I was introduced to a family whose two teenage sons are going to be baptized next Sunday. This offers a marvellous opportunity for Basma to witness a baptismal service for herself. She is keen to be baptised but has yet to reach the stage where it's necessary to explain to her all the detail of the ceremony. She's at an early stage of preparation. 

Hilary had acquired a Good News bible for her in English to match the Arabic one we presented to her two weeks ago. She brought it to the altar at the offertory, and stood with Basma as I gave it to her  when they came up to the Communion rail. She was full of questions after the service about what happens during a service. She'll have even more questions when I see her again at church in two weeks time. I was late home for lunch again. Clare is so patient and long suffering with me.

After eating I walked in the park for an hour and a half, and bumped into Fr Andrew on his way to an open air party in Plasturton Gardens with friends. As I was about to turn for home, I accompanied him, and was glad to have done so. There was quite a crowd in the small park, decorated with lights and with tents service refreshments. A choir of children from a Welsh language primary school was singing, all dressed brightly and wearing Santa style hats. They weren't singing carols at the moment I passed, but familiar songs by Abba in Welsh translation. Amazing!

Kate came and collected Jayne and myself from the Romilly Road bus stop to drive us to St Peter's for Evensong and Benediction. I was back home again before seven for supper. We watched this week's 'Antiques Roadshow' and then a portion of Welsh black comedy series 'Pren ar y Bryn' half in Welsh and half in English, very sweary and a bit coarse, which does little to sustain interest in a bizarre plot line. In the end I gave up and continued with emailing Christmas greetings to people in local churches I've been serving this past year. And there was my bag to pack for my visit to London tomorrow. And then bed.

Phone for June

Another cold and cloudy days, but without rain thankfully. I benefited from getting to bed just a bit earlier and slept well, so I got up before Clare did, which is unusual for me. It meant I could start the breakfast by cooking our Saturday pancakes for a change. It's ages since I last did this, and was pleased with the result.  It was the first time I used a smaller frying pan rather than the big standard sized one, and found it much easier to cook with. No burnt or broken pancakes! Savoury as well as sweet pancakes is what we do these days. It's good to have the variety. 

Clare made jam using dried apricots yesterday. Unfortunately the jam stuck to the bottom of the pan and carbonised. It seemed like the jam would taste terribly burned, but the apricot flavours came through with a slightly caramelised sweetness, pleasant and hard to reproduce. She found a new remedy for burned pans on-line, using boiling water with sodium bicarbonate added to it. The jam jar labels read 'Burnt Apricot', written before we discovered the surprise flavour.

After breakfast, following up on a request from Ruth to take Communion to housebound nonagenarian Ray I phoned him and made an arrangement for a visit next Thursday, after I take Communion to Sandra. Then I went to Iceland opposite Canton Library to buy packets of Brace's Welsh Cakes to take to my sister June on Monday as these were a success last time I took them.  Then I improvised a veggie pasta sauce, by frying together a leek, a parsnip, a chunk of cabbage, some sunflower seeds, with herbs spices and garlic. I never combined these three like that before and was pleased with final flavour. A day of two culinary successes. Good for morale.

After lunch I made an effort to prepare the four sets of reading that are required for next weekend with Advent 4 falling on Christmas Eve. Now they're all ready to email to the usual recipients on Monday. I have services morning and evening tomorrow. It eases the pressure of the 'to-do' list. Then I went over to the big Tesco's on Western Avenue where there's a phone shop, to buy one for my sister. I wanted to get her a Motorola phone, though not necessarily as powerful or expensive as mine unless the price was right. Her needs are less varied than mine. The key issue is battery life. She uses my old Samsung 2016 model. Even with a replacement battery it doesn't hold its charge well. Battery life and quality has improved greatly over the past seven years. The Samsung has at least introduced her to the workings of a smartphone, and Motorola ones don't have nearly as many added Samsung apps that few bother to use getting in the way and confusing things. 

The Moto e13 I bought for her was £89, including a PAYG SIM card and a ten quid top-up voucher to boost her phone credit. It's a clean and simple version of Android on a phone which came to market in the UK about nine months ago. It has the same amount of memory as my Moto G22, but a less powerful processor, which won't make that much difference to her. And the screen will be bright and sharp for old eyes, and the sound a lot better. I'll keep the SIM card, in case it comes in handy in an emergency. I still have my Blackberry to use at home with wi-fi on occasions when having two mobile devices is handy. Before walking back, I went to the Aldi store nearby, and bought a couple of bottles of wine for Christmas. All their really fancy bargain buys had sold out.

It was quite dark by the time I reached home, and the park was almost deserted. Clare was holding a study session meeting in the lounge when I arrived, so I pottered around in the kitchen. Then we had a surprise visit from Fr Stewart with thank you Christmas gifts a Rioja for me and a poinsettia for Clare. How very kind!

Earlier I had intended to go to the coach station and buy a ticket for a trip to London Monday - Tuesday, but ran out of time, so I booked on-line instead. The National Express user interface has improved and seems to work faster than it did a year ago. Still easier for me on a laptop than on the phone. I never feel I have as much control over a small touchscreen. Or the big one on my Chromebook come to think of it. Coach takes twice as long, but is a third of the price, and does away with the underground section of the journey, as Victoria Coach station is just a ten minute walk from the train station. No need to queue for a ticket now that tap and pay is available for travel to Wandsworth Common. The train is great if available time is constrained. The coach station is a fifteen minute walk from home instead of thirty five to the train station. It's good to have such convenient options when planning a trip.

Clare asked me to accompany her to King's Yard near St Catherine's church where Pipes Craft Brewery and The Wardrobe Coffee House occupy areas of an old industrial space, which houses craft markets and assorted social and musical events in a warehouse space on the site which has been renamed 'The Yardbird'. It's a venue where her jazz piano teacher George McDonald is expecting to perform in a few months time. She wanted to confirm this with the guy who runs jazz events there, but we didn't leave until nine, so she could meet local drummer Finn who manages Jazz events, to check if George's group is scheduled. A gig was just finishing when we arrived, and I had to hang around while she hunted him down and chatted, and we were back by ten.

Kings Yard is very much a work in progress, scruffy exterior, with piecemeal adaptation and renovation of spaces in use, and prodigious use of strings of white lights to cheer the place up. 'Derelict chic' might well describe it. The place is privately owned by a couple who bought it with the aim of making it a community venue. It's popular and well frequented by young adults with a sprinkling of bald or grey headed older people in the beer drinking crowd. 

Other other side of the street, a yard next to the Co-op and behind the row of houses has been converted into several retail units, with a gift shop, hairdresser, cafe snack bar. This looks a lot smarter catering for daytime clientele, whereas greater number frequent King's Yard by day and in the evening. When moved into Meadow Street fourteen years ago, the Co-op was still an antique furniture store using what had been Pontcanna's dairy and bottled milk distribution depot. The Co-op bought the site and then gentrification of the neighbourhood was destined to take off. The King's Road site was bought just a year earlier. A visionary initiative indeed.

I was glad to get home and start winding down, satisfied to have got everything done as intended for a change.

Celebrating Max at eighty

A cold cloudy start to the day, though the ski cleared later on. Astonishing reports of 30C temperatures on the Costa del Sol. Andalusia is stricken with drought, disastrous for agriculture, but especially so for the production of olive oil.

After breakfast I worked on my Sunday sermon, and archived a few previous issue of Sway. Considering we have fast broadband, I was surprised at how slow Sway was to load and function, using Chrome browser rather than the desktop applet I tried before and decided not to trust. I don't know what causes this unless it's simply a question of heavy morning internet traffic.

Clare has been trying for a while to gain access to her on-line French shareholder account, as the system looking after them got updated. Her mobile number wasn't on the site as this had never been required in the past. The new security system is very complex and difficult to negotiate. It presents itself in English but uses protocols unlike ours in the UK. Very strong anti-hacking measures in place, but punishing for new users. This morning she got into the system and made the necessary change, but needed me to be alongside her to check her navigation of the website. At fourth attempt over several weeks she succeeded.

I cooked lunch and afterwards took the UK Christmas cards to the Post Office. I was astonished to have to pay £2.20 each for the four European cards I was sending in addition. All our letters and parcels together cost £200 to send. On the way back I called in to the butcher and ordered a small turkey or turkey crown - depending on what's available, as our family celebrations this year will only be a couple of days, as Kath and Anto fly to Australia for a month's adventure they've been looking forward to for many years.

A walk in the park until teatime, then after we'd eaten, I prepared this year's digital Christmas card to go out by email with our newsletter. Sending out forty odd emails in small batches is a fiddly job, plus another couple of dozen via WhatsApp, (which is somewhat easier), I did while watching an interview with Max Boyce, on the occasion of his 80th birthday. It had video of him singing his all time favourites but most of it was conversation with Max in hilarious story telling mood, and recollections of his life in Glyn Neath, where he still lives. A treasure of a programme.

Christmas Newsletter mailshot time

Another cloudy day with occasional showers. I woke up at half past seven, posted the Morning Prayer YouTube link to WhatsApp, listened to Thought for the Day, and fell asleep again until ten to nine. It's getting to be a habit.

I went to the Eucharist at St John's. There were five of us with Meg who celebrated. I went to Tesco's afterwards to get our foodbank donation and then returned and had coffee before returning home. I had some last minute edits to make on Sway, then more material came in, so I was again late starting to cook lunch, but Sway was ready to send at two, the usual deadline. 

When I started Mailchimp, it asked me to verify my login with a pass code via SMS or email. The last time I had to do this was at the end of August. I have no access to the email account or the mobile phone the passcode is destined for, so I sent a message to Rachel who has admin rights over these accounts, and just had to wait for a response and an opportunity to agree a time when this info can be transmitted. Why it should happen now I have no idea.

I went for a walk in the park and returned at five to rendezvous with Rachel in order to get the Mailchimp security passcode from her. After gaining access to the account, the matter of updating the mailing list and sending out this week's Sway link was completed very quickly, much to my relief. Then I was free to work on assembling the annual letter and Christmas card to about forty people. Label printing first, then supper and later in the evening, an hour of envelope stuffing and stamp mounting. Clare had already sent another dozen with parcels and letters. 

Tomorrow I'll see to the digital mail-out of the letter and greetings to another forty recipients in distant places. This year's postage bill for parcels and letters was over seventy quid. It's not only inflation pushing up the cost, but the huge drop in ordinary postal traffic due to the rise in digital greeting cards and emails, driving up the sending price per unit because staff numbers and equipment required are much the same, whether the revenue from postage rises or falls.

When I look at today's mailing list compared to when I retired thirteen years ago, it's amazing to think how many former recipients, friends, family, acquaintances, colleagues have died, or are lost contact with for other reasons. The stream of life flows own. We go with it, but will eventually get left behind. It's fifty five years since I sent out copies of our newsletter while I was training in St Mike's, and have continued to do so ever since. Why bother? It's simple really. Telling our family story to any who might be interested in our life together is to my mind part of the bedrock of our identity. I wonder how many recipients down the years kept copies tucked away somewhere. I know I didn't, until I started using and storing things on a computer. back in the late 1980s. I've not yet trawled through my archives to see how many I can find. Perhaps one day I'll get around it. Right now it's time for bed,            

Gentification

It's strange how it's possible to wake up from what felt like a disturbed half-awake nights sleep, feeling groggy and realise that you've slept longer and better than usual, at least according to the sleep monitoring feature of my smart watch. I'm never sure how accurate it is. Sometimes it appears to fail to account for several hours of time in the small hours spent in bed in which I have no recollection of being away, or tossing and turning. Truth is that it's often a struggle to wake up fully and get going in the morning, and I lose a lot of daytime hours just getting started. I don't understand why.

I helps if I have to get going for an engagement outside home. This morning after breakfast, I was on duty celebrating the Eucharist at St Catherine's again. Bishop Rowan turned up, ready to celebrate just after I did. I think he'd not read his rota correctly. He's on duty next week! Four months into a double vacancy in full time ministers an element of chaos can creep into routine organisation. This morning a ministry rota in print in the sacristy informed me of a change in Christmas services I was unaware of. 

This meant that I had to make changes to information already published on-line later in the days. We don't meet to check out the details, we just presume everyone else is equally diligent in doing so. And we aren't. Always there's too much information. It's due to a church management culture which presumes bigger is better and that much more efficient. But, when a unit of organisation is enlarged so does its potential to harbour flaws. When will we ever learn that small is beautiful - when 'small' takes communication and connectedness seriously.

There were eight of us for the Eucharist. After coffee and chat, I collected the weekly veggie bag from Chapter Arts centre on my way home. Clare was already cooking tofu burgers for lunch when I arrived. After lunch, I took an assortment of parcels and letters prepared by Clare to the Post Office for mailing, and bought stamps for mailing out Christmas cards. The cost of this was eye-watering!

While I was in the queue inside the Post Office, I received a text message to say that my repaired jacked  was ready for collection. The tailor's shop is just around the corner from the Post Office, so I was able to collect on my way home. Pleased to have it back with new sleeve linings and be able to use it again. Then I went for a walk in the park, and discovered that the work on reshaping the carriageway  on Penhill Road is finally complete after six and a half months. The job seemed to be been completed two months ago, but traffic cones remained in place, and there was no sign of further work taking place. The cones must have disappeared early this morning, or yesterday. 

At the end of my walk, I saw a bus actually using the bus lane for the first time. The work on a 500 metre stretch of road is said to have cost a million pounds, to speed up the passage of buses leaving the city centre. All other traffic occupies one lane in each direction. It seems to flow more smoothly than it used to. Possibly the imposition of the 20mph speed limit and lane restrictions is an improvement on a situation in which congestion could be generated by cars and buses changing lanes to get through the lights at the top of the hill. The road feels much safer to use now than it used to now that it has better defined road markings.

The other thing that's happened over the past few days is that work has started on renovating the large Victorian house on the corner of Romilly Crescent opposite the Gospel Hall. It's been empty for several years. Last year a number of large trees near the end of life were felled on site, arousing local feelings. Fortunately the agreed Local Authority Planning application includes reinstatement of younger trees in the garden. Excavating machines were clearing space where the front garden had been, to allow vehicles to access the site when I was passing bay. 

One of the workers noticed that I'd stopped to look and came over to chat with me. The house exterior is to be restored to the way it was meant to be, The building was converted into apartments decades ago, and renovation is likely to continue this, if not redesign the layout, to accomodate more dwellings. Sussex House, on the opposite corner  of the junction underwent a major re-vamp a couple of years ago, sub-dividing a grand mansion into apartments, and restoring its facade. It looks good and the work just started will also improve the look of the neighbourhood when it is completed in a year or so from now.

I spent the evening getting started on an edition of Sway to cover the the first half of Christmas-tide, embracing two Sunday's worth of information, to give me a week's respite from production. I certainly need it! I keep recalling my father's advice: "Whatever you do steer clear of working in any production industry."  Now I know what he had to endure for forty years of his life in mining. Working at keeping people informed and understanding in an ever changing environment is  a production industry much like any other. Serves me right!

Unwelcome complexity

In the morning news, the Gaza death toll is approaching 19,000. Air bombardment and street fighting has continued without any remission. Little aid is getting through and there's no sign of a humanitarian pause any time soon. Violence in the West Bank territories is slowly escalating, and support for Hamas among young people is growing, although there's no love lost between the West Bank authority and Hamas rulers of Gaza. International organisations and governments are losing patience, given the colossal scale of destruction and abuse of the civilian population. The Netanyahu government believes the end justifies the means, and excuses so much suffering and death as collateral damage. The UN General Assembly voted unanimously in support of an immediate cease fire today, but nobody is in a position to force a halt in the fighting. It's just continued to worsen each day since the seven day humanitarian pause ended. Heartbreaking, This cannot end well.

I went to bed an hour late last night and paid for it this morning, as I couldn't lie in. With Clare expecting her study group members to arrive for a festive season session at ten, I had to eat breakfast and then make myself scarce for a couple of hours. I worked on next Sunday's sermon until her guests departed at midday and then cooked lunch. 

I was unsuccessful at dropping off to sleep afterwards, so went and the the week's grocery shopping at the Co-op, calling at 'Jalo & Stitch' the tailors shop on my way to collect my jacket following repair work on the sleeve lining. It wasn't ready to collect however as the shop had suffered a day's power cut yesterday, sowing chaos and delaying completion of work on many more garments than mine. Hopefully it'll be ready by Friday.

After taking the shopping home I went for a walk in the park and bumped into Jan and Peter walking their dogs. Jan had just survived three school carol services and was suffering from a heavy cold. Peter was suffering from a heavy data loss, having accidentally deleted years worth of files relating to books he's written or is working on, while in the process of deleting a batch of work files from decades ago. He'd also emptied the trash file on his computer. The fact that some of these were in an encrypted folder means that he's had to seek the services of a top level data recovery company, handing over his laptop and backup hard drive for them to work with for the next few weeks. I'm crossing my fingers for him. I've been rather obsessive about data security for many years, relying not on handy Cloud storage but the principle of multiple redundancy, keeping backups of my data on several hard drives, memory cards and pen drives. 

When I returned from walking, Clare was about to leave for her meditation group. She told me that I'd printed off the unedited version of our Christmas newsletter, and she'd sent over half a dozen of them out by post already before noticing. A very distressing error on my part, not realising the file I'd used was the wrong one. I reformatted Clare's edited version to fit on one page using my laptop, but must have got distracted and failed to transfer it to a place where I could find it on my workstation with printer attached. I started to reprint her edited version without noticing it wasn't the one I'd reformatted, so the letter was reproduced on one page and the signature on another. I had to stop the print run, find the correctly formatted version, make it into a pdf file and start the print run again. What a waste of paper!

At this point the pdf was opened using Microsoft Edge by default. I've been using Google Chrome since it first come out in 2008, escaping from Internet Explorer, and more recently configuring my Windows computers to avoid using Edge as default browser. Like Chrome, it contains a pdf reader. Whichever browser you use to display a pdf will show up the file with the browser's logo. Annoying and confusing, if you have several shortcuts on your pointing a browser to a frequently used site, rather than a pdf. 

I've hardly ever used Adobe pdf  reader. For ten to fifteen years I used a small quick pdf reading app called Foxit Reader, but since acquiring my present Windows machines haven't used it. Foxit has had facelifts and become more complex over the years, but it has its own identifiable logo when set as default pdf reader. Instead of downloading the latest version of Foxit, I looked through one of my take-with-me pen drives containing an assortment of handy files to have with me when using a foreign computer. Sure enough, there I found an early lightweight version taking little space and working very fast, utterly simple with no ads or pop-ups - a simple basic tool for all situations.

Edge is evidently feature rich, but I prefer the minimal design of Chrome and find it's less prone to distract me when in use. Edge now has the latest AI gizmo from Microsoft, known as 'Co-pilot', which is there to help you make smarter searches for things you're after. It has all sorts of user requirements for you to choose from to minimise your need to think for yourself thereafter. When Co-pilot popped up during the last Windows update of Edge, I googled to find out how I could deactivate it straight away. This feature of Edge browser can also appear separately on the desktop instead, taking up screen space, so further effort is required to get rid of it, for plain simplicity to reign once more.

After a solitary supper, I wrote for a while, then watched the last episode of Michael Portillo's series on Andalusia, featuring Sevilla the one major city in the region we've yet to visit, and Carmona, a town founded by Phoenician traders, where he has made his Spanish home over the past sixteen years, restoring a derelict building in a way that has revealed an arcade of moorish arches, and several floor areas dating from Roman times. Portillo threw a party for the many friends he's made in the town. On top of great food and drink, guests contributed flamenco music and dance, improvised songs and poetry recital. 

It reminded me of parties at home when I was very young, when extended family would join us and sing together with Mum playing the piano and Dad the 'cello. The atmosphere wasn't fiery like it is in Andalusia, but full of romance, sentimentality and convivial warmth, generated by popular ballads operatic arias, hymns and carols when in season. There wasn't enough room to dance when the front room was full. I was meant to be in bed, but would often sit on the stairs and listen, until I was old enough to stay up and join in. How many kids today will grow up with that kind of childhood memory, from the days before television took over our lives? Earlier to be tonight.

Wayward alarm

Another overcast day with occasional showers, though quite mild for this time of year. After breakfast, the usual housework chores, then preparing next Sunday's readings for emailing, and making a start on Sway for next weekend. Then I recorded and edited audio for next week's Morning Prayer.

A neighbour asked for help getting her car started, and I took our battery charger across to her lifeless mini motor caravan, as Clare was leaving for the shops. For some inexplicable reason the charging process activated the car alarm and it couldn't be deactivated with the key fob. This immobilised the engine in any case. The alarm could only be stopped by disconnecting the battery. After a couple of hours it had taken enough charge to turn the engine over but it wouldn't fire, the alarm just screeched deafeningly. Another neighbour arrived and got us out of the predicament by calling upon her AA subscription, via a phone app. Not sure how she did that for someone else's car, but the outcome was the car made it to QuikFit where a new battery could be fitted. I will find out in due course how it was possible to deactivate the alarm!

Being thus distracted and my work interrupted, I didn't notice the passage of time. When Clare returned at one thirty I hadn't cooked lunch, but she speedily cooked a veggie curry in the pressure cooker, and we ate lunch half an hour later. After we'd eaten, I made the Morning Prayer video slide show and uploaded it to YouTube. It was gone four by the time I went out for a walk. I met Miriam out in the park and we chatted in a mixture of Spanish and English as it got dark, talking about novels in particular. I walked for about two hours, then prepared supper at the usual hour, so we could listen to the Archers after.

When we'd eaten, I started making some bread dough. While it was rising I watched the finale of the Italian 12 episode series 'Off Grid' was full of surprises and dramatic tension, a hostage taking, a suicide and a murder spree, all within the last couple of episodes, after ten moderately paced episodes which peeled back exterior of family relationships to reveal deceit, betrayal and weakness, and the impact this has on all who are affected by corruption in the banking system, sparking murders and a quest for vengeance against the family of a banker, falsely accused of killing a colleague, and forced to flee into hiding by an aggrieved victim determined to make victims of all responsible for  the failure of the bank. It was complex, and I was wondering how it could all be resolved right down to the last ten minutes. In all this their two children had a very tough time as co-victims and may have come out of it better than the parents, although not enough attention was given to them in the finale, or their eventual relationships with their parents for this to be completely assured.

With this finished, I put the bread in the over to bake and got back to reading the first chapter of 'Travesuras de un Nina Mala' by Mario Vargas Llosa. The Spanish of the narrator is as spoken with words and turns of phrase from Peru, some not found in Google Translate, but guessable in context. I started this a couple of months ago, read the first page and was looking forward to continuing it, but simply havev not found the time, perhaps due to binge watching a succession of new crimmies in French, Spanish or German. Reading a story takes up more time than just watching something and following dialogue with sub-titles for clarification, but reading is fun nevertheless when I have time for it.

Text to speech explored

Rain again in the night and a cloudy start to the day, with occasional heavy showers. I slept well and woke up in time to listen to BBC Radio 4 Sunday Worship, coming this Morning from Llancarfan Church, with 14th century singing from the Fountain Singers and led by Fr Edwin Counsel Ministry Area Leader of the Heritage Coast group of Parishes in the Vale of Glamorgan. He reflected on Advent themes of Death, Judgement, Heaven and Hell, while guiding listeners through the remarkable collection of frescoes uncovered from beneath a covering of limewash on the church walls which had concealed them since the Reformation area. It was an admirable exposition and interpretation of one of Wales' historic artifacts and spiritual treasures, all in half an hour!

As a result of listening to this, I was late getting ready and eating my breakfast, considering that I had to be on my way for a nine thirty Eucharist at St Peter's Fairwater. I had to abandon my cup of coffee and half a slice of bread to get out of the house in haste, and thankfully the roads were clear and I arrived ten minutes early. There were just over forty adults and children present for the service. A mother with a baby asleep in a pram beckoned to me at the end of Communion to come over and bless the babe, as she'd been unable to carry her up without disturbance. So natural and spontaneous, every one a few weeks old to over eighty, all at home with each other in the Lord 's House. 

I was back home at eleven and had a relaxed quiet time reading and text editing before Clare returned from church. After lunch, I started investigating 'Speechify', a piece of software which will turn text into speech from many different sources using a wide variety of voices, mostly paid for. I wanted to know about ease of use and how it works on digital devices you have, without needing extra hardware. Free voices are American accented. It's even possible to record your own voice for use in AI generated speech synthesis for playing back text audio. 

I tried using it as a Chrome browser extension, and found it was fairly easy to learn how to use, though the software version of my voice only vaguely resembled mine. That was probably due to the shortness of the sampled sound recording it used. No trace of a Welsh accent, very slightly American, although the rhythm of phrases and sentence sounded OK. This was just a free demonstration sample. I daresay a paid for subscription would unlock the full potential of this app and produce a more accurate representation of recognisable voice. Buying into Spotify's digital ecosystem will be worth it, and help to ease Clare into a new way of interacting, before her sight becomes too poor to cope with reading.

After this, I walked down to Blackweir and around Pontcanna Fields. The Taff is still as high as it was yesterday. Then I went home to meet with Clare at half past four to go St John's for the Fountain Singers Advent concert. There were fifteen singers this evening. Some of the music we had sung with them the concert in St Catherines this time last year. It brought back good memories, an interesting making use of a dulcimer as well as bells and tambour. This really gives ancient character to the singing when some of the carols are in dance measures.

I admit that I miss singing this kind of music, but can't keep up with a rehearsal schedule which gravitates around Llantwit Major. It's a long way to drive in winter too. But it was good to see Claus and Anna. They are excited about a plan they're hatching to take a group to Lindisfarne for a workshop and concert next year. I imagine that Mother Frances will be delighted if this happens.

We got home in time for supper listening to the Archers, as ever. Then, a couple of episodes of 'Off Grid' before turning in for the night.

Troublesome TalkTalk day

More rain in the night and strong gusty wind during the day, but not much more rain thankfully. I woke up late to a breakfast of pancakes, sweet and savoury cooked by Clare while I was dozing. In the mail, a bank statement showing a a bill from TalkTalk that was double what I thought it should be, despite the fact that two months ago I cancelled a couple of add-ons which I thought we no longer needed. 

I spent the morning trying to get some sense out of the website chatbot, the Direct Messaging and SMS  helpline services. The chatbot was totally useless. The other two put me through extensive security checks to establish that I was the account holder, but couldn't give me a simple answer, so I was referred to the helpline which has a real human voice at the end of it. The queue of people desperate for an intelligent human being to talk to must have been very long, as the line just hung. No wonder the company is losing revenue and heading into crisis.

I returned to the website and switched on 'Call Boost' again, as this seems to be the only way to send and receive landline calls that can last up to an hour. The allowance of landline calls is generous, but without 'Call Boost' you can only phone other TalkTalk customers, and we have very few in our calling circle. The rate to all others is 24p a minute. This didn't explain why wi-fi calling from a mobile resulted in my being billed on my landline number. I returned to Direct Messaging with a simple question and this time got the response I was looking for. I had been mistaken to switch off 'Call Boost' in the first place, and paid for it very dearly. 

I think it's improper to use a term like 'Call Boost', implying an additional paid service. Once upon a time before TalkTalk customers gave up and started switching to other providers, maybe half the people called would be TalkTalk users, whereas nowadays it's one in twenty. The information is there in the small print on the website but not presented with sufficient clarity on the options pages. Half a day wasted trying to sort this out, before and after lunch! I was very upset.  I also messed up changing my account password and locked myself out of the account. 

The Direct Message helpline was helpful with this first time. It was a matter of deleting existing TalkTalk passwords from Chrome browser's memory, then deleting stored cookies and browser memorised history. Before doing this, I went out and walked for two hours until it was dark to clear my head. The wind was very strong, buffeting me as I walked along the Taff footpath. Once again the water level was over the top of the fish ladder. It's risen half a metre or more in the last 24 hours.

I changed the password successfully, printed off tomorrow's sermon, then cooked supper, before settling down to watch another couple of episodes of 'Off Grid'. It's long drawn out, with lots of unexpected turns in the plot and the fate of its characters, the portrayal of an ideal middle class family in deep trouble, with all having to cope with life changing identity loss is quite insightful.

Afternoon musical extravaganza

Another wet night and overcast start to the day, with the sun peeping through mid morning. There was a news report this morning with photos taken across Wales of yesterday's cloudy sky in the hour before the sun set, in pale purple and pinkish hues. I noticed this when I was out walking in the park, and supposed it was something to do with the layer of clouds right above not being very thick so that the bright orange and red light from the sun on the far horizon was diffusing through the low layer. Unusual I thought though not exceptional, and didn't bother to take a picture as the colour wasn't that intense, seen from Llandaff Fields. It seems however, that it was an uncommon phenomenon produced when atmospheric dust acquires a film of water from cold air saturated with humidity. This catches the light and diffuses it, giving the clouds an unusual tint.

I had another nose bleed in the night and slept until half past eight. I did some more work on my Sunday sermon after breakfast. I thought scrutinised my reasons for exchanging my laptop, and decided against it. The Dell I had my eyes on is larger and heavier as my Honor laptop, and not as easy to carry abroad with me. Google informed me that it was possible to buy a replacement batter, should the existing one becomes too weak for practical purposes. Before lunch I went and had a chat with Davey at Tourotech, to tell him I'm not ready to made an exchange yet. He told me that he'd be willing to acquire a new battery and install it for me in due course.

We ate a snack lunch early so we could walk to the Royal Welsh College for the afternoon performance of the College students annual musical theatre show 'Christmas on Broadway', a superb showcase of song and dance routines with seventeen students and a big band of over fifteen, including a string quartet. It was a most enjoyable two hours, superbly arranged and brimming with youthful energy. We went straight home afterwards, as it was getting dark, then watched 'Amser Jazz' live Christmas session on the RWCMD YouTube channel while we had supper.

I worked on another Morning Prayer and Reflection afterwards, then watched another couple of episodes of 'Off Grid' before turning in for the night.

Tech' temptation

More heavy rain overnight, overcast this morning and only intermittent showers during the day. I woke up and posted today's Morning Prayer YouTube link to WhatsApp just before the phone notified me it was time. I listened to Chief Rabbi Ephrem Murvis talking about the festival of Hanukkah on 'Thought for the Day'. Then I fell asleep again and woke up an hour later. Strange how this tends to happen on Thursdays especially.

After breakfast I went to Tesco's for this week's food bank contribution, mostly cleaning products, as these are needed as well as food. I had a very heavy bagful to carry to church. When I arrived I found Fr. Colin hadn't arrived to celebrate. Unusual for him, but he may have got stuck in traffic. It was another heavy traffic day, others reported. I stepped in and celebrated, then after coffee, returned home and cooked lunch. Clare returned from the School of Optometry optician's with new variable lenses in her spec's after the last set got damaged or were poorly configured. I can't remember which. After lunch I made an early start on drafting the first of two different sermons I'll be preaching at St Catherine's at Christmas. Then I went for a walk

On impulse, I went down Wyndham Crescent to see if Tourotech had a new stock of good used computers in for Christmas, and I guessed right. Much as I love my Honor laptop, its battery life is diminished and needs to be plugged in fairly frequently. I've had it two and a half years and it was already a year and a half old then if not older. I'm tempted by a high powered Dell with a bigger screen, faster processor and double the memory of the my present laptop, so good for video editing. Googling showed me it was possible to order a replacement battery for seventy quid. I might be worth the outlay, unless the Dell is nicer to work on. The only thing I don't like about the Honor is the webcam which is embedded in the row of function keys, requiring it to be placed at an awkward angle if you want callers to look you in the eye when zooming. Not that I zoom more than I desperately need to! 

I walked back home through Sophia Gardens and along the Taff. The river was pretty full, and it struck me how quiet it sounded in the dark. When the water level is much lower, as is usually the case, the river emits much more noise flowing over rocks protruding from the water. It's quiet until two hundred and fifty yards below the weir, when the noise of falling water becomes audible.

When I got back, there was a request to put another carol service poster on Sway. It didn't take long as it had a coloured border making it stand out against the while background of Sway's display environment. 

After supper, I worked on a sermon for Sunday at St Peter's, when the announcement of the name of the second clergy team member now appointed, whose main focus of work will be in Fairwater Parish. Good to be the bearer of good news. Then I watched the finale of the new series of 'Shetland' on BBC iPlayer. It was on live last night but I missed it, again. 

Midweek calm

Cloudy and cold, but no rain today. I went to the Eucharist at St Catherine's, charged with opening up the church as Clive who usually opens is away, but others with keys turned up before me. If I had known this, I wouldn't have needed needed to arrive so early, but at least I had an extra fifteen minutes to say Morning Prayer before Bishop Rowan celebrated Mass. 

The church hall was a hive of activity after the service with a small work group assembling Christingle oranges for next Sunday's service. It's a fiddly job and I didn't fancy joining in as stiff fingers make me less dextrous these days than I used to be. After coffee and a chat I went and collected this week's veggie bag from Chapter on my way home.

Clare was cooking lunch when I arrived, so I worked on making the video slide show to go with the audio  recorded yesterday and uploaded it to YouTube after we'd eaten. Then, a walk in the park, and early supper as Clare was going out to her Plygain singing group. I answered a few messages, but otherwise spent most of the evening relaxing, watching a couple of episodes of 'Off Grid' with enchanting villages and scenery in South Tyrol.

Gripes

Cloudy and cold, but little rain today. Clare went to her study group after breakfast, I prepared and then recorded and edited next week's Morning Prayer and Reflection. I cooked lunch in time for Clare's return, against a background of stomach pain which I've come to recognise as caused by some dairy ingredient in what I've eaten lately, thanks to my malfunctioning gall bladder. To take my mind off the discomfort, I did the week's grocery shopping at the Co-op after lunch, a day early, then went for my daily walk in the park, most of it in the dark. As ever, exercise makes a difference. 

I'm vigilant about eating anything that could cause me pain, but couldn't couldn't figure out if I'd eaten anything different from usual. Then I remembered I'd eaten two slices of toast from a new loaf of bread which Clare had bought in a different bakery from our usual one, which had run out of what we normally buy. It's a few months since it last happened, when I ate a fishcake for lunch at my sister's, whose label said that milk powder was a flavour ingredient. I can't yet prove it was that loaf of bread, a check at the bakery which produced it will tell whether or not it was a culprit.

Clare's special Swedish Bitters remedy eased the pain, but the discomfort stayed with me for the rest of the day, as the offending substance worked its way slowly from my stomach into my intestines. It's only my stomach which is affected it seems. After supper I exchanged emails with Basma, who thought she'd be meeting her asylum solicitor this afternoon, but the appointment was intended only for the delivery of documents relating to her case and this had not been explained to her. I was not impressed with the way she said she was treated. 

Then I drafted this year's Christmas newsletter for sending out to relations and friends, for Clare to check and approve. It was a less eventful year than 2022, with not much to look forward to so far, and no concrete plans apart from renewing the roof on the house after the winter. With all three ministry vacancies filled by Easter in the churches I serve, I should have more free time on my hands. What I'll do with that time I'll think about when it finally happens.

The Israeli assault on Hamas in Khan Younis in southern Gaza continues with brutal ferocity and stupidity. The military has dropped leaflets warning the population to move to designated safe areas. Where it was digital contact details text messages are sent. Updates are sent if safe zones become unsafe. Due diligence. But what a hypocritical joke when people's phones cannot be re-charged and cell towers are out of service, due to inability to access power. 

Accounts are emerging now of the extent to which Hamas terrorists invading the Israeli border zone targeted women for rape and disfigurement before murdering them. It is now at last being more widely recognised that sexual violence is a weapon of war. I remember this first being mentioned during the Bosnian war, and then again in Syrian conflict zones where the Islamic state held sway. Maybe things like this have always happened in times of conflict. Human beings soon revert to animalistic behaviour when it seems there are no sanctions. When will we ever learn?

Overdue recognition

I woke up to rain and it continued until late afternoon. As usual another Monday morning was taken up with housework, preparing next Sunday's readings, mailing them out, and inserting them into the new edition of Sway for next weekend. 

Sister June called me to say she's still made no progress on getting her landline reinstated, then later on, she sent a message to say that two OpenReach vans were parked in front of her building. Another resident told her the engineers were installing a landline, so it was possible to alert them to her faulty connection, and get it fixed. Sheer serendipity! And a great relief for me as well as her. She relies on her landline for domestic emergencies, but just as important to her, for calling long standing friends her own age.

I also had a conversation with Rufus, who has just completed his six weeks of training and induction in his new role as South Wales Ports Chaplain for Missions to Seafarers. He was down in the Port Talbot centre for seafarers, which like other facilities has suffered the loss of its volunteer teams due to the pandemic. There's a lot of work to be done getting places fully serviceable and adapted to fast changing conditions, recruiting and rebuilding welcome teams and ship  visitors. It's a job that makes the most of his practical as well as pastoral skills. He's in his element. 

A few days ago I had an invitation from Philip, one of Rufus's fellow students when they were ordinands in training at St Mike's. I was lucky enough to have these two mature professional men in my tutor group, both giving up successful careers to follow their calling to full time ministry, each very different, each bringing with them understanding and experience of the working world to apply in pastoral life each facing challenges and setbacks on the way. Philip is being licensed as Ministry Area Leader for the group of seven churches he's worked in as team Vicar for several years. So good that his true worth is finally being recognised by the diocese. But why did it take so long? Before ordination he worked for Daf trucks as an engineer overseeing apprentice training. He's a real asset as a priest who's a home in a tough working class area, as well as among the better off elite.

Clare went out in the rain to collect her prescription medication while I was on the phone. I made lunch for us to be in good time to drive for our hair dressing appointments with Chris at two, but she didn't get back until nearly one thirty and had to eat lunch in haste before we could set out for Rumney in driving rain and heavy traffic. We got there ten minutes late, and it was getting dark when we left for the drive home in rush hour traffic. We stopped at the big Tesco Extra for petrol, and went to the nearby Aldi for food and wine on our way. As soon as we got back, I went out again and walked for nearly two hours in the dark. grateful that it had finally stopped raining.

After supper there was more work to do on Sway and letters to write. I didn't have time for telly, and went to bed a bit earlier instead.

Milestone

A cold, damp and cloudy start to Advent. I woke up thinking about devising a simple ceremony for giving Basma the New Testament in Arabic which arrived yesterday, just in time. I did this after breakfast, and I left a little later than I usually do, but fortunately arrived at St German's at the same time as Basma with then minutes to spare, in which to brief her and get ready to celebrate Mass.

She stood arm in arm with Hilary presenting her just after the blessing of the first Advent Candle and said her few lines clearly and confidently. I had wrapped the book in a beautiful patterned silk handkerchief that has been in a bedroom drawer unused over half a lifetime. It's common for Arab Muslims to keep their copy of the Qu'ran wrapped up and in a special place at home. I knew she would realise the significance of this, and that such special treatment applied equally to biblical texts. She was in tears after the ceremony, and I too was much moved. The beginning of the new Christian Year will be for Basma a milestone in a journey that has lasted twenty five years so far.

The liturgy was a little longer than usual, with the additional elements, but also because it took me longer than usual to pray my way through it, and preach. It's one of my favourite moments in the Christian Year.

I gave Basma a bible commentary as well, based on the New English Bible text, and she was given an English New English Bible to go with it. The Arabic text is a translation of the Good News Bible, and one is being ordered so she has exactly what she needs to study in, albeit confusingly in two versions of text. The first question that came up was about the Chapter and Verse numbers in the text. Thankfully they are fairly consistent, across different versions, even the Arabic, but it needed explanation. It was gone half past one by the time I got home for dinner. Clare is getting used to me arriving this late for lunch while I'm at St German's, ever patient with me, fortunately.

After lunch I slept in the chair for more than an hour, then walked in the park for an hour, in the drizzle as it got dark, returned for tea, then we both went out to the St Catherine's Advent Service of Light, attended by four dozen people, a dozen of them in the choir. There were mince pies and mulled wine in the church hall afterwards and we stayed, though not for long. We went home and listened to the Archers on catch-up. Then I watched the first episode of a twelve part Italian crimmie called 'Off Grid', about a banker who is forced to go into hiding with his family after the bank he heads collapses. He is framed for the murder of his colleague and both receive death threats. I have the early impression that this is a matter of infiltration by organised crime into working of the bank. How and why is going to take a lot of episodes to describe!

Special delivery

The temperature was minus four when I woke up this morning, and there was a layer of low lying cloud of freezing fog over the city until early afternoon, when the temperature lifted to two degrees. The conditions reminded me of Novembers in Geneva, when low lying cloud would obscure the sky for weeks on end with sub-zero temperatures at lakeside level. We had to drive up a thousand metres to the Jura plateau to see blue sky and get some sunshine.

I had an email to say that the Arabic New Testament I ordered is due to be delivered today, which is very awkward as we are both out at Christmas Fayres most of the time, and there's no indication as to when it will arrive. All I have is a tracking number with options to change delivery address, but whether this will take effect once the delivery van is on the road is anybody's guess. We're at the mercy of yet another company in the parcel business, about which we know little.

After breakfast, I made my way over to St German's by bus and on foot to attend their Christmas Fayre. It was a good occasion, giving me a chance to chat with congregation members and Fr Stewart. Basma came before I left and I was able to share good news about the Good News Bible in Arabic hoping it'll arrive in time for tomorrow's Mass. 

I learned that her university degree was in Fine Arts, specialising in ceramics. Immediately I thought of introducing her to Martin and his collection of Japanese pots, something I can arrange with her in future. Having a specialist competence could possibly open a path for her in the world artifact conservation. She has yet to discover the National Museum of Wales and its ceramic collection. Needless to say her mind has been elsewhere in recent years.

I reached home in time for lunch, and then just after two, the Arabic New Testament  was slipped through the door by a courier. So pleased it's come. We can present it to her at Mass in St German's tomorrow morning. I'm thrilled to have been able to arrange this at such a key moment in her journey to baptism.

Having received the awaited parcel,  we were free to go to St Catherine's Christmas Fayre, drink mulled wine and chat with people for an hour. Then I popped down to Tescos to buy Clare some flowers and myself a weekend bottle of wine. The air temperature was dropping back below zero and it was dark by half past four as I walked home. Three weeks to the shortest day already!

Israel has pulled out of negotiations with Hamas over further humanitarian pauses, intent of pressing on with its assault. Nearly 200 have been killed since shelling and bombing resumed. No aid deliveries and still no discussion about what happens after the fighting stops. Heartless and foolish.

I spent the evening after supper on revising the draft letter of support for Basma's asylum tribunal lawyer, finishing my sermon and printing copies. It's Advent Sunday tomorrow and the countdown to Christmas begins in earnest.\