Getting out and about

Up with the sun, but after a chilly night and a few gusts of wind the air warms quickly to around 15C and even more for a while mid-afternoon. Time to inspect the car and give it a trial run. It has just one locking door. The rest unlock and lock automatically with the drivers door. It's a smallish Dacia Sendero Stepway four seat hatchback with a diesel engine, which is comparatively noisy and not terribly powerful, but it's good enough to get around in. First I drove up to Mijas Pueblo and back down into the centre of Fuengirola to experience demanding hill driving and urban traffic conditions. I felt a lot better for having done that. I put it off yesterday to avoid overstressing my dodgy ankle, but it was fine today.

I returned and reheated yesterday's remaining pasta and sauce with chorizo picante sliced into it. In apple crumble was waiting for me in the freezer, along with a cauliflower cheese bake when I arrived. The cauli can wait until someone comes to join me who does eat cheese. The crumble I microwaved, and made up some custard with oat milk, as my secret chef had kindly included a portion of custard powder to use. That was enjoyable, and I certainly needed a good walk to digest it all. Clare and I talked before she went for her siesta. 

I also had a surprise call from John Duncan. He and I were colleagues together in Birmingham University Chaplaincy work fifty years ago. He decided to respond to my Christmas newsletter by ringing me up on his mobile, delighting in free wi-fi calls! He still plays golf twice a week and still has an active interest in good things. He didn't know I'm in Spain, and was quite surprised when I told him. That made my day!

Having finally completed my Sunday sermon, it was time to try out the chaplaincy house printer, hoping that it would behave for me and not force me to visit the office and print it off there. The last time I had used my laptop with a new printer was Estepona last supper. Windows recognised their Epson with ease and it was still set as the default printer. Within a minute or so of attaching a little Samsung lazer printer (a good choice for longevity sake), the laptop recognised it and all worked perfectly. When I think back over the decades, and recall what a task it used to be downloading and installing printer software, and now the whole process has been radically simplified, and made printing a lot less haphazard for all.

Job done, I went for that much needed walk, taking my time, along the road that runs beneath and beside the Metro, all the way to the terminus in Fuengirola. Nine years ago, I bought my Tarjeta Dorada 40% discount rail card there, I had hoped to do it again, but alas the ticket office is long gone. I need to go to Malaga's Maria Zambrano main station to find a ticket office. The terminus has had a makeover, and is equipped with ticket gates, that allows you to tap and pay for your fare, or use your phone, or a paper ticket from the usual machine. And there's a ticketing app for your phone as well. Just like in London. Ah well, at least I know. It's not a priority to get one for the moment.

While I was down that part of time, I found the only branded Banco Santander ATM in town. You can do everything with your account in their centre there, at an on-line terminal. I wonder if they have real people to talk to as well. One day I must go in office hours and find out. The ATM took my card and greeted me as an English client automatically. It only gave me the option of withdrawing €140, unless I missed something on the screen display. It was a maximum of €200 I could withdraw last time I tried in the summer. I paid £133 for this, but there's no exchange fee but a set rate of €1.05 to the pound, which is less than the current €1.11 rate on the street, but banks can add transaction fees which ends up costing just as much. 

Owain says it's cheaper to tap and pay for everything, as it's on the cumulative spend in a banking cycle that the currency conversion is worked and one's account is charged. It means that we're being charged more for using physical money than digital. Covid drove the change to cashless purchase in Britain. Other EU countries and Scandinavia have been way ahead of us. For better or for worse? We'll see.

I walked back along the beach promenade, visited the little shrine of our Lady of Fatima beside the storm drain that runs down into the sea. It's strange that it's quite close to the large statue of Our Lady Star of the Sea. There must be a story behind these local devotions. I'd walked over eleven kilometres by the time I reached Casa de Esperanza. I haven't walked that far for a good while, and my ankle didn't really complain.

A light supper after a big lunch, then photo uploading, and writing this cloaked in a large counterpane I found upstairs, just about enough to enable me to sit and write without being unbearably cold. And now to early bed to be sure that I'm on my best form when I drive to Calahonda for tomorrow's first service.

Still Costa del Viento

A cold night, but I was kept warm in bed by a huge comfortable duvet, and woke up at first light to enjoy opening the bedroom window curtains and see the light of the rising sun at the far end of this group of houses, beyond the swimming pool.

Jen and John passed by after breakfast to bring me the Chaplaincy phone - an iPhone, unfortunately for me as I have never used one before and don't know how to work it. With trial and error was got as far as finding out that I can't access WhatsApp as it won't work unless up to date. There seems to be no record of the phone's Apple i/d or other sign in details. It can send as receive phone calls, but do nothing else in this state as the phone cannot be returned to factory settings without knowing who registered it, how and when. Not quite the sort of cultural challenge I was expecting!

My ankle got jolted when I tripped this morning and it hurts again, though it isn't swollen. It's set me back a few days in terms of walking discomfort, but this was a timely reminder to buy some pomade de arnica as arnica cream is called here. I went to the Mercadona, ten minutes walk from the house and did my first big grocery purchase of my stay - enough to last me over the weekend and into next week. The wind blew in strong unsettling gusts. No wonder the original name for this region was Costa del Viento.

When I came to tap and pay using my Post Office money card, the card reader gave an error message several times, so I had to hunt for the pin number in my password protected file, as I'd not used the password before and then insert it into the reader.  Still an error message. When I took it out, I realised that the chip on the card was partly covered by a strip of paper telling me to activate the card. I had done this, but omitted to peel off the notice. Oh dear, silly old fool.

I had a rucksack and a Mercadona bag for life full of groceries to lug uphill back to the house, and it took a longer than usual, but my ankle coped with the extra weight and the slope. Then my first cooked meal, pasta and a veggie sugo with butter beans, enough for another lunch tomorrow, or even Sunday to save me cooking when I get back after church at Alhaurin.

Clare and I chatted on WhatsApp over lunch, but it wasn't the best arrangement as background noise was a problem for both of us - from me cooking and her washing up. We'll have to consider a better way of keeping in touch during the day, before either of us gets too tired.

Jen asked me to collect a batch of weekly notice sheets from the church office for Calahonda, so I walked to Los Boliches with my big bunch of keys and let myself into the Edificio Jupiter apartment block which houses St Andrew's church in a ground floor corner location, accessible from the main street. Work on the building planned before lock-down and completed after has created a new disabled access toilet, renovated the old one and the kitchen, and redecorated the sanctuary. It all looks very good indeed. A credit to the church at such a challenging time. I went out for a walk down to the promenade and had a message in response to a query made to Caroline to say I'd need to bring a liturgical stole with me for the service at Alhaurin, so I had to return and collect one.

On the way back up the hill I called in a pharmacy and bought the Arnica I needed for my ankle, and some Argan oil to use as scalp and help conditioner, as advised by Chris, since my hair easily gets dry and my scalp flaky. Not cheap, but necessary. The thermometer in the pharmacy sign read 19C, half an hour before sunset. The same strong gusty wind picked up again and it was soon dark. With the curtains shut, and the wind moaning outside, I'm in an island of calm. 

The temperature drops quickly at dusk and reveals how poor is the thermal insulation of houses in part of the world. I had to work out how to get the air conditioning system to blow warm air into the lounge. It's years since I've had anything to do with such a device. It seems to be working now, but fighting a losing battle to raise the temperature any higher than 15C. Another cold night ahead. It'll take ages for the house to gain overall warmth, having not been occupied for a month in mid-winter.

Return to Fuengirola

I woke up just before my phone announced that it was time to post the link for today's Morning Prayer to WhatsApp. It's dry and cloudy, the sun looks like it will break through eventually, but sadly my flight to Málaga will start at sunset.

After breakfast, just a few minor adjustments to my travel bags, and then some time to relax and reflect. In the past I've usually been too much in a last minute packing frenzy to sit quietly for a while. I admit that I am nervous, setting out on another long period of locum duty. It's in a familiar pastoral setting, but any ministry has as many unknowns as it does routine activities. The surprise element is what I enjoy. 

Thankfully, I'm well and fairly fit for my age, but still affected by that slip down the lower stairs. My ankle is OK for normal walking. It's at the end of a good long walk that it tends to play up now, but maybe that's just a symptom of old age. I'm looking forward to the coming months, not anxious about travel, but it's just hard getting started, out of the door and on my way, leaving behind set domestic routine, and above all leaving my best beloved Clare. Sadly it'll be two months before she joins me.

We went for a circuit of Thompson's Park together before I collected my bags from the house and we parted company at the end of the street. I had to walk pretty briskly to avoid missing the bus and got there with only five minutes to spare. We underestimated the time our farewell pasito would take. The coach driver in her hi-viz with blonde hair tied back had a passing resemblance to Sarah Lancashire playing Sergeant Catherine Cawood in 'Happy Valley', but with a good Welsh Valleys accent.

There were just eight of us on the coach to the airport. After the third pick-up stop in Newport, I started eating the turkey sandwiches prepared last night. I inadvertently put them in the freezer, not the fridge, and they were far from thawed! Having made haste to catch the coach, and wearing extra winter layers, I was feeling overheated, and  eating the sandwiches cooled me down nicely. The coach arrived at two twenty, and by quarter to three I was in the departure lounge with a two hour wait before me. EasyJet's flight to Malaga left on time and was completely full. A lot of those on board seem to be party guests for someone's big birthday fiesta. Much expensive in-flight booze was consumed, but everyone was quite good natured, except for an adolescent sitting next to me. 

His behaviour was bizarre and childish for a fourteen your old. I suspect he was high on some illegal substance. At first I was quite disturbed that he kept his phone on throughout the flight  taking photos or mini videos, chatting to someone far away, if not to his mate in the seat ahead of him. Then, I realised that a number of people were also on their phones throughout. It seems EasyJet now offer in-flight wi-fi and it's used for passengers to download an on-board sales and order menu. I remember some years back when Kath sent me an in-flight email, from a Norwegian airline's flight, excited about the fact that she could do this for the first time. I couldn't be bothered, and switched off until we were just about to land, and I thought I'd change the time zone.

Jen and John met me at the arrivals gate, and brought me back to Casa de Esperanza, the Chaplaincy House, already warming up to welcome me, with some food in the fridge to tide me over until I can go shopping tomorrow. The house internet has been switched exclusively to fibre broadband. There are no landline phones any longer, all is wi-fi calling using a mobile phone. There is a chaplain's phone, but I won't get that until tomorrow, as Jen forgot to bring it tonight. That will give me an WhatsApp calling circle of people in the chaplaincy orbit, and I guess F.D.s and wedding arrangers, should these be necessary. It took me a while to find the router and password on a piece of paper tucked underneath it. After weeks of non-use, it needed rebooting to work properly. It's not fast by UK standards, but it works. That's all that matters.

I had some tostado with olive oil and some fruit. All I felt I needed for tonight. Now it's time to turn in, with the sound of a cold wind blowing outside.

Packing

To St Catherine's for the Eucharist after breakfast to celebrate the Conversion of St Paul. Over coffee after the service, Mother Frances gave me a belated Christmas present, mail ordered nearly two months ago from an American publisher, a book from which she'd read a meditation at a service back in early Advent. It's called 'Mother of God - Similar to Fire', and consists of fifty one full page images of icons by William Hart McNichols an American priest and iconograph. All of them are of Mary, under a wide range of titles used to honour her name in different parts of the world wide church. Each is accompanies by a poetic text of reflection on what an image so titled evokes for the writer Mirabai Star. It's a beautifully produced book with profound thought provoking texts. What a treat!

After coffee, chat and farewells, I went to collect this week's veggie bag, then helped Clare prepare our lunch. Then, a big effort to pack the right clothes for my Spanish sojourn and round up necessary.  bits and pieces. The devil is always in the detail! It's more difficult than just packing for a summer trip. It can get pretty cold in Spain at this time of year, but by the time Clare comes it could be quite warm, if not hot, so I need to be prepared both ways. I'm slightly regretting not having hold baggage, though it concentrates the mind to pack with hand luggage only in mind. Many times I've travelled with a large bag and not used half of the clothes I've taken with me. 

After an hour of packing, I went for a walk around the streets of Canton, trying out a pair of wet weather shoes to decide if I can live with them for the next few months, rather than take walking boots. I've got a comfy pair of trainers and would like to take sandals as well, for when it get warmer and drier. But will all this fit in my rucksack and cabin bag? We'll see.

After supper, I made some packs of turkey sandwiches for the journey, then re-packed both my bags with a different distribution of clothes, shoes, bits and pieces. Somehow everything I wanted to take fitted in. I'm not sure about the weight, however. When I went to check with the bathroom scales, I found it's broken. Still, all seems to be in order now, with a free morning to relax before I go for the bus at twelve. 

Scrutiny nightmare

Another cold dry day, with clouds and sunshine on times. After breakfast, Clare went to her study group, and I caught up on Monday's housework. I had a text message from 'Thirdfort', the digital identity service used by Owain's conveyancing solicitors. No response from them about being able to do this process on a laptop. The company website was brilliant at blowing its own trumpet, but offered no answer to this question. Owain found a number, called the help line and was told it wasn't available on anything other than a mobile phone. No reason given. 

I was obliged to install the company's app on my phone, and go through the lengthy procedure of proving who I am yet again, only this was more difficult. Nothing I did could persuade their image analysis routine that my passport photo as acceptable. I must have tried twenty times without success. It was hard enough to achieve this with the Credas i/d procedure. The passport isn't designed to be easy to photograph or scan. This is not taken into account at all. In the end, I tried using the option to use a photo of my driving license. It worked first time, and the procedure finally confirmed that I am who my documents say I am.

In addition, I was required not only to state how much money is being gifted to Owain for his flat deposit, but to allow this system to access my bank account and interrogate the digital record directly. I was also required to give information about my sources of pension income. I regard the latter two queries as an enforced invasion of personal privacy. I have never used a mobile banking app, nor would I wish to, but I was required to use my personal security details to log in on the phone as well. Santander seem to be OK and reassuring about the security of this intrusive procedure, but it left me feeling less secure than I was when I got up this morning.  It was exhaustingly stressful. And it was so problematic that I lost several hours of time that I needed to spend on other things. Fortunately, Clare returned and made lunch while I was still struggling to complete the process.

I was glad of a walk in sunny cold fresh air after lunch. Outside the stables on Pontcanna Fields, I took a photo of the first daffodil bud this year to start bursting into flower in this locality. There are hundred of snowdrops now, but so far only a handful of purple crocuses. I'll be in Spain by the time the rest emerge, but it won't be long now.

Clare and I ate separately this evening as she had a meditation group meeting to attend. While she was out I prepared and then recorded next week's Morning Prayer and Reflection for Candlemass Day, ahead of time, to give myself some slack while I'm settling down in Fuengirola. When I'd done this and uploaded it to YouTube, I watched episode four of 'Happy Valley'. sadly I'll miss the two final episodes, as there's no means of watching UK telly available in the chaplaincy house, that I'm aware of. There doesn't seem to be a chaplain's computer any longer either, but I'll take my own anyway. This seems more commonplace now although finding a device fit for current purpose while on locum duty has been rare.

I got my travel bag down from on top of the wardrobe this evening, and put the first few things in it. My must-do job for tomorrow, to avoid last minute rush on departure day, Thursday.

Scrutiny in excess

Clare had a nine thirty appointment with the osteoporosis specialist at Llandough Hospital this morning, so following a quick breakfast, I drove her there, then returned home and got to work on an article for the St Andrew's Chaplaincy monthly magazine. I returned to collect her after the appointment, and we drove from there over to the Dunelm Mill store in Newport Road to buy a small folding table for her sewing machine. On the way home we called at Tesco for some petrol as the Polo's tank was almost empty and I didn't want to leave it like that just in case there was an urgent need for someone to use it in my absence. 

Clare then cooked a chick pea curry for lunch while I completed the article I was writing. While I was out walking later in the afternoon, Owain called to let me know about yet another request from Nationwide Building Society to confirm the gifting of funds for a mortgage deposit, and a separate one from Owain's negotiating solicitor. That three processes demanding confirmation of my intent plus verification of my identity and available funds, all of them different. 

This is the new normal in a world where obsession with preventing money laundering challenges us to prove who we are and what assets we have to dispose of with no integration of processes. The government requires we pay taxes, but doesn't demand we show bank statements to prove what we declare. It knows who we are, and whether we can be trusted to behave, and punishes when we don't. 

When it comes to house purchase, something that could and should be done once for the sake of personal security and safety must be done three times over, with triple the risk to an individual. No matter how secure these information services declare themselves to be, with their accreditations and certifications, no digital system is immune to hacking. I am very unhappy there's no alternative but to rely on them in order to help Owain buy his first home, but it has to be done. Meanwhile big time money launderers find other ways to shift ill gotten gains, investing cash in third party businesses, or valuable artefacts bought for money at live auctions, and the such-like.

When I  got back home, I had to download and print two more different forms and fill them in by hand, and then scan them ready to send. The Building Society form design was very user unfriendly with text entry boxes so small it was impossible to print single letters in each one without using a sharp stylus. For someone with poor eyesight or wobbly handwriting, this would be a next to impossible task.  I think it's an inhumane demeaning way to treat people. 

This evening, I watched the week's double episode of 'Silent Witness' on BBC One. It told a story about climate emergency protesters taking dramatic steps to prevent the sacrifice of ancient woodland to a new commercial development and how this resulted in a train crash and three murders, that had less to do with real protesters than it did with family dysfunction. It's a messy old world, as it is, and more than ever, an ailing, vulnerable one.

Counting down to next locum duty

A wonderful rose hued sunrise this chilly  morning, then the sky clouded over for the rest of the day. I drove to St Edward's to celebrate the Eucharist with a congregation of forty adults and children. There were a few singers missing but the choir still sang well. I was impressed that they chanted a long gradual psalm and stayed in pitch perfectly throughout, with only a light touch chord on the piano at the end of each verse to check. Impressive! There wasn't a coffe time after as a prize draw was taking place instead, so I was home half an earlier than usual.

After lunch, I spent an hour on advance preparation for my first week's assignment in Fuengirola. Then I went for a walk around the Fields, and took photos of the snowdrops and setting sun.

After supper I watched two more episodes of Dark Rivers. A well constructed plot about organised crime and the drug trade in Passau, a German city on the Danube, bordering Austria, complete with Bavarian dialect, German and Austrian accents. Complex but not obscure, easy to follow. A traditional religious thread runs through the series story. Unusual these days, though not surprising as it was made in Bavaria.

With my last service done, I can now start packing as I can fold up my alb to put in the bottom of my case. The countdown to my flight on Thursday has begun.

Phone sorted and sent

After a good night's sleep, pancakes and porridge for breakfast. It was a cold night again, and the city was shrouded with mist as well as low cloud, which persisted until the afternoon. Clare was collected by taxi for another session as a model eye patient for ophthalmology students.

I went to Tesco's and bought some credit for my sister's mobile phone, then went to the Post Office to buy a jiffy bag to mail the phone in. Then a walk in the park. Clare called on the way back home and proposed lunch at the Conway, so I went there and we ate there instead. I had fish and chips, but the batter disagreed with me and gave me terrible stomach cramps - it contained dairy products. I hadn't thought of that when I ordered. 

A dose of Swedish Bitters and some chamomile tea sorted the problem fortunately, but it sapped my energy, so I spent the rest of the day watching crimmies on-line. First the Aussie 'Mystery Road' and then a German serial set in beautiful Passau on the Danube, called 'Dark Rivers' - with an ingenious plot line.

New Bishop elected decisively

It's still around freezing, but awakening to sunshine is the best start to the day for me. I learned from WhatsApp that Assistant Bishop of Bangor Mary Stallard is to be next Bishop of Llandaff. Clear learned from Frances yesterday evening, and forgot to tell me. It seems the Electoral College reached its conclusion in two thirds of its allotted time. Mary is well thought of, so it's not so surprising really. She was ordained in Monmouth and worked in three other Welsh dioceses, but not Llandaff. It's not going to be easy for her. If she can raise morale and get all parties behind her, who knows what will be possible?

After breakfast an electrician hired by Clare arrived to fit additional electrical sockets in the front room and remove an unused  ancient burglar alarm which tends to go off if there's a power cut. Not good for the neighbours if we're away or out at the time! He worked flat out for over four hours to do the job, and the result is pleasing, as we can power all our electrical appliances without messy space consuming extensions.

In the post, arriving just after the electrician was the Samsung phone. The Tesco SIM card when inserted was working, but only to say it wasn't going to send or receive calls. I walked over to Tesco Extra for help  from their mobile phone counter to troubleshoot the problem. A kind and helpful young man went through various procedures to eliminate faults and confirmed the SIM was in fact working. He demonstrated this by inserting it into the second SIM slot in the SIM tray of my new phone, and sending it a text message. The conclusion was that the phone itself, for no apparent reason is locked, and needs unlocking, but it couldn't be done except by EE's mobile service. 

I walked back through the park and took a bus into town along Cathedral Road, to visit the BT/EE store in St David's centre. The man on the welcome desk said that it couldn't be done in store, and that I needed to go on-line or ring up the EE helpline. Not really helpful, and a wasted journey. I got home well after two, and found a comforting pot of still warm salmon and veggie soup which Clare prepared anticipating the electricity being cut off at lunchtime. Strength restored, I consulted my EE mobile account, and hunted for a while until I found the page that serves the unlocking procedure. It was straightforward and only took five minutes, but it was a bit fiddly with long numbers to type and re-type on the Samsung phone. 

As soon as the procedure was complete, the Samsung came to life and now works as it did when I first put my SIM card into it back in 2017. Now it has my sister's Gmail account working on it and Android needs whatever updating is possible for a seven year old phone. It needs to be able to attach to her wi-fi network, but I'm not sure I can do that if I'm not there in the room. 

Clare went to 'Amser Jazz' again late afternoon and returned in time for another remarkable, beautiful edition of 'Winterwatch'. There was a slow moving American movie set in the Depression years on BBC Four which I watched part of but gave up on before it finished. I had other things to do before bed.

Postal error compounded

A frosty start to the day, with bright sunshine. I woke up in time to post my Morning Prayer YouTube link to WhatsApp just before my phone notification sounded - a minor satisfaction. After breakfast a visit to Tesco Express to buy this week's food bank grocery offering before attending the Eucharist at St John's. Only five of us this morning. Icy pavements and car windscreens are a deterrent to the cautious. 

When I returned from church, the postman had already called with the small parcel containing Owain's Christmas present, sent us by Ann, as she didn't have his current address the day she was in a mail sending frenzy to bear pre-Christmas postal strikes. When it didn't arrive she checked at the sending office and had it confirmed that that parcel had yet to leave there. It went eventually, arriving about five weeks later, at a guess. It had a big postage stamp on it, the kind printed at the counter, and dated 6th December 2022, the day of posting. The edge of the label was wrinkled and degraded a little. Whoever handled it in Cardiff sorting office decided this parcel was wrapped in re-cycled brown paper from which an old stamp hadn't been removed, and imposed the postage charge again. Errors at both ends. I sent Ann a photo of the parcel plus the notification card left in our letter box, so she can use these to start a complaint.

For lunch I cooked a pork steak in the remains of yesterday's tomato sauce for myself, and a chunk of cod for Clare, plus veggies. She returned from a shopping trip to Cardiff Market with a large bag of fresh fish to keep in the freezer from Ashton's. Next month's supplies!

As EasyJet emailed me a check-in reminder this morning, I thought it would be a good idea to book a ticket for the direct coach to Bristol Airport. I walked to the ticket office in Sophia Gardens to renew my discount coach card, and a return ticket. Twenty five quid altogether, much the same as the cost of the train fare and airport shuttle from Temple Meads, and taking about the same amount of time without the need for a change of transport. Then I walked into town and had another look in the John Lewis Sale to see if there was any new potential bargain, but there was nothing of interest. 

I caught the 61 bus home. There were no buses waiting in Westgate Street, and when I was walking up to the next stop outside the Holiday Inn, a 61 passed me. I increased my pace, and when I rounded the corner saw the bus was still boarding passengers at the stop, I broke into a run for about thirty yards, and just made it as the doors were closing. Amazingly my injured ankle wasn't at all distressed by this, nor did it swell up later, so the last week's improvement is sustained, though I still need to be careful.

Clare went out to a Fountain Choir practice. I didn't think there was much point in learning music that I won't be around to sing, so I stayed in and saw 'Winterwatch' and another episode of 'Madame Blanc Mysteries' on telly. I found out when googling that although set in the South of France at a place called Ste Victoire, it was actually filmed in the Maltese Islands, mainly in Gozo with some lovely scenery. The setting of Ste Victoire in these ex-pat detective stories is fictitious portraying an inland village quite close to the sea. The real place of that name lies east of Aix en Provence, about 30 miles from the coast, at Marseille. The name belongs to a 1000m high rocky outcrop ten miles long west to east, known as the Montagne de Ste Victoire, a famed subject of Paul Cezanne's paintings. It has its amusing moments, but progresses with little tension or drama at a rather dull pace. Like other telly series about Brits abroad it fails to stimulate much interest. Soporific, if you want to go to bed straight after it. But on this occasion I decided to check in for next Thursday's flight and get my boarding pass before turning in for the night.

Phone woes and nature's healing

Another sub zero night, getting up late in bright sunshine. It was when I left the house after breakfast to go to the Eucharist at St Catherine's that I discovered there'd been flurries of snow earlier on, turning to rain as the temperature rose just above zero leaving a layer of slush on frosty ground. A potentially treacherous surface to walk on, so I had to tread with caution all the way to church and dare not hurry. I arrived several minutes late much to my annoyance. There were nine of us at the service and all but one stayed for a drink ans a chat in the hall afterwards.

No veggie bag to collect this week. It was raining lightly as I went to the GP surgery to collect my extra month's medication prescription for my time abroad, and took it to the pharmacy across the road. In the time I was waiting to collect it, the rain abated, so I didn't get wet, walking the rest of the way home. Clare was cooking a tofu stir-fry for lunch as I arrived, just in time to eat.

After lunch I completed work on the Lent Course for St Andrew's, getting into print read format, and sent it off to Caroling and Jen to look over.. It's taken a while to get it into shape. I look forward to see what response I'll get, whether or not it needs more work.

Then, I called my sister to sing her Happy (88th) Birthday. Her friend Elaine had already started to transfer the SIM card from June's old Nokia phone to the Samsung I sent, which arrived on Monday, but was having problems getting it to fit and to work. I think she succeeded in fitting it in the end, but I gave a strange error message for a Pay As You Go card - 'SIM locked'. It is possible to lock a phone and a SIM separately so the two can only be used together as when the original device was bought, but it's less than usual nowadays when SIMs can be bought without a phone and phones can be bought without a SIM and neither is locked.

I wondered if there was a solution which could be effected remotely, so I walked over to the Tesco Extra on Western Avenue when I knew there was a Tesco Mobile phone shop. June's phone had Tesco mobile PAYG SIM working in it, and was able to receive text messages, but won't work in the Samsung. I needed to ask if anything could be done about this. There was only one sales person in store and he'd just started with another customer, so I had to wait twenty minutes to be told nothing was possible without info that was written on the SIM and the phone. Elaine and I had already agreed that I should sort of the problem and so the phone will be mailed back to me tomorrow for troubleshooting. 

What a wretched nuisance, for such a simple routine task to be fraught with a mystifying complication. June isn't pleased, naturally, as it's something she was dreading have to get to grips with, but it was a necessity, as the Nokia isn't that easy to learn to use and remember how to use if you don't need to so often. An Android phone is easier as it can be set up for the simplest of uses, and gives easier to notice and read incoming messages.  It's a shame I hadn't thought to ask Elaine to remove the Tesco SIM and mail it to me to fit in the first place, then I could have set it up at home, ready for delivery in person or by mail. It will just take that much longer to sort out now.

My expectations weren't all that high of a quick answer, but I though it was better to find out before the phone and SIM card were posted back to me. It wasn't a wasted journey however, for on the approach to Blackweir Bridge going to the supermarket, I saw a circle of about fifty small birds feeding together in the grass near the path. Something disturbed them and they flew upwards in this formation, crossed over the double line of trees, and settled in the grass in much the same formation on the other side of the footpath to continue feeding. Initially I thought they were starlings, but their backs and wings weren't quite so dark. A few that I could see on the periphery of the flock had much lighter speckled breasts, but were too far away for me to photograph. They were smaller than starlings, and their flight formation was different, not as variable as that of starlings. 

I came to the conclusion they there were redstarts. They've arrived around this time of year, at least since I started noticing them first about five years ago, but in numbers of six to eight - one family perhaps. This is the largest number I've ever seen. I wonder how long they've been here and how long they'll stay. I believe they're migrants from the east, possibly Scandinavia, over-wintering here, but as for breeding here, I don't know whether they do or not.

After supper, two outstanding BBC telly programmes to lift the spirits - 'Winterwatch', showing otters, beavers, badgers, hares, and some amazing photos of raptors taken by enthusiastic viewers. There was also an interview with an a man who suffered badly from PTSD due to his service career, first as a soldier and then as a policeman, who'd got his life back from watching, then photographing garden birds, and moving on from there to walking the Cairngorms stalking and photographing mountain hares. He spoke about the healing power that wild nature had revealed to enable him to get his life back from the brink. This rang bells for me, having been close to burn-out several times in my life, and brought back to normality by time spent outdoors. Since I no longer have to work for a living, no day would be complete without a couple of hours spent outdoors, though preferably not in the rain, unless really necessary.

Then, my favourite science presenter Jim Al-Khalili, telling the story of the birth of astrophysics, and the discovery of Big Bang theory, conceived by Father George Lemaitre a Belgian academic in the Catholic University of Louvain in the 1920's. The concept contradicted the traditional notion that the universe is a stable constant entity, and was largely dismissed by academics, even by Einstein, whose Relativity theory Lemaitre had been working with. Hubble's astronomical observations didn't make sense unless traditional assumptions were questioned, and after several years, Lemaitre's work was found to interpret the findings in a way that made sense, and Einstein conceded that he'd been mistaken. By the time Lemaitre died in the early 1960s, new observational findings about the existence of background microwave radiation from the Big Bang proved Lemaitre's theory to be correct in reality. I wonder if he knew before he did that his work had been vindicated by actual evidence. Beautifully presented by Prof Jim, in some lovely surroundings, La Palma, and from La Saleve above Geneva, instantly recognisable. Ah! Most rewarding.

Parcel puzzle

As the air wasn't very damp there was only a light frost last night and it wasn't uncomfortably cold in bed, despite being sub-zero outside. After breakfast, there was an email from Ruth with next week's service texts, so I spent the morning recording and editing them together with my reflection for the week. Clare went to her study group in Penarth, and I had lunch cooked and ready by the time she returned.

As I was going down the lane after lunch on my way to shop at the Coop, I saw a youngish woman in front of me at a door which opens to the back yard of one of the houses in the street. She was bending over and I heard a clinking sound. She rose and hurried past me saying "Hi" awkwardly. When I looked at the doorway, there was an empty vodka bottle parked on the ground against the door. I wondered if she'd dumped it there on the way home because she didn't want to put it in her rubbish bin, perhaps to conceal her drinking habit. 

It's not the first time I've seen empty quarter and half sized vodka bottles dumped in the gutter along the lane, sometimes smashed, likewise cider bottles or beer cans. I assumed it was local under aged drinking lads on their way home or hanging out in a quiet spot. But this told a different story. On the way back from the Coop, I resolved to collect the bottle to put in our recycling bag, as our weekly collection is tomorrow. To my surprise, it had disappeared. I wondered if the woman had felt guilty and returned to pick it up.

I need to go into the Post Office and pay the postage on a package as yet to be delivered, as we received an official document in this morning's post about this. Neither of us has any idea what it might be, unless it's a missing Christmas present sent for Owain to our address by Ann. The strange thing is that she took it to a Felixstowe post office, early in December, and after Christmas when she realised it had not arrived when others she'd sent to us at the same time did arrive, she went to the same post office to enquire. Not only did she find the parcel hadn't been sent, but was shown the parcel by the counter clerk at the time. And that was weeks ago. I can't imagine that parcel not having stamps on it, either initially or the second time it was shown to her in the post office. We'll find out some time soon if the parcel delivered is the one she sent or some other. It's exceedingly odd.

When I was walking in Llandaff Fields later, I saw several other walkers making hands free phone calls using wireless earpieces, as is common practice. The joke used to be that you can't actually tell if people are having a phone conversation or talking to themselves out loud because they're crazy. It's interesting to observe people making calls, because intermittently they stare into the distance when listening, and when speaking may gesture with their hands as well. I saw one young woman smiling and looking around as she walked, and overheard her praying aloud joyfully. The light in someone's eyes that says they're praying, looking above and beyond. Someone talking to themselves seems focused internally, in their own world.

There are a few crocuses now in full flower, and the spread of snowdrops steadily enlarges on the verge by the Pontcanna Fields gate. A delight to see. The evening, I watched last night's episode of 'The Blacklist' and tonight's episode of 'Silent Witness' on catch-up, which is more convenient that watching things live as you can stop and start them whenever you want. It probably makes suspension of disbelief a bit harder, as you have time to ask yourself if you really understood the plot-line details, and sometimes it is hard to make sense of what is going on.

Real winter chill

Wonderful to wake up to sunshine and a clear blue sky. It stayed like that all day, just a few degrees above freezing. Housework as usual after breakfast, made more onerous by the vacuum cleaner losing suction power. It turned out that two of its sections weren't properly clipped together so the seal between the two components wasn't properly tight. Easily fixed once the problem was diagnosed. Also its roller brush was thickly wrapped around with strands of grey hair - mine rather than Clare's I reckon, as mine are longer!

After an early lunch of mussels with rice and veggies we drove to Rumney for a hairdressing session with Chris, both of us. I was thinking about having it cut short again, but relented when decision time came. It's enjoyable having such long hair, particularly in winter. I won't stop losing hair at my age, but it can be slowed down by proper maintenance Chris reckons. I defer to his skill and fifty years of hands-on experience as a master coiffeur.

I walked a mile up to the main road from his shop to the Post Office to mail a small birthday present to my sister while Clare was having her hair done. We learned that Martin is in Egypt for a month, and will then travel on to India, Sri Lanka and Oman before returning home. Chris is off to see his parents in Canada shortly. He said his parents will be celebrating their diamond wedding this year. An amazing couple. 

On the way back we called in the Dunelm Mill store on Newport Road, as Clare wanted to see if there was anything worth buying in their huge discount sale. She bought a new duvet cover at half price and we shared a teacake with a cup of coffee before re-joining the slow traffic queue across the city centre. Then I went out for a test walk in the dark, wearing my new long winter coat. It's going to be useful now that really cold weather is upon us.

After supper I wrote a short piece to introduce myself to chaplaincy members at St Andrew's Los Boliches, and sent it to Jen along with a new photo. I also put the finishing touches to a biblical reflection for Morning Prayer the day I leave for Spain. Then I watched this week's episode of 'Silent Witness', looking into the world of social media influencers after an unexplained death at a festival. The introduction of a profoundly deaf character communicating with sign language and contributing in an interesting way to the story development in this series is most interesting innovation.

Before turning in for the night, as the house was quiet, I recorded what I'd written earlier. The temperature outside, minus three.

Like an untitled art work

I got up in good time and was at St Catherine's to celebrate Mass at eight this morning. I was surprised and puzzled when nobody turned up, so I said Morning Prayer and went home for breakfast. It seems Francis and I had crossed wires in communicating with each other last night. I thought the monthly early service was on the third Sunday of the month when it's on the second. There is an early service in the Ministry Area this morning but it's at St David's Caerau, where I knew Frances was destined to spend the morning. I had to laugh about this, when I realised my mistake, but there's still a problem with integrating public in-line information about church services and activities. 

There's still no Ministry Area-wide website which isn't dependent on Facebook. Church Facebook info pages aren't always up to date or that well organised and over-reliant on Facebook presentation format. It fails to take account of the fact that not everyone is happy to subscribe to Facebook, which you must be, to access its content. Anyone logged in to Facebook has to put up with an annoying stream of notifications, from posts left by users you're 'friends' with. Getting rid of them all is no easy matter. 

There's a weekly digital news bulletin hosted by Microsoft's Sway software, which is kept up to date, but is available only to those on a circulation list. So neither of these are available public information in the true sense of the word. The situation is worsened by the absence of a current church notice board. The ones in the former Rectorial Benefice of Canton are still informing the world that Canon Mark Preece is in charge. He's been at the Cathedral four years! 

Information displayed about services out in the public realm can also become more out of date unless attention is paid to this matter. Nobody cares, since most people use Facebook is no excuse. It says to hell with people who are digitally excluded for whatever reason. If there's no up-to-date physical notice board outside a church stating what it is for and who it serves, it's just another building. Just as there is such ignorance about the content of the bible nowadays, so too there's ignorance about churches and other religious community buildings. A church without a functioning noticeboard is like a work of art without a title and attribution - just another artefact recognisable only to the initiated. 

After breakfast, I drove to St German's to celebrate the Eucharist. We were two dozen adults and three children. It was cold in church but the sun shone to cheer us up. Sad to thin that I won't be back here until Low Sunday. I shall really miss them all. It's funny that in many churches where I have ministered I feel as if I am carrying the congregation, whereas at St German's I feel they are carrying me. I guess that's why I enjoy serving there so much.

It was nearly half past one by the time I got home afterwards, as I chatted with several people in church and over coffee before leaving. Fortunately, Clare had only just starting eating lunch without me. Then we went out for a walk around Bute Park. I was surprised to discover how far I walked altogether today, seven miles and found that it was on our family Boxing Day hike that I last walked further. This month I've been walking about a mile less than my daily average, as much due to horrible weather as to the ankle injury.

I spent the evening watching 'Mystery Road', and then this week's episode of Happy Valley on iPlayer and by ten I was tired enough to turn in for the night.

Singing in Llantwit again

A rather quick everyday breakfast this morning, as we had to collect Mother Frances at nine fifteen and drive to Llantwit Major for a choir rehearsal. It was meant to be a recording session for the music we sang in Advent, but the sound technician was unwell. Instead much time was spent organising rehearsals for the next concert on Palm Sunday. Neither Clare nor I will be able to sing in it as we're in Spain, but we went along for the pleasure of a singing with others and learning some new Early Music, from the Holy Week repertoire. 

The skies were overcast and it threatened to rain, but didn't fortunately. Frances needed to get back for an afternoon of work, so we didn't stay for a pub lunch of fish and chips, as we did previously. We resolved to but some when we reached Canton, but found both our local chippies were closed. Instead, we bought cod and oven chips to cook at home, with peas from the freezer. The fish was actually much nicer pan fried without the heaviness of batter.

Afterwards, I went out for a walk in the park and down the the River, which was up again by half a metre and was probably higher and just overflowing earlier in the day, judging by the presence of riverside pools of water. It rained in the night, and I suspect may have rained much more, nearer the Taff source in the Brecon Beacons. Even more rain is promised tonight, although it held off during the day, giving way to a strong cold wind. I was in the last quarter of a mile on the way home when there was a sudden short burst of heavy rain, though not enough the soak me through fortunately.

By chance, when I was going my daily DuoLingo Spanish exercises I came across a link to the DuoLingo podcast series, which I first discovered a couple of years ago but lost track of or didn't have time to pursue after listening to a dozen or so episodes. This prompted me to download the Google podcast app so that I could subscribe to the series of over 120 episodes and have them listed conveniently to take up on while I am travelling or waiting for something to happen. They are very interesting, varied in content and also in tSpanish stories from different countries, told in the accent of the place. I should have done this ages ago.  

Tomorrow is the Sunday in the month with an 8.00am Communion at St Catherine's, and it's a busy day for Mother Frances, with a Ministry Area conference in the afternoon, so I offered to take the service instead of her. Just as well there's nothing compelling to watch on telly tonight, so I can get to bed early. 

More digital dolor

Early rain gave way to a clear blue sky and sunshine, but I found myself stuck in front of the computer and uploading verification documents to the Credas website yet again, as it wasn't able to recognise perfectly legible pictures of my passport scanned properly, or so it said, demanding a a driving license copy and a detailed latest bank statement as well. Fortunately Santander's on-line system did deliver this without full when I'd logged in. As for the driving license, I had difficulty in finding out exactly where and how to do  this. I selected the correct document, but the photo got uploaded to the passport section. It's not as smart as it thinks it is. It ruined my morning having to kowtow to this monster. It's de-humanising us by reducing us to a digital data stream. 

A man was interviewed on the lunchtime news about a ransomware attack on a group of London schools serving a deprived area, describing the games played by Russian cyber criminals to extort money from the organisation. It seems that the entire school organisation was attached to the same digital infrastructure network platform, not only containing personal and financial information, but controlling electronic doors and security cameras. The idolisation of our technological capabilities, making the world totally dependent on them is now showing its ability to destroy its worshipper. What fools we are to have let this happen.

I wiped my old Samsung phone and packed it up so that Clare could post it for me to my sister June when she went out to post other parcels. Her friend Elaine will hopefully switch the SIM from the Nokia phone she finds hard to master to this Android phone. All so that she can receive SMS messages easily to confirm payments, deliveries and receive messages from the GP surgery. Given the weather and transport chaos at the moment, getting to and from London in a say to do this in person is rather daunting, unfortunately. I hope this will not be too scary for her to engage with. She already has a Samsung tablet, so it shouldn't be that foreign a device to get used to.

The death of my friend Chris was announced in this week's diocesan newsletter. I hunted on the diocesan website for his wife Bev's contact details, but couldn't make the search facility work. Odd. I tried the Church in Wales Provincial website and initially had the same problem. More by luck than skill, I was able to find the clergy database and what I needed to be able to email her. 

A parcel arrived for me from my sister June containing a lovely warm comfortable fleece. It'll definitely be coming with me to Spain, where it can get quite cold at night, even on the coast. I cooked prawns for lunch in time for Clare to arrive home, then had a snooze in the chair, feeling a little depleted by an aggravating morning. Owain has it worse. He's moving out of his flat today, back into the house he used to share. And he's working from home. And he too is struggling to upload documents to the same Credas website. Enough to drive a man crazy.

I walked to Blackweir and found that the river level had dropped by a metre over 24 hours, still it's higher than average, but the flood water on the playing fields has drained away almost entirely. This is good news as it means the remedial work on clearing the river bank and bed has withstood the crucial stress test. I crossed over the bridge and walked down the other side through Bute Park. Annoyingly the gate was padlocked shut at about three thirty. There is a stile at one side, but in the few moments while I was there, a Deliveroo cyclist with an electric bike arrived, then another cyclist, and a woman with child in a push chair. I helped them get their means of transport over the stile, and walked on. 

Out of curiosity I walked to the Castle grounds gatehouse at the far end. The big gates were closed by the small door alongside was still open with people both leaving and still entering Bute Park. For students and work commuters this route from Castle Street to Western Avenue is frequented all day until early evening after dark by cyclists and walkers. It seems unreasonable to me to close the gates furthest away first and obliging all users to climb the stile. There are no proper warning notices at the Castle Street gate to deter cyclists. It's even worse for people with mobility issues. It seems like a policy poorly thought through. 

Clare had gone out to 'Amser Jazz' at the Royal Welsh College by the time I got back, and returned just as I was finishing supper. I spent a couple of hours watching an episode of 'Madame Blanc Mysteries' and then 'The Blacklist', as confusing and mystifying as ever. This was episode 16 of the current series. IMDB tells me there are 168 episodes. Will the storyline never wrap up? Unbelievable, never ending inconsequential twaddle.

Loss of an old friend

By the time 'Thought for the Day' was on the radio, my weekly video Morning Prayer upload was posted to the church WhatsApp. Then I got up and made breakfast. A bright start to the day but clouds and rain soon returned, with a strong wind too. I think it rained for much of the night too. I went to St John's for the Eucharist, calling into Tesco's on my way to buy food bank contributions, and just making it to church as Mother Francis started. Through the prayers I learned that Fr Chris Reaney, a friend of mine for the past forty years has recently died. We had a chat over coffee together in town just before Christmas and I thought he was looking better than the previous time we met. It comes as a shock. He's only just 65. 

Back in the eighties, he and his wife Bev were members of a USPG Root Group, a sort of missionary cell of people living and working together and helping the church in the Rhondda to grow its community. He went on to train for ordination, and Bev followed him to ordination later once the church decided to admit women to the priesthood. He was always a humble quiet grassroots pastor, at home in a poor Parish. Sadly the Bishop under-valued him because he had long term health issues, and he was pushed into retiring early last year, as part of a ministry area re-formation plan and was still finding his feet and thinking about what to do next. I think he was very poorly treated. May he rest in peace and rise in glory.

After the service, I walked down to Pontcanna Fields, and found that the Taff has breached its banks again, as it did the year before last, water spilling out from just behind Blackweir bridge into the fields behind to the left and the right of it. Last year the river banks were cleared of vegetation and some work was done on clearing the islands of pebbles that accumulate in the river bed just below the weir, but evidently not enough. The water level this time around is higher and may be backing up and overflowing at this spot simply because of the volume of flow. As the water was ankle deep on the path so I couldn't risk going through it to reach the river. Water was flowing across the fields in the same direction of flow as the river, and pouring over the path and down the banking. There'll be more rain. Will it go any higher I wonder?

I returned home after squelching through waterlogged turf, just in time for lunch. Afterwards, I completed and edited next week's Morning Prayer video, and the stitched together the video clips I'd taken of the Taff and uploaded them to YouTube

After supper I watched the final episode of 'Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy', then took a call from Owain about the demand from the mortgage finance people for a picture of my bank statement which had more detail about the bank account number showing, to meet their criteria for correctness, Both Owain and I weren't happy about this and earlier in the day he spoke with the head of the verification body, who explained this was a requirement under anti-money laundering regulations. But he conceded it was not obligatory for the entire account number to be shown, just the first half of the eight digit number. OK, I suppose, like they do on debit card purchase receipts. So I had to rescan the latest bank statement and edit the image accordingly a fiddly job which took ages.

I'm still not happy about the stringency of this requirement. Money laundering is happening on a vast scale around the world involving property bitcoin and finds ways to elude banking safeguarding. I see why it's thought to be necessary, but given there is so much information about private individuals available on-line, it can't be that difficult to establish a personal profile of someone non-intrusively which indicates the extent of the personal resources and whether or not they are in a position to guarantee delivery of a sum of money adequate to pay a mortgage deposit. If someone sets out to deceive they may well find ways to do this anyway.  How can you prove you're trustworthy, that you life truthfully in a culture that is habitually distrustful in the name of safeguarding. What a horrible world we've created to inhabit. It has the Mark of the Beast all over it.

Home opportunity

A sunny start to the day but by the time I walked to St Catherine's for the Eucharist, it was overcast and began to rain steadily until after sunset. There were eight of us for the service and some old friends of Hilary and Clive turned up in the hall afterwards with their daughter and grand daughter. It turned out that Paul had taught the daughter in Llandaff Primary school twenty five years ago, so there was a surprising little reunion over coffee. I got soaked afterwards walking in the rain to collect this week's veggie bag, but was cheered when I got in to find Clare cooking fresh sardines for lunch. That's something I look forward to eating fresh from the sea when I'm in Fuengirola.

I received a WhatsApp message from eye surgeon Andrew on mission in Malawi with a photo of him and his surgical team visiting Manchinga District Hospital for a 'cataract camp, an hour and a half's journey from his working base in Malawi. Taking precision surgery to a remote area when people are reluctant or unable to travel to a urban medical centre is a remarkable challenge to achieve. I was certainly privileged to have him take my cataract away.

After lunch I worked on next week's Morning Prayer and Reflection and later went out for a walk as the sun was setting and the rain abating. Then there was a special task to do.

Since his first attempt to buy a place of his own foundered, Owain has made progress recently on the purchase of a two bedroom flat in Easton. His offer has been accepted by the vendor for his half share in a co-ownership housing association deal. We promised to help him by funding the deposit. The building society providing the mortgage demands certification of the funding promised, and this in turn requires an on-line identity check to match the bank statement and passport photocopy. 

It was quite a rigorous process run by an organisation called 'Credas', and not exactly user friendly, involving face recognition, comparing one's passport photo with a two photos taken live within minutes of each other, one in passport mode and the other with a hand on top of the head to prove the subject is alive! Not impossible to fake, but quite an effort to be convincing. I found this harder than DVB safeguarding or gov.uk i/d registration checks, but it's done now and hopefully this will facilitate the next steps Owain will have to make to complete the deal. 

After supper I carried on watching several episodes of Alec Guinness' masterly 'Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy' on iPlayer, but I'm keeping the final episode until tomorrow night!

Zooming with the team

The sound of drilling came in from the street when I was getting up late this morning. A road repair team had arrived to work on the sink-hole in the middle, six inches deep and two feet across, above the line of the 125 year old sewer running down the street. Once every two years over the past decade the sink hole has appeared and been repaired, either patched with tarmac or dug out then filled in and tarmacked over again. The sewer doesn't appear to have collapsed, but changes in the water table have had an impact on the surface layer, causing it to sink. I chatted with the guys doing the job, and was told that the sinking subsoil problem was likely to be due to the wrong qualities of material, gravels of different sizes and sub soil being used in appropriate thicknesses to ensure it doesn't compress in places and produce sink-holes. We'll see if this is correct in year or so from now.

After breakfast, Clare's study group arrived for their two hour session at ten while I continued working on the Lent course until lunch. I did the week's shopping at the Co-op, after lunch, and then at three joined the St Andrew's ministry team meeting on Zoom. It was good to see Caroline and Peter on screen, two team members I worked with on my first visit to the Costa del Sol West Chaplaincy nine years ago. There's also John a retired cleric and his churchwarden wife Jen and William, a curate in training, being supervised by Fr Louis in Malaga but living and officially attached to St Andrew's Los Boliches. It's great that a monthly ministry rota is still organised, and good to see my name on it, so that I can plan well ahead.

I went out for a walk after the forty minute meeting, and hadn't gone a mile before started drizzling and then raining lightly, enough to soak my shoes and trousers by the time I got home again. Clare went out to her meditation group at six and I had supper on my own. Afterwards, I watched one of Michael Portillo's Great Railway Journeys series on Indian railways - fascinating. Then an ancient episode of Dalziel and Pascoe I'd not seen before. Well, it makes a change.

Feeling the cold

A bright clear sky sunny start to the day. Housework as usual on Mondays after breakfast. I then continued working on talks to go with the Lent programme and Clare cooked lentil curry for lunch. A cold wind blew when I went out for an afternoon walk. It was seven degrees but felt much closer to zero. Only when I felt chilled did I remember that I bought a new long winter overcoat a few weeks ago but it's not been hanging on the coat rack but the space under the stairs, Out of sight, out of mind. I'd better move it!

I checked the progress of the snowdrops on the avenue through Pontcanna Fields. More are emerging now, including several small clumps of them, as opposed to single ones. I met Gareth from St Catherine's with his wife Irene on the path by the Taff, and learned that they're going to be in Fuengirola while we're there. They're keen about taking their daily paseo so no doubt we'll see them out and about unless they come to church first.

Clare had a visit from Diana while I was out and they talked until it was nearly seven. Meanwhile, I tidied one of my Google photos accounts and archived a few gigabytes of locum photos to an archive hard drive. It's a fiddly process and takes time. It's the sort of thing you can occupy yourself with when you've nothing better to do and are avoiding concentrating on work.

After supper I watched this week's double episode of 'Silent Witness' back to back on my laptop, as Clare was watching something else on telly. Despite the heating being on, I found the middle room chilly, so I put on my new overcoat for the duration. It's just right to wear when sitting around and just watching.

An unusually complex case about 'county lines' drug running recruitment and people moving illegally across borders both ways, for reasons of than exploitation. Complex, and hard to follow. So many people, so many twists and turns in the story it was hard to follow. So many long chase sequences on foot that could be cut out and save ten minutes air time, while compressing the story-line un-necessarily in others. Rather odd really. Nice to go to sleep under a clear sky with a waning wolf moon visible high above.

Choral Sunday

Before getting up this morning I listened to BBC's Sunday Worship programme which came from Lviv in Ukraine, where Orthodox Christmas is being celebrated, according to the Old Julian Calendar, as is still the custom in Slavic Orthodoxy. Greek, Romanian and Bulgarian Orthodox use the contemporary calendar and make something special of the 7th January as the Feast of Christ's Baptism. Interestingly Bulgarian Orthodox, although culturally Slav follow the Western, rather than the Eastern Church calendar. It was lovely to hear Ukrainian carols and hymns being sung, with some beautiful prayers and reflection on the importance of celebrating Christ's birth despite the war.

After breakfast I drove to St Edward's to celebrate the Eucharist, expecting to observe the Feast of Christ's Baptism, so that was the focus of my sermon. After the service started I discovered that the service sheet of the day had the readings for Friday's Feast of the Epiphany. Too late to change it, so I had to ad lib the first part of my sermon and excuse myself for the confusion. Thankfully, it was well received in any case. And the Eucharist itself was very nicely sung by the choir of eight.

It seems the Church in Wales calendar allows for option of moving the Feast of Epiphany to the nearest Sunday as commonly happens with Ascension and All Saints these days. Clare said that Epiphany was observed in St Catherine's as well. I'm not sure there was a Mass in the parish on Friday Epiphany Day. Step by step we're losing the habit of putting on weekday festive celebrations. Encouraging the faithful to make the effort to turn out for them is an effort fewer want to invest in. 

I got back for lunch at one. Afterwards, Clare was getting ready to welcome her study group, so I walked to the Cathedral for three thirty Evensong. A notice board outside stated that there'd be a Sung Eucharist at four. I went inside and listen to the choir rehearse, intending to leave before the service started, as I'd been to the Eucharist of the day already. Then Father Mark arrived and came over to greet me. He reassured me that it was going to be Evensong after all, so I stayed for the service and so glad that I did. Two beautifully sung Anglican services in one day. It's a rarity these days.

After supper, two programmes worth watching - a new episode of 'Call the Midwife' and of 'Happy Valley' back to back. Then, I spent an hour working on the Lent study series which I'm writing on the Psalms of Lament to use at St Andrews Los Boliches before turning in for the night. It would be good if I can present the scheme proprly at tomorrow Zoom meeting.

Andalusia in view

A splendid Saturday breakfast of waffles with marmalade, chocolate sauce, mashed bananas and sunflower seed puree this morning to cheer a damp and cloudy day, though there was the odd break when the sun broke through the gloom for a while. While Clare baked carrot cake, I got on with recording and editing this Thursday's Morning Prayer audio, remembering  Aelred of Hexham a 12th century Cistercian monk whose treatise on Friendship is regarded as a spiritual classic. 

I was interested to learn that his father had been a priest, celibacy wasn't yet obligatory in Britain it seems., but in his father's lifetime a conciliar edict banned sons of clergy from ordination disqualifying them from inheriting a living or property. The work-around solution was for a cleric to bequeath his entitlements to a nephew instead - from which we get the term 'nepotism'. Anyway, Aelred became a lay monk. His ministerial gifts were soon recognised and he rose to the office of Abbot, for which he wasn't obliged to be ordained priest. Communities were more flexible about who could occupy leadership roles back then.

After lunch, I continued recording and editing the accompanying reflection which has some relevance to the episcopal election retreat which will be taking place when the link to today's video upload to YouTube is posted on WhatsApp. With tomorrow's sermon completed and printed out. A message came into from Caroline, the Lay Reader at St Andrew's Fuengirola, inviting me to join their pastoral team meeting on Zoom this Tuesday afternoon. I'm please about this as it will give me an opportunity to meet everyone and receive a briefing from them before I arrive, which is very valuable.

About an hour before sunset we went for a walk down to the river, inspecting early snowdrops and single crocus on our way. Rain kept threatening but never really got past a slight drizzle, though the west wind felt colder than it really was, still around eight degrees, not the usual two degrees for early January. After so many days of rain level of the Taff continues to run within inches of the footpath. I'm not sure if it's still rising or receding.

After supper a lovely programme about the way Andalusia has inspired some great 20th century writers like Frederico Garcia Lorca, Earnest Hemingway, Laurie Lee, and ex pop musician Chris Stewart, whose best selling books about dropping out and living the good life in a remote farmstead in the Alpujarras led to programme presenter Richard E Grant paying him a visit for an interview, with much talk about local food and recipes thrown in. This certainly added to my excitement about this next spell of locum duty.

Then a double episode of Australian crimmie series 'Mystery Road', very slow moving and raw, with spectacular rural landscapes which seem to swallow up signs of human activity in its vastness. The dialogue is sparse, often crude, almost boring at this pace. It takes time just to get used to it, and that doesn't mean to say it's all that good a story in the end. Like other series in which the landscape seems to play as important a part as the characters.

Operation Marmalade - phase three

The day started with a clear blue sky with some beautiful red orange and yellow clouds along the horizon  at sunrise - shepherd's warning. By midday it clouded over completely again. Clare had an appointment at the School of Optometry at ten thirty, so I drove her over to Cathays. Came straight home to begin phase three of Operation Marmalade. I went to the greengrocers and bought a couple of pounds of oranges and a lemon and had them stewing in the pressure cooker by the time she returned  home. I cooked a butter bean and veggie sauce to go with pasta for lunch, then went to the Co-op to buy a couple of kilos of sugar for jam making, and a couple of tubes of tomato paste which I'd forgotten to buy last time I went to the shops.

I set out across Llandaff Fields to inspect the progress of the early snowdrop and crocus crop and when I was as far from shelter as I could get, the rain finally started, fortunately not too heavy. I took a few photos and then returned home. More snowdrop heads are visible, and just one crocus has a fully formed flower in the stretch of grass under the trees at the gate entrance to Pontcanna Fields. Looking at photos taken in this same place in the first week of the year several times told me that this year's crop isn't more advanced than previous colder years. It's been wet recently, but I can remember even wetter starts to the New Year.

Clare was cutting up and de-pipping the fruit when I got home, and with sugar and water added, soon batch number three was reaching boiling point. By the time we sat down to supper it reached setting point and had been transferred to jars, six altogether, as I'd bought a couple fewer oranges than I thought. Never mind, we have twenty four jars to see us through the year! The Seville bitter orange season is quite short, so we're not alone in benefiting from this brief window of opportunity. If we had more jars we could do another batch, but we're out of spare jars now.

I spent part of the evening decanting large photos from my main Google photos account to a hard drive archive, as the free account storage is eighty percent full, not surprisingly given the number for photos that I take. Then an interesting documentary about the art and work of David Bowie on BBC Four. To hear him reflecting when interviewed over the years on his journey of self discovery through creativity. "I just spent all those years learning to be somebody." Food for thought. 

My turn to make marmalade

Back to being damp and overcast today. I woke up as my phone reminded me to post the link to Morning Prayer for today. After breakfast a walk to St John's to celebrate the Eucharist with seven others, and pray for Pope Benedict as his funeral proceeded in Rome. After a cup of coffee and a chat, a quick trip to Tesco to buy some tins of butter beans, then home to prepare lunch, and make ready the next batch of marmalade oranges and lemons for cooking. 

I snoozed in the chair for an hour and then went into town, walking part of the way and taking the bus to hasten my arrival. Another visit to John Lewis' to check out a potential sale bargain travel camera, but on inspection I realised it didn't have quite the specifications I need to replace my damaged HX90. Ah well, keep on looking I suppose.

As I was walking up Westgate Street on my way to the bus stop outside the Holiday Inn, I noticed dozens of taxis parked along the other side of the road. I wondered what exodus after a big event they were waiting for. Then one by one they began to sound their horns. Other taxis went past in procession, also honking their horns and I noticed that many were flying a Unite Trade Union pennant from a window. The penny dropped. It was a protest action. There was a similar one held a month ago. The concern being voiced seems to be about taxi licensing fee reductions for electric car owners, an incentive to owners to upgrade their vehicles. Well intended, but many self employed taxi owners cannot afford to buy a new vehicle and end up being unable to continue earning a living this way, as their running costs are higher. Greening the economy isn't always as simple as we'd wish it to be.

After supper, I extracted all the pips from the cooked oranges and lemons, chopped them all up, added the required amount of water and an amount of sugar less that the recipe requires, so that the jam wouldn't be too sweet to taste, and boiled the lot for over two hours to reduce the mixture to a right consistency. I had to keep an eye on it throughout, so I sat at the kitchen table and watched the first two episodes of another series of 'Madam Blanc Mysteries' on Channel five, rather lightweight sometimes comic amateur sleuthing stories set in the ex-pat community in Provence. Well, it helped to pass the time. Check and stir every time the ads come up. Another eight jars of marmalade produced!

First of the year

Thankfully, a day without rain, a little colder due to a wind from the west, but not as cold. From Poland to Spain average temperatures are being recorded ten degrees higher than we'd expect for early January. Very much a symptom of global warming. After breakfast I walked to St Catherine's to celebrate the Eucharist with five others, and then chat over a cuppa in the church hall afterwards. No veg bag to collect this week, so I went straight home and shared cooking lunch with Clare, as she'd bought me some pork loin steaks to prepare in whatever way I fancied. I stewed them slowly with tomatoes and onions and was pleased with the result.

She returned home with the first three kilos of organic bitter oranges from Seville for this year's first batch of marmalade. Later in the day she cooked and de-pipped them and cooked them until they were jam consistency, eight bitter-sweet jars worth! It'll be my turn next to make the second batch.

John at Pidgeons called about a funeral for the 27th of this month, which I won't be able to do as by then I will be in Fuengirola re-orienting myself for the weeks to come

I went out for a walk afterwards, retracting my steps from two days ago to check if any of the new growth of winter flowers had emerged any further. I found a few scattered snowdrops with buds on slender stems just about to open, also one narcissus in bud but not about to flower. 

Not quite as early as last year judging by a photo I took on the second of January last year, but still a couple of weeks earlier than expected. Lots of fresh grass growth is visible in places, pushing up through the brown layer of dead leaves, and there were a few hazel branches with tiny catkins on them as well.

On the way out of Llandaff Fields at the end of my walk, a man was standing outside Cafe Castan in its sheltered space juggling with coloured plastic balls which lit up - a striking sight. He said that he'd worked as a juggler over the years and now taught juggling and circus skills to children. I tried taking photos of him juggling but wasn't pleased with the result with my Sony Alpha DSLR on auto-setting in poor light, I didn't know how to adjust the shutter and ISO speed manually on the spot, and in the end attempted to take some video clips instead. With these I got this result after editing two clips together with MS Clipchamp. It's the first time I've used this camera's video capability since I bought it six years ago next week.

After supper and the Archers, I couldn't find anything of interest to watch on telly, and spent the rest of the evening just sitting quietly and pondering.

Unlikely story

I work up to another disappointing day of non-stop rain. After breakfast, I worked on a biblical reflection for next week's Morning Prayer offering, and then cooked paella for lunch. I haven't done that for a while. I ran out of pimenton dulce, and decided to go into town and buy some at Wally's delicatessen, to have something to motivate me to put my waterproofs on and get out of the house. I took the bus part of the way, but still got very wet. Wally's was out of pimenton dulce, so I had a fruitless journey. 

I visited John Lewis' to see if there was anything of interest in the January sales, but saw nothing. I was amused to see the SD card equivalent which I bought yesterday at Tesco's at more than twice what I paid for it. I hung around looking at things until my rain coat dried out, then headed out into to rain and got wet again, taking the bus over to Canton from the Holiday Inn and walking the rest of the way.

In the evening I watched the first double episode of the new season 26 of 'Silent Witness'. A rather over dramatised complex detective story with lots of forensics in it presented more like a spy thriller. The story hinged around the identity of a top officer in the National Crime Agency being a child of the Italian n'Drangeta crime cartel, corrupting and diverting investigations from above. 

It's so implausible to even consider that the female culprit's origins wouldn't be meticulously vetted by MI5 before getting a job in an anti-terror agency. Unless that's a forensic investigation tale for later in the series. Any silly idea is up for grabs in a way out series like this, as has been seen in the past. The story was weird enough but, too much of the final minutes of this story were shot in semi darkness obscuring the outcome in a confusing way. I hope this trend doesn't persist.

By the time it was over it had stopped raining for the day, more or less, so I went out for another half hour walk in the park to get some late night fresh air, and then head for bed.

Tale of two crashes in one hour

A welcome return to blue skies today, but cold weather is on the way it seems. Housework after breakfast, then time spent investigating the hard drive from Rhiannon's defunct computer. I was already aware that  she'd taken a lot of photos, since she first had a pocket camera of her own, but the 43GB size of the folder puzzled me. When I looked inside just one sub-folder within, I discovered that mixed with the photos are dozens of video clips, experiments in telling stories, performing with friends. It helps explain her ambition to work in the movie industry both sides of the camera.

After lunch, I decided to go to the big Tesco on Western Avenue to buy a memory stick or card big enough to hold all the files, and a new wireless mouse. I have two dead ones waiting to be recycled, plus a wired mouse of great age which works but only just, as its scrolling wheel doesn't do what I expect it to. 

On the way into Llandaff Fields, I noticed a car perched precariously on the pedestrian traffic island refuge close to the bus stop. It had rounded the bend in the road too fast to notice or avoid it, and demolished the lane warning sign. In fact, the car was perched atop the remains of the post on which the sign was displayed. It may have happened shortly before I arrived. The police hadn't arrived, nor a tow truck. A few people were standing around looking or taking photos.  I guess the driver wasn't injured, well, I hope so.

When I got to Western Avenue, I made a made a brief diversion through the gates to Pontcanna Fields to check if there were any snowdrops or crocuses out today, as there were on this day last year. Lots of green shoots - snowdrops, crocus, even narcissii, but not a single bud or flower yet, but maybe later this week?

As it turned back on to the main road I caught sight of two uniformed policemen with hi-viz vests on in the vicinity of the riverside path, probably part of the search team looking for a local man reported missing on Saturday night causing worry as he hadn't taken vital medication with him. Then I heard a metallic crunch followed another from the middle of the road. I turned to see a car travel along the raised central central reservation, having demolished a sign and a bollard, just rolling to a halt, bumping into a lamp post crunching the front end of the car. I turned back to see, and it wasn't clear if the driver had escaped quickly or was slumped over the wheel. Three young women ran across the road dodging cars to see if they could help, and then within a minute the two cops had sprinted from the edge of the riverside path to see what help was needed. Within another couple of minutes two more cops from the search team arrived. I noticed the car's airbag hadn't deployed, and still have no clue about what happened to the driver. Within twenty five minutes an ambulance was arriving, from the Heath A&E a mile away weaving its way through the traffic tail-back the accident caused. 

I went on my may to Tesco's bought what I needed and was passing the accident site a quarter of an hour later. Already a tow truck was on the scene removing the vehicle. The truck driver found the car's front suspension and engine still worked, and reversed it up the ramp. I noted that he looked in the boot first and took a photo of whatever was or wasn't inside, a good way to refute spurious allegations about the content after the car was handed back to the owner. The entire incident was over in an hour. Except for replacing the obliterated road signage!

How did this happen. It seems as if the driver, if not taken sick at the wheel, may have lost control for a few moments on approaching the raised section of the central reservation. It stands just after the bridge over Taff, where the road bends ever so slightly, and at this time of day and year the sun is just above the horizon at the far end of the next stretch of road, capable of blinding the unwary or inexperienced driver. At such a moment, the involuntary gesture of shielding ones eyes, or reaching for the sun visor might be enough to cause enough of a swerve to mount the central reservation kerb as the driver struggled to regain control. It could happen to anyone. Thankfully no other car was involved. Thankfully there were cops on the ground for once to take charge and call in emergency support.

I returned home with a new wireless mouse and a 128gb mini SD card, the kind you can put in a phone if its SIM tray has a second slot. It cost £35, five quid off. After supper, I transferred 80+gb of data from the rescued hard drive on to the card without a hitch. It took the best part of an hour, while I watched the first episode of series three of 'Happy Valley' on iPlayer. The new Chromebook Rhiannon had for Christmas has a mini SD card slot so she can have this archive of all her work available on her new laptop, and have nearly 40gb free storage too. I was quite pleased that it worked out so easily. Then Clare and I watched an fascinating interview with Michael Jayston one of the actors who worked with Alec Guinness on the first serialised version of 'Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy'. This was a prelude to a re-run of the first two of seven episodes of the 1979 series. Such wonderful acting, such perfect diction. Needless to say, bed late. 

Viennese New Year

A bright blue sky greeted me when I got up this morning. On my drive across town to celebrate Mass at St German's I was delighted to find the New Year's Day concert from Vienna being broadcast live. Such a cheery start to the day. We were two dozen of us celebrating the Naming and Circumcision of Jesus, and in honour of the 250 anniversary of the first occasion when John Newton's anthemic hymn 'Amazing Grace', we sang it just after I preached, mentioning it in conclusion. 

An unscheduled hymn was slipped in at the last moment at my request, having climbed up the long narrow staircase to the organ loft to ask Brian the organist if we could do this. As the readings were shorter than usual, the extra hymn didn't lengthen the service which normally lasts about one hour and fifteen minutes. As I left church and drove home for lunch, the Vienna concert was just coming to its conclusion with the traditional Radetzky March, accompanied by audience hand clapping led by the conductor. A great start to New Year's Day.

By the time we'd finished lunch and I'd had a short snooze, the sky had clouded over. I set out for a good long walk in the park, and slowly it began raining,, building up the further away from home I was. A wind blew in from the west making it fell much colder than the actual twelve degrees. With trees now stripped of leaves there was nowhere to shelter, so my feet and legs got soaked. In the end I gave up and headed for home in a moment when the rain eased off, feeling very frustrated and annoyed with myself for failing to check the weather before leaving.

After supper we watched a programme on BBC Wales in which Welsh presenter Huw Edwards reviewed the development of the movement for Welsh independence over the past thirty years, following its rather cranky start in the sixties with the short lived Free Wales Army creating a media fuss, while real action in the shape of the Gymdeithas yr Iaith's success in political campaigning for Welsh language equality led to equal status for Welsh and English in government communications and bilingual road signs, and then the establishment of the Welsh Assembly government in 1999. 

It took a while for it to develop and legislate on a range of issues relevant to Welsh life in education, health, agriculture and social issues but its credibility gained impressively in the way devolved health policy dealt with the covid pandemic, steering the course differently from the Westminster government, and to good effect. Through practical measures a strong case has been made for greater autonomy. The notion of complete independence is to my mind wishful thinking, but moving closer toward a national self governing federation with common foreign policy, law enforcement and state security seems reasonable to discuss if not aim for in future. Many young people seem to feel positive about such a change, although I doubt if many realise how complex further steps towards that measure of devolution would be, especially when it comes to economic affairs, give that so much of Wales's capital wealth has been expatriated over past centuries. Let's see first how far Scotland's independence movement in achieving its aims.

After this thought provoking programme, back to Vienna for a repeat of this morning's broadcast concert on telly and radio. Two hours of delightful music with some beautiful ballet performances to concert music shot on location, and an appearance by the thirty strong Vienna boys choir augmented by ten girls of the the Vienna girls choir, met by rapturous applause from the audience. I couldn't help wondering how the two hour live concert programme was broadcast with the midway interval of another twenty minutes omitted. Mention was made by Petroc Trelawney the Radio Three presenter of there being a shorter first half. I guess the first half was recorded, then played back with a delay of twenty minutes to fit nicely with start of the second half, broadcast completely live. Often during concert intervals there are interviews with performers. It may have happened for the Austrian broadcast audience, but either to expensive to arrange or demanding on the programming schedule to be worth bothering with.

After the recorded version finished at ten, I went for a walk around the park as the rain had stopped and I needed fresh air. Lovely music echoed in my mind as I walked. A great way to pass the first day of a new year, despite the rain.