Wet Saturday

Back to gray skies and torrential rain again today. We woke up and had our pancake breakfast late, then with nothing better to do, went back to bed for a late, lazy lie-in, until eleven. Clare was keen for me to try out an armchair in John Lewis' as we're thinking of replacing one of our unsatisfactory sofas with separate chairs. So we took the 63 bus into town, all dressed up in our rain-gear, and visited John Lewis' furniture department. Outdoors it was cold and drizzling. In the store on the third floor, it was pretty warm, dressed for the street as we were. 

After a satisfactory inspection of the armchair - fabric colour to be decided next week, we headed for home. Clare caught the bus and I walked along the river. There must have been heavy rain in the Brecon Beacons overnight, as the water level was up about a metre from yesterday, just covering the fish ladder on the weir. Lunch was ready by the time I reached home, curried prawns with rice and Swiss chard.

Earlier in the day, I exchanged messages with Emma who hasn't yet fully recovered from laryngitis which little Ned brought home from nursery. I offered to spare her voice by preaching and reading the Gospel and intercessions if needs be, and she agreed. We'll be at St Luke's together tomorrow. After lunch I wrote the sermon, reflecting on the meaning of the phrase 'Abide in me.' I enjoyed doing that.

Then I took some time out to watch an episode of the second series of stories about the German detective 'Inspector Falke' on More Four. I think I watched the first series about three years ago. As ever, modern crimmies often deal with crimes relating to current social issues. This one was bang up to date, reflecting the rise of the far right in Germany, resentment against immigrants and Brussels also the indifference if not complacency and ignorance of some young people (though not all by any means) about the value of their own citizenship and social responsibility. A script that exposes the vernacular debate about German society, its past and where it's headed. Not too distant from the conditions in this country really, before and after brexit.

I was relieved to hear that Welsh Labour has secured half the seats in the new term of the Senedd, with Mark Drakeford continuing, at least for the rest of this year as First Minister. It's the endorsement which he and the party deserve for carefully steering their own course this past few years, and not succumbing to the misfortunes that English Labour has brought upon itself. Faithfulness to context is everything when it comes to good politics I guess. Despite the array of nay-sayers, Welsh Assembly government has done its best, given the limitations imposed on it by Westminster. I don't think you need to campaign fruitlessly for independence. A viable case for transferring more responsibility and power for self determination can be made that unites more citizens than it divides. I'd love to see Wales prove this point in practice.

Getting the record straight

At the St German's midweek Eucharist yesterday morning, I told the children about St Mark and how he collected stories from St Peter and others about their time with Jesus and made them into the first of the Gospels to be written. Mark probably grew up speaking Aramaic, and learning to read and write in Hebrew and Greek, I told them, and how fortunate they were to be learning Welsh as well as English in school, and for many of them to be hearing other languages spoken at home - some will learn basic Arabic to read the Qu'ran outside school hours, as well. Whether they find it a chore or not, this is a special thing about good education, that we can learn to communicate and say good things to people in their different languages. I'd so like children to appreciate the diverse environment they are part of, and learn from.

I went into the office in the afternoon and worked on an equipment inventory database format to record our newest acquisition of handsets prior to issue. It's important to get as much as possible of the recording done ahead of time, to keep track of the complex exchange and upgrade process step by step.

Thursday afternoon I started the laborious task of entering data. Just doing the first few entries reveals the limitations in design, and calls for discussion and modifications to the framework. Even before the number of data entries grows, the framework itself has to grow, as we understand more clearly our own need to record different kinds of information to help the project to progress. 

It wouldn't be all that difficult to scan this information from bar-codes on each piece of equipment, and I did some tentative experimenting with this some months ago. It's even possible to scan data into a spreadsheet of sorts, but the challenge is to configure the data received so it can easily be imported into our database. Sure you can buy scanning equipment and software packages that will do this, and deliver an inventory database, but you still have to take time learn how to use the kit, and take the risk that the database is in a proprietary format that isn't all that flexible about exporting data, or else you pay extra to do so. We simply don't have to time to invest on this, nor are we running on the volume or turnover of equipment or have numbers of staff that would make this seem a sensible worthwhile option. So the old fashioned slow steady plod of manual data acquisition will continue, so long as we are not going to be overwhelmed by the task.

Clare and I both completed our postal ballot sheets for the Welsh Assembly and Police Crime Commissioner elections, taking place next week. While we're in Spain in June there's the EU referendum. I hope the postal ballot papers arrive before we leave. For this election they were issued two weeks ahead of the date, and if this happens again they may arrive after we leave. Clare will return in time to vote, but I'll still be in Spain and unable to use mine. Such a shame if this happens, as to my mind it's one of the most important voting issues of my lifetime.

I watched the final episode of 'Line of Duty' tonight, tense and demanding watching to the end, with a fairly satisfactory conclusion in which right and justice prevail, but only after much suffering and struggle. Almost everyone involved seems at some time or another to have compromised their own integrity or told lies to cover their tracks, but in the end the truth comes out, and the courageous prevail.

There was ome impressive acting from the leading characters in the Police anti-corruption squad which gave it all a very convincing and realistic feel. To think that a twenty minute interrogation scene in one room, crammed with references to investigative detail could be so dramatically gripping, is a credit both the writers and actors. For this to be shown in the same week that the inquest into the Hillsborough Stadium tragedy revealed police corruption in the fabrication of a cover-up, blaming fans for non-existent misbehaviour, is perhaps co-incidental, but most remarkable in the way that dramatic art can sometimes reflect authentically the unhappy realities of life.