WS: Sound trumpets! let our bloody colours wave! And either victory, or else a grave

Yesterday was January 13, unlucky for some. You might well expect me to discuss yesterday’s unluckee but I won’t. No siree. Something entirely different. But if you’re into symbols, mantras and cusps you may discern a faint link between yesterday’s news and today’s post. Perhaps an “appropriate” link since that adjective just recently got an unexpected work-out and I like to be fashionable.

Vegetarians and especially vegans look away now. This post is unashamedly about meat. My favourite, most flavoursome meat is brisket, hot or cold. But brisket is not appropriate to these piping times. It’s origins – for me – go way back to post-war when it was far cheaper and the days were quieter. These piping times demand something redder and rawer which cannot be simulated with tofu or minced cabbage.

Beef rib. Or in our case beef rib for two. We love it but eat it rarely. For one thing it’s fiendishly expensive. For another it’s so red, so raw is comes close to being uncivilised. Great big boomerang-shaped bones give it bulk.

Searing. Nine's as far as the hob goes 

First we sear it since that seals in the flavour. Then it’s roasted infernally at 15 minutes per pound and – Lordy – we’d got over 5 lb. You may infer that this leaves it far from “well done” and you’d be right. I know this shocks some people but for them there’s always Spam.

VR invokes Dick III's last moments 

When it comes to cutting beef rib forget the concept of slicing. It gets hacked and not in a computereque way; the chopping board looks like the Somme. Chewing tends to be noisy. Some new potatoes dolloped in butter and that’s about it.

You expect me to apologise? As I said, we eat it rarely.

Only when it seems to fit the occasion.

A tendency to wander

I'm not given to writing about the weather - I worry it may reveal me as "a pauper spirit". (Direct quote from Henry Williamson's Dandelion Days. These days he's ignored as a writer given he was terribly impressed by the Hitler Youth. His judgment on Adolf: "essentially a good man who only wanted to build a new and better Germany")

I never saw "pauper spirit" defined so I'm saying it means lack of imagination. Since I'm at the stage of life when my imagination ebbs more than it flows I try to steer clear of banality. However the weather was cold enough a couple of days ago for me to obey VR's steely insistence - "Wear your old après-ski boots." - when I went out to pick up The Guardian.

These boots look comically clumsy but they are thermally efficient. They also have a strange tread pattern which is only hinted at in the photo. On the way back from the filling station I tried to follow the exact route I'd taken outwards but I was not alone in leaving distinctive footsteps in the snow. Was this what the snow looked like in and around Stalingrad during the siege? That got me thinking about the inappropriate clothing the troops wore during this titanic struggle. Overcoats which ceased to button up somewhere north of the wearer's waistline, much of the fabric flapping loosely and thus offering little in the way of insulation.

Soldiers - from all countries - are renowned for their grumbling. Napoleon called his lot Les Grognards and you can guess what that means. Stalingrad would be a perfect source of grumbling if you were German.  Those doing the shooting (while being shot at) are entitled to grumble as much as they like, in my view. A series of novels by the German author Hans Helmut Kirst about WW2 gets to the heart of wartime grumbling. I read them forty years ago, would they still stand up?

I'm back with The Guardian. Plenty to read (but little of it new) about Brexit.

Uncaring youth

Trolley bus had open entrance at rear: good for "legging off"

Kids are insensitive wretches. Tending - at best – to ignore adults, at worst to treat them as enemies. I was a boy you see.

Going to school by trolley bus I never waited for it to stop before descending. I experimented: what was the highest bus speed for "legging off"? Hitting the ground running, to match the speed of the vehicle I'd left. I found my limit and came home bloody. My mother worried but did I care? Not a jot.

A nearby flat-roof garage was set into the hillside. I could walk on to the flat roof, climb its surrounding wall and shuffle round three sides of the building (20 feet above ground at the front) on an elevated pathway three bricks wide. A quandary for watching neighbours: Leave me be or remonstrate, perhaps causing me to fall off? Hah!

Then swimming in an operative canal (say no more), motorbikes and rock climbing. But, you say, I too became an adult. Alas for those who prayed for my just deserts. My kids were girls, too sensible for such idiocies.

Fairness in the after-life?  It's run by Jahweh who probably had a wild youth.

Hardline Hope, a novel (13,369 words)
“Is selling a step up?” Amber asked.

“Not as such but it can lead to different places. Office manager is a dead end.”

“Didn’t Leesha do something like that? On the free newspaper?”

“Leesha?”

“Caribbean family; one year ahead of us.”

Lindsay waved her hand faintly. “Good grief, I can hardly keep up with our lot, let alone other classes. Why do you mention her?”

“It didn’t do her any good. They hired and fired almost seasonally.”

Time discounted

Aldi is a "global discount supermarket chain" originating in Germany. Its range of goods is much smaller than those of the UK Big Four (Tesco, Sainsbury, Asda, Morrison) and its sources, often in Central Europe, are comparatively obscure.  The ambience, once stark, has improved to functional. I go there for the house gin which costs £10 a bottle yet has outscored more expensive brands in a nationwide blind tasting.

Aldi has its attractions but it's short on ceremony.

So, Aldi, mid-morning last week. As I rearranged my shopping bag a man in a striped shirt with cufflinks barked an incomprehensible announcement just behind me. Gradually it became clear this was a Remembrance Day silence. A woman, who must have been about to pay, seemed frozen in time then had her embarrassment enhanced when her mobile went off.

As the silence continued I realised this was a Full Monty two minutes. At the main entrance  a dozen people peered through the glass doors as if into an aquarium. The doors were obviously locked. I approve of Remembrance Day but I'm not sure it should be compulsory.

It seemed apt that retailing should be brought to a halt but, as I say, Aldi hardly evokes moral grandeur. A slightly out-of-synch experience.

WIP Second Hand (48,821 words) 
“Tell me what you’ve learned, then.”

“Ignore  the handout, look elsewhere for the story,” said Francine.

“Excellent.”

“Provided I remember where the s goes in fuchsia.”

“At least the penalties aren’t as harsh as when you leave a clamp inside.”

“My tutors can make it seem like that.”

Have I Gen. Zhukov's toughness?

(Above) Von Paulus plans an outflanking manoeuvre

Missie, my younger daughter's Cairn terrier, is spending an uneasy ten days with me and - as I write this - I realise where the roots of dissension lie. I am old and so is she. Please note: this is an I-post, not a we-post (ie, one that necessarily includes VR's views)

If I adjust Missie's doggie years to match mine, both of us are staring 80 in the face. Selfishness and routine are essential in cheating Biblical expectation and both she and I rely on these factors every waking moment. Inevitably there are clashes.

I should also explain I have reached a financial point in life where saving money becomes irrelevant and spending is all that is left. Just recently I was almost party to a decision to spend £75 on a pair of Hotter Energises ("Shoes to fall in love with" says the publicity; see pic) and this project only came to nought when I discovered that Size 11 isn't available in a wider fitting. Who needs more than one pair of shoes, anyway?

What I was party to was the replacement of a rather gloomy, dark green leather sofa, still in fairly good nick, with a gayer, stripy sofa from Parker Knoll (ie, pricey) on the grounds that it lifts the otherwise pessimistic atmosphere of the living room. An airy-fairy idea which confirms only one thing: when it comes to cash I disburse rather than conserve.

I am sure you can see where this is leading. The PK sofa is becoming a symbolic Stalingrad in the war of wills between Missie and me. The hell with the living room decor, says she; those stripes would set off my highlighted greys. And while I prefer to play the triumphant role of General Zhukov (All those medals!), leaving Missie as the unfortunate General Von Paulus, I fear the coughing tendency has returned, despite antibiotics, and I am a weakened force. More later, perhaps.