Cold, cough, sore throat, Syria and Lost in Space

I've been battling to avoid a cold for some weeks. About a fortnight ago I was fine, but when I walked into the office a couple of Mondays ago I found I had a streaming nose, which cleared up after a couple of days. The following Monday the same thing occurred. I'd been fine, nothing wrong at all, but suddenly a streaming nose and loud sneezing. Somebody even suggested it might be hay fever or the office air con. There are a lot of people in my office (I'm not one of them) who moan about the air con and heating, claiming it's too hot or too cold. I never notice it.

Andy gets out on the road, but I stay home...with a bad cold

About five days ago, possibly six or seven, I started to get a sore throat, but I still felt fine. It got worse and became one of those 'painful when I swallow' situations and last Friday, after nothing more than being an irritation, I started to feel hot and bothered, I couldn't really concentrate, I felt weary and not at all well. On Friday night I kind of knew I wouldn't be riding, certainly on Saturday, although I figured I'd be alright for Sunday. I sent Andy an 'abort' text, made a Lemsip and then started to watch the first episode of Lost in Space on Netflix, but it was late so I resolved to watch it later (I ended up watching episodes one and two on Saturday night, it's good). I say it's good, I'm not overly keen on the robot. In the original series the robot is much more friendly whereas the new one is a little dark and gothic in a Batman/Alien kind of way, but overall I'm enjoying it, although they've made Dr. Smith a woman (in my opinion you'll never beat Jonathan Harris' interpretation of the role).

So, back to the cold, or the flu or whatever you want to call it. There was no way I could make any kind of early start at the green and while last week late nights held me back, this week it was being under the weather. I was feeling so down at heel that I didn't ride at all. Instead, I walked around 2.5 miles into Croydon to get a blast of fresh air. I checked out Waterstone's but lacked the concentration to read anything, I found myself in the Camden Coffee House in the Whitgift Centre where I had a lemongrass and ginger tea plus a slice of banana cake (with walnuts) and read an old newspaper, or tried to, and then popped my head into a few other stores. Nothing really made sense to me so I headed home, catching the bus rather than walking the same distance back.

I still had enough energy to mow the lawn front and back. I was basing everything I did on staying in the fresh air and sunshine (as always when I abort a ride, the weather is beyond fine). The back lawn was done perfect (I gave it half a dozen mows, clicking down the cut size so that I eventually had a low cut, but stepped down rather than an immediate low cut which tends to rip the grass and clog up the mower. That said, I need a new mower, or a new blade. The front lawn wasn't so good. I was feeling weary and I didn't want to run through the cut settings like I had on the back lawn, so I gave it one high cut and then changed down to a four setting for one more cut: it looks terrible, but I plan to get out there today.

Low-grade political figure Williamson

Last night I watched the remainder of episode one and the whole of episode two of Lost in Space and then hit the sack around midnight, without a Lemsip. I had a streaming nose, I was sneezing (loudly, I always sneeze loudly) and I just hoped I would sleep well. I didn't. I awoke around 0400hrs and eventually slipped downstairs to make a Lemsip. Whenever I watch TV in the early hours Click is always on. Needless to say I listened to the news about Syria. Look, my view on the crisis is simple: first, I don't rate any of our politicians in the UK, they're all low-rent people who lack gravitas and shouldn't be in charge of the country. Just the phrase, 'Boris Johnson, Foreign Secretary' makes me cringe, in the same way that one cringes at work when the general feeling is that somebody shouldn't be in a particular job, they don't fit, they don't deserve it. There are far too many imposters in my opinion, and there's an inordinate amount of them in British politics. Why is Gavin Willliamson defence secretary? Michael Portillo, yes, but Williamson, with his pet spider, he's SUCH a cock! And what did he say about the Russians? They should 'go home and shut up' apparently. Where's the gravitas? The Russians, quite rightly, derided his comments. And what about Boris likening Putin to Hitler, completely ignoring the fact that the Russians lost millions during the Second World War. Again, what a complete and utter COCK!!! So why would anybody trust these people with making decisions on invading another country? Invading another country? Isn't that what the bad guys do? Pardon? Oh, you mean we ARE the bad guys, it's just the BBC that tells us we're not.

This idiotic buffoon shouldn't be our foreign secretary...

Something else I can't abide is our arrogance, our belief that we are right and everybody else is wrong. There was a moment in the run-up to the air strikes when somebody on our side of the argument said that the Russians' were claiming that if there were casualties on their side, or any of their forces were hit, they would retaliate. The person, whose name I forget, said, as if surprised, that Russia's comments effectively meant that they, the Russians, were declaring war. Well, of course they are: we, don't forget, are the aggressors. If the Russians decided to drop a bomb on the Houses of Parliament (hopefully when it's in session!) then I would imagine we would retaliate militarily. Well, this is the same thing and what amazes me is how we think that whatever we do is right, even if we're invading a sovereign nation. The West was still referring to the chemical attack as 'alleged' and 'suspected' when they launched their attack.

Donald Trump came out with the best, and possibly the most self-damaging, quote of the conflict: "What kind of nation wants to be associated with the mass murder of innocent men, women and children?" You won't like the answer, Donald.

Anyway, it's happened, we went in, dropped a few bombs and came away and ever since there have been the usual shots on TV of Theresa May, putting on her stern-faced look (I can only assume they're trained to do this, they don't really care) discussing how bad the Syrians and the Russians have been and trying to keep everybody on side. They lost my vote ages ago.

It's odd, also, that two 'chemical weapons' incidents should happen so close to one another: first the Skripals in Salisbury and then the alleged Syrian chemical attack. That's slightly odd, don't you think?

What should have happened in Syria is this: fine, the West isn't keen on Assad, but then the West has been responsible in the past for nurturing other despotic tyrants in the region, like Saddam Hussein, a man known, of course, for his chemical attacks on his own people. So we're not entirely innocent on this issue. It's obvious why Russia supports Assad: he and his bombed-out country are of strategic importance. It was mentioned recently that there are monsters on one side of the conflict and maniacs on the other. Well, my view is we should have engaged with the Russians, possibly assisted them in returning normality to Syria even if that meant continuing Assad's leadership of the country. What was the alternative? In the process rid the region (and the world) of ISIS and then rebuild Syria. Why prolong the conflict any longer than necessary? But no, our blind faith in ideology – on this occasion 'the Russians are the bad guys so everything they say and do we must oppose' – has prolonged the conflict and increased the likelihood of a fast return to the bad old Cold War days. Who wants that? Nobody. If I was Donald Trump, I'd pick up the phone to Putin today and try and sort things out man-to-man.

I went back to bed around 0530hrs and awoke at 1000hrs and now, having enjoyed my usual breakfast (multi-seed porridge with grapes, blueberries, raspberries and sliced banana plus a mug of decaff tea) I'm sitting here blogging.

The original series was the best and much funnier...

The weather is perfect for cycling, but there's no way I could have made it. A lazy day lies ahead of me. I'll resume reading the paper at some stage, later I'll have lunch, there's the traditional Sunday roast this evening, which I normally make (I'll probably do it tonight) and then there's Lost in Space, episode three. One thing I tend not to like about modern remakes of past programmes, like Lost in Space or, indeed, anything, is that those who make the remakes (and this is across the board) think that that word 'modern' means they have to be more edgy. I hate it, for example, when there's a 'modern' version of, say, a Shakespeare play and whoever produces it thinks: we must have rap music and graffiti and make it more 'of the street', or, as in the case of Lost in Space, take the humour out of the programme and, especially where the robot is concerned, give him a darker edge. In the original series there was a lot of humour surrounding Doctor Smith and the robot, but not in the remake, it's all 'serious' and 'dark' and I'm not sure if that's a good thing.

Andy got out. I've just seen a tweet on Twitter. He went up White Hill Lane, a killer hill if I recall. Nice one, Andy, see you next weekend.