remembrance

Very good weekend. Yesterday we watched the ceremony at the Cenotaph on TV – kids found it very interesting and insisted on continuing to listen to the rest of it on Radio 4 in the car on the way over to my Mum’s for lunch. Saw various war memorials with their new wreaths on the way. I have, in the past been guilty of a fair amount of cynicism about Remembrance Sunday and the real reasons for war. I retain it in part but you know it really doesn’t matter what one thinks about war in general or particular wars. Millions died, very young people witnessed and lived through horrors most of us can’t really conceive of… and it felt important to honour them. War discussion continued over lunch… various books brought out and mulled over, got on to the American civil war… Kids had a lesson from my Dad (have just had to enquire what it was about – such a bad parent, like expressing no interest when your kids come home from school!!) – it involved crystals, water and molecules. I knew there was a microscope out :) We played cards and behind the doors – I married Don Giovanni (lovely – watched a really good version on DVD the other night, great cast, no old and fat Don Giovannis).

…and here’s the lunch:

I am in the process of adding photos to recipes over on vegan family – back in 1999 when I first started on the site, there was no broadband and you really couldn’t be too picture intensive… so people are being prevented from eating while I take photos just now. Recipe written up here now with pics

Were all reading lots. Daniel is on 1984, The Cappuccino Years and a couple of books on languages from the library, one on hieroglyphs and one on world languages (he is the first person to check these out, brand new books). Charlotte found various Asterix titles she hadn’t read and is waiting to grasp TCY from Dan as soon as he’s finished (should be today) – she found a book on drawing fantasy figures too which seems really good. I have just finished Arthur and George, one of the best books I’ve read for ages, very moving, I really felt for both men in their very different lives. The corruption during the various enquiries and investigations really reminded me of the official investigation I instigated after our state school experience: the blatant lies; the avoidance of answering any questions or giving information that would make them look bad; the ‘let’s blame the victim because we want them to be to blame’ attitude; outright discrimination… ugh, total institutional scumbaggageness. Nice to have got some distance from it so it’s not emotional now – but it’s no less shocking. Last night as I was finishing the book, I came to a letter from Sir Arthur detailing all those he had lost in the Great War including his son just a couple of weeks before the Armistice was signed – will be reading that to the kids later.

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