The Sunday Rumble 03:03:13

I will add further 'rumbles' to this post concerning this, that or the other during the course of the day as and when anything occurs.

News from the Rehab Unit:  The 'Memsahib' gains strength daily - and I'm steadily going downhill!  It's not the weight of work in running a household but its sheer unremitting, relentless, never-ending nature that pisses me off.  I don't want to think about what we are going to eat for lunch next Tuesday, or whether the sheets are due for a change, or whether or not I remembered to leave the money out for the milkman . . .  I mean, it's all so damned domestic!  Nobody seems to realise that a great mind like mine should not be encumbered with such trivia, I have matters of great moment upon me which it is essential be passed on to my faithful blog followers who wait, daily, hourly, for my views and opinions and . . . sorry, did someone say something?  Anyway, 'er upstairs' is now downstairs as well and is leaping about on a single crutch, well, "leaping" is perhaps a slight exaggeration, but anyway, she is now in a position to actually supervise my downstairs activities - so there goes the occasional nap on the settee!

Bye, bye, Benny, baby, but why?  Yes, the question is, why did Pope Benedict resign?  I must instantly confess my almost total ignorance concerning the Catholic church but in doing so, I suspect, it places me amongst a vast majority of people including most catholics.  Only the Vatican insiders plus a tiny handful of informed outsiders know what is going on inside Vatican city, a place that makes Stalin's Kremlin look positively transparent!  Some possibilities are discussed by John Cornwall in The Mail.  His Wiki entry seems to mark him as an outsider with some penetrating knowledge of what may be going on inside the Curia, as the Vatican civil service is called.  Worth a read but my guess is that, given the secretive nature of the Catholic hierarchy, it will be a hundred years before we even get a hint as to the truth behind this resignation - if resignation it was! - and in a hundred years will I care?

When cracks appear in an icon:  I never thought I would live long enough to see the beginning of the collapse and fall of the Nationalised Health Empire in Britain - but it is beginning.  As I mentioned in a previous post, perhaps the only good thing to emerge from the Mid-Staffs Hospital horror story is that the carefully nurtured image of nurses being angels of mercy and light and therefore above and beyond criticism has just crashed and burned.  From now on we will all view them as they are, ordinary people trying to do their best, some good, some not so good and some who should have been prison officers!  There may be one other benefit derived from the Mid Staffs story, that is, having driven all other NHS stories off the front pages it has hidden the sly, surreptitious changes wrought by this government.  Yesterday there was a 'Shlock-Horror' story in 'The Graun' (natch!) reporting howls of complaint from some Doctors' union about the sneaky privatisation of the NHS.  Well, if it results in the sort of service provided by the privately-owned Shepton Mallet Clinic who dealt with the 'Memsahib's hip under a NHS contract, then "give me surfeit of it"!

D' Ancona no can do:  I have long had my doubts concerning the judgment of Matthew d' Ancona notwithstanding the fact that he was once the editor of my favourite mag - The Spectator.  I suppose you can mark him A1 in loyalty to Dave but is that really a virtue as it becomes clearer to everyone, except our Matthew, that Dave is driving the Tory party into oblivion.  As far as I can tell from his article in The Telegraph, 'all is for the best in the best of all worlds' as far as Dave's leadership goes and the only slight fault is that perhaps his presentation isn't very good!  And the idea that somehow Dave is a paid-up member of a metropolitan elite with no understanding of ordinary people's concerns d' Ancona dismisses out of hand saying that such a "cabal" is a figment of imagination.  Well, no one was suggesting the existence of a "cabal", only the very real existence of a certain state of mind prevalent amongst the wealthy upper middle-classes with comfortable homes in both the country and in London neither of which brings them into contact with ordinary people beyond the butcher, baker and candle-stick maker.  D' Ancona is as big a dimwit as his hero!

My two favourite 'biches sont revenus':  Oh, yes, indeed, they're back.  Both the enticingly tough but tender Caroline Proust (Insp. Laure Berthaud); and the deliciously naughty and red-headed Audrey Fleurot (Lawyer Joséphine Karlsson) on my TV courtesy of BBC4 on Saturday nights in the superb French crime and justice(!) series, Spiral.  I'm loving every minute of it but hating trying to choose which of those lovely ladies I prefer.  I know, I will write to both of them in impeccable French, er, with a 'leetle 'elp from mon ami, Google Translate' and see which of them replies soonest.  Waddya mean - neither of 'em!  Of course they will, I shall enclose a photo, perhaps that one with me in my Long Johns, that's always a winner!

Here endeth my Sunday Rumble - see you tomorrow!

 

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Pell wary over papal resignation

Comments

[Hank]

David

Glad to here the missus is getting better. If she is supervising, I'm the results will be much better

-------------------------

The John Cornwell article is a rehash of a single unattributed article in the Italian press by a person who does not cover the Vatican. Which is the sort of thing one expects from Cornwell.

He has long been supporting a program that is about the opposite of what B XVI's vision of the church, often using the lefty tactics you commonly highlight.

The retirement of a person who can't walk for long without help and is down to three hours of work a day does not need much additional explanation.

John Allen, Vatican reporter for the lefty National Catholic Reporter Comments

As a rule of thumb, one should usually take unsourced speculation with a grain of salt, especially in the Italian papers. As I'm fond of saying, God love 'em, Italians have never seen a conspiracy theory they're not prepared to believe

snip

No, Benedict didn't quit under the pressure of a "gay lobby." But the perceived disarray in the Vatican, which may well be one part perception and one part reality, probably made resignation look even better.

http://ncronline.org/blogs/ncr-today/thoughts-vaticans-gay-lobby

And on the lighter side

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=CrzfbbgJu8M

http://eclecticmeanderings.blogspot.com/
Hank’s Eclectic Meanderings

[Whyaxye]

On nurses being angels of mercy.
A good friend lives in Winchester, opposite the bus stop which serves two major state services: the local General Hospital, and Her Majesty's Prison, Winchester. When he moved there over thirty years ago, the buses would disgorge large numbers of ladies destined for both establishments. The nurses were "nice gels", demure and well-spoken with a sense of public modesty. They all wore thick tights and flat shoes. The prisoners' wives and girlfriends were, of course, as rough as badgers. All smoked, swore imaginatively, and dressed like hookers. Some even had tattoos.
The funny thing is, these days, you can no longer tell them apart. They all look like robbers molls, and you wouldn't want them anywhere near you, let alone providing care.

[Kevin B]

David, if you want a punt on who the next Pope will be Paddy Power has Richard Dawkins at 666 to 1.

[Able]

Whyaxye

I resemble that description! I do not, have never, and will never "look like (a) robbers moll". Whilst 'flat shoes' have always been the order of the day (although I favour high leg combat boots myself, with matching 'box' and/or kevlar vest A&E being what it is. Heels on a 6' 5" male seem both a little superfluous and 'weird' to me, call me old-fashioned if you will) I have never partaken of 'thick tights' either (well except for that one fancy dress Christmas party when appearing as Batman seemed a good idea post 16 pre party drinks).

Oh, and having started in the days of those allegedly "demure" "Nice gels" I can tell you it was a front - hardened trooper that I was, I was still regularly shocked, embarrassed and confused (having to look up many a word and phrase. I still, many years later, don't think most of what those 'demure' ladies discussed was possible either anatomically or choreographically let alone legally or morally. And I've met sailors who'd blush at the language and ask them to 'tone it down a little').

[David Duff]

Hank, as I indicated, I think it will be a considerable time before the ultra-secretive Vatican lets slip what is going on. However, the first *proper* resignation by a Pope is an extra-ordinary event whatever the reason. Sorry, but I do not believe it was simply a matter of old age. I'll check your links later.

Kevin, your witticism cracked me up - and helped shake down a gargantuan Sunday lunch from my favourite pub.

'W' and Able, I suspect that nurses, like just about every other work group, simply reflect the changes in society over time, nearly always for the worst - or is that just a jaundiced old man moaning - quick, nursie, fetch the meds!

[dearieme]

Ah, Whyaxe, that reminds me of a Cambridge codger who remarked, apropos admission interviews, "The applicants no longer have the interests of educated people".

[dearieme]

Oi, Duffers, are your French lassies starring in a serial, or is it a series of separate stories?

[David Duff]

Not just a serial, DM, but a series of serials! I think the current one is Part IV. This particular one started (I think) 4 weeks ago and, as usual on the Sat night BBC4 they always run two episodes so you need to try and get back to Episode one if you can - I believe there is some 'techie-thingie that allows you to do it up to a certain time. You will find it tricky to pick up to begin with but just watch those two fine French fillies and you will gradually absorb the sundry plots.

[David Duff]

Come to think of it, the whole bloomin' lot may be out on a DVD somewhere.