One of the traditions in our house over many years has been the Simnel cake, ideally we would have it on Mothering Sunday, but in honesty, I am seldom organized enough to hit that target and more often than not it has been Easter Day before the Simnel Cake has been ready to eat. I…

I still get quite emotional as I look at this beautiful picture of class one at the Dunblane Primary School. Yesterday marked the twenty fifth anniversary of perhaps one of the darkest days in recent British history, we have a very similar school class photograph featuring our eldest daughter when she was the same age…

One of the things I have missed during the last year has been our family holiday to Conistone in Wharfedale, about three miles up the Dale from Grassington in some beautiful countryside. Normally over twenty of us spend time in communal living, there is no television, so we entertain ourselves, chatting, catching up on each…

As I look back over the last year, I have found myself repeatedly saying sorry. The truth is that life hasn’t worked in the way that it ought to work and I know that I have made mistakes along the way, in part, because I have found the whole process of working in an alien…

We first visited our manse at the beginning of 2013, the house had stood empty for quite some time and the garden was a bit of a wilderness, the house itself was a bit of a throwback to the 1960’s but one of the big selling points for us was the view across the fields…

Maybe you don’t need me to remind you that today is St Valentine’s Day and as a grumpy old man, I look at these occasions as yet another marketing ploy for companies to re-brand their ordinary product, inflate the price and fleece well meaning members of the public.  My wife tells me that I haven’t…

David Jason made one of his few guest appearances on an episode of the BBC’s “The One Show” a couple of years ago.  He was asked the usual kinds of questions about the programme he was currently appearing in and then the interviewer asked him “what kind of television do you enjoy?” his reply surprised…

Sometimes life offers us unexpected surprises.  I was quite interested to see that as I peeled a satsuma this morning and pulled the segments open that right in the heart of the fruit was a tiny replica of the larger outer one.  In all my days, I don’t remember seeing this before and, sad as…

The village country show has been a part of our British culture for several generations I love the Kilnsey show (Pictured above) held in upper Wharfedale on the Tuesday following the August Bank holiday each year.  It is everything a country show should be, local businesses selling their huge range of wares from food to…

Dr Michael Mosely explains in his book about reducing sugar in your diet that eight weeks is a long enough period of time to change your lifestyle for ever.  Personally, my will power is insufficient to achieve eight weeks, so I have never been able to test the theory.  That is until 2020, when all…