Head versus Heart ? My heart is feeling sad and let down. My head is saying don't worry about it.
My heart has been running a marathon at the speed of an
Olympic sprinter as I have been working to have the OurRebekah website up and
running so it can be formally launched today. It is 4.46am, I have just
come to the laptop after having a lay in bed today. Yesterday and Wednesday I
started work at 2am. The site is on-line and today it will be launched. If
I may say so myself it is looking good, many people have said it looks good,
even my head is saying to my heart That's OK, well done.
So why is my heart feeling miserable and why is my head
saying Don't worry about it ?
An organisation which promised amazing help and support,
something upon which the OurRebekah project is based has failed to respond to
two letters sent on Wednesday 21st June, that's ten days ago ! Another
area upon which I was pinning so much has failed to respond to numerous e-mails
- no, not a single reply to anything ! Then yesterday someone who I felt
certain would help the project basically said - get stuffed !
My heart is aching, it can not abandon the project so what
can it do ? My head is still thinking things through but is hinting: step back a bit, if people are letting you down just accept it and
change your direction. You have been running so fast others can not keep
up with you. Everything will be alright in the end.
It is also saying: You silly old fool - take some of your own
advice. What is it you always say ? LIFE IS A DISCO - SO DANCE !
Don't stop dancing, just play a different record.
Thank you head. My heart thanks you. Let's see what
today and the week-end bring.
While I have been typing this little self indulgence an
e-mail popped in. Nick usually e-mails me while he is listening to the dawn
chorus. Nick is a cyber buddy I met on Twitter. He has been reading The Bridge
House as I write, commenting, making constructive criticism and being a great
source of support.
Head to Heart - SEE, take note of that and smile !
Yesterday, for the first time in almost a week I did some
writing for The Bridge House. I typed up 824 words to begin Chapter Three.
Today, no matter what happens or does not
happen I will scribble a minimum of
another 1,500 words.
This diary page is chapter 40 in The Diary Of A Silly Old
Man. I want to publish the diary on Amazon but the first entry was only
made on Wednesday 12th April, that's not even three months ago. So much has
happened in those three months, so much in my own life and in the life of my
country. How long before I could put the diary into an e-book and ask
people to buy it ?
Head to Heart - You need to wait a year, until 12th
April 2018 and publish THE DIARY OF A SILLY OLD MAN - THE FIRST YEAR.
Sound advice.
Heart
to Head - Do not wait that long, publish THE DIARY OF A SILLY OLD MAN - THE
FIRST FIFTY PAGES.
That sounds possible. I could publish as soon as
Tuesday 11th July.
Heart to Head - what do you think about that ?
Head to Heart - I'll think about it and let you know
tomorrow.
It's the maxim by which I try to live my life. Part of my YouTube Channel is
given over to some disco songs I particularly like.
I have
also been known to say that Life is a ballet - SO POINT YOUR TOES.
Another bit of philosophy from the Silly Old Man is - LIFE IS A TYPO - THE MORE
YOU MAKE THE BETTER YOU ARE LIVING IT !
I wonder, when it is
time for me to shuffle off this mortal coil if my words of wisdom will live on
or be forgotten.
Let me give you another thought. LIFE IS A
HAPPY MEAL SO TUCK IN.
Mr
McDonald - Ronald - has been filling my life over recent weeks. Yesterday I got
out of bed at 2am and started working on the
OurRebekah
website. OK, I did take a few breaks during the day but did not finish the work
until five in the afternoon. It is now 2.52am on Thursday morning and here I am,
back at the laptop and rattling the keys to work on the plan to launch the
website tomorrow.
I have never had a McDonald's HAPPY MEAL, my
grandson will tuck into one even though I say he is getting too old for one.
Truth is he likes the little toys in the box. On one page of the OurRebekah website I
put forward the suggestion that ALL meals sold within the Golden Arches are
Happy Meals -they can be if you let them.
Life is a Happy
Meal, of course it is but you have got to eat it in order to enjoy it.
There is little point in standing and looking at life, you have got to get in
there and enjoy it. Just like dancing or pointing your toes you have got
to tuck in.
I once suggested to a group of my students that if
life were perfect, if life were Utopia, it would be Hell. If things in
life did not go wrong now and then, if problems and challenges did not frustrate
what you want to do then what is the point of that life ?
I
also said to some students, I think I stood up one day in an assembly and
lectured on the subject - Life can be a bitch ! When it is, clench your
fist and punch it in the face ! I was speaking metaphorically, of course I
was not advocating violence. You know what I mean.
Allow
me to introduce you to my granddaughter Katherine, she likes to be called Katie
but she will always be Katherine to me. Aged five she is far too
sophisticated to eat a Happy Meal. I took her to McDonald's and asked what she
wanted to eat. She would have the same as Granddad - a cheeseburger without all
the muck in it - PLAIN, just the burger, the bun and the cheese.
As we started to eat Katie, I mean Katherine, opened the bun and started picking
off the cheese. "What's wrong with it, looks OK to me ?"
"I
like my cheeseburger without cheese," she said.
Katherine, you
wait until you are grown up, your silly old Granddad will take delight in
embarrassing you with that !
But isn't there another life
lesson here ?
I never have been able to understand why
McDonald's destroy the taste of their food by slopping muck aka relish over it.
Muck on my cheeseburger is a big NO NO ! Some things in life are also a
big NO NO and I would never let them anywhere near me. But some times life
will serve you up things you would rather not have, a bit like Katherine and the
cheese in her cheeseburger. You then follow Katherine's example, pick the
cheese out of life, roll it up into little balls then put it aside.
Have a great day, take your Happy Meal and TUCK INTO IT.
Did you think I had emigrated ? Gone, perhaps, to live on the dark side
of the moon ? Even been abducted by aliens ? It has been a few days since my
last diary entry so where have I been ?
I've been to McDonald's ! There's nothing quite like a McDonald's you
know. When did you last go to your local branch ?
I
want you to go again - SOON.
When you are there enjoying your burger and fries I want you
to throw a few coins in Ronald's spinner then send me a selfie.
Will you do that for me ?
Will you do that for the families of sick children in
hospital whose hands Ronald McDonald is holding so tightly ?
The picture at the top of the page shows Your Truly, the old guy with the long
hair, with Ken a McDonald's Franchisee and Laura his Marketing Manager.
Yesterday we sat talking about Ronald McDonald and the incredible work he does.
The reason why I have not written a diary entry for a few days has nothing to do
with aliens, the dark side of the moon and no I have not been sitting in
McDonalds stuffing my face with my favourite menu item - a plain quarter pounder
with cheese, served as a large meal with a diet Coke. I have been working flat
out on a website for the OurRebekah project.
You do know what Ronald does for families of sick children in
hospital don't you ? I wonder if you do. Probably not. The
international fast food giant may scream THERE'S NOTHING QUITE LIKE A
McDONALD'S or AT McDONALD'S WE'VE GOT TINE FOR YOU but it keeps its
charity arm very quiet, modestly working every day to support families with
children sick in hospital.
The lad throwing some coins here into Ronald's spinner in his
local McDonald's is Adam.
His favourite is chicken nuggets. If you ask me
he is a bit old for a Happy Meal but he likes the toys in the box !
This picture was taken when Adam went to The Golden Arches for a
birthday treat
a few weeks ago. Usually Auntie Rebekah would be there with him and ready
to tuck into a chicken meal. On Adam's seventh birthday Beck was too poorly to
be there but here she is on Adam's fourth birthday.
Beck that chicken thingy looks good.
When Rebekah was a little girl, for most of her childhood,
she was in and out of Guys Hospital in London being treated for chronic renal
failure.
The skills and dedication of the medical team was so great,
so loving, so skilled. I am a great fan of the NHS, I never stop shouting
my mouth off about it. Last week I wrote to the Prime Minister and made sure she
knew how highly I rate our NHS.
When Rebekah was in hospital her family was supported by
Ronald McDonald. Without Ronald holding our hands I can not begin to think
how we could possibly have coped.
Look
at Ronald's logo. It is actually NOT a house, it is a home - a home away
from home. There is Ronald holding the hand of the family. Ronald McDonald
provides FREE of charge a home
away from home for the families of sick children
in hospital. My family was one of the first to be taken care of by Ronald
in his first UK house. There are now fifteen Ronald McDonald Houses up and
down Britain. There are THREE HUNDRED AND SIXTY-FIVE in forty different
countries of the world. Every minute of every day Ronald is lovingly
holding the hands of countless families at a very difficult time.
Speaking to Franchisee Ken yesterday, he said working at
McDonald's is like working in a family. I do not know the exact figure but
I think it is somewhere between three and four hundred people Ken employs in his
five McDonald's franchises. Those family members, as well as serving the burgers and fries, not to mention the breakfast hash browns and porridge, support Ronald
and all he does for his families. Not keen on the porridge myself, that's my
wife's dish, but I love McDonald's hash browns - YUMMY. So does my best
friend Jake.
When a child goes into hospital Ronald takes the family's
hand and says: "Hey come and join my family."
Rebekah passed away last month. She and our family have
always supported Ronald, every time Adam and his brother go to McDonald's they
have coins ready to throw in the spinner. It was not me but Rebekah's
friends who came up with the OurRebekah Project to support Ronald's work in
Beck's memory. I am just working to help them.
I am working to support Beck's Friends to support Ronald
McDonald as he supports families of sick children in hospital. Do you
follow all that ?
So my absence from the diary pages has been down to my
writing the OurRebekah website. It should be finished today. Just then
need to get a few good friends to beta test it and it will be properly published
on Friday. You are welcome to have a look at it as I work - go on see how
many TYPO's you can find ! I dare you !
What I want you to do is to go to your local McDonald's,
throw a few coins into the spinner and take a selfie. Then send me that selfie
to add to the OurRebekah website.
How
many times have I gone on record saying 1967 was the greatest year
the world has ever seen ? My photograph, left was taken in
1967. What a handsome, good-looking and sexy young man I was. Note
the image is in black and white, few people could afford the film to
take colour pictures. Television was in black and white as well,
just two stations and they only operated limited hours each day. No
such thing as home computers, smart phones, frozen food, microwave
ovens. There was so much more we did not have. Among everything we
all take for granted today - WE HAD NO McDONALDS !
School dinners in 1967 were never great, some days they
were not nice and some days they were utterly disgusting ! The most disgusting of disgusting school dinners were beef burgers.
If anyone was stupid enough you could buy these hideous items in
sealed tins in the shops. Inside the tins gristle and onion patties floated in a foul
smelling gravy. At school they were served with lumpy mashed
potatoes and peas which could have been used to deadly effect in an
army machine gun.
On Wednesday 13th November 1974 an American
company opened a restaurant in Woolwich, South-East London, selling
beefburgers and silly thin cut chips. To obliterate the taste
of these ridiculous attempts at a meal the meat was served in a bread
roll, plastered with sauce and all kinds of pickled muck.
It would never catch on, we all knew that. The
idea had been imported from America, the land of the eccentric. It
was doomed to failure. The company called itself McDonald's.
American food - beefburgers - silly thin chips that you couldn't
possibly sink your teeth into. No, it would never catch on. The
company couldn't even get its name right - McDonald's, sounded
Scottish so perhaps these beefburgers were really haggis in
disguise. That was it, it was a diabolical American plot to
take revenge on Britain for becoming the world capitol of pop music.
In 1975 I was a newly qualified teacher. One
Saturday I helped a friend run a youth club trip to somewhere in
London, I can not remember where but I do remember one boy on the
mini-'bus pleading for it to be driven to this McDonald's place so
he could eat a beefburger. My friend the youth leader flatly
refused, if he had agreed there would have been a riot as none of
the sensible boys would ever eat a beefburger !
McDonald's in Woolwich did not fail, it is still,
there and I have eaten inside where I viewed its
proud notice
announcing it was the first McDonald's in the land.
McDonalds came to the town where I lived in 1979. I was married then
and had been promoted to be a head of year in a large comprehensive
school. None of the teenagers in my charge were interested in
McDonald's although one or two did confess to having been there.
Two people who did go there once a week were
husband and wife colleagues. My own wife said to me that if
McDonald's was a good enough place for these respected friends and
colleagues to eat perhaps we should try it. Eventually I
summonsed up the courage. I refused to eat a beefburger,
McDonald's called them hamburgers in those days even if here was no
ham inside the dreaded food. I ate chicken and ordered that
none of the muck was to be put inside the bread roll, just the
chicken and nothing else.
What an experience ! Even if the chicken
did taste nice enough you had to eat it with your fingers ! OK
you could hold the chicken bun using a paper napkin but you had to
eat your chips using your fingers. Oh, McDonald's did not call
them chips but French Fries. For goodness sake what was French
about silly American skinny chips served in England ? You were
not given plates to put your food on but had to eat everything out
of cardboard boxes and paper bags. But this was not the biggie !
Everyone was expected to clear their table at the end of eating !
I am surprised the management did not send you out to the kitchen to
do the washing up ! Ah there would not be any washing up would
there ? The paper bags and cardboard boxes were thrown in the
bin !
One
of the teachers at the school's wife worked at McDonald's in Central
Milton Keynes, she was the staff manager. She gave a job to
one of my year group, Peter, as a management trainee. I was
convinced he could have done better for himself than work for a
beefburger, I mean hamburger, outfit. I went in there one
evening and found Peter yelling orders as he bullied the staff to
work harder. Peter rose through the ranks to become a regional
manager before taking on a new career.
This branch of McDonald's could not cope with the
demand of customers, very quickly it took over the adjacent shop and
doubled its size. It was the only McDonald's for miles around and I
do know, for a time at least, it held the company record for the
most UK burgers sold in a day.
When my children were born the treat was not to
go to McDonald's but to a branch of Little Chef where you ate with a
knife and fork at a table where the food was served to you and you
did not have to clear the plates away after. Little Chef ?
Remember them ?
My daughter, Rebekah wanted to have her
birthday party at McDonald's. Peter organised it for her and
the entire class from school came along.
Rebekah was born with chronic renal failure and
spent most of her childhood in and out of Guys Hospital London.
Medically Guys is a centre of excellence but food wise, food for
patients ! Nobody ate anything served.
When
McDonald's opened a branch in the hospital grounds what an answer to
prayer that was.
I would go down to McDonald's from Rebekah's ward
high up in Guys Tower and join the queue of relatives buying food
for patients in the hospital. You would always see doctors
sitting at the tables eating, I assume the staff canteen was as
terrible as the patient catering.
It was at this time I decided to try my first
beefburger, Setting aside schoolboy prejudice but not brave
enough to eat all the muck they plaster over the meat I ordered one.
To my astonishment I liked it. I graduated to a cheeseburger, minus
the muck of course. That is still my favourite today - a quarter pounder with cheese as a large meal with a diet Coke. I always
make my wishes very clear - PLAIN quarter pounder please - just the
burger, cheese and the bun please. I resist saying NO MUCK
please.
This
building with the bit sticking out is Guys Tower where Rebekah's
ward was located. In the shadow of the tower McDonald's built the
first Ronald McDonald House in Britain. It was opened by Her Majesty
Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and provided twenty bedrooms for
families with sick children in the hospital. We were one of
the first families to be supported by Ronald in the first British
Ronald McDonald House in England.
At the time I was writing newspaper and magazine
articles to make a few extra pounds for the family while Rebekah was
in hospital. I decided I would write something about McDonald's and
the way it had supported my family, I called the article HOW FAST IS
FAST FOOD. I interviewed a chip shop owner who said McDonald's
had done a great service to the take away food industry by raising
standards of hygiene in production. McDonald's head office
was
in Finchley, North London. I spent time there with the then
company secretary who was also in charge of Ronald McDonald
House. It was a great visit and I was able to look round the
McDonald's Hamburger University. I never did find out why they
insist on putting all that muck inside the burgers.
At the time my local newspaper feature was
published there was only one branch of McDonald's in town. A reader
from an adjacent town wrote to the editor complaining that Leighton Buzzard did
not have its own McDonald's.
McDonald's may be excellent at making burgers,
providing they are served without all that muck on them, but it's
website is a navigational nightmare ! I tried to find out how
many McDonald's branches there are in Milton Keynes today and have no
idea, no idea at all.
At the same time as I wrote the local newspaper
article I did some writing for Landrover Owner Magazine and an NGO
working in a former European communist state. I was there
shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall. My interpreter told me
that a McDonald's had opened in the country's capital city. I
challenged him and said that was not right. He insisted there was a
McDonald's and took me to see it. It was not McDonald's but a
family run cafe. I explained whereupon he said to me "But they
sell McDonald's !" In the heart of Europe's most totalitarian
state McDonalds did not mean the company but the food it sold.
You can not buy a burger in a supermarket that
tastes anywhere near as good as a McDonald's burger. Those you buy
frozen have the same diabolical taste as the hideous stomach
churning tinned burgers we had served to us at school all those
years ago. I would never touch it but my wife enjoys a pot of
porridge, she will tell you nobody makes porridge as good as
McDonald's. My breakfast favourite is McDonald's hashbrowns.
Why is it the hasbrowns you buy in a supermarket taste of nothing
but onion ? Perhaps all frozen food manufacturers should take
a course at McDonald's Hamburger University.
My
best friend, Jake - a Patterdale Terrier, loves McDonald's hash
browns. He understands English, you have only to say the world
McDonald's and he goes crazy in anticipation of something to eat. If
we drive past a branch and he sees the golden arches he becomes most
distressed if we do not pull in.
Jake's favourite branch of McDonald's is near our
home at Westcroft, Milton Keynes. Jake has a special friend
there, McDonald's employee Gianis. We made this silly film when Jake
went one morning to see Gianis at McDonald's. I tell you if I
was a businessman I would nick Gianis from McDonald's, his customer
service skills are amazing. It's worth going to the drive
through just to chat with him.
Where is your favourite McDonald's ? Where
in the world have you eaten in a branch of McDonald's ? I have
had my quarter pounder with cheese - minus the muck - in Amsterdam,
Holland and Los Angeles, California. Los Angeles will always
be a bit special to me.
Most schools take trips to Alton Towers or if
they are very ambitions to somewhere like France. As head of year I used to organise trips to
Disneyland - CALIFORNIA. I did it five times. We would
fly from Heathrow to Los Angeles where I would collect a hired mini'bus then drive right across Los Angeles to Anaheim, I would rive
in the height of the afternoon rush hour. As soon as we had checked
into our hotel I would take the group to McDonald's to chill out
after our long journey. 1500 South Harbour Boulevard, Anaheim, California. I can still remember the address ! Eating
my burger there - minus the muck - just the burger, cheese and the
bun, meant we were in America.
Looks a bit different doesn't it ? 1500
South Harbour Boulevard ? It's
still McDonald's with the golden arches and the red and yellow. Did
you know there are two places in England where McDonald's is
strictly forbidden to use the golden arches and those bright red and
yellow colours ?
Stratford Upon Avon and Windsor, there a far more
sedate identify is in use.
I took Rebekah one one of my trips to Disneyland
California, I had to get special permission from her doctors but she
had a great time and, yes she ate in that branch of McDonald's.
When we returned home from California the company
secretary of McDonald's UK wanted Rebekah to be Europe's child
ambassador to some global McDonald's event being held at its world
headquarters in Chicago. That was lovely but we had only just
got back from the US. It happened that a child from France was
chosen to represent Europe, McDonald's England was not please at all
but it was good for the little girl from France.
Americans like their apple pie don't they ?
Have you heard the expression, As American as Apple Pie ?
If you have not eaten a McDonald's apple pie you have not lived !
They do not put any burger style muck on their apple pies - just
piping hot apple in an amazing pastry. There is only one pie better
than a McDonald's apple pie and that is a McDonald's Festive Pie at
Christmas. I do not understand for the life of me why some years
these are not available. Christmas is not Christmas without a
McDonald's Festive Pie. Hey you bosses in Finchley, London,
and Chicago you had better make sure festive pies are on the menu
this coming December !
A word to my former students and now friends on Facebook. Do you remember the week-end trips to Shropshire ? I did not initiate this but do you remember the Big Mac eating competitions you used to hold in McDonald's Shrewsbury ? The years may have faded my memory but I think John Chapman held the record at four. Four Big Macs, eaten one after another and all served with the muck on them !
It is fifty years since I ate my last school
dinner. It is thirty-eight years since I made my very first visit to
McDonald's. It is three days since I last ate at McDonalds.
THREE DAYS, I will be getting withdrawal symptoms !
Ronald
McDonald has always been a special friend of my family's, we can
never thank him enough for Ronald McDonald House when Rebekah was a little
girl.Ronald has been an important friend of my family for thirty years,
ever since the time Rebekah was in Guys Hospital.
Rebekah died on Friday 19th May 2017, aged 34
years. It is hard to believe I am now living in a world without my
darling daughter. On a recent birthday she said to her friends
not to send her cards but to go to McDonald's and pop a few coins in
Ronald's box.
In her will she asked that there be no flowers
at the funeral but for people to make donations instead to Ronald McDonald. Her
friends set up a project OUR REBEKAH and have so far raised eight
hundred and twelve pounds. I have spoken with Ronald and shared some
ideas where we can make thirty four thousand pounds, one thousand
for every year of Rebekah's life, then to do this every year until
the end of my own life. If I can live to support Ronald for another
thirty years that comes to one million pounds.
This picture shows two of Beck's friends who initiated the
Our Rebekah project. On Tuesday I am meeting with McDonald Franchise Owner, Ken
and his Marketing Manager Laura to talk about ideas Rebekah's friends
and
I have to help Ronald. How appropriate that we are meeting in the branch
of McDonald's where I ate my first McDonald's meal - a chicken in a bun with no
muck on it.
As Project Rebekah gets under way I will be sharing so many
things with you here on this diary page. Rebakah may have passed away but
she will be with us all as we make her project a success.
There will be many different people I need to meet with as
different activities are introduced, planned and brought on line. ALL of
these meetings I intend holding in branches of McDonald's up and down the
country.
Did you read yesterday's diary entry ? The letter to The
Prime Minister's Principal Private Secretary has been sent by recorded delivery.
My local member of parliament has had his arm twisted to speak to the Prime
Minister. I am asking for just a fifteen minute meeting where I can praise
the work of our NHS and thank her for all it did for Rebekah. That is a
personal meeting and time to show my family's gratitude, it is not part of the
Our Rebekah Project and does not involve Ronald. However, at the meeting
it is my intention to invite Theresa and Philip May to come to McDonald's and
have a burger with me. I will assure them they do not have to have any
muck on the burger and can eat it nice and plain just as I do !
There
have been a couple of recent diary entries where I have been pessimistic as to
our country's future. Pessimistic, I feel, with just cause but let me
balance things a little today. NO balance them A LOT.
Yesterday marked five weeks since my daughter died. Five hard
and difficult weeks but five weeks in which so much love has been shown to my
family, love from so many people and so great that I can never, ever say a big
enough THANK YOU to everyone.
The recent spell of hot weather has taken a toll on my
garden, I was out there yesterday with the hosepipe offering first aid to the
flowers, to the strawberry plants and to the wilting tomatoes. I heard the
phone ringing inside the house so raced up the path and snatched the handset
before the caller hung up.
It was Toni Fisher, the practice manager from my GP's surgery
calling to ask how I and my wife Maureen were. How were we coping with our loss
? Was there anything we needed ?
Can you believe that ? A large and busy doctors surgery
serving many thousands of families yet the person in charge of its
administration and co-ordination took time out to personally call me. Love
does not come much better than that. Incredible as it was, it is just one expression of the immeasurable love my
family has received across the past five weeks.
Doctor Philip Mason, Renal Consultant at Oxford's Churchill
Hospital, said to me
the
day after Rebekah died, "My job is not to treat patients but to care for them."
Let me put a face to the man - here he is, Lovely Doctor
Philip Mason. Rebekah thought the world of him and so do I. "My job is not
to treat patients but to care for them."
The phone rang one evening, two or three days after we lost
Beck. It was Maureen and my GP Doctor Hilmy. Before she moved to Northampton
Doctor Hilmy had also been Rebekah's GP. Gary, Rebekah's husband, calls
him Doctor Heal-me. Let me introduce you to this incredible man.
Doctor Hilmy was calling to say how sorry he was and to
express his love
for my family. He said during that telephone
conversation, "You may be my patient but you are also my friend." I could
write so much about lovely Doctor Hilmy but back to that call yesterday from
Toni Fisher. She said that Doctor Labrum had asked if he could have my telephone
number as he would like to speak to me.
Doctor Labum retired fifteen years ago, he was my family's GP
when each of my children were born and the family doctor who oversaw Rebekah's
condition when it first became apparent thirty-two years ago. Of course
Doctor Labrum could have my number, I would be proud if he wanted to call.
I returned to the garden and busied myself spraying a jet of
water over wilting flowers. Fortunately I had left the door to the patio open so
heard the phone ringing again. Linford Christie you would have been proud of my
sprint back up to the house. It was Doctor Labrum calling. The
practice manager must have called him the moment we finished speaking, given him
my number and he called me straight away. We spoke for a long, long time on the
telephone, a beautiful conversation filled with love. How wonderfully
special that a man who had retired fifteen years ago still wanted to speak about
one of his patients ! He remembered Rebekah so well, his words were so
beautiful, so loving and so comforting.
I said to Doctor Labrum that I was proud he had been my
family's GP. Unfortunately I do not have a photograph of Doctor Labrum, even the
mighty Google can not help me. I do have a photograph of this man.
This is Iain Stewart, our local MP.
Here
is a letter Iain wrote to me a few weeks ago.
LOOK - it is on House of Commons letterhead. LOOK - it is
hand written.
Iain was thanking me for praising the work of Milton Keynes
Hospital. The Nurse Specialist who looked after Rebekah's dialysis even took
time out of her duties to come to her funeral.
For thirty-two years, since Rebekah's renal failure was first
diagnosed I have had experience of our WONDERFUL NHS. I shout my mouth off
all the time about it. My wife says I talk too much, I can never talk
enough about the likes of Doctor Mason, Doctor Hilmy, Doctor Labrum, Oxford
University Hospitals, Milton Keynes Hospital - I can never shout my mouth off
loud enough and for long enough in praise our incredible health service.
When I am shouting I now mention Iain's hand written letter
and say how special it is that a busy MP could do that. Iain is a strong
supporter of our NHS and himself a lovely man. When I spoke to Toni Fisher
yesterday and speaking the day after Beck's funeral to the deputy CEO of Milton
Keynes Hospital they both praised Iain for his support.
I will be seeing Iain in a couple of weeks when he attends an
event Maureen, my wife, is running. No doubt I will bend his ear as I praise the
National health Service again.
Putting down the telephone yesterday my first reaction was to
write again to Iain then I devised a different plan. I am very good at
opening doors. If I knock and the door is not opened I just kick it in and
enter anyway. YES, I will tell Iain about those two 'phone calls from
yesterday but first let me tell his boss.
I
doubt anyone reading this diary entry will recognise this man. NO, he is not a
doctor. NO, he does not work for the NHS. He is Peter Hill,
Principal Private Secretary to The Prime Minister.
On Monday morning he will be receiving a recorded delivery
letter within which there will be another letter for Iain Stewart's boss.
I am asking him to arrange a fifteen minute meeting for me with Theresa May. The
letter will be worded in such a way it will be very difficult for him or Mrs May
to refuse. As Prime Minister Theresa May meets hundreds of people every
week, some will just be faces that pass her by and are forgotten within seconds.
I promise you Mrs May you will not forget those fifteen
minutes you spend with
me. You probably will not be able to say much as I will be dominating the
conversation throughout as I tell you experience after experience after
experience praising our National Health Service.
Mrs May I will meet you anywhere in the country at any time
on any day. I want just fifteen minutes of your time. Fifteen minutes to praise
our National Health Service. During those fifteen minutes I will give you two
thoughts to take away with you.
FIRSTLY
it is not the politicians that make a country great, they can do all they like
but it is the PEOPLE who make a country great. People like Doctor Mason, people
like Doctor Labrum, People like Doctor Heal-me, people like all those who work
in our National Health Service.
SECONDLY Mrs May, I will be telling you the National Health
Service is NOT undefended. Yes, of course, it needs more cash, no matter
how much money government throws at it
there will never be enough.
Government is in an impossible position and can never find enough. However, when
it comes to LOVE our National Health Service is OVER-FUNDED by the incredible
people who work within it.
Yesterday two of Rebekah's friends and I met to discuss ideas
we have to help Ronald McDonald as he supports families of sick children in
hospital. Mrs May I intend to pack a lot into our fifteen minute meeting, I
wonder if you and your husband would allow me to take you for a burger at a
branch of McDonalds ? We'll also talk about that in our fifteen minute
meeting.
My family would never have coped when Rebekah was a child in
hospital if it were not for
Ronald McDonald House. For thirty years my
family has supported Ronald. Rebekah put in her will a wish that we
support Ronald in her memory.
Unlike
myself, Ronald does not shout his mouth off. I admire McDonalds, the fast food
giant, for the calm and almost secretive way it goes about the work Ronald
McDonald Houses do. It could make so much marketing capital out of its work but
does not. I wonder if Prime Minister May knows of Ronald's work. She will
once we have met.
On Tuesday I have a meeting with a McDonald's franchise owner
and his Marketing Manager. Following the meeting yesterday with some of
Beck's friends, I am busy typing up notes to share and plan tomorrow to write a
diary entry which I will call MEMORIES OF McDONALDS.
I really would like to take Mr and Mrs May to McDonalds and
to show them the Ronald McDonald boxes there. I will be asking Iain
Stewart to come with me to our local branch, share a burger, see what Ronald is
up to and for me to tell him how Beck's friends and family want to help Ronald.
When we go I would love it if someone from Whaddon Medical Centre and someone
from Milton Keynes Hospital could join us.
My wife says I talk too much, as you can see when I get going
I write too much as well. But there are some things in life you can not
say too much about.
Time for me to shut up. I'll be back tomorrow with my
memories of McDonalds. (NO the way I write McDonalds is NOT a typo - I will
explain tomorrow.)
One year ago today our country went to the poll, it was a day
where common sense
prevailed and we voted to leave the dictatorship of the
failed European Union. One year further on where are we ? Realistically has anything effective happened ?
At the end of the day we are still a part of the institution and freedom is in
reality no closer than it was a year ago. The European Union has achieved what
The Spanish Armada, Napoleon Bonaparte and Adolf Hitler all failed to do.
Britain voted to leave the European Union but we are still a
member. Holland and France failed when common sense was needed in elections
within their countries so the politicians who could have rescued the people were
never given a chance.
Why are we having all these talks ? Why all the
negotiations ? What is there to negotiate ? Just walk away. Let the
European Union come crawling to us and beg.
What do we need to leave this dictatorship ? WORLD WAR
THREE ?
When I was a kid it was not a case of IF World War Three
happened but WHEN. Sooner or later there was going to be a nuclear
holocaust and that would be the end of the world as we knew it. I actually wrote
a story in the 1970's - ESCAPE FROM ARMAGEDDON. Armageddon as we
understood it has not come and will not come but World War Three is as big a
threat to Planet Earth today as it has even been, it is just coming in a
different form. Oh it will come, that is unless we wake up and open our
eyes.
In 2016 1,326 innocent people were murdered by islamists,
another 2,620 were injured. So far in 2017 364 have been murdered and 911
injured. The liberals continue to tell us islam is a religion of peace.
Have you heard a mosque anywhere near where you live condemn the terrorists ?
I have not. Oh yes World War Three is coming and we are sleepwalking our way to
allowing it to happen.
When
is The Bullshit Broadcasting Corporation going to stop sensationalising a fire
in a London block of flats ? Has nothing else happened in the world that
needs coverage ?
Yesterday the news was proudly reporting there would be no
immigration checks carried out on those who were in the fire. WHAT ? Why
are we as a nation allowing crimes to be overlooked ? Does that mean if
there were murderers, rapists, paedophiles or armed robbers living in Grenfell
Tower their crimes should be overlooked ? What about islamic terrorists ?
If there were any of them living there should we overlook them ?
WHAT A MESS !
23rd June 2016 was a great day for Britain. How sad that it
has been followed by three hundred and sixty five weak and pathetic days. We
deserve better.
It's
half past one in the morning and too hot to sleep, I am tired but
can not sleep, far too uncomfortable so here I am at the laptop
writing today's diary entry.
I usually start my social media day by playing a
piece of inspirational music from my YouTube Channel. still from
that channel but not from my Morning Collection I am now going to
play something different..
Typical Englishman talking about the weather, it's our national
number one subject of conversation !
It can only be a short period of time before everything explodes
with a thunder storm.
I wonder how long it will be before our country explodes !
Britain is in a mess and can not continue the way things are. Sooner
or later the mess is going to erupt into something very nasty.
On the subject of nasty, we have the nastiest politician of the
modern age doing all he can to create anarchy.
We have a prime minister who scored the most spectacular own goal
since 1066.
We have the dictatorship of the European Union seeking to destroy
our way of life.
We have islam all but declaring open war while the left wing
liberals close their eyes to what is happening and accuse all who
stand up for Britain being racist.
We have the Bullshit Broadcasting Corporation misrepresenting the
news and
showing
a bias towards anything and everything British.
I love my country but it is getting harder every day to recognise
what it is about Britain I love,
Unless people stat to wake up, look about themselves and say ENOUGH
IS ENOUGH then the long and proud history of this country will come
to an end in a thunderstorm which will make a nuclear explosion look
like an ant sneezing !
