The 'font' is away for a few days enabling both me and the boyz to rapidly regress to our feral ways. This means that I can dress as unstylishly as I like in old shorts, hawaiian shirt and floppy sun hat while the boyz can go sniffing and ferreting away in the olive groves to their hearts content. The 'font' disapproves of my natural dress style believing anyone bumping into me would dig into their pockets for 50 cents and suggest I go and get a cup of coffee and a doughnut. How many visitors are we likely to have at six in the morning I ask?Today, we were all up bright and early, out in the glorious post-dawn morning sunshine, cutting down old vines and carting off the cuttings to an ever growing mound of dessicated vegetation. It's against the law to have a bonfire during the arid summer months so the pile of grass ,olive and vine cuttings has grown over the last twelve weeks to rather impressive (the font might say alarming ) proportions - come cooler weather I'll be out here in a flash with a box of matches to send our miniature Gibraltar skywards.Wilf and Digby lay contentedly in the field watching the activity with an air of proprietorial indifference . They like to pretend that they are brave, independent spirits but whenever my pruning took me too far away from them they would stand up and saunter over to join me as if to say 'don't worry we're here now'.
Interesting article in the Washington Post about healthcare. Every year 700,000 Americans are forced into bankruptcy over their medical bills. In the UK, France,Germany and Japan the number of medical bankruptcies is zero.
Spoke last night to a friend who works in the Treasury in London. He can't understand why everyone is acting as if the economic crisis is over. Sure, the banks have been saved but now the reckoning is at hand and the financial maitre'd is hovering over the table with the bill in his hand. A hike in UK sales tax to 20% and income tax to 25% would 'only' raise about £25 billion of the £75 billion that will be needed each year to service and paydown the recently incurred debt. This tells me that there's a huge wave of government cutbacks in services on the way - what's the betting Britain will be hit by a rerun of 1970's industrial action next year?.
The 'font' has just been on the phone to remind me that the mayor is coming this morning so must go to have a shower and upgrade my tout ensemble.
