And here are some of the better photos

More photos from the plinth

Sarada Gray

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Last night was great

I promised you some highlights, and here they are. We begin with one of the high spots for me of the last decade-and-a-half, which is my time on the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square. The plinth had been empty for decades and there was a project led by Anthony Gormley to use it as a space for public art. People would enter a lottery to win a one-hour slot during which you could do anything you liked (provided it was legal and decent) and take with you anything you could carry. I entered, not remotely expecting to win, and to my delight I was awarded a slot in the middle of the day. I’d been going to do yoga for an hour but had been ill so in the end I decided to do some poems for peace. At this point the local CND group got involved and offered a minibus and some banners; it was a great day.

Sarada Gray

Left to right: Kate Hudson from National CND, old man who looks like Michael Foot, Mark, Jan – (in red holding the banner) and – erm, some others from Leicester CND plus onlookers.

Back home, we celebrated.  Present were the three of us plus Peter, Stephen, Jan, Yvan and Claire.  Also, back from Lifebeat – Holly!  She brought with her a number of necklaces and bracelets that she’d made.  I made pizza and salad and hoped that others would bring snacks.  In fact everyone brought wine so we ended up with 2 bottles of rose, one of white, plus 2 wine boxes (one of which Steve had mauled in an attempt to wrestle it open) and half a bottle of red.

A good had was time by all, the pizza went down well and the plinth video generated a lot of interest.  We watched another one of a woman in…

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Goodbye in Slo-mo

It occurs to me that after all we’ve been through last night’s goodbye was a bit on the perfunctory side. After all, we’ve been together for 14 years, or some of us have, so we deserve a better send-off. In due course I shall be reminiscing about some of my favourite posts as well as touching on some low points: I shall give a mention to some of my most loyal followers and highlight some of the best comments. There may also be photos…

I’ve enjoyed my blogging journey despite the frustrations of working with WordPress. I’ve enjoyed the interactions with readers and the connections with other blogs. I’ve relished the challenge of finding something to write about nearly every day. I’ve posted some stories and poems and for the first couple of years this blog was the only outlet for my work.

And I’ve learned loads: how to structure a good post, how to write interestingly (I hope) on a variety of topics, how to deal with trolls and spammers and of course how to navigate some of the many obstacles WordPress throws in our path. But when the best ideas you can come up with are repeats of something you’ve already done, it’s time to move on, even though I may not have anything to move on to. I shall miss you all and I hope you’ll miss me but as the song says, it’s better to burn out than to fade away. There will be no jumping of sharks on this blog.

Please keep sending in your comments as I value them all. And as the travellers say, I’ll see you down the road…

Go well, friends

Kirk out

The Time Has Come

You know when you’re watching a TV series that used to be good but starts to fall off a bit? When it jumps the shark? Or maybe it starts repeating itself. No series can carry on forever and still retain its quality. Friends managed ten years and finished with dignity but The Simpsons carried on long after the shark had been jumped and I don’t want to do that. It’s been a good run but I have to acknowledge that the passion I once felt for writing this blog has diminished. Yes, I’m in the speedboat and I can see the shark waiting in the water. I think it may be time to lay this blog down and try something new.

I may come back in a few days with some retrospective posts but for now I’ll say so long and thanks for all the fish.

Kirk out

Tempus Fugit

Time, as many clever people have spotted, doesn’t actually exist. And yet we have to live as if it does. Try ignoring time and you get into all sorts of trouble – like for example today, when I looked at this site and realised it was almost 2 weeks since I’d posted. Gulp! So here goes.

I guess the most exciting thing that’s happened in that time is the addition of an exercise bike to our household. I’ve been having a lot of trouble motivating myself to get out cycling, what with the weather and all, so when I saw this on freegle I thought it would be the ideal solution. I requested it and waited: no response. I asked again and got nothing. Assuming it must have gone I gave up, but a few days later I checked and it was still there. I worded a very polite request saying how much I’d love to have it and a couple of days later I got a reply. All the messages had gone into the spam folder apparently – that’s happened to me too – and if I was still interested it was mine. Brilliant.

As it was free I wasn’t expecting anything fancy but look at this! It looks almost new. It’s very sturdy and it has a digital readout of distance, time and heart rate. I’ve been doing 5k every day this week. It’s not much but it’s 5k more than I was doing before.

Kirk out