Peas Bounce Off The Walls Of Marathon 50 Years Ago

I have just received an email from my brother on the other side of the world containing a scan of an old press cutting which must date back fifty years. The young chap who is clinging the microphone like some semi-adolescent crooner is indeed myself, an age and a half ago. The rather stout chap to my left was Clifford Ward the Secretary and Agent of Halifax Labour Party and his research had led him top believe that an ancient public speaking pitch existed in the town centre (Halifax's equivalent of Speakers' Corner) which had been forgotten about for generations. It happened to be in the middle of a car park in Bull Green. The Young Socialists decided to exercise their right to speak to the citizens of the town so the police were called in to erect no parking signs and we set up our soapbox. As the newspaper reports, we organised speakers from all over Yorkshire and attempted to bring about the revolution by boring the people into submission. 

I always recall Lenin once writing about the Russian revolution and saying, "Socialism bounced off the peasants like peas off a wall". It was a bit like that in Halifax fifty years ago. But we gathered around and listened to ourselves. And we lay down rich memories that could be excavated half a century later.

Old, Slow, Worn Out and Unable To Multi-Task

Much of my time has been taken up recently with the arrangements for my surprise 60th birthday party. There have been endless lists to make : lists of people to invite, lists of food to buy or prepare, lists of lists to consult and update. I have come to the conclusion that there is nothing like planning a 60th birthday party to make you feel 70 years old. One such list did, however, give rise to one of my finest little jokes for a very long time. We were sat in the Rock Tavern on Friday night and Jenny had just said that she would prepare some potatoes for my surprise party. "Chips" said I more in hope than expectation. "Certainly not" she replied. "OK" said I with an appropriate degree of disgruntlement, "I'll cook some myself". "You can't do that she replied", to which I replied (are you ready for this, concentrate, it's a really good one) : "It's my party and I'll fry if I want to, fry if I want to ...."

Part of the problem is that I seem to be getting slower as I get older. For the last few days I have been doing some heavy practice for the surprise birthday present from Mark and Chrissy which will be an ascent of several mountains in the Lake District. I decided to be sensible and work my way carefully through some staged training and acclimatisation : and I dedicated this week to short strolls up and down the road with walking boots on my feet (the main expedition isn't until next week so I have loads of time to practice things like bivouacking, trekking, rock-climbing and all that sort of thing. I thought I was doing really well, marching up the road with the kind of pace that even the Grand Old Duke Of York would have been proud of. And then a little old lady - in her mid eighties at least - complete with two Scottie dogs said to me "excuse me love, do you mind if we pass you" and I realised that I had been holding her up for ages.

I managed to walk about half a mile this morning and then had to come home because I was worn out. My back was aching, my right foot was beset by a severe pain of unknown aetiology, the rib I cracked a few weeks ago whilst performing a splendid death fall during a game of Murder started to flair up again, my throat was lined with sandpaper, and my nose was running. I came home and collapsed into the chair and said to Xan "I feel worn out". I got his standard reply which was "don't be such an old woman". Thinking of the little old lady with the Scottie dogs I thought "chance would be a fine thing".

The other thing that seems to have evaporated from my list of personal skills is my ability to do more than one thing at once. I am not talking about fairly complex things such as simultaneously translating from French to English whilst reading a newspaper whilst drinking a cup of coffee (I used to watch the translators at the European Commission do this and was always impressed with their ability) : I mean relatively basic things. I have been meaning to do a blog posting since Sunday but my inability to multi-task has got in the way. On Sunday we were all treated to a most sumptuous Sunday lunch by Elaine - every element of which was a true delight (except the Yorkshire Puddings Elaine, except to Yorkshire Puddings). But when I got home I discovered that I could not let this wonderful meal digest and type at the same time. I got up early on Monday to write, but discovered that I could not think and shave at the same time. I started to worry that soon I would not be able to breath and do anything at the same time. And then I realised that I could not worry and write at the same time.

However, none of this has anything to do with what I want to write about which is the perilous state of my computer. It has been playing up for some time now but I have never said anything in public about it because I still intended to try and sell it to Cousin Dave when I eventually got another one. Alas it has now got to such a state that I am going to have to do something about it. After all, it's about four years old which is on the dark side of middle age in computer terms. And it is dreadfully slow at doing anything these days. You could boil a kettle while it finds a web page and eat a four course lunch whilst it launches an application. In its youth it was as swift as an Olympic runner, now it wouldn't qualify for a Veterans Zimmer Frame Race. The truth is that it is getting worn out. The fan next to the CPU makes a dreadful noise, occasionally the screen transposes the colours so everything looks as though you have been on an LSD trip, and the mouse regularly dies and can only be brought back to life by slamming it down onto the desk from a considerable height. And when it was new it could run several programmes at once whilst it calculated pi to 10,000 places and made a reasonable slice of toast, but now it struggles to do two things at the same time. If you try to get it to archive my old e-mail while it checks out the latest football news it transmits its annoyance with a flicker and a frozen screen.

I complain about this endlessly to my wife and she keeps telling me to get a new computer. Until now I have resisted, after all it has been a good friend to me over the years. We've had some good times together and I've told it things I have never told anyone else. But today I realised that you can't afford to be sentimental . Difficult decisions have to be made sometimes. I will pop down to PC World tomorrow and see what is available. The truth is that when such things get old, slow, worn out and unable to multi-task they have to be disposed of. Don't they?

Want an new computer? Then make your first port of call the Computer and Laptop Department of Alan Burnett's Amazon Store. Friendly service and some great bargains. Just press that link and come on in.

Take The Prisoner Down (Under)

Surfing around, as one does, I came by chance upon a fascinating repository of historical information : namely Old Bailey Online. The site contains the transcripts of the proceedings of the Central Criminal Courts for the period 1674 to 1913. Access is free and the massive database of information can be searched by keyword. So - as one does in such cases - I went in search of any Burnett's and found, amongst the hundreds of records highlighted, the story of one John Burnett of Stepney in London. In re-telling the story here I am not suggesting that John B was any relation of mine, nor that his story was in any way special. The story provides nothing more than an insight into the workings of the criminal justice system in the eighteenth century.

The first reference to John Burnett occurs in the Court records of December 1768 when he is up before the judges on a charge of petty larceny. He is charged with the theft of a linen handkerchief, valued at ten pence, the property of a certain John Phipps of Cheapside. According to the gentleman's statement :

"On the 24th of November, between eight and nine in the evening, I was coming from Cheapside. At the corner of St. Paul's Church-Yard , I felt something at my pocket, I put my hand down, and found the prisoner's hand in my pocket; I catched hold of his arm; he had not got the handkerchief quite out; he finding I had hold of him, let the handkerchief go".

On this occasion, John Burnett was lucky : as the handkerchief was not in his full possession at the time of his capture, he was acquitted.

Did he learn from this narrow escape? : did he heck. Six months later, on the 10th May 1769, he was back in court again, this time charged with burglary. No ten-penny hankie either : he was indicted for stealing a quantity of silver plate (namely, a silver tankard, value £9, a silver waiter, value £3, six silver table-spoons, value £3, a pair of silver tea-tongs, value 8/-, a silver milk-pot, a pair of silver salts, two silver salt-shovels, and five silver tops of cruet-stands). This time he wasn't caught red-handed, he was grassed up by his fence, a certain Moses Lyon. Having been approached by John B. to sell a quantity of silver of dubious provenance, Mr Lyon went to the police and a trap was set. Lyon agreed to meet Burnett at a nearby alehouse and bring the silver with him. When he came the police were waiting and took him into custody (alehouses have always been an important element in the downfall of members of the extended Burnett family). John came up with a somewhat convoluted defence : he was innocent and just accompanying a old schoolfriend :

"I met John Bagnall , a schoolfellow of mine, who asked where I was going; I said to my father in Leadenhall-street. He asked me to go with him to Mr. Lyon's. I did. He then took out some plate. Mr. Lyon desired him to come again. At night he went down to Mr. Lyon's with some plate in his pocket, and some in a silk handkerchief. The two officers came up and took hold of me. They wanted to take the plate away; but I said the plate shall not go without me. I said, Where that goes, I will go to clear my character".

You will note that when the police officers approached Bagnall and Burnett, the former ran for his life (and managed to escape) while the latter, in true Burnett fashion, attempted to clear his name. The Judge didn't believe a word of this, found John Burnett guilty and sentenced him to be transported to Australia for seven years.

In many ways John B was lucky. At the end of each court session there is a summary of the sentences delivered during the relevant session. The list for the 10th May 1769 is as follows:

Received Sentence of Death, Seven.
Mary Harris , Louisa Smith , James Best , William Sykes, John Abram otherwise Abraham, Judith Baldwin , and John Creamer .
Transportation for fourteen years, Two.
Winnifred Carryl , and John Baker .
Transportation for seven years, Thirty-One.
John Smith , Sarah Manton otherwise Stretton otherwise Smith, George Pool , Joseph Bluckfield , John Steward , James Catling, William Nicholl, Mary Harding , Michael Mills , Eleanor Smith , Philip Erovselle , Francis Bush , Moses Waters , Robert Mallows , Thomas Gray , James Warden , Peter Medley , Samuel Levi , John Butler , Eleanor Morgan , Matthew Dalloway , Stephen Hope , John Burnett , William Perry , Thomas Jones , John House , John Morris otherwise Hambleton, Andrew Burk , Robert Williams , Elizabeth Odell , and Sarah Rowden .
Branded, Two.
Daniel Collins , and Sarah Scurry .

I've never been over-fond of silver. Perhaps it's a genetic thing. Perhaps I now know the reason why.

Alan Burnett And His Fleet Of Rowing Boats

I have to admit, I wasted some valuable time over the Bank Holiday weekend watching a piece of arrant nonsense on the television entitled "Flood". In my defence, I must say that I only watched the first part of what was a two-part film, and I watched that with the kind of fascination one feels when watching something really bad (it's the same pleasure one gets from watching the candidates on the current series of "The Apprentice"). "Flood" was wooden, formulaic, trite and totally unbelievable. "How do I know?", you ask, dear reader. "Because, in a previous existence I used to sit on the London Tidal Flooding Defence Committee."

Way back in the early seventies - long before the Thames Barrier was constructed - I found myself acting as the Inner London Education Authority representative on Emergency Planning Committee of Riparian London Boroughs (I think that was its name but my memory is beginning to fade). Back in those days, the tidal flooding of the Thames was a real threat and I spent many happy hours attending large committee meetings along with the Army, the Emergency Services and representatives of the various London Local Authorities. At these meetings we would endlessly discuss important questions such as whether evacuees would be allowed to take their pet dogs and cats with them. I carried the day-to-day responsibility of evacuating children from schools within the flood zone and for this purpose I was allocated a number of rowing boats from, I think, Stratford Park Lake. I know this sounds slightly bizarre, but I assure you it was true : much truer than the ridiculous plot of last weekend's film.

What the film didn't take into account is that there are very few single-storey buildings in London. Thus, the standing instructions in the event of tidal flooding were simply to go upstairs. Go upstairs and wait for Alan Burnett to arrive with his fleet of rowing boats.

Spring Cleaning

If you are wondering why there hasn't been many posts for the last few days, it is because I have been Spring Cleaning. Before the rest of the family gets too excited and imagines that I am - at last - turning my hand to honest housework, let me stress that this is digital spring-cleaning ... to my website. So if you have nothing better to do, pay it a visit and admire its new, sleek, sharp lines. Thrill as you re-read old blog postings. Shudder as you admire the breath-taking images in the on-line galleries. Tremble as you browse the latest selected news items. If you like it, tell a friend. If you don't, don't bother telling me, I'd rather not know.

All Blogged Up

It is one of those rare occasions that all my blogs have been recently updated. This may not sound like much to you, but believe me it is a considerable achievement. So, if you are really bored and if you are fed up with watching re-runs of the Jeremy Kyle Show, here are the various links :

DAILY PHOTO BLOG : The blog is currently working its way through photographs taken during my day out in Dewsbury and Wakefield last week. (GO THERE)

GREAT YORKSHIRE PUBS : Read all about Henry Boons in Wakefield. (GO THERE)

FAT DOG TO THE BIG APPLE : Amy and I have just walked from Dutchman's Flat in Northern California (where there are a lot of trees) to Richardson Grove in Northern California (where there are a lot of trees). (GO THERE)