First week of retirement

Not even a full week really, since I was paid to the 31st May. Highlights of the week:

• Done a lot of cleaning - the house is looking good (even the hardwood floors have been cleaned!)


• Cleaned out and re-organized the garage


• Cleaned out and painted the furnace room, ready to receive new shelving


• Cleaned up most of the paperwork on my desk


• Made a rather nice beef in beer casserole (from a new-to-me Delia Smith recipe)


• Finished up some bits and pieces of paperwork for the University (returning keys etc)


• With Bill's help, signed up for domestic partner status at the University Gym


• Shopped! Kohl's is my friend


• Cleared out a LOT of clothing that I'll never wear again (including lots of my work Oxfords) - it'll be going to charity


• Started work on some long-standing web projects


• Watched some quality BBC TV shows :-)

Now to get busy with week 2.

Move over Harry Houdini!

I didn't understand a word of this video - but you really don't need to! The climax of this trick is stunning! A long video, but worth the wait.

Drama

"The Street" was a BBC drama series set in Manchester, England. It examined the lives of various residents of the the street in question. It was a three season series, with six one-hour episodes in each season. As with any neighborhood, the stories of each person were unique, but major characters from one episode played tangential roles in others.

I recently started re-watching the three seasons; I'm currently half-way through season two. It's one of those series where you really want to watch the whole thing in one sitting, yet dread getting to the end, because there will be no more. The BBC canceled the show, not because the show had run out of steam, but because they had run out of money.

I think the series resonates so much with me because I recognize the community and the rows of 'back to back' houses as part of my childhood. Actually, I spent a part of my childhood in Sunderland, many miles north-east of Manchester, but the culture was very similar; and quite different to that of the South of England, where I lived the rest of the time. Over the years, I've met just about every person in the street; the man who commits a crime and is torn between owning up and saving himself when his best friend is arrested by mistake; the kid who ruins a promising future with a single act of shop-lifting, egged on by his friends; the unhappy married man with two kids and a mortgage who works as a demolition worker and cannot conceive of coming out in that homophobic environment; the day-to-day adultery and deception, the desperation of living paycheck to paycheck; the decimation of families when a husband loses his job, or a wife is diagnosed with breast cancer. The hard working, hard drinking, constantly challenging lives of these working class men and women are very accurately portrayed.

Set as it is against the bleak backdrop of this midlands town, it also shows the strength of individuals and of a close-knit community in rising up to meet, and overcome, apparently insurmountable challenges.

This series is BBC drama at its very best.