‘If’! The pandemic had not happened, for certain billions of pounds would not have been burnt in fighting it. Would Boris Johnson still be PM with his Brexit dream becoming a strong reality. As none of that happened, we watched as Boris was torn to pieces by enraged members of his own party.

He was replaced by Liz Truss who had the idea of reducing taxes to ease the financial burden of the people and of making the country work again. One cannot help wondering ‘if’ that could have worked, but the savages were at it again and her term as Prime Minister in office became the shortest in nine hundred years of the British Parliament.

I wonder what the game plan was – ‘if’ there was one, when the current British Prime Minister whose income, we are told, in the past year was two million pounds – let me put that into perspective, it would pay my 850-euro Spanish Council Tax (Suma) for 2,353 years.  We are also told he has paid less tax on earnings than a nurse does. So why did he want to be leader of the country? Is it a game to see ‘if’ he can do it, but is he dedicated to reducing the people’s daily financial burden. I can’t help feeling ‘if’ in his heart, it is to grow the country he is governing, then surely, he would set an example and pay British taxes, and thereby encourage others using offshore facilities to do the same.

The games people play are a daily part of life, obvious really, and of course they are so varied. So much so that our son in law plays darts, and he is good at it. Me, I used to play chess, but it was difficult to find someone to play with, not because I was good, exactly the opposite as my strategy was not strong enough and I would not give them an exciting game, well that’s not quite true I used to win sometimes.

As a young businessman golf seemed to be the thing, never mind the cost, but when the heavens opened halfway round, with thunder and lightning, I decided it was not for me, back to chess.

Then there are games which are really events and played without rules; the world is awash with them. Rioting in the street is seen on news broadcasts frequently in a multitude of countries, where the game plan is to change a government, or its proposed legislation, as seen in France at the present time protesting against the need to work for another two years, until retirement at sixty-four. They should be so lucky, it’s far longer than that in the United Kingdom.

What game was the Russian Despot playing in Ukraine when he invaded it and ‘if’ the Western World had taken him seriously and met with a force equal to his at the border before the invasion, to create a stalemate. It is my belief that history would have different – instead the West thought sanctions would bring him to heel. However, for any action there is an equal and opposite reaction, so the tyrant gets in bed with the Chinese and offers them all the companies that once belonged to businesses in the West. Xi Jimping, thought Christmas had come, or at least another Chinese New Year.

A Big ‘If’

I would think most people are afraid of fire, myself probably more than most. My grandfather died when trapped in an attic and the house burned down. I have vivid memories as a child in my bedroom when the hallway caught fire and in our early married life, we lost eight friends when they were in an upstairs room and there was no escape.

 

Living in a detached property with fields either side, it is comforting to see they are kept ploughed and clear of undergrowth.

It was a Wednesday and we had been pottering around all morning with a plan to do some shopping plus having lunch out somewhere. Unknown to us, our neighbour who lives to the front of us, saw the farmer at eight o’clock in the morning light a bonfire in the field next to our garden on the other side of the boundary to where the pool is.

Three and a half hours later we eventually got ready to go out and decided, first we would have another cup of coffee – ‘if’ we had not had that drink then events would have been totally different.

Evidently the farmer had his bonfire and then, I am guessing, he thought the fire was out. But it was not totally. For four hours the fire had been smouldering in the undergrowth and slowly spread to the bushes surrounding our property.

We were about to leave when flames started leaping out of the greenery. The smoke was billowing across the pool. Frightening to watch as it spread rapidly along the fence destroying part of it, the wind blowing it towards the house. The local police and then the fire people were expert in dealing with it.

The frightening thing, ‘if’ it had happened the following day we would have been out all day and there would have been nothing or nobody to stop it.

Embarrassing.

In a recent report one hundred and twenty barristers have formed an alliance of ‘declaration of conscience’ and are refusing to take to court, so called Eco Warriors. These top lawyers have also, according to the write up, are refusing to deal with anyone involved in oil or gas legislation. It appears they are not just happy arguing cases in Court; they wish to be the judge and jury as well.

When the people who are responsible for upholding justice in our Courts refuse the very function of operating it, then the country is slipping into anarchy, where the ‘woke’ attitude takes control – ‘do what you want when you want’. Take care.

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