Name an attraction or town close to home that you still haven’t got around to visiting.
For those of you who have read Great Expectations you will remember that a fair amount of the story takes place in Satis House, the home of Miss Havisham where she lives in constant despair after she was jilted at the altar on her wedding day. It is actually based on a real house in Rochester called Restoration House. With Great Expectations being such a favourite of mine and with Rochester being so close it seems incredible that I have never been there. I have always wanted to, but it is one of those attractions that is only open occasionally, and it’s not easy to remember to check when. What I will do is to find the official website, work out when it is open and when I can go and finally make the booking. When I do I will definitely write about it on here.
List five things you do for fun.
I am trying to find out what I do for fun as that has become more important as I have stepped back from full time year round teaching. It’s not actually a case of doing something new, but appreciating what I already do more than I have in the past.
- Writing my blog every day is a good discipline to get into but it’s also a lot of fun. I wouldn’t do it otherwise. The fact that it is nearly always early on in the morning means that I have to engage my brain and it’s really good for me.
- Janet and I love doing jigsaw puzzles together and it’s something we need to do more of this year. Yes, there is the occasional frustration of getting stuck but even that’s fun because it’s followed by the inspiration that means you are full steam ahead for the next part of the puzzle. It’s great as a mental challenge and also as an opportunity to work on something together.
- Walking is something I have always enjoyed doing and Janet and I love walking down by the Kent coast in particular. It is great exercise of course but it is also great fun to see the views and to feel the fresh air. Over the years I have undertaken a number of charity walks for a number of different causes and our walks are a very important part of my training. I am not sure if I am going to do a charity walk this year but if I don’t then I’ll definitely do one next year.
- One of the pastimes I let slip after finishing my commuting days was reading. My hour long journeys there and back were completely focused on books rather than a screen. I would read over 100 books a year as a result and I would concentrate on anything I liked. Romantic comedies, detective novels, books about music, books about popular culture and social history. You name it, I read it. To restrict myself to fiction or non fiction, or to read a specific genre is anathema to me. Variety is the spice of my reading life.
- Finally we come to my favourite TV programme of the moment. My youngest daughter and I started watching Celebrity Traitors together last year and I got completely hooked. Tonight, as I write is the final programme of the normal version and I am absolutely loving it. The game is great, the players are a fantastic mix and the sheer enjoyment I get from it is amazing. A lot of that enjoyment comes from sharing it with my daughter and discussing the programmes and what might happen next. The programme we share as a family is Home and Away. It’s a blast of sunshine from our favourite country and we have been to Palm Beach where it is filmed a couple of times so we recognise the places where the filming takes place. Individual watching is OK but nothing like as much fun as watching something with other people. My Dad and I shared three programmes, MASH, Yes Minister/Prime Minister and The Wonder Years. The last of those we shared despite not living in the same house. We used to watch each episode then chat about it on the phone and I really treasure the memories of those conversations as I grew to understand him more and more.
So, there you have it. That’s what is fun for me, and long may it continue.
If you could make your pet understand one thing, what would it be?
I have posted before about the ill founded exceptionalism of the human race. Let’s start with one thing I want people to understand. We are simply members of the animal kingdom ourselves, not some kind of master species. Our pets are generally far more intuitive than we are and we ignore their instincts to our detriment. So, what can we learn from our pets?
First of all, unconditional affection. We are extremely bad at loving other living things with no agenda. We want to know what we can get from them. Well, pets stay with us for food, you might argue. Evidence shows that you are wrong. Pets will stay in houses where they are underfed or mistreated because of that unconditional love they have. When they are abandoned they shut down because they lose so much whereas many of those who abandon their pets do so without feeling the least bit guilty. However much pets go through, they want to love and trust again.
Second, your pet will be able to sense a ‘wrongun’ very quickly. If someone visits the house, they size up the unconscious cues that we all give off and decide whether to approach, to observe or to avoid. If they avoid the person, that is an excellent indication that they are not particularly pleasant.
Third, we have a lot of difficulties in ascertaining the emotional state of our pets. They have to be exhibiting extremely unusual behaviour for us to notice. We on the other hand only need to be showing small signs, imperceptible to other people and perhaps even to ourselves, and our pets will pay closer attention to us, be more affectionate and will do that until we feel better at least temporarily.
Finally, our pets learn what we are like and what our routines are far more quickly than we realise. They are often ready to greet us as soon as we come home. I remember reading that they can identify the sound of your footsteps long before you come into view because of their excellent hearing. If we go away on holiday, particularly a long holiday, they will get agitated even if someone they know is taking care of them during your absence. Our cat Albus had my daughter looking after him for nearly three weeks during Christmas 2024 and her schedule was very different to ours. He was absolutely fine, being fed, played with and cared for, but when we got back and he had forgiven us, he spent a good few days reintroducing us to his correct schedule!
Our pets are intuitive, loving and loyal. In return they deserve the best care and attention we can give them. We are the true dumb animals in this relationship and the sooner we realise that the better. That said, there is one thing I do want Albus to understand. If it’s raining outside one door, it will be raining outside all of them so there’s no need to try all three! ☔☔🤣🤣
Write about your first name: its meaning, significance, etymology, etc.
I was given the name David when I was born. In 1965 it was the third most popular boy’s name in the UK, behind Michael and John. In the decade as a whole it was the top baby name in the UK. As a result there were a good sprinkling of Davids everywhere I went. It is a ‘classless’ name in that you can’t tell where a David might come from in the social hierarchy. There would have been as many Davids in the comprehensives as there were in the Public schools. Interestingly, if I had been a girl I would have been given the name Jane, the 7th most popular name for girls during the decade.
David is a Hebrew name meaning Beloved although I never really lived up to that! I am interested to find out that it also means ‘to boil’ more appropriately as I often found myself boiling over! I think it’s interesting how having a common name makes you one of the masses. Now, obviously there have been famous people called David throughout history, but its ubiquity means that you are much more likely to fade into the background of life. In the Scout movement and in Polytechnic I was almost always called Dave but I am not a fan of the shortened version. To me, Dave sounds quite common – in the class context rather than its ubiquity – and indicates a person who is in some way trying too hard to fit in. I never went as far as telling people not to call me that, but I never really took to it.
Funnily enough, it was my middle name that attracted the most attention, generally negative, because I was given my Dad’s name for my middle one, as was common at the time, so I was David Gerald. Unlike me, he disliked the full version of his name and called himself Gerry from very early on. That suited him far more than Gerald would have done because he was always at the centre of everything in social terms.
As a name, David is OK and I have just accepted it over the years without question, but I wonder what would have happened if I had been given a more unusual name. Would I have been a different person? It’s an interesting thought experiment but how would you go about pursuing it?
What’s your dream job?
I think a dream job is an obsolete concept in two ways. First, the idea of a dream job belongs in your childhood. In those days you don’t think about the reality of employment and nor should you. Your childhood is a time for trying to find your strength and your passion in your life. When I was younger I wanted to be a sports journalist or a music writer, and I would have been good at it, but the reality was that you had to be hard nosed to get into papers and I wasn’t. In those days you had to work in local papers reporting on everything and anything and I wouldn’t have had the instincts to do that. The fact that I have had the opportunity to write about music and sports in various ways is a bonus and because it hasn’t become a job, it’s been better for me as a person.
The second reason why you should forget about the idea of a dream job lies in the way that today’s employment practices are so impersonal and so profit driven. I have said it before and I will say it again, employees have never had it so bad in my working lifetime. Since Human Resources took over from Personnel, the difference in treatment has been stark. It wasn’t just a change of vocabulary, it was a change of approach. Personnel departments used to be full of people who had done the same jobs in the same situation and therefore understood you and your issues. They had compassion for you as people as well as employees. Nowadays, HR departments are full of university graduates with no experience of the sectors and no interest in the people who work for the firm. They are there to protect the firm not you, because you are Resources, not Humans. The shareholders are the people who count and the employees merely replaceable cogs in a machine. As a result of this change dream jobs can no longer exist in my opinion. I would love to hear from an HR professional with their take on this, but I am merely a small blog so I don’t suppose it will happen!
David Pearce - Popular Culture and Personal Passions 