With preparations for a visit to the Paralympics including the closing ceremony taking precedence I am way behind in writing up what has happened over the past month and which engaged my interest. I will begin with a reminder to myself what there is to do and then report on the first of the two episodes of the latest New Tricks series and the second episode of George Gently.
I have acquired several of the Montalbano Books and have commenced to read Round the Mark on which the first of the second series which went under the name of Turning Point and about which I have already written (or have I?) I will view the second episode after I return in a week’s time and by then the third will also have taken place. This is called Equal Time and was an original Script. I have also been much affected by the Millennium Trilogy of the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo with an English version as well as the original Swedish, plus the Girl who played with Fire and the Girl who Kicked the Hornets Nest the last two I have also viewed in Swedish in a combined DVD set plus extras as well as having acquired the Daniel Craig with Rooney Mara version and the three original Stieg Larrson novels. I am also starting a collection of the Wallander Books, although I am still to finish the Le Carre Smiley books and films as well as having acquired the full radio and not to mention a dozen other books and DVD’s built up for sometime
I have been to see The Dark Knight Rises, the last of the Batman Trilogy and which I believe is the finest of the all the Super heroes from the comic books. I enjoyed Gorky Park, the film and also saw again the last Harry Potter in 3D TV saga. I want to mention Kings of South Beach because it features Donnie Whalberg. Then there is the second series of the Borgias and the most interesting series The Newsroom created by Arron Sorking of the West Wing where I have a completed set of the programmes on DVD.
In addition to covering Cycling, Swimming and other Medallists at the 2012 Olympic Games Olympic Games, there is the Opening Ceremony of the Paralympics and the events and back stories of the amazing GB team together with my visit to the see Eleanor Simmonds swim and the closing ceremony. Sunderland and Newcastle have commenced their new Premiership season campaign and Jenson Button has won another Grand Prix with still in with a shout for his first Grand Slam.
I have improved my use of the Sleep Apnoea Treatment Machine over the past month since the cold and missing out on three nights. The loss of the nights has affected the overall average for 30 days but the missed day will be lost from the current record over the coming week. I am average 6.2 hours which I hope to raise to 6.5 hour as some night I am able to use for three long sessions or four shorter ones. The more use and longer sleep the better I feel but my condition emotionally and physically has an impact and so far I have been unable to develop a consistent regime. My weight is still hovering around 16 and a half stone and I have a health check at the practice tomorrow. The weather had steadied with some good days which mean I am walking more.
I was unable to upload the photos taken on Olympic Games visit because there are no USB cable links and may never have been. While my service provider is seeing if a transfer to a memory stick is possible I have upgraded to a new photo phone at the modest price of £19.99 to existing users of the provider. The phone is touch screen although getting used to the writing system will take time. It has free FM radio and a host of other features which make this the bargain of the year.
Sprats are back in season.
I begin the catch up with Series 9 of New Tricks the cold case series which featured three of my favourite characters actors of all time. Alun Armstrong plays the recovering alcoholic and brains of the trio of former police officer brought in to help head of team Angela Redmond and her boss solve long standing mysteries where a new event or evidence results in a renewed investigation. Former Minder Dennis Waterman always with one eye on the ladies plays a thrice married former Detective while the man with wisdom and right hand man to the team leader was Likely Lad James Bolam. I say was because the first episode opens with Jack taking mystery phone calls and announcing he is leaving the team. Eventually he discloses to Brian with whom he had an important relationship, more for Brian and himself, that he has only weeks to live and has decided to spend the time at a clinic close the area where he and his wife had one of their happiest times. This affects Brian deeply especially being sworn not to tell the others until afterwards.
According to the available information Jack revealed his intention to leave when the BBC announced they were commissioning series 9 and 10. This aspect made the actual story secondary. A Whitehall representative of the Secret Services insists that the team investigate a 160 year old murder mystery having to blackmail them first into undertaking the work and then insisting that their records on what they discover are handed over.
At the root of this case is a Machiavellian attempt by the government at arms length to prevent a contract being confirmed because the evidence of the murder case suggests that the family money on which the contractor built up their position was based on murder and fraud? Jack who now has nothing to lose is responsible for the leak to a journalist which scuppers the contract. However it emerges that this was the intention all along.
In Old School Ties, a former pupil and now Member of Parliament is to open a new Computer Department with his Daughter another former pupil at the school now acting as his Secretary when a few days before the visit workmen excavating a site near the entrance to the school discover the remains of a Physical Education teacher who originated in New Zealand. His contract had ended and it was assumed he had returned to his homeland.
Time does not permit all the interesting twists and turns and red herrings. The head of the school is granddaughter of a racist, and as Brian points out despite as with other Private Schools, whatever their standing, they have become increasingly dependent on taking non white pupils from overseas to balance the books there are no non whites at the establishment. So how does the school survive and afford the latest computer department?
For the head of the school maintaining the principles of her family and the reputation of the school dominates all that she has done. The PE Teacher was very friendly with one young man who had found out that his girl friend was having an affair with the teacher. The young woman had been self abusive before this and it slowly emerges that she had a blazing row with her closest friend who had alleged she had slept with someone at the school, she admitted this was not true and to cover for the fact she had become fat which was itself a cover for something else.
The row was because between the disturbed girls believed the fat girl had also slept with the PE Teacher. She had then accused the PE Teacher who had honestly denied the accusation and when started to use the knife to harm herself the man had attempted to intervene and she had accidentally stabbed in. She had called the head that had helped her take the body into the woods outside school and bury it with the suggestion that the head had made sure the man was dead when in fact he might have survived the tab wound.
The former schoolboy friend of the PE teacher with the disturbed girl now his mistress had come under suspicion because of finding out about the relationship between the two.
However unrelated to this is the cause of one girl becoming disturbed and self harming, and the other becoming fat, quickly, and which forms the core of what happened subsequently. It emerged that the Member of Parliament had been a contemporary at the school, with the head and had a secret affair with the mother of the disturbed girl when she and his daughter were about 11 and 12 years of age. The story was that mother had been killed in a car accident which understandably affected her daughter greatly but also because the car had been found with its door unlocked something which was said never to have happened if the mother was in the car on her own or out with her daughter. This suggested someone else was in the car and had left the scene
It also emerged that the other girl had been asked to cover for her father that he had been in all night at home when she had seen him return and observed him crying. He had come back to house in the car of the head teacher who he had called from the scene of the accident. The Head had blackmailed the Member of Parliament who had become a Government Minister in arranging for those bidding for government contracts where his department had control to make substantial gifts to the school, including a wealthy Indian man who gained a £20 million contract who donated several hundred thousand to the school despite its racism.
An elderly Latin teacher of 35 years experience provided one red herring when it was discovered that he stole items of clothing and other mementoes from pupils and teachers alike over the past decade since the death of the PE teacher which he kept in a Lock up owned by a local developer whose men had dug up the remains of the PE teacher.
He explained his behaviour as evidence of his existence feeling unappreciated by other teachers and pupils for his work. He had been caught out by the PE teacher which had led to a row on the night of the man’s death,
This teacher of Latin had disclosed to the property developer sufficient of the dark deeds going on for him to pay for a detective to enter the school as a teacher. He has hoped to take over the school to convert into a country club.
The detective had died in a genuine road accident, I think this was separate from the other accident although could have been connected. In any event this happened before she was able to reveal the evidence.
In a further twist, the working class background Matron had got hold of CCTV showing the return the girl and the head leaving the school and then returning by a secret passageway. She had then used this as a means of getting her son a free place at school after he had been reported for drinking at the age of 12 and suspected of also taking drugs. So everyone was arrested and guilty of one thing or another.
All the members of the Team are affected by the absence of Jack particularly Brian who has become distant again from his wife who has to leave him for a few days to help out a relative. The episode closes with Brian unable to keep the burden of the knowledge to him any longer. Meanwhile Angela is under pressure to advise on short listing the applicants to replace him. She is also finding this difficult to impossible.
I have written about the first episode of the George Gently series recently, an episode which engaged and was well constructed. Last night I looked forward to viewing the subsequent episode on the BBCi player and was disappointed at the time although on the reflection this was not justified. The subject was well worn, the ability of the aristocracy and those with power to protect themselves. In this instance it was Northumbrian aristos where the Lady of the manor insisted on being addressed as her Ladyship but was an over protective slut prepared to do anything to protect her son and the family good name. She demonstrated contempt for everyone else including her husband and the dead young woman who had drowned in one of the eight or was it nine cars on the estate and used by those who worked there with keys left in the ignition. The car had gone off the road and the girl had been trapped by a leg unable to get out of the vehicle as the water rose. The main plot issue concerned who had been in the car with the girl and then walked away.
However from my viewpoint the issue was the behaviour of the Sergeant who spouted all the anti aristo prejudices of the post war period, in this instance with justification as twice before he had arrested the son for drunk driving and the case had never got to court because of the influence of the family with the authorities. In this instance an assistant Chief Constable intervened insisting on being in attendance while the son with his mother was interviewed and refusing to allow the Sergeant to participate in the questioning. However the Sergeant later placed a smear of the special blood type of the young man on the vehicle which led to the death of the girl in order to get justice. He was wrong of course both in his actions and in the facts although at first the son appeared the prime suspect because of nasty knock on his forehead.
The anti aristos theme was reinforced by the father of the dead girl who has a job on the estate after losing his job as a pitman and who was full of invective with a background of supporting Eileen Wilkinson and the Jarrow march the one time pride of Jarrow but where local politicians have worked hard to bring the community into the contemporary world in terms of jobs and living standards. There is a great work of art about the march outside the large supermarket although I suspect the nasty smell from the local chemical works still affects residents from time to time as it did when I lived there for a short period after arriving on Tyneside.
The dead girl sang folk protest songs and played the violin, now lived in London where it emerged she had a new boyfriend thus eliminating the young man of the house and another young man on the estate who was being groomed for political stardoom in the Tory Party through a liaison with her ladyship. The girl was left of the left and it when the writer attempts to enter the world of the revolutionaries and politicos that scripts never ring quite true although they come close.
And the truth in this instance? First the son of the house is gay and the product of mother’s tendency to take her pleasure where it can be found. She smothered and controlled the boy who had been persuaded to go to London with the girl to break free from the woman leading to the row after he had said he would drive her in his own car. When her Ladyship stopped the boy leaving it was his Lordship who had followed to drive the girl to catch a coach and they had stopped to talk and he had discovered that he had never recovered from the loss of his first wife, having little in common with his second other than protecting the family interest. He had the driven too fast and after the accident but he had held her hand when unable to free the girl until she drowned. There was a lot more of twists and red herrings and although the Lordship ended in a police cell and son died committing suicide and Sergeant got a reprimand I still feel that the episode failed to measure up and remained a fabrication rather than an honest portrayal of the people and their predicaments.
There was one great truth which came from the lines of Martin Shaw who told the Sergeant with all the benefits of hindsight that the Aristocrats would not longer directly exert the power they once had but they would equip a new generation to carry forward their values. Even in this respect I believe things have not changed to the extent suggested. I had one experience of assessing an application for a grant where it was arranged for me to meet the Committee at a country hotel and where while I waited there was great excitement expressed by hotel staff about who was at the meeting. It was a member of one of the great families of England, someone in tune with the times a million miles from the image presented in the programme; it was the people who maintained the sense of awe, respect and deference. It is the curious aspect about the old and the new English, more than the Scots, the Irish and the Welsh, I believe, which is demonstrated by the support not just for the Queen and her Jubilee, or the patriotic flag waving at the Olympic and Paralympic games but by the resistance to abolishing the House of Lords as we now know it, or renaming the Order of the British Empire something else. If this happens such as the Order of Excellence as proposed by one Commons Committee then the issue of Precedence involved will have to be tackled including the use of Sir and Lady etc. I do not expect to see fundamental change during my lifetime.
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