Skip to main content

A Brief Parole Beckons

Day 1 at home with my spouse is over. Little blood spilt. And that has been by my spouse in the daily battle to get a pill down the throat of our older cat.

I had a bit of a long lie but I don’t think it did me too much harm .. I rose at 0615 rather than my usual 0530.

Especially when followed by walking 2½ miles around our country roads. Not a single vehicle was seen or heard, so business as usual.

A brief chat, at a distance, with a neighbour – in country living a mile away counts as a neighbour – and the subject of the chat? Social distancing. And an agreement that we country dwellers were pretty adept at that already.

The other highlights?

Well, I have incorporated a few short bits of jogging to raise the cardio action. All on the flat of course. Perhaps I shall start on some uphill sections next week—a target set of getting to do 10K twice a week and doing it in the hour. But without a target date .. yet.

It’s a chastening thought that when I, and my late pals Archie and Joe, used to run around Linlithgow Loch on a Sunday morning, we did it in under 14 minutes. Now I feel quite pleased to walk it in 50.

But that was 40 years ago .. another life.

So back to the electronic bully. The email inbox.

And there’s a noticeable increase in emails from an unexpected source.

It’s been a hobby of mine since the early 1960s to undertake family ancestry research.

Initially one had to attend New Register House in Edinburgh. One bought a two-day ticket and had a free run of searching the original paper documents about births, deaths, marriages and censuses that are held there. Provided always that one took no pens in; only pencils were allowed.

Today the search room, still a favourite location of mine, is closed because of CORVID-19 so that’s no longer an option.

For the many tiny personal businesses that are the professional genealogists, that’s going to be a serious impediment to continuing their quite modestly paying researches. Like businesses large and small, their very viability will be threatened by the pandemic.

The increase in the inbox? Emails from amateur genealogists around the world.  Time at home, time to research.

For family research, like many desk-bound tasks, has been transformed by the internet.

50 years ago I searched for 3 years, during intermittent visits to Edinburgh, for the birth of my grandfather Alexander Campbell MacGregor.

A census record had him living in Leith, where my mother was born in 1909 and showed him born in Edin.

The psychological phenomenon of confirmation bias kicked in and I spent that 3 years searching Edinburgh’s birth records for him. To no avail.

It turned out, after a suggestion from the ever-helpful staff in New Register House, that he had been born not in Edinburgh, which I had assumed “Edin.” meant, but in Edindonich in Argyll. A hamlet so small that none of its houses have survived to today.

It was obvious, really. The census showed him as a native Gaelic speaker. Normal in Victorian Argyll. Unusual in Leith.

The final task of the day? Preparing for the highlight of the week. Discussing the shopping list for the special session at Huntly’s ASDA for pensioners tomorrow between 0700 to 0900. But as journalist Derek Bateman pointed out, the drinks aisle does not open until 1000. Ah well, a little help to keeping healthy.

Temporary parole beckons.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

New Solutions, New Problems

A wee bit under 6 miles walking for yesterday's exercise. Had to fit it in between a couple on online conferences. As people are getting the hang of this, the diary is filling up with work for and with constituents. But the highlight was the walk. Despite the phone ringing several times. Have I said I hate phones? A highlight because it was a warm wind and a "big sky" day. We started with absolutely clear blue above us, and around us. As the day wore on, a beautiful set of alto-cirrus clouds painted beautiful patterns on the sky. It just somehow makes one want to swivel one's head around to take in the scale of the patchwork of textures above. And at a pragmatic level, those high altitude clouds were a blanket to keep the day's heat from escaping. Creating the conditions for a warm start today. My deadline for this diary this morning has to be 0900 not my usual 1000. That's because I shall be playing my part in a discussion led by some of my f...

Newsing

Today, as every day, I rise from my slumbers, pad through to the kitchen to make porridge and then sit down to breakfast in front of some of my computers. The order I then read the morning's media is theoretically random but actually formed of habit. It follows a predictable pattern. With the Financial Times being my most expensive monthly indulgence, it comes top of my reading list. Even the recently announced reduction in tax on online media will make no difference. The FT is pocketing the saving and my subscription will remain the same. It actually costs more than I pay for my broadband connection. Is it worth it? Yes. But is it worth more than my next read which is free? That's the Independent. A very different publication and since 2016, online-only. And apparently making a financial success of it. Their figures published in March show a profit of £2.3 million on £27 million turnover (source: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/independent-financial-results-profit...

Discussions at a Distance

The pace of change seems to be stepping up. This week will see me participate in eleven online video discussions, only one of which is social. Two are international discussions centred around COVID-19 and its potential long-term effects. The remainder are Parliamentary. But I think we have further transitions in our mode of working to make. We shall have legislation to progress. And I am deeply concerned that this key part of our duties excludes those of us unable to be present physically. With social distancing rules also restricting the number who can be present in the Chamber, the scrutiny is potentially reduced while we are accelerating the pace at which we make new, albeit mostly temporary, new laws. The risk of error is rising, although I cannot see any yet. Others may. Two difficulties exist that need our attention. We don't seem to be able to run sessions where some members are physically present while others are "dialled in" from home. And yet even Westmins...