Blasphemy...

Asia Bibi, a 47-year-old mother of four, and a Christian, was sentenced to hang for blasphemy in Pakistan. She had angered fellow farm workers - all Muslims - by taking a sip of water from a cup she had fetched for them on a hot day. When they demanded she convert to Islam, she refused, prompting a mob to later allege that she had insulted the prophet Mohammed. She has been in prison, in solitary confinement, for the past eight years. Her sentence has now been quashed, on the sensible basis that she has no case to answer. However, members of TLP a fast-growing political party dedicated solely to the punishment of blasphemy, have vowed to hunt her down and kill her, along with the judges who decided she should be freed.

Sam Harris has been criticised for suggesting that “the Muslim world is utterly deranged by its religious tribalism”, but he was right. How can we talk to people who believe such nonsense, and who believe it with unshakeable conviction? How could that conversation even start?

A poor month for Alamy sales was rescued by a late surge of sales, including this shot of Scale Lane Bridge in Hull...

Satnav...

Pic licensed today in a flurry of end-of-month sales. The moral? Don't believe everything the satnav lady says...

 



 

Hay-time...

More wise words from Krishnamurti... "You are now listening to me; you are not making an effort to pay attention, you are just listening; and if there is truth in what you hear, you will find a remarkable change taking place in you—a change that is not premeditated or wished for, a transformation, a complete revolution in which the truth alone is master and not the creations of your mind. And if I may suggest it, you should listen in that way to everything—not only to what I am saying, but also to what other people are saying, to the birds, to the whistle of a locomotive, to the noise of the bus going by. You will find that the more you listen to everything, the greater is the silence, and that silence is then not broken by noise. It is only when you are resisting something, when you are putting up a barrier between yourself and that to which you do not want to listen—it is only then that there is a struggle"

Licensed this pic, over the weekend, of hay-making in the Scottish Borders...

Death raffle...

Two doors down from the Wetherspoons in Leek is a characterful little pub, the Wilke’s Head, which, in decor, ambience and clientele is everything that Wetherspoons is not. On one wall is a blackboard, announcing the results of the latest Death Raffle, with locals betting on the next celebrity to croak. So I offer my heartiest congratulations to ‘Jackie’, who is now £612 to the good after forecasting the demise of Burt Reynolds (1936-2018).

The barmaid either had badly-applied make-up or a facial tattoo. When she wasn’t pulling pints, she was hollowing out pumpkins with a knife, ready for this evening, when the pub will be filled with even more vampires and zombies than usual. Requiring only a minimum of make-up, I could have joined the ranks of the undead; instead I’m heading for a family get-together in Coventry.

The blackboard in the Wilke’s Head, from a previous visit…

Uppingham...

Licensed today: some of the school buildings, Uppingham...

Memories...

Saw a rag & bone man, and his horse and cart, clip-clopping through the streets of Otley. It took me straight back, for a few moments, to a world of farthings, florins, farenheit and fuzzy felt. Antirhinums, antimacassars and avoidupois. Dubbin and dolly blue. Green Shield Stamps, twin-tubs, tiger nuts, singing cowboys, coltsfoot rock, barley sugar twists, temperance hotels, sarsaparilla and sweet cigarettes (what a great idea they were, introducing kids to two lifelong addictions - sugar and tobacco - for the price of one!).

Drax power station...

Zip Hotels...

I read in the Guardian  that we’ll soon have a new, budget, no-frills hotel chain, called Zip Hotels, whose tiny en-suite rooms will cost just £19 per night. Hmmm… I might be tempted to have the occasional night indoors. There will be electric plugs, to charge my gadgets, plus free wifi, hot showers, big towels, free shampoos, soap and shower cap. I can watch TV in my underwear, before falling asleep in a bed with clean sheets. I have no need for space, or luxury, and the price is right. I already pay a similar amount to stay in a campsite, where the amenities may be little more than some hard-standing in a field, for parking the van, an electric hook-up and a shower block just a ten-minute walk away (maybe twenty minutes if you forget to take a torch)…

Drax...

Just finishing off my two-day stint in the campsite: quite productive and very restful. Gout easing (I have the pills, but it still takes time). Off to Leeds now, to pick up the printer.

The village of Drax, with its rather splendid church...

Slaithwaite...

The Huddersfield Narrow Canal at Slaithwaite...

Threshfield...

It’s a wet day in Wharfedale, with the kind of light drizzle that will soak you to the skin in five minutes. I’m parked up in my favourite campsite, near Threshfield. I’d planned to process a backlog of pix, work on my book, finish an article and do the ‘housework’: shower, wash my clothes, charge up everything that needs charging, etc. But the gout’s come back, and I’m feeling a bit grumpy. I’m tempted by plan B: go back to bed and listen to the radio…

Job...

A guy wearing a hi-viz jacket works at the bus station in Otley. His only role, as far as I can see, is to help buses reverse. “Come back”, he’ll shout, while beckoning with his hand. I wonder what his job title might be: Bus Reversal Manager? How long was the interview for the job? Were there any questions at all, apart from “Can you start on Monday?” Could this be the most boring job on the planet?

Bus Reversal Manager, hard at work...

Anjem Choudary...

Anjem Choudary is leaving prison today, having served half of the five-and-a-half-year sentence he received in 2016. He’s a thoroughly nasty piece of work: pledging allegiance - and recruiting impressionable young people - to ISIS, promoting Sharia law for the UK, preparing for a time when we’ll all be living under strict Islamic rule, and spouting hateful nonsense at anyone who’d listen. In times past he was featured on news and current affairs programmes - presumably to act as BBC ‘balance’ to the more rational participants - but I hope we’ve learned our lesson. We should never again give him a platform to air his repellent views.

Anjem Choudary: a portrait of religious certainty...

Book...

It’s time to get some opinions about my book. I don’t need anyone to correct my spelling or grammar; that can come later. I just want to know if the damn thing is any good…

The 9th-century cross in the churchyard of the church at Irton Green, West Cumbria...

Joke...

My favourite joke: what do Winnie the Pooh and John the Baptist have in common? The same middle name...

Printer...

Synchronicity… I’ve been researching mobile printers, and have decided to go for the HP Officejet 200. It’s small and designed for people on the move (ie having been charged up it can then be used without mains electricity). It’s a bit more than I expected to pay, but a few minutes ago I got my DACS royalty payment for 2018, which will cover the cost of the printer and a few reams of paper as well. Hooray!...

Tabernacle...

Timeless wisdom from the Bible: how to build a tabernacle...

“Moreover thou shalt make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet: with cherubims of cunning work shalt thou make them. The length of one curtain shall be eight and twenty cubits, and the breadth of one curtain four cubits: and every one of the curtains shall have one measure. The five curtains shall be coupled together one to another; and other five curtains shall be coupled one to another. And thou shalt make loops of blue upon the edge of the one curtain from the selvedge in the coupling; and likewise shalt thou make in the uttermost edge of another curtain, in the coupling of the second. Fifty loops shalt thou make in the one curtain, and fifty loops shalt thou make in the edge of the curtain that is in the coupling of the second; that the loops may take hold one of another. And thou shalt make fifty taches of gold, and couple the curtains together with the taches: and it shall be one tabernacle. And thou shalt make curtains of goats’ hair to be a covering upon the tabernacle: eleven curtains shalt thou make. The length of one curtain shall be thirty cubits, and the breadth of one curtain four cubits: and the eleven curtains shall be all of one measure. And thou shalt couple five curtains by themselves, and six curtains by themselves, and shalt double the sixth curtain in the forefront of the tabernacle. And thou shalt make fifty loops on the edge of the one curtain that is outmost in the coupling, and fifty loops in the edge of the curtain which coupleth the second. And thou shalt make fifty taches of brass, and put the taches into the loops, and couple the tent together, that it may be one. And the remnant that remaineth of the curtains of the tent, the half curtain that remaineth, shall hang over the backside of the tabernacle. And a cubit on the one side, and a cubit on the other side of that which remaineth in the length of the curtains of the tent, it shall hang over the sides of the tabernacle on this side and on that side, to cover it. And thou shalt make a covering for the tent of rams’ skins dyed red, and a covering above of badgers’ skins. And thou shalt make boards for the tabernacle of shittim wood standing up. Ten cubits shall be the length of a board, and a cubit and a half shall be the breadth of one board. Two tenons shall there be in one board, set in order one against another: thus shalt thou make for all the boards of the tabernacle. And thou shalt make the boards for the tabernacle, twenty boards on the south side southward”.

First words...

Listeners to Radio Five Live were asked today about their children’s first words. One of my art college lecturers told a tale which has lodged in my memory and won’t go away. He was adamant that his son’s first words were “Why precisely, papa, does the refrigerator drip?”…

Pickering...

Stayed in Pickering last night, unaware that I was gatecrashing the end of a 1940s weekend. Just about everyone was in uniform: quite disorientating. I congratulated an elderly couple for getting into the spirit of the occasion by wearing their oldest and dowdiest clothese, but they said it was what they wore every day. The 1940s look for women I can take or leave, but a long coat and a homburg hat is a great look for a man. I had a beer (not 1940s prices, alas) while the pub played Vera Lynn songs, before putting the blackout curtains up in the van and having an early night…

Licensed this pic of the old post office on Beast Bank, Kendal: the inspiration for Postman Pat...

Heaven...

I’m reading a book, A Travel Guide to Heaven, by Anthony DeStefano, which is as daft as the title suggests. It will be going back to a charity shop tomorrow. Based on biblical sources (or so the author insists) he imagines what we can expect if we pass the celestial audition and make it to heaven. “There’s bound to be a bit of speculation and imagination in any book about heaven”, Mr DeStefano admits, before turning his powers of speculation right up to eleven.

“We’ll be able to see ancient Rome again, not in ruins, but clad in all its golden splendour. We’ll be able to see the Pyramids and the Sphinx just as they were on the day they were built. We’ll be able to view the Parthenon with all its marble columns and statues intact. We’ll be able to walk through the streets of old Paris, or Renaissance Florence or the China of the Ming Dynasty. Likewise, ancient Greeks and Romans who rise from the dead on the Last Day will get to see the skyline of Manhattan. And yes, why shouldn’t it be true that in God’s heaven, the World Trade Centre will rise up again? I know this all seems incredible, but heaven is incredible”.

“Everything we know about God tells us that heaven will be literally bursting with colour. Think of the most colourful sunset you can imagine. Think of the reds, yellows, oranges, pinks and blues. Think of the thrilling effect a sunset like that can have on your spirit. Now realise that only four basic colours go into making that beautiful picture. Let me ask you a question: do you think that God only has four colours on his palette?”

“Do you think you’ve tasted some good food in your life? Well, wait until you taste the food in heaven! Not only will you be able to eat the familiar foods you had on Earth, but there will be new ones to try - with brand-new flavours and brand-new tastes”.

I only carried on reading Mr DeStefano’s book to see if there would be sex in heaven. He seems certain - though God knows how - about colours and new taste sensations, but when it comes to sex, he becomes rather coy and ducks the question entirely. He doesn’t know if there will be sexual relationships in heaven, and, for the first time in 200 pages, he refuses to speculate. Since nobody dies in heaven, there is no need to procreate. There is no marriage in heaven (Jesus said we would be “like angels”). So, in the Christian view, that makes sex irrelevant. The thought of men and women having pleasurable, consequence-free sex with multiple partners is just too much for Mr DeStefano to contemplate. He mumbles a few words about love and respect, then starts a new chapter…

Birker Fell...

Any lay-by will do when I want to get some writing done. On the Yorkshire coast now, heading to Scarborough to see an old friend tomorrow evening...

Pic licensed yesterday: a herdwick sheep on Birker Fell. I love it up there: a real sense of freedom, plus never many people about...

Beverley...

In Beverley yesterday evening (that’s the town, not a romantic assignation), after taking pix on a day of warm sunshine. I had a beer in Nellie’s, one of the great pubs of Yorkshire: a rabbit warren of rooms and snugs, all still lit by gas mantle. The customers disappeared contentedly into a shadowy chiaroscuro; it was very restful.

Back in the van I listened to an approving essay on the radio about Winston Churchill’s habit of bursting into tears, on receipt of both good news and bad. Apparently he became more moist, not less, with the passing of the years. The tears were of defiance, not defeat, and maybe the British people were grateful to be led, through the war years, by a man who was able to show his feelings.

My dad came into my bedroom, on January 24, 1965, woke me up and told me that Churchill had died. He sat on the end of my bed and wept; it was the only time I ever saw him cry.

Just licensed: Salcombe in Devon...

Imagine...

For a lot of people, but not me, John Lennon’s song, Imagine, represents a musical manifesto for the good life, the secular life. The first verse starts promisingly: imagine there’s no heaven, imagine there’s no hell. Living for today: fine. Imagine no religion: even better. If the song had stopped right there, I’d be an enthusiast too.

But it goes on: You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one, I hope some day you'll join us, and the world will be as one. Move over Gandhi, move over Martin Luther King. It’s like Lennon is imagining himself to be the first and only ‘visionary’ who has entertained an idea as novel as world peace. Asking the rest of us to “join him” is so condescending that it takes the breath away. Finally, as a man who banked millions from Beatles records, and the music he made as a solo artist, he has the gall to imagine “no possessions”. Did he “share” his money? Some of it, no doubt. But the narcissism of the lyric makes me want to throw up. Imagine no John Lennon; it’s easy if you try…

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people sharing all the world

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Pic licensed today of Long Meg and her Daughters, near Penrith...

Waking up...

What a beautiful morning to wake up in Slaithwaite. What a beautiful morning to wake up anywhere. And, at my life of life, how wonderful to wake up at all. I had a stroll along the canal, watched a grey wagtail exploring the water margins and took some photos of narrowboats and mill chimneys reflected in the canal. Saying that the leaves are turning “brown’ really doesn’t do justice to the range of colours in such an autumnal scene.

I got my breakfast - tea and a bacon sarnie - at the Carvery Courtyard, where a local butcher has created a shop within a shop. You can get beef, or pork or lamb sandwiches, freshly carved from a roast joint; they have pies and pasties too, served with gravy or without, or onions or mushy peas. You can even get a ‘Shaun the Sheep Minted Lamb Pasty’. “That’s not really Shaun, is it?”, I asked. “I didn’t catch its name”, said the butcher, grimly, as he wielded a cleaver.

I’ve done an hour’s work on the book. An hour in the morning, when the brain is refreshed by sleep, is worth two hours in the evening, when finding the right word can be frustrating. The only way the morning could be improved would be to go online and find that I’ve licensed a pic or two. Sales have been poor in recent weeks; at this rate I’ll be lucky to match last year’s total.

STOP PRESS: just licensed this pic taken from the top of Malham Cove. I've just realised that what I try to do, with a lot of my pictures, is to show people interacting with their surroundings and with each other...

 

Slaithwaite...

In Slaithwaite this evening: a place name which can be pronounced in three different ways. The beer I'm drinking is called Heathen, the obvious choice...

Apostasy...

Apostasy - leaving the religion - is punishable by death in twelve countries, all Islamic: Afghanistan, Iran, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritania, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, United Arab Emirates and Yemen (Pakistan imposes the death penalty for blasphemy - including a disbelief in God)…

Anywhere...

More by accident than design I’ve been wandering around old haunts. The long, straight, tree-lined avenue, between Harewood and Collingham, where we used to collect conkers. The village hall in Pool, where I was a cub (“dyb, dyb, dyb, dob, dob, dob”), and where I won first prize in a model-making competition by entering a boat built by my old friend Howard, while he was on holiday. I still feel (a bit) guilty about that. The cricket pitch - ‘Bedquilts’ - near Adel Church, where I spent many happy summers playing cricket for Cardigan Road Methodists Cricket Club (which, on a show of hands at one AGM, became, simply, Cardigan Road Cricket Club, once the last Methodist had hung up his boots). We used to play a few other church teams: the Moortown Baptists and the Stanningley Satanists are two whose names spring to mind. 
 
The standing stone in a field near Yeadon, which dad took me to see many, many years ago. “From here", he said, "you can get to anywhere in the world”. I was stunned: "What? Anywhere?" "Anywhere", he confirmed, gravely. The implications were staggering to a young lad whose experience extended little further than house, garden and the nearby woodland that witnessed so many games and adventures. The world seemed to open out, like the petals of a flower, as my imagination took flight. The stone is still standing, though now it’s next to the roundabout at Yeadon Airport, long since re-badged as Leeds-Bradford Airport. At those moments when life seems to throw up more problems than opportunities it's good to remember that from here you can indeed get to "anywhere in the world”.

Clovelly, in Devon...

Hand shandy...

I thought I’d finished my chapter about gender, sex and sexual identity; it’s certainly long enough. Then, this morning, I realised I’d written nothing about masturbation. I’ve rectified this omission (emission?) with a few extra paragraphs. The solitary vice is not specifically mentioned in the Bible; Onan’s ‘sin’, for which God strikes him dead, is not masturbation but ‘coitus interruptus'. Nevertheless, most religions condemned self-abuse (and still do). Martin Luther was not really out of step with his theological peers in believing that masturbation was a sin worse than rape, which shows how skewed the moral intuitions of the righteous can be whenever they think about sex.

Another uninspiring pic which sold today: St Chad's Church in Rochdale...

 

Last lap...

As I’m adding a few paragraphs, and deleting a few others, the book seems to be settling down at around 120,000 words. It’s been a marathon effort. I’ve run the 26 miles; now, having done a lap of the stadium, I’m in sight of the finishing line. But where are the cheering crowds? The stands are empty! The chapter which still needs a bit of work is the one about Islam and the Koran. I am well aware that I’m treading on dangerous ground. I alternate between the desire to let fly with both barrels (and to hell with the consequences) and being, well, a bit more diplomatic. The most important thing, perhaps, is to ensure that every sentence reflects what I really think and feel - no more, no less and no grandstanding!

Just licensed another shot of McDonalds by night. This is in Guiseley: coincidentally, I was there yesterday morning, for my breakfast...

 

Sex...

A missive came through the ether this morning: Krishnamurti on why we're so obsessed about sex. "What do we mean by the problem of sex? Is it the act, or is it a thought about the act? Surely, it is not the act. The sexual act is no problem to you any more than eating is a problem to you, but if you think about eating or anything else all day long because you have nothing else to think about, it becomes a problem to you... Why do you build it up, which you are obviously doing? The cinemas, the magazines, the stories, the way women dress, everything is building up your thought of sex. And why does the mind build it up, why does the mind think about sex at all? Why, sirs and ladies? It is your problem. Why? Why has it become a central issue in your life? When there are so many things calling, demanding your attention, you give complete attention to the thought of sex. What happens, why are your minds so occupied with it? Because that is a way of ultimate escape, is it not? It is a way of complete self- forgetfulness. For the time being, at least for the moment, you can forget yourself—and there is no other way of forgetting yourself. Everything else you do in life gives emphasis to the “me,” to the self. Your business, your religion, your gods, your leaders, your political and economic actions, your escapes, your social activities, your joining one party and rejecting another—all that is emphasizing and giving strength to the “me”... When there is only one thing in your life which is an avenue to ultimate escape, to complete forgetfulness of yourself if only for a few seconds, you cling to it because that is the only moment you are happy. So, sex becomes an extraordinary difficult and complex problem as long as you do not understand the mind which thinks about the problem"...