It’s that time of the year when Liz and I depart for the substantially warmer climes of Lanzarote. I wrote a post a while ago called It’s C C Cold which really sums up my feelings about this time of the year. I really hate the cold. Yes, I admit I it, I hate this time of year. To be fair, this winter hasn’t been so bad in the north of England. Yes we’ve had to put up with two big storms but to be honest, they weren’t that bad, not in my part of the world anyway and apart from a few chilly days it’s not been so cold either. Even so, the cold isn’t my cup of tea.
A long time ago I relocated to a place called Newton-le-Willows. I worked in the GM Buses control room at the time and our control room was about to relocate to Atherton, a mere stone’s throw from Newton-le-Willows hence our move. I’d even been to Atherton depot and checked out the offices that were to house our new northern control room but then our bosses decided to relocate to Oldham instead. I’m not sure why but then when Atherton depot was closed down, reduced to rubble and a new housing estate was built on the spot, I pretty much understood.
Assured of the move to Atherton I went ahead and bought my new house and a short while later I was forced to drive to Oldham to report for duty at our new control room which was a heck of a journey. In the winter I left Newton which was usually raining or sleeting to find there was about 2 foot of snow in Oldham and most days of the winter I had to dig my car out of the snow before returning home.
Anyway, getting back to the present, Liz and I have jetted off to Lanzarote for a little winter warmth. I don’t mind flying, at least not the actual flying but all the other related stuff can be a bit of a pain. Going through customs and passport control for instance. I always take a bag on board the flight for my camera, iPad and laptop, all of which have to be extracted from the bag and placed in a tray in order to be X rayed. Can take you jacket off please sir? OK, jacket off. Watch off as well? No sir you can keep that on. Belt off? No you can keep that on sir. Happy days. My stuff disappears towards the X ray machine and I myself go through the electronic portal and then- Can you take your watch off please? Is there anything in your pocket? Yes, my wallet. Can you take your shoes off please? Are you wearing a belt? Take it off please. Bloody hell!
Further down the queue I’m trying to grab my laptop, put my shoes on and fasten my belt all before my trousers drop to my ankles. I can see the headlines now: Flasher arrested in passport control!
After all that the flight itself was rather enjoyable. When I left home that morning a tune was strumming around my head and it was still there as I buckled myself into my seat. I tried to hum it to Liz but she didn’t recognise it. Anyway, I glanced through the flight menu, decided what I would order later and settled down.
When we checked in online we had a bit of a panic. We had booked the flight about a year ago and we chose our seats right at the front. Since then however it looks like Jet2 have decided to use a different aircraft. It was an airbus something or other and it was one of those planes with a 2, 4, 2 set up. Two seats then an aisle, 4 seats then another aisle and the final two seats on the other side. Anyway, we had to choose our seats again and the only ones near the front of the aircraft were ones sat either side of the aisle.
Only the other day I was watching a documentary about the early days of passenger flights and the passengers boarding their aircraft were served food on proper plates and had tea in proper cups as well as wine in actual glasses. Our cheese and ham toasties were served on a piece of cardboard and the wine came with a plastic cup. So much for the advances in passenger transport.
Lanzarote may be just a big volcanic rock in the ocean but it’s a warm rock, a friendly rock and full of welcoming bars and restaurants and just the place for a winter getaway. Prices seem to have rocketed in the last few years though. Looking at my video from Lanzarote in 2021, most of the tapas at the Berrugo bar, a favourite haunt of ours were round about 4.65 to 4.85 euros. This year most of those are in the 7 or 8 Euro range and the meal we had there the other day was €8.95 and it was nice but so much smaller than it used to be.
The flip side was that it was January and we were sitting outside eating and drinking in the warm evening. That tune was still in my head and I tried it on Liz again but she still didn’t recognise it. Do you remember any words she asked? Sadly no . .
Anyway, moving on. I knew I had my 600th blog post coming up soon and this last week before getting my passport and driving licence together, sorting some euros and packing my case I tried to put together a few thoughts about what to write about. Not a lot came to mind and to be fair, I did have a lot on my mind, all those things I’ve just mentioned as well as sorting out our airport transfers and so on as well as getting a blog post ready for Saturday, the day before we left the UK. Imagine my surprise then when I realised that last week’s post, the one about romcoms was actually my big 600th blog post and I never even realised.
This week then is my 601st blog post, stretching back in a line to the 23rd of May 2014 when I created my very first post. It wasn’t anything exciting, just three paragraphs about the book I was writing and about to publish on Amazon. It was actually a pretty dreadful post and I like to think my blogs have improved a little since then. There is more to them certainly. A typical post for 2014 had 638 words, and a post in 2024 has on average 1626 words. I’ve had over 52,600 views and I’ve been shared over 12,000 times each on Facebook, Twitter and Reddit as well as other social media sites. Every post I’ve ever produced finishes with a little bit of a plug for my book Floating in Space or my poetry anthology so clearly I’m getting my message out there but as sales for either haven’t yet gone viral I’ve had to call Ferrari and tell them to put a hold on the new sportscar I ordered a while ago. I hope that when I can finally afford it, I’ll still be able to actually get in it as my back is giving me a heck of a lot of pain lately.
The plan for this holiday has been to take it easy and do a little light exercise like walking and swimming and try and slim down a little. So far I’ve managed to swim every day and when we visited Casa Carlos, another of our favourite restaurants, I found I had to move my trouser belt up to the next notch which must be a good sign.
Another plan was to make a big effort at writing and while I have done a little of that, the lure of the pool, the sunbed and a good book has so far been a little too much.
Yesterday I still had that tune in my head and I finally began to recognise a little more of it. The singer was Neil Diamond and yes, I finally recognised the tune.
“What is it?” asked Liz.
“Yes I’ve finally got it, it’s The Reverend Blue Jeans!”
“What?”
“You must have heard it. Neil Diamond, The Reverend Blue Jeans?”
“You total divvy! It’s called Forever in Blue Jeans!”
“Forever in Blue Jeans? Really?”
Oh well, I might save that for a misheard lyrics post. Watch this space!
Back here in Manchester it was nice to have a few days to myself after Christmas and New Year. One thing I tend to eat a lot of when I’m alone is sandwiches. Yes, I’ve always loved the humble sandwich. As a child I took sandwiches to school, either ham, cheese or corned beef, almost always on white bread. Occasionally I’d have a salmon or salmon paste sandwich but generally salmon or any kind of fish just isn’t my cup of tea.
Tell us about your new book.
Yes, It’s that time again. As I write this there are only a couple of days left before the big event, Christmas day.
I had a huge amount of recorded music of course. By the mid-seventies my record collection was already pretty big and I was buying vinyl records, usually 45 rpm singles, every week. My tape recorder had a built-in radio so I could record my favourite tracks straight onto tape for free and I spent a lot of time taping the new top twenty which came out every Tuesday. The other thing I could do with my tape recorder was record myself with a microphone.
Friday was another cold and wet day here in the north west of England. We had planned to dine out at a nearby Italian restaurant and then walk over to the Pier Inn for a few beers and listen to the music. I wasn’t feeling at my best even though Liz and I knew our friend Ray would be performing and we do like his music. There was a 30% off deal at Allegria, the Italian restaurant in question but the catch was this: to get the 30% off, diners have to book a table 24 hours in advance. We hadn’t booked and that meant paying the full price. There was only one thing for it, I had to call for help. I quickly dialled the Northern Association of Tightwads and I was soon through to an advisor.
It’s been a little chilly this week although here in the north west we had one rather sunny day in which I was able to give the lawn and the privets a final trim before the winter.
Perhaps that’s a consequence of nearing the latter stages of my journey through life. Recently when we were travelling through France motoring along through the endless country lanes of the Loire valley, it seems as if I only became aware of the speed when I reached a new village or hamlet and had to slow down. Perhaps that’s the way it is with time too, that you only notice the passing of time with some new event, something that brings time into perspective.
I started off with a post called 
One of the places I visited this year was Compiègne in France where the armistice was signed which ended the First World War. Hitler came here in 1940 when Nazi Germany defeated France and forced the French to sign the surrender in the same railway car where the Germans had surrendered in 1918. I shot a short video at the site and wrote a post titled 
I’ve always wanted to be a writer. It’s a desire that I suppose came from reading a lot of books. Someone had an idea, wrote a book and I read the book and in doing so the author transmitted his thoughts and ideas to me through the book. It’s only natural, at least it seems so to me, to want to do the same, to not just receive the thoughts of someone else but to transmit my thoughts and ideas, in the form of a book, to others.
Right, I thought, that’s it. I’m finally published. Now I can just sit back and wait for people to buy it. The thing is, who would know about my book? How would readers even realise that a new novel was available? Yes, that’s the thing. Writing a book isn’t enough, nor is actually publishing it. This is where marketing comes in. To sell your book you need to advertise. You need to use all your social media channels to tell everyone and his dog, here is a new book, come and buy it. You need to start an author page at Amazon and one at Goodreads too. Then you need an author website which is where this page comes in. How can you keep people coming in to read your blogs? Well, you need more social media and more blogs and for more blogs you need more and more ideas. How can you make your social media posts more interesting? Well you might want to add some graphics. Then you might want to add some animated graphics and even video so now you might find not only have you written a novel, you’ve written over 500 blog posts and graphics and made over a hundred videos, all to bring in more blog readers who may, or may not, buy your book.
Letters from an Unknown Author! 