This morning an email from the UK. It was the greatest compliment I have ever received my whole life, I think. It is from a man who does not give compliments out easily and so when he does – it is SO meaningful.
He: Your ability to string words together is truly impressive. Building a whole world form 26 bricks.
Me: Damn YOU have a way with words! That first paragraph is stunningđI am so proud of you going back to school. What is the name of your Uniđjust found these emojisđi am now armed and dangerousđ
We have had a three and a half year ârelationshipâ that can best be described as tortuous.
Yes, indeed, that is the word. Definition: Full of twists and turns: But, in a very strange way, he always comes through, not in the way I wanted at first and it was so painful. But now I am content – both with him and myself. The synonyms of the word are: twisting, winding, curving, curvy, bending, sinuous, undulating, coiling, looping, meandering, serpentine, snaking, snaky, zigzag, convoluted, spiralling, twisty, circuitous, rambling, wandering, indirect, deviating, devious, labyrinthine, mazy; rare anfractuous, flexuous. ANTONYMS straight.
The relationship has been most serpentine, mazing, zigzagging, convoluted, and bloody labyrinthine. The poor guy has put up with so much from me – he has the patience of Job. Now what does that mean? âTo have an immense and unyielding degree of patience and conviction, especially in the face of problems or difficulty. A reference to the biblical figure Job, whose absolute faith in God remained unshaken despite the numerous afflictions set upon himself, his family, and his estate by Satan.â We are not a couple but a very unlikely twosome. Most unlikely!
But back to other things from the United Kingdom. So as many may know I am going back to the UK for a visit, this week actually. After I left London in March of 2017 I altogether stopped following the political scene. I was not going back to live there and I had a lot to catch up on in Canada – having not lived there in fifty years. Then the move back to San Francisco and the USA – well a great deal going on here in the political arena (to say the least). But anticipating a return to the UK I started reading about the UK. My source was an article in the New Yorker, my fact checked source of knowledge . My God What a Mess. Here are the facts, gleaned from the article written by Amy Davidson Sorkin.
âIn other words, Brexit long ago entered a realm in which subsidiary obligationsâto obtaining the consent of the constituent parts of the country, to their union, to changing circumstances, to international obligations, to good senseâhave fallen away. The Irish border is the most obvious example. Brexit represents an extreme and controversial change in the status quo in Northern Ireland. The peace brought about by the Good Friday agreement relied on the effective invisibility of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. Brexit threatened either to reimpose it or turn it into a beacon for smugglers moving goods between the E.U. and the U.K.âto sabotage peace, the all-island economy, the integrity of the single market, the Republicâs standing in the E.U., or all four. In the referendum, a majority in Northern Ireland voted against Brexit. The referendum represented a trashing both of the Good Friday agreementâs consent principle and, potentially, of all its good works. And yet it proceeded; it did so, once again, with the D.U.P.âs support and with remarkably little attention from just about everybody else to the concerns of the Irish on both sides of the border. That failure is what defines Brexit.â
And âmyâ country Scotland is more than a little upset and good old Boris is not helping things with his ridiculous remarks. Boris almost makes Trump look charming and erudite. .
âAmong the angriest voices in Parliament on Saturday were Scottish. Scotland, like Northern Ireland, had voted against Brexit in 2016. Joanna Cherry, a Scottish National Party M.P., asked Johnson âin what way it strengthens the union of the United Kingdom for Scotland alone to have foisted upon it a Brexit it didnât vote for.â Johnson replied that she was suffering from a âcomplete conceptual confusion,â which didnât go over well. âNorthern Ireland, thirty; Scotland, zero!â
I consider Scotland my country as I am 100% Scottish (with some Canadian thrown in). This is a distressing scene, beyond belief. But I do have to say that my.UK friends seem to be going about their lives (as usual) and do not seem to be horribly effected by this garbage. I shall see when I get there – which is soon.
I do admit to retaining a morbid curiosity in the money laundering practices in my country of origin, Canada. This curiosity is satisfied by CPI who Kindly sent a recent article about the bungling of one of the first times criminal charges were brought against someone (anyone actually). What is morbid curiosity? Morbid curiosity is a curiosity which is so compelling that the curious person is driven to satisfy it, even though he or she knows or strongly suspects that they probably won’t like what they find, or otherwise find something which is irrelevant or unsatisfying.
Now that is so true of me and money laundering. I sure do not like what I find, it is largely irrelevant to my life and most unsatisfying but Canada does not know what the hell it is doing. Those Canadians bungle beyond belief. I copy from that article sent by CPI. .
âMonths after charges were stayed in Canadaâs largest money-laundering case, neither the RCMP nor the Public Prosecution Service of Canada have provided any public explanation of what went wrong.
But a Postmedia investigation has uncovered details of how the massive prosecution of Silver International and its owners Caixuan Qin and Jian Jun Zhu was derailed.
The RCMP has completed its internal review of the troubled investigation into the alleged illicit washing of more than $220 million a year through Silverâs Richmond office.
Sources say the review concluded that RCMP investigative standards werenât always met, that there were leadership problems resulting in breakdowns of supervision over investigative teams, and that in some instances, proper documentation wasnât kept.
But the biggest complication in the case was the inadvertent disclosure of unredacted files to Silverâs defence team and concerns that some of the information could identify confidential informants.
Most of the problems stemmed from a lack of experience on a criminal case of that magnitude, the sources said. In the end, it was senior federal Crown prosecutors who made the decision to pull the plug.
Bumbling idiots is the only way to describe this situation. I remember the motto of the RCMP from my early days of being a Canadian.
They: The RCMP! They always get their man.
Me: Excuse ME! That is untrue. They seem to NEVEr get their man. Whereas, Alexis McBride seems always to get her man (men)
On that high note I shall conclude/ Attached os something else from the UK. One of Davidâs jewels.
