Povey Prattle

Connor - is one of the fabulous young people from my  St. James's Cambridge days. He was beaten up on Friday night. Connor's Mum (Tess Pope) writes this regarding what happened: "And so summer begins. At the ER with  Connor  until 5 a.m. A joke about the relative merits of one exam school over another can lead to this? 5 kids kicking Connor in the head??? What is the mind set here? How do you justify kicking another person in the head? Or being part of a group of 5 kicking 1 person in the head? The kids who did this were not lacking in privilege or opportunity, most of them growing up in West Roxbury." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Connor on the E.R. after having been beaten up ...

Cartoon from the New Yorker

There are five Povey brothers who are the sons of Henry John Povey and Evelyn Maud Finch of Bristol, U.K.. I, John Michael, am the oldest of the five (born 1944) . Then came Andrew (1950), David (1951), Stephen (1952), and Martyn (1954). (We also have four sisters). The older I get the more I realise that I love my four brothers dearly, if not equally.  I cannot imagine growing up without brothers. So it is little wonder that I was drawn to a book published in 2012 by Scribner (a division of Simon and Schuster, Inc.) The book is “Brothers  ---   George Howe Colt On His Brothers and  Brothers in History”. Lord above I loved this book and I highly recommend it. It tells a wondrous tale of George, his older brother Harry, and their younger brothers Ned and Mark, who grew up in Dedham, MA, Darien CT. and then back in Dedham. It’s a tender and honest tale of sibling brothers who in youth are rivals, allies, competitors, protectors...

I received the following e-mail today (together with a return e-mail address) "I am David williams(Special Agent FBI)working in conjunction with The Unied Nations and The   world Bank on compensation of internet scam victims around the globe,pls do contact me if you are a victim of scam Thank You. David Williams" "David Williams"  must think that I am stupid . Indeed I can be stupid.   That's not to say that I am gullible!

This morning I took myself to a local Church which was the site for voting in Sarasota's Precinct 125.  We have a run-off election for two City Commissioners. I didn't notice that there were two registration places, arranged according to the first letter of the voter's last name. The registering Clerk look at my photo' I.D. -  then, realising that I was at the wrong desk she said "Oh, you'll have to go to P". There was a split second of silence, then the whole room erupted into laughter.  The Clerk had a very red face.

In our Spring. No daffs or tulips. No lilacs. No hyacinths. But we do have a plant which for most of the year looks like some dead stalks, but which produces lovely flowers at this time.of the year,

Readers in countries other than the United States may not be familiar with one of the origins of the American celebration of Mother’s Day, (not to be confused with Mothering Sunday).   Around 1870, (soon after the end of the Civil War) Julia Ward Howe called for a Mother's Day to be celebrated each year to encourage pacifism and disarmament amongst women. It continued to be held in Boston for about ten years under her sponsorship, but died out after that.   For more about Julia Ward Howe see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_Ward_Howe Peace was at the heart of that early observance of Mother’s Day . Thus it was that in Boston “ The Mother’s Day Walk for Peace” began in 1996 for families who had lost children to violence; over the years, it has become a way for the wider community to show a commitment to peace and financially support the work of the Louis D. Brown Peace Institute. According to Boston.Com thousands of folks participated in the walk ...